Review: In The Loop

Set in a parallel universe to The Thick Of It, where the sweary Scots play the same characters but the rest of the regulars get name changes to suit the story of the impending war and MP Simon Foster's trip to America.

To be honest I could've done without the whole going to America business, the material suits shorter bursts and begins to drag over 1 hour 40 mins. Despite enjoying what I saw I always had the nagging feeling I'd rather have a half hour Thick Of It episode based around Ollie/Toby/Chris Addison's love life and constituency meetings in Northampton - both minor stories in the film but the kind of story that made the TV series great in my view.

In the Loop is still worth a watch though, if only for Steve Coogan's cameo - arguably the best thing he's done in ages and the highlight of the movie.

Review: Frequently Asked Questions About Time Travel

Frequently Asked Questions About Time Travel deals with 3 blokes (made up of 66% Nerd) whose night at the pub takes a turn for the strange with some Time Travel-based shenanigans. The film, whilst having a clever script that doesn't tie itself in knots with all its twists - lacks the laughs it needs to make up for the total lack of excitement in their absence.

FAQ is better than the recent Red Dwarf specials that dealt with parallel universes, but only because you don't get that crushing sense of disappointment you got watching them, having to live up to the quality of what had gone before.

WWE Survivor Series 2009

This didn't have the usual Big 4 feel of the Survivor Series, mainly because Raw seems to spend more time plugging guest hosts than actual matches coming up. This makes this year traditional Thanksgiving event even more surprising as they dropped all that for a series of matches that were all pretty good and actually gave some of the younger stars a chance to shine.

Team Miz vs Team Morrison

The opening match looked a little one-sided on paper and that's how it played out here. Only Morrison needed protecting on his team as the rest of his team-mates have spent most of the year jobbing to the rest of the roster. What stood out to me was just how far Ziggler's star has fallen in recent months when he found himself pinned by Evan Bourne, which I supposed made a change from John Morrison for Dolph. Morrison was quickly left as the sole survivor against McIntyre (who looks like Jason Mewes if he choose steroids not heroin), Miz and Sheamus - after a brief flurry of offence he was taken out by the trio. This was a simple match that achieved what it set out to do putting over the 3 survivors strongly, giving them all the eliminations for the team and a bit of mic time at the end.

Batista vs Rey Mysterio

Washington DC probably wasn't the best place to cement the Big Dave heel turn as the hometown hero was cheered wildly as he beat Rey to a pulp for 6 minutes. Mind you after the awful mimicking of Eddie Guerrero whilst on the top rope I'm in half a mind to suggest Mysterio deserved what he got. The match was ended via ref stoppage after several powerbombs - something I'd like to see continued to help the Batista heel turn with him going a run of destruction - and would be better bet at adding drama to a big match than his recent attempts to bust out the ankle lock

Team Kingston vs Team Orton

In recent weeks, WWE stumbled upon something with Kofi Kingston, who originally looked like cannon fodder to build up Orton, surprised everyone with the strength of the crowd reaction to his fightbacks. Going into this match there was a lingering feeling that they might just fuck this up and have him job to Orton, killing all the momentum he'd built up. Thankfully, this wasn't the case after a slowish start with the highlights Striker's usual Morrissey references (but the November Spawned a Monster one was awful!) this match really got into gear when it came down to Kingston & Christian against Orton & Punk. The brief exchanges we got between Christian and Orton were great and when Christian hot the Killswitch on Orton the crowd went wild, thinking after unbelievably the Canadian had took out both members of Legacy he just might complete the set next - that didn't happen as an RKO quickly followed, but left me wanting a Christian/Orton feud somewhere down the line.

Once it was down to 2 on 1, Orton hopped off the apron and prowled the ringside area whilst Kofi took on Punk for about 5 minutes - Orton was great here as he managed to combine the look of being a predator waiting for his moment with suggesting a hint of fear of going one on one with Kofi. After Kingston rolled up Punk for the 3 count Orton seized his moment only to be caught by Kingston with his spin kick to pick up the win in a finish that perfectly took the feud a step further - it was great stuff and the match of the night for me.

Undertaker vs Big Show vs Chris Jericho

I really wanted Big Show to win this as the thought of him having to defend the belt in a TLC match was too good to be true. Sadly this wasn't the case as Undertaker won with his annoying submission move where he pins himself but no one ever seems to notice, but the match was as good as it was going to get with 2 of its competitors even more knackered than usual - but its annoying how they've thrown away Jericho/Undertaker in what could've been a great match to save for Wrestlemania.

Team Mickie vs Team McCool

This match exceeded expectations - in the sense that instead of 5 minutes it got 10, but those extra minutes were baffling stuff. The world's most dangerous anorexic Michelle McCool, the one who we are supposed to boo, spent the majority of the time bravely fighting against Mickie James and Melina whilst Michael Cole continually pointed out she was a future Hall of Fame wrestler and the only Divas and Women's Champion. Then on top of that she loses to Melina, who is on a different brand. On a night where most of the booking decisions were right, this stood out like a sore thumb.

Cena vs HHH vs Shawn Michaels

In a perverse way, the awful build up to this match involving all the Hornswoggle business made this match better, as because they has seemingly forgotten there was a title at stake in the build up - so you never really had a clue who was going to win, making it quite the exciting spectacle.

Aside from Shawn superkicking Hunter at the start, and a spinebuster through the table in revenge, they never really did any DX fighting parts during the match, suggesting that may be on the back-burner till Wrestlemania perhaps. Cena retained pinning Triple H, a sound move as it keeps Michaels strong going into the next PPV where they may need him to step into Jeff Hardy's shoes to do a big jump off a ladder when required.

Review: Slacker Uprising

Lacking the usual narrative structure that holds together your typical Michael Moore documentary, Slacker Uprising pretty much boils down to 90 minutes of highlights from Moore's tour of university campuses in the build up to the 2004 US election.

Basically Bush-bashing from stage to stage over an hour and a half, there's no payoff to watching the movie - it feels like a missed opportunity, as someone else could've made a really interesting documentary about Moore himself and the mission he was on, instead the frankly boring one we actually got.

Review: Bronson

The bastard son of A Clockwork Orange and Chopper is made up of stylised and abstract images punctuated with bursts of theatrical violence with a surreal 80s synth-pop soundtrack on top.

Tom Hardy's performance is excellent and makes sure the film is always watchable, but whilst the idea of Bronson performing his story is interesting at first, it doesn't have enough substance to it for the concept to carry the film as a whole.

Review: W.

The latest Presidential biopic from Oliver Stone wisely isn't the slapstick kicking of Dubya it threatened to be - just watch Will Ferrell's off Broadway show to see how rubbish that would be. Disappointingly though, the film stops short of being the harder and darker expose into the influence Cheney and Rove had over Bush, with the brief moments the issue is explored being the most interesting bits of the film by far.

Key moments off his presidency are missed out (9/11, Katrina) and it doesn't tell you anything you didn't know before - apart from the brief moment when Prince William was apparently Prime Minister of Britain that I must've missed.

Review: The Men Who Stare At Goats

Clooney is on quite the roll with turns in this, The Fantastic Mr Fox and the much anticipated Up In The Air all coming in quick succession. Sadly this film is more about Ewan McGregor as journalist Bob Wilton than Clooney and Jeff Bridges whose part in the rise of New Age Army in the post-Vietnam military, told in flashbacks in by far the funniest part of the movie.

A wasted Kevin Spacey briefly turns up as the villain of the piece without much to do and the film petters out to an anti-climatic finish that leaves you wondering why they bothered to change the source material if they aren't going to end it properly.

The film is entertaining enough and at 84 minuted doesn't outstay its welcome, but if you want to watch Clooney and Bridges do screwball comedy, go watch a Coen Brothers film

Review: Sunshine

After the first hour this was on course to become arguably the greatest Sci-Fi movie of all time, such is the masterful level of suspense that builds and builds throughout.

Then out of nowhere the film takes a huge nosedive for its last half hour that is more AVP than Alien complete with a monster that appears out of nowhere and an ending that seems extra confusing for no apparent reason.

Review: Bedtime Stories

This family film, the type that was so successfully lampooned by Sandler himself in Funny People is actually the polar opposite of the moral it tries to portray - being really dull, unimaginative and just out to make a quick buck - there can be no other reason for the guinea pig with goggly eyes appearing other than cynical need to sell some toys to kids.

Don't be fooled by the trailer, which suggests a film full of fun flashbacks set in a range of fantasy set pieces - viewers will be left disappointed as these only make up a brief part of the film - centre stage is instead given to the dull story of who gets to run an even duller hotel.

Why anyone is supposed to like Sandler is beyond me, as our hero spends pretty much the entire movie manipulating a couple of kids for his own personal gain with his nemeses guilty of such crimes as stopping people stealing from mini bars and not wanting to give their kids sugar - send them to the stocks!

Review: Fantastic Mr Fox

As a Wes Anderson film its good. As a film a children's book its rubbish.

The marketing of it as a children's film is going to result in a lot of disappointed kids alongside parents who will probably be a peeved with the amount of cussing (literally) and cider being pushed as 'liquid gold' at various points during the film.

For adults however, there is plenty of the usual surreal humour you've come to expect from Anderson with frequently funny, yet completely bizarre moments throughout the film - including Jarvis Cocker popping up for a banjo interlude and a South African pilot that is probably the funniest moment in the film for its sheer randomness.

Review: Inkheart

Following the likes of Stardust into the post-Potter world of family fantasy films, Inkheart lacked the marketing push and Take That soundtrack to push it into the mainstream so hopefully it will find the audience it deserves on DVD.

The choice of Brendan Fraser in the lead seems odd, but he holds his own with a cast that features some of the finest British actors around at the moment and the end result will keep young and old happy.