Keep Discovering

The Europa Report is more about human goodness and courage than your average science fiction movie. Led by Captain William Xu (Daniel Wu), the Europa mission sets out to Europa – one of Jupiter's moons – with the mission of possibly discovering extraterrestrial life. Remoteness and the sheer inherent level of risk expose the team to fatal dangers. However, what shines through is the determination of the team to complete the mission – to communicate back to Earth that we are not alone in the universe. A must-watch on the lines of Moon and Gravity, The Europa Report demands some degree of initial patience but quickly grows on the viewer

15/20

Alone

Tough and alone, Riddick kills without compunction, finds his way around a predator-infested planet, tames a jackal as ally, lives off the land. And yes, sees off two mercenary hordes, with some lessons and reminiscing along the way. Somewhat simulation-like, Riddick is copybook one-man-army in an alien planet – good entertainment in sepia tinted hues

13/20

Fallen Demigod

The resoundingly insipid The Legend of Hercules takes the eponymous character and makes a totally blotched job on possibly all conceivable fronts. Poor cinematography, a total absence of character build-up, near-invisible visuals, a musical score that was turn-on turn-off and incongruous with the story in the background, the inexplicable hurried execution that makes the movie look more like a collection of trailers – where does one even start? The only saving grace is that with a few minor exceptions, each of the actors looked their part. If you are generally a period movie buff, I suppose this is a must-watch, simply because there is so little of the stuff going around. For anyone else, this is an unequivocal miss

9.5/20

He Wolf

For me, The Wolf of Wall Street operated at several different levels. At one level is the unavoidable allusions – the Mayflower (twice!), the crazy partying,choices related to marquee employers/small employers/entrepreneurship, the kid that’s oh so close in spite of all that is going on in life, the back pain pills – what can one say save what an outcome in spite of it all?! At another level is the debauchery, the over-the-top movie, the living-on-the-edge recklessness combined with high performance, the coke high to get over the lemmon high, perception versus reality across it all. Jordan Belfort (Leonardo DiCaprio) and Martin Scorcese come together to produce a one-of-a-kind movie that is profane, intense, irretrievably materialistic and out-and-out a one of a kind movie. Absolutely unmissable, whether you belong to the 99% or the 1%

16/20

Bengali Movie v 2.0

I went in to watch Chander Pahar expecting incongruity – the barely-peripatetic Bengali out in the open wilderness in Africa, on a treasure hunt that is not his own. The first half of the movie kind of corroborated this impression. And then came the second half. Some spiffy acting, stunning or near-stunning vistas, and the Bengali explorer Shankar (Dev) standing shoulder to shoulder with the Portuguese explorer Diego Alvarez (Gerard Rudolf). While the special effects leave a lot to be desired, the movie itself is stunning – weaving its way through the part-fiction part-reality almost-mythical lands of Africa

15.5/20