Money Monster (2016)
Genre: Crime/Drama/Thriller
Certification: 15
Duration: 128 minutes
Directed by: Jodie Foster
Starring: George Clooney, Julia Roberts, Caitriona Balfe
KRS Releasing Ltd

George Clooney plays financial guru Lee Gates in Money Monster.

Money Monster is a 2016 American thriller film directed by Jodie Foster. The film stars George Clooney (who is also co-producer) as Lee Gates, a TV personality who advises his audience on commerce and Wall Street.

The film also stars Julia Roberts, Dominic West, Giancarlo Esposito and Caitriona Balfe.

Cable financial guru Lee Gates is in the midst of airing the latest edition of his show, Money Monster. Less than 24 hours earlier, IBIS Global Capital’s stock inexplicably cratered due to a glitch in a trading algorithm, costing investors $800 million.

Midway through the show, a deliveryman ambles on to the set, pulls a gun and takes Gates hostage, forcing him to put on a vest laden with explosives.

The ‘deliveryman’ is Kyle Budwell (Jack O’Connell), who invested $60,000 in IBIS after Lee endorsed the company a month earlier on the show. Kyle now wants answers. Once police are notified, they discover that the receiver to the bomb’s vest is located over Lee’s kidney. The only way to destroy the receiver –and with it, Kyle’s leverage – is to shoot Lee and hope he survives.

With the help of long-time director Patty Fenn (Julia Roberts), Lee tries to calm Kyle down.

Unfolding in real time, Gates and Fenn must find a way to keep themselves alive while simultaneously uncovering the truth behind a tangle of big money lies.

Despite not getting particularly glowing reviews, Money Monster did receive credit where credit was due.

Anthony Oliver Scott from the New York Times states: “You will not necessarily learn anything here about how TV or high finance really works, but you will be invited to enjoy the skilled and charismatic company of Julia Roberts and George Clooney.”

On the other hand, Eric Eisenberg from Cinemablend claims “you do beg for Money Monster to be just a bit more than entertainment, but it is, at the very least, that.”

All in all, Money Monster blends topical economic outrage with a hostage situation and will surely serve as a good time out.

Ratings
IMDB: 6.7/10
Rotten Tomatoes: 54%
Empire Magazine: 4 stars

Everybody Wants Some!! (2016)
Genre: Comedy
Certification: 15
Duration: 147 minutes
Directed by: Richard Linklater
Starring: Blake Jenner, Tyler Hoechlin, Ryan Guzman
KRS Releasing Ltd

Blake Jenner, Ryan Guzman and Temple Baker in Everybody Wants Some!!

There are only two rules for the college baseball players in Richard Linklater’s sequel to the 1993 film Dazed And Confused, Everybody Wants Some!! The first: no alcohol in their houses and the second: no girls in the upstairs bedrooms. Of course, it doesn’t take long for both to be broken.

In Texas in the fall of 1980, college freshman Jake (Blake Jenner) moves into a new house he will be sharing with other members of the fictional Southeast Texas Cherokees college baseball team, and meets several of his new teammates, including his roommate Billy (Will Brittain)

Before he can even unpack, three of the returning players take him and another freshman out drinking.

His introduction to his team and housemates serves as ours and it’s handled perfectly – no one fades into the ensemble. Finn (Glen Powell) is a charismatic ladies’ man, Willoughby (Wyatt Russell) is a laid-back stoner, Brumley (Tanner Kalina) is an enthusiastic but slightly dim freshman.

Everybody Wants Some!! received a limited release across 19 locations in New York and Los Angeles but received critical acclaim. Rotten Tomatoes deemed the film “Nostalgic in the best sense, Everybody Wants Some!! finds Richard Linklater ambling through the past with a talented cast, a sweetly meandering story, and a killer classic rock soundtrack”.

Adding to this, Peter Bradshaw from The Guardian states that although “nothing much happens”, “that’s the point in this beautifully observed exploration of what it’s like to be young and male”.

Ratings
IMDB: 7.8/10
Rotten Tomatoes: 88%
Empire Magazine: 4 stars

Whiskey Tango Foxtrot (2016)
Genre: Comedy/ War
Certification: N/A
Duration: 112 minutes
Directed by: Glenn Ficarra, John Requa
Starring: Margot Robbie, Tina Fey, Martin Freeman
KRS Releasing Ltd

Tina Fey plays Kim Baker in Whiskey Tango Foxtrot.

Whiskey Tango Foxtrot is based on the memoir The Taliban Shuffle: Strange Days in Afghanistan and Pakistan by Kim Barker.

Dissatisfied with the state of her career covering low-profile stories, television journalist Kim Baker (Tina Fey) agrees, to the disappointment of her boyfriend Chris (Josh Charles), to take a short assignment as a war correspondent in Afghanistan during Operation Enduring Freedom.

Assigned low-budget living quarters with other international journalists, she begins friendships with noted Australian correspondent Tanya Vanderpoel (Margot Robbie) and openly lecherous Scottish freelance photographer Iain MacKelpie (Martin Freeman).

Despite the danger, Kim stays in Afghanistan for months, then years beyond her original assignment.

Whiskey Tango Foxtrot grossed $7.6 million in its opening weekend, finishing below expectations and fourth at the box office.

Critics, however, were not so impressed.

Justin Chang from Variety claims that “this haphazard fish-out-of-water dramedy tries to show how the rush of war can become its own weird escape from reality, but never really hits the surreal, satirical groove it’s aiming for,” while David Edelstein from the Vulture necessitates that “odds are the movie will bomb for having no distinct point of view. It’s not so much bad as dismayingly bland”.

Ratings
IMDB: 6.9/10
Rotten Tomatoes: 67%
Empire Magazine: 3 stars