Tully (2018)
Genre: Comedy drama
Directors: Jason Reitman
Starring: Charlize Theron, Mackenzie Davis, Mark Duplass, Ron Livingstone, Emily Haine
Duration: 96 minutes
Class: 15
KRS Releasing Ltd

Charlize Theron plays a mother of three in the new comedy drama written by Academy Award winner Diablo Cody (Juno).

The film follows how Marlo (Theron) is gifted a night nanny by her brother. Hesitant to the extravagance at first, Marlo beings to form a speical bond with the thoughtful and sometimes challenging young nanny named Tully (Mackenzie Davis).

Directed by Jason Reitman, who had worked with Cody on Juno, the film has received positive reviews, with critics particularly praising Cody and main protagonist Theron.

Joshua Rothkopf of Time Out described the film as “a major movie about motherhood in which Cody’s signature sarcasm has deepened into anxiety, exhaustion and wisdom – she’s truly becoming a voice for the ages.”

Owen Gleiberman of Variety was impresed with Theron’s performance. He described her role as “fearless, emotionally raw and physically intense, rippled with embattled waves of exhaustion and anger.”

And Dan Jolin of Empire magazine commented: “Sharply observed but tenderly realised, Tully brings back the Reitman we knew and loved, represents Cody's finest work since Juno and reminds us why Theron deserved that 2004 Oscar.”

The film, which premiered at the Sundance Film Festival in January, will open internationally, including Malta, on Friday.

Ratings
IMDB: 6.7/10
Rotten Tomatoes: 92%
Empire: 4 stars

Lily James plays an inquisitive young writer in The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society.

The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society (2018)
Genre: Drama
Directors: Mike Newell
Starring: Lily James, Matthew Goode, Michiel Huisman, Jessica Brown Findlay, Katherine Parkinson, Glen Powell
Duration: 124 minutes
Class: 12A
KRS Releasing Ltd

British film-maker Mike Newell (Four Weddings and a Funeral, Harry Potter  and the Goblet of Fire, Donnie Brasco) has adapted the 2008 historical novel by Mary Ann Schaffer and Annie Barrows, set in post-World War II England.

The story revolves around London-based writer Juliet Ashton (Lily James) who begins exchanging letters with residents on the island of Guernsey which was occupied by the Germans during the war. Feeling compelled to visit the island, she starts to get a clear picture of what it was like during the occupation.

The film received mixed and average reviews.

Harry Windsor of The Hollywood Reporter wrote: “Buoyed by a reliably appealing star turn from James, this handsome tearjerker mostly sidesteps the tweeness of its title to become, somehow, both an old-fashioned romance and a detective story trumpeting gender equality.”

Guy Lodge of Variety said: “Undemanding yet never quite effortless, agreeable yet never quite engrossing, The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society has fewer stumbling points than its loopy title, but that title sticks for longer than the rest of it.”

Olly Richards of Empire magazine was of a similar opinion.He described the film as a “well- told, beautifully-acted drama that offers nothing new but a comforting level of familiarity and cosiness.”

Ratings
IMDB: 6.9
Rotten Tomatoes: 77%
Empire: 3 stars

Maggie Grace and Toby Kebbell play siblings in arms in The Hurricane Heist.

The Hurricane heist (2018)
Genre: Action thriller
Director: Rob Cohen
Starring: Toby Kebbel, Maggie Grace, Ryan Kwanten
Duration: 103 minutes
Class: 12A
KRS Releasing Ltd

The heist film, directed by Rob Cohen (Dragonheart, The Fast and the Furious) follows a band of thieves who plan to use a Category 5 hurricane to cover the tracks of a bank robbery in the rural town of New Hope, Alabama.

Unlucky for them, Agent Casey Corbyn (Maggie Grace) is on their case, teaming up with brothers Willie (Toby Kebbell), a meteorologist, and Breeze (Ryan Kwanten), a hard-drinking ex-Marine, to take them down.

The movie did not go down very well with critics.

Michael Ordona of Common Sense Media wrote: “This is pretty much what you expect when you pay to see a movie with this title: a few fun action sequences, a lot of genre clichés, CGI disaster effects, and unemotional violence.”

Peter Bradshaw of The Guardian called it “a daft but enjoyable thriller” while Andrew Barker of Variety said: “A candidate for the best-worst movie of 2018, The Hurricane Heist is a perfect storm of inanity and ineptitude.”

Such reviews must have affected the film’s success at the box office since the $35 million production has grossed a mere $6 million since its release in the US on March 9.

Ratings
IMDB: 4.9/10
Rotten Tomatoes: 46%
Empire: 3 stars