Worth Watching:

• The Butcher Boy (1917), Roscoe Arbuckle – Short film starring Roscoe ‘Fatty’ Arbuckle, Buster Keaton in his first screen appearance and Luke, the original superstar screen dog. Arbuckle is the greatest physical comedian ever, and that includes his co-star here, who would go on to greater esteem (and who is my favourite screen comedian). This is fantastic as all the jokes are perfectly structured, a great rapport between the stars is immediately apparent and there’s lots of action, culminating in a great food fight.

• I Am Bruce Lee (2011), Pete McCormack – The film perfectly captures Lee’s transformative brilliance and persona. The film uses Lee as a starting point to examine all the beautiful things in life. His wife, a wonderful brave woman, leads a selection of interviewees who imbue much intelligence and thought. Explores Lee’s influence over dance, MMA and many other things. A great documentary.

• The Avengers (2012), Joss Whedon – Whedon has done a wonderful job of balancing the numerous characters. Also of imbuing humour into proceedings fantastically, without it coming off as extremely lame. The film is overlong, and the characters who have not had stand alone films suffer in comparison to Iron Man et al. But whilst not perfect, this is wonderful big budget fun.

• Sherlock Season 1 (2010 – Pilot 2009), Steven Moffat & Mark Gatiss – Fucking amazing television series, featuring three 90 minute episodes. Driven by an innovative, cracking visual style and brilliant editing, this is like no TV show you have ever looked at. Benedict Cumberbatch is dynamite as an exxcentric and hilarious Sherlock and the interplay between him and Martin Freeman’s Watson is great. The third ep, featuring Andrew Scott as a chillingly effective Moriarty, is as searingly a creative piece of telly filmmaking as I have ever seen.
  

Not Worth Watching:

• Real Steel (2011), Shawn Levy – A Saturday arvo vibe to the whole thing, but you know, with robots. Hugh Jackman’s character starts off an utter prick – he tries to sell custody of his child for 50K – and doesn’t improve a whole lot. Boxing robots could have led to fun, well made mindless fluff. But this fluff is so mindless it is a painful experience, with montage taking up much of what should be the crux of the story and some inexplicable robot/boy dancing. Awful.

• The Thing (2011), Matthijs van Heijningen Jr. – I’m not familiar with the original, but it’s safe to say it’s much better than this. Bland, to the point that your attention to wander, with the only aspect holding interest the awesome Antarctic scenery. Butt there is not much of it. Really tame for a horror film, not enough happens unless you count bad CGI and moving arbitrarily from death to death of characters you don’t give a shit about. Pretty lacklustre and mindless overall.

• Salmon Fishing in the Yemen (2011), Lasse Hallstrom – I deeply disliked basically everything about this. The characterisation is intensely ham fisted – we get that Ewan McGregor is a nerdy, stuffy suit. The film starts with an annoying voiceover and even more annoying attempt at hip visual style. After that though, it just because tepid, average beyond measure with an inexplicably unbelievable romance at the centre. Only one minor character, that of Kirsten Scott Thomas, feels grounded in any sort of reality.

If you only have time to watch one I Am Bruce Lee

Avoid at all costs Salmon Fishing in the Yemen