DIRECTED BY Roger Donaldson
STARRING Al Pacino, Colin Farrell, Bridget Moynahan
Opens March 28, Cert 12A, 114 mins
When Colin Farrell signs up as a trainee CIA operative in Roger Donaldson's slick spy caper, he has more to deal with than weapons instruction, role-play exercises and psychological evaluation. He also has to cope with shameless grandstanding from Al Pacino giving another of those shouty, screen-hogging, over-the-top performances that have now become his trademark.
Enduringly popular epic, directed with vigorous panache by Richard Fleischer. Kirk Douglas and Tony Curtis are terrific as the feuding half-brothers, sons of hugely-bearded Viking warlord Ernest Borgnine, and there's an admirable amount of rowdy quaffing, hearty pillaging and general mayhem.
The sequel to Robert Rodriguez's maniacally good Spy Kids, with budding-Bonds Alexa Vega and Daryl Sabara up against a rival team of adolescent agents and the monsters of mad scientist Steve Buscemi's fantasy island. Suggesting a Ray Harryhausen movie invaded by the screwball surrealism of a Looney Tunes cartoon, it ups the first film's formula of candy-coloured cool stuff for kids and in-jokes for grown-ups. Quite fantastic.
Tim Robbins is Jacob, a Vietnam Vet trying to adjust to civilian life in New York but suffering from horrific, nightmarish visions. The after-effects of a military drug experiment, or something more sinister and supernatural? Even if Adrian Lyne's film makes a lot of confused choices, it's still an interesting—and genuinely scary—ride.