Cloud Atlas
Tom Hanks, Halle Berry, Jim Broadbent - Dir: Andy Wachowski, Lena Wachowski, Tom Twyker

How far the Wachowskis seem to have fallen since they conquered the world with The Matrix. Speed Racer, colourful though it was, tanked, and this hugely ambitious film was a disaster at the box office, doomed by a promotional campaign which simply couldn't make any sense of the contents. You expect a train wreck – and then you watch it...
And it's kinda brilliant. Confusing, long, intermittently difficult to follow, but undeniably kinda brilliant.
The film (from David Mitchell's 'unfilmable” novel) tells six separate stories in six separate time frames spanning several centuries, each of them connected in theme and character, and connected by having the same actors appear in different roles. Some of these roles are weird. Halle Berry is, at one point, white and looks a bit odd. Also, the film cuts continually between the six stories, often through strange and unpredictable links.
And its still kinda brilliant. The themes – life, storytelling, mankind's eternal struggles – are big and bold and the film looks absolutely spectacular, from the early eighteenth century settings to way into an unrecognisable day-glo future. There is a fine cast (add in Wachowski favourite Hugo Weaving, Hugh Grant, Susan Sarandon, Ben Wishall, James D'Arcy and more) and, if you can make it through the initially-confusing first half hour you will find a thing of wonder. Check it out.

Dreamworks latest offering is a peculiar proposition which, despite staggeringly hyper-real visuals, is what probably sank it at the box office. Rise of the Guardians, not to be confused with the similarly-titled owl movie, posits a superhero outfit kinda like the Avengers but comprising Santa Claus, the Easter Bunny, the Tooth Fairy, the Sandman and – prime focus – Jack Frost. He's an unhappy lost lad with lessons to learn from joining the other guardians to combat the threat of Pitch Black and protect the children of earth. Frankly this is pretty weird stuff, tonally confused, but a unique shtick and dynamic style make it strangely appealing.

Once upon a time the Austrian Oak used to appear in interesting films. Total Recall, Terminator, even Predator still look good. It would be nice to report that The Last Stand, his full return after a couple of expendable cameos, did anything to break new ground. But, no. Arnie's obviously dipping his toe in fairly safe waters to start with, staging a variation on High Noon as a modern day sheriff whose small-town is directly in the way of a fleeing Mexican bandit. And, despite despite many flaws and breaking no new ground, this is actually a lot of fun, especially the climax where Schwarzenegger reacquaints himself with heavy-calibre weaponry.

If there is a tradition associated with Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter then FDR: American Badass is probably part of it. But, lacking the budget of that previous film, this relies very much on cheap parody and pretty much one joke. This sees America's wheelchair-bound president pimping his ride with rocket launchers and machine guns and heading off to battle polio-inflicting werewolves in the form of Hitler, Mussolini and Hirohito. Did I mention it was cheap? And that it really only has one joke?

Anglophiles of a certain age no doubt fondly remember tough cop show The Sweeney, now rebooted as a movie starring Ray Winstone in John Thaw's 'Guv'nor” role and Ben Drew as his loyal sidekick, updating the original seventies setting (so beautifully parodied in TV's Life on Mars) to modern London, all sharp and slick and steely blue. But some things never change: The Flying Squad still enjoy driving cars headlong into the middle of heists and meting out justice with baseball bats; and Winstone's first line is 'You're nicked”. There's a terrific shoot-out though Trafalgar Square, reminiscent of Heat, and plenty of other cool stuff.