DVD OF THE WEEK

THE LAST STATION ****
Dir: Michael Hoffman Starring: Helen Mirren, Christopher Plummer, James McAvoy

A film about the last days of an aging Russian author in 1910 would seem like a hard sell. But, like all good stories, it's how you tell ‘em that counts. And this one is told exceedingly well.
It helps that the dying author is Tolstoy (Plummer), at the time the most famous writer in the world and one who had transcended fiction to become the revered figurehead of a movement based around his personal philosophies. Thus his final days saw a gathering of acolytes intent on persuading him to relinquish the copyright to his work and gift it to ‘the Russian people'.
This seriously upsets his long-standing wife (Mirren), and fair enough too. After bearing 13 children and copying out War and Peace by hand six times, she is less than impressed that the family fortune is being left to the joyless ideologues of the Tolstoy movement (led by a terrific Paul Giamatti).
Into this hotbed of intrigue comes James McAvoy, Tolstoy's new secretary, who finds himself predictably torn between the charismatic Tolstoy, his passionate wife, and his beliefs as a follower of the movement.
It's a whole bunch of fun, in the finest of sophisticated English ways, with both Mirren and Plummer having a great time. It's like fine BBC drama with a better budget: smart, moving and funny in all the right places.

The A-Team (***) is about as good a movie as anyone who watched the old TV show could expect. It has guns, lots of explosions, a lashing of entertaining banter, and a bunch of clever plans. The new actors do a terrific job: Liam Neeson isn't exactly stretching himself but chomps his cigars manfully as team leader Hannibal, while Bradley Cooper is a solid Face and Sharlto Copley (from District 9), is entertainingly insane as Murdock. Only wrestler ‘Rampage' Jackson seems a little out of his depth in the ‘pity the fool' role. On the downside, two of the big set pieces are marred by somewhat iffy CGI. But hey, it's a Big Dumb Blockbuster and will do till the next Big Dumb Blockbuster gets here.

Films about warring angels make up a surprisingly well-populated sub-genre in cinema history, at its best with Constantine and the Prophecy trilogy. They may be insanely stupid from both a rational and theological perspective, but they can also be good trashy fun. Legion (***) mixes riffs from Terminator, The Mist and others as angels Gabriel and Michael and various minions duke it out over the life of an unborn baby in a small roadside diner. Being angels, they naturally use serious quantities of heavy automatic weapons. Occupants caught in the crossfire include Dennis Quaid, Tyrese Gibson and Charles Dutton.

The shadow of the brilliant Sexy Beast hangs heavily over 44 Inch Chest (***), what with the burly presence of Ray Winstone, a similar London hardman milieu, and its predilection for cockney swearing. Here a heartbroken Winstone and his seedy mates kidnap his wife's lover to extract vengeance on the unfortunate waiter. John Hurt, Tom Wilkinson and Ian McShane clearly relish their roles and it is a pleasure watching them have at it, but a streak of over-theatrical direction stilts the flow and Winstone's central character is an unlikeable bore, making for an undeniably powerful yet often unengaging ride.

The people who have been meticulously remaking every seventies horror franchise (Chainsaw Massacre, Friday 13th, Hills Have Eyes, Amityville Horror, Halloween, et al) have finally got to A Nightmare on Elm Street (**). It is – of course – a ‘reimagining' rather than a remake, which means they have changed some of the minor background details and tried to provide a little more specific motivation for the famous killer.
I can't say that it's bad particularly: Jackie Earle Haley is blandly passable as the replacement Freddy Krueger and the best bits are taken directly from the original.
It's like listening to a insipid cover of your favourite song – predictable and lifeless.