Mike has written a total of 1,397 reviews with an average rating of 5. Mike particularly liked Fight Club (1999), Se7en (1995), Snatch (2000), Gladiator (2000), V for Vendetta (2005), The Matrix (1999), The Corporation (2003) and Dear Zachary: A Letter to a Son About His Father (2008).
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Relay (2024) - 6/10
This is an interesting film in which you find yourself wondering, "Does shit like this really go on?" The world is mad place - especially in 2026 - so it probably does. These relay workers must have heard some shit. It struck a chord with me how you can have this sort of relationship with someone without ever actually speaking to them on the phone. There are plenty of whispered conversations delivered via burner phones, so in that sense it reminds me a lot of all the time I've spent calling sex lines over the years. There really is nothing more dangerous, intimate, or thrilling than taking the opportunity whilst your wife is in the bath to sneak into the spare bedroom with some tissues and a tub of vaseline to grunt down the phone to a mysterious voice on the other end. It's about secrets, surveillance, paranoia and corporate conspiracies, although disappointing, not once is anyone asked, "So... what are you wearing?"
The Brutalist (2025) - 6/10
This is a film about a Hungarian-Jewish Holocaust survivor who gets separated from his family and travels to New York to make a new life for himself. It touches on romance, on hard-work, on the immigrant struggle and, most importantly, on how the only thing László loves more than his wife is concrete. Adrien Brody plays the part very well; you can see in his eyes how torn he is between human connection and the seductive promise of reinforced cement. When he's not thinking about load-bearing walls, he's either re-living his trauma or doing heroin in an attempt to make it through to bed-time. The cinematography and musical compositons are great and you definitely come out of the film feeling like you've experienced something, but what exactly? I'm not so sure. I definitely felt like I wasn't clever enough to be the films intended audience though, which did feel marginally insulting. It's a mad film but worth a watch.
Wake Up Dead Man (2025) - 5/10
This is the latest installment of the Knives Out franchise, which essentially are feature-length games of Cluedo repackaged for Gen Z who haven't got the patience themselves to sit down and play a board game. Somehow, yet again, every other character is a bigger prick than Benoit Blanc, which takes some doing. You know the format, it's been done since the dawn of time. Some cunt comes to a sticky end and we have to figure out who's done it... Yeah, I know. There's smug rich people, deceit and dodgy accents aplenty, although, again, it's a let down compared to the original Knives Out, which had Ana de Armas in it, so of fucking course it's not going to be as good as that.
Train Dreams (2025) - 6/10
I love getting the train. There's something about sitting there, staring out the window and seeing the world shoot by that inspires melancholy, and in a fast-moving world where you don't have time for anything, I very much appreciate that. I also enjoy eyeing-up good-looking women on the train and imagining an entire shared life together. I like to ask myself, "Where would we go on Honeymoon?", "How many kids would we have?" and, "Why hasn't she looked my way once?" And thus, more melancholy as I mourn a relationship that lasted exactly three stops. This film, too, is very much about the melancholy, about life choices, about doing your best and about consequence. It's slow but in a good way, and I enjoyed seeing a glimpse into how people lived in that part of the world at that point in time. Worth a watch.
Misery (1990) - 7/10
The morale of this story is that all women are cray-cray. I know I may be overstating that, but come on. We've all had girlfriends and wives long enough to know that this is the case. In many cases, it's not even their fault; it's the hormones. But that doesn't stop it being true. I'm obviously joking here because Annie Wilkes is spectacularly unwell, but you know what I mean. You didn't watch Jaws and then think that all fish will fuck you up given the chance, did you? It's not out of order to suggest that Kathy Bates (as Annie) delivers here one of the most iconic performances in cinema history. I, like Annie, despise continuity errors in fiction but are they punishable by death? Well, that's for you to decide. Annie has certainly made her mind up. The genius of Misery is how it weaponises home comforts. A cosy house, a comfortable bed and a bottle of wine with your meal all seem well and good until you've got a smirking psychopath offering you a biscuit with a scalding cup of tea so close to your face. This is the most realistic horror film you'll probably ever see and therefore it deserves a lot of respect.
Filth (2013) - 4/10
Watching this is like being trapped in the mind of a bad man who thinks collecting women like football cards is the most entertaining game ever, especially when off your face. It's one of the most misogynistic films you'll ever see, and given everything we know about Hollywood, that's saying something. In fact, I think that's what Irvine Welsh set out to do. Imagine a person whose entire personality was contempt for women and you've got the main character in this. I think we're meant to be repulsed by it rather than to celebrate it, so if you actual enjoy this, then you're a massive twat. I bet if your teenage nephew watched it, it'd be his favourite film ever. The only person Bruce hates more than he hates women is himself. It is grimy, chaotic and aggressively Scottish, yet, somehow, paints a portrait of a man on a path to self-destruction bringing as many others down with him as he can. I recognised all of that, yet I didn't like it, because of all the above, which is strange, because I hate women as much as anyone.
Sinners (2025) - 5/10
This is basically what From Dusk Till Dawn would have been if you'd ordered it off Alibaba. It, like From Dusk Till Dawn, is basically a film in two parts, where the first part is all serious and setting the scene and the second part is, well, fucking vampires. Both films have fantastic lighting based in wooden shacks, and both contain numerous people of questionable morals and pits them up against a bunch of bloodsucking baddies. Neither do the shift from part one to part two subtly and that's sort of the point. More films should follow this arc. Imagine Andy fretting all that time in Shawshank prison, only so that when he eventually emerges, covered in shit, from that pipe, and with his hands to the sky, a fucking vampire jumps on his back and rips out his throat! Now you're talking! Or Gladiator whereby, instead of tigers coming out the ground to munch on Maximus, they instead released vampires! I'd watch that. Or imagine Ripley getting to LV-426 and she's greeted by a bunch of - actually, no; that can't be improved upon. The big-titted, cocoa-skinned elephant in the room, though, is that there's no Salma Hayek equivalent. Sinners has plenty of dancing and plenty of menace, but nothing quite as delightful as Hayek shimmying to the enchanting melody of After Dark. But really, has there ever been? I don't think so, so good on them for not even trying. There is one plot hole bigger than the Grand Canyon in this though, but when another plot point is vampires, you can't really question too much.
The Greatest Night in Pop (2024) - 6/10
Have you ever wondered how the biggest popstars in America would have coped on Pop Idol? Well watch this and you'll know. It documents the moments that they were brought together to sing a song in an attempt to save starving Africans. The most interesting bit is how they interact with each other, how they try to out-do each other and, crucially, how they deal with realising they're not the biggest talent in the room. Some, like Springsteen and Lauper, shine despite not being the most gifted and others, like Dylan, spend the entire time looking for a rock on the ground to climb under. Good on him for even showing up, and fair fucks to the lot of them for doing their bit right into the early hours.
Predator: Badlands (2025) - 4/10
Have you ever, whilst watching the original Predator, asked yourself, "I wonder how the Predator got to be such a good hunter and all round magnificently hard bastard?" No? Me neither. Because that's what this film tries to explain, as it delivers a teenage Predator with an attitude to some mad planet even more deadly than Australia. Imagine God had got bored of creating Earth after a couple of days and instead went on a bender; that's what this place is like. It's the latest of a long line of classic movies that have been remade for a new idiot generatiion. I didn't like it much at all and I own a Predato-themed Christmas t-shirt.
Frankenstein (2025) - 5/10
We all know the story here. Dr Frankenstein creates a monster out of nothing but ambition, human limbs and bits and bobs from his garage. The outcome is an overly dramatic nine foot tall indestructible human-like creature with a degree in Philosophy. I watched this weeks ago and haven't been able to summon even an iota of motivation to write a review for it. That about sums it up. Just a big fat bowl of nothingness which left me inspired to do absolutely sweet FA; not even provide a few sentences of spite for The Internet. If you're into fog and lightning and damp surfaces, then sure, you may dig it, but it wasn't for me. I love Oscar Isaac too, and I'd watch anything he's in. It's just a shame he chose to be in this because it's very average.
Den of Thieves: Pantera (2025) - 4/10
The first Den of Thieves was great because it was a bunch of hard men robbing banks under immense tension then shooting their way out of the trouble they'd got themselves into. That's the sort of action film we all want to see. This sequel is just stupid and loud. Gerard Butler stumbles around confused most of the time looking like he's dealing with concussion whilst playing a game of chicken with heart disease. The plot is a fucking joke and the baddy is so criminally Disney-evil that I half expected him to break into song and dance at one point. This is not a film for serious people.
Kenny Dalglish (2025) - 8/10
It's impossible not to adore Kenny Dalglish. He is one of life's good guys and, for me, as a Liverpool fan, he is so much more. The club's greatest ever legend and, as far as I'm concerned, the greatest living Scouser, despite having been born in Glasgow. This film goes some way to showing why he is so loved by so many, Liverpool fans, football fans, and human beings in general. What a guy. Absolutely worth watching, despite your football allegiances.
Ballad of a Small Player (2025) - 4/10
There's something inexplicably watchable about Colin Farrel. I've always thought that, despite him now having been in some dreadful films. Of late, he's been generally playing the worn out, middle-aged drunk, which is a big change from his early days of him playing the hunk. And it's more of the same here, although it's not even that entertaining. I'd say it's like the worst hangover you've ever had becoming sentient and booking a trip to Macau, but that makes it sound too appealing. It felt to me like a bunch of independent short stories based around the same character using the same actor, but with the only thing to connect them being the beautiful cinematography. There is a sniff of a storyline but it's all over the place and indulges some massive leaps of faith over some monumental crevasses, meaning generally it comes across as an awful whiff. Avoid.
One Battle After Another (2025) - 5/10
War has never before been so horny. Immediately at the start of this, you're wondering, "What's going on here exactly?" and "Why does that man have an erection?" I see what they were trying to do, but really? I mean, I've never used a firearm in the bedroom but, you know? The film follows the same pattern as most of my Tinder dates; it starts off with sexual tension and threats, continues on with confusion and tears and then ends with someone passed out having unspeakable things done to them by people in masks. It's a single dad raising his daughter by himself using obsolete Bond gadgets whilst artillery is dropped all around him. It's Paul Thomas Anderson's attempt at Pulp Fiction or The Departed and despite using a bazooka, he misses the target. There's not enough time invested making you care about the characters and too many questions left unanswered. Christmas Adventurers?! Say what now? You may like it, but I left disappointed.
Reputation (2024) - 4/10
You know what winds me the fuck up? How often I see some North Face wearing, low-level drug-dealing scallies walking around town with an absolutely stunning girlfriend. These gobshites have no ambition, no charm, no emotional availability and no job. Yet their birds are fit as fuck!? Make it make sense. Anyway, this is the sort of film a 13 year-old lad would watch and think is great. It'll probably inspire them to become a drug dealer when really it should be doing the exact opposite. I've been there myself; I loved Scarface as a kid, but at least that's a good film. This, on the other hand, is a load of rehashed, seen-it-all-before shite. They didn't even make the main character likeable. Jib.
The Long Walk (2025) - 6/10
This film combines two of my favourite things, a nice walk in the countryside - fresh air, birdsong, maybe a pub or two - and point blank executions using a carbine gas-powered semi-automatic weapon. Walking, they say, is the safest form of exercise. Not when you're walking side-by-side with the Grim Reaper it isn't. This is a bit like the hunger games for lazy people, where you're being handed fresh water one minute then wiping your new pal's brains off your face the next. It'll certainly leave you questioning your footwear each morning as you pull them onto your feet. Will these things really take me 300 miles if required? I loved the book so it was always going to be tough for the film to meet my expectations, but it was alright. I have no hate for it but it also didn't blow me away. Definitely worth a watch though.
E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial (1982) - 8/10
When I was born, apparently I had a red birth mark on the end of one of my index fingers, so the nurses at the hospital said I looked like E.T. I was told this numerous times as a kid and it did wonders for my self-confidence, as you can imagine. Why wouldn't you want to look like a short wrinkly space raisin with a massive head? It really is no surprise his best friend kept him locked in a cupboard, is it? This is an absolute classic though, and if you think otherwise, you're wrong. It did introduce me, from an early age, to the idea that the government are bastards. And, to be fair, this is something that has both helped me a great deal in my life and, sadly, it is now more truer than ever.
Weapons (2025) - 4/10
This had all the required hype, excellent imdb ratings and Josh Brolin, which meant I went into it with high hopes. Sadly, it was very disappointing; almost as disappointing as your mum telling you that your creepy aunt is coming to stay for the weekend, which is basically what starts all the problems in this. There is very little logic, loads of loose ends and plenty we've all seen before multiple times. Sadly, it turns out that Josh Brolin can be in shit films. The only thing it truly nailed is the idea that family are, indeed, the real curse.
The Promised Land (2023) - 7/10
Did you enjoy the bit of The Martian where Matt Damon is trying to grow potatoes on another planet? Yeah? Well then you'll enjoy this. Somehow, despite being on Earth, Mads Mikkelsen finds an environment less forgiving than Mars. He has to contend with barren soil, soul-crushing weather, frost, AWOL workers, theivery and the biggest prick of a spoilt land owner you've ever seen. I haven't hated anyone this much since Joffrey Baratheon. Can't a man just be left to grow some potatoes in peace? It's like Pride and Predjudice meets There Will Be Blood and will leave you thinking, "Fuck the potatoes. Eat the rich!" Mads Mikkelsen’s simmering glare deserves special mention too. If looks could kill, indeed.
Hustle (2022) - 6/10
This is the heartwarming story of Adam Sandler proving he can fall out bed, throw on a hoody and still earn millions of pounds for reading some lines. He doesn't even need a golf club or a stupid accent in this one. As you may have guessed, he's not my favourite actor, but he doesn't act like some mentally-challenged teenager in this, at least. The gist is he's a basketball scout who comes across some giant street baller in Spain and decides he can train him to reach the NBA. That's basically all you need to know. I know nothing of basketball and despise Adam Sandler, yet I didn't hate it. The sort of film you do the ironing to, or browse Vinted to, or whatever else mundane shit you do with your evenings.