We've said this last year and we'll say it again: 2016 was a bumper year for films. So much so we've had to delay this usual end-of-year list all the way to April, and here we are now, compiling the list of films of the recent yesteryear which we think ruled the roost in terms of storytelling, production value and overall great entertainment. Don't worry about HBO's movie-budget television series or Netflix's influx of well-received TV shows: Cinema is still King.

Much celebration must be had on the blog front too, with many new readers coming along the ride over the past twelve months to see me this writer either praising or slagging off what cinema has to offer. Curiously, our review of Emilia Clarke's Me Before You is our most popular write-up EVER, which had us pondering on what our potential core audience really is. Wonder if there are any new chic-flicks to review at this time of year...

For this year's selections, we're going for the unconventional's here, from massive blockbusters to small-time delights from around the world, and there's plenty of diversity in our magnificent seven (not including the actual Magnificent Seven remake) to make it feel like an all-you-can-eat international buffet, along with a dastardly duo of movies worth mentioning/avoiding. Enjoy...




Hunt for the Wilderpeople

If you're only allowed to watch one more film this year, make it this charming Kiwi adventure-comedy film straight from New Zealand's Taika Waititi (What We Do in the Shadows). Wilderpeople's story of two mismatched characters, one a hermit (Sam Niell) and another a city kid (Julian Dennison), trekking through the NZ landscape is a witty, downright hysterical adventure, with plenty of offbeat humor and a stylized filming (reminiscent of Wes Anderson's work) to have you grinning all the way, as a manhunt is afoot for the two.

Yet, at the same time Wilderpeople presents itself as a warm-hearted and certainly an emotional hike of two characters clearly different in views, with the two leads of Neill and a young Dennison sharing a lot of chemistry as their charm bounces instantaneously off each other with every passing scene, portraying an unwilling father-son dynamic in this oddity of an adventure.

TL;DR watch this great piece of cinema before watching Waititi's upcoming Thor: Ragnarok, and if that film has a similar tone to this Wilderpeople but with Thor and Loki, colour me VERY excited.

Popstar: Never Stop Never Stopping

Music mockumentary's are few and far between, but The Lonely Island's second film project Popstar is a prime contender to be the best in the genre in a long while.

Servicing like an expensive Saturday Night Live skit, though without pandering to current trends and would have surely made it dated with every passing year, it successfully delivers joke after joke, with each scene in Popstar worthy of being individually uploaded to YouTube (exhibit A, exhibit B, exhibit C, exhibit D, exhibit E). Though The Lonely Island trio has successfully translated their wacky music career o the big screen, Popstar's soundtrack ironically pales in comparison to The Lonely Island's past SNL offerings, and is largely a hit-and-miss affair. It's a damn shame that it couldn't even make back half of its budget from the box office.

"In the spirit of the film, if I were to rate this film without a score, I'll probably give this the 🙈 emoji, for sheer stupidity at its funniest." [REVIEW]

Rogue One: A Star Wars Story

Not the war film many had expected, the first Star Wars spin-off not to center around the Skywalker lineage is an enjoyable sci-fi heist film, while serving as a perfect companion piece to the original Star Wars from 1977. While its storyline does play heavily into A New Hope's main plot device, Rogue One can stand perfectly on its own, rarely/barely relying on established Star Wars lore, while introducing a diverse (much-welcomed) batch of individuals bent on stealing the plans to the Death Star.

Donnie Yen's Chirrut Îmwe and Alan Tudyk's K-2SO are more memorable than any other character introduced in The Force Awakens, and when Rogue One does rest back on familiar faces, it does so with gusto without stealing attention from the story, though it's obvious that motion capture performances is still a mixed bag, ranging from flawless to absolutely jarring (we'll leave you to guess who). If future Star Wars spin-offs are anything like this, bring on more, because the galaxy far, far away doesn't revolve around one problematic family tree.

Independence Day Resurgence


"20 years after the original defined the sci-fi disaster/disaster porn genre, Resurgence unfortunately feels lost amidst the pile of pretenders trying to emulate its forefather. Compared to ID4, the only redeeming factor Resurgence has is its upgraded creature and special effects, which looked spectacular in that brief five minute segment of 'Earth plus moon' destruction. Even with favourites Goldblum and Pullman returning, Resurgence lacks the charisma brought out by Will Smith (who now inadvertently serves as the missing puzzle piece), and yet still heavily relied on past characters (those who bothered showing up anyway) to make Resurgence a mildly interesting affair, as the newer additions are heavily short-handed with such an excessive roster and an uninspiring characters. That, coupled with one plot arc too many and an unoriginal storyline makes the two decades for a sequel to the 1996 classic all the more unworthy. Perhaps the void left by the Fresh Prince is perhaps even deeper than the large hole he aliens drilled." [REVIEW]


The Huntsman: Winter's War

"The Huntsman: Winter's War feels like a rushed project where the studio decided to plomp ahead after already spending money developing a sequel before the Stewart-Sanders incident. A phrase put forward at one point during one of the film pitches was probably sounded similar to "Hey guys, should we explore a time when Thor decides to team up with Brave's Merida to fight Elsa from Frozen? Wait, this isn't a Disney meeting?". Even with a number of famous cast additions, the end result was a film, being a sequel that no one wanted, that had you bothered for neither the characters nor the story. One parts dull, another parts silly, perhaps the only redeeming quality The Huntsman indefinitely has was introducing audiences to the brilliant credit music (also: the joy of the whole thing ending) as performed by Halsey." [REVIEW]