Category: Reviews

Originally titled Neighbors in the US, the film was renamed ‘Bad Neighbours’ in the UK to avoid confusion with the popular Aussie soap.

However, a more fitting title would have been ‘Bad Parents’, as the couple in question – Mac (Seth Rogen) and Kelly Radner (Rose Byrne) – often neglect their infant daughter for extended periods of time.

Mac and Kelly’s peaceful new home is disrupted when a college fraternity, Delta Psi Beta, moves in next door. Initially, the two groups get along well, with Mac and Kelly even joining in on the partying.

But when a particularly noisy party forces Mac to call the police, tensions escalate between the neighbors. Fraternity president Teddy Sanders (Zac Efron) is angry that the couple broke their promise to him, and both sides engage in a series of childish pranks to get back at each other.

Mac and Kelly enlist the help of Mac’s work friend Jimmy (Ike Barinholtz) and Jimmy’s ex-wife Paula (Carla Gallo) to exact revenge on the fraternity, leading to some hilarious and outrageous moments.

While Bad Neighbours may not reach the comedic heights of Animal House or other classic college comedies, it’s still an entertaining and fun film. With a running time of just 90 minutes, it’s the perfect length for a comedy like this.

Look out for Bad Neighbours on DVD, releasing September 8th.

⭐️⭐️⭐️

Unfortunately, the comedic value of this film is severely lacking, to the point where it’s almost cringe-worthy. The premise is intriguing enough: two best friends attend a fancy dress party as cops and decide to continue their ruse as pretend cops. However, the execution falls flat, and the idea quickly becomes tired and repetitive. It’s difficult to believe that the plot can stretch out to a 104-minute film, as the situations are implausible and require a significant amount of suspension of disbelief.

Despite the potentially interesting premise, the comedic writing and delivery fall short, resulting in an unfunny and almost painful experience. Damon Wayans Jr. and Jake Johnson have proven comedic talent, but their efforts in this film are wasted on weak material. The attempts at humour feel forced and predictable, and the jokes fall flat more often than not.

In hindsight, this could have been a much more successful project if it had been executed as a series of 5-10 minute shorts online. The premise is better suited to a shorter format, and the situations would have been more effective if they were presented as individual sketches rather than stretched out over a feature-length film. Ultimately, the film fails to deliver on its potential and is a forgettable addition to the comedy genre.

⭐️

“Non-Stop” is almost a difficult film to review, as it’s everything you expect it to be. Every character is a suspect and everyone is dismissed as a suspect, and the more they’re dismissed as a suspect, the more they start to look guilty.

Liam Neeson, is playing the same type of role his played since Taken. This time he’s Bill Marks, a former NYPD officer turned Air Marshal. He’s on a trans-Atlantic flight when he receives a text message from a passenger, demanding $150 million be wired to his account or he’ll kill one passenger every thirty-minutes.

The problem is that it tries to be something it isn’t. It has one too many scenes that border on ludicrous, and the terrorists plan doesn’t really make sense.
Non-Stop is a flawed but fun action movie.

The blu ray comes with two special features “Non-Stop Action” (5 minutes and “Suspense at 40,000 Feet” (8 minutes). Neither feature really adds anything to the film.

Non-Stop arrives on DVD and Blu ray on June 30th.

⭐️⭐️⭐️