My Review of My Policeman (2022)

 

Written by Ron Nyswaner

Directed by Michael Grandage

Patrick: "There he was. I recognized him even from behind. That fine head. The unmistakable line of his shoulder. My policeman was magnificently alive in front of me."

In terms of movies I've left too long to actually review, this was another. In the time it's been released, I've watched/reviewed several gay themed movies and shows since. I've heard mixed things about this one.

This would be one of those movies in two different eras for it's three main characters. In the present day, Patrick Hazelwood (Rupert Everett) suffered a stroke and was being taken care of by his friend, Marion Taylor (Gina McKee). The latter's husband, Tom Burgess (Linus Roache) wasn't pleased about this.

In the past, we saw the younger versions of Marion and Tom, as played by Emma Corrin and Harry Styles meet and fall in love with one another. Then there was the younger version of Patrick, played by David Dawson. It didn't take long for things to become complicated for everyone.

Marion was a school teacher, Tom was a policeman and Patrick was a museum curator. As the three learned from each other, there was an affair brewing between Tom and Patrick. If I'm being pedantic, Tom was with Patrick before he decided to marry Marion. Tom also wanted to keep seeing Patrick, which didn't end well for anyone.

Yes, Marion found out about the affair and reported Patrick to the police. Patrick went to jail and Marion's marriage to Tom was never the same again. The fact that Marion in the present day chose to look after Patrick stemmed from guilt. It also led to her having the most honest conversation she ever had with Tom.

As with these period movies for gay men, there's a lot of angst and consequences of discovery but this one managed to end on a positive note. Marion left Tom and Patrick and the latter two finally held hands. I'll admit that little moment actually got to me and it's informed my rating for this movie too.

- Ron Nyswaner who wrote the script would go on to create the Showtime miniseries, Fellow Travellers. I've reviewed all of that on this blog.

- The movie's based on a 2012 book of the same name and of a relationship between writer E.M. Forster and Bob Buckingham. The latter was a married policeman.

- Standout music: Dean Martin's Memories Are Made Of This.

- Chronology: Present day in Peacehaven but the flashbacks started in 1957 Brighton.

I got to admit that I really like My Policeman as a movie. While it certainly felt familiar, I do think the central performances from both group of actors in both time settings genuinely worked. That ending also gave it an extra point for me.

Rating: 7 out of 10 

My Review of Bent (1997)

Written by Martin Sherman

Directed by Sean Mathias

Max: "I love you... What's wrong with that?"

I'll admit that seeing a random gif on X/Twitter might have motivated me into watching this movie. I had vaugely heard of it but had never seen it until yesterday.

We've had a lot of movies in this specific genre but not many that have focused on the persecution of gay men during the rise of Nazism in Germany at the time. This movie centred on a gay man named Max (Clive Owen).

Max's been living in Berlin, had a boyfriend named Rudy (Brian Webber II) but a sexual encounter with Wolf (Nikolaj Coster-Waldau) would be the ruin for both of them. It turned out that Wolf was a Sturmabteilung man and SS men killed him as both Max and Rudy tried to flee for their lives.

While Max had some connection through a wealthy uncle named Freddie (Ian McKellen), it was his refusal to abandon Rudy that resulted in the two of them being arrested by the Gestapo. Worse than that, Max was forced to kill his boyfriend while also concealing his own sexuality.

Max being in denial about his sexuality didn't shield him that much in the concentration camp he ended up, which was Dachau. He was still horribly treated by the Nazis and it seemed clear in some scenes that they were well aware that he was actually gay.  The way they would make him witness a particular death drove that point home.

The second half of the movie explored a relationship of sorts between Max and fellow prisoner, Horst (Lothaire Bluteau). It was a relationship that was intimate without physical touching and Horst's brutal death saw Max take his own life. It's a heartbreaking final moment.

- This movie also featured Mick Jagger, Paul Brittany, Jude Law and Rachel Weisz in prominent roles.

- Based on the 1979 play of the same name by Martin Sherman, who wrote the script for the movie.

- Standout music: Mick Jagger's Streets Of Berlin.

- Chronology: 1934, Germany and taking in the events of the Night of the Long Knives.

Bent (1997) for obvious reasons doesn't make for an easy watch. There's excellent performances throughout, notably from Clive Owen. This movie definitely saw one of his best work with Max being one hell of a character to watch. 

Rating: 8 out of 10 

Doctor Who News - Missing Episodes Recovered And Other Bits

It's been a while since I've done a Doctor Who related blog. Actually, I think this might be the first one this year.

Let's start things off on a positive note first. There was the recent news of two more missing episodes being recovered. Those episodes were The Nightmare Begins and Devil's Planet from The Daleks Master Plan. This now means that there's 95 episodes from the classic era that are still missing. These recovered episodes are now available to watch on BBC iPlayer. I watched both of them last night and it made me happy to have seen them properly for the first time. Here's to more missing episodes getting recovered.

Now on to more frustrating things. 

Christmas 2026. Six months since a special was announced, we are still none the wiser as to what the hell is going on with it. Aside from Russell T. Davies causing more division among fans with his poor choice of sound bites (love RTD but he's not helping himself these days), both him and the BBC have given us little to work with. 

If the special is going to be a David Tennant and Billie Piper led one and it looks like it will be, then it could be a while before filming commences as both are filming upcoming seasons of Time and Wednesday respectively.

That's assuming it's this particular pair leading the upcoming special. Surely, we're due some actual news on the special within the next few weeks? 

Last but not least but what the hell is going on with The War Between The Land And The Sea? It's been nearly four months since it's debut on BBC1 and Disney+ have yet to release it to international audiences. In fact, at this point it's starting to look less and less likely they'll even bother with this show. 

After publicly cutting ties with the main show itself, are Disney+ going to bother releasing a spin off to it? I don't think they will. In fact, I'm surprised they just didn't dump it all at once during the start of the year. If you still haven't seen it, you might have to find other methods in order to watch the show.

Hopefully my next blog in relation to the show will be something more telling about it's actual future.

Scream 8 Finds It's Writers

This was announced a few days ago and I was meaning to get around to it, but yes - Scream continues to be the franchise that will make more movies.

Following the success of Scream 7 (currently in at $204.9 million and now available on digital), an eighth instalment of the popular horror is in the works. Penning the script for the movie are Nora and Lillla Zuckerman. Both have worked on the Peacock show Poker Face, which ran for two seasons. They also recently worked on the pilot for Buffy The Vampire Slayer: New Sunnydale, which Hulu chose not to pick up.

The film, which is in development with Paramount and Spyglass have no director confirmed as of now. It seems going by recent reports that Kevin Williamson will not return to direct while no cast members as of now haven't been confirmed.

So, I'm doing a list of things that I'd like to see in Scream 8.

• Returning cast should just be Sidney (Neve Campbell), Gale (Courtney Cox), Tatum (Isabel May) and Mark (Joel McHale)
• Perhaps have Robbie Rogers (Mark Consuelos) as an opening kill.
• Eight to ten new cast members. Two of them filling in as Ghostface. At least one new character surviving for a potential ninth movie.
• Ghostface motive to be better fleshed out and for them to interact with main cast a lot in the movie.
• All the new characters to be better fleshed out, including a new friendship group and love interest for Tatum.

Honestly, that's it. As news materialises for the movie, I'll report it here. 

My Review of This Is Not A Test (2026)

 

Written And Directed by Adam MacDonald 

Rhys (to everyone): "Never have I ever survived a zombie invasion."

Keeping with the horror for this year, I went for something on the zombie side of things. Not really my favourite subgenre within the horror space and this movie wouldn't be one to convert me either.

The movie started off like a grim family drama with a young girl named Sloane Price (Olivia Holt) about to attempt suicide in the bathtub. She doesn't go through with it but an altercation with her father (Jeff Roop) showed him to be an abusive scumbag towards her.

There's flashbacks peppered throughout the movie that showed Sloane's older sister, Lily (Joelle Farrow) being no longer able to tolerate their father and leaving. Lily promised to come back and get Sloane. It's not a promise that she's able to keep and their eventual reunion would be horrifying for both of them.

Anyways the film itself revolved around an outbreak with most of the town being infected. Sloane's dad didn't last long and Sloane ended up going to her highschool for sanctuary and also teamed up with fellow students. Those included boyfriend of sorts, Rhys Moreno (Froy Gutierrez), brother and sister duo Trace (Carson MacCormac) and Grace Casper (Chloe Avakian) and bad boy Cary Chen (Corteon Moore).

As a group, they're not exactly a united front and the discovery of their teacher Mr. Baxter (Luke Macfarlane) brought out their worst and then the death of Grace further splintered the group. Throw in a subplot where Lily was apparently in a safe area and things really ended on a tragic family note for Sloane and a bittersweet note overall.

- This book is based on Courtney Summers 2012 young adult novel of the same name.

- At one point in the movie, Sloane catches Grace and Cary hooking up before Grace died.

- Standout music: Orbital's Halycon and On and On.

- Chronology: December 12th 1998.

This Is Not A Test (2026) made for a rather middle of the road zombie film. There's decent chemistry with the main cast but it's very plodding in parts and generally a bit dull.

Rating: 5 out of 10 

My Review of Pretty Lethal (2026)

 

Written by Kate Freund

Directed by Vicki Jewson

Bones: "These guys are drunk and out of shape, and we're prima fucking ballerinas."

Was anyone in the mood for a ballet meets Hostel (sort of) themed movie? Well, Amazon Prime recently served up something in that regard and it's kind of a mixed bag. Partly entertaining and very much ridiculous but here we are.

You've got a ballet troupe comprising of Bones (Maddie Ziegler), Zoe (Iris Apatow) and her sister, Chloe (Millicent Simmonds), Grace (Avantika) and Princess (Lana Condor). For the most part, they're a troupe that were largely at odds with one another until the movie needed them to step up or get killed.

They're mostly kept in line by their dance instructor Thorna Davenport (Lydia Leonard) but upon entering the wrong hotel owned by Devora Kasimer (Uma Thurman). Let's just say that it didn't take long for all hell to break loose or for Thorna to be shot in the head. From this point onwards, it just got more and more violent.

Every man in this movie, including characters such as Pasha (Tamás Szabó Sipos), Lothar (Michael Culkin), Doktor (Gábor Nagypál) and Yuri (Julian Krenn) etc would be revealed to be a violent would be rapist and general misogynist. Because of this, the ballerinas had to put their many differences to one side and work together to make it out of the movie alive.

I'll admit the characters themselves are likable enough if not the most well drawn out. Bones somewhat became the defacto leader of the group and almost lost her leg when it turned out that Devora was a former ballerina missing a leg. Much as I love Uma Thurman as an actor, her European accent tended to verge on parody at times here.

The movie itself though did have some fun in the way the girls used their ballet skills to actually fight back against their oppressors. I'll give the movie points for some incentive enough scenes there before Devora's act of extremism took care of a bigger threat. 

- The film was originally titled Ballerina Overdrive. Lena Headey was attached at one point to star in it.

- Kate Freund played Sona, a character who ended switching sides by the third act.

- Standout music: Snap! Rhythm Is A Dancer (Ballerina Remix).

- Chronology: Present day Los Angeles at the start with the majority of the movie set in Budapest. 

As I said at the start of this review, I found Pretty Lethal to be mostly entertaining but it's also a bit messy too. Overall, it's decent enough with a few incentive moments of violence and team work. It won't be the best thing you watch this year but neither will it be the worst either.

Rating: 6 out of 10 

DCU Blog - March 2026 Edition: Supergirl Promo, Lanterns Trailer And More

We're a quarter into 2026 and the DC news has been a little sparse but we did get some good bits this month.

Later today will see the release of a new trailer for Supergirl (June 26th). David Corenswet's Superman is confirmed to feature in it. Claudia Sarne is now the composer.

Filming for Man Of Tomorrow (July 9th 2027) will begin in three weeks in Atlanta, Georgia. 

Aaron Pierre will reprise his role as John Stewart in Man Of Tomorrow. An actress has also been rumoured to play Maxima in the movie. Eva de Dominic is the rumoured actress.

Paramount's deal to acquire Warner Brothers will be decided next month. It might not even happen.

Robert Pattinson has talked about The Batman - Part II (October 1st 2027) taking some big swings. Filming will start during the end of May in the UK.

Ruby Sear has been cast in an undisclosed role for Clayface (October 23rd). A trailer is likely to appear at CinemaCon next month. The WB panel will be on April 14th from 4.30pm to 6.30pm.

Phil Lord and Chris Miller have written a movie for The Flash for the DCU but it hasn't been picked up.

Peacemaker won Best Superhero TV Series at the Saturn Awards.

The first trailer for HBO's Lanterns was released. The show will air from August on the cable channel.

Fans of the Absolute Batman series will be seeing Two Face in an upcoming issue while Absolute Wonder Woman will debut a new Cheetah in the next arc.

David Jenkins has confirmed once again that he's still the show runner for the upcoming Booster Gold show.

Superman worldwide collection now stands at $624.3 million.

A casting announcement for the Mister Miracle animated show from Tom King is on the way. It'll air on HBO Max.

The Jimmy Olsen show will be a crime mystery comedy according to co-showrunner Dan Perrault.

Freddie Stroma has confirmed that he doesn't know when he'll return as Vigilante in the DCU.

The 2026 DC Pride will be released in June and will factor in a Justice League: Dream Girls event. June will also see the release of the Dark Knights Of Steel sequel series.

That's your lot for this month. Bigger things on the way for DC no doubt.