Romantic comedies can be the bane of a young man’s cinema going existence. For every Star Trek the Mrs politely watches by your side there’s a debt that can only be re-paid with soul-crushing fare such as The Proposal or The Ugly Truth. It’s been a heck of a long time since When Harry Met Sally and even longer since the 50s “rom-com” hey day but the current yoof generation has finally got its own love story that doesn’t stick to the formula; doesn’t simplify relationships into good times, bad times and last minute dashes to the airport; and leaves you with a tangible sense of love ripped open and dissected onscreen.

Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Zooey Deschanel (last seen together in the underrated Manic) are Tom and Summer, the couple at the heart of [500] Days of Summer, but completely unlike any other onscreen couple. Summer doesn’t believe love exists and, despite her looks and good nature, doesn’t even want a boyfriend. Rather predictably perhaps Tom falls in love with her, but what makes [500] Days of Summer different is it’s smart fractured timeline (which contrasts moments of soaring emotion and heartache to great effect) and it’s realistic portrayal of a couple that was never meant to be.

The film’s unique structure is never confusing due to a clear and simple framing device telling viewers exactly which of the 500 days we are on at the beginning of each new scene. Starting with the break-up immediately lets viewers know that they’re in for something different and [500] Days of Summer is like nothing you have ever experienced before. There’s a genuine sense that everything these characters are going through feels true to life, from awkward first encounters to transcendental highs, soured by looking back at them when the relationship is little more than a bitter memory. The film is also devilishly funny with Gordon-Levitt proving a fine comedic presence, more often than not the laughs stemming from his embarrassing attempts to impress the girl in ways we’ve all tried in the past.

The film also brilliantly plays with Tom’s perception of his relationship with Summer in contrast with the bleak reality. Most overtly in one split-screen party scene we watch Tom’s expectations of the night down one side and the devastating reality on the other as Tom’s life comes crashing down around him. There are also some wonderfully staged fantasy sequences that perfectly capture the unique top-of-the-world feeling only love can achieve.

Gordon-Levitt and Deschanel prove to be a perfect fit for the odd-ball couple with the kind of spark between them most rom-coms only dream of, and they’re well supported by a suitably quirky supporting cast, in particular the brash, if somewhat clichéd best friend McKenzie (Geoffrey Arend).

My problems with [500] Days of Summer are few but important. Firstly a Pushing Daisies-esque narrator is introduced at the start of the film and largely abandoned until the final scene, annoyingly inconsistent which is strange considering the rest of the film is so perfectly balanced. Secondly in making this Tom’s story writers Scott Neustadter and Michael H. Weber fall into the “female enigma” trap that too many other romantic comedies have fallen into over the years, never satisfactorily explaining Summer’s motivations or feelings. And finally some of the film’s more whimsical elements fall flat – not least of which is the world wise younger sister of Tom who manages to be a step too far for believability, even in a film with spontaneous choreographed dance numbers.

But these minor criticisms should in no way deter you from seeing easily the best romantic comedy of this generation and probably the first since When Harry Met Sally that the blokes will enjoy just as much as the ladies. At once devastating and achingly beautiful [500] Days of Summer proves there’s still life in a tired genre.

Lauded by critics but generally ignored by audiences upon its blink-and-you’ll-miss-it theatrical flash last year (or two years ago if you’re in the States), Frank Darabont’s The Mist has found a new lease of life on DVD and Blu-ray, complete with the director preferred black and white version which demands to be seen by even casual horror fans.

Based on a novel by Stephen King (who Darabont also adapted for The Shawshank Redemption and The Green Mile), the set-up for The Mist is deceptively simple horror fare that belies hidden depths and makes it clear even with otherworldly killing machines running loose humanity’s greatest enemy is, and always has been, ourselves. Thomas Jane (who really should be in more movies) plays David Drayton who, along with a large number of the inhabitants of a small town in Maine, becomes trapped in a supermarket when a bizarre mist descends upon the whole town in an instant. It soon becomes clear that there’s something nasty lurking in the mist and to venture out means certain death. Initially David intends to wait out the storm in the supermarket, stocked with enough supplies to keep them going for years, but as tempers fray, minds snap and factions form (the most dangerous of which is a religious cult led by Marcia Gay Harden’s wicked Mrs Carmody) it soon becomes clear David’s best chance for survival lies outside.

A crucial element to horror movies that many people overlook is the environment you first watch them in. See a film like The Shining on a sunny day, in a room full of friends and you’re more likely to laugh than get goosebumps at Kubrick’s classic chiller, and the same could be said for The Mist. Taken out of context viewers not paying enough attention could see it as little more than a slow creature feature with a needlessly bleak ending and some hammy character acting, however The Mist is so much more. I first saw the film while stuck in Manchester one evening on my own, a city far from home and in a late night screening with just four young lads, no doubt set to annoy me. To say it left me devastated is an understatement, even the young men in the cinema with me who started out making a ruckus were deafly silent by the end. We even let out a little cheer in unison at the fate of Mrs Carmody, the first time I’ve ever shouted at the screen, totally incapable of controlling the emotional outburst. The walk to the hotel that night was not a pleasant one.

But it seems to be an experience very few people I know have had with The Mist. Inevitable talk always revolves around the creatures and the ending, most dismissing both as silly and unrealistic. The Mist however makes the most of its minimalist setting to craft a believable group of characters and a completely believable series of events as the master plan comes cascading down around them. Sure people act very stupidly at times (this is a horror movie after all) but for the most part this is the best acted, best written and best realised ensemble cast for a horror film in a long time.

The creatures themselves are also a vision of genuine horror. The story hints that they are creatures from another dimension, but they’re so efficient at killing humans in the most disturbing ways imaginable it makes you wonder if they’ve been genetically engineered for that purpose. The special effects are for the most part excellent. It’s clear some of the actors have had little experience working with special effects with some dodgy physical performances but the various grotesque bugs, tentacles, spiders, and giant predators are truly terrifying, their skull faces making them the very personification of death.

I’d also put it up there as one of the bleakest films ever made. Frank Darabont allegedly forefeit a huge amount of his budget (and no doubt the marketing clout of the studio based on its theatrical bow) to keep the devastating ending intact, but it’s so perfect it would be a travesty to see it end any other way. It seems a little out of character that David would give up so quickly, but after living through what he did I doubt many others would act differently. A special mention also has to go to Darabont’s choice of song for the concluding moments of, for my money, his third truly great King adaptation which will henceforth always be associated with that feeling of wanting to make me kill myself.

It’s rare that I see a film and can’t stop thinking about it for days after. After seeing The Mist I had the uncontrollable urge to tell everyone I know that they should drop everything and see it at the cinema while they can. Few did but now DVD and Blu-ray have given us the chance to revel in The Mist’s depressing glory time and time again, just make sure you check out the black and white version first.

One of the most satisfying aspects of being a fan, whether you’re the fan of an artist, a singer an actor or a director, is that once in a while someone comes along who fulfils every aspect of the potential you saw in those rough-around-the-edges early days. Starting out on TV with under-seen but much loved coming-of-age comedy shows Freaks and Geeks and Undeclared before graduating to the big screen – directing two of the most well balanced comedies of the past decade and acting as leading light of the frat pack production line – Judd Apatow has blossomed from the prank phone call origins witnessed in Funny People’s opening scene to a much more thoughtful and reflective film-maker, albeit one with a mouth foul enough to make a sailor blush.

The plot is a loose adaptation of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby with added dick jokes. When comedy mega-star George Simmons (Adam Sandler) finds out he has a terminal illness he befriends wannabe stand-up performer Ira Wright (Seth Rogen), employing him to write jokes and act as his personal assistant while George fumbles about trying to make amends for a wasted life. The real problem for George is “the one that got away” Laura (Apatow’s real life wife Leslie Mann) who now has her own family, but an unhappy marriage to Australian alpha male Clarke (Eric Bana). George takes it upon himself to save Laura from Clarke, with Ira reluctantly in tow, but has staring death in the face really taught George to change his debauched ways?

Sentiment is a hard thing to stomach on film. Getting the balance right can be a problem even for film-makers like Steven Spielberg, whose tooth-decaying syrup injections are usually what let his flawed efforts down (see the last 20 minutes of AI for the best example). But Apatow just about pulls it off, with a genuinely heartfelt story of pathos and regret that refuses to fall into rom-com genre trappings (at least until its contrived ending). Funny People is first and foremost the product of a film-maker who is also a family man. Spielberg once famously said that if he was to make Close Encounters of the Third Kind today he wouldn’t have Roy abandon his family and run off with ET at the end, and the same could be said for Apatow. Had he made Funny People ten years ago no doubt things would have turned out differently for Sandler’s repulsive George, but Apatow has matured as a film-maker to the point that he’s not afraid to show us the film where the guy doesn’t get the girl.

Despite all this talk of maturing as a film-maker Apatow certainly hasn’t abandoned what made him popular in the first place – a razor sharp sardonic wit and some of the foulest verbal exchanges committed to film. In a film all about stand-up comedians you would expect the laughs to come thick and fast, however they’re spread a little too thinly over Funny People’s mammoth two and a half hour running time to justify going to see the film just for its laugh quotient, though overall you won’t be disappointed. Where the film really works is its wonderfully realised central relationships between George, Ira and Laura covering friendship, love, regret and forgiveness at levels unheard of for most modern, puerile rom-coms.

Sandler gives a performance at least equal, if not better than his game changing turn in Punch Drunk Love, where the world finally realised there was more to Sandler than the class clown (a stage in Sandler’s career hilariously mocked in Funny People through a series of spoof films George has appeared in over the years). Rogen puts in a fine turn as Ira, playing a slightly more child-like and gentle version of Ben from Knocked Up and going through a similar character arc, from puppy dog loyalty to George, to making the difficult moral choice. While Mann is instantly likeable as the conflicted wife and mother who has never reconciled her decision to leave George all those years ago. Bana excels in his first out and out comedy since his early days of sketch shows in his native Australia, nailing every one-liner like a game of whack-a-mole and delivering some of the film’s biggest laughs. Jason Schwartzman and Jonah Hill provide able support as Ira’s successful, albeit sleazy, room-mates while Apatow has managed to populate the rest of his world with enough memorable faces to keep you smiling throughout.

Not necessarily his best film but his most mature and thoughtful to date, Funny People marks Apatow still riding high on the crest of his A-game. While it could have done with half an hour being exorcised, it’s refreshing to watch a mainstream comedy that dares to offer a more rewarding experience to viewers raised on a diet of last minute embraces and improbable reconciliations. The only problem is after covering sex, birth and death what does Judd Apatow have left? I’d put money on a ghost buddy comedy with Will Ferrell and Seth Rogen, natch.

As in the run up to the release of the Lord of the Rings trilogy, the trickle of information flowing through on Guillermo Del Toro’s upcoming adaptation of The Hobbit in recent months has inspired me to revisit J.R.R Tolkein’s source text, a novel which I last read almost fifteen years ago and one which still managed to inspire that child-like sense of wonder in me all these years later.

This particular post isn’t going to be a review of The Hobbit, however, as anyone who hasn’t read it by now clearly has no intention to and anyone who has doesn’t need me to tell them how wonderful it is. Instead I will dedicate this space to a few thoughts on how Del Toro and his writing partners – Peter Jackson, Fran Walsh and Philippa Boyens – might realise Tolkein’s most focused yarn on the big screen.

For starters it’s important to note that Del Toro’s Hobbit will be split into two parts (and possibly and third film bridging the gap between The Hobbit and The Fellowship of the Ring, though this is a rumour that seems to pop up every so often and then quickly gets quashed). This presents a problem as the logical place to end the first film on a high, the battle with the goblins/wargs after Bilbo, Gandlaf, Thorin and the rest escape from the Misty Mountains, probably occurs too early for there to be an even split. They may also choose to leave the first installment on a cliffhanger, ending in the Forest of Mirkwood when things look bleakest for our intrepid adventurers – either after the dwarves are captured by the giant spiders or the Wood-Elves.

The other major problem with the two film structure of course is that you are building to a confrontation with Smaug the Dragon throughout the first film with no payoff until the second. It seems unlikely Del Toro, Jackson, Boyens and Walsh will play around with the timeline much after their faithful adaptation of the Rings trilogy but a Battle of Dagorlad-esque flashback isn’t out of the question.

On the surface The Hobbit feels like it should be a relatively straightforward adaptation as it’s linear, focused, set-piece driven plot leaves little room to wander, but there are a couple of problem areas. Dialogue heavy sections are always an issue in adapting from book to film, but with them so few and far between in The Hobbit I expect this will be much less of an issue than with the Rings trilogy. Only the Beorn section could pose a particular problem – not least of which is how to realise this mythical creature visually.

Another major problem (and a slight issue I have with the book) is that the ending contains not one but two anti-climaxes. Firstly the slaying of Smaug by Bard the Bowman – a man we are introduced to mere moments before – not Bilbo or the Dwarves, and secondly the Battle of the Five Armies – which readers hear next to nothing about after Bilbo is knocked unconscious early on. I’ve always wondered why Tolkein chose to end his tale in this way and it will be interesting to see if Del Toro et al. are willing to make such a radical change to the story to satisfy modern audiences.

The rest of the book however just got me excited. It’s full of electric moments that I can’t wait to see realised through Del Toro’s twisted fantasy filter. Encountering Gollum in the Misty Mountains, Bilbo proving his worth against the giant spiders in Mirkwood Forest, escaping from the dungeons of the Wood-Elves and of course the confrontation with Smaug in the Lonely Mountain. Quite how they’ll handle a talking dragon and fourteen central characters you’re supposed to empathise with I’m not sure, but with two films they’ve got the luxury of space many adaptations don’t.

Traditionally the autumn/winter months sees a break in the American football season in the States, and with it a whole raft of new and returning sci-fi shows premiering their new series on the goggle box. In terms of high quality genre TV, the 2000s has seen its fair share of hits and misses with some cancelled in their prime (Firefly) and others drawn out way beyond their expected lifespan (Smallville), but one thing’s for sure – with production values that outstrip many Hollywood efforts and intelligent, gripping storytelling, viewers have rarely had it better.

Unfortunately to make room for all these new shows those which are seen to be underperforming or (as in the case of Battlestar Gallactica) which reach the end of their planned arcs are cancelled. As well as Battlestar Gallactica this year saw the planned conclusion to Stargate Atlantis (to make room for Stargate Universe – more later) and the premature deaths of Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles, Pushing Daises, Reaper, Eleventh Hour, Eli Stone, the ill-advised Knight Rider re-boot, Kyle XY, the US Life on Mars and Primeval in the UK. While most were understandable and welcome cancellations The Sarah Connor Chronicles and Pushing Daisies were a particular blow to genre fans as, despite ‘low’ ratings, both were critically well received and ended on mesmerizing cliffhangers that begged for another series.

But what have we got to look forward to over the coming year? In terms of returning shows there was the surprise renewal of Joss Whedon’s Dollhouse despite having the lowest viewing figures ever for a renewed programme, Fox perhaps showing faith in Whedon after the Firefly debacle and a noticeable improvement in quality from season one’s mid-point. There’s also big hitters Lost and Heroes (the former reaching the end of its planned six season arc and the latter presumably on its last legs), A Town Called Eureka, Fringe, Chuck making a surprise return, Smallville looking darker than ever, Supernatural bringing the plight of the Winchester brothers to a dramatic conclusion, True Blood which is enjoying considerable success in the States and of course new episodes of Doctor Who.

New properties on the cards however look to be a mixed bag. Ronald D. Moore’s promising looking spaceship drama Virtuality looks like it won’t make it past the pilot, but Battlestar Gallactica prequel Caprica has been given a full season to expand after its feature-length backdoor pilot debuted to critical acclaim earlier this year. It’s good to see at least one intelligent sci-fi show left on the box in a season of largely consisting of gimmick driven action shows. The small screen re-make of 80s classic V is one to look out for, however, starring Lost’s Elizabeth Mitchell and Firefly’s Morena Baccarin in the tale of alien visitors whose friendly exteriors mask a terrible secret. The remake machine isn’t limited to old TV shows either with Eastwick being an adaptation of the Jack Nicholson film from the 80s, but with a worrying whiff of Charmed about it.

I’ll be surprised if Day One makes it to day two as yet another post-apocalypse set series so soon after Jericho’s failure to pick up viewers looks unlikely to become a sleeper hit. Human Target is probably the most low key of the new season’s shows with nary a dollar spent on publicity despite starring Rorscach and Freddy Kruger himself Jackie Earle Haley. The premise also sounds disappointingly flat – body guard assumes the identity of his clients to protect them – to arouse much interest.

Most promising looking new properties have to go to Warehouse 13, Flash Forward and Stargate Universe. Warehouse 13 is enjoying record breaking viewing figures on the Syfy channel in the states, but time will tell if this blend of the X Files and Supernatural will live beyond its Raiders of the Lost Arc inspired premise. Flash Forward has a high concept starting point (everyone in the world simultaneously sees six months into their own future for two and a half minutes) that gives little indication of what the series has in store, but with a cast including Brit Joseph Fiennes and co-created by Blade scribe David S. Goyer I have high hopes. Stargate Universe on the other hand looks like the dark, character driven re-boot the series was crying out for, abandoning the shiny military bases for a bleak space ship setting and throwing Begbie into the mix for good measure (hopefully with random acts of psychopatic violence).

Not a bad line up I’m sure you’ll agree but with networks more ruthless than ever when it comes to renewals is it worth investing your time in so many new shows? It can be devastating to have a programme you have an emotional investment in cut-off prematurely but I’m sure you’ll agree even 14 episodes of Firefly were better than none.

Debuting at the arse-end of a disappointing summer you might expect this paradise set murder mystery from Pitch Black creator David Twohy to be a waste of everyone’s considerable talents; however A Perfect Getaway proves that, for Twohy at least, bigger budget isn’t necessarily better and that he may just have another good Riddick film in him yet.

Milla Jovovich and Steve Zahn star as Cliff and Cydney, a honeymooning couple on a Hawaiian vacation when they discover that another couple of newlyweds have been murdered by a man and a woman on a nearby island. Deciding to push on with their dream holiday they come across two pairs of ‘unhinged’ lovers – Nick and Gina (Hitman’s Timothy Olyphant and Lost’s Kiele Sanchez) and Kale and Cleo (George Kirk himself Chris Hemsworth and Planet Terror’s Marley Shelton) leading Cliff and Cydney to question whether they could be the killers’ next targets.

A Perfect Getaway is David Twohy’s  first non-genre film as a director (though he did script The Fugitive and G.I.Jane) and he does an impressive job of making a lacklustre, slow build script based around one blindingly obvious twist into a taut and exciting piece of work. He clearly hasn’t lost any of the visual flair he demonstrated so effectively in Pitch Black (used expertly to create an otherworldly feel) but which was entirely absent from its over-reaching follow up. Creative set-pieces, a nice split screen chase and no-nonsense choices in the editing room are let down slightly by a bewilderingly long and pointless flashback just over an hour in that hammers the twist over the audience’s head enough times it’s a wonder there aren’t more walking out of the cinema with concussion.

The slow-build/climactic chase structure of the script works well within the confines of the film’s 95 minutes. The problem however is some decidedly dodgy dialogue and a Scream-esque attempt to be postmodern that falls flat on its face, giving any viewer that pays attention to choice hints like ‘act two twist’ and ‘red herring’ no problem in working out exactly where the film is heading. There are very few ‘twist’ films that live up to their attempts to wrong foot the audience (The Usual Suspects and The Crying Game being the best modern examples) and A Perfect Getaway completely disappoints in this respect with canyon sized plot holes and early conversations between characters that make no sense once the twist is revealed, however there’s enough good going on around the centrepiece to forgive its rotten core.

The leads are perfectly watchable, Timothy Olyphant in particular steals every scene he’s in as the former special ops soldier/shark fisherman/screenwriter Nick whose tall tales seem too extravagant to believe, but Hemsworth and Shelton are little more than arbitrary caricatures, with surprisingly little screentime, who serve no purpose other than to throw the viewer off the scent. Zahn and Jovovich seem like an odd pairing initially but do well throughout as the on-edge couple, coming into their own when the film switches gears.

Although it might not be the best advert for Hawaii the film is shot beautifully by Mark Plummer, perfectly capturing the feel of paradise even after the descent into hell but the score is forgettable, default Hollywood thriller fare. Despite a disappointing centrepiece twist; good performances and impressive direction from genre veteran Twohy raise A Perfect Getaway to the level of an unexpected treat and prove there’s still something to look forward to from a promised return to Riddick’s small-scale roots.

Friday 21 August, 24 hours after the trailer for James Cameron’s long awaited return to sci-fi feature film-making debuted to a mixed response online, viewers around the globe were treated to approximately 16 minutes of footage in glorious 3D from the mysterious Avatar. But after years of lofty promises and barely a glimpse of what the film might look like, did last week’s information overload propel expectations into another galaxy, or sink them in the swampy marsh of Pandora?

Well, it’s hard to say. While the trailer certainly didn’t seem to be evidence of the game-changing motion picture we were all expecting; as an original SF story, set on an entirely alien world which isn’t a sequel, remake or adaptation Avatar is, at the very least, a refreshing change of pace in modern Hollywood. It’s even arguable that Cameron has already instigated his Avatar revolution without even finishing the film as the ubiquitous 3D bandwagon picks up passengers as diverse as Steven Spielberg, Peter Jackson and horror hack David R. Ellis whose 3D Final Destination flick hits screens this Friday.

But what about those 16 minutes? For the most part the footage consisted of extended scenes merely glimpsed at in the trailer but there were a few welcome additions. After a brief introduction from a shaggy looking Cameron our first glimpse is of Stephen Lang’s Col. Quaritch as he delivers a speech (no doubt delivered dozens of times before) to a batch of fresh-faced recruits to be sent down to Pandora. It’s standard boot camp stuff but Col. Quaritch is no Apone. What impresses most about the scene is that Cameron is clearly not treating 3D like a gimmick, hurling objects out of the screen like almost every 3D animated/horror film thus far. The 3D is used to give a palpable sense of depth and for my money is much more immersive in scenes like this than high octane action sequences where the problem of motion blur acts to instantly distance you from proceedings (more on this later).

The next sequence gives us our first look at Sigourney Weaver’s Dr. Grace Augustine and Drag Me to Hell’s Dileep Rao as Dr. Max Patel putting Sam Worthington’s disabled war veteran Jake Sully into the Apple version of a PET scanner, which will link his mind with his Na’vi Avatar. Weaver looks to be on fine form as the tough talking doctor, bitter at the fact Jake has been chosen to join her on a mission to Pandora despite having no experience of its hostile environment. The scene also makes it clear Avatar’s got a sense of humour, it’s not just going to be environmental messages, strange worlds and aerial dogfights.

The next scene was an extended look at the moment from the trailer where Jake in his avatar’s body wakes up in a lab for the first time. You’ll be happy to know that a combination of the 3D and being able to watch this short scene in full will remove almost all worries you may have from the brief glimpse in the trailer. Movement looks much more natural and the effects work much more convincing than the trailer seemed to imply. Abandon the hope that the Na’vi are going to look photoreal and it’s unlikely you are going to be disappointed by what Digital Domain have achieved with this alien race come December.

The remainder of the footage took place on Pandora. If you hadn’t noticed from the trailer because the Na’vi avatars are genetically engineered with the DNA of their human hosts they take on certain characteristics, in particular facial features. The next scene gave us a brief glimpse of Weaver’s Na’vi avatar for the first time, which looked uncannily like a young, smooth skinned version of herself. In the scene Jake’s avatar has to stand his ground in the face of one of Pandora’s many hostile creatures, an exotic hammerhead rhinoceros with colourful peacock-esque feathers protruding from its skull – it’s a promising hint of what to expect from the world Cameron and his team have been building for the last four years.

The scene concludes with Jake’s avatar being chased by the Thanator glimpsed in the trailer, but unfortunately the scene in full isn’t much of an improvement on the questionable effects work seen there and the rapid, destructive pursuit suffers from wicked motion blur, making a large portion of proceedings near incomprehensible. It’s a common problem with rapid camera movements in 3D films and one that Cameron doesn’t seem to have solved. On the plus side the effects work on Jake’s avatar in this scene is stunning with naturalistic movement and convincing skin textures creating an entirely believable CG creation.

The two remaining scenes both featured Zoe Saldana’s indigenous tribal Na’vi Neytiri, first fighting off a pack of wolf-like creatures who attack Jake and then berating him for making her do so. Saldana’s Neytiri looks suitably elegant and otherworldly but the broken English and hostile relationship which will inevitably turn into affection is something we’ve seen far too many times before.

Thankfully Cameron saved the best for last in a scene where Jake’s avatar, now seemingly an accepted member of the indigenous Na’vi tribe, must bond with a banshee (the flying creatures seen in the trailer) organically, but not after a tense fight on a perilous cliff edge. Again the effects work impresses and the 3D does a great job of making that inevitable ‘hanging off the edge’ moment look even more terrifying. As the banshee takes off there are a few motion blur problems, but it’s not as big an issue as in the earlier scene and once the camera settles further back the remaining moments are electric.

Together with the trailer this 16 minute peek at Cameron’s baby has reassured me somewhat that come December we won’t just be watching Fern Gully meets the Star Wars prequels. There are a few things to worry about, in particular motion blur from the 3D technology and the CG slipping into ‘uncanny valley’ more often than not, but overall there is much more to be excited about than dismayed, and of course even after these 16 minutes it’s impossible to tell if Cameron’s script will deliver on the potential. Come December 18 we’ll all know if Cameron is still the ‘King of the World’.

Seeing as every man, woman and their no doubt sci-fi loving dog has now seen the teaser trailer for James Cameron’s 3D opus Avatar I thought I’d chip in with a few thoughts of my own. As a huge Cameron fan (Aliens is probably my favourite film) I’ve been following the development of Avatar more obsessively than most, every little sliver of information, every behind the scenes promo picture and even screenshots of the game seemed to confirm more and more that Cameron wasn’t going to put a foot wrong with his $200 million epic. But while there’s a lot to like from the brief glimpse of the film we were given yesterday there are some elements which prove to be an unwelcome cause for concern.

The first impression you’ll get when watching the trailer is that Cameron seems to have nailed the sense of scale this story no doubt requires. Mountains hang in the air like helium filled balloons on the hostile planet of Pandora, the camera swoops over a lush, verdant forest that stretches as far as the mist allows you to see and a frenzied battle in the sky between Banshee riding Na’vi and Hornet VTOL aircraft looks to be a thing of chaotic beauty.

The environmental effects work is stunning, as is the character effects work but there are some glaring early issues. While many touted Avatar’s revolutionary 3D effects work as “photorealistic” before the release of the trailer, not many are doing so now. But in his defence Cameron has always claimed photorealistic computer creations aren’t possible at present and that even the one frame out of 10 that falls into “Uncanny Valley” means the human eye will instantly recognise the effect as a computer creation. This of course is an even bigger problem when you try to create even vaguely humanoid creatures like the blue warrior race Na’vi.

Their skin textures don’t look quite right, far too smooth, but the long shot of Jake’s avatar’s feet look as real as CG feet ever will; the real problems are their faces and general body movement. It all looks disappointingly like something from one of the Star Wars prequels or at worst something from a video game cutscene. In the film’s defence this is all no doubt unfinished effects work, in 2D, that should be polished to perfection once it reaches screens in December but I’m starting to fear that Avatar could not possibly live up to the hype. The Thanator in particular (the large reptilian creature that chases Jake’s avatar when he first arrives on the planet) doesn’t look very good at all with its shiny skin texture and dodgy lighting effects looking more like something out of Doom 3 than a $200 million film. The amploaders look a little too much like the APCs from the Matrix sequels for my liking and strangely even the human characters (barring the early close-ups) look CG as well, more likely down to unfinished compositing effects that will hopefully be sorted out before release.

The final battle in the skies of Pandora looks nothing short of spectacular however, and if Cameron’s purported 14 years of script work is anything to go by the film should have a narrative to back up its astronomical cost. The teaser doesn’t give much of a hint about what we can expect from James Horner’s score, we see very few of the human cast and there’s only one brief line of dialogue in the whole thing but, Cameron gave viewers exactly what they wanted to see – a tease of what one of the most expensive films in the world is going to look like. While it may have soured the impossibly high expectations of most there’s no doubt overall it’s a stunning teaser and hints that Cameron is still on track to deliver one of the best films of the year come Christmas.

For those unaware today (August 21^st) is worldwide Avatar day and to celebrate 15 minutes of footage is being screened at select cinemas across the globe. Your intrepid blogger will himself be seeing said footage at 6pm today so expect a full report soon!

With the summer blockbuster season crawling to a finish for another year there’s no time to lament the disappointing lack of big hitters this year when there’s a whole winter of genre goodies to look forward to.

The unfathomably successful Final Destination franchise reaches its fourth instalment at the end of August – the imaginatively titled The Final Destination (by the creative minds behind the rebranding of The Fast and the Furious no doubt) – the gimmick this time round, it’s the first in 3D. If it has half the fun factor of February’s My Bloody Valentine 3D it should be one to look out for.

The first week in September sees District 9 and Gamer going head-to-head for the genre crown. Already gaining stellar reviews across the pond District 9 looks likely to be the sleeper hit of the year with a fantastic viral campaign raising expectations through the roof and an intriguing apartheid metaphor premise which, like all the best sci-fi, has something to say about the world we live in today. Gamer on the other hand looks like a bit of mindless fun but little more. It raises more interest than it should by having the creative duo responsible for the lunacy of Crank, Mark Neveldine and Brian Taylor, behind the camera and Dexter himself Michael C. Hall playing the film’s villain.

Space horror takes off the week after in the form of Pandorum, but after a promising looking teaser the recent theatrical trailer seems to hint that the film will share more in common with the likes of Event Horizon and Resident Evil than Alien or fright-fest video game Dead Space. Still it’s got Ben Foster and Dennis Quaid so it can’t be all bad.

New Bruce Willis vehicle Surrogates closes out the month – based on one of the most thought provoking comics in recent years by writer Robert Venditti, but directed by Terminator 3 hack Jonathan Mostow. Surrogates is unlikely to be anything more than a watered down, action driven shadow of the comic with a few decent set-pieces and enough explosions to distract you from what should have been a much better film. Then again I could be eating my words in a few weeks time.

Toy Story is getting re-released in 3D at the beginning of October, I’m not convinced the 3D will add anything to an established classic (Nightmare Before Christmas in 3D was underwhelming to say the least) but you can’t argue with the chance to see one of Pixar’s finest the way it should be seen more than 14 years since its debut (God that makes me feel old). If nothing it will also serve as a useful marketing tool for the debut of Up in the UK, almost five months after it first appeared in the States. Why Pixar insist on such a big gap between worldwide releases every year I’m not quite sure, but the wait is always worth it.

October 9 is a busy day as it also sees the release of Megan Fox’s man-eating horror Jennifer’s Body and Scorsese’s much anticipated Shutter Island which looks to be the master’s first foray into the world of the supernatural (not counting his episode of Amazing Stories – Mirror Mirror). Both at least show more promise than Zombieland, out at the end of October, which looks like little more than an American Shaun of the Dead with more zombie killing and less Cornettos.

Robert Zemeckis’ motion capture 3D version of A Christmas Carol debuts, oddly, at the beginning of November with Jim Carrey playing not just Scrooge but all of the ghosts that haunt him (a trailer has yet to be released), while Roland Emmerich is back on familiar disaster-strewn territory with big budget effects-fest 2012 exploding onto screens in November. Emmerich has been off the boil recently with 10,000 BC proving to be little more than the dumb man’s Apocalypto, but 2012 shows promise of a return to the much more accomplished works of his early career like Stargate and Independence Day.

The second instalment in the wildly popular Twilight franchise New Moon drops in November but the best is saved for December with Richard Kelly’s new thriller The Box hopefully marking a return to the quality of work seen in Donnie Darko as opposed to his much maligned follow-up Southland Tales; Where the Wild Things Are hopefully proving that a troubled production doesn’t always mean a bad film; and James Cameron’s Avatar hopefully living up to the hype.

To say Cameron’s first theatrical feature since 1997’s Titanic is hotly anticipated would be the understatement of the year. The drip feed of information on his revolutionary 3D work is set to become a torrent this Friday as the world is granted its first glimpse of Pandora and the Na’vi with an online trailer and select screenings of 15 minutes of footage all around the globe. It’s hard to know what to expect but based on past form it’s hard to imagine Avatar being anything other than a stellar return to the big screen for the king of the world.

Sometimes it’s hard to know what to expect when investing your precious time in a brand new TV show, but one glance at a 30-second TV spot or even a couple of on-set photos and you will know exactly what to expect from Legend of the Seeker – the new fantasy show, which debuted on the Sci-Fi channel last Thursday. Lord of the Rings by Xena probably doesn’t do it justice but the influences of both were clear in this two-part season opener.

Based on the Sword of Truth book series by Terry Goodkind (the show was originally going to be called Wizard’s First Rule – the title of the first instalment in the series) the set-up for Legend of the Seeker is nothing fantasy fans haven’t seen a hundred times before. A young “confessor” Kahlan (Bridget Regan) is rescued by woodsman-with-a-destiny Richard Cypher (Craig Horner) from a group of armour clad warriors after passing through the boundary between D’Hara and Westland in search of the legendary “seeker” who, prophecies say, will end the tyrannical rule of Darken Rahl. Initially dismissing Richard as the woodsman he is (how many times have we seen that old chestnut?) Kahlan abandons him in search of wizard Zeddicus (Bruce Spence) who is in this land protecting the young seeker under the guise of an old mad-man. Soon enough the truth is revealed, the seeker gets his sword and Darken Rahl’s soldiers kill Richard’s father sending the trio on a quest that promises to change the fate of their world forever.

As far as set-ups go it’s bog standard fantasy fare but it gets the job done and introduces a few unique elements into the mix. Kahlan as a confessor has the power to “touch” people, at which point the person will be devoted to her, confessing absolute truth and even fighting to the death to protect her if needs be. Unfortunately using her power leaves her extremely weak for a lengthy period after meaning two of the shows main protagonists must rely on swordplay in battle, but thankfully the numerous fights featured in this season opener impress with choreography of unexpected quality and production values that wouldn’t look out of place on the big screen. The sheer volume of slow-motion becomes a bit of a joke by the end but it’s well done and looks better than close-up quick cuts could ever hope to (just less in the future please).

Of the three leads Bruce Spence is the standout. Again it’s standard wizard fare – Gandalf lite if you will – but genre veteran Spence successfully injects the show with a much needed sense of humour, a quality that seems to be entirely absent in Richard and Kahlan. Horner and Regan both get the job done, but little more with line deliveries ranging from middling to awful and some laugh-out-loud bad “looking surprised” acting. It doesn’t help that Horner looks like a Hollyoaks cast-off but they do an admirable job in the action set-pieces and it’s still early days. Unfortunately the creators seem to have made a big mistake casting Craig Parker as Darken Rahl, he played Elf Haldir in Lord of the Rings and its shows as he is far from the imposing figure one would expect from a tyrant, like Sauron if he were a rock star rather than a floating eye.

The series certainly shows promise and as one of the few Dungeons and Dragons-esque shows to hit the screen since the demise of Xenia (not counting the god-awful Krod Mandoon – who thought that was a good idea?) it’s certainly a welcome addition to the weekly roster. It looks amazing (shot in New Zealand no less) and the cinematography is up there with the best on TV, but the cgi is dreadful (a TV budget can’t cover everything) and it needs to do something to distinguish itself from the likes of Lord of the Rings if it’s ever to create a world that feels unique. Far from exceptional but a series that shows a lot of promise.