Pete's Dragon, The Shallows, Wiener-Dog The Film Review

tomorrow's new Premier League season on the cricket. That all coming up

at 6:30pm. Now time for The Film Review.

Hello and welcome to The Film Review BBC News. To take us through this

week's similar releases is Anna Smith. What we have their say? It is

all about the animals, we have Phil, the Disney film is reimagined for

the modern era. And we have The Shallows, in which Blake Lively is

threatened by a shark, a summer horror thriller. And finally

Wiener-Dog follows a dog as she goes from an eccentric family to another.

A dog a shark and a dragon. Let's look at the Dragon. Phil, I wasn't

expecting to love this but I adore it. It is charming. Disney had been

doing a live action series for a while, Jungle book... I like to

Cinderella but I didn't like the BFG very much. This did everything the

BFG was supposed to do. A charming story of boy meets dragon and be

friends dragon, loosely based on the original. At the beginning it

reminded me of Up. I was choked up from the start of this. The little

boy is orphaned and wanders into the forest and what is New Zealand, but

passing for America. He befriends a dragon. The Dragon sort of brings

him up and then he used as covered many years later by the forest

ranger, played by Bryce Dallas Howard, who has always maintained

she doesn't believe her father, played by Robert Redford, that there

are dragons in the forest. Let's take a look.

Looking for something? You scared me. Why aren't you asleep? The same

reason you're not, I suppose. I guess you heard about the boy? I

did. Word travels fast in this town. How long has he been out there? Six

years. Six years? No one can survive in that forest for six years, or at

least not alone. Well, he says... He says he wasn't alone. He drew this?

He says it's his friend, from the forest, and it reminded me of... I

know what it reminded you of. That one?

It is kind of do you believe in magic, yes, dragons do exist.

Terrific performance from Oakes Fegley, the young boy who plays

Pete. The Dragon itself is the star, SEG creation with a mossy like fur

and very doglike movement. It doesn't speak, which is away is a

blessing in these films. As an adult I found myself watching it and

getting very involved. It is not just a kids film. It harks back to

the kind of Disney films of the 70s, the matinee films. Very wholesome

family values, which can be very sickening, but is done in a very

elegant and simplistic way. The Dragon is a bit like Chewbacca,

hairy and very. Also, one of the difficult lines in children's films

as Howdy make the Dragon scary enough kids kind of greener little

bit but aren't terrified question mark this is definitely a friend --

friendly dragon but only friendly to children it trusts. You have people

coming in to hunt it and you see what is capable of, but it is a

large, wounded animal. It is capable of being invisible, which is

exciting. The flying scenes are the best, the boy flying on the back of

the Dragon. I was tried in the Venney children film or story which

really connects with you when they are separated from their parents.

This one is the sad event, death of parents at the start. But Jungle

book, there are so many in which the whole point is separation and

finding something in the animal kingdom or supernatural kingdom they

can relate to? Absolutely, Disney specialise in this. It is rare to

have a child with both parents in a Disney film. This is also that if he

should we assimilate into society for the human world. The Shallows. A

very different non-family film. This does Blake Lively, who is coming

into her own as an actress. Originally best known for TV and

then marrying Ryan Reynolds and great fashion choices but she puts

in a good performance in this film, which could have been a low rent

thriller. But it is glossy and really sustains the tension. She

plays a girl who goes out to a secluded beach and finds the sort of

paradise she was looking for. She goes surfing, perhaps unwisely

continue surfing when everyone else has left the beach and then is

attacked by a shark. She then crawls to the nearest reef, only 200 yards

from the shore, with the shark circling and with nobody around and

badly injured. Luckily she is a medical student or the film would

have been a lot shorter! She tries to survive. It is a castaway

survivalist thriller as much of a shark thriller. I heard about this

film on my first reaction was, it is amazing this has never been done

before. If you take jaws and a survivalist kind of film, will she

or won't she, how can she get back to the beach without the big monster

and the tide is coming in and getting higher and higher... To me

it is a brilliant concept. It is a good exercise in suspense. The end

is a little ludicrous but prior to that I was with it. Jaume

Collet-Serra is an accomplished director. It is better than it might

initially seem. Isn't it something more like 127 hours, the guy stuck

down the hole and what does he do about his armour? What can he do to

get out question yes, one person against nature and will they survive

with their wits? Wiener-Dog. Todd Solondz, great director, especially

with Happiness. This is probably his best work since then. An American

Indian director. He uses this dog to wonder from family to family. There

are four different groups of people, owners, including Greta Gerwig and

Danny DeVito. He plays a very faded university lecturer, who talks about

film studies a lot. His students hate him. He's also trying to flog a

screenplay and his agent won't return his calls. Eventually his

agent says, I a hot, new agent for you. Let's see the conversation may

have. -- I have a hot, new agent. Hello? Hello, this is David question

at please hold, I have Karen Hauer. -- for you. How are you doing? I

don't have cancer. I was warned about you. How are things going? Oh

my god... Are you sitting down? Yes. I slipped a copy of your script over

to Jane Marks. When do you think they will read it by? I should know

by Monday. Really they are desperate for new material. Did you read it?

Are you kidding me question at it is genius. I'm telling you, the script

is going to be a game changer. I want to see the dog! Black

comedy... The problem with that comedy, when I see that I tend to

think, it's not that funny. It is actually really funny. If you had

seen the build-up to that, it is quite sharp. I like the idea of

cutting through the idea of people being insincere and stringing people

along instead of saying, I love the script, but they don't mean it at

all. They're just tried to maintain oration job with someone who was

once successful. You get a sense of autobiographical nature to this.

Julie is a star for me, she plays a mother who has a son, once this dog.

It is such a relief, dogs are nearly always mail in films! There is the

whole thing about the dog being sprayed and the kid says, what about

if the kid wants puppies quest much she says, it won't, it's a complete

myth. It is like the same hotel room or the house, to get a series of

stories together and it only works if the stories are good. Most of the

stories are good, but not all of them. It doesn't add up to much but

it is funny at the time. You said that very sincerely, unlike the

agent. Your Best of the week is Maggie's Plan. Yes, another Greta

Gerwig film. She plays a young woman who is to turn in to have a child.

Then she meets Ethan Hawke, plays a university professor. He happens to

be married but that does not get in the way. When Love doesn't run as

smoothly, she tries to get him back with his ex played by Julianne

Moore. A terrific cast. It is a bit of poking fun of academia. Julianne

Moore in one of her scary woman rolls? Yes, a harsh Danish woman.

Your DVD of the week has got an Olympic raver? Yes, Eddie The

Eagles. I love this film, and other family film. -- Olympic flavour. It

is the story of the underdog, the Olympic ski jumper who shouldn't

have succeeded and somehow got to the Olympics. Real feel-good. We

love that, especially now we are winning some medals, makes it even

better. That's it for this week though,

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