With our 2 for 1 movie coupon in hand we decided to go see this knowing full well that it was likely to be pretty bad. On arrival at the movie theatre we found out that the coupon was not valid for the newest movies out. So that was annoying.

Well, it was pretty much as bad as I thought it was going to be. The good: Some mildly amusing bits, some pretty good special effects. The bad: A serious lack of action and a lack of real emotion. Nicolas Cage plays Johnny Blaze, who starts the film as a boy who learns his dad has cancer and so sells his soul to the devil to save him. Except there is no real strong bond shown between the two of them, and when he finds out his dad has cancer he doesn't even look that bothered. He then grows up to be a stuntman who, again, doesn't seem that bothered that he is cursed by the devil, looking upon it as a minor annoyance to him rather than being wracked with pain and anguish about it. He needed to go on some kind of journey as a character, going from tormented soul to accepting his curse and becoming the Ghost Rider, but he just kind of stumbles through the film taking it all in his stride.

Over Christmas I have seen quite a few movies, and can't be bothered to review them all. So here's the quick versions:

• Night at the Museum : Surprisingly good, but basically a kid's film, it's like a funnier Jumanji. With Ricky Gervais in it - who as always is just himself, but bloody funny.
• My Super-Ex Girlfriend : Really fucking bad.
• Beerfest : Really fucking funny.
• Talledaga Nights : Alright, much worse than I thought it would be - nowhere near as good as Anchorman.
• Clerks 2 : Bad. Like Episode One bad, going back and revisiting something that used to be good, but just goes through the motions. Clerks 2 has the same level of dick and fart jokes, but none of the charm of the original - it's amusing in pieces but the once-clever Star Wars in-jokes and references have been replaced by not that funny jokes about Lord of the Rings that make the characters look old and bitter, and not witty and hip anymore.
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A great man once said "It's a kind of magic." That man's name was Christopher Lambert in the excellent movie Highlander. Today I saw another movie featuring a different "kind of magic". It was called The Prestige and here is my review.

It's pretty great. Not GREAT great, but it's a well acted, well directed, intelligently written film that outshines the majority of films that I have seen recently. There's just something classy about it that puts it a level above a lot of other, more generic films. I knew I wanted to see the film because after seeing the trailers, I knew it looked good but had no idea where the story was going to go or what the characters would be like. It really was going to be a mystery, and what a mystery it is.

The 3rd in my "terrible films with gun-toting women" viewing list - it was just as bad as the other two. With perhaps the most nonsensical plot of them all : In the future, people with a "vampire" like disease are treated as an underclass, kept in camps and generally repressed - there's some kind of cure/weapon/mcguffin that everybody is after and some stuff blows up and lots of people die in ridiculously staged sword/gun fights.

And that's it...avoid.

Probably the least horrible of my recent batch of bad films, Underworld 2 has some good bits and is generally less ridiculous than Aeon Flux and Ultraviolet but suffers from many of the same faults, leaving it pretty much a mess.

The film starts with a prologue which helpfully explains the plot that is about to happen, which kind of ruins the first two-thirds of the film as characters try and uncover the secrets that we have been shown upfront. I like to call this the "Tomorrow Never Dies" method of plot twists - the Bond film that starts with us seeing a "stealth boat" attempting to start an international war, which is then followed by an hour of Bond investigating the incident only to find out that...it was a "stealth boat" attempting to start an international war. Fancy that! It robs the film of half the suspense when your characters are trying to uncover a mystery that you already know the answer to.

With not much on TV at the moment I have been renting some really bad films that I hadn't got round to watching. Three of them are very similar sci-fi themed movies with "kick-ass" female action heroees: Underworld 2, Ultraviolet and Aeon Flux.

Aeon Flux is apparently based on a decent cartoon/anime series, but it's not something I have ever seen. This future apparently is a cross between the Matrix and Bill & Ted, with half the population walking around brightly lit cities with ridiculous "futuristic" costumes on, and the other half in brooding dark, Neo-wannabe leatheresque outfits.

Bloodz vs Wolvez.

"Prepare for the ultimate battle of evil when two rival supernatural gangs wage war on the streets of New York City. The Bloodz are affluent vampires who rule downtown – controlling real estate, blood banks and financial institutions. The Wolvez are the werewolves who rule the night in the New York’s upper ghetto. Now, it’s a battle to the death to determine who will run the city in the day, the night, and for all eternity..."

Oh dear. I present for your viewing displeasure, the theme song from Casino Royale, the new James Bond film.

I didn't know that by "going back to Bond's roots" meant the 1980s. I mean, I love Rocky IV as much as the next man, but I don't think returning to the 80s cheesy rock film themes is going to be what makes James Bond great again...

United 93 tells the story of the only plane to be hijacked on 9-11 not to hit its intended target. Passengers, aware of the fate of the other planes, rushed the terrorists and the plane crashed into the ground.

Choosing to watch this on 9-11 was probably both a good and a bad move. Good, because it made me watch it with a more serious attitude. Bad, because it really is a powerful film and watching it in a serious frame of mind made it quite an emotional experience.

At times through the film I felt both sick to my stomach and close to tears. It's probably the closest experience you can have to recreating the emotion of hearing the news about 9-11 for the first time.

Having just upgraded my graphics, I was looking for a cheap game that was a bit of a change from all the (admittedly excellent) first-person shooters on the PC. While browsing for bargain games, I came across Path of Neo. While I haven't played it much yet, I was surprised to find it rekindling memories of how awesome I used to think The Matrix was.

The two (progressively worse) sequels tainted the memory of it, but the first film is still probably one of my top 10 films of all time - it's pretty much a perfect action film. I also remember how excited I was when I saw the trailers for Matrix Reloaded and how disappointed I was when it finally came out. Reloaded and Revolutions were so bad that it dampened mine, and everyone else's enthusiasm for the franchise. What could have been timeless and even maybe the next Star Wars is instead a joke.