Vivienne Courto

Ok, so it got bad reviews and wasn’t renewed for a second season, but personally, I’m loving it! It’s a rollicking steampunk romp across (or more accurately- beneath) the Seven Seas that is very easy to watch. Thanks to a huge budget, it looks impressive and has a great international cast featuring some excellent lesser-known/up-and-coming actors (including a bunch of Australians and New Zealanders - hurrah for team Antipodes! 🇦🇺👏👏). Whilst not overly-taxing on the grey matter, it touches on some big themes like diversity, equality, friendship, leadership, vengeance, greed and basically how being a decent human being and treating others decently is probably the best approach in life. On top of all that, there’s plenty of good, old-fashioned action, adventure, drama, romance and humour to keep things galloping along for the duration. There are ‘goodies’ and ‘baddies’, but enough moral ambiguity to keep things interesting, plus a couple of characters whose motives remain intriguingly opaque to the end. (My favourite ‘star turn’ was the wonderful Richard E. Grant, who appears as a deliciously very bad baddie indeed!) If you’re the curmudgeonly type who dismisses positive messages of equality and whatnot as woke, commie nonsense, this is definitely not the series for you. Likewise, if you’re a Jules Verne purist, I urge you not to watch as the nod to “20,000 Leagues” is passing, at best. However, viewed for what it is - i.e. a visually spectacular sub-aquatic adventure yarn - Nautilus absolutely nails it and I’m sorry there’s no more to come!

No. Just “No”. Let me begin by saying that I love cats. I love T.S. Eliot’s “Old Possum’s Book of Practical Cats”. I love Judi Dench, Ian Mackellen and Idris Elba. In fact - by way of evidence - one of my three cats is a 5-year-old Burmese who just happens to be called Idris. So, dear reader, I sprinted to see this film with gleeful anticipation. Perhaps my expectations were too high. But the massive budget! The eye-popping special effects! The all-star cast! High expectations were exactly what these much-touted features were intended to create. So it’s not all my fault. Regrettably, Mr Hooper, I fear that at least some of the blame must rest with you. Like many disappointed viewers, my criticism lies principally with the character effects. However, NOT because the human-feline hybrid is so amazingly realistic that you pay a one-way, creeped-out visit to the Uncanny Valley. Personally, I’ve never really had an issue with the visual dissonance thang. For example, I really enjoyed “Beowulf”, despite - and partly because of - it’s semi-animation CGI overlay. It suited the mythic quality of the story. (Although, I admit I’d have sat through it pencilled on the corner of a flip-pad in stick figures just to hear Ray Winstone growl “Oi wiw kiw your monsta”...Guv...; in tones rather less Norse Hero and more Bloke Who Just Got Nicked Dahn The Jasmine Allen With A Lorry-load Of Moody Tellies. Pure cinema gold!!) No. My Principal objection to “Cats” the movie is that NONE OF THE CAST REMOTELY RESEMBLES A CAT!!! Despite the film’s massive budget and armies of acting, makeup and effects talent, I’ve seen better renditions of the imagined Felis sapiens on Red Dwarf and Dr Who! I believe the producers dialled-down the CGI facial effects because people found them creepy. For pity’s sake, dial them back up again. Or change the name of the film from “Cats” to “Famous People Pratting About in Onesies”. Either way.