Film reviews: Fuze is 90 minutes of relentless, high-octane crime drama
Aaron-Taylor Johnson as Major Tranter in Fuze Picture: Sky UK All Rights Reserved.
★★★★☆
Some heist movies build tension by following the perpetrators’ intricate planning; others lean into the chaos that inevitably ensues when the best-laid plans go awry.
(15A), which opens with the discovery of an unexploded WWII bomb on a building site in central London, goes for broke by tossing every heist movie convention into the mix.
An army bomb disposal squad headed by Major Tranter (Aaron Taylor-Johnson) is called in to nullify the threat, while Superintendent Susanna Greenfield (Gugu Mbatha-Raw) oversees the efficient evacuation of one of the busiest square miles in the world.
What Greenfield doesn’t know, however, is that a group of men in boilersuits have evaded evacuation; headed by The Man (Sam Worthington), they swing into action in the basement of a flat complex, drilling through the wall and into the vault of the bank next door, this just as the unexploded bomb, dormant for seventy years, suddenly starts ticking.
Written by Ben Hopkins and directed by David McKenzie (Hell or High Water), Fuze is a wonderfully slick multi-character tale that fairly rattles along, ramping up the tension with every successive twist.
But while fast-paced thrillers can often sacrifice character for the sake of a propulsive narrative, here the characters are sharply etched: Tranter, the ostensibly calm bomb disposal expert who is clearly suffering some form of PTSD; Greenfield, the capable policewoman whose abilities are stretched to breaking point by a situation spiralling out of her control; Karalis (Theo James), a charismatic gang member who embodies the cliché of no honour among thieves.
An unfortunately clumsy coda aside, during which the makers attempt to contextualise the thieves’ motivation, Fuze is high-octane entertainment, a twisty-turny yarn that feels like a six-episode crime drama crammed into a relentless 90 minutes.
★★☆☆☆
The world’s most famous animated plumbers, Mario (voiced by Chris Pratt) and Luigi (Charlie Day), return in (PG), which is a direct sequel to 2023’s .
When the Guardian of the Cosmos, aka Princess Rosalina (Brie Larson), is abducted by the evil Bowser Jr (Benny Safdie) in a bid to have his captured father Bowser Snr (Jack Black) set free, Rosalina’s sister Princess Peach (Anya Taylor-Joy) sets off on a rescue mission aided and abetted by the irrepressible Mario and Luigi and their new dino pal Yoshi (Donald Glover).
Given that it’s inspired by a video game, it comes as no surprise that virtually every scene finds Mario, Luigi and Princess Peach navigating increasingly dangerous levels of potential threat, although, given that this is aimed at a young audience, the peril is pretty mild.
Fizzing with a turbo-charged pacing, and a veritable kaleidoscope of exploding colour throughout, it is a largely visual spectacle akin to a fireworks display, dazzling but mindless.
★★★★★
As she looks back through old scrapbooks and watches her old movies, Novak speaks poignantly about her entire career and her deep desire for authenticity; of overcoming impostor syndrome, her bi-polar nature, and playing a variety of roles that helped her to discover her true self.
Essential viewing for any film buff, the movie is even more interesting when it turns to Novak’s vocation as a painter, and the art that she still creates, in part as an ongoing process of self-actualisation. ‘I was a shining star in the wrong galaxy,’ she says, justifying her reason for leaving Hollywood behind, a valediction that is simultaneously heartbreaking and uplifting.
- All theatrical releases
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