Beast review – down-and-out MMA fighter film is predictable but still lands punches

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Directed by Tyler Atkins and co-written by Russell Crowe, this Australian feature follows a familiar playbook – but you’ll find yourself surprisingly invested Ah, yes: the promising fighter who could’ve been a contender, could’ve been a champion. But then life intervened: bad decisions were made, promises broken, the wrong paths taken. But what if the past came knocking on his door? What if our long-in-the-tooth hero could have another crack, set things right, get in the ring one more time? To say that Tyler Atkins’ Australian martial arts drama Beast plucks moves from a well-worn playbook is putting it lightly. This is one of those genre films in which nothing surprises in broad terms; it’s the small pivots and deviations that matter. Given the ring of familiarity surrounding everything, I was surprised to find myself as invested in the film as I was, particularly because so many chest-thumping sports movies are already out there, many of which I find about as intellectually engaging ...
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Mea Culpa review – Tyler Perry’s schlocky Netflix thriller descends into silliness

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Kelly Rowland and Trevante Rhodes do some heavy lifting in an often hilariously messy attempt to recall classics like Jagged Edge and Basic Instinct

There are small pockets of low-rent fun to be had in Tyler Perry’s lurid erotic thriller Mea Culpa, some intentional, most less so. It’s a film that, yes, is about a woman called Mea who is also, yes, at fault, as women often are in the writer-director’s films. The mogul has gained a reputation for punishing his female characters, especially when they dare to stop believing in their husband, no matter how awful his behaviour might be, like in his atrocious 2018 thriller Acrimony, where he had the gall to waste, and chastise, Taraji P Henson.

His latest target is a powerful lawyer played by Kelly Rowland, making a convincing case as leading lady, trapped in a marriage with a letdown, a man fired from his job as an anaesthetist for turning up to work high and drunk (!). He’s also under the thumb of his vile mother, played to such laughable extremes by Kerry O’Malley that I half-expected her to literally start breathing fire. When Mea is approached about defending an extravagant painter, Zayir (Moonlight’s MVP Trevante Rhodes, who deserves far better), accused of murdering his girlfriend, she initially turns it down, not just because the case seems unwinnable but because her brother-in-law would be the opposing attorney (!). But when the aforementioned battleaxe, also dying of cancer (!), insists that Mea not take the case, she decides to rebel and soon finds herself falling for her client. Kinky sex follows.

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