Film, Action, Hannah McGill

Welcome to the Punch

James McAvoy and Andrea Riseborough star in this showy action flick from the director of Shifty

There is something distinctly hypocritical and pernicious about the way this homegrown thriller gestures towards a moral stance on gun violence, only to itself locate firearms as not only an absolutely critical element in effective policing, but also…

Flight

Some great effects and an intriguing moral quandry are sold short by a self-righteous finale

This action flick/courtroom drama/morality tale from the director of Back to the Future and Forrest Gump boasts a fine performance from Denzel Washington, a pivotal effects set piece of nail-biting intensity, and a third act so crushingly pious…

End of Watch

Jake Gyllenhaal continues trying to prove something – who can say what? – with this swaggering police potboiler, in which he plays reckless, foulmouthed, macho LAPD officer Brian Taylor, and looks, as ever, like a big pretty kitten on its way to have…

The Sweeney

Even without Danny Dyer and a followable backstory, Nick Love's reboot has verve and theatricality

Do policemen really have offices like that? Can ramifications have repercussions? What would be the gender-reversed equivalent of a Ray Winstone/Hayley Atwell love match? Will anyone ever do a makeup job on poor ginger Damian Lewis that doesn’t make him…

Prometheus

Ridley Scott's return to the Alien universe is compelling but inconsistent

When contributing to a franchise with singular cultural standing and an obsessive fan base, how does one evade one’s film being largely obscured by a firestorm of nitpicking, over-interpretation and delusional theorising? If one is Ridley Scott making…