Gladiator (M)
Director: Ridley Scott
Bug rating: three out of five

The newly crowned emperor of Rome faces a serious dilemma - and it's not just the fact that he was named after a chamber pot container.
The spineless, jawless, whimpering, cowardly Commodus would dearly love to order the death of his nemesis, the brave general Maximus, but the full house at the Colosseum wants the soldier spared.
Commodus dithers and his thumb tip waivers as the crowd shouts over and over again: "Welease Wussell!"
For these sports-hungry Roman spectators are quick to recognise a true talent, and under all the armour and beefcake out there in the blood-and-guts flecked arena they've spotted dinky-di, true-blue Aussie/New Zealand actor, Wussell Crowe fresh from his Oscar-nominated role in The Insider.
Adding to Commodus's quandry is the fact that the actor playing him, the Phoenix Joaquin, formerly known as Leaf or Stream or some such thing, knows how important it is to despatch Maximus as quickly as possible.
For it is indeed crunch time in ancient Rome, and two hours into this remake of Ben Hur/Spartacus/The Robe/Cleopatra, Commodus is acutely aware that it's a lineball decision as to which actor will take out the 2001 coveted Bugsie for male actor using the least number of facial expressions in a leading role.
Commodus/Joaquin knows he has it won if he can just get that pesky thumb to point at Maximus's K-Mart sandals, because with a full half-hour still to run, another couple of subtle lip curls with pout will have him bounding up to the podium on Bugsies night to thank Ridley Scott for his lack of direction and the cinematographer for always shooting his face with his eyes in total darkness, thus avoiding the necessity to do any eye acting which could have cost him the coveted gong.
Besides, it has come as a complete shock to see his former general in the main ring, because Commodus thought he was long dead.
Commodus had trottled his own father Marcus Arilius for having the temerity to pass on the reins of power to the general and looking too much like a really old Richard Harris.
Commodus had then ordered the deaths of the general and his family in a very sensible two-for-one deal.
Now years later with the Bugsie up for grabs, Commodus being the weak and vacillating creature that he is spares Wussell, thus allowing Scott (Blade Runner, Alien) to stage a few more grand gladiatorial spectacles to round out an enjoyable evening's computerised blood-letting.
It seems like just a few minutes of Commodus pouting and lip-curling and trying to get up close and personal with his sister for the morning glory of Rome - and some minor Senate intrigue involving a stutter-less Derek Jacobi - and it's welcome back live to the arena and World Championsip Gladiating where the brave Wussell is being forced to fight not just the greatest gladiator of all time, but a clutch of man-eating Bengal tigers to boot.
Luckily for Wussell and the screenplay by David H Franzoni and John Logan, the tigers are all on chains which, while seemingly defeating the purpose of their being there in the first place, prevent them from eating our hero.
The tigers growl a lot and look incredibly fierce, but as the fight continues between our brave protagonists, they can eventually be spotted lazing about in the background, purring mightily as if they've just enjoyed a hearty meal of whiskers and the Christians that they were attached to.
Maximus wins yet again - and poor old Commodus has this brainwave of fighting the general himself to settle matters once and for all and become the only trooly, roolly hero of Rome. This proves not to be the smartest of career moves.

- Don Gordon-Brown

Angela's Ashes (M)
Director: Alan Parker
Bug rating: Four out of five

Forgive me, father, for I have sinned.
For it is almost 50 years since my last confession.
Long time, eh? And that's just the start of my sins. The biggest sin of all is that I'm not Catholic.
I'm just hoping you can find it in your heart of hearts to forgive me on behalf of the big guy upstairs, because it's sure as hell dark in here. Now I know what you Micks see in this confessional procedure. Sweet fuck all.
But the reason I'm in here all repentant and looking desperately for a light switch is that I've just watched Angela's Ashes and I have a shocking confession to make.
I enjoyed it a lot – and I'm pretty sure I wasn't supposed to. Especially as a non-practising, non-Catholic.
The experience has left me racked with lapsed-Methodist guilt as a result and that's why I'm here today sitting in the dark wondering if anyone would be able to see me if self-abuse becomes a viable option to my current state of distress but nevertheless seeking your guidance and forgiveness.
For you see, father, I even laughed out loud along with all the obvious Catholics in the audience at that confessional scene where a doddery old priest orders a few Hail Marys and other such mumbo jumbo as absolution to the young Frank McCourt who found that a well-instilled Catholic guilt still couldn't keep his hand off his adolescent and demanding cock.
Forgive me too, father, for chuckling also at the interdenominational rivalry depicted in the squalid poverty-riddled backstreets of pre-war Limerick, with dirt-poor Cattleticks looking down their noses at dirt-poor Protestants because of their surnames, accents or where they hailed from. And visciously versa.
There is humour, surely, in such dirt-pour sods not seeing that they had far more in common as downtrodden working class poor – not the least of which is presumably sharing the same God – than they ever would with their own church leaders, looking down their own noses as they sanctimoniously dish out charity to members of their flock kept poor by the church's strict rulings of that same God's attitudes to contraception, wifely duties, etc, etc, etc.
It must surely be a sin, father, to find any humour at all among such destitution, hypocrisy, hunger and pointless lives, where scant savings left over from burying infants are wasted on pretty dresses and nifty little suits for first communions/confirmations for those lucky enough to survive.
I blame director Alan Parker (The Commitments/Midnight Express) and Pulitzer Prize-winning author McCourt's rites of passage story for making me laugh at the incessant rain, the shit and piss-filled alleyways, the constant death from the cold and the rising damp, the drunken fathers without a cause and the ragged, hagged women left without dignity or hope.
Only God knows how hard life must have been for these people.
And thank that very same, merciful, God that they at least had their religion and that fine black medicinal stuff called Guinness to sustain them through these darkest of hours.

- Don Gordon-Brown

Music of the Heart (PG)
Director: Wes Craven
Bug rating: Four out of five

This is the movie Mr Holland's Opus tried to be.
Each story's much the same – a music teacher battles other teachers, bureaucracy and indifference to instill a love of organised sound into their pupils – but Music of the Heart is more uplifting and emotionally charged because it focuses more on the success of the pupils than that of their crotchety teacher.
Besides, Meryl Streep on a good day is much better to look at than Richard Dreyfus and wasn't his opus finale an absolute shocker?
It was such a cacophony of disjointed sounds that you left the cinema thinking: "Shit, this guy wasn't wrong - he really did waste his life!"
By comparison, the finale to Music of the Heart, while based on a schmaltzy, tear-jerky Carnegie Hall concert where the brilliance of the kids' playing defies belief as they fiddle away with the likes of Issac Stern and Itzhak Perlman, is a four-tissue gimme for people who love rags-to-riches; little people make good; look, Ma, I'm just a Negro but I'm playing the white man's instrument! type storyline.
The writing's crisper, too, and the true-life story of Roberta Guaspari, a man-dependent soul who finally realises that the only thing that should be constantly plucked over in her life is her beloved violin, doesn't always travel down anticipated pathways.
Roberta finally casts herself free from her ex-husband and a subsequent affair with Aiden Quinn to bring her love of music to a bunch of poor kids in Harlem, with the support of the school principal (Angela Bassett) and a co-teacher (Gloria Estefan).
Wes Craven (Scream, Nightmare on Elm Street) has by-passed his favoured slasher genre to give us a slashing good movie that tugs effectively at the heart strings. He should do this sort of stuff more often.

- Don Gordon-Brown