THE MAN FROM U.N.C.L.E. (12A)

2 stars

There can be little doubt that turning old TV programmes into movies can be a lucrative business, with Mission: Impossible – Rogue Nation currently lighting up box offices and flying the flag for a two-decade old franchise.

Unfortunately that magic has evaporated with the big screen adaptation of another 60s spy show in the shape of The Man From U.N.C.L.E., which deals in Cold War spy shenanigans, albeit coming up woefully short in the actual shenanigans department.

A dull opening sequence introduces us to CIA agent Napoleon Solo (Henry Cavill), who is in East Berlin trying to bust out Gaby (Alicia Vikander) over the wall. Trying to stop him is KGB agent Illya Kuryakin (Armie Hammer), by means of a pedestrian car chase and laboured banter.

It fails to pick up after this, as the pair are told by their superiors that they must work together to prevent a nuclear bomb being built, which has something or other to do with Gaby’s uncle. She poses as Kuryakin’s wife as the - for want of a better word - action moves to Rome and a lot of talking ensues.

It’s all punishingly dull, paced like treacle and the exact opposite of what you might reasonably have expected from a Guy Ritchie spy movie, given what he did with Sherlock Holmes. It’s also the exact opposite of a summer movie, entirely lacking life or energy, and absolutely nothing happens for the first hour or more. It’s supposed to be a sprightly caper and the music seems to think the film is jaunty, but that’s not backed up by what’s on screen.

It’s not even as though while nothing is happening we’re getting to know those involved or being entertained by them. Solo and Kuryakin are dull as individuals and chemistry-deficient when they get together.

Taking place mostly in Italy, it’s remarkably glamour-free, while the need to make it look like the 60s adds a horrible CG sheen to some of the locations. Elsewhere honking innuendo passes for humour and it treats the audience like idiots through painful exposition.

So the humour is lame, the action is non-existent and the espionage is thrill-less. It should be Bond, but it’s barely Johnny English, aiming for laid back but overdoing it to the extent that it becomes an immensely boring failure.

Director: Guy Ritchie

Running time: 116 mins

PIXELS (12A)

2 stars

A bunch of kids who were video game champions in the 80s are called on to save the world in the present day in this misfiring sci-fi comedy.

Footage of the games were sent into space, where aliens intercepted it and mistook it for a declaration of war, so now as adults it’s up to them to use their video game skills to defeat the aliens, who appear as the likes of Pac-Man and Donkey Kong.

It’s a dopey idea, but let’s just go with it - this is after all a film where Kevin James plays the president. Of the United States. Of America. Peter Dinklage carves out the least flimsy comic moments and Adam Sandler is more likeable than he often can be, but there’s little going on here in terms or real ideas or wit.

There’s nothing offensive, it’s all just very lazy and uninspired, doing little with the premise and trying to coast on nostalgia alone. Hey everyone, who remembers the 80s? They were a thing that happened weren’t they, so let’s just mention something that existed then because that’s comedy. Weak.

Director: Chris Columbus

Running time: 106 mins

MISTRESS AMERICA (15)

3 stars

Student Tracy (Lola Kirke), freshly arrived in New York, looks up Brooke (Greta Gerwig), the daughter of the man her mum is soon to marry.

The relationship between these would-be stepsisters is keenly observed, with Tracy seeming fairly normal and in control, and for all that the 30-ish Brooke behaves like she is, she’s flighty and possibly phony, full of ideas but little substance.

She could be annoying and it seems as though we’re waiting for Tracy to see through her, even as she does rather admire her and her lifestyle.

These are engaging characters and interactions, with much that amuses though it can be a bit try-hard, and grows a little theatrical and fraught in its staging.

Director Noah Baumbach, who co-writes with Gerwig, mines ground similar to his While We’re Young from a few months ago, playing with notions of age gaps and how this shapes people, and Gerwig and Kirke are a winning pair.

Director: Noah Baumbach

Running time: 84 mins

TRAINWRECK (15)

3 stars

Amy Schumer translates her successful TV persona into this smart and funny if somewhat overstuffed comedy.

She plays Amy, a 30-something New Yorker who knows what she wants and likes when it comes to drink and sex and who has no time for monogamy.

As a magazine writer, she’s assigned to produce an article on a sports doctor (Bill Hader), but she resists when they start to become involved.

There’s good stuff in here but some filler too, and it’s a bit too sprawling with characters and subplots, and suffers from that thing that many modern comedies do where it often doesn’t know how to end a scene.

But though Trainwreck could seriously use some tidying and reverts to rom-com norms before too long, its depiction of female characters is hugely refreshing and Schumer, who also wrote the screenplay, is a very welcome addition to the film comedy landscape.

Director: Judd Apatow

Running time: 125 mins

PRECINCT SEVEN FIVE (15)

4 stars

This gripping documentary takes a look at police corruption in New York during the 1980s, in particular officer Michael Dowd, basically a gangster who happens to be a cop.

With so much crime and violence in the city, the cops who were there describe the hell of it, how they all stuck together and how easy it was to fall into rackets to supplement their income.

It’s an eye opening account of systemic corruption and a film that never ceases to amaze with how astonishingly brazen they were in what they got up to, graduating to major crime and associating with proper crime lords, feasting on whatever cash they could get their hands on.

From time to time it cuts back to hearings that took place in the 90s, with Dowd’s admissions proving jaw-dropping, and as we head towards their downfall it becomes structured like a thriller, paced and narrated like it’s Goodfellas in a stunning story so well told that you sometime forget how dangerous and bad these people were.

Director: Tiller Russell

Running time: 104 mins

THEEB (15, 100 mins)

4 stars

The great Anthony Mann westerns of the 1950s were often about the encroachment of civilisation on traditional ways of life, and this outstanding Arabian drama tackles similar themes while also serving as a parallel companion to Lawrence of Arabia thanks to its 1916 setting.

It’s seen through the eyes of a young Bedouin boy, Theeb, as he and his older brother guide an English soldier across the desert, with all the associated danger that brings.

Simultaneously a coming of age story (Theeb is an endlessly bold and spirited character) and a look at the tentacles of imperialism, it’s also a thrilling adventure to boot.

Director: Naji Abu Nowar

Running time: 100 mins