Ice and heat on the big screen

Rugby hunk Kyran Bracken did it on the TV, and now American clown Will Ferrell is doing it at the cinema.

And what might that be, you ask? Wearing sequinned, skin-tight lycra and emerging a winner.
The weird and wonderful world of men’s figure skating provides the unlikely backdrop to Blades of Glory, the latest raucous comedy (Click here to watch the Blades Of Glory trailer).
At the world figure skating championships, sworn rivals Chazz Michael Michaels (Ferrell) and Jimmy MacElroy (Jon Heder) clash violently on the winner’s podium, in front of the world’s media.

Judges strip them of their medals, and ban them from men’s figure skating for life.

Chazz descends into alcohol-fuelled oblivion in a second rate children’s skating show called Grublets On Ice, while Jimmy has to earn a meagre crust in a shoe shop.

Then Jimmy learns of a loophole in the skating rulebook: while he is banned from the men’s single competition, he can still compete in the pairs event.
But who with? Jimmy reluctantly agrees to work with Chazz to form the world’s first same -sex skating partnership. Media interest reaches fever pitch, taking the spotlight away from current champions who resort to dirty tactics to stop the controversial duo from succeeding.
After a slow start, Blades of Glory flips and spins into a tale of riotous comic fun.
Ferrell’s pelvis-thrusting, hip-swivelling theatrics become a little tiresome, but co-star Heder is an excellent comic foil as the shy, sensitive type, who lets people skate all over him.
The four screenwriters are on painfully thin ice in the opening half hour, struggling to develop the characters in any detail away from the rink.
But once their unlikely double-act glides onto the ice, Blades Of Glory triple flips to delirious heights, allowing the leads to perform death-defying moves with the help of computer jiggery-pokery.
The dance sequences are the undisputed highlight, littered with outrageous moves that gleefully kick ice in the face of gravity and poke fun at the sport, and the actors.
Ferrell and Heder look like they are having fun throughout, and some of the banter is sparkling. The romantic subplot which is slushing around in the background is weak, but when this film is on the ice, it barely puts a foot wrong.
Sci-fi fans will be eager to lap up Danny Boyle’s latest offering, Sunshine. And from an impact point of view, they won’t be disappointed.

He has created a movie which looks simply sensational, conjuring up a stunning vision of the near future laced with suspenseful sci-fi adventure.

Every frame is polished to perfection, and as the mission nears its destination, clever lighting effects bathe the entire film in brilliant, retina-searing white.

Foreboding labyrinthine corridors, which are reminiscent of the claustrophobic interiors of the Ridley’s Scott’s classic 1979 shocker Alien, contrast with spectacular sequences in deep space, and there is plenty of bloodshed and screaming before the mission nears completion.

The sun is dying, threatening to plunge mankind into total darkness - and without enough light to sustain plant life and replenish oxygen, or to warm the planet, the human race stands on the brink of extinction.

A team of plucky astronauts embark on a perilous mission to save the world in a spaceship called Icarus II. Their plan is to delivering a nuclear blast into the heart of the dying sun which should reignite it.

As the team drifts out of radio contact with home and tensions start to mount, bitter rivalries surface.

And in the midst of the power struggles, the crew stumbles upon a distress signal which appears to be coming from the ill-fated Icarus I, which disappeared seven years earlier on a similar quest.

Should the crew continue with their mission as planned, or make an unscheduled detour to investigate the source of the distress signal?

Cillian Murphy’s man of science clashes nicely with Chris Evans’ cocksure leader as the characters see their judgement dangerously impaired by cabin fever. There are perhaps a few too many characters to wrestle with, though, and some - like former Bond girl Michelle Yeoh’s biologist - remain rather undeveloped.

But Boyle sustains the tension well. It’s just a pity about the overblown climax, which should have been the cherry on top of the icing, but ends up as a rather incomprehensible blur amid an orgy of digital effects.