Belfast's Holylands area has become infamous over the past two decades for its cheap student housing and it's anti social behaviour.
Every St Patrick's Day, in particular, the area is the scene of boorish, alcohol and drug fuelled parties that have sometimes resulted in students being arrested.
Although the truth is anti social behaviour and boorish partying is a problem the whole year round and that has created tension between long term residents of the area and the universities who have also invested a lot of time, resources and money trying to curb their students' worse excesses.
First time Enniskillen director Paddy Duffy has a different view of it, however, as anyone who has seen his execrable "comedy" movie 'The Unholylands' can tell you.
The story of two law undergraduates, Ciaran McCourt's Michael Brennan and his stepbrother, Peter Jeffries' Scott, the premise is simple.
Both have aspirations to work in the family law firm run by their dad, played by Larry Cowan but are summoned to his office where he proceeds to trawl through social media posts of them behaving like hooligans in the Holylands.
Warning them they cannot assume they will secure a place in the firm if they continue to party and behave like numpties, he assigns Sean Daly's posh and uptight Oxford graduate Alister Griffiths to chaperone them.
Scott, however, has other ideas and persuades Michael to continue to party and draw Alister in as well.
What follows is a back of a fag packet plot involving a group of psychotic culchies, a bag of ketamine, Mr Brennan's efforts to check up on them and another Belfast psycho who wants his drugs.
Duffy, who also wrote the screenplay, seems to be aiming for the same demographic who adored the 'Kneecap' movie and 'The Young Offenders' - the types who think drugs and excessive drinking and swearing and casual sex is all a bit of a lark.
However what sets those two movies miles apart from Duffy's effort is the writing and in the case of 'Kneecap,' the film craft.
'The Unholylands' looks like a student film stretched over over 99 minutes.
It's unimaginatively written.
The acting is so dreadful and the direction is so amateur, it actually makes 'The Hole In The Wall Gang' Christmas specials look like the work of Federico Fellini.
It's a film that is so weak in every aspect, it's a wonder how it managed to secure a cinema release in Northern Ireland and a broadcast slot on BBC1 NI.
Although, it has to be said it's an even greater wonder how Duffy managed to persuade James Nesbitt to make several cameo appearances in the film alongside country singer Nathan Carter.
The behaviour of students in the real life Holylands has been a depressing spectacle for many years.
Duffy has managed to come up with a movie that is even more depressing than the behaviour it lauds.
And that is hardly worth celebrating
('The Unholylands' was released in UK and Irish cinemas on October 4, 2025)
If you're not into Marvel movies, you've probably never really cared much about the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU).
Thirty six films in, Jake Schreier of 'Robot and Frank' fame has taken on the task of ending the fifth phase of the MCU with the $180 million budgeted 'Thunderbolts*' - note the asterisk.
That means a hell of a lot for fans of the superhero franchise but very little to the rest of us who view MCU movies as variations on the same tune.
'Thunderbolts*' is built around Florence Pugh's Russian assassin Yelena Bolova who first appeared in 2021's 'Black Widow' and in various TV spin-offs of the franchise.
In the latest movie Yelena carries out her business with a heavy heart, having lost her adoptive sister Natasha Romanoff/Black Widow in 2019's 'Avengers: Endgame' movie.
Early on, in a stunt actually performed by Pugh, she rather depressingly jumps off a skyscraper only to activate a parachute and glide to safety.
Working for Julia Louis-Dreyfus' CIA boss Valentina Allegra de Fontaine, Yelena is ordered by her boss to go to a facility to carry out a hit.
When she gets there, she discovers other members of the O.X.E. Group's Sentry superhuman project are also there and after trying to knock seven bells out of each other they deduce that Valentina, who is facing impeachment proceedings in the US Congress, is hoping all evidence will disappear if they kill each other and the facility is incinerated.
The group includes Wyatt Russell's new Captain America John Walker, Hannah John-Kamen's Ava Starr/Ghost and Olga Kurylenko's Antonia Dreykoff/ Taskmaster.
They are also surprised to discover Lewis Pullman's amnesiac Bob Reynolds there but together they break out of the facility.
Learning the group has escaped, Valentina sends a force there and manages to capture Bob who starts to show superpower abilities.
Meanwhile Sebastian Stan's Congressman Bucky Barnes, AKA The Winter Soldier, also gets involved - capturing Yelena, the other so-called Thunderbolts* and David Harbour's Alexei Shostakov/Red Guardian - in a bid to get them to testify in Congress.
They end up going to New York, however, after learning Valentina has persuaded Bob to join forces with her under his new superhuman guise, Void.
But has Valentina unleashed a monster?
As you can probably tell from the synopsis, the plot to 'Thunderbolts*' doesn't exactly set the world alight.
Schreier and his screenwriters Eric Pearson and Joanna Calo just go through the motions in what is clearly a bridging film to the next phase of the MCU.
But it has to be said this is probably in the top quarter of the Marvel movie league table and that is largely down to Pugh who has genuine star quality.
The best moments mostly involve her and while Russell, John-Kamen, Kurylenko and Pullman slavishly follow the MCU playbook, she imbues Yelena with a bit more depth.
More seasoned performers like Dreyfus, Stan, Harbour and Wendell Pierce as a Congressman leading the charge against Valentina are fine.
And while the CGI effects are pretty impressive, you kind of feel we've been down the road 'Thunderbolts' takes us many times before.
Stick with it and you'll discover what the asterisk is all about.
However brace yourself for the next Marvel onslaught with the Russo Brothers' 'Avengers: Doomsday' hitting cinemas in December 2026.
('Thunderbolts*' was released in UK and Irish cinemas on May 1, 2025)
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