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The Leisure Lab (RSS)
Jamie Ewbank
05 June 2009 12:11
It’s another pair of polar opposites on our movies channel this week, with Frank Miller’s embarrassingly poor adaptation Will Eisner’s The Spirit picking up a single star for just about managing to look and sound vaguely interesting, while Slumdog Millionaire
Filed under: Blu-ray, DTS-HD MA, Blu-ray Disc, Dolby True HD, DVD, The Leisure Lab, movies, reviews, Playstation, Xbox, The Spirit, Slumdog Millionaire
Jamie Ewbank
15 May 2009 12:08
Arriving on Blu-ray on May the 18th, Defiance is director Edward Zwick’s follow up to the Oscar nominated Blood Diamond and recounts the true story of the Bielski partisans, a community of Jewish resistance fighters hiding in the Belorussian forests and
Filed under: Blu-ray, Blu-ray Disc, Dolby True HD, The Leisure Lab, movies, games, James Bond, Preview, Defiance
Jamie Ewbank
23 March 2009 11:25
Much has been made of the slightly disjointed feel of Bond’s 22nd outing, Quantum of Solace , and while a glossy blu-ray presentation can’t do anything to fix the mid-trilogy feel of the film, it does bring the action and excitement to the fore, making
Filed under: Blu-ray, DTS-HD MA, Blu-ray Disc, The Leisure Lab, Samsung, film reviews, reviews, Quantum of Solace, Daniel Craig, James Bond
Jamie Ewbank
19 March 2009 11:15
Quarantine ’s arrival on Blu-ray represents a clash of medium and message, in which a deliberately lo-fi, horror movie is presented on a format better suited to far slicker productions. The Blu-ray presentation is the mixed bag you’d expect, a product
Filed under: Blu-ray, Blu-ray Disc, Dolby True HD, Blu-ray Audio, DVD, The Leisure Lab, movies, Samsung, film reviews, reviews, Resident Evil 5, Quarantine
Jamie Ewbank
10 March 2009 10:52
We’ve finished our first run through the gorgeous Resident Evil 5 and while we’ve loved every action-packed second it has to be said there’s something missing: the chills. Even when the last instalment, Resi 4, opted for more action and less horror it
Filed under: The Leisure Lab, games, reviews, Playstation, Xbox, Resident Evil 5
Jamie Ewbank
10 February 2009 12:40
With 7.1 audio and 720p graphics, Killzone 2 is the most cinematic game ever released, but it’s also proving controversial, as reviewers who suggest that it might be all gloss and no guts are being inundated with hate mail from PS3 owners desperate to
Filed under: The Leisure Lab, Samsung, games, reviews, Playstation, Killzone 2
Jamie Ewbank
09 February 2009 12:11
Set twenty years before the original Halo trilogy and with Master Chief nowhere in sight, Microsoft’s new Xbox title, Halo Wars , is already risking fanboy disapproval, but it’s not the absence of everybody’s favourite Spartan that makes things dicey,
Filed under: The Leisure Lab, Samsung, games, reviews, Xbox, Halo Wars, Hal, Preview
Jamie Ewbank
16 January 2009 11:45
It’s been a pleasantly surprising week on the Leisure Lab, where our expectations have been exceeded by both Somers Town on Blu-ray and Gears of War II . Expecting the first to be unable to live up to the excellent This Is England and the second to simply
Filed under: Blu-ray, Blu-ray Disc, The Leisure Lab, movies, Samsung, film reviews, games, reviews, Xbox, Gears of War, Somers Town
Jamie Ewbank
22 December 2008 12:22
It’s been a cracking year for gamers, with titles like Grand Theft Auto and Metal Gear Solid making it to their fourth instalments, new titles like LittleBigPlanet and Dead Space bringing new characters and stories into play, and a sprint finish to the
Filed under: The Leisure Lab, games, reviews, Playstation, Xbox, Nintendo, wii, LittleBigPlanet, Dead Space, FPS, Call of Duty: World at War, Top 5
Jamie Ewbank
10 December 2008 16:35
Given that we’re one of the few sites that refrained from making early predictions that Call of Duty: World at War would stink, it would be very easy to pretend that the thought had never crossed our minds and consequently look an awful lot more composed
Filed under: The Leisure Lab, games, reviews, Playstation, Xbox, Nintendo, wii, FPS, Kiefer Sutherland, Gary Oldman, Call of Duty: World at War
Jamie Ewbank
01 December 2008 12:33
After a year in which we’ve been inundated with superhero movies, all of which have been, to a greater or lesser extent, better than expected, we finally come to Hancock . On paper, it has the edge over all its rivals - it isn’t hampered by an original
Filed under: Blu-ray, Blu-ray Disc, Dolby True HD, DVD, The Leisure Lab, movies, Samsung, film reviews, reviews, Will Smith, Charlize Theron, Hancock
Jamie Ewbank
27 November 2008 12:35
It’s long been the dream of game developers to create a game that feels like a playable movie, and in Dead Space , EA has succeeded. Albeit, it’s the sort of movie that involves an awful lot of trudging backwards and forwards doing menial labour whilst
Filed under: CD, The Leisure Lab, MP3, Samsung, music reviews, games, reviews, music, Playstation, Xbox, album reviews, Snow Patrol, Dead Space
Jamie Ewbank
19 November 2008 15:16
If Batman Begins was a surprisingly dark and serious take on the Batman mythos, then its all-conquering sequel, The Dark Knight , sees director Christopher Nolan heading into even grimmer territory to produce an excellent and unpredictable blockbuster
Filed under: Blu-ray, Blu-ray Disc, Dolby True HD, DVD, The Leisure Lab, movies, Samsung, film reviews, reviews, Heath Ledger, The Dark Knight, The Joker, Batman
Jamie Ewbank
07 November 2008 12:11
Age may have caught up with Harrison Ford, but in this fourth Indiana Jones movie he turns his advancing years into a virtue. Sadly, the same can’t be said for Steven Spielberg and George Lucas, who direct and produce this rather disappointing sequel.
Filed under: Blu-ray, Blu-ray Disc, Dolby True HD, DVD, The Leisure Lab, movies, film reviews, reviews, Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, George Lucas, Steven Spielberg, Harrison Ford
Jamie Ewbank
04 November 2008 11:35
Quantum of Solace is the latest Bond tie-in game to try and step out of the shadow of the N64 classic Goldeneye, and the first that has a chance of succeeding. Using the superb Call of Duty 4 engine, Quantum of Solace has a solid foundation upon which
Filed under: The Leisure Lab, Samsung, games, reviews, Playstation, Xbox, Nintendo, wii, Quantum of Solace, Daniel Craig, James Bond, Goldeneye