Good looking cast and some visceral special effects prop up the seventh and final installment of the X-Men series

That the underlying message against the commercialisation of Christmas is brought out in a secular manner with no mention of the Nativity is ironic. An attempt to appeal to the largest demographic seems to bend and pray to filthy lucre rather than celebrate the first Noel.

The Meg does not promise much but neither does it ask much of its audience.

For those who look at the film as the ultimate management film, there are all sorts of subliminal takeaways, but for the others Storks is like being on an inexorable trip being constantly assaulted by different levels of twee.

The misunderstandings, the love, the heartbreak, the tears, the wedding, concerts, races, mad dash to the airport, the night of somewhat passion, the first kiss, all check out and you are finally left with a voice from beyond, in a letter being read in a sunny bistro in Paris — there is nowhere to hide in cliché central.

The film is depressing for its laziness and cynicism. The colours are bright, the birds are twee and toy ready, the jokes are not particularly clever and when nothing works, a pop number swells up in the background obliterating all thought.

The film is not unwatchable but then it is not worth climbing every mountain and fording every stream to watch either. You might as well wait for it to come on telly—the movie feels like a loosely strung together sitcom anyway.

The film grips you from the get go and in his directorial debut Dan Trachtenberg has kept a tight rein on the proceedings. By focussing on three people in an enclosed space, he gives the grand disaster movie imagery a miss, which works well as we are imagining all manner of horrid things.

Everything about this movie is pedestrian: the plot, the animation, the jokes, the action.

Gerard Butler after playing the king of Sparta in 300 , plays Set with teeth-gnashing villainy; he also has the legs and shoulders to carry off little skirts. Geoffrey Rush is the venerable Ra, flying in his sun chariot and sending lightning bolts to quell the serpent of chaos. Chadwick Boseman plays the god of wisdom Thoth, while Rufus Sewell (Murdoch from Dark City ) is Urshu.