Author: BO

For nearly two decades, writer/director Paul Thomas Anderson went to a dark place. He dealt with corrosive, perverse characters in “There Will Be Blood,” “The Master,” “Inherent Vice,” and “Phantom Thread,” presenting grim conduct and bleak situations of domestic and psychological endurance. Anderson is back in a bubbly mood for “Licorice Pizza,” his return to the ways of idiosyncratic love and strange events, connecting to his time on “Punch-Drunk Love,” analyzing the weird ways of attraction and maturity. “Licorice Pizza” contains its fair share of oddity, as the helmer approaches the central relationship between a 15-year-old hustler and his 25-year-old object of desire from a variety of perspectives and tonal changes, detailing the craziness of impetuous behavior during the early 1970s. Anderson is attentive to the shaping of personalities, but his old impish ways make a return to the screen, delivering another cinematic triumph in a career that’s full of them. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

“Fortress” is many things, but “good” isn’t one of them. It’s the newest release from producers Randall Emmett and George Furla (continuing their mission to resurrect the Cannon Films legacy), and it’s the second directorial undertaking in 2021 from James Cullen Bressack (“Survive the Game”), who’s more about quantity than quality. Also having a busy year is star Bruce Willis, with his latest offering of sit-in-chair acting his seventh of the year, making sure to say yes to anything that meets his quote. There’s nothing in “Fortress” that’s different than most VOD entertainment offerings, once again setting up a basic conflict between good and bad guys, with the film’s location someone’s backyard, offering open spaces for actors to run around and pretend to shoot one another. There’s a set and a hallway, and Bressack stays out of the way when it comes to performances, keeping the endeavor hideously overacted and absolutely ridiculous, simply here to make his days and move on to the next bottom shelf project. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

Mattson Tomlin had a successful 2020. The screenwriter made an impression with two features, going the superhero route with “Project Power,” while “Little Fish” offered a prescient look at the world’s ruinous reaction to a public health crisis. Tomlin graduates to directorial duties for “Mother/Android,” which returns to the ways of a troubled planet, with the story exploring a new future that’s ruled by vicious robots on a mission to destroy humankind. It sounds like a wild ride of danger and destruction, but Tomlin’s writing connects to his “Little Fish” ideas, offering a moody, meditative understanding of dystopia and the power of love during the bleakest of times. “Mother/Android” is not a fan of pacing, often taking its sweet time to get where it’s going, but the production successfully updates the zombie genre with a new, metallic enemy, and the ultimate dramatic destination for the tale is satisfying, rewarding the sometimes extraordinary amounts of patience required to sit through the movie. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

2017’s “Spider-Man: Homecoming” and 2019’s “Spider-Man: Far From Home” did a sensational job creating excitement for the world of the eponymous superhero. Director Jon Watts found ways to freshen up the Marvel Cinematic Universe routine, making the character feel like a real teenager as Peter Parker juggles the demands of adolescence and bravery, with the two pictures generating a rich collection of personalities and action set pieces, making time with the wall-crawler irresistible. Such vibrancy of spirit is slightly diminished for “Spider-Man: No Way Home,” which doesn’t choose to remain with Parker’s quest for identity, instead aiming to create “Avengers”-style event cinema with the ways of the “multiverse,” and all the chaos and franchise surprises it contains. “No Way Home” is definitely a big screen ride, out to delight hardcore fans of Spider-Man’s cinematic adventures, but after the sugar rush of “Homecoming” and “Far From Home,” the new installment is decidedly heavier in tone and ambition, trying to create colossal challenges that tend to distract from the core appeal of the earlier chapters. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

Creative progress was made in 2017’s “Kingsman: The Golden Circle,” with co-writer/director Matthew Vaughn learning from mistakes made in 2015’s “Kingsman: The Secret Service,” which often indulged his worst habits as a filmmaker. The sequel sharpened his vision, bringing out the cinematic thrills of the premise, with the spy game creating some crazy moments, but packed into a more consistent endeavor. Instead of moving forward, Vaughn goes the prequel way with “The King’s Man,” which explores the formation of the intelligence service during the dark times of World War I. Instead of being explicitly comic book in style, “The King’s Man” tries to be a bit more historical, playing with the political gamesmanship of the era to inspire a point of origin for the well-dressed team, though Vaughn, in his excitement, often fails to create a balanced picture, offering an occasionally rough ride of tonal highs and lows. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

“Swan Song” is about death, though it’s also about life. The screenplay by Benjamin Cleary (who also directs) has the quality of a sci-fi short story, offering a level of futurism as the writer explores the human experience from a fantasy point of view. Cleary doesn’t delve too deeply into matters of the unreal, simply using it to understand universal ideas on love and loss, working very deliberately with the slow-burn tale. “Swan Song” is heartfelt and heartbreaking, offering an ideal space for actor Mahershala Ali to showcase his gifts, tasked with bringing to life two characters who share the same body and mind, only divided by their mission to bring comfort to others. Cleary avoids cliché as much as possible with the picture, hoping to reach complex feelings instead with this challenging but engrossing endeavor. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

Johnny Depp is known for fully inhabiting the characters he portrays. It’s been his obsession since the 1990s, and it’s largely worked for him, turning in some amazing performances and a few uncomfortably showy ones along the way. For “Minamata,” the actor seeks to step inside the life of photojournalist W. Eugene Smith, a respected but troubled professional who provided coverage of “Minamata disease” in the early 1970s, with mercury pollution destroying lives around a Japanese village located near a chemical plant. Depp tries to hide himself once again, and he successfully communicates the strange ways of Smith, who was a man of guilt and little self-control, but he had a gift with a camera, using it to provide the world with visions of life and hardships, with this particular case of unimaginable suffering allowing co-writer/director Andrew Levitas (“Lullaby”) to detail a greater understanding of industrial pollution and corporate malice. Depp is strong in “Minamata,” but it’s the larger story of suffering that’s most gripping. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

Most animated endeavors are created to be heartwarming, looking to appeal to a wide audience with lessons on family and friendship, typically balancing high comedic energy with gooey scenes of tenderness. “Rumble” just wants to be entertaining, offering the kid-approved concept of a professional monster wrestling league that’s dealing with the presence of its newest, and least threatening, participant. It’s underdog cinema with lots of slapstick, giving “Rumble” an enjoyable pace and sense of cartoon engagement, never slowing down to deal with unnecessary melodrama. Simplicity is the idea here, and a lot of humungous bodies flying around wrestling rings, with the production understanding it’s not going to make it as a sensitive study of partnership. There’s warmth here, but more zaniness, giving young audiences an enjoyable break from the soul-stirring routine. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

After spending years as a respected actress, Maggie Gyllenhaal takes the next step in her career, making her feature-length directorial debut with “The Lost Daughter.” She handles screenplay duties as well, adapting a 2006 Elena Ferrante novel about a middle-aged woman wrestling with dark thoughts and stinging memories while taking a vacation on a Greek island. It’s not a tale that’s built for comfort, and it’s not a thriller either. Gyllenhaal rolls up her sleeves and digs into the ugliness and exposure of a mental health crisis, using Ferrante’s plotting to generate a striking character study. Gyllenhaal gets a little tripped up while trying to compact the book into a movie, but her instincts with casting and emotional wreckage are spot-on, creating a disturbing picture that sneaks up on viewers, also painting an unnervingly realistic portrait of motherhood and all the sacrifices it demands. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

Lauren Hadaway has been working with dialogue and sound for the last decade, participating in productions such as “Justice League,” “Underworld: Blood Wars,” and “The Marine 4: Moving Target.” She makes the move to the director’s seat with “The Novice,” building on her 2017 short, “The Row.” It’s a story of a punishing collegiate rowing experience told with autobiographical touches, presenting Hadaway with some authority on the subject. She commits to the ugly details of the sport and the educational experience, offering a superbly lived-in screenplay that really digs into the experience of competition. “The Novice” remains riveting when sticking tight to the rowing odyssey, giving viewers a chance to understand physical exertion and psychological ruin. However, the helmer doesn’t remain within the shock of it all, working out unnecessary directorial flourishes and superfluous dramatics to show her stuff, which periodically weakens the fierce character study Hadaway is clearly capable of delivering. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com