Author: BO

“Off the Rails” is a comedy that arrives with some level of sadness. It represents the final film appearance of Kelly Preston, who passed away in 2020, with the feature dedicated to her memory. While wrestling with an uneven career, at least Preston goes out with one of her better performances in recent years, adding her personality to a story about a lapsed friendship being renewed during a trip through Europe. “Off the Rails” isn’t anything new, and it doesn’t try to be wacky, with director Jules Williamson and writer Jordan Waller looking to examine the challenges of personal connection, with life often getting in the way of special relationships. It aims to be meaningful, and while it doesn’t achieve much sincerity, it offers engaged performances and a brightness of spirit that should easily connect it to its target audience. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

2016’s “Sing” didn’t feature inspired screenwriting or a particularly heartening story, but it was a hit, giving Illumination Entertainment another brand name to exploit between movies about the Minions. It took some time, but “Sing 2” has arrived, and it’s really not all that different from its predecessor. It’s another let’s-put-on-a-show tale featuring the characters in desperate situations of fear, only this time there are more personalities to follow and a Las Vegas-y escalation of showmanship to add some visual power. Writer/director Garth Jennings returns to duty in “Sing 2,” and he’s not filled with fresh ideas, but he’s not crude either, giving the continuation a chance to charm. It’s not exactly an improvement on the original endeavor, but the follow-up offers a bit more personality and cartoon atmosphere, which helps to digest the sameness of it all. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

“Death Valley” is a micro-budgeted actioner with creature feature intentions. The ingredients are there for a B-movie good time with militaristic characters and a monster on the loose, creating scenarios of survival that could provide a decent ride for those who enjoy this kind of bottom shelf distraction. What writer/director Matthew Ninaber doesn’t have is much of an imagination, embarking on a project that opens itself to all kinds of madness and mayhem, only to end up mostly talkative, while scenes of conflict are lethargic, failing to trigger much excitement. “Death Valley” doesn’t become anything special, resembling many other small-scale offerings that need to do something inspired to be noticed, but just don’t have the drive to deliver an enjoyably bonkers viewing experience. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

Steven Spielberg has been making movies with defined rhythm for decades now, but he’s never gone all-in with a musical before. Sure, there’s the crackerjack opening of 1984’s “Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom,” and some sections of 1979’s “1941” certainly feel the beat, but Spielberg has avoided making full contact with a Broadway adaptation. And now he’s finally ready to put on a show, taking on “West Side Story,” with the 1957 Leonard Bernstein/Stephen Sondheim/Arthur Laurents creation previously realized in a beloved, Academy Award-winning 1961 Robert Wise film. There’s a lot of pressure on the iconic helmer to do something different with the source material, and he does, offering a grittier, more dynamically shot take on the musical, working to shave off a few layers of staginess to best expose the deep feelings in play. It’s still “West Side Story,” but the “Romeo and Juliet” riff is in good hands with Spielberg. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

The “Diary of a Wimpy Kid” book series has made author Jeff Kinney extremely popular with young readers, exploring the daily punishment of middle school awkwardness, finding comedy in growing pains. He’s managed to crank out 16 titles about the misadventures of Greg Heffley and his friend, Rowley Jefferson, and with such literary success, Hollywood hasn’t been far behind. A big screen adaptation was created in 2010, making Kinney’s simple illustrations painfully real, and the movie did some business, at least enough to inspire two sequels and 2017 reboot, which was essentially ignored by filmgoers. “Diary of a Wimpy Kid” is brought back to life in 2021, this time as an animated endeavor, using Kinney’s artistry to guide the visual look of the effort, which isn’t long enough to be a feature, but isn’t exactly a television show either. It’s a highlight reel of the original book, with Kinney (who scripts) and director Swinton O. Scott III trying to create a breezy distraction for “Wimpy Kid” fans, launching a new franchise with much smaller dramatic goals. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

It’s been 15 years since Adrienne Shelly was murdered inside her New York City apartment, and so much of her career has occurred after that horrible day. Director Andy Ostroy is Shelly’s widower, and he’s fearful that his late wife’s memory is lost, embarking on a mission to capture her talent and lifeforce in documentary form, with “Adrienne” much more than a simple valentine to a wonderful actress and filmmaker. It’s an act of catharsis from Ostroy, who confronts all that’s been left behind with the picture, trying to make sense of a horrific crime that ended the future he imagined, forcing him down a different path of parenthood and grief. “Adrienne” is a highly emotional viewing experience, dealing with raw feelings and memories of a special woman who tried to make her dreams happen, which they eventually did, only long after she was gone. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

Just in time for the holiday season comes a film about the end of the world. “Silent Night” offers a Christmas story about family, friends, and the wonders of childhood, but writer/director Camille Griffin (making her debut) isn’t in the mood to be precious with the details of a special reunion. Instead, she’s constructing a sometimes unspeakably dark tale of finality, using the cloak of yuletide excitement to explore how relationships react to the news that everything on Earth will be dead in a matter of days. It’s not exactly a cheerful tale of celebration, but bleakness is what makes “Silent Night” periodically riveting, with Griffin getting into the horrors of this new reality, delivering an askew take on the tenacity of the human spirit. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

Director Paul Verhoeven doesn’t make movies for casual viewers. He wants a full-throated response to his endeavors, which always deal with charged conflicts and shocking scenes of violence and sexuality. Verhoeven experienced a career resurgence with 2016’s “Elle,” and now he’s back with “Benedetta,” which provides an unnerving ride of vicious human behavior, with this tale steeped in Christian history, adding a spiked sense of exploration when dealing with matters of power and cruelty. It’s raw work from Verhoeven (who co-scripts with David Birke), but one doesn’t expect anything less from the excitable helmer, who tries his best to make the viewing experience as Verhoeven-esque as the source material allows (the picture is an adaptation of 1986 book by Judith C. Brown), hitting hard with a sometimes crazy mix of insanity and opportunism, sold with burning passion. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

Co-writer/director Michael Pearce tries to approach a story about developing insanity in a slightly unusual way for “Encounter,” which initially positions itself as a sci-fi tale of a potential alien invasion before exposing its true intent with a decidedly more earthbound crisis. Pearce maintains a steady level of dread in the feature, which deals with a road trip that brings an unhinged father and his two sons to an unknown destination, gradually exploring how the parent’s fragile mind is betraying his natural instincts, making things worse for everyone during his pursuit of protection. “Encounter” carries a degree of mystery, but Pearce ultimately wants to focus on feelings as already complicated relationships are pushed to the edge during a mental health crisis. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

There’s no big introduction or conclusion to “Wolf.” It just exists in an area of pure behavior, understanding the movement of potential madness as it comes after young minds used to trusting their own version of reality. It’s a strange picture from writer/director Nathalie Biancheri, who explores the gray areas of psychological ruin, with the feature resembling a project for first year acting students just beginning to learn about physical movement and character exploration. Such energy works for “Wolf,” which does well with smaller dramatic goals, electing to study select horrors and struggles while detailing a specific approach to therapy for patients who are beyond the boundaries of reason. Biancheri commits to her premise and sees it most of the way there, unafraid to make a modest movie about a deep internal itch. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com