Author: BO

Apparently, 2014 is the year Nicole Kidman and Colin Firth can’t quit each other. Last spring, the pair co-starred in “The Railway Man,” a stark POW drama that demanded the most out of Firth, while Kidman played support. In “Before I Go to Sleep,” the roles are reversed, with Kidman taking on the majority of screentime, put through the emotional wringer while Firth stands back and waits for his moment. Considering their combined talent and commitment to the cause, it’s a shame “Before I Go to Sleep” is such a snooze, barely putting in the effort to be a proper nail-biter before it reveals that it was never about suspense anyway. It somehow bores and disappoints in the same instant. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

With a shapeless jazzy score, incendiary material, and pronounced performances, there’s no doubt that “Dear White People” is meant to emulate the work of Spike Lee during his most creatively fertile period. It also targets the bravery Lee once exhibited, marching forward with a provocative take on race relations and self-serving interests in the realm of exploitation, submitting a biting but windy screenplay that’s out to emphasize its thematic reach with every available moment. While not particularly inventive, “Dear White People” has a certain underdeveloped moxie that might’ve resulted in a braver effort, interested in telling a solid story and ruffling feathers. Instead, the movie only makes to the halfway point before it exhausts itself, biting off way more than it can chew. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

It’s rare to come across an action film that isn’t bloated these days. In recent weeks, features like “The Equalizer” and “Fury” have taken an eternity to explore simple themes, offering violence that’s more about anger than escapism. And now comes “John Wick,” which runs just over 90 minutes and values economical storytelling, acting as a breath of fresh air in suffocating marketplace. Roughhouse and genuinely thrilling, “John Wick” sprints with its B-movie premise, delivering exceptional stunt work and engaging theatrics, while star Keanu Reeves returns to his impressive “Matrix” physicality, taking the form of a human steamroller in this deliriously entertaining, enjoyably brutal revenge picture. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

“Whiplash” displays originality by taking audiences into the world of jazz drumming, observing the lead character as he receives the education of a lifetime at the hands of a mentally unhinged teacher. It’s a thunderous movie, following its percussive lead with booming outbursts and aching physical strain, with performances by Miles Teller and J.K. Simmons displaying authority both actors have rarely shared before. “Whiplash” is a cinematic adrenaline shot with a sharp jazz tempo, and while nagging questions of genuine reaction to the malice at hand remain, it’s a dynamic piece of work, always on the verge of explosion as it surveys an unusually punishing creative skill. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

Maintaining his reputation as a sophisticated filmmaker fostering an obsession with human suffering, co-writer/director Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu unleashes another torrent of self-loathing and psychological flight with “Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance),” presenting himself with a firm technical challenge to match the screenplay’s exhaustive reach into the banalities and pressure points of an actor on the edge. The picture is certainly an achievement, with winding cinematography and a captivating, face-rubbing performance from star Michael Keaton, but it’s also showy work, persistent in its effort to remind the audience that they’re watching intricate craftsmanship, not necessarily an intimate study of a mental breakdown. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

A few years ago, Universal Pictures lost a lot of money trying to bring the board game “Battleship” to the big screen. It was loud, explosive, and slick, but at the end of the day, it was a film based on a board game. The studio returns to the scene of the crime with “Ouija,” only now the budget has been miniaturized and the genre has switched over to horror and its notoriously forgiving fanbase. The true power of fright that drives the Ouija board experience remains up to the viewer, but as a feature, the dark distraction makes for a sleepy time at the movies. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

Writer/director Gregg Araki loves young people. Or, more specifically, the young people from his own coming-of-age period. He’s made several films chronicling the misadventures of reckless youth, and a few more about the pain of this lonely existence, leaving his latest, “White Bird in a Blizzard,” at a disadvantage, with its to-do list of dysfunction already worked through by the helmer. Helping to define the new feature are mystery elements concerning a disappearance, and there’s Eva Green in a self-destructive mother role, creating some fresh elements to survey while Araki works out a way to make “White Bird in a Blizzard” feel fresh to all interested parties. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

Suffering for decades with a reputation as a house of schlock, there’s been a resurgence of interest in Cannon Films lately, mixing nostalgia and ironic appreciation. Founded by Menahem Golan and Yoram Globus, Cannon Films was a magic store of low expectations, striving to sustain a run of B-pictures throughout the 1980s, with plans to transform into an A-list moviemaking force that Hollywood couldn’t deny. Along the way, they made crap. A lot of crap. But also the occasional gem, and a slew of beguiling efforts that reveled in their tackiness and rickety sense of spectacle. “Electric Boogaloo: The Wild, Untold Story of Cannon Films” isn’t satisfying journalism, yet the opportunity to sit down for 105 minutes and hear war stories from the Golan-Globus trenches is irresistible. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

Some consider 1996’s “The Island of Dr. Moreau” to be one of the worst movies of all time. I wouldn’t go that far, but clearly something was amiss during principal photography, with stars Marlon Brando and Val Kilmer off making their own film, while director John Frankenheimer bursts a few blood vessels trying to hold it all together, failing to make much sense out of the narrative puzzle. It seems there was a reason for such a fragmented feature, with the documentary “Lost Soul” working to transform hushed rumor into fact, tracking the development of the project under its original creator, Richard Stanley. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

Joe Carnahan loves to make movies that push levels of intensity into the red zone. He’s built a filmography on surges of adrenaline, with “Smokin’ Aces, “The Grey,” and “The A-Team” all delivering big thrills with light dusting of sarcasm. “Stretch” brings Carnahan into a low-budget playground, forced to come up with fresh ways to build up momentum now that large piles of money aren’t available. While frugality keeps the helmer on a leash, “Stretch” remains incredible amounts of fun, with a ferocious sense of humor and attention to pace and character connection that maintains a smooth, silly viewing experience with the occasional acid splash to identify it as a Carnahan picture. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

Jai Courtney has been a difficult actor to pin down. Hollywood scooped him up a few years back, pushing him into bad action movies where he delivered bad performances, sleepwalking through dreck like “A Good Day to Die Hard” and “I, Frankenstein.” He’s never been able to show off any chops, making a small but searing effort like “Felony” all the more valuable. Courtney isn’t the star of the film, but he makes a positive impression for a change, adding subtle support to a wrenching drama directed by Matthew Saville. At the very least, “Felony” provides hope that Courtney will take greater care of his career and select better material such as this. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

“Fury” is an attempt to mount a throwback war film like they used to make in the 1940s and ‘50s. The kind where themes of innocence lost were deafening, while hero shots of Americans in battle were submitted to extend post-war national pride. “Fury” has its modern touches, but it’s also teeming with chewy characters and loaded with tank attack sequences. Unlike the bygone era, writer/director David Ayer asks the audience to sit through a lot of this effort, which run 135 minutes, and every second of it is felt. There are astonishing images of combat and terrifying passages of death, but this is repetitive work, periodically lost in its own chaos to satisfy those craving visceral thrills. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com