Category: DVD/BLU-RAY

Every film year, there are a few movies that emerge from out of nowhere to become not only top-grossing hits, but miniature phenomenons as well, commanding attention from a public that's responding to something primal about the pictures, while entertainment press spends countless hours trying to decode impossible allure. In 1982, "Porky's" was one of the chosen few, emerging as a tiny production only interested in bawdy behavior and a few moral lessons, and ending up one of the biggest successes of the year. No one saw it coming, and many wished it never happened, but "Porky's" managed to capture the imagination of its audience, using a blend of nostalgia and lewd behavior to entice ticket-buyers into return trips, essentially legitimizing the teen hornball subgenre that eventually plagued the moviegoing decade. Bare breasts and bad pranks made up writer/director Bob Clark's formula, and he wasn't about to let a good thing go unmolested, getting the band back together in quick fashion for the 1983 sequel, "Porky's II: The Next Day," which isn't truly a continuation of the Angel Beach High saga, but more of a remake, only with more sermonizing and less nudity. Apparently Clark wasn't paying attention to his initial achievement. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

I suppose 1984's "Police Academy" is the gift that keeps on giving. While offering its own legion of sequels and television shows, the unexpected hit also spawned a series of imitators. And who better to rip off "Police Academy" than the men that co-wrote it. Enter Neal Israel and Pat Proft, who collaborate once again on 1985's "Moving Violations," reviving formula that pits the smart alecks versus police department squares, only here the emphasis is on the ways of driving school, with its tests of skill and memorization. After experiencing a degree of success with 1984's raunchy "Bachelor Party," Proft and Israel (who directs) go the PG-13 route, trying to find a balance between the comic architecture of their youth and the needs of a modern audience used to bawdy humor and dumb guy antics. To its credit, "Moving Violations" is never boring, always on the prowl for a sight gag or a one-liner, but the screenplay doesn't reach very far, remaining weirdly conventional when their previous efforts enjoyed a wilder sense of humor to help attract attention. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

There are many odd details and turns to 1976's "Death Machines," but the fact that it was marketed as a futuristic thriller is perhaps the most bizarre aspect of the feature. It's simply not one, arriving as a thoroughly 1970s-styled martial arts demonstration with unstoppable killer motivation. Director Paul Kyriazi has a vision for his picture, which is a nice change of pace from the fight film norm, giving "Death Machines" some real teeth for 1976, managing an orgy of violence that includes bar brawls, bazooka attacks, and mass murder, sold with a certain style of stunt-heavy gusto that makes the effort enjoyable, even when it doesn't exactly make sense. Kyriazi is out to give audiences a joy ride of nonsense, and he accomplishes his goal, delivering screen aggression that keeps on coming, while the cast is filled with all types of bruisers and cowards, making conflicts highly amusing. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

1997's "Jack Frost" is a monster movie, though one that doesn't always follow the genre routine. Instead of a truly ghoulish creation terrorizing innocents, there's a killer snowman, which doesn't inspire any particular level of fear, ever during its most intimidating attack sequences. Writer/director Michael Cooney understands the tonal challenge ahead of him, eventually turning into the skid, transforming "Jack Frost" into a cheeky, self-aware chiller with pronounced elements of comedy. However, without a budget to successfully launch the visual of a snowman on a homicidal tear around a small town, Cooney gets creative, using interesting low-fi special effects and an agreeable script to make something memorable out of a potential disaster. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

After stunning the world with 1972's "Last Tango in Paris," and exhausting himself with the botched release of 1976's "1900," writer/director Bernardo Bertolucci changes pace with the intimate ways of 1979's "Luna," which intends to return the helmer to his softer, more observant side. Of course, there's a return of controversy as well, as the picture is primarily about the ravages of grief, but also indulges a certain amount of incestuous thoughts and deeds, with the screenplay approaching themes of love and control with a plan of extremity to snap the material to attention. Bertolucci is never one to turn down a chance to attract attention to his work, and "Luna" certainly does a fine job of flailing to maintain eyes on the screen. However, the movie is also something of a mess, albeit a highly artistic one with committed performances. As much as Bertolucci believes in the power of such raw emotions, he fails to make a cohesive effort, with nearly every scene a random assortment of volatile emotions and blurry storytelling. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

Bringing the lively Spaghetti Western mood to Hollywood, 1969's "100 Rifles" doesn't follow through with its initial Sergio Leone admiration, soon settling into a story about passion and political defiance that tends to drain away the pure escapism the feature initially seems intent on delivering. Co-writer/director Tom Gries doesn't have an easy job, managing three intense personalities in lead actors Burt Reynolds, Jim Brown, and Raquel Welch, but he periodically commits to large-scale action and cultural interests, keeping "100 Rifles" a stylish, spur-jangling cartoon. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

While it boasts the presence of a shadowy wolfman, 1942's "The Undying Monster" isn't truly a horror picture. Adapted from a novel by Jessie Douglas Kerruish and directed by John Brahm (1944's "The Lodger"), "The Undying Monster" is more of a murder mystery, preferring acts of sleuthing to shock value. It's a talky effort, but wonderfully constructed by Brahm, who works overtime to make what ends up becoming a series of conversations and tasteful confrontations somewhat unsettling, bathing the feature in gothic mood. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

On co-writer/director Oren Shai's IMDB page, there's a picture of him engrossed in a pulp novel. It's unlike most photos on the website, highlighting his literary interests, which have been funneled into his feature-length directorial debut, "The Frontier." Playing around with time and motivation, Shai constructs a criminal chess game in the middle of the Arizona desert, using broad characters and secret pasts to manufacture a mild mystery with noir-ish flavorings. "The Frontier" doesn't have a big enough budget to completely erase signs of production limitation, but Shai gets an impressive amount accomplished with the resources he has, finding enough tension to preserve interest in this saga of bad people involved in dirty deeds. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

Writer/director Andrzej Zulawski is perhaps best known for his 1981 endeavor, "Possession," an authentically bonkers feature that's breathtakingly nightmarish and unhinged. "Cosmos" welcomes the helmer back to a similar playground of madness, making a return to filmmaking after a 15 year absence. "Cosmos" is also Zulawski's final movie (he passed away earlier this year), but it's another doozy. Replacing horror with a macabre mystery, the effort successfully braids the unexplainable with the unknowable, transforming a simple visit to a country house into a carnival of warped behavior. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

The saga of 1994's "The Fantastic Four" is no Hollywood secret. Over the last two decades, details have leaked about the film's quickie production and aborted release, with the picture eventually discarded altogether after some promotional work was already underway. It's one of those industry black eyes, and while journalistic endeavors have explored the creation and disintegration of "The Fantastic Four," director Marty Langford looks to dig deeper with "Doomed! The Untold Story of Roger Corman's The Fantastic Four," constructing a documentary that collects stories from those on the front lines. It's not a cheery tale of creative and financial success, but it delivers a wider appreciation of what was attempted in the 1990s, with B-movie imagination eclipsing the blockbuster intentions later iterations of the property attempted. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

A 1980 novel by Philip Nicholson, "Man on Fire" has inspired three cinematic adaptations, the most financially successful being a 2004 Tony Scott film starring Denzel Washington. However, it's the first attempt that's perhaps the most interesting, with 1987's "Man on Fire" attempting to turn a heartwarming tale of an unlikely friendship into the action event of the year. Director Elie Chouraqui doesn't possess the same visual ambition as Scott, keeping matters relatively straightforward for this endeavor, which strives to be more about characterization than orgasmic explosions of violence. Scott Glenn takes on the titular role, and while he's a credible avenging force, he's trapped in a picture that doesn't always know what it wants to be, trying to keep up with the helmer's often hazy concept of suspense. "Man on Fire" is the most tasteful of the adaptations, and it's certainly eventful. It's the overall thrust of urgency that's lacking from the feature, which spends more time with setup than it does with payoff, forcing viewers to retain the utmost patience with the production as it struggles to prioritize escalation. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

While we know Fred Olen Ray today as a multifaceted filmmaker capable of grinding out movies with alarming speed, he was once a hungry young director on the rise, trying to break into the industry with his vision for low-budget entertainment. 1983's "Scalps" made an impression, but 1985's "Biohazard" started to get the ball rolling for the helmer, who musters up all his creative energy to complete an "Alien" clone where the beast from a distant galaxy is played by a five-year-old boy (Chris Olen Ray, Fred's son). Expectations aren't welcome here, as Ray barrels through this scrappy production, trying to keep faint star power and visual distractions active enough to cover for the endeavor's distinct lack of polish. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

Mike Hammer was big business in the 1980s. A creation from author Mickey Spillane, introduced in 1947, Hammer is a quintessential pulp private detective, imagined as a brute with a brain and his share of vices. He's hard on crime and harder around women, but focused on justice, with Spillane coming up with plenty of literary adventures for producers to use. And they did, hiring Kevin Dobson and, most famously, Stacy Keach to portray the character in television efforts, finding a home for the era-specific mood. However, 1982's "I, the Jury" elected to modernize Hammer for a new audience, attempting to merge dated aspects of masculinity with an action endeavor, basically laboring to make a Hal Needham film with Spillane grit. "I, the Jury" tries to play it cool, trusting star Armand Assante to be bold enough to carry the work, but absurdity blankets the picture. Striving to play with the big boys of violent cinema, director Richard T. Heffron (who replaced original helmer and screenwriter Larry Cohen a week into the shoot) makes a television movie that's periodically interrupted with salacious and macabre encounters, keeping Hammer more of a cartoon than an engaging screen antihero. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

The Brooklyn Hipster is a popular target for derision these days. The television show "Girls" seeks to understand the ways of millennial life from a female perspective, wrestling with stereotypes to find the living, breathing people underneath. "Fort Tilden" takes a more jocular approach to understanding the ways of youth as it collides with responsibility, with writer/directors Sarah-Violet Bliss and Charles Rogers creating a travelogue of sorts for Brooklyn and its edgy, exhausted community of struggling twentysomethings, trying to find the humor in off-putting characterizations. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

Famed director Elia Kazan takes on law and order in 1947's "Boomerang" (released the same year as his classic, "Gentlemen's Agreement"), which takes viewers into the heart of justice, inspecting all its passions, procedures, and corruption. It's distanced work from Kazan, who traditionally embraces intimacy when it comes to characterization, but the feature's iciness is intentional, surveying judicial battles and political gamesmanship to deliver a stinging viewing experience that challenges the process, not the authenticity, behind guilt and innocence. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

"Tikkun" isn't technically a horror film, but it creates a nightmare realm where religion and sexuality collide, dissecting ideas on obedience and maturation. Writer/director Avishai Sivan has a unique vision for his third feature, launching a provocative descent into a young mind at the point of implosion. "Tikkun" is specialized moviemaking, challenging faith and sanity as a lifetime of order, religious education, and respect for family is thrown out the window when an erection and pent-up curiosity come into play. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

1972's "Sacrifice" (aka "Man from Deep River") is largely credited in horror circles as the first Italian jungle cannibal movie, inspiring a legion of knockoffs and variations, which grew into its own subgenre during the 1970s and '80s. It's a strange legacy to assign to the picture, which barely features any cannibalism at all, saving most of its human munching for a single scene near the end of the film. However, director Umberto Lenzi (who would go on to replicate this success multiple times, most notably in 1981's "Cannibal Ferox") does generate a familiar atmosphere of dread and fear that other productions would help themselves to, staging a jungle adventure that embraces the reality of remote tribes in the corners of the world while emphasizing myths about tribal life, celebrating grotesque rituals. "Sacrifice" is more observational than macabre, and while Lenzi isn't shy about showcasing body trauma, animal abuse, and sexual horrors, this is by far the easiest of his "cannibal" efforts to digest, more interested in the evolution of its main character than potential depravities to share with the viewer. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

As melodramas go from the 1940s, "Daisy Kenyon" has the advantage of a sharp cast and a surprisingly authentic handling of marital and relationship woes. An adaptation of Elizabeth Janeway's novel, the picture offers director Otto Preminger a chance to toy with the conventions of a traditional love triangle. However, instead of giving in to syrup, the helmer (along with screenwriter David Hertz) maintain a slightly acidic tone to the feature, treating the confusion, hysteria, and growing bitterness with the authenticity it deserves before returning to formulaic events. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

Following up 1940's "The Return of Frank James" with another western, director Fritz Lang opts to recreate America's developing communication woes with "Western Union." While it's not rooted in any true events, the feature takes a look at the expansion of the telegraph, and how that specialized intrusion on private land plays out with troubled characters all battling for something they can't have. Lang aims to tell a quintessential American story with heightened dramatic intentions, and he ends up with a curious picture that resides somewhere meditative and cartoon, periodically visiting both extremes. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

The 1960 British comedy "The Battle of the Sexes" takes a look at a world where men and women compete in the workplace, playing up the oddity of such an event during a special time of growing national consciousness. However, this is no document of progression, but yet another chance for star Peter Sellers to play dress up, burying himself in middle-age make-up and heavy clothing to portray a mild man brought to a boiling point by female interruption. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com