Category: DVD/BLU-RAY

Screenwriter Peter Hoare isn't trying to move the world with "Standing Up, Falling Down." Instead, he offers a small-scale relationship drama about an unlikely friendship developing between two aimless men struggling with private issues, bonding over a shared sense of humor. The material has very little wow factor, but it's sincere, and that's most important with a picture like this, which tends to do its best when aiming to be meaningful instead of volcanically dramatic. "Standing Up, Falling Down" has its humor, and it's very funny at times, but director Matt Ratner (making his debut) is more attentive to chemistry, letting his actors interpret Hoare's vision for camaraderie and personal inventory, resulting in a mild but effective dramedy. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

In 1966, the powers that be were ready to say goodbye to "The Munsters" on television, with the popular series coming to a close after 70 episodes. Needing a big splash to help send the series off to syndication, a feature was ordered up, put right into production to capitalize on the show's dissipating position in pop culture, and there was hope that such a leap from the small screen to movie theaters might trigger a second wind for the brand name, leading to various sequels for the residents of 1313 Mockingbird Lane. "Munster, Go Home!" is the strange title for the initial cinematic endeavor, but the production itself remains faithful to the blend of broad antics and sly comedy that made "The Munsters" such a hit, only here the scope of such mischief is widened for a potentially fresh audience. And there's the addition of color, giving fans a chance to see the clan go about their wacky business in bright, deep hues, creating an ideal hook for the faithful, presenting The Munsters with their intended green skin and Technicolor shenanigans. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

There was a point in the year 2000 where someone, somewhere wanted to turn rapper Snoop Dogg into a horror icon, delivering a new Freddy for fatigued genre fans, freshening up the roster of screen villains. 2001's "Bones" was meant to be the first of many movies starring Snoop Dogg as the undead pimp Jimmy Bones, but the feature failed to do any business during its initial theatrical run, condemning the endeavor to a life of cult appreciation. What was underwhelming two decades ago remains so today, with director Ernest Dickerson trying to work up a Euro-style nightmare with a screenplay by Adam Simon and Tim Metcalfe, and he makes a pretty picture, but not an appealing effort, losing "Bones" to noise and narrative disjointedness as he struggles to conjure an expressionistic viewing experience while managing decidedly literal material that doesn't have enough ferocity or imagination. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

The title "Frankenstein: The True Story" promises something more biographical about original author Mary Shelley. The picture doesn't bother with the writer, instead using the titular promise as a way to revisit the central tale of man and monster, with the screenplay (by Don Bachardy and Christopher Isherwood) looking for a fresh way to approach old business, dialing back the Victor Frankenstein character, turning him into a driven man dealing with special influences that lead him to bad decisions concerning the ways of creation. A two-part television movie directed by Jack Smight, "Frankenstein: The True Story" is a lavish take on the core tale of danger, and while it's a relentlessly talky endeavor, it remains engrossing thanks to a large cast of acting greats, who do amazing work breathing life into a production that's very careful not to push too hard on horror. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

"The Kill Team" was originally a 2013 documentary from director Dan Krauss, looking into the madness of the military in Afghanistan, singling out the story of Private Adam Winfield, who witnessed his fellow soldiers commit murder, taking down civilians, and felt powerless to stop it. After creating other documentaries, Krauss returns to the Winfield saga with "The Kill Team," this time dramatizing the events, giving real world agony to actors for interpretation. In a marketplace overwhelmed by tales of Middle East war and agony, Krauss brings intimacy to the screen, examining the moral ungluing of boy who wanted to become a man while in service, only to face his future as a monster. While there's little reason to revisit the story, Krauss makes his points vividly, finding an effective thriller this time around. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

The musical legacy and poetry of Bob Dylan tries to find any source of oxygen in 2003's "Masked and Anonymous." It's a dystopian western with periodic concert performances from Dylan, who also accepts a starring role in the picture, returning to dramatic interests after a long break from the movies. Co-writer/director Larry Charles (who collaborates with Dylan under pseudonyms for some reason) has the unenviable task of translating Dylan's thinking into a feature, and there's some sense of adventure with "Masked and Anonymous," which puts in a game effort to protect the beloved musician's head space. However, four minutes of Dylan is one thing, but Charles has to tap dance for 107 minutes here, and his fatigue is impossible to miss. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

In this installment of "Nicolas Cage Doesn't Say No to Anything," attention turns to the arrival of "Primal," which, from the film's marketing efforts, appears to concern Cage's character as he does battle with a cargo ship full of wild animals secretly released from their cages by a very bad man. Oh, dear readers, if that were the actual picture, what a state of B-movie bliss we'd all be in. The screenplay by Richard Leder ("Christmas on Chestnut Street," "A Thousand Men and a Baby") isn't that bonkers, not even close. Instead of pure exhilaration as the hero(?) is forced to fight for his life against the animal kingdom, the production offers a prisoner escape feature instead, spending more time with a human protagonist. There's no zoo- gone-mad aspect to "Primal," but, as always, there's Cage, and he's in peak Cage-osity here, trying to give the blandness that surrounds him some much needed thespian spice. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

Noomi Rapace is an intense actress. She rarely plays light roles that offer a peek at the sunnier side of cinematic fantasy. Instead, she takes on the gut-rot parts that have her screaming in pain or suppressing emotion to such a degree, she risks implosion. Rapace has been on a tear with darker material in recent years, acting herself into a frenzy in "Close," "What Happened to Monday," and "Rupture." She continues her career riot with "Angel of Mine," which asks the talented thespian to portray possible madness in escalating offerings of distress. Screenwriters Luke Davies and David Regal have plenty of agony for Rapace to work her hands through, and she's a magnetic lead for the picture, which has some issues with pace and the potency of reveals, but rarely falters when it comes to the primal scream Rapace provides without hesitation. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

A poor sculptor with limited professional prospects, Marcel (Martin Kosleck) is ready to end it all when he happens to spot The Creeper (Rondo Hatton) drowning in a lake. Saving the man's life, Marcel hopes to use The Creeper's distorted facial features to inspire new work. However, when he learns of the stranger's propensity for violence, he decides to use The Creeper to murder art critics around town. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

A doctor employed by the Vienna Royal Theater, Hohner (Boris Karloff) is in possession of a horrible secret. Some time ago, the man of medicine murdered his prima donna fiancée in a rage, trying to bottle his emotions ever since. A decade later, Angela (Susanna Foster) is the new singer on the scene, prepared to dominate audiences with her extraordinary vocal gifts. However, Angela sounds just like Hohner's dead lover, putting him in a troubling position as old obsessions return to view, keeping him close to the new hire and her protective fiancé, Franz (Turhan Bay). Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

A man ruined by medical care, Ingston (Ralph Morgan) has elected to invite his doctors to his remote home for a gathering, joined by various employees and authorities, and there's Agar (Nils Asther), an Eastern mystic. Eager to showcase Agar's gifts with materialization, Ingston welcomes confusion from his guests, but when murder enters the picture, the push to locate the culprit proves more difficult than imagined, with evidence not matching to a possible suspect. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

Ranger Security offers its clients a revolutionary way to protect their businesses, using an electrical system to defend stores from thieves. Inventor David (Boris Karloff) has an upgrade for owner Stephen (Samuel S. Hinds), but the moneyman desires to screw the nearly blind genius out of a fortune. Upset with his treatment, David teams with lowlife Petty Louie (Alan Baxter) to showcase his ability to crack Ranger Security systems. However, what was once envisioned as protest turns into trouble for David when local gangsters try to take command of the technology. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

Dismissed as a 100-minute-long commercial for Nintendo during its initial 1989 theatrical release, "The Wizard" has managed to shed such contempt over the last three decades of cult appreciation. Make no mistake, the feature is one big plug for the video game company, with the production making sure to highlight new games and controllers, while nearly every character has a fever for the NES and all the video adventure it provides. However, there's a bit more to "The Wizard" than promotion, with screenwriter David Chisholm and director Todd Holland making an effort to get the picture to a point of emotional connection, trying to stuff as much family business as possible into the corners of the endeavor. It's up to the viewer to decide how successful the creative vision is, as the movie isn't the sturdiest dramatic offering, often struggling with tonal extremes as the sugar rush of gaming meets the sobering reality of death and familial denial. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

After experiencing success with "Good Will Hunting" and "Finding Forrester," director Gus Van Sant decided to cleanse his filmmaking system with 2003's "Gerry," a deliberate attempt from the helmer to get back to his experimental roots. Taking inspiration from the work of Euro talent such as Bela Tarr, Van Sant delivers a purely observational viewing experience with "Gerry," which consists of lengthy takes and limited dialogue, examining the gradual deterioration of two men (Casey Affleck and Matt Damon) lost in the desert, left with nothing to do but walk as they search hopelessly for a rescue. It's as spare as it gets, which is exactly what Van Sant wants for this initial installment of his "Death Trilogy." Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

While 1970's "Hollywood Horror House" provides a lively cult movie viewing experience, it never quite tops its opening sequence. Writer/director Donald Wolfe introduces the audience to the Hollywood of yesterday, which was fueled by star power, with actors selling their glamour and polish to the masses, creating a unique time in the entertainment industry when such incredible fame could be achieved just by appearing in features, creating tremendous excitement. Wolfe cooks up an introductory montage of glitz before cutting to the then-current state of the Hollywood Sign, carefully photographed by the production, using main title time to study its rusted, peeling appearance, signaling the end of Old Hollywood and the dead splendor of the town. It's a powerful statement on the changing times, and the last bit of intelligent commentary from Wolfe, who quickly leaps into the B-movie muck with this riff on multiple dramas and thrillers, endeavoring to create a nightmare for the drive-in audience using the remnants of a bygone era of stardom and filmmaking. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

Three years ago, "47 Meters Down" enjoyed a movie release miracle, rescued from a DTV fate by Entertainment Studios, who purchased the film on the day of its DVD debut, with the company trying to cash in on shark fever at the cinema. The plan worked, with "47 Meters Down" managing to find an audience, keeping the subgenre alive for another season. This summer, the real aquatic action remains with alligators (from last July's excellent thriller, "Crawl"), but the suits aren't about to leave money on the table, returning to the deep with "47 Meters Down: Uncaged," which has nothing to do with the first picture, merely taking its title and sharks for another underwater joyride. Co-writer/director Johannes Roberts returns as well, newly empowered to dump character work and suspense, focused primarily on making a cheap scare machine that's brainless and joyless, sticking with limp exploitation basics. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

1982's "Xtro" is just one of those genre movies that benefited from the VHS boom of the 1980s. It offered provocative box art and provided a gruesome ride, with co-writer/director Harry Bromley Davenport ignoring good taste to deliver something nasty and sellable, trying to make his mark. It's not a memorable feature, but it did inspire ire from the likes of Roger Ebert, who described the film as "one of the most mean-spirited and ugly thrillers I've seen in a long time." Whatever it was to fans and detractors, it was a meal ticket for Davenport, who returned to the saga with 1990's "Xtro II: The Second Encounter," trying to restart the brand name. In 1995, he finally cried uncle with "Xtro 3: Watch the Skies," which hoped to offer the faithful more creature anarchy, only here Davenport tries to go all "Aliens" with the project, bringing in big guns, explosions, and Hanks. Well, Jim Hanks. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

1999's "Terror Firmer" is often sold by Troma Entertainment as a satire of their usual production mayhem, with co-writers Patrick Cassidy and Douglas Buck using parts of director Lloyd Kauffman's book, "All I Need to Know About Filmmaking I Learned from the Toxic Avenger" (sharing authorship duties with James Gunn), as a starting point for the company's usual outrageousness, this time focusing on the chaos of no-budget moviemaking. It's not easy to identify the cleverness of such a creative attempt, because all Troma really does is provide noise, and their runaway train sense of humor frequently destroys anything imaginative about "Terror Firmer," which could be an illuminating study of Kaufman's lifelong pursuit of independent freedom in the film world, but it mostly wants to be a grotesque serial killer endeavor with a wafer-thin plot and boundless appreciation for all things disgusting. It's certainly one of the more extreme efforts from Troma, and one of their most disappointing, with sections of satiric clarity quickly clouded by every single bodily fluid imaginable. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

There are no major displays of dramatic firepower in "The Parts You Lose," and the plot is simple, dealing with issues facing the main characters, without going beyond the core dynamic to pad the runtime. Writer Darren Lemke doesn't go for flash with his screenplay, trying to land more of a literary atmosphere to the feature, which often resembles an adaptation of a young adult novel. "The Parts You Lose" may not have a fireworks display, but there's consistency to the picture, providing a full sense of character and heart. The modest nature of the production isn't a problem, as director Christopher Cantwell creates an inviting sense of tension and interaction, always preserving the human side of the story to best retain viewer attention. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

It doesn't come as a tremendous surprise to learn that "Luz" is actually a thesis film from writer/director Tilman Singer. The German production doesn't aim to go big with its tale of possession and obsession, preferring to play everything with a slow-burn study of performance as tensions rise in small rooms. It's largely inexplicable, with Singer playing homage to Euro cinema brain-bleeders of the 1980s with the picture trying to reach a specific audience with its avant-garde antics. It's all a great big question mark of behavior, history, and domination, and while "Luz" has something, it visibly struggles to fill a scant 65-minute-long run time, with Singer clearly trying to taffy-pull a minor idea into something major, leaning into the stillness of the effort instead of developing its level of dread. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com