Category: Film Review

“The Rising Hawk” takes its inspiration from an 1883 historical fiction book by Ivan Franco, a Ukrainian author, which was previously explored in a 1971 production. For a new take on an old tale, director John Wynn focuses on upping the intensity of the war story, simplifying conflicts to connect with the audience, giving the material a slight “Braveheart” makeover. While other productions have attempted to deliver sword-and-arrow adventure, “The Rising Hawk” is unexpectedly successful with its offering of violent action and tensions between Carpathian Mountain villagers and an invading Mongol army. It’s basic in many respects, but the picture has an appealing handle on B-movie action and emotional content, while the performances find the vibe of the production with refreshing ease, supporting the effort with enjoyable thespian intensity. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

Writer/director Seth Larney offers some gloom and doom for today’s audience with “2067,” which represents his attempt to create an epic sci-fi story about the end of the world. Missing from the endeavor is scale, with Larney losing budgetary dollars after an evocative first act, soon transitioning the tale into a time travel mystery, hoping to satisfy viewers with a brain-bleeder concerning one man’s visit to his future. The helmer isn’t exactly achieving anything original with “2067,” which starts off strong while focusing on a ruined Earth and a relationship facing an incredible challenge of separation. Larney can’t sustain what works well for the picture, which eventually becomes a video game-esque adventure that loses interesting elements of discovery as it goes on for much too long and without proper thespian support. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

Despite a 13-year-long break from box office performance, director Darren Lynn Bousman has managed to keep working, remaining in the horror genre, where the budgets are usually low and the distribution deals are marginally profitable. He’s not an inspired architect of doom, riding his early success with the “Saw” franchise into forgettable efforts such as “Abattoir,” “St. Agatha,” and “The Barrens.” He returns to spooky stuff yet again with “Death of Me,” and despite the presence of three screenwriters and 20 producers, Bousman is basically remaking “The Wicker Man,” hitting similar beats of dread and community coercion. “Death of Me” has the benefit of an exotic locale in Thailand and a story that details early confusion with a found-footage-y twist, but there’s little presented here that’s original or even all that interesting, with the script running out of ideas long before the movie reaches its climax. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

It’s probably not the best time to release a movie that depicts frontline health care workers as corrupt, depraved individuals bent on harming their patients, but “12 Hour Shift” isn’t a documentary. It’s a low-budget, darkly comedic thriller from writer/director Brea Grant, who’s in the mood to deliver something slightly twisted with the picture, offering time with dim-witted, addicted, and diseased characters dealing with a particularly active night inside an Arkansas hospital. “12 Hour Shift” isn’t sharply made, missing a roaring engine of chills and near-misses that normally accompanies such a viewing experience. Grant is trying for something more offbeat and unsteady, clearly enjoying a chance to play around with bad people and buckets of blood. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

“Eternal Beauty” comes from writer/director Craig Roberts. He’s best known as an actor, appearing in the television show “Red Oaks” and movies such as “Neighbors,” “Submarine,” and “Tolkien.” He’s been in the business for quite some time, starting out as a kid, and now he’s trying to make something happen behind the camera, previously helming 2015’s “Just Jim,” and now he’s presenting the claustrophobic viewing experience of “Eternal Beauty.” A look at the winding ways of a paranoid schizophrenic woman and her family ties, the picture enjoys keeping the audience immersed in self-destructive behavior, with Roberts searching for the glory of empowerment in the darkest corners of the human mind. He hires top talent to realize such immense pain and confusion, and slams a visual stamp on the project, but this is a tough film to watch on many levels. It’s a respectable attempt to visualize mental illness, but asking people to sit through 105 minutes of restless hell is a big ask from Roberts. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

An artist to her core, director Julie Taymor seldom makes movies, but when she does she puts in a muscular effort to visualize the extremes of drama and music. Taymor hasn’t made a feature since 2010’s “The Tempest,” making “The Glorias” a rare event, and one she clearly doesn’t want to overwhelm with her usual gusto. It’s the bio-pic for author and feminist Gloria Steinem, with writers Taymor and Sarah Ruhl adapting the icon’s 2015 autobiography, “My Life on the Road,” trying to transform an extensive list of experiences into a single picture. It’s not an easy task for the pair, but they come up with inventive ways to connect four eras from Steinem’s life, celebrating her accomplishments and leadership while feeling the pain of her upbringing. It’s a long haul at 150 minutes, but “The Glorias” is immensely respectful of its subject, with Taymor muting her need for bombast to craft a loving portrait of a woman who changed the world. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

While primarily dealing with intense dramas and topical thrillers, Jessica Chastain has attempted to expand her range in recent years, taking on a few genre pictures to seek new creative challenges and beef up her box office draw. Last year, Chastain participated in “Dark Phoenix” and “It: Chapter Two,” and for 2020, she takes control of “Ava,” an actioner that also finds the actress in a co-producer role. Reminiscent of the Europa Corp heyday of slick bruisers with unlikely stars, “Ava” strives to deliver a stunt show with plenty of character layering to help give the brawling some substance. Chastain is a good fit for this style of steely aggression, and the film does well with family ties and professional paranoia, giving the titular assassin plenty to deal with while destroying enemies. However, not everything works in the endeavor, and when it hits the wrong note, the script (by Matthew Newton) threatens to ruin the whole viewing experience. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

The messy art of revolution and the origins of a movement are charted in “Misbehaviour,” which recounts the efforts of the Women’s Liberation Movement as they attempted to disrupt the Miss World 1970 beauty pageant. The screenplay by Rebecca Frayn and Gaby Chiappe is based on a true story from 50 years ago, but it plays into topics of equality and objectification that remain in play today, creating a fascinating look at attitudes and offenses. Director Philippa Lowthorpe (“Call the Midwife” and “The Crown”) maintains a period look and guides a number of strong performances, but the core experience of “Misbehaviour” is unrest, watching those who dream of a better, more just world setting their sights on a British television institution, and, wisely, the writing manages to understand both sides of the argument while still remaining supportive of a team of twentysomething women and their battle to bring equality to England. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

Writer/director Miranda July enjoys making very strange movies about universal issues concerning relationships, but she hasn’t been around in quite some time. She won cult appreciation with 2005’s “Me and You and Everyone We Know,” and pushed her eccentricities to the breaking point in 2011’s “The Future.” July is back with “Kajillionaire,” which is a more mainstream effort from the artist, who hasn’t shed her obsessions with idiosyncrasy, merely muting them to a certain degree with her latest offering, which examines the eternal struggle of family from the POV of a young woman who doesn’t understand her precipitous situation. “Kajillionaire” is unusual, which is the July way, but it’s certainly the most approachable offering in her limited filmography, with much to share on the camouflaged ways of familial abuse and the healing power of love. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

A vision for dystopian misery is interrupted by a domestic drama in “LX 2048,” which invites audiences into the future to observe the next generation of marital strife. Writer/director Guy Moshe attempts some early razzle-dazzle with visual effects and low-budget design ideas, trying to sell the dangers of the day after tomorrow, imagining Earth as a polluted hellhole where life only really exists after the sun goes down, while humans have tapped into cloning to solve a few of their problems. Moshe has provocative ideas on the state of household divide due to technological advancement, and he brings in James D’Arcy to deliver the most emphatic performance of his career in the lead role. However, initial promise and some degree of expanse slowly diminishes as the movie unfolds, with “LX 2048” having trouble developing what appears to be a short story idea into a fulfilling feature. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

The massive success of 2017’s “Get Out” has cleared the way for filmmakers to explore racial tensions using genre storytelling. This allows the audience to participate in the tale as it weaves around fantastical turns, giving them a ride before hitting them with doses of reality. Jordan Peele found a way to give his lesson some big thrills, continuing his odyssey in the similar 2019 effort, “Us.” Screenwriter/directors Gerard Bush and Christopher Renz have the same idea with “Antebellum,” which surveys the horrors of slavery and its continued presence in 21st century America. It’s an unexpectedly grim feature, and one with surprises viewers will either tolerate or reject in full. If Peele and M. Night Shyamalan had a baby, it would be “Antebellum,” which is at its most successful when toying with reality, providing a puzzle to solve while reinforcing the lasting wounds of an unforgiving nation. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

“Lost Girls and Love Hotels” is an adaptation of a 2006 book by Catherine Hanrahan, and while it initially appears to be a salacious account of secretive Japanese sexuality as it pertains to the titular housing, it’s actually a much darker understanding of obsession and depression. There’s definitely kink play featured in the movie, but Hanrahan (who also scripts) is more invested in her characters, following a woman as she succumbs to grim thoughts while embarking on an emotional connection to a forbidden man. There’s plenty of atmosphere in the effort, with director William Olsson making the trek to shoot in Japan, and there’s beguiling shapelessness to the endeavor as well, helping the production to capture blurred headspaces with elements of mystery and compelling displays of self-destructive behavior. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

To help bring to life a tale of rural American horrors tied to all levels of faith, co-writer/director Antonio Campos (“Afterschool,” “Christine”) gathers a cast of European and Australian talent to help fill out the ranks of corrupt and threatened characters. It’s a different approach when dealing with such regionally specific torment, but this isn’t a straightforward account of evildoing. An adaptation of a 2011 Donald Ray Pollock novel, “The Devil All the Time” offers a knotted timeline as it manages a community of thinly related and connected people confronted by their demons, with Campos looking to keep the audience on their toes while he experiments with the shock of violence to capture attention. While lengthy (138 minutes) and fond of stillness, the feature connects when necessary, offering an immersive tour of mental illness with a few pulpy touches. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

There seems to be an endless appetite for movies and shows about Sherlock Holmes. He’s a perennial character, with the Sir Arthur Conan Doyle creation offering an intellectual game of sleuthing, merging the thrill of the hunt with room for audience participation. While Sherlock has a part in “Enola Holmes,” the film’s really here to introduce a new sibling full of deductive reasoning, adapting a tale from author Nancy Springer’s YA book series. Attempting to make something appealing for a teen audience, screenwriter Jack Thorne (“Wonder,” “His Dark Materials”) delivers a spunkier take on the family business of solving crimes, with “Enola Holmes” aiming for emotional ties and empowerment glow with this whodunit, which is more of a whereshego. It’s a different style of caper for Sherlock’s little sister, putting a lot of pressure on star Millie Bobby Brown to carry the charm and the narrative focus of the picture. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

“Blackbird” takes on the topic of euthanasia, offering a family drama about a matriarch who’s planning to end it all after a weekend of personal time and group activities, finally stopping developing health issues. Of course such a reunion isn’t easy to watch, but the subject is an important one, and director Roger Michell (“Notting Hill,” “Hyde Park on Hudson”) tries to protect some of the ideas and feelings involved with the event while maintaining dramatic focus. The movie isn’t a grand offering of emotional volatility, but it remains a tearjerker, and one capably handled by the cast, who deliver deeply felt performances. It doesn’t exactly brighten the day, but the sadness of “Blackbird” is compelling, visiting universal issues of dysfunction and communication as the story highlights difficult areas of personal engagement, especially when a level of finality is introduced. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

“H is for Happiness” is an adaptation of the book “My Life as an Alphabet” by Peter Jonsberg, and it’s a bit of a miracle that an American production company didn’t get its hands on the material for a film adaptation. It’s slightly quirky work with some level of melodrama, but the picture is an Australian undertaking, thus achieving a bit more oddity to offset the formulaic elements of the plot. There’s genuine weirdness running through “H is for Happiness,” and that’s a good thing, with director John Sheedy making his feature-length debut with true test of tonal balance, setting out to visualize Jonsberg’s world of unhappy people and one girl’s push to solve their problems, without overdosing on cutesiness or heartache. The helmer gets the movie most of the way there, offering a charming understanding of positive thinking from a juvenile point of view. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

“Alone” is a remake of a 2011 Swedish chiller (titled “Gone”) about a woman traveling across the country getting into trouble with a mysterious and malevolent driver on the open road. Original screenwriter Mattias Olsson returns to duty for the Americanized version, sticking close to the recipe that made the original picture a prime candidate for an English-language do-over. Director John Hyams aims to bathe the endeavor in mood, which becomes a necessity, as “Alone” isn’t big on incident, keeping the helmer attentive to small details and daily business while striving to find some level of suspense to keep the viewing experience passably unsettling. There’s not a lot to the feature, and it shows in the final cut, with Hyams stretching to fill the run time, losing valuable tension along the way. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

Once again, actress Noomi Rapace is sent in to portray a physically and psychologically tortured character, this time taking the lead role in “The Secrets We Keep,” which has her playing a woman confronted by the agony of her World War II past. The part plays right to Rapace’s professional capabilities, giving her a chance to deliver the gut-rot emotionality she’s known for, with director Yuval Adler (“Bethlehem,” “The Operative”) making sure to emphasize the character’s pain as much as possible. If only the entirety of “The Secrets We Keep” was as invested in the moment as Rapace, with Adler riding the line between promising chiller and a filmed play with the endeavor, which is big on conversations, preferring dry patches of conversation instead of creating something more intimidating, which it definitely has the potential to do. Adler lingers instead of delivers with the effort, which could use a great deal more anguish and a lot more movement. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

“Rent-A-Pal” is set in 1990, but it’s a relevant picture for today’s world of frustrated people dealing with isolation. This isn’t what writer/director Jon Stevenson initially intended, but he’s found a way to make a movie about 2020, creating a slow-burn chiller about one man’s decent into madness due to suffocating domestic experiences and his own distance from a functional relationship. While other filmmakers have touched on the toxic relationship between man and machine, Stevenson gets oddly specific with his writing, which turns a simple quest for VHS attention into a downward spiral of insanity. “Rent-A-Pal” has flashes of originality, and Stevenson has a good eye for casting, finding actors capable to doing something memorable with a shapeless threat. It’s not the tightest feature around, in need of more editorial pruning, but when it focuses on blurred lines of reality, it’s vividly executed with a wonderfully dark sense of humor. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

Lacrosse is not a sport that’s often depicted in movies. While offering heated competition and high-scoring highlights, filmmakers aren’t all that interested in doing something with the contact game, which received one of its more high-profile explorations in 2012’s “Crooked Arrows.” For “The Grizzlies,” lacrosse is the impetus of the story, but screenwriters Graham Yost (“Speed,” “Hard Rain”) and Moira Walley-Beckett (“Breaking Bad,” “Anne with an E”) are more interested in the community unification of the sport, merging underdog cinema with a sincere examination of despondency in the Artic region. “The Grizzlies” has its playing field highs and lows, but the feature is more interested in the struggles of life for Inuit people, finding a way to deliver sporting development with a stark study of anguished characters looking for something, anything, to lift themselves up. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com