Category: Film Review

After spending the last handful of years developing surefire hits in “Despicable Me 2” and “Minions,” animation powerhouse Illumination Entertainment returns to original material with “The Secret Lives of Pets,” or least keeps away from the moneymaking minions for a year. The long shadow of Pixar darkens the picture, as much of the movie resembles a sneaky “Toy Story” remix, only instead of plastic cowboys and space rangers, the feature offers time with cats and dogs. Laughs are a rare event in “The Secret Life of Pets,” which is more determined to be loud, spotlighting screaming performances and frantic action that tends to drain the heart right out of the effort. It’s not a disaster, but after managing wit and speed with the surprisingly effective “Minions,” Illumination’s latest endeavor is a bit too desperate to please. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

Director Anne Fontaine has been working for the last two decades, amassing a varied filmography that includes recent efforts “Gemma Bovary” and “Adoration.” “The Innocents” is perhaps her bleakest picture, but it’s also her most accomplished. A haunting look at desperation during an unusual time of liberation, “The Innocents” finds yet another corner of World War II to examine, with Fontaine building an uneasy drama with sensational characterization, defining personalities and troubles with helming precision, but never discounting the emotional power of the tale, despite dealing with a subject matter that welcomes religious and cultural iciness. It’s not a feature to be approached causally, but it captures a place and time superbly. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

The director of “The Last Kiss” and “Seven Pounds,” Gabriele Muccino specializes in sensitive stories with melodramatic extremes. He’s a patient helmer, fascinated by the durability of the human heart and the depth of broken individuals, funneling these interests into “Fathers and Daughter,” another go-around with distraught characters struggling with emotional blockage as they speed toward tragedy. Calling “Fathers and Daughters” Muccino’s most accomplished work in years isn’t exactly a compliment, but he handles certain sections of the tale with refreshing sincerity. The confidence doesn’t last throughout, but before excess suffocates the movie, there’s a sharp sense of loss that carries significant power, almost able to buttress the entire effort. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

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Although it has the appearance of a traditional rock documentary, “Breaking the Monster” takes an unusual route to familiar sights of band dysfunction and industry pressures. It endeavors to explore fame via the YouTube Generation, showcasing the power of video, not presence, which helped the band Unlocking the Truth achieve cult fame, resulting in a record deal and a shot at mainstream stardom. The clichés are unavoidable, but the participants are barely teenagers, watching the children who make up Unlocking the Truth navigate an adult world of responsibilities while still dabbling in “Spinal Tap”-esque shenanigans. Director Luke Meyer (“Darkon”) has an interesting take on the routine, helped along by the band’s unusual sonic power. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

Cinematic adaptations of Stephen King novels are common, and most do not work. “Cell,” however, is a promising title for a big screen inspection, with the successful 2006 book exploring the ubiquity of technology — a chilling reality when supernatural disaster strikes, creating an easy and widespread circuit of doom. Interestingly, King steps up to co-script this feature, making him part of the creative vision. And yet, even with the author’s control, “Cell” falls apart. While the material seems suited for a ripping horror yarn, the film is missing dramatic pieces and overall enthusiasm, making it more of a summary of King’s work than an engrossing, consistent adaptation. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

“Marauders” joins a growing subgenre of thrillers and actioners that play under the pop culture radar, keeping a low profile with a limited budget, while release publicity is secured with the addition of a single brand name to the cast list. In this case, it’s Bruce Willis, who slumbers through this lukewarm puzzler, barely participating in the story as lead Christopher Meloni does all the heavy lifting. Aiming for sophistication and procedural blue steel, “Marauders” is buried under the weight of exposition. It’s tough for anything of note to happen in the movie when every character is dedicated to explaining everything on screen. And yet, somehow, nothing is clear or, in the end, all that interesting. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

I don’t know if director Alex Gibney sleeps at all, but it certainly doesn’t seem like it. The prolific helmer has churned out over 15 documentaries in the last decade, covering topics such as musical artistry (“Finding Fela”), disgraced sporting gods (“The Armstrong Lie”), and political ruin (“Client 9: The Rise and Fall of Eliot Spitzer”). Gibney is always in motion, which is likely why his latest endeavor, “Zero Days,” feels like it’s on autopilot. It’s an informational explosion, delivering all the facts and figures an audience member could want from a movie, but suspense is missing from the picture, which is so consumed with proving its sophistication, it never bothers to build cinematic energy. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

What is it about the mysteries of the rectum that bewitch so many filmmakers? While watching “Swiss Army Man,” I was reminded of 2005’s “Me and You and Everyone We Know,” where writer/director Miranda July spent valuable screen time on the idea of two people passing fecal matter between their bottoms, using the (thankfully) imagined visual as a symbol for human connection. “Swiss Army Man” turns to flatulence as the ultimate communication of intimacy, and it uses it quite a bit. Sometimes for comedic effect, other times it’s frighteningly serious about farts, sustaining the passing of gas as a literal and symbolic awakening throughout the entire movie. Not that breaking wind defines the feature, but it plays a key role in a largely baffling, semi-sincere effort, igniting the imagination of co-writer/directors Dan Kwan and Daniel Scheinert (credited as “Daniels”). Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

When confronted with the work of author Roald Dahl, there’s always going to be some degree of weirdness. Cinematic adaptations of his work tend the celebrate oddity, inspiring pictures such as “Fantastic Mr. Fox,” “Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory,” and “The Witches.” “The BFG” isn’t particularly fascinated with darkness in the same manner as other Dahl-branded productions, finding director Steven Spielberg employing his traditional sentimentality to cut through strange happenings involving giants and little kids. “The BFG” means well enough with its sweet side and explorer spirit, but it’s a surprisingly plodding movie, taking its sweet time with introductions, almost forgetting it has a story to tell. Spielberg and fantasy is usually a promising combination, but the feature never gets out of first gear. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

Every so often, Hollywood revives its interest in exploring the world of Tarzan, returning to original inspiration from author Edgar Rice Burroughs to fuel another franchise. He’s been recycled for radio, television, and movies, but rarely does the Lord of the Apes receive the big-budget treatment. “The Legend of Tarzan” is a large-scale attempt to revive the character’s popularity for a new generation of filmgoer, with director David Yates forgoing a tangible world for a digital one, creating a collection of animals and environments with plentiful CGI assistance, trying to remain stylish while dealing with familiar artificiality. The lack of natural sweep hurts the picture, but there’s a larger problem in the screenplay, which doesn’t really know if it wants to study the story of Tarzan or use him as a poseable action figure in a tale that seldom inspires awe or excitement. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

2013’s “The Purge” asked characters to liberate their rage and “release the beast” during a special night of murder. The third chapter of the series, “The Purge: Election Night” will have audiences looking to release the hounds on writer/director James DeMonaco, who destroys his once interesting premise with an abysmal chiller that offers little to no technical expertise or dramatic moderation. DeMonaco runs right into a wall with “Election Year,” which plays cheaply and desperately, striving to wring a few last scares out of an unlikely franchise the helmer has personally shepherded over the last three years. It’s a terrible movie, ugly and ridiculous, missing the zeitgeist by a country mile, but it also identifies DeMonaco’s professional carelessness, emerging as one of the few filmmakers to deliver progressively lamer sequels despite enjoying a rare offering of creative hindsight. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

There’s always an expectation of whimsy when dealing with a Michel Gondry film. However, his last production, “Mood Indigo,” overdosed on fantasy to such a degree, it obscured the emotional core of the picture. Perhaps reassessing his creative influence, Gondry plays it relatively cool for his latest work, “Microbe & Gasoline,” which is much more fascinated with character than bulging imagery, keeping both feet on the ground as the occasional Gondry-constructed flourish takes a spin. “Microbe & Gasoline” is one of the helmer’s finest efforts because of this restraint, exploring the folds of the teenage mind with genuine awareness of human behavior, mixed tastefully with periodic bursts of delightful oddity. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

Somewhere in our world, there’s an audience for Competitive Endurance Tickling. Granted, it’s not unlike any other underground fetish observed by many but experienced by few, but it carries the potential to be the most ridiculous. The “sport” is as plain as can be, tying up young men on comfy beds who are soon straddled by patient staff. These professionals proceed to work their magic fingers all over the subject’s body, triggering a convulsive reaction that’s recorded and savored by those into the kink. And yet the documentary “Tickled” only really uses the strangeness of the bedroom play as an introduction to legal woes and journalistic adventures, refusing to simply rest when encountering the needs of those who enjoy the process and uncontrollable reactions associated with tickling. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

Joining a recent trend in stark, ultra-violent westerns, “The Duel” takes the slow-burn route for its developing tensions. The feature is directed by Kieran Darcy-Smith, who last helmed “Wish You Were Here,” a riveting character-driven chiller, returning to a mood of suspicion with this unsettling study of control and seduction. “The Duel” has plenty of atmosphere and strong performances, and it works when locked into intimate power plays and tough-guy stare downs. Editing isn’t kind to the film, which feels rushed in places, awkwardly shaped to bring the movie down to a manageable size. For those capable of working past such strangeness at times, there’s plenty to admire about the effort, which hits genre highlights while remaining in a dark place. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

Bringing the works of author John le Carre to the big screen is always a tricky endeavor. He’s an iconic writer who requires special care when translating his dense spy games for cinematic inspection, with recent efforts such as “Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy” and “A Most Wanted Man” delivering the intricacies of suspense without indulging more broadly defined acts of panic. “Our Kind of Traitor” attempts to play in the same sandbox of paranoia and secretive dealings, with director Susanna White managing growing tensions to satisfaction. It’s the story that’s a little strange this time around, finding implausibility a more powerful foe than the Russian mob in “Our Kind of Traitor,” though charismatic performances help the feature work through a few tight spaces of credibility, keeping attention on the screen. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

Dreaming up new avenues to explore when it comes to the world of vampires is difficult, but writer/director David Ruhm has an interesting solution to combat staleness. Instead of picking one aspect of bloodsucker life to inspect, he’s selected all of them, using “Therapy for a Vampire” as a chance to celebrate vampire cinema as influences pop up everywhere in the feature. Cutesy at times, but engaging, “Therapy for a Vampire” tries to avoid the norm with elements of humor and horror, finding highlights as the overall story teases quirk, but never indulges in full. Ruhm’s love for darkness remains throughout the effort, emerging with a degree of creativity when dealing with the same old undead business. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

Sharksploitation efforts, once home to nail-biting aquatic nightmares, have turned cartoony in recent years, with the “Sharknado” franchise forcing itself on the world, using irony and exaggeration instead of fear to engage audiences, turning primal oceanic horrors into cartoon time. “The Shallows” isn’t a documentary, but it endeavors to return some bite to the animal attack subgenre, pitting actress Blake Lively against a large great white shark who won’t take no for an answer. Thrills and chills are promised, but only a few scenes land with any sort of punch. “The Shallows” isn’t a lean 90 minutes, but director Jaume Collet-Serra (“Non-Stop,” “Orphan”) almost gets it right, periodically ramping up suspense and shocks while Anthony Jaswinski’s screenplay figures out how to fill up a run time with necessary characterization. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

1996’s “Independence Day” was the last of its kind: a largely practically built blockbuster that enjoyed the element of surprise, buttering up audiences with a year’s worth of enigmatic marketing before delivering big thrills with a loopy, lovingly designed alien attack picture, giving the disaster movie formula one last sweaty workout before CGI arrived and smoothed out all the mayhem. It was a mammoth hit and one of the best films of the year, delivering huge action with sincerity and a tasteful amount of stupidity. “Independence Day” was also the last decent feature from director Roland Emmerich, who followed up his biggest hit with junk like “Godzilla,” “10,000 BC,” “White House Down,” and last year’s bomb, “Stonewall.” In need of career CPR, Emmerich reteams with former partner Dean Devlin (also someone who could use a professional boost) to mastermind “Independence Day: Resurgence,” which attempts to sequelize a tale that ended rather successfully the first time around. The creative well’s gone dry with these two, who visibly struggle to come up with a reason why this continuation should even exist, tarnishing the brand name with an unreasonably idiotic, irritatingly plasticized follow-up. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

Nicolas Winding Refn found a wide audience with 2011’s sleek and furious “Drive,” but it was the follow-up, 2013’s “Only God Forgives,” that truly represented his baroque filmmaking interests. Mischievous and addicted to cinematic style, Refn does a deep dive into the abstract with “The Neon Demon,” his bloody, ornately lit valentine to the world of modeling and sexual obsession. A challenging picture that seems to exist only to irritate unaware moviegoers, “The Neon Demon” is pure big screen language from Refn, who takes his sweet time laboring over shots and performances, slowly, glacially introducing macabre ideas that transform the feature into art-house flypaper for those willing to submit themselves to the helmer’s extravagances, iffy sense of humor, and adoration for the extreme. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

A hit film for Disney back in the summer of 1987, “Adventures in Babysitting” was a perfect example of the era’s interest in teen entertainment with an edge, launching a family-friendly plot of a babysitter encountering a disastrous night with her charges, but giving the material a PG-13 bump, making slumber party rentals a bit awkward. The Chris Columbus picture wasn’t short on charm or laughs, while bringing out the full appeal of star Elisabeth Shue, and it’s easy to see why the studio would pursue a remake, trying to connect to a new generation of working kids. However, instead of bringing the comedic mayhem back to the big screen, “Adventures in Babysitting” receives the Disney Channel treatment, sanding away the coarseness of the original effort to keep the material appropriate for all ages. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com