Category: Film Review

“Locke” joins a special breed of movies that play out within a single location. Despite such an enticing filmmaking challenge, this is no thriller. Nobody’s been buried alive or pinned down in a phone booth, this is just the relatively simple tale of a man who’s devoted his entire being to a sense of order enduring the worst night of his life. Tension is conjured through tortured acts of recognition and passes at denial, while lead Tom Hardy delivers an exceptional performance that’s subtle and strong enough to hold viewer attention for 85 minutes, articulating an emotional breakdown with absolute precision. Although it might sound like unbearable directorial showmanship, “Locke” is a crisply defined drama that delivers on suspense and a swirling storm of heartache. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

With his first two pictures, “Forgetting Sarah Marshall” and “The Five-Year Engagement,” director Nicholas Stoller proved himself skilled at navigating the “everything improv” mentality that’s absorbed all reaches of American comedy. He showed good judgment, balancing story and silliness with laudable timing, making sure the features held some type of emotional resonance even as they sprinted into stupidity. His latest, “Neighbors,” slips out of his control early and Stoller never quite recovers, forging ahead with a slapdash effort that continually blows its potential on a series of sketch comedy bits that have no connective tissue. “Neighbors” is a blunt instrument, which will be appealing to some, but when one steps back and considers the possibilities of the premise, the disappointment is crushing. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

Between the release of “Oz The Great and Powerful” and the 75th anniversary reissue of the 1939 classic, “The Wizard of Oz” is officially back in business. “Legends of Oz: Dorothy’s Return” hopes to continue this financially lucrative run, only here the focus is on CG-animation, executed with a smaller budget than most big studio offerings, hoping to reawaken author Frank L. Baum’s world for box office dominance one more time. Filled with musical numbers and celebrity voices, “Dorothy’s Return” isn’t the expected embarrassment from untested independent film producers, but it’s not exactly magic in the making. More bizarre than charming, the feature has a pleasingly earnest quality about it, but no rousing creative ambition. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

With 2010’s “Submarine,” writer/director Richard Ayoade proved himself to be a visually stimulating filmmaker with an addiction to idiosyncrasy, which nearly blocked out the dramatic power of the picture. “The Double” travels deeper into oddity, only here there’s a surreal story of identity to back up such cinematic detours. Inhaling the power of his favorite moviemakers, Ayoade submits a valentine to powerlessness with “The Double,” helming a mild comedy that’s eventually evolves into a technical exercise with the occasional blip of surprise. It’s a fantastic looking picture, but images are the only memorable element of this psychological puzzler, which works extremely hard to register as mischief. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

The saga of the West Memphis Three has been recounted in three documentaries by Joe Berlinger and Bruce Sinofsky, and another documentary by Amy J. Berg. That’s a lot of screentime devoted to a single crime, and while the tangle of evidence and suspects is considerable when detailing the arrest and prosecution of Damien Echols, Jessie Misskelley, and Jason Baldwin, most, if not all emotional and legal developments have been covered at this point. “Devil’s Knot” has the unfortunate task of dramatizing only a mere slice of the story, and its very existence is puzzling, arriving after so many other filmmakers have dissected the absurdities of the case. Although director Atom Egoyan has a commendable approach, “Devil’s Knot” is overwrought and, frankly, feels like old news. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

Writer/directors Lucky McKee (“May”) and Chris Sivertson (“I Know Who Killed Me”) tried this once before. In 2001, the partners created “All Cheerleaders Die” during the infancy stage of their careers, using the little-seen horror picture as an example of filmmaking ability in the genre. 13 years later, the pair has elected to remake their debut effort, reawakening the feature with a fresh perspective and a larger budget, hoping to use early inspiration to fuel a new round of macabre highlights. “All Cheerleaders Die” is certainly ghoulish, with a pronounced nasty streak that keeps it on edge. It’s how this fury interacts with lighter material that poses a problem, with McKee and Sivertson perhaps too entranced with their own creation to fully appreciate how uneven it is. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

“Whitewash” is the strangest survival story you’ll see all year. A Canadian production, the film employs a criminal element of murder to lure viewers into an impossibly tight place with the lead character, watching desperation take hold in a forbidding, frozen landscape. And then, slowly but surely, the picture reveals bits and pieces about the crime and the men involved, moving away from mysterious intentions to play out as a game of endurance with a side of hypothermic madness. It’s a specialized viewing experience for more adventurous audiences, but “Whitewash” is accomplished, darkly humorous, and features a focused turn from actor Thomas Haden Church, showing rare commitment here. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

I’m not sure what Elizabeth Banks was hoping to gain by agreeing to star in “Walk of Shame,” but I’m certain she’s not going to feel much in the way of positivity once the public begins sampling the picture. Uselessly crude and insistently moronic, “Walk of Shame” features the type of story that could be completely washed away if the main character simply stopped to explain herself. However, that approach would negate the movie, leaving writer/director Steven Brill to groggily dream up nonsensical ways to keep this attempt at a screwball comedy on the go, subjecting Banks to lethal screenwriting and aggressive supporting performances. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

Revenge stories tend to celebrate violence, cashing in on the visceral appeal of righting wrongs with extreme aggression. “Blue Ruin” is a familiar tale of pent-up distaste, though writer/director Jeremy Saulnier works diligently to avoid expectations of stylish comeuppance, returning the drive of revenge to its most feral state, where gut-rot anxiety overpowers any fantasy of psychological liberation. An exceptionally composed and imagined film, “Blue Ruin” finds suffocating spaces of contemplation, doing a masterful job exposing the frightening yet functional steps of murder as it plays with the conventions of an operatic blood feud. Saulnier establishes himself as a major talent with “Blue Ruin,” displaying refreshing care for emotional wreckage and abrupt acts of violence. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

“Stage Fright” merges the worlds of musical theater and slasher cinema. The disparate traditions might not seem to be an ideal mix, yet writer/director Jerome Sable finds a splendid middle ground of camp and suspense, filling the picture with memorable songs and a traditional display of bloodshed. It’s certainly a bizarre movie, but also immense fun and surprisingly well-produced, having a ball as it dreams up ways to weave through musical numbers and stalker sequences. With the horror genre always chasing repetition to secure hits, it’s nice to see a feature that’s a little loopy and imaginative, delivering the goods with some hostility and a sense of humor. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

The decision to bring multiple villains into a superhero extravaganza has always been a difficult one to digest. It works periodically (Christopher Nolan’s Batman films established a memorable community of foes), but, for the most part, it results in severe overcrowding, with the production failing to juggle the needs of the protagonist as it faces the wrath of numerous antagonists. “The Amazing Spider-Man 2,” a quickie sequel to the 2012 effort, suffers from too much, too soon, cramming three different villains, a parental backstory, a tepid love story, and comic book hero adventuring into a single picture. The fatigue is immediate, even when director Marc Webb struggles to jazz up the feature with event movie excess, resulting in a mediocre follow-up to a mediocre original, with the production’s speed to explore spin-off possibilities damaging the dramatic potential of “The Amazing Spider-Man 2.” Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

There have been a few penis-centric comedies throughout the years (perhaps most notably, the 1988 Doris Dorrie picture, “Me and Him”), but “Bad Johnson” has the right approach for such an iffy cinematic premise. Instead of working around the oddity of a human organ suddenly attaining consciousness, the feature elects to personify the male member as a living, breathing wiseacre, thus allowing the movie breathing room to work out its plot. Mercifully, “Bad Johnson” has an adequate sense of humor, providing some hilarious punchlines here and there, but miscasting is the tight leash that keeps the film from truly inspired madness. When it comes to penis comedies, it always helps to cast funny people in the leading roles. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

Despite obvious limitations, 2005’s “The Protector” was a pleasingly weirdo action fest from Thailand that chased every impulse it could get away with, from elephant adoration to a transsexual villain. Featuring thrilling fight choreography, the film was a stepping-stone in the once thrilling career of star Tony Jaa, who was building a powerful brand name at the time, using “The Protector” to inch his way into the global marketplace. Nearly a decade later, and there’s now a sequel, which arrives years after Jaa’s momentum cooled, hoping to trigger fond memories of the hero’s abilities by returning to one of his most popular characters. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

“The Skeleton Twins” is going to attract a lot of media attention for its casting of comedy stars Bill Hader and Kristen Wiig in an edgy, indie drama. Mercifully, the movie isn’t a steady display of severity, but a strongly imagined screen depiction of desperation and clinical depression, with welcome breathers of levity and warm sensitivity. It’s a beautiful picture that understands the tenuous bonds of family and pressures of self-delusion, winningly explored with an emotionally consistent, graceful screenplay and assured direction from Craig Johnson. While it appears foreboding, and perhaps that’s the most tantalizing direction for all marketing efforts, “The Skeleton Twins” is approachable and meaningful, confronting an impossible darkness with a generous flow of humanity. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

When a movie wants to communicate the passage of time, it typically takes tricks in casting or make-up to sell the illusion of the years floating by. Richard Linklater’s “Boyhood” attempts something different. Production actually commenced in 2002, with short segments of the helmer’s script filmed over a 12 year period, allowing the stars to age naturally, with emphasis on its youngest characters, who naturally work through adolescence as the feature progresses. It’s a fascinating experiment but a surprisingly relaxed effort. Linklater eschews the poignancy of time passage with this ode to growing up, instead highlighting the development of personality, interests, and defense mechanisms as he observes the world around him. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

“The Quiet Ones” had potential. A creepshow co-produced by Hammer Films, the feature has the right ingredients to at least reach a comfortable plateau of scares and demonic happenings, boasting a creepy doll, unexplained telekinetic events, and a remote location. Disappointingly, director John Pogue doesn’t trust the essentials, trying his best to amplify every single creak and slam to goose the audience, never allowing them to slowly slip into the foreboding atmosphere. Although it’s well-acted, “The Quiet Ones” whiffs on true terror, caught between a habitual need to artificially jolt the viewer and a languid pace, unable to increase pressure in a manner that would benefit the chilling intentions of this misfire. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

Jim Jarmusch always makes interesting pictures, but it’s been a while since he’s made a great one. “Only Lovers Left Alive” toys with the waning trend of vampire stories, only instead of plastic passions and teen angst, there’s conversation, history, and a heaping helping of ennui. Shellacked with Jarmusch-branded wit and coolness, the feature is kept in play through near-perfect casting, with stars Tom Hiddleston and Tilda Swinton carrying the effort’s mystery and understandable concentration on fatigue with wonderful timing and physical presence. Eased with pockets of humor, “Only Lovers Left Alive” is comfortable in its own skin, permitting disparate moods room to breathe as the helmer searches for an angle that might make vampirism fascinating again. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

It’s interesting timing to welcome “The Machine” into theaters a week after the release of “Transcendence.” Both pictures share an interest in the possibility of A.I. and human experimentation, but the Johnny Depp movie is a big-budget slog of half-baked ideas, while “The Machine” is a low-budget effort with a stellar visual presence, competent performances, and a tighter grasp on its message of humanity withstanding an artificial form. Although constructed with bits and pieces from other sci-fi films, “The Machine” retains a dynamic presence, with interesting futureworld ideas sharply realized by writer/director Caradog W. James, who submits quite a cinematic vision for next to no production money. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

“Young & Beautiful” is the latest effort from writer/director Francois Ozon, and it features his interests in behavioral anomalies and troubling domestic developments. It’s a coming-of-age story with a steep learning curve for its lead character, but there is a sense of understanding that permeates the picture, even when it inspects some rather unsavory bedroom business. Distanced but attentive, “Young & Beautiful” remains an intriguing look at a life derailed, though whether or not all this disturbance is intentional remains a question left up to the viewer, with Ozon providing the pieces of a fracture psyche, not the instruction booklet to put it all together. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

I’m not exactly sure what audience “The Other Woman” is for. There’s an enormous amount of bathroom humor, a comedic crutch typically aimed at young males, and director Nick Cassavetes loves to ogle the exposed skin of his stars, making it difficult to comprehend its intention to appeal to a female audience. There’s a graphic conversation about pubic hair and scenes of bloodshed, vomiting, and defecation, and the leading man ends up assaulting a woman in the final moments of the movie. There are so many unappealing ingredients to “The Other Woman,” it’s difficult to remember what exactly works in the picture. Thankfully, that list is short, but the film feels very long. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com