Category: Film Review

The “Paranormal Activity” film series has made its producers and distributor a massive amount of money, a fact especially disconcerting when one factors in the limited effort put into these pictures. With all installments revolving around the exploits of characters who willingly put themselves into dangerous situations while refusing to put their camera down, “Paranormal Activity” has becomes a brand name for cheap scares and unsteady acting. It’s a haunted house experience that once dominated the Halloween season. For “Paranormal Activity: The Marked Ones,” the frightfest has been bumped to January, moving scares from autumn to winter with hopes a change of date will recharge the franchise as it enters the second stage of its longevity. Perhaps the moneymen also hope all the cold and snow might distract from the fact that “The Marked Ones” doesn’t bring anything new to the series, only triggering memories of the previous chapters. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

With 2010’s “Outrage,” writer/director/star Takeshi Kitano set out to manufacture a Japanese crime saga that was authentic in its observance of yakuza methodology and ritual while indulging in a plot of tarnished loyalty and cold-blooded control. It was his “Godfather” in many respects, and in an effort to keep up with the Coppola achievement, Kitano has created another chapter in what appears to be something of a trilogy for the gifted filmmaker. Much like the first feature, “Beyond Outrage” is a byzantine creation that’s primarily made up of names and faces, with the occasional burst of viciousness arriving to remind the viewer that Kitano still packs a punch these days, deftly blending extended dialogue sequences with harrowing moments of hostility, crafting a worthy follow-up to an unexpectedly engrossing picture. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

Although it was never a success, William Friedkin’s 1980 effort, “Cruising” (starring Al Pacino), has inspired a cult following over the last three decades. A deeply flawed but fascinating vision of the gay club scene in New York City, “Cruising” was reportedly shredded by the MPAA to achieve its release, shorn of 40 sexually explicit minutes that have never seen the light of day. Enter James Franco and Travis Matthews, two filmmakers out to flex their creative muscles by restaging this lost footage with an eager cast of background players and a hesitant star in Val Lauren, spending a few days in a Los Angeles theater dissecting the motivations of the moment, using the shoot as a way to challenge personal fears. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

“Open Grave” has a nasty exposition habit. A horror film with some mystery on its menu, the picture is terrified to leave any viewer behind, always explaining itself, underlining relationships and spelling out tension. It’s an irritating routine, making the movie feel more diluted than it already is, with director Gonzalo Lopez-Gallego (“Apollo 18”) incapable of quieting down the effort, showing respect for intelligence and natural screen suspense. There’s a germ of an idea within “Open Grave” that deserves development, but what’s ultimately made it to the screen is simplified and stripped of feeling, scratching out the level of anxiety screenwriters Chris and Eddie Borey are aiming to summon with this end of the world endeavor. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

There’s an incredible story of tenacity buried somewhere in “Lone Survivor,” but it’s difficult to embrace the searing aspects of the tale when director Peter Berg (fresh off the 2012 flop, “Battleship”) insists on turning the effort into an action movie, wrapped in the American flag. The true-life tale of Navy SEAL Marcus Luttrell and his astonishing fight out of an Afghanistan war zone, “Lone Survivor” doesn’t need much ornamentation to explore the heat of the moment when processed by an elite military unit. Sadly, Berg doesn’t trust the inherent nobility and stress of the situation, changing the blurred dynamic of conflict to fit the needs of cliched screenwriting and unimaginative direction, reducing a primal fight for life to a patriotic “Die Hard” sequel. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

“47 Ronin” has received its fair share of press due to its runaway costs and missed released dates. Branded a troubled production, it’s with some relief to report that the feature is not a mess, just misguided in a manner familiar to moviegoers who’ve previously been subjected to the runaway ambition of a first-time director with access to unlimited funds. His name is Carl Rinsch, and while his career will undoubtedly survive “47 Ronin,” let’s hope the experience assembling a fantasy samurai picture of this magnitude will provide him with much needed focus for any future endeavors. This one simply gets away from him, and while it’s handsomely made, the work is stiff, still, and tonally unsteady. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

“Grudge Match” finally puts the Raging Bull and Rocky Balboa into a boxing ring, though I fail to recall anyone actually demanding this showdown. It’s the gimmick that drives the movie, with plenty of inside jokes pushed into the pockets of the picture, but it’s not a particularly tempting offer. In dire need of a fresh sense of humor and imaginative screenwriting, “Grudge Match” is made passable by its two stars, Robert De Niro and Sylvester Stallone, who are amusing to watch as they trade insults and, eventually, punches, showing surprising interest in this limp dramedy, boosting the viewing experience with their innate charm. If only the rest of the effort followed their lead. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

Ben Stiller is primarily known for funny business. While every artist deserves the opportunity to expand their creative horizons, it’s difficult to understand what Stiller was aiming for with “The Secret Life of Walter Mitty.” After “Reality Bites,” “The Cable Guy,” “Zoolander” and “Tropic Thunder,” the director/star drops the overt laughs to play lyrical, helming this hymn to the human experience that’s insistent in its importance, but void in its emotions. While gorgeously shot and peppered with sweet, alert performances, “Walter Mitty” doesn’t add up to much, stuck in neutral as Stiller attempts to figure out what type of movie he wants to make. It’s the most elaborate piece of mediocrity in the 2013 film year. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

“The Wolf of Wall Street” is a work of pure insanity. Mercifully, it’s also the latest from director Martin Scorsese, which guarantees some degree of cinematic refinement when it comes to the depiction of excess in all its forms. It’s a rowdy, relentless picture, chasing a rowdy tone of chemically-drenched madness and lip-licking greed, eating up three hours of screen time as it beats a repetitive sense of physical collision and brain-spinning hyperactivity into the ground. Although it overstays its welcome, “The Wolf of Wall Street” has some truly inspired chaos to hold attention, led by an eye-bulging, spittle-spraying performance by Leonardo DiCaprio, who once again takes the title as the most feral actor working today, channeling his inner badger to portray a man without morals, decency, and self-control, flaming out in a most spectacular manner. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

“Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom” is a strong, articulate portrait of South African leader Nelson Mandela, but it wouldn’t be as compelling as it is without the participation of stars Idris Elba and Naomie Harris. Two powerful performances that are direct in their firepower and subtle in emotion, the actors bring density to the traditionally thin bio-pic genre, allowing the viewer to understand deep-seated motivations and the passage of time, which is a crucial element to this story. Competently assembled by director Justin Chadwick (“The Other Boleyn Girl”) and screenwriter William Nicholson (“Les Miserables”), the feature is surprisingly honest and welcomingly underplayed, generating an understanding of the Mandelas instead of blindly celebrating their accomplishments. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

The holiday season receives a dose of troubling behavior in “White Reindeer,” a darkly comic tale of mourning from writer/director Zach Clark. Working with a limited budget, the helmer brings to the screen an unusual tale of mourning, employing Christmas cheer as a mocking reminder of false sincerity as we watch a woman’s life fall to pieces. Sounds like a treat, right? Well, in many ways “White Reindeer” is a delight, with a sharp script of surprises and a finely bewildered lead performance from Anna Margaret Hollyman contributing to an amusing, vaguely horrifying journey into psychological paralysis, soaked in eggnog and scored to the repetitive sounds of seasonal hits. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

Somewhere underneath all the hair and costumes is a fine motion picture called “American Hustle.” It’s a period piece sampling from the style and discomfort of the 1970s, and it’s the latest from writer/director David O. Russell, a helmer currently on a tear with the back-to-back successes of “The Fighter” and “Silver Linings Playbook.” That momentum is halted a bit by “American Hustle,” but the movie remains an evocative, churning inspection of responsibility and deception, only communicated in a Russellian cinematic language that takes some time to get used to. A bizarrely still, tortured caper, the feature offers exceptional performances and a coarse script, yet attention always manages to return to its visual impression, calling up the decade in the strangest ways. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

“Saving Mr. Banks” tells the story of how the 1964 smash “Mary Poppins” came to be, weathering a difficult creative process that featured intense disagreements between author P.L. Travers and Walt Disney. Although it may seem like a joyous picture about the birth of a classic, “Saving Mr. Banks” is unexpectedly dark, prone to belaboring its mournful elements as if to apologize for its lighter side. Masterful performances carry the effort, and observance of the screenwriting process is fascinating, but here’s a movie that seems far too bland to truly explore the diseases that haunted Travers for the duration of her life, leaving director John Lee Hancock powerless to manufacture the tearjerker the screenplay is aching to become. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

“Walking with Dinosaurs” is based on the popular 1999 documentary series that tried to put the viewer into the world of these massive, fierce creatures through a mix of CGI and live-action cinematography. A massive hit, the program spawned a brand name that carried on to a live stage show that used puppetry to wow audiences. Now it’s time to conquer the big screen, though the producers have decided to water down the educational inspiration behind the material, hoping to capture more imaginations through action sequences, cartoon voicing, and jokes about fecal matter. “Walking with Dinosaurs” is impressively constructed, with stunning animation, but it’s a frustratingly insulting endeavor that pushes away the awe of paleontology for the comfort of family film convention. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

Joel and Ethan Coen make movies a certain way — a thumbprint that’s created some of cinema’s most powerful and delightfully lopsided features. They rarely miss, and even when they fail to live up to expectations, their pictures are exceptionally layered, idiosyncratic efforts that charm with their tight craftsmanship and impish sense of humor. “Inside Llewyn Davis” is perhaps their most challenging endeavor, asking viewers to process the existence of a man who refuses to get his life together, embarking on an aimless tour of his own misery with razor-sharp edges to his personality that cut those daring to get close. Evocative and steadfastly Coen-esque, “Inside Llewyn Davis” is nevertheless a chore to sit through, missing a certain snap that usually comes so easily to the filmmakers. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

The original “Anchorman” didn’t exactly tear up the box office, but the comedy did fairly well in the summer of 2004 before soaring as a cult hit on home video. It’s odd that it took nearly a decade for a sequel to come together, finding the creative team of co-writer/star Will Ferrell and co-writer/director Adam McKay a little rusty when it comes to the revival of screen insanity. While not quite as snappy as the previous effort, “Anchorman 2” remains loaded with laughs and heavy-handed but clever satire. Missing a certain hellraising attitude, the follow-up nevertheless finds its footing quickly, allowing Ferrell and his supporting cast time to feel around the edges of stupidity, locating old rhythms as Ron Burgundy is hit in the face by 1980. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

In an effort to expand his empire, writer/director/producer/star Tyler Perry has set his sights on the holiday season and all the perennial business it offers. “A Madea Christmas” is the eighth film featuring the titular behemoth, though it feels like the hundredth, with Perry serving up the same stale brew of moral lessons and pratfalls, only here the antics are infused with a yuletide ambiance that’s only marginally convincing. Aggressively broad, half-realized, and intermittently inexcusable, “A Madea Christmas” is dead on arrival, and no amount of seasonal cheer and supporting turns from former “Facts of Life” stars is going to steer the sleigh to satisfaction. Even for a Tyler Perry movie, this feature seems excessively cheap and lifeless. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

The question posed last year was how director Peter Jackson was going to stretch the thinness of J.R.R. Tolkien’s novel, “The Hobbit,” to meet the needs of three feature films. With the release of the second chapter, “The Desolation of Smaug,” the strain is beginning to show. Not built for such an extensive big screen adaptation, “The Hobbit” is fighting for oxygen in this sequel, failing to provide a reason (beyond a financial one) why the material should carry on for three years. It’s still enjoyable fantasy fun, but “The Desolation of Smaug” has difficulty coughing up reasons for its extended run time (161 minutes) and legion of characters. And this is only the midway point in the story. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com