Category: Film Review

“The Words” is riveting, illuminating, and communicative…for about 45
minutes. It’s enough time to convince an initially hesitant ticket buyer
that something interesting is afoot, with writer/directors Brian
Klugman and Lee Sternthal gracefully exploring the mechanics of a
literary career (or lack thereof), while building toward a crucial act
of plagiarism that feels like it could be dissected for two movies. And
then the brakes are applied in an abrupt fashion, removing the
professional urgency that drives the material, turning a pleasingly
straightforward story of personal corruption into a tepid cinematic
confessional. “The Words” commences so convincingly, there’s hope for a
climatic return to form. Alas, the picture limps to a close, more
interested in playing games than burrowing as deep as possible into a
spellbinding situation of fraud. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

If there’s anything positive to glean from “The Cold Light of Day,” it
would have to be its use as an educational tool, teaching young film
students how not to make a mid-budget action movie. Perversely
amateurish and astonishingly tedious considering its mouthbreathing
screen elements, the feature stumbles from scene to scene, using
violence and disorder to cover the fact that the script, credited to
Scott Wiper and John Petro, is a complete load of rubbish, from dialogue
to plotting. While the genre typically leans toward nonsense to provide
cheap thrills, “Light of Day” launches into absurdity in the opening
ten minutes and never recovers. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

“For a Good Time, Call…” is the rare movie about the phone sex trade
that doesn’t treat the experience as flypaper for dysfunction, instead
generating a flighty, colorful atmosphere of salacious activity to
backdrop a thin but merry story of friendship. It’s rarely funny, yet it
sustains a jovial mood of naughty business, supported by two vivacious
performances from Ari Graynor and Lauren Anne Miller. Indecent enough to
fluster prudes and warm enough to win over female audiences, “For a
Good Time, Call…” is only undone by its pedestrian screenwriting, which
is so slavish to formula, it comes to destroy the big screen party
director Jamie Travis is fighting to maintain. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

To its credit, “V/H/S” attempts to attack the found footage genre from a
slightly different angle, taking the herky jerky antics to the realm of
the anthology movie, allowing six directors to have their way with all
manner of POV horror. Unfortunately, with this aesthetic comes expected
elements of blurred cinematography and amateur acting, and while the
irritations are broken down into blocks of 20-minute-long stories,
“V/H/S” remains protracted and dramatically undernourished. While two of
the tales retain a satisfying bite, the experiment as a whole is tiring
and often ridiculous, spending most of its energy supporting a concept
that wears out its welcome after ten minutes of exposure. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

Fans of the 1992 picture “Baraka” have been waiting two decades for some
type of glorious follow-up to attack screens. “Samsara” is that
long-awaited continuation, once again plunging viewers into the alien
landscape that is our Earth, pulling at the threads of life to acquire a
sharper sense of humanity in motion as it moves toward times of
destruction and, in some cases, technological immortality. It’s a
mesmerizing viewing experience, returning to the battle grounds and
blissful encounters of “Baraka” while expanding on themes of humanity,
existence, and consumption, captured with painstakingly precise
cinematography and supported by a layered selection of music. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

While I didn’t find myself overwhelmed with the insanity of last year’s
hit “Bridesmaids,” its absurd length and dramatic decline is a Caribbean
vacation compared to the forced acid bath of “Bachelorette.” Shockingly
unlikable and unfunny, this latest round of women behaving badly is
crippled by unnecessary excess, botched characterizations, and a
calculated round of 1990s nostalgia to appeal to the core demographic.
Aching to be irreverent and insightful when it comes to the flattened
soul of the thirtysomething party girl facing the cell clank of
adulthood, “Bachelorette” would be better off as a soulless farce, not
the noxious semi-melodrama it eventually becomes. It’s a movie that
doesn’t know whether to hug its characters or push them off a bridge. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

Landing in America a full year after its UK release, “The Inbetweeners
Movie” is intended to conclude the popular Brit series that ran from
2008-10, while also drumming up a little publicity for the U.S. remake
of the show, currently airing on MTV. Unfortunately, I’ve never been
exposed to the original work prior to the feature, leaving me at a
slight disadvantage, likely missing inside jokes and established
characterizations. Thankfully, “The Inbetweeners Movie” isn’t algebra,
pushing forward as a lewd, crude teen comedy in the “American Pie” vein,
with broad acts of humiliation and simplistic emotional cues to decode.
While I’m sure the effort has proven popular with the faithful,
newcomers shouldn’t have trouble catching up with the shenanigans, which
are largely amusing and enjoyably obvious. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

Adapted from the 1973 novel by Patrick White, “The Eye of the Storm” is a
film about vicious behavior committed by exhausted people. It’s not an
easy sit, teeming with venom and chaotic states of mind, but there’s a
wonderful focal point in the three lead performances from Charlotte
Rampling, Geoffrey Rush, and Judy Davis. Providing exemplary work to a
picture in desperate need of defined emotional directions, the cast
carries the heavy burden of the material with dignity. The same cannot
be said of helmer Fred Schepisi, who stumbles through the muddy drama,
placing more concentration on family dysfunction than compelling
narrative direction. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

While I’m not up on my science fiction writing as most people, from my
viewpoint, “Robot & Frank” is a fairly original idea massaged
wonderfully by director Jake Schreier. It’s a funny movie, but not
really a comedy. It’s melancholy, but far from depressing. It’s
mischievous, but grounded in realism. A hodgepodge of moods built around
an unlikely story of friendship between a man and his service robot,
the film carries itself confidently, with occasional moments of
significant emotion, articulated superbly in Frank Langella’s lead
performance, his most memorable work in quite some time. Who really
needs human co-stars when a faceless robot helps to form one of the
year’s best on-screen pairings? Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

One would think that a movie produced by World Wrestling Entertainment
would contain a little more theatricality, a little more bang for the
buck. “The Day” is a post-apocalyptic actioner from the sports
entertainment factory, and despite a plot that dabbles in cannibalism
and supplies a sizeable body count, there’s little here that invigorates
the senses, despite a production that’s sniffing around for a certain
tone of badassery it never achieves. Glum, poorly acted, and hard on the
eyes, “The Day” is a flat feature with a few spikes of absurdity that
push the production into unintentional camp. Even by the relatively low
standards of the siege horror genre, this picture is a tedious waste of
time. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

What’s most frustrating about “The Possession” (not to be confused with
last week’s “The Apparition”) is that it’s filled with potential. It’s a
distinctive story of demonic ownership with a specific cultural tilt,
yet the production seems hesitant to follow through with its chilling
ideas for terror. Instead, “The Possession” is locked in mediocrity,
always wincing when the horror hits a few memorable extremes. Maybe it’s
the PG-13 rating or perhaps director Ole Bornedal isn’t up for the
challenge, but this feature is exceptionally good at pulling its
punches, leaving discouraged viewers to fantasize about a more
satisfying picture poured from the same filmmaking ingredients. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

Sure to raise pulse rates and incite shockwaves of disbelief,
“Compliance” is an exceptional example of provocative filmmaking, taking
viewers on a 90-minute-long journey of humiliation, manipulation, and
good old fashioned stupidity. It’s a riveting watch, with a stranglehold
of suspense expertly maintained by writer/director Craig Zobel, who
accepts the challenge of adapting a true crime situation without pumping
the plot full of fiction, holding to the innate horror of the central
violation while subtly shifting the ground beneath the viewer’s feet.
Bravely uncomfortable and sure to inspire heated post-movie (and likely
mid-movie) conversation, “Compliance” is haunting, positively enraging
when it sinks in that this was no nightmare, but a reality. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

“The Oogieloves in the Big Balloon Adventure” is the brainchild of Kenn
Viselman, a marketing wizard behind “The Teletubbies” and “Thomas the
Tank Engine” who decided to strike out on his own, overseeing a family
film geared toward the short attention spans of pre-schoolers. Billed as
“interactive,” “Big Balloon Adventure” encourages young viewers to
twist and shout in front of on-screen characters, getting into the
spirit of this lackluster musical blasted with puppetry and nuclear
colors. Although it’s meant to tickle toddlers, “Big Balloon Adventure”
isn’t worth punishing multiplex pricing, delivering small-scale thrills
on a limited budget. It’s definitely a rental, offering parents a chance
to escape while wee ones bop around for 85 minutes. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

It’s difficult to recommend “Lawless” to the average moviegoer. It’s a
film that contains scenes of pure evil, with lacerating violence to back
up its arguments, making it extremely troubling for those with
sensitivity to screen brutality. Thankfully, there’s a consistently
impressive effort inside its grim ambiance, embellishing its
Depression-era setting just enough to activate splendidly as an offering
of pulp cinema, keeping viewers glued to dramatic developments and
widescreen menace. It’s a rough feature, yet this intensity keeps the
material on task. Instead of lounging around as an evocative slice of
backwoods history, “Lawless” stands up straight as a revenge picture,
with flawed heroes and a villain of unparalleled sliminess. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

Marketed as a sinister picture with heavy demonic overtones, “The Tall
Man” turns out to be something quite different, absent a juicy genre
hook to immediately pull viewers in. That’s not to say the film is
successful, but its intentions are unique, hoping to approach formulaic
scares with moralistic twist. It’s a shame the feature isn’t terribly
interesting beyond its central concept, laboring through pedestrian
chase sequences and flaccid confrontations. Writer/director Pascal
Laugier has a few inspired visual ideas to share, but what begins as an
intriguing Stephen King riff devolves into a Lifetime Original,
effectively burning off the potential of the complex misdirection. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

“The Victim” has been routinely referenced as a classic grindhouse
production, out to charm fans of sleazy, violent entertainment. However,
writer/director/star Michael Biehn doesn’t put his best perverted foot
forward with this lackluster, budget-minded suspense picture.
Underdeveloped and occasionally directionless, “The Victim” is actually
quite tasteful for the genre, preferring windy dialogue exchanges to
wrathful acts of bloodshed. While not without a few highlights, the
feature is disappointingly tame, missing a grand opportunity for screen
insanity. Biehn has a germ of an idea here, but lacks the sickness
needed to bring this tale of murder, sex, and feverish uncertainty to
life. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

The trailer for “The Apparition” contained more story than the picture
it was promoting. In fact, I think the trailer for “The Apparition” is
actually more of a movie than “The Apparition.” A wildly incoherent
effort that spends most of its running time avoiding its own plot, “The
Apparition” is one of those major studio releases that is so stunningly
inept, it’s a wonder it’s receiving a theatrical release. However, maybe
a brief stay in multiplexes is a positive thing, allowing those with
heavenly B-movie patience to sit down and decode the bungled filmmaking.
Perhaps there’s someone out there who could possibly explain the
feature to me one day. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

After his lackluster turn in the recent “Magic Mike,” it’s encouraging
to watch star Matthew McConaughey dig his teeth into something
positively evil like the character of Joe Cooper. A cop drenched in
Texas swagger, Joe is a man you wouldn’t want to cross, yet he carries a
seductive, strangely respectful aura about him that’s almost appealing.
It’s a tremendously controlled and creepy performance from the actor,
matching the intensity of director William Friedkin, who summons a humid
atmosphere of desperation and humiliation for “Killer Joe,” a ripe,
captivatingly repellent picture that challenges its cast with stark
portrayals of stupidity and intimidation, roasting in the Dallas heat.
It’s a punishing viewing experience, but a uniquely vile sit that
rewards the brave with exemplary technical credits, a sure pace in the
early going, and the sight of McConaughey reacquainting himself with
excellence. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

The rush in “Premium Rush” only arrives in short bursts, often after
lengthy offerings of exposition I doubt most ticket buyers will care
about. A chase film that consistently torpedoes its momentum, the
picture is frustrating sit, finding co-writer/director David Koepp
insisting on a story that matches the intensity of the pursuit. He fails
to find one, though “Premium Rush” is determined to deliver on
characterization despite a premise that works just fine focusing on the
heat of the moment, supported by a marvelous display of bicycle stunts
and streetwise navigation that’s depicted with the utmost urgency. Koepp
doesn’t trust the basics of the hunt, bending over backwards to paste a
soul on a simplistic machine of suspense. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

It’s hard to believe it’s been a decade since the release of “Like
Mike,” leaving “Thunderstruck” ample room to pick up where the
teen-centric sports fantasy left off. However, while “Like Mike” at
least made a faint attempt to conjure curiosity concerning the iffy
magic dust it was spreading, “Thunderstruck” doesn’t even attempt to
pinpoint its basketball enchantment. It’s a peculiar creative choice in
an otherwise bland, feebly acted comedy, concentrating more on laughs
and half-realized messages of adolescent responsibility than solidifying
a truly bizarre premise, at least to a point where it appears as though
the production actually cared about telling a coherent story. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com