Category: Film Review

I fully recognize that I was in the minority with my mixed review of
2008’s “In Bruges,” finding writer/director Martin McDonagh’s obvious
cleverness overwhelmed by issues of pace and a formulaic sense of humor.
The helmer has tightened his game some with “Seven Psychopaths,” though
it’s another bumpy ride of black comedy and narrative wanderlust, this
time supported by a wonderful cast of famous faces, who’ve arrived ready
to play in McDonagh’s sandbox of graphic violence and daffy characters.
“Seven Psychopaths” is uneven, but defiantly so, creating immense
personality along the way, helping to absorb the randomness of the
screenplay and his numerous tangents.
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After making a slew of films emphasizing his way with fall-down-go-boom
comedy, star Kevin James is finally ready to make a picture where the
comedic impulse is integral to the plot. Heck, it’s even titled “Here
Comes the Boom,” giving James the easiest lay-up feature of his career.
While there’s a triumphant physical commitment to the part, delving into
the brutal realm of mixed martial arts, James’s screenplay is day-old
bread, blending the “Rocky” formula with heaping helpings of “Nacho
Libre,” creating an energetic visual experience throttled by a humdrum
story. Indeed, James does plenty of fall-down-go-boom, but it’s wasted
on a tediously conventional movie that does surprisingly little with the
spectacularly strange sight of James in stampeding MMA mode. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

It makes sense to find producers continually working to bring Louis
Pergaud’s 1912 novel, “The War of the Buttons,” to the big screen.
Christophe Barratier’s French production is actually the fifth picture
born from the original work, which spawned two features in 2011 alone. A
tale of war that blends the innocence of youth with the realities of
world conflict, “Buttons” is a seriocomic tale with ripe
characterizations, opportunities for horseplay, and a piercing awareness
of the evil that men do. Setting the story near the end of WWII,
Barratier makes the viewing event obvious in theme and location, yet his
classic Hollywood approach results in a satisfyingly glossy,
endearingly acted movie. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

A comedic farce doesn’t have to make perfect sense, but there should be
something within the realm of logic fueling the insanity, grounding the
effort in plausibility as fits of madness swirl around. The
unfortunately titled “3, 2, 1…Frankie Go Boom” doesn’t supply a single
believable moment, sprinting around a most nonsensical, contrived
offering of screenwriting. It’s unbearable to sit through at times,
watching decent actors flounder with intentionally ridiculous material,
working themselves into a lather to serve writer/director Jordan
Roberts’s clumsy sense of humor. It’s utter nonsense, but not an
admirable type of tomfoolery that carries itself with an engaging
creative vision. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

While Louis Leterrier’s “The Transporter” and “Transporter 2” were no
diamonds of cinema, they were wonderfully amusing offerings of junk
food, big on action and entertainment value, sold with a special Jason
Statham growl. And then co-writer/producer Luc Besson handed
“Transporter 3” to helmer Olivier Megaton, who cooked up a dreadful,
comatose third installment, effectively killing interest in the series.
Pierre Morel’s “Taken” was blissfully simplistic, focused, and served
raw, using star Liam Neeson’s natural way with blunt force to fashion an
absolute gem of an actioner. And now Besson has returned to his bad
luck charm, calling up Megaton to guide “Taken 2,” a disappointingly
flat, atrociously edited, and somewhat nasty sequel that doesn’t come
close to the rapid-fire original.
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There’s no doubt that “Frankenweenie” is a Tim Burton film. That it’s a
largely lifeless Tim Burton film is the real surprise, considering it's
the man’s second shot at mastering this story. Originally brought to
life by the helmer as a short in 1984 (where it was basically brushed
aside by nervous Disney executives), “Frankenweenie” returns to screens
nearly two decades later, this time as a stop-motion animated
production, hoping to mirror the success of Burton’s similar efforts,
“The Nightmare Before Christmas” and “Corpse Bride.” While it’s crafted
with gloriously ghoulish details and teeming with classic movie
references, “Frankenweenie” shows great difficulty proving its worth as a
feature-length effort, working through elements of monster rampage and
scientific debate that feel more like padding than a naturally dramatic
extension of the original creation. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

Emily Bronte’s celebrated 1847 novel has been adapted time and again by
world cinema, with each production embracing the squeeze of unrequited
love and the abundant atmospheric trimmings of the original work. It’s a
timeless tale of obsession, yet this latest take on the material takes
matters into a harsher direction of internalized agony and violent
communication. It’s a lengthy picture with ambiance to spare, but it’s
something to be seen, offering a rejuvenated approach to the story that
dazzles with grit and grief, captured with an authentically terrifying
atmospheric approach that beautifully supports the discomfort and
anguish flowing through the veins of the performances. This “Wuthering
Heights” is not something to be passively accepted, but deeply felt,
down to the bone. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

There was tremendous potential for “Butter” to throw a spotlight on the
rigors of butter sculpting competitions, drinking in the varied
characters that populate this odd hobby while taking note of the
exceptional skill required to turn slabs of dairy into art. Instead,
“Butter” goes for a swipe of irreverence, poking fun with Midwestern
caricatures while bending over backwards to earn a gratuitous R-rating.
It’s a needlessly vulgar, decidedly laugh-free picture that works up a
sweat trying to come off provocative when all it needed to be was
present with a sculptural medium that doesn’t require much of a satiric
boost to provide 80 minutes of solid entertainment and the occasional
giggle. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

Here’s a film that assumes a great deal of its characters and situations
are interesting and, in some cases, deeply sympathetic. How wrong
“Someday This Pain Will Be Useful to You” is. A conventional exploration
of a young, troubled soul living an affluent life in New York City, the
feature is disorganized and unpleasant, aching to reach some form of
emotional vulnerability, only to spotlight a story without severity,
lacking an abyssal sense of violation and soulful agony that typically
informs such angsty endeavors. It’s not exactly a trainwreck of a movie,
but “Someday This Pain” is so void of depth and meaning, it often
resembles a parody of the bruised teen subgenre. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

I applaud writer/director Darren Lynn Bousman’s attempts to keep the
spirit of low-budget horror alive, scripting stories that prey on fears
of the apocalyptic unknown and the mentally unstable. However, with
efforts such as “11-11-11” and a remake of “Mother’s Day,” the helmer’s
ambitions are far more interesting to dissect than his movies. Add “The
Barrens” to the pile of promising failures, with the creator isolating
the drive to seek and destroy the legendary Jersey Devil, which promises
to be an enticing feature of creepy woodsy remoteness, populated with
characters touched by madness. Bousman doesn’t have the vision to hoist
the horror up high, settling on a mundane camping thriller only
sporadically enlivened by mysterious violence. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

“Won’t Back Down” is such an exaggerated attempt to shed light on the
failures of the public school system, it might have you rooting for
illiteracy to win in the end. Nuance and some type of dramatic balance
is punted away right at the top of the feature, making the next two
hours a preachy, hokey bore boosted by a few sublimely devoted
performances. Education is a critical topic worth a cinematic
inspection, but thespian passion and good intentions do not carry a
movie alone. A production like this demands a brain as big as its heart,
helping viewers to understand complexity when dealing with the youth of
the nation. “Won’t Back Down” merely uncorks a box of Crayons and
broadly colors over the issues at hand, doing a disservice to the
parents, students, and teachers who struggle with this impasse on a
daily basis. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

Writer/director Rian Johnson has developed a reputation for
uncompromising, inventive work (with “Brick” and “The Brothers Bloom”),
and his latest, the sci-fi brainteaser “Looper,” is no different. While
his features are intricately designed and heavily considered, Johnson’s
not one to keep an eye on pace, often so enamored with screen
particulars that a simple sense of forward momentum is missing, losing a
primal cinematic drive to step back and admire his handiwork. “Looper”
is the closest the filmmaker has come to a dazzling motion picture,
toying with the conventions of the time travel subgenre to fashion his
own thriller, a movie with real teeth and a working brain. Although
intermittently ferocious, “Looper” doesn’t hold the viewer by the throat
for two hours, showing a troubling lack of stamina the longer it
develops the central conflict. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

It’s difficult to believe “Pitch Perfect” was scripted by Kay Cannon, a
vastly talented writer who made a name for herself working on “30 Rock,”
a job that requires ingenuity, a samurai-sword-sharp sense of humor,
and a mathematical understanding of screen timing. Cruelly, “Pitch
Perfect” is a glorified episode of “Glee” with a “Family Guy” funny
bone, bellyflop displays of improvisation, and a running joke concerning
projectile vomiting. At one point, a character even slides around in
the soupy stomach contents. Yeesh. Perhaps the target demographic of
teenagers and music competition nuts will enjoy themselves
wholeheartedly with this bothersome feature, losing themselves in the
songs and fatigued silliness, yet “Pitch Perfect” is an unexpectedly
lazy effort from a genuinely inspired writer, steamrolling through the
world of a cappella in an uncivil manner that doesn’t inspire laughs or
induce the chills that typically accompany true vocal power. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

The particulars of film distribution have kept “The Hole” from American
eyes for quite some time now. Originally shot in 2008 and released in
Europe in 2009, the feature finally makes its way west for reasons that
aren’t immediately clear, but I’m grateful regardless. The latest from
director Joe Dante, “The Hole” is a modest production with a hearty
sense of scare, tunneling into the psyche to find a human source of
terror to compliment the monsters that occasionally pop into view during
the picture. Entertaining, with a welcome sense of mischief, “The Hole”
plays to Dante’s strengths, returning him to a suburban battleground
where young characters face off against an unstoppable, often knee-high
malevolent force. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

There’s a polar opposite difference between the gloriously elastic
animation of “Hotel Transylvania” and its wretched screenplay, and it’s a
heartbreaker to see such a wonderful premise torpedoed by a lack of
storytelling consideration. A rare foray into spooky business for family
audiences, the feature contains such promise that it seems almost
impossible to screw up in a major way. Enter Adam Sandler, who brings
his low-brow sense of humor to this monster mash, endeavoring to appease
adults with a moldy tale of father-daughter strife, while he looks to
tickle kids with bodily function humor. Although it’s a shame that
“Hotel Transylvania” is so persistently crude, true disappointment
emerges from the exceptional cartoon craftsmanship of the movie, which
is wasted on ghastly writing. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

It’s a rare event to find an author not only writing the screenplay
adaptation of his own work, but directing it as well. It’s a heavy
workload for Stephen Chbosky, who attempts to make the nuances of his
book, “The Perks of Being a Wallflower,” compute on the big screen.
Although gifted a trio of inspired performances from the lead actors,
“Wallflower” is a muddled creation blessed with unique emotional
sincerity, yet cursed with loose ends and poorly defined characters,
huddled into a precious creation that might test the patience of those
with a sensitivity to effusive teen melodrama. There’s enormous insight
into the adolescent mind, yet Chbosky is hopelessly disorganized,
creating a film of sporadic significance. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

“Bringing Up Bobby” has all the good intentions in the world to tell an
honest story about separation and the lasting sting of mistakes.
Writer/director Famke Janssen (the “X-Men” star making her filmmaking
debut) portrays her story earnestly, massaging an arc of personal
responsibility that’s kindly enough, but rarely is it ever felt down
deep in this underwhelming picture. A mismanaged drama with overheated
performances and a general disinterest in following through on
characterizations, “Bringing Up Bobby” doesn’t provide the soulfulness
it aims to share. Instead, it stumbles through scenes without a
consistent tone, hoping to shape something meaningful out of its display
of misguided parenting. Janssen just doesn’t have the vision to achieve
it. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

There’s an enormous gust of passion blowing through “Unconditional,”
though it seldom has the force to lift leaden scenes off the ground.
Being a Christian production, its intention is peaceful enough, with a
concentrated effort to reduce the audience to a puddle of tears through
acts of goodness and confession. However, that aspiration to extract a
massive amount of emotion from characters and viewers is clouded by
scattered storytelling. “Unconditional” often goes out of its way to
divert concentration from its most compelling subplots, trying hard to
come across as an important movie on a myriad of topics. While strongly
acted by stars Lynn Collins and Michael Ealy, it’s a clumsy picture that
feels like it’s going to add up to more than it actually does. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

As Hollywood anoints Jennifer Lawrence as the Next Big Thing, there’s
some unfinished business to tend to before she bathes in her “Hunger
Games” franchise success or tastes Oscar glory with the upcoming “Silver
Linings Playbook,” and its name is “House at the End of the Street.”
Shot before her stint as Katniss in “The Hunger Games,” this B-list
thriller reminds the world of more humble time for the actress, when she
had to take any job that slipped into view, establishing her name with
traditional genre career steps. It’s a terrible picture, but it’s hard
to fault the star for its failure, as she delivers a performance best
described as “embarrassed,” while the rest of the effort dissolves into
an insipid bore with nearly a third of its running time devoted to an
easily escapable situation. I hope Lawrence takes some time today to hug
her “Catching Fire” producers for her good fortune. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

The last time we saw the character of Judge Dredd on the big screen, it
was in a 1995 Sylvester Stallone vehicle from Disney. While
interestingly designed and occasionally inspired, “Judge Dredd” was a
misfire, tanking an opportunity to bring the cult comic book bruiser
(first inked in 1977) to life in the manner he was originally conceived.
It took time, but enterprising financiers have decided to try again
with Dredd, this time sticking close to the source material to inspire a
cinematic do over, shedding a Hollywood action bonanza atmosphere to go
grittier, keeping the character masked and mean as he’s once again sent
out to assess the wicked citizens of Mega-City One. Second time’s a
charm with “Dredd,” which brings out the agony of this world and the
duty of the protagonist with a welcome discomfort, hitting consistent
points of futuristic fury in a supremely entertaining picture. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com