Category: Film Review

What a challenging and unusual motion picture this is. “Higher Ground” marks the directorial debut of actress Vera Farmiga, one of the most astute performers in Hollywood today, and she reaches big for her first cinematic offering. A story of salvation and awakening, about religion and spirituality, “Higher Ground” is an exquisitely measured, fair-minded assessment of faith. It’s never mean or condescending. It’s honest and richly imagined, drilling to the heart of commitment and life. It’s difficult material from which to launch a filmmaking career, yet this is a splendidly confident, unexpected movie. One of the best of 2011. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

“Warrior” is “Rocky” for the mixed martial arts generation, a fact the film itself acknowledges. It’s pure formula from start to finish, yet there’s a wellspring of sincerity here that softens the clichés, at least for the first half of the picture. It’s wholly predictable (Lionsgate marketing has done their part to give away the ending) and occasionally ridiculous, but the passions in play are convincing, often rousing. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

It’s been over a decade since John Landis last directed a feature-length comedy, spending the last 10 years working on various documentaries, perhaps waiting for the right material to come into view. “Burke and Hare” certainly plays to his sensibilities, combining slapstick comedy, English wit, and macabre occurrences into a sprightly picture that encourages more amused reactions than laughs. Landis is comfortable here, fluid and frisky, but the material just doesn’t have much snap to it. At least outside of all the broken limbs. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

“Apollo 18” is the latest entry in the growing “found footage” genre, popularized in recent years by the blockbuster “Paranormal Activity” films. Instead of rehashing eerie domestic terror, “Apollo 18” blasts into outer space, playing around with history and horror to manufacture a slightly different take on the game of fabricated realism. NASA nuts and conspiracy freaks might find something to embrace here, but the average viewer is likely to be bored stiff by this overlong, underwhelming chiller. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

About this time last year, “Piranha 3D” was released into theaters. Instead of a predicted monstrosity, the picture turned out to be an enjoyable, mercilessly gory romp, retaining ideal exploitation instincts and a marvelous sense of humor. This year’s fish-based horror offering is “Shark Night 3D,” which is about as polar opposite a viewing experience from “Piranha 3D” as possible. Labored, idiotic, and tightly restricted when it comes to violence, the feature is a fiasco on every level of execution, aiming to be some type of camp classic yet cursed with moronic direction that renders the whole thing useless. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

With “Red State,” writer/director Kevin Smith seeks a darker path of storytelling, directly contrasting a career made up of profane comedies and barbed but cuddly relationship dramas. Part chiller, part lecture, “Red State” is a jumble of ideas and characterizations tossed haphazardly into an unnervingly disconnected motion picture, which often feels unfinished and calculated instead of winningly feral. Yes, “Red State” is unlike anything Kevin Smith has made before, but it’s also the least effective feature of his career. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

Promising a bawdy time with a slippery slapstick edge, “A Good Old Fashioned Orgy” instead plays it fairly safe, pulling a tired RRR routine (raunch, riff, and reference) while remaining about as enchantingly explicit as PBS daytime programming. It’s a moldy film (shot three years ago), uninspired and predictably performed. All it really has is its titular event, an extended sequence of pure pulled punchery that’s going to leave many viewers disappointed. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

The Christian golf drama “Seven Days in Utopia” is truly a mixed blessing. Competently acted and gorgeously shot, the film is often unbearably corny at times, assuming the guise of an inspirational tool when it’s far more compelling as an intimate story of personal struggle. It’s perfectly digestible and refreshingly G-rated, but it’s often so confused, looking to make salient points on godly goodness when its best attributes are found on the fairway. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

A remake of a 2007 Israeli film, “The Debt” has all the components of a richly observed, fingernail-chewing spy thriller, yet the dramatic elements are anything but taut. Heavy with marvelous, ideally impassioned performances, the picture suffers from an unevenness that robs the material of the excitement it effortlessly generates in the electrifying opening half. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

Miranda July has a way of making 90 minutes of incessant quirk feel like 30 years on a chain gang.

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The Luc Besson action machine revs up again with “Colombiana,” a female-driven shoot-em-up that never feels particularly organized or inspired. A few sequences based purely on visual appeal shine, but the rest is a heated jumble of emotional breakdowns and assassination games. It’s not quite up to the popcorn-gobbling standards Besson is usually known for.

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Admittedly, marriage can be difficult. The comedy “Swinging with the Finkels” makes it look absolutely unpleasant. A half-baked ode to the challenges of sustaining marital sex, the picture makes all the wrong moves, somehow believing it’s forming some type of poignant comment on the complexity of commitment. Instead, it’s an occasionally loathsome sitcom starring two miscast leads doing their chipper best to make this malarkey profound.

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“Brighton Rock” is an incredibly dramatic motion picture, positively loony at times. There are a few moments so heated, it feels as though the film itself is pointing a loaded gun to its temple, threatening to shoot. The manic energy isn’t a smooth blend with writer/director Rowan Joffe’s sizable effort of screen style, but the volcanic mood feels undeniably effective at times, funneled into a combustible story of gang warfare, criminals, and the women they secretly detest. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

“Main Street” represents the final cinematic contribution from the late playwright and screenwriter Horton Foote (“To Kill a Mockingbird,” “Tender Mercies”). His rich vocabulary and observance of southern life continues on in this motion picture, but it also holds the producers captive. Unable or unwilling to challenge the writing legend, “Main Street” unfolds with a myriad of problems in the areas of characterization and resolution. There’s something interesting here at the core of the conflict, but the story is offered so little room to breathe, coming across rushed and undercooked. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

“Don’t Be Afraid of the Dark” is a remake of a 1973 television movie, a production beloved in cult circles, but it’s hard to believe the story didn’t originate in the murky ocean of ghoulish events that passes for co-writer/producer Guillermo del Toro’s imagination. Pervasive darkness, tiny goblins on the hunt to inflict pain, and a creepy old house of horror. This picture is right up the filmmaker’s alley. I’m shocked he didn’t direct it himself. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

We’ve seen multiple R-rated comedies this summer that’ve trafficked in vulgarity to make themselves heard, dependent on shock value to acquire box office attention. “Our Idiot Brother” is a swell change of pace from the obnoxious norm, rooting its shenanigans in a welcome feeling of familial reality, pulling laughs from a source of frustration viewers might be able to relate to. It’s a dumb comedy but never stupid, always good-natured and sharply performed. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

“The Smurfs” have enjoyed an extensive history of television and print achievements, charming audiences for decades now with their miniature adventures and lust for mischief. Their CG-animated/live-action film debut finally answers the question weighing heavily on the mind of every fan: do Smurfs fart? Turns out they do, with this and several other revelations just waiting to be discovered in this dreadful kiddie distraction. Franchise creator Peyo (who passed away in 1992) would be so proud. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

More entertaining than riotous, the dark comedy “The Guard” is best valued as a vehicle for actor Brendan Gleeson, the vastly talented performer who’s enjoyed accolades and awards for decades now, yet remains best known as Mad-Eye Moody from the “Harry Potter” pictures. Digging his teeth into a delightfully sour antihero role, Gleeson is perhaps the only true reason to sit through “The Guard,” a satisfactory yet oddly monotonous police adventure in dire need of the actor’s perfectly timed delivery. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

“The Family Tree” looks to expose the poisoned heart of suburbia, rendering the picture formulaic and a little on the moldy side. However, it’s determined, at least visually so, shoving the ensemble into action, expressing all the worry and wonder surrounding this myriad of subplots, often mashed together into a toxic whole. The feature isn’t especially humorous or enlightening, but it’s rarely boring.

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When one thinks of a gut-churning, politically minded film about war, the name Renny Harlin doesn’t immediately spring to mind. The action maestro, who’s spent the last decade taking odd genre jobs to get his career back on track, attempts to crack the mystery of the message movie with “5 Days of War,” an unsettled mix of history and histrionics that benefits from Harlin’s special touch with large-scale action sequences.

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