Category: Film Review

Director Gabriela Cowperthwaite has tried to forge an unusual career, dealing with oceanic creature concerns in “Blackfish,” exploring the war experience in “Megan Leavey,” and examining intimate relationships in “Our Friend.” Now she heads to the stars with her latest endeavor, which details rising tensions between Americans and Russians on a space station when the world below erupts into nuclear war. “I.S.S.” is written by Nick Shafir, who cooks up a promising tale of paranoia and close-quarters tension, using the space station setting to play with games of trust and escalating violence, with Cowperthwaite in charge of finding a visual and dramatic rhythm to the feature. “I.S.S.” struggles to match the potential of its premise, but the helmer extracts some decent performances and captures compelling visuals with this mostly talky survival film. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

The depths of loneliness and the power of friendship is explored in “Robot Dreams.” It’s an animated offering from writer/director Pablo Berger (“Blancanieves,” “Abracadabra”), who creates a feature of visual communication, eliminating dialogue to play with pure expression as he details the seriocomic ways of a friendship between a robot and the dog who’s purchased him to help lift his spirits. “Robot Dreams” is an unexpected viewing experience, with Berger willing to explore the sometimes sad side of life and relationships, and he also delivers many laughs as he observes two characters handling separate adventures into the unknown. It’s an odd endeavor, but it remains emotionally engaging and superbly animated, with a sharp sense of character movement and location, as Berger returns to New York City in the 1980s to help backdrop this adventure of the mind and celebration of cheese snacks. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

Lauded actor Daniel Kaluuya makes his directorial debut with “The Kitchen,” joining forces with co-helmer Kibwe Tavares for a study of guardianship and society in dystopia London. Kaluuya also co-scripts (with Joe Murtagh), presenting an intimate story of care in the middle of grander ideas concerning community influence and survival, committing to the dramatic potential of a few simple yet important lessons on the state of humanity during dark times. “The Kitchen” has futureworld touches, but it remains intimate with characters, with the production after an understanding of choices and influences. Kaluuya and Tavares capture a special level of introspection with “The Kitchen,” which supports an involving viewing experience brought to life through vibrant, deeply felt performances. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

Director Jon Keeyes is not a name associated with quality filmmaking, with his last feature, 2022’s “Code Name Banshee,” one of the worst releases of the year, even with the presence of the usually reliable Antonio Banderas. Keeyes is back for “Cult Killer,” and he’s reunited with Banderas for a seedy detective/revenge story involving histories of sexual abuse, the torture of women and children, and the corruption of humanity. This isn’t something to watch with a popcorn and soda, with screenwriter Charles Burnley lifting liberally from the world of author Stieg Larsson, aiming to make a B-movie version of “The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo” with “Cult Killer,” trusting audiences are still in the mood for storytelling that plumbs the depth of cruelty. And perhaps they will be with this low-wattage tale of rage, which is propped up by a few fine performances and some interesting levels of evil. Keeyes certainly takes his time with the picture, but it periodically gets to where it needs to go. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

Over the last two decades, Dolph Lundgren has acted in a lot of movies, never one to turn down a part. He’s also managed to direct a handful of them, and he returns behind the camera for “Wanted Man,” which hopes to offer a little sensitivity when it comes to the issues of Mexican border tensions and culture. Co-scripted by Lundgren, Hank Hugues, and Michael Worth, the feature is no splendid example of dramatic subtlety, with the production committed to a crude understanding of the central situation. Lundgren gets in some decent action sequences with his tiny budget, doing especially well with shotgun blasts, but he’s less assured when it comes to creating nuanced characters experiencing something profound in their lives. “Wanted Man” gets in a few hits, and it opens with potential, but the picture gradually falls apart, showing little interest in following the character arcs it establishes. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

Co-writers Erik and Carson Bloomquist played with horror just under a year ago, having their way with summer camp terror in “She Came from the Woods.” Tonality wasn’t steady, but the siblings had some fun with genre highlights, endeavoring to provide a ride for fans who’ve experienced the routine repeatedly. The Bloomquists return with “Founders Day,” which is another semi-cheeky take on fright films, with the target here slasher cinema, finding their own holiday to make a mess of. The writing hopes to deliver scares and mild political satire concerning a vicious mayoral election occurring during a mass murder event, and “Founders Day” has some level of blood to satisfy the faithful. The rest of the picture runs into problems fairly early, with the script attempting to create a chess game of characters to follow as doom arrives, and director Erik Bloomquist is never sure what he wants the feature to be, as swings into camp and loss of life are treated without finesse, deflating the viewing experience. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

“Which Brings Me to You” is being marketed as a romantic comedy, and it even opens with subgenre touches, including a cover of the song, “It Had to Be You,” and initial character interactions that promise a wily ride of confessions and warming feelings to come. And yet, the film doesn’t retain such liveliness, taking a slow ride into darker areas of behavior and experience. It’s an odd picture, an adaptation of a 2005 book by Steve Almond and Julianna Baggot, which used letter writing as a way to prolong communication needs between the main players. The tech has been updated some, but director Peter Hutchings (“Then Came You,” “The Hating Game”) can’t nail the delicate tonal balance involved with “Which Brings Me to You,” resulting in an uneven viewing event that can’t land elements of comedy and feels insincere with developing tenderness, making for a dull sit. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

Primarily known for her television work, actress Kaley Cuoco switches to cinematic assassin mode for “Role Play,” which requires a more dynamic physical presence for the sitcom star. The screenplay from Seth W. Owen (“Morgan,” “All Nighter”) presents the plight of a married woman dealing with her dual role as a loving spouse and top contract killer, and there’s certainly room for the material to develop a case of the cutes when exploring this tap dance of secrets. Mercifully, Owen doesn’t plunge into the deep end of wackiness, working to keep “Role Play” somewhat steady as a thriller, adding elements of violence for Cuoco to show her stuff. Director Thomas Vincent (a T.V. vet) also brings some energy to the endeavor, crafting an acceptable viewing experience that rises slightly above the norm with this kind of entertainment, especially when it pulls away from silliness. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

There are a lot of action titles produced for the VOD/streaming market, and most are not quality work. They’re cheap to make and crudely written, requiring some level of violence and the services of a paycheck-cashing star to help these offerings reach the masses. One of the more engaging releases in recent years is 2021’s “One Shot,” which retained the gimmick of “one take” filmmaking to bring some electricity to the usual business of bad guys coming after good guys. Director James Nunn didn’t nail all aspects of the production, but he crafted a compelling, nicely paced thriller that made proper use of its star, Scott Adkins, who committed himself fully to all the rough business. Apparently, the feature did well, because now there’s a sequel, with “One More Shot” picking up right where the last movie ended, with Nunn restarting the single take machine for another wave of attack and survive, looking to sustain the brutality and panic found the last time around. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

In 2003, director F. Gary Gray found career success with his remake of “The Italian Job.” The feature found an audience in theaters and exploded on DVD, giving the helmer industry viability when he needed it. After taking a professional hit with 2019’s “Men in Black: International,” Gray is back in the thieving game with “Lift,” which details the work of professional bandits aiming to steal a fortune in gold from an airplane in flight. Screenwriter Daniel Kunka (“12 Rounds”) doesn’t stray far from formula with the material, creating a target for the team and time to explore their way of doing business. There are no real surprises with “Lift,” which often departs from the realm of the real, but Gray keeps the endeavor on the move, sticking with the basics in heist cinema. He provides a flashy ride of breakthroughs and setbacks, and he keeps the effort to a 95-minute-long run time (before end credits), staying mercifully short to help digest semi-enjoyable nonsense. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

Two decades ago, there was “Mean Girls.” Screenwriter Tina Fey found her way to a 2002 book by Rosalind Wiseman, bringing the world of cliques and teen behavior to the big screen, using the ways of exaggeration to encourage laughs. The picture did well enough at the box office, but “Mean Girls” went on to capture pop culture dominance in a surprising way, launching catchphrases, parodies, a 2011 sequel, and even a line of Toaster Strudel. In 2017, “Mean Girls” became a musical, eventually making the journey to Broadway, aiming to celebrate the original film and give it a fresh spin of singing and sassiness. And now there’s “Mean Girls,” which looks to hook fans of the 2004 feature with an update of hallway warfare, only now there’s song and dance to express hidden desires and angry feelings. And directors Samantha Jayne and Arturo Perez Jr. bring real life to the material, committed to preserving a bright energy and charming broadness to the musical, which also scores with its soundtrack and delightful performances. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

David Ayer has recently directed “The Tax Collector,” “Bright,” and “Suicide Squad.” Kurt Wimmer has recently scripted “Expendables 4,” “The Misfits,” and “Children of the Corn.” This is not a partnership most moviegoers would want, but “The Beekeeper” pairs the men for a study of revenge, sold with a lot of violence, terrible dialogue, and poor performances. It’s a one-man-army event starring Jason Statham (who’s appeared in five films over the last year), and he's made plenty of these pictures, but “The Beekeeper” is certainly one of the worst. It’s not exactly an acting challenge, with the endeavor merely asking Statham to growl his lines, but the lights are certainly out for the star during the run time, with Wimmer straining to create a connected game of villainy and insect-laden motivation for the lead character, while Ayer once again goes the hyperactive route with his action, failing the thrill with his empty sense of style. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

Jake Johnson, who made a name for himself as an actor on the television show “New Girl,” makes his feature-length directorial debut with “Self Reliance.” In fact, he’s in creative control with the project, also writing the movie, co-producing it, and taking the starring role. And what does Johnson want to do with the opportunity? He elects to make a comedy about a man facing his own mortality, using this reality to deal with most of his personal issues. It’s not a particularly original dramatic plan, but “Self Reliance” twists formula, adding a manhunt premise for a game show to help intensify the situation and bring in strange events to goose the comedic potential of the endeavor. And Johnson scores with the weird film, crafting a very funny and somewhat sincere understanding of panic in both a physical and psychological sense, which provides a decent ride of goofy neuroses and kooky personal interactions. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

We don’t see many of these anymore. Screenwriters Mike Benner, Jared Logan, and Charles A. Pieper look to raise a little hell with “Destroy All Neighbors,” which is a strange blast of violence and dark comedy, with heavy emphasis on madness and makeup effects. Director Josh Forbes (“Contracted: Phase II”) is in charge of this cinematic circus, and his job is to find some level of tonal stability to help viewers get into the mood of the endeavor, which isn’t afraid to go just about anywhere with its macabre visuals. “Destroy All Neighbors” is meant to be a roaring good time with practical effects and screen craziness, and it definitely has inspired moments of insanity. The picture as a whole is a little too much to endure at times, but creativity is plentiful and humor remains intact in this exploration of overkill. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

As filmmakers increasingly turn to artificial intelligence for dramatic inspiration, “T.I.M.” dares to go a little smaller with its vision of robotic control. A.I. has been used to launch a few epics in the last year, including “Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning” and “The Creator,” but the new picture is mostly contained to domestic spaces, following the influence of an A.I.-powered servant who’s becoming a little too attached to one of his owners, working to understand the power of obsession that’s corrupted its system. Writers Sarah Govett and Spencer Brown (also making his directorial debut) aren’t committed to a full-blown horror endeavor with the movie, going more for a general creepiness as stalker cinema meets a few futureworld touches. “T.I.M.” lacks chills, but it’s held together by a decent cast and a general atmosphere of unease, working to reach viewers already on edge about the heavily surveilled world we live in. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

We’ve come a long way in 45 years. In 1979, Monty Python had their fun with biblical ideas and characters in “Life of Brian,” and they walked right into a storm of controversy for their efforts, facing those practiced in the ways of outrage working to dismiss a sharp and enjoyably goofy take on the path of Heavenly light. Today, there’s “The Book of Clarence,” with writer/director Jeymes Samuel (“The Harder They Fall”) pursuing a similar tone of irreverence with his take on the power of Jesus, and I don’t believe anyone is going to raise much of a fuss with this release. “The Book of Clarence” is silly, but also deadly serious about the mysteries of faith, with Samuel paying tribute to biblical epics of old with his study of a slacker becoming a messiah. The helmer really tries to put on a show with this uneven endeavor, which lands somewhere between a lame “Saturday Night Live” sketch and an earnest celebration of spirituality. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

“Night Swim” began life as a little-seen three-minute-long short film from 2014, and now, a decade later, it’s a 98-minute-long picture looking to dominate multiplexes in the horror-friendly month of January. That’s quite a leap for writer/director Bryce McGuire, who’s tasked with building an entire world around the idea of a haunted swimming pool and all the evil contained within, searching for fresh victims. McGuire doesn’t have a particularly strong idea driving “Night Swim,” but he has an opening half, dealing with the mysteries of the semi-deep and introducing a collection of troubled characters forced to deal with the wicked pool and its weird way of taking lives. It’s the rest of the feature that quickly loses consistency, finding the screenplay’s pass at explaining everything nowhere near as interesting as its ambiguity, with the mystery at the heart of the endeavor failing to pay off a decent set-up. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

After receiving some on-the-job training as a director on his television show, “Schitt’s Creek,” Daniel Levy pursues a feature-length story to tell with “Good Grief.” Also claiming an acting role and screenplay credit, Levy goes triple threat with the small-scale study of personal loss and all the shock it provides, portraying a man who learns more about his husband after his unexpected death. It’s the stuff of soap opera cinema, but Levy endeavors to keep the picture as down to earth as possible, investing in characterization, not sharp turns of surprise, also setting a cozy mood as the story travels to Paris for most of its run time. “Good Grief” isn’t always something that jumps off the screen, but Levy remains confident with tone and performances, surrounding himself with talented actors invested in the challenge of finding a path through the nebulous ways of the writing. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

Mads Mikkelsen has created a career out of playing steely men with fierce determination to achieve their goals. And he’s excellent at it, becoming one of the top actors working today, giving such hardness subtle emotionality while commanding the screen. He returns to business with “The Promised Land,” which finds Mikkelsen in a period piece, portraying a man of tradition ready to transform seemingly barren land into a farm, coming up against those who doubt his commitment and those who stand in the way of his success. “The Promised Land” is an adaptation of a book by Ida Jessen, and Mikkelsen reteams with his “A Royal Affair” director, Nikolaj Arcel (last seen with the 2017 misfire, “The Dark Tower”), for this examination of endurance in the world of agriculture and class divide. The material doesn’t boil over into sustained acts of violence, which feels like a missed opportunity, but Arcel sustains gripping drama during the run time, wisely leaning on his star to provide a nuanced sense of unease to boost suspense. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

The saga of Uruguayan Air Force Flight 571 has been the subject of many media explorations, including films such as 1976’s “Survive” and 1993’s “Alive.” It’s a story of unbelievable endurance, touching on the basics of human spirit, faith, and brotherhood, and there’s a more unsavory side to the tale, which is usually the primary focus of most analysis concerning this disaster. Co-writer/director J.A. Bayona doesn’t shy away from offerings of cannibalism that come into view midway through the experience, but he’s after a more specific understanding of sacrifice with “Society of the Snow,” which is based on a book by Pablo Vierci. Bayona (making his first picture since 2018’s “Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom”) finds the intimacy of the event, aiming to strip away all sensationalism to best understand the true struggles and sorrows of the survivors, trying to retain as much humanity as possible for a tale that’s primarily known for its most gruesome turns. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com