Category: Film Review

Christopher Guest found tremendous critical and commercial success with his run of faux documentaries, but the last endeavor, 2016’s “Mascots,” failed to inspire much praise and viewership, with the helmer’s creative tank out of gas (he hasn’t made a movie since). Enter co-writers/directors Molly Gordon and Nick Lieberman, who join co-writers Noah Gavin and Ben Platt (who also stars) in an attempt to rebuild the Guest house, returning to the impishness of the “mockumentary” approach to construct “Theater Camp.” Perhaps one slightly recoils at the idea of a broad comedy set at a summer program for theater kids and their high-strung staff, but Gordon and Lieberman pull off a minor miracle with the effort, capturing a balanced tone of wackiness and feeling, while weirdness is exactly right, making for a frequently hilarious picture that understands timing and this particularly bizarre world of thespian spirit. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

Over the last few years, Nicolas Cage has taken a little break from his commitment to creating B-movie entertainment. He’s been trying to revive his reputation for interesting performances in unusual films, scoring critical praise for his work on “Pig,” “The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent,” and “Renfield.” Sadly, box office response has been tepid at best, keeping Cage on the hunt for low-budget offerings of oddity to maintain career momentum, finding his way to “Sympathy for the Devil,” where the famous eccentric is tasked with portraying a deranged man with a gun, forcing a seemingly mild man to join him on a drive toward conflict resolution. Cage becomes Cage in “Sympathy for the Devil,” doing what he can to wake up an otherwise sleepy screenplay by Luke Paradise, who keeps his characters in monologue mode, making a potentially tense viewing experience more tell than show. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

Just a few weeks ago, director William Kaufman (“Jarhead 3: The Siege,” “The Marine 4: Moving Target”) submitted “The Channel” to the masses, delivering a low-budget study of brotherhood and violence with plenty of unrealized potential. It was bro-happy entertainment without a deeper sense of drama, struggling with cliché and limited financial support. Kaufman returns with his second film of July, “Shrapnel,” which once again submits a small-scale tale of family and survival, this time taking concerns to a border town in Texas, where a concerned father searches for his missing daughter. Cartel antagonisms rise up, but there’s little to the viewing experience beyond shoot-outs and pained faces. “Shrapnel” is buoyed by leading work from Jason Patric, who pushes to bring passably authentic emotions to an otherwise generic siege tale, giving as good a performance as one can possibly expect from a B-movie with limited storytelling goals. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

For many years, Ian Karr served as a co-host for “Jackie’s Joke Hunt,” a Sirius Radio show that dealt exclusively with bite-sized offerings of humor, with Jackie Martling serving as the master of ceremonies. Karr hopes to go deeper into the world of Martling with “Joke Man,” a documentary exploring (some) of the life and (some of the) times of the veteran comedian, who’s been trying to make audiences laugh with his machine-gun like delivery of traditional jokes, and his encyclopedic knowledge of humor. The idea is similar to 2017’s “Gilbert,” which also took a closer look at a filthy, habitually misunderstood man. Martling isn’t quite as famous as the late Gilbert Gottfried, and Karr is a little too light when it comes to the details of his personal life, but “Joke Man” is a breezy, amusing sit. It’s a valentine to Martling, who’s still in the mix when it comes to performing and hustling, eager to perform for audiences and Karr’s camera, doing a fine job guiding the story of his life. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

Sophie Kargman makes her feature-length directorial debut with “Susie Searches.” She has a major creative challenge with the material, which is an adaptation of a 2020 short film, with William Day Frank handling scripting duties. The short was 13 minutes long, while the new movie runs 105 minutes, tasking Frank and Kargman to come up with plenty of fresh story to work with, embellishing a seemingly small tale of a young woman and her thirst to become a true crime podcast superstar. There’s an enjoyably animated performance from star Kiersey Clemons as the ambitious broadcaster, and there’s a first act where so much happens, it’s almost enough to fill the picture on its own. However, “Susie Searches” keeps trying to knot its tale of mistakes and suspicion, with Kargman unable to match the opening activity of the endeavor, gradually letting the air out of a once passably engaging mystery and potent study of online validation. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

While watching “Sons of Summer,” a feeling that something was off about the viewing experience began to grow. Characters were referencing events from long ago, and they carried a relationship that seemed defined elsewhere, not in this movie. I started thinking, is this a sequel? “Sons of Summer” is being sold to North American audiences as an action film, with 1991’s “Point Break” used as a comparison in press materials. This picture isn’t “Point Break” by any stretch of the imagination, but it is a follow-up to 1977’s “Summer City” (which featured the acting services of a young Mel Gibson) and 1988’s “Breaking Loose: Summer City II,” with co-writer Phillip Avalon returning once again to work on his Australian brotherhood saga, updating the troublemaking and surfing for a new audience. There’s a lot wrong with “Sons of Summer,” and there’s a lot missing from the endeavor, which tries to breeze past references to the previous chapters, but still creates plenty of confusion along the way. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

2023’s filmmaking fascination with the history of consumer products returns with “The Beanie Bubble,” which follows recent releases such as “BlackBerry,” “Air,” and “Tetris,” with these movies all endeavoring to make a slick cinematic ride using the details of business dealings and ethics. For the latest installment in this series, the tale goes small and plush, with “The Beanie Bubble” examining the tremendous popularity of Beanie Babies, which grew from an idea for a different kind of stuffed animal into a billion-dollar business during the 1990s. However, this isn’t the story of eccentric owner Ty Warner and his financial dealings, with co-directors Damien Kulash and Kristin Gore (who also scripts) looking to change the POV to the three women in his life, who all contributed to his success and received nothing but aggravation and betrayal for their efforts. “The Beanie Bubble” carries some high energy at times, but it really strikes gold with performances, with the actors fully understanding the tone of the feature, gracefully playing levels of frustration. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

There is some interesting bravery involved in the production of “Oppenheimer,” with writer/director Christopher Nolan using his power in Hollywood to get a major studio to finance and release a three-hour-long examination of atomic bomb development, unleashing it in the middle of the summer moviegoing season. Now there’s a flex one doesn’t see every day, and the picture certainly reflects a steely concentration from Nolan to deliver an extended study of a complex man and his dealings with military, marital, and political forces during a turbulent time in American history. “Oppenheimer” tries to combat the bigness of the production with a depiction of highly internalized behavior brewing within a carefully composed man. Nolan does his Nolan thing with the endeavor, but he’s also making an Oliver Stone film in a way, highlighting the sinister ways of scientific breakthroughs and the poundings of government conspirators, playing with time, color, and a Boys Town-sized cast of actors trying to make themselves seen in a lengthy effort that mostly features men talking. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

“Barbie” is the first major motion picture for the Mattel toy line, which has enjoyed generational success since its debut in 1959. The doll has become an iconic plaything in the lives of young people around the globe, selling primarily to girls, giving them a world of glamour, fantasy, and vocational possibility (at least eventually) to enjoy, with all the commercialization opportunities a corporation could ask for. “Barbie” is queen when it comes to the toy aisle, and she’s now a movie (at least not an artlessly animated one), and one that will probably have limited appeal to anyone under 13 years of age. Enter co-writer/director Greta Gerwig, who’s out to confront gender inequality and sexism with this endeavor (co-scripted by Noah Baumbach), attempting to use the plasticized universe of Barbie and her friends to take on societal ills, blended with some dance sequences and exaggerated production design achievements. “Barbie” is meant to be whip-smart and challenging, with Gerwig and Baumbach trying to do something inspirational with their feature, giving it sass and style to reach its creative goals. Genuine wit and a focused to-do list of criticism hasn’t made the final cut, which is definitely colorful and built for die-hard “Barbie” fans, but the whole film feels like a first draft of ideas and concepts in desperate need of refinement. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

Writer/director Neil LaBute worked out some genre wiggles with 2022’s “House of Darkness,” blending some horror experience into his usual brew of charged conversations, retaining a theatrical presence for a study of unease. LaBute returns with “Fear the Night,” which is an action cinema offering from a helmer not normally known for physical acts of survival, always more comfortable with agitated psychological states. “Fear the Night” retains LaBute’s love of dialogue and head games, but it’s a more violent presentation of exploitation interests, with star Maggie Q portraying a tough woman facing off against a team of men in small town America. There’s death and some destruction, and, true to form, LaBute brings some gender hostilities to the endeavor, which adds something different to the usual submission of survival panic and one-person-army screen activity. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

There’s some hope at the beginning of “The Island” that director Shaun Paul Piccinino (“A California Christmas,” “Holiday Harmony,” “A California Christmas: City Light”) will understand the filmmaking assignment ahead of him, working with screenwriters Michael Caissie and Philippe Martinez (“Christmas in Paradise,” “Christmas in the Caribbean”) to deliver a straightforward action movie featuring a furious hero going after a despicable bad guy in a tropical setting. Helping the cause is star Michael Jai White, who tries to go the Van Damme/Seagal/Stallone/Schwarzenegger/Norris route, delivering a charmingly tough guy performance in a picture that truly needs a hit of enjoyable steeliness, playing up the western atmosphere the production is occasionally trying to conjure. “The Island” doesn’t sustain such fury, with Piccinino throttling any potential excitement, trapped between the dramatic inclinations of the material and audience expectations, with viewers left shortchanged when it comes to hard-charging genre activity. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

Screenwriter Chris Thomas Devlin, who scripted 2022’s lame “Texas Chainsaw Massacre” reworking, returns to the darkness with “Cobweb,” which is another genre effort from a person who struggled to come up with something passably menacing for a horror icon to do. Thankfully, the stakes are lower this time around, as Devlin returns with a haunted house story in way, taking inspiration from the work of Edgar Allan Poe to generate a fear factor for “Cobweb,” which examines the terror of a young boy stuck in a house that contains something living behind the walls. Director Samuel Bodin is tasked with conjuring the creeps for viewers in the mood for sinister business occurring around a static location. He has some fun ideas for nightmare imagery, but the writing clearly struggles to provide a feature-length experience with short film material, adding some unnecessary stillness to a premise that should be played as swiftly as possible. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

The screenplay for “They Cloned Tyrone,” written by Tony Rettenmaier and Juel Taylor (who also directs), recalls the golden age of Spike Lee moviemaking, where the talented filmmaker took genuine creative risks with his work, creating cultural and social commentaries with skill. Lee has nothing to do with the effort, but his essence remains in the picture, which is a compelling mix of mystery and conspiracy, endeavoring to understand the Black Experience from a different, more bizarre perspective that retains a sharp satiric edge. “They Cloned Tyrone” is unusual and engrossing at times, with Rettenmaier and Taylor blending the vibe of 1970s cinema with an incisive understanding of character and paranoia, dealing with the broken ways of life as it’s experienced today. It’s never quite outrageous or intense as it initially appears, but it’s a fascinating story told well by the production. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

If Sandra Bullock isn’t going to agree to do a sequel, it’s time to expand the universe. That’s the general vibe of “Bird Box Barcelona,” which is an attempt to do something with the monster streaming success of 2018’s “Bird Box,” where Bullock did battle with mysterious forces as her character made her way through a world gone mad, protecting children in her care. The feature was odd but effective, capturing a rich sense of confusion and horror as an unexplained event unfolded for a desperate woman. Bullock was the major selling point of the movie, but she’s not around for “Barcelona,” which passes the franchise to a new lead character experiencing a bizarre crisis of faith and sanity. Writer/directors David and Alex Pastor are tasked with expanding the “Bird Box” universe with the new picture, and they go to some interesting places with the premise, which retains the apocalyptic grimness fans are looking for, only lacking some star power when it needs it the most. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

In 2019, there was “Crawl,” with director Alexandre Aja tasked with creating a tense chiller featuring a raging hurricane, characters trapped in a flooded space, and the presence of alligators looking for an easy meal. Instead of being just another B-movie, Aja managed to achieve tremendous suspense and a full sense of danger with the film, which was rewarded with healthy box office returns. “The Flood” features basically the same plot, once again observing characters getting wet and restless as they search for safety, trying to avoid advancing alligators during a hellacious weather event. Similarities are perhaps intentional, but “Crawl” had something of a budget and a commitment to screen tension. “The Flood” looks cheaply produced and remains shockingly slow, with director Brandon Slagle refusing to pick up the pace for this simple study of terror. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

“The Miracle Club” carries the initial glow of a simple tale of Irish guilt, meeting four characters all dealing with domestic and emotional issues, setting out to find a way to cure all that ails them through the power of faith. Screenwriters Jimmy Smallhorne, Timothy Prager, and Joshua D. Maurer work with a period setting and seemingly tight community interplay to get the picture on its feet, but there’s some darkness to the endeavor that becomes prioritized by the material, making a seemingly candied time with eccentric personalities much more interesting as the story unfolds. “The Miracle Club” takes some time to drill to the core of personal issues and fears, but it gets there, with compelling ideas on religious influence and trust, and performances are outstanding, bringing true depth to seemingly shallow writing. The cast helps “The Miracle Club” find its way and avoid the lure of cliché, touching on some richly dramatic areas of ache during this strange journey to salvation. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

There’s truth in advertising with “Quicksand,” which mostly takes place in a pit of the viscous stuff, watching two characters manage a fight for their lives as they deal with survival challenges while slowly sinking into the ground. It’s a simple concept, and the screenplay by Matt Pitts doesn’t push too hard when trying to add complications to the situation, sticking with physical attacks and psychological decline. As for suspense, “Quicksand” doesn’t provide much of a thrill ride, with the low-budget nature of the production greatly limiting its ability to create tension. Instead of chills, director Andres Beltran hopes to hit the heart, transforming a dire situation of certain doom for a troubled couple into study of long-term commitment, which limits the potential for B-movie excitement I’m sure many are expecting from this slow-burn endeavor. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

Writer/director William Kaufman (“The Marine 4: Moving Target,” “Jarhead 3: The Siege”) has spent most of his career making action movies, and he tries once again to contribute to genre highlights with “The Channel.” It’s a tough guy examination of brotherly duty and catastrophic mistakes made while in the pursuit of criminal activity, giving the helmer plenty of time to stage shoot-outs and chases, and he keeps the masculine energy flowing throughout the endeavor, which is not short on characters referring to one another as “bro.” There’s clear intent to do something manly with the production, but Kaufman doesn’t have a lot of fresh ideas for the feature, which is reliant on cliched events and bland personalities, putting most focus on the replication of other, better crime films, including “Heat,” “Scarface,” and “Point Break.” “The Channel” (a title that refers to a special neighborhood in New Orleans) can’t get beyond predictability, with sameness overwhelming the viewing experience. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

The Happy Madison factory is back with “The Out-Laws,” which is directed by Tyler Spindel, who’s Adam Sandler’s nephew, previously helping his uncle deliver Netflix content with efforts such as 2018’s “Father of the Year” and 2020’s “The Wrong Missy.” Spindel has one speed when it comes to creating comedy, and he returns to it with his latest picture, which looks to offer a wacky good time with crude jokes, lots of improvisation, and an aggressive lead actor. In this case, it’s Adam Devine, who brings his poor man’s Jack Black shtick to the feature, screaming and squealing his way through a simplistic performance for a thoroughly uninspired film. “The Out-Laws” is rough on the senses, in desperate need of a more imaginative helmer and some sort of writing, as the movie basically wanders from scene to scene, counting on the cast to bring their own ideas to the limp endeavor. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

2011’s “Insidious” was a fun ride from director James Wan, who visually transformed Leigh Whannel’s small-scale study of a suburban haunting, delivering one of the better films of his career. One could argue there was no need for a second installment, but producers weren’t going to stop with one hit movie. “Insidious: The Red Door” is actually the fifth chapter in the franchise, aiming to pick up after 2013’s “Insidious: Chapter 2,” luring stars Patrick Wilson, Ty Simpkins, and Rose Byrne back to the brand name for another session of demonic entanglements, with Wilson handed the keys to the series, making his directorial debut. “Insidious” is mostly a one-note horror event, giving the fourth sequel a real challenge of freshness, but Wilson and screenwriter Scott Teems (last year’s dreadful “Firestarter” remake) aren’t invested in a fear factor with the endeavor, primarily out to make a study of fatherhood and trauma. “The Red Door” is more of a drama than a horror event, but the emotional pull of the material is limited, and scares are as routine as they come. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com