Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on May 6th, 2007
Dreamgirls created a substantial amount of buzz when it was first released at the end of 2006, and has since won two Academy Awards. Although this movie never really struck me as being something I just had to watch, I've been curious to check out what all the praise was about. For those of you that don't know, Dreamgirls is a musical, a whole whack load of singing intertwined with the ongoing plot; much like Grease or Chicago. Like most musical films, Dreamgirls is adapted from a pl...y of the same name, and inspired by the history of Motown Records.
The film takes place during two separate eras, the first taking place between 1962 and 1965. We then skip ahead a few years where the story continues between 1973 and 1975. Back in Detroit 1962, a trio of women (Jennifer Hudson, Beyonce Knowles, and Anika Noni Rose) known as The Dreamettes enter a talent competition with the hopes of awing the crowd with their apparently sensational singing. Things work out even better than they could have hoped when the R&B superstar James "Thunder" Early (Eddie Murphy) is in the need of backup singers for his evening’s performance. Curtis Taylor Jr. (Jamie Foxx) an aspiring young Cadillac dealer further arranges with Early's manager Marty (Danny Glover) for The Dreamettes to tour as backup singers. As time goes on, the group rapidly gains popularity and Curtis turns his Cadillac dealership into an office for his newly formed record label, Rainbow Records. After a short period of harsh times the group finds their way to the Apollo Theater and other top clubs. Along with the success comes a number of problems for the group, affairs, payola schemes, and betrayal amongst each other.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on May 6th, 2007
Synopsis
Holy crap, this movie made a boat load of money for Fox when it came out around Christmas 2006, making $250 million and running second only to the Pirates of the Caribbean sequel for box office money. And to see Ben Stiller finally appear in a film that could be considered a blockbuster success was nice too. And in Night at the Museum, he gets to play Larry, night security guard in the New York Museum of Natural History.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on May 6th, 2007
Synopsis
Hey lookee here, in this movie called Off the Black, there are two Oscar nominees and one Oscar winner! So with this pedigree of talent, you’d expect to be a gangbusters piece of dramatic storytelling, right? Well, not exactly.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on May 6th, 2007
Posted in Disc Reviews by Joshua Noyes
The Jerk, released in 1979, is a rags-to-riches-to-rags comedy film of belated self-discovery. This was Steve Martin's first starring role in a feature film and was also written by him.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on May 5th, 2007
Catch and Release is appropriately dubbed as a chick flick. Written by Susannah Grant, who also makes her directorial debut, is responsible for the screenwriting of some rather dismal movies in the past, including Ever After, Erin Brockovich, and 28 Days. Although I hint at a dislike for romantic comedies, I'll have you know that in the past I have enjoyed several, and am going into this completely unbiased.
The movie starts off on a sad note, Grey (Jennifer Garner) a grieving a...most widow mourns the death of her fiancé Grady. Originally they were to be married on that day, but due to an accident on a fishing trip, Grady was killed. Dealing with the loss in her own way, Grey sits in a bathtub where she can be alone with her thoughts. Before long, Grady's friend Fritz (Timothy Olyphant) bursts in and seduces a waitress. Waiting until the woman leaves, Grey reveals herself and tells Fritz she never understood why Grady was his friend.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on May 5th, 2007
Grace (Sophia Bush) and Jim (Zachary Knighton) are your average college students. They love each other and with the arrival of Spring Break, they want nothing more than to spend a week down in Mexico with their friends. Leaving their campus, everything is progressing smoothly until they nearly run over a man who simply wants a ride to the nearest motel. They speed off thinking they obviously shouldn’t pick up any stranger, especially in the pouring rain. Once they arrive at the nearest gas station, they’re shocked to...find out that the same man they didn’t pick up has just arrived at the gas station after receiving a ride. Now comes the fun part. The man asks Jim for a ride and, for some reason, Jim can’t refuse. Enter your midnight psycho who calls himself John Ryder (Sean Bean) who decides to torture these folks and you have yourself a decent remake of the 1986 classic.
As I just mentioned, this film is a remake of the 1986 film of the same name by Rutger Hauer. This film was clever and downright horrifying. You had the similar psycho killer who simply wanted to play a few mind games with our two lead characters. But where the 1986 film had a few twists and actual real horror that felt, well, real, this 2007 remake lacks everything that made the original so good.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on May 5th, 2007
Synopsis
Well in the ever ongoing series of reviews of the James Bond series, this particular installment is the last of the Pierce Brosnan collection (the others are on the site, so go find them). And in Tomorrow Never Dies, I saved it for last because well, I needed some form of drama to keep me going.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on May 3rd, 2007
The Drew Carey Show originally aired its pilot episode in 1995, focusing on a simple group of friends living their simplistic lives. Known for its everyman characters and situations, the show enjoyed a 9-year run on ABC, getting yanked from the schedule in 2004. Drew Carey and Bruce Helford, who both continued to write for the show in the following seasons, created the show with the premise of Drew Carey’s life if he hadn’t become a comedian and pursued a different career. I wasn’t even aware that this show wa... going to be released on DVD anytime soon, so I was happy to see that it was.
The show focuses around a close group of friends and their relationships, romantic lives, and their jobs. The main characters, Drew (Drew Carey), Kate (Christa Miller), Oswald (Diedrich Bader), and Lewis (Ryan Stiles) are life long friends’ living there everyday lives in Cleveland, Ohio. Drew works at a department store as a mid-level manager, Kate bounces from job to job and lands one working under Drew, Lewis is a janitor at a drug company, and Oswald is a delivery driver. None of them are too adamant about their jobs, but enjoy each other’s company and drinking beer. Some of the shows greatest moments occur while Drew is sitting in his cubicle, where behind him sits Mimi. She’s quite the heavyset make up ridden, trash talking assistant for Drew’s boss. The two share witty insults towards each other and often prank each other as well. Outside of the work world the group all have romantic lives, but only Drew’s and Kate’s get top billing. As the season goes on their relationships face problems and at other times look strongly optimistic, making for pretty entertaining side stories.
Posted in: Highly Defined, News and Opinions by Archive Authors on April 30th, 2007
And how did you spend YOUR NFL Draft weekend?
This seems to be a week where things just aren’t happening news wise (granted, the $299 HD-DVD player remark was clarified to be a little vaguer this week, but that’s about it), but there’s some fun things on the disc release front, most of it for Blu-Ray fans. Sony pimps out The Patriot, Wild Things and Flatliners on 7/3. Lion’s Gate puts Season Two of Weeds out on 7/24, and Waiting comes out one week prior. Warner will be rel...asing Music and Lyrics to both formats on 6/12, while Magnolia does the same thing for The Host on 7/24 and Paramount doing it for Ghost on the same day. On the bad news though, Sony has delayed the release of Meatballs, which was due to be released on 6/5, to a date to be announced.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on April 29th, 2007
Synopsis
Coming of Age is a film about a girl who goes to private school in New York City, and with the help of her friends, tries to find a way to achieve an orgasm. It sounds eerily family to The OH in Ohio, a more recent Parker Posey film I watched and enjoyed.
![Dreamgirls (Two-Disc Showstopper Edition) [HD DVD] dvd cover art](https://upcomingdiscs.com/ecs_covers/dreamgirls-two-disc-showstopper-edition-hd-dvd-large.jpg)
![The Jerk [HD DVD] dvd cover art](https://upcomingdiscs.com/ecs_covers/the-jerk-hd-dvd-large.jpg)
