Brent Lorentson

Football season is well on its way, and that can mean one thing; fantasy football players are at their computers making trades and setting up their lineups.  For some fantasy football is nothing more than Dungeons and Dragons for adults who like football, but those that have their own league, well, you know how cutthroat things can get once your star receiver is injured and that perfect replacement just hit the waiver wire.  The F/X (now I think FXX) show The League may take more than a few jabs at those who take fantasy football a little too seriously, but for myself this is one of my comedies on the air right now. 
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The idea of taking a long road trip with your loved one or best friend is something everyone has to do at least a few times in your life.  There is something that occurs while driving down long lonely roads with nothing but music, scenery and good conversation to keep you company.  The road trip film is almost a genre onto itself and can be funny like Plains, Trains and Automobiles, insightful like On The Road, or horrifying like Joyride.  These films are so easy to relate to, because at some point we all share in these kinds of adventures, perhaps not so exciting but memorable nonetheless.
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Even though director Steven Soderbergh (Traffic, Ocean’s 11, Magic Mike) has an Oscar under his belt and numerous box office hits, the road to getting Behind the Candelabra was a difficult one.  Originally Soderbergh had planned for the film to play in theaters, but every studio was afraid of the project believing it to be “too gay”.  Sure, there have been numerous films in Hollywood that dealt with homosexual subject matter, and considering this was also a bio pic I’m still surprised the typically liberal studio system was so afraid of this project.
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In the caverns beneath the planet’s surface there exists a place like no other, a place where duels are settled not with bullets but with slugs.  But these are not the kind of slugs that ooze their way across your driveway; instead they each have their own personalities and skills that are to be used in battle.  In the land of Slugterra, El is the quickest slugslinger out there, but there are a lot of baddies out there looking to take control over Slugterra, and thankfully he has the Shane gang (Trixie, Kord, Pronto and Burpy) to help him out.
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Knowing very little about Thailand’s gangster history, I jumped into The Gangster with no expectations and was left breathless by the time the final credits rolled.  With the energy and violence on display here, I can’t help but feel this is the intensity Scorsese intended in his underwhelming film Gangs of New York; there he had over a hundred million and the street fights, though they had epic buildups, seemed to just fall flat.  The Gangster, on the other hand, is on a micro-budget by comparison and delivers street fights that hurt, that leave scars and stay with you.
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There are so many vampire films, it’s hard to get excited any time a trailer for one comes along.  The Twilight series as well as shows like True Blood and The Vampire Diaries have managed to take everything I once enjoyed about the menacing creature and turned it into a joke.  Let the Right One In and the American remake Let Me In are the last vampire films that had any substance that went for more than cheap thrills and gore and delivered a solid story.  That is until Kiss of the Damned came along.  It’s a film that keeps things simple, yet brings back the beautiful elegance of the creature we loved to fear.
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First let me come out and say I know very little about Anime; aside from a few episodes of Speed Racer when I was growing up, Anime just never really caught my interest.  But I’m willing to give anything a shot; after all, it’s never too late to discover a new genre in entertainment.  Unfortunately the Shout Factory release of Starzinger was a bad first experience that made for a long cringe-worthy experience.  Films like Howl’s Moving Castle and Grave of the Fireflies are beautiful pieces of animation as well as touching stories.
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With films like Sharknado it’s clear that that Hollywood can’t say no to a disaster movie no matter how bad it may sound.  It’s almost as though everyone has given up on the idea that a disaster movie can be good; The Towering Inferno holds up after all these years, yet you can almost guarantee if they attempted to remake it, awfulness would certainly follow.  Heck, the Poseidon Adventure was amazing to watch growing up, and even on the heels of Titanic and with “better” special effects at their fingertips, the remake, Poseidon, was a failure.  What I find all the more odd is that with these straight-to-DVD or SYFY-made movies
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The surf culture and those involved are like a tribe separate from everyone else.  Those who are hardcore into the scene seem to care very little about money or material things, all that seems to matter to this group of outsiders are the onslaught of waves that’ll soon be theirs to ride.  Several movies have been made about the sport/lifestyle, Point Break and Chasing Mavericks are the two that stand out the most for me at this time (not sure if admitting my secret love for Back to the Beach is good idea).
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Ever since I’ve had a little girl in my life, the amount of kids’ programming I’ve gotten to review has mushroomed.  This is by no means a complaint; if anything it has helped me bond with her.  Granted, at times all the kids’ shows can quickly grow to be as grating as nails to a chalkboard, but when shows like Dragons and The Amazing World of Gumball come along I’m not sure who gets more excited, her or myself. When I reviewed The Mystery DVD I wasn’t sure what I was getting into, but quickly I found myself pleasantly obsessed with Gumball Watterson and the trouble he would get himself into.
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The moment I see the words “inspired by true events”, I simply accept the fact that most likely everything that follows should be taken with a grain of salt.  I understand films are not meant to be reference materials to be seen as fact, but simply as a tool to entertain and hopefully motivate you to learn more about the subject matter.  When it comes to Emperor, I know going in this isn’t going to be a history lesson, so I could allow myself to simply enjoy the show.
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The quack pack returns for season three of the A&E reality series smash hit, Duck Dynasty.  After season 1 I was thinking perhaps this would be a show that would be amusing but quickly lose steam with the season that would follow.  I couldn’t have been more wrong.  The Robertson family is quickly becoming the most recognizable family on TV considering they are flooding the stores with their books, DVD’s, and many other products you can find at Wal-Mart.  I can’t help but think this is a family that is doing everything right, and good for them for the success they’ve managed.
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For over 40 years Aerosmith has been rocking the airwaves, and with over a 100 million albums sold, it is safe to say they are one of America’s greatest rock bands.  It had been seven years before that the band previously performed in Japan, and after the devastation the country endured during the earthquake and tsunami in early 2011, the band was inspired to return to Japan and perform.  Rock For The Rising Sun is more than simply a documentary of a concert in Japan; instead it is the documentation of the band’s journey that follows them along their stops throughout their tour and their interaction with the fans.
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At some point or another as kids we’ve experienced either the fear of the dark, what lurks in the closet, or perhaps the dread of what awaits under the bed.  As adults most view these fears we had as children as impractical, but for those of us who remember these fears, the possibility of what terrors awaited us come nightfall was something very real.  Sure, mom or dad would check the room to assure us there was nothing there, but we knew better.  We knew the moment the parents left the room the dreaded terrors would crawl out from there dark hideouts and come for us in our sleep.  It’s this childhood terror that director Steven C. Miller (director of the Silent Night remake) attempts to bring to the screen.
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The cartoons I’m most fond of from my childhood are all cell-animated, simply because I grew up in a time before computer generation effects and animation had been fully realized.  Now when you flip on the TV it’s hard to find any true animation; everything has moved on and evolved to CGI.  When the studios have the time and money, they can release some breathtaking features like Finding Nemo and The Croods. But when it comes to television the CGI never seemed to match the quality of the features.  That is until Dreamworks released Dragons: Riders of Berk.
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The Cinemax anthology series continues to be my guilty pleasure that when it’s over I simply want just a little bit more.  The show takes sleaze and debauchery to a whole new level, and I mean that in the best way possible.  At first glance and even if catching an episode out of context, for some the show may resemble some B-grade skin flick, but for those who sit back and give it a chance, you’ll discover it is so much more.  But for those who may find beautiful women randomly discarding their clothes mixed with random acts of violence offensive, well, here is your chance to run away and never look back, because this show takes pleasure in pushing the limits of decency and good taste.  And that is what makes it fun.
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When describing Greg Sommer, at first one would believe you are describing what most would consider a man-child.  You know, the 30-something male who still lives at home with mom and on the weekends dresses up in elaborate cardboard costumes and takes part in epic backyard battles.  But in this case that would only be a superficial look at a man that seems to have found the secret to happiness and has the tenacity to pursue his dreams unlike anyone I’ve ever met.  Skull World is a documentary that follows Greg over the course of three years, and what he manages to accomplish in that time, man-child or not, is still impressive.
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Without my girlfriend’s six-year-old daughter to help me out, I had the opportunity to tackle this 10-episode compilation DVD of the hit Cartoon Network series.  I can’t blame Makayla for her lack of interest in the show; after all, with the title character being a sixteen year old boy who fights robots and aliens, well, I don’t believe she fits the target audience.  On the other hand, as I started watching I began to see that anyone who enjoys aliens and robots is sure to enjoy the show at least to some degree.
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After having two successful films, Kung Fu Panda made its way onto the small screen as an animated show for Nickelodeon.  Though I wasn’t the biggest fan of the films, I could still appreciate the charm and allure of Po, the Dragon warrior who just so happens to be a Panda.  In the films Jack Black voiced the character of Po, and it’s his goofiness that seemed to make Po so likeable.  But on the small screen, the studios can throw down the healthy chunk of money that the A list actors take in when doing the voice work for the full-length films.  As luck would have it Mike Wingert would take over the voice work of the title character, and he does a remarkable job filling in.
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Imagine being arrested, not even finished with high school, and you are tried and convicted of the rape and murder of your high school sweetheart.  Try to imagine being locked away for 19 years in a cell, alone, awaiting your execution by lethal injection.  But then one day, DNA evidence emerges that seems to exonerate you for your crimes, and suddenly you are given your freedom back.  How do you go on?  This is question creator and executive producer Ray Mckinnon explores in the new series Rectify that airs on the Sundance channel.
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