Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on July 30th, 2005
Synopsis
Poor Tom Selleck. The guy has had to deal with the Magnum P.I. stigma for so long, whenever he tries to play darker characters in a film noir-style TV movie, people just don’t buy it, as what seems to be the case in Stone Cold.
But Selleck actually does a pretty decent job in the film, playing Jesse Stone, a chief of police in a small New England town who has to deal with a serial killing husband and wife combo. Jesse has moved from Los Angeles, where he lost his job and his...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by David Annandale on July 28th, 2005
Synopsis
A small mining town is torn apart by strife between the workers at the toxic mine that is about to be closed down, and the Native Americans on whose land the mind is, and who are about to erect a casino over the closed facility (but won’t that make a for a dangerous contaminated entertainment complex?). Stirring up trouble is Satanist David Boreanaz and his cohorts (which include Tara Reid, whom we first see as a sniper, so you know the audience is in deep, deep trouble here). As part of a r...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by David Annandale on July 27th, 2005
Synopsis
Anna Sophia Robb is a little girl named Opal, who has just arrived in the small town of Naomis with her single-parent father (Jeff Daniels), a preacher. Opal finds it hard to fit in and make new friends, until she adopts a rambunctious dog she finds in the Winn-Dixie supermarket. The dog’s extroverted nature helps make connections not only between Opal and the town, but between the townspeople as well.
A very kind little movie, but a completely unoriginal one, too. Between this and...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on July 22nd, 2005
Synopsis
Many people have provided screwed up metaphors as to just how important Led Zeppelin has been to music in the last 35 years. So of course, I’ve gotta throw one in. Imagine today’s rock musicians as workers in a factory, all punching in and out for work at a time clock each day. Led Zeppelin is the clock. There really was nothing before it that could compare to it, and while there have been some imitators, real or implied (Whitesnake and Kingdom Come being two names from the 80’s hair band metal day...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by David Annandale on July 21st, 2005
Synopsis
Michelle Trachetenberg is a gifted science student, and her mother (Joan Cusack), a committed feminist, is pushing her to forge her way through college. But her Trachtenberg’s true love is figure skating, and she manages to combine the two in a physics project, which opens the door to more skating for her. What to do when she turns out to be really good at skating? That or more academic pursuits? Her opposite number is Hayden Panettiere, the stuck-up blonde whose mother (Kim Cattrall) is a f...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by David Annandale on July 15th, 2005
Synopsis
Grand Hotel (1932) was the model: a large cast of known faces with soap opera problems. The High and the Mighty takes this set-up and puts the characters in a plane flying from Hawaii to San Francisco, then blows out an engine and has the fuel leak away. John Wayne is the Co-Pilot With The Tragic Past, Robert Stack is the Pilot Losing His Nerve, and they are surrounded by a collection of other very recognizable types: the Cute Kid, the Charming Dying Man, the Loud Couple From N...
Posted in: Game Reviews by David Annandale on July 13th, 2005
Gameplay
The maps range from the enormous to the intimate. The biggest are Containment and Terminal. Containment is a vast, snowy valley with fortresses at either end and tunnels running the lengths of the mountain walls. This is a map that makes one wish the multiplayer limit was greater than 16, as even the biggest parties can all but disappear in here. Its size does make it the map most amenable to vehicle combat outside of Coagulation. Terminal, on the other hand, is an urban environment reminisc...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on July 9th, 2005
Synopsis
I didn’t know what quite to expect from watching D.E.B.S. for the first time. So, it looks like a group of college girls who double as CIA assassins, right? OK, I can buy that, I mean, I’m a fan of Alias, so I can dig it. You’ve got Amy (Sara Foster, The Big Bounce), D.E.B. Academy’s top notch student with her pick of anywhere she wants to go; her friend, the tough and ambitious Max (Meagan Good, The Cookout), along with the younger Janet (Jill Ritchie, Herbie Fully L...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on July 9th, 2005
Synopsis
One could make an attempt at witty prose by comparing Jackass to the works of Kubrick, Cassavettes, Scorsese, or what have you. But look, it’s a bunch of guys, some of whom have reputations in other circles, such as skateboarder Bam Margera and acclaimed director Spike Jonze, doing stunts that you may not have thought, dared or remotely considered doing, and keeping parts of the general public off guard. The gang made a huge splash on MTV, and scores of crazed teens wanted to try what these guys we...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on July 4th, 2005
Synopsis
Among the more unjustly ignored performances was Jack Nicholson’s turn as Union boss Jimmy Hoffa in Hoffa. Fox finally decided to put out the Danny DeVito directed, David Mamet written film on DVD. Mamet’s script seems to romanticize Hoffa, portraying him as more of a Union man, as one who was forced to make deals that could compromise his integrity, but he overlooks his integrity in order to help benefit the American working man. The story is told in the point of view of Hoffa aide Bobby Ci...
