Posted in: Disc Reviews by David Annandale on November 10th, 2004
Synopsis
The ice-locked crew of a ship searching for the Northwest Passage finds, to its collectiveastonishment, a near-dead man quite literally in the middle of nowhere. This individual is oneVictor Frankenstein (Alec Newman), and he recounts to the captain (Donald Sutherland) hishorrific tale of creating a monster (Luke Goss), and subsequently losing his family to themonster’s vengeance.
Of all the versions of Mary Shelley’s novel, this is probably the most faithful. The m...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on November 9th, 2004
Okay. I admit it. I’m guilty. I’m probably one of the few people on the planet Earth who has never seen Fast Times at Ridgemont High. Not because I’m an art film snob or anything (which I’m not…usually). I just never got around to it. I heard all the hype, heard a lot of the famous lines. But I’ve never actually seen the movie. Until now.
The Special Edition of Fast Times is now available and it’s worth picking up. For all the rest of the planet that has seen it, the movie takes plac...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by David Annandale on November 6th, 2004
Synopsis
As a young man, Mike Blueberry (Vincent Cassel) falls in love with a prostitute, but theirtryst is rudely interrupted by the black-hearted Michael Madsen. The woman is killed, andBlueberry is badly wounded. He is taken in and nursed back to health by Native Americans, andthus taps into a bunch of mystical hugger-mugger as well. Years later, he is the town marshal,and who should ride into town but Madsen again, now possessed of supernatural power andintent on capturing the s...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by David Annandale on November 5th, 2004
Synopsis
Jane Austen’s tale concerns the Dashwood sisters. Elinor (Emma Thompson) is sensible tothe point of excessive caution in matters of the heart. Marianne (Kate Winslett) is the opposite,so passionate that she might follow her heart into trouble. Their lives (and those of their littlesister and their mother) are made difficult by their loss of fortune. They are at the mercy ofselfish in-laws, though the brother of the gorgon-in-chief is the extremely likeable Hugh Grant(with w...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by David Annandale on November 5th, 2004
Synopsis
For the audience this film is aimed at, a synopsis should be superfluous. At any rate, this isthe tale of March family, consiting of mother Marmee (Susan Sarandon) and her four daughters:protagonist Jo (Winona Ryder), proper Meg (Trini Alvarado), delicate Beth (Claire Danes) andyoungest Amy (first Kirsten Dunst, cute as a button, then Samantha Mathis). We begin during theCivil War, with the father absent, and the family dealing with the privations of that time, andthen move...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by David Annandale on November 3rd, 2004
Synopsis
Sterling Hayden, as the demented General Jack D. Ripper, sends a squadron of bombers offto nuke the Soviet Union. The principle bomber pilot is the equally demented Slim Pickens.Captain Mandrake (Peter Sellers) desperately tries to stop the bombers. The President (PeterSellers again) summons his principle aids to the war room and the assembled characters(including George C. Scott, and Sellers again as the titular character) do all they can to avert adoomsday scenario.
...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by David Annandale on November 3rd, 2004
Synopsis
Writing a synopsis for Gone with the Wind must be as silly an exercise as doing onefor King Kong or Casablanca. But for what it’s worth, this is the tumultuous sagaof Scarlett O’Hara (Vivien Leigh), spoiled southern belle at Tara, whose life is turned upsidedown by two things: Rhett Butler (Clark Gable) and the Civil War. Her love affair(s) with Rhettare almost as fiery as the chaos of war, and in that crucible she is forced into becoming a self-suffici...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by David Annandale on October 31st, 2004
Synopsis
Nick Nolte (in full bruiser form) heads up the Hat Squad, a team of LA detectives composedof himself, Chazz Palmiteri, Michael Madsen and Chris Penn. We first see them in actionroughing up a gangster by tossing him down a cliff (hence the joke of the title). Their next caseis the body of a woman, found flattened in the sand, every bone in her body broken. Nolte israttled by the sight of the victim, because she is Jennifer Connelly, with whom he had an affair(kept secret fro...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by David Annandale on October 29th, 2004
Synopsis
A plague is sweeping the world: the dead are rising to bite and eat the living, turning theirvictims into yet more ferocious zombies. A group of survivors (headed by Sarah Polley and VingRhames) take refuge in a mall. Tensions keep threatening to tear the group apart, not to mentionthe fact that they don’t know what their next course of action should be. Outside, the zombiesgather in ever increasing numbers.
This is the unrated version, running nine minutes longer t...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by David Annandale on October 28th, 2004
Synopsis
On the tenth anniversary of his wife’s death (and his daughter’s tenth birthday), TimothyHutton finds a mysterious briefcase (we see it appear out of nowhere near his wife’s grave). Thecase has his name on it, and when he unlocks the combination, Hutton finds a file containing thedetails of his murder five days in the future. The clock starts ticking. Once he accepts that he isnot the victim of a hoax, will he be able to alter his destiny?
If the idea of a man inves...
