Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on March 5th, 2009
“The dead can hover on the edge of our vision with the density and luminosity of mist. And their claim on the Earth can be as legitimate and tenacious as our own.”
In The Electric Mist is based on one of James Lee Burke’s Detective Robicheaux novels, In The Electric Mist With Confederate Dead. The role was previously played by Alec Baldwin in Heaven’s Prisoners. There couldn’t be any two more diverse actors playing the same role. I have never seen Baldwin’s film, so can’t make an actual comparison, but I suspect that Tommy Lee Jones adds far more depth and a more contemplative nature to the role.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Athena on March 5th, 2009
Athena here again. Yup, that’s me, the 13 year old Siberian Husky who sometimes “sub-woofs” for Gino. For some reason he only gives me these dog movies to review. Something about being an expert witness. ‘Cept there aren’t any Siberian Huskies in this movie. So, I settled into Gino’s theater, but almost got kicked out when I decided to pass a little Air Athena. Turns out that while we may share a taste in movies, Gino and I don’t share a taste in smells. Actually I was pretty excited to see this one. I’ve seen a couple of the Buddies movies now, and you can check out my reviews is the movie that started the whole ball rolling, the basketball, that is. Turns out that Buddy was the Buddies’ Papa. But, that’s another movie.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on March 5th, 2009
Ace Ventura’s back, sort of. It’s a new day. A new cast and crew. A new movie. And, unfortunately, a new Ace Ventura. This is Ace Ventura, Jr. Emphasis is on the junior. Without Jim Carrey, this thing was doomed from the start. Still, if you’re going to do it, I would have hoped that at least some kind of an effort would be in order. Alas, it seems that everyone involved knew this one wasn’t going anywhere so they just decided to have a great time and not worry so much what actually made it on to the film.
Director David Evans is best known for killing the Beethoven franchise with its third and fourth direct to video films. He did the same with the abysmally bad Sandlot 2. Evans is the place where mediocre comedy franchises go to die, or at least end up in direct to video cheap imitations of their former selves. If he had torn himself away from playing with the kids and animals long enough, he might have realized that he was killing yet another franchise. In the previous cases, I’d say he had a shot at 2nd degree murder, or negligent homicide. This time it’s a clear case of premeditation. He needs to be sentenced to life…away from a movie set.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on March 4th, 2009
What happens when a television series depends on a title character, but that character is completely uninteresting? The answer is you get a 6 episode run, and then you’re over. That’s exactly the story with Canterbury’s law. I have no doubt that Julianna Margulies is a better actress than she showed on this show. I mean, she has to be, right? Margulies walked through her role as lawyer Liz Canterbury. The character had tons of potential. She was a bit of a rebel. She wasn’t afraid to bend…all right, break … the rules for her client. That kind of a maverick character usually means high ratings. But not if the actress playing the part refuses to invest anything into playing the character. Even when Canterbury is fired up, which, honestly, is most of the time, there’s almost no expression on Margulies’ face. Her voice fails to lift the dialog to the level of passion the material might be calling for. In short, she plays a charismatic character with no charisma. To make matters worse, the team was made up of unknowns, likely to remain such. Not that I really blame the actors. The parts were pretty bad. Ben Shenkman stars as Liz’s partner, Russell. Russell was once on the DA side of things. What makes him decide to partner up with Canterbury is a mystery deeper than any case the show explored. He disagrees with her nearly 100% of the time. He doesn’t appear to be happy most of the time. The firm appears to be struggling, so he’s not in it for the bucks. Liz, for her part, is always waiting for him to cut and run. It seems he’s there only to prove he’s loyal. Her associates are made up of Keith Robinson as Chester. Chester’s dad is running for the Senate and is a powerful man who doesn’t like the idea of his son in such a dead end firm. Chester’s trying to prove he’s got street cred and distances himself from his influential father. Finally you have Trieste Dunn as Molly, the attorney who has yet to pass the bar. She’s the budding idealist who was just beginning to develop somewhat when the show’s bottom fell out. Liz is dealing with a lot in her personal life as well. Her son was abducted three years ago, and it’s caused a strain on her marriage. The infidelities she’s had didn’t help much either. She’s in a pissing contest with one of the DAs who is out to bring her down at any price. She happily assists by doing things like suborning perjury and tampering with a jury. Did I miss anything?
Each episode of Canterbury’s Law is presented in its original broadcast 1.78:1 aspect ratio. I hope this show looked better when it was on the air. This stuff is a mess. Colors are often unnatural and heavy on the reds and yellows. They also run and appear blurred. Flesh tones are hampered by some odd soft focus that makes it look like a kid was running the camera. There’s an excessive amount of grain, particularly in the pilot episode. If it looked this bad in HD broadcast, it likely improved the odds of it not surviving. This is a very bad video presentation.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on March 4th, 2009
Juliette (Thomas) has spent the last 15 years in prison for the murder of her 6 year old son. She has been expectedly abandoned by her family while locked up. When it is finally time for her to be released, the only one willing to even talk to her is her estranged sister, Lea (Zylberstein) who takes her into her home. Lea has a family of her own now. She is married with two adopted Vietnamese children. The film pretty much follows no plot or story. It’s more or less Juliette’s journey to adapt to the outside world and deal with her own flood of emotions. If the movie is Juliette’s journey, then it is also a journey for Lea. Without revealing the ending, I can safely say the only destination here is understanding.
The highpoint of I’ve Loved You So Long is a rather brilliant performance by Kristen Scott Thomas. She is able to inhabit a character in ways I’ve rarely seen. You’ll be hard pressed to find any identifiable boundaries between the actor and the character. Now, usually, that’s the foundation for a solid film. The problem is that her character just isn’t that interesting of a person after a while. Of course, there are nuances to observe, and Thomas serves them up well, but after a short time we’ve really come to know this character pretty well. We just don’t find her all that interesting.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Michael Durr on March 2nd, 2009
Autism is commonly defined as a brain development disorder characterized by impaired social interaction and communication, and by restricted and repetitive behavior. Sometimes, due to that lack of social interaction and repetitive behavior, the people affected develop a special skill or heightened senses. The results can be amazing. However, in film, autism is rarely shown as what it truly is, a disorder. To find a film that not only embraces the special skill as well as show the difficulty it takes to exist and function normally is pretty rare.
Zin (played by Ammara Siripong) is involved with Yakuza Boss Masashi (played by Hiroshi Abe). There is just one problem with that. She was previously the girlfriend of a gangster simply known as No. 8 (played by Pongpat Wachirabunjong). No. 8 in his own jealous rage decided to shoot his own toe and forbid Zin from ever seeing Masashi again. She decides to flee and tells Masashi to not follow.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on February 27th, 2009
This is actually a very charming situation comedy that harkens back to the days of The Cosby Show, but is actually far more honest and less about one liners. While everybody loves the Cos, the show got cluttered and rarely dealt with real life issues in any serious way. In My Wife And Kids, I get the sense of a real family here. The cast makes it work, but credit the writers for coming up with a comedy that did not rely on one liners. Don’t get me wrong, the jokes are there, and they sometimes fly fast and furious, but one always feels there’s more to any given scene or situation. The show is completely family friendly. I’m a little sorry that I stumbled on it after it was already gone.
Michael Kyle (Wayans) lives a comfortable life. He’s quite content. He makes good money, so they live in comfortable style. His wife, Jay (Campbell) is pretty much a stay at home mom and day trader. They have three children: Kady (Posey), Junior (Gore II), and Claire (Raycole). The younger child has a Hispanic nanny, Rosa (Forte), who doesn’t like Michael at all. But life is about to change in the Kyle household. Jay’s trading skills have gotten so good that she’s offered a job as a full time broker. Michael wants to be supportive, but he’s gotten used to having a housewife around. Now Michael will have to adapt and share some of the parenting. His own brand of common sense and efforts to advise the children tend to be where much of the show’s comedy is mined.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on February 27th, 2009
I get worried when I see box art make claims like they have on the recent release of Dorothy Mills. It claims that this film is a contemporary take on The Exorcist. The problem is that we don’t really need a contemporary take on that classic film. It’s a bit pretentious and arrogant to think that this low budget affair can come close to reproducing what that film did back in the 1970’s. Why can’t the folks who make these kinds of films allow the film to stand on its own and aspire to something unique and exciting for its own merits? Fortunately the box art is just marketing hype, probably written by some advertisement executive who never actually even saw the film. This isn’t The Exorcist, nor does it actually try to be. Truth be told, the film doesn’t play out like your normal run of the mill possession films at all. It has a rather clever angle that might be more Sybil than Exorcist.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on February 27th, 2009
I used to think that any movie that Robert De Niro attached his name to had to be good. And that used to be true. I was willing to take a chance on low budget or blockbuster films, knowing that De Niro wouldn’t lead me wrong. Then along came Stardust, and honestly, the man hasn’t been in a good film in some years now. Still, my loyalty remains, and What Just Happened looked to be interesting enough that my buddy, Bobby D couldn’t disappoint me again. So, what did just happen? He let me down.Films about filmmaking are always a hazard. We all think that we want to see inside the true Hollywood, don’t we? Gossip programs and internet sites would seem to indicate that we can’t get enough of the inside poop. So, the temptation to deliver accurate films that portray these inside aspects of Hollywood come along every once and awhile. We peek, because we think we want to know. The truth is that voyeurism gets boring pretty quickly. We all want to eavesdrop on other people’s private moments. I’ve done it both professionally as a private detective and even for fun with a scanner that allowed me to listen to cell phones back in the old analog days. You know what? People are boring. It was exciting at first and my friend Mike and I would sit and listen to stuff for hours. We would get together and talk about what interesting things we heard. Before long we both realized that most of it was so painfully mundane that we just sort of stopped doing it. That’s what these films remind us. No matter how exciting the world of movie stars, directors, and producers might look from the outside, 90% of it is pretty pedestrian stuff. Unfortunately this film doesn’t spend much time in the 10% that might be exciting. In the end, not even some good casting could save this picture from making me feel like I did listening to those cell phones.
Robert De Niro is Ben, a big time producer and power broker in Hollywood. He’s dealing with two films at the moment. One is already shot and stars Sean Penn. The film’s director, Jeremy Brunell (Wincott), is a temperamental pill addict. When the advance screening doesn’t go so well, he’s told he has to redo an ending that shows a dog get blasted dead by the film’s bad guys. He doesn’t want to compromise his artistic integrity, but the studio boss, Lou Tarnow (Keener) will pull the plug on his Cannes premier if he doesn’t play ball. Ben’s upcoming film stars Bruce Willis, who shows up for his fitting appointment overweight and sporting a “Grizzly Adams” beard, which he refuses to shave. The studio bosses insist they’ll shut the film down and sue everybody involved if Willis won’t shave the beard and work out to lose weight. Willis’s agent is a crazy hypochondriac who is deathly afraid of his client, so Ben can’t get him to lay down the law. The agent is played wonderfully by quirky character actor John Turturro. Ben needs both pictures to work out because he’s supporting two ex-wives who are used to fancy living at his expense. The film is mostly told from Ben’s point of view, often through De Niro’s narration, as he attempts to save both pictures and deal with the more recent of his ex-wives. They’re actually in therapy to learn how to live without each other.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on February 26th, 2009
Popular gaming franchise Resident Evil is no stranger to the world of film. With a trilogy already in the bag from writer-producer Paul W.S. Anderson (Death Race), and starring Milla Jovovich, our favourite perfect being from The Fifth Element, audiences are pretty familiar with the RE brand. Well, the ones who go for schlocky zombie-fests, at least.
You can count me in that company. Every once in a while, a junk-food movie like Resident Evil just hits the spot. The question is, does Resident Evil: Degeneration deliver the goods?
