Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on July 29th, 2022
"It all started when a man named Bishop created a team of robots. He sent them back in time with one goal: to destroy the 20th century. These machines were programmed to think that they were beyond human. That they were superheroes. They made their way across country murdering some of the greatest figures in history, famous lawmen and men of science. Finally they kidnapped the inventor of time travel itself, and with his help set their sights on destroying all of history. No one could stop these so-called Legends. Not until we came upon the real flesh-and-blood superheroes whose job it is to put history back on track. We're the real Legends of Tomorrow."
If none of that made any sense to you, don't worry about a thing. It'll all become clear over the final 13 episodes of DC's Legends Of Tomorrow: The Complete 7th and Final Season. OK, I lied. No. It really is the 7th and final season, but it won't really become all clear. You see, that's the nature of the series. It's the crazy uncle of the Arrowverse that says a lot of things no one understands. But we all kind of nod our heads and suspect it will all be OK.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Brent Lorentson on July 27th, 2022
It is a shame that director Roger Michell (Notting Hill) passed away before this film had a proper release. He’s a director who while he may not have a filmography of blockbuster hits, he’s literally worked with many of the biggest stars of the industry. Notting Hill is easily my favorite film of his; easily I’d rank it as one of the best rom-coms of all time. Sadly he’d go most of his career not quite matching the success of the 1999 film, but with The Duke, he gives us a film that is so damn charming it shows how he’ll be missed in an industry that’s become so dependent on CGI and spectacle.
The film presents itself as “based on a true story”. When it comes to the movies, it has become harder to believe how much is actually true and how much is sensationalized to tell a “better” story. In 1961, Kempton Bunton (Jim Broadbent), stole the Goya portrait of the Duke of Wellington from the National Gallery in London and held it hostage for 140 thousand pounds. This wasn’t some simple get-rich-quick scheme that Bunton concocted, but instead it was a way to get the government to pay for television licenses for the poor, the disabled, and the elderly. Despite the noble intentions, it was a crime that could possibly land the man in prison for ten years. While the film does cover the heist and eventual trial of Kempton Bunton, the real heart of the film is about the relationship between Kempton and his wife, Dorothy Bunton (Helen Mirren).
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on July 22nd, 2022
"Sounds like the Mad Hatter is throwing a tea party."
Of all of the Arrowverse shows, I think Batwoman has had the hardest road of it. Ruby Rose was far from the dynamic character the CW or DC could have hoped for, and she spent most of her first season complaining or on the outs in some way or another. In her single season she was constantly outshone by her villain and pretty much everyone around her. It's bad when the one in the cape and cowl can't seem to attract any attention. It was a surprise to no one that Ruby Rose left the show after that first year. What did surprise me was that the show was going to continue. Instead of recasting Kate Kane, the powers that be brought in a completely different person to play the title character. Enter Ryan Wilder, played by Jevicia Leslie. She took the rap for a friend and ended up serving 18 months in prison for drug possession. Her foster mother was killed by some bad guys who never paid for the crime. Needless to say, she is carrying a lot of angst. Now she can't find a job or a place to live. She's homeless and living out of her van. She watches a ball of fire which turns out to be a plane crashing out of the sky. It hits near her van, and when she explores the wreckage, she finds the batsuit. Of course she puts it on and gets quite a kick out of the things she can do. She soon realizes the suit can help her get some revenge on the bad guys and starts kicking some butt.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Brent Lorentson on June 21st, 2022
Offseason is the type of film we just don’t get a lot of anymore. It’s a film that heavily pays homage to HP Lovecraft and The Messiah of Evil and other films of the 70’s era, only there is little to no gore to show for it. There’s a strong Silent Hill vibe going on with the film, especially with the copious amounts of fog that seem to always be around. It would seem that this film has all the makings to be a hit, especially when it seems to be going for tropes that I like in a horror film, but unfortunately this one just missed its mark by making two big mistakes. One, it was too obvious, and two, it just totally screws up the ending. I’m not expecting every movie to be the next Wicker Man, but it seems that writer and director Mickey Keating is trying so hard to be on the same level as Ti West and Robert Eggers that the film just comes off looking like a good-looking snore-fest we’ve seen before. I really wanted to like this, and it had a lot going for it, but it seems when you pull inspiration from too many sources, it can get pretty messy.
Marie Aldrich (Jocelin Donahue) gets a notice that her mother’s grave has been vandalized and that she must immediately come to the remote tourist island. We find out that her mother, Ava Aldrich (Melora Walters) never even wanted to be buried on this island, but that somehow her will was mysteriously changed, and she was still buried on the island. Marie knows little to nothing about the island, but she goes out there to see to the repairs that need to be made for her mother’s grave … trouble is that the island is being evacuated of tourists, and if Marie and her beau, George (Joe Swanberg) don’t get things sorted out in time, they run the risk of being abandoned on the island.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Brent Lorentson on June 14th, 2022
“Congratulations, you’ve just been erased.”
In 1996, when Eraser came out, it was pretty much what everyone expected from an Arnold Schwarzenegger film: lots of action and cheesy one-liners. It was far from Arnold’s finest work, but it was fun, and the big guns used in the film were pretty cool, too. Eraser is a film you can look back fondly on if you grew up in the 90s, because it was silly fun and nicely directed by the legendary Chuck Russell, who had a pretty good streak of films going when he did Eraser. Before he’d had success with the breakout Jim Carrey film The Mask, and before that he had the remake of The Blob and A Nightmare on Elm Street 3: The Dream Warriors. I bring this up because the reason Eraser worked when it did was because it had the biggest action star on the planet in its lead role and a talented director working behind the camera, and to top it off a $100 million dollar budget to play with. Now we are talking 25 years later, and Warner Brothers has given us a sequel no one in their right mind has asked for, and it doesn’t even have its star. Dusting off older properties is the rage in Hollywood, and at least most of these sequels are warranted, but Eraser: Reborn comes at us about as unwanted as solicitors on a Saturday morning when all we want is to sleep in. Despite everything, I still went in to this with an open mind, hoping maybe they returned to this intellectual property because they had something new and cool to bring to the table. Spoiler alert: they didn’t, but that’s why I’m here to take the visual bullet so you don’t have to.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Brent Lorentson on May 27th, 2022
Licorice Pizza marks writer/director Paul Thomas Anderson’s 9th feature film, and it seems to be his most personal film to date, as it takes place in his hometown of San Fernando Valley during 1973. It’s difficult to go into a Paul Thomas Anderson film and not have high expectations. I can’t even guess the number of times I’ve watched Boogie Nights, and Magnolia is one that I adore just as much. These two films just impacted me from the first time I experienced them in the cinema and really fostered my appreciation for film and storytelling with large ensembles. Since then I’ve been waiting somewhat patiently for PTA to do another film like those two, but instead he’s grown as a filmmaker and genuinely become an auteur. While I can look at his films The Master, There Will Be Blood, and Phantom Thread, they are great cinematic achievements that show he can do award worthy films and that he’s definitely one of the best working directors out there, BUT I’d be hard pressed to say they have the re-watchability of his earlier films. It just seems he’s been chasing after that elusive Best Director award rather than simply having fun directing movies. Then Licorice Pizza comes along, and it is a sweet breath of fresh air, a film filled with the cinematic flair and great characters, along with a great soundtrack that got me to become a fan of Paul Thomas Anderson’s work.
The overall plot of the film is simple. Gary (Cooper Hoffman) is a precocious 15-year-old who is an actor and has started up a few businesses of his own. When he meets Alana (Alana Haim) on picture day at school, he is instantly smitten with the 25-year-old who works for the photography company. He’s persistent about getting Alana to go out on a date with him, and reluctantly she agrees in a way to call his bluff. She sets the ground rules that they are meeting, but only as friends. As the film progresses and the relationship gets more complicated, she has to keep reminding herself that they are only just friends … or are they? This isn’t a teenage sex comedy, but it is fun-spirited romance that is charming and innocent. Sure, this has some vibes that remind me of Rushmore (1999) with the precocious teen trying to win over an older woman’s affections. The difference I see is that in Rushmore, the main character was more fueled by jealousy, whereas Gary’s affections and actions are genuine.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on May 18th, 2022
After watching Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy, my mind wandered over to Inception, of all places. Remember how Ellen Page’s character pretty much only existed so other people could explain to her — and, by extension, us in the audience — the rules of the movie’s universe and what the hell was happening? Well, watching Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy for the first time felt a lot like what I imagine Inception would look like if Page’s novice architect hadn’t been in the script: words and items have dual meanings, characters have double (and triple) motivations, and good luck figuring out everything that’s going on in this complex world! The plot, however, is deceptively simple: veteran spy George Smiley (Gary Oldman) is called out of retirement to uncover a Soviet agent in the highest ranks of MI-6, the British intelligence service. (I’ll refrain from further discussing the plot so that I don’t give anything away, but also because there’s a decent chance I haven’t comprehended everything that happened. That being said, my second viewing of this movie went considerably smoother than the first.)
Things only get complicated when you realize that almost every person presented on screen — with the notable exception of a shy schoolboy — is a spy or possesses a critical piece of intelligence. (It’s no accident that we never get a clear look at George’s wife, Ann.) As a result, the audience is constantly kept off balance, not knowing who or what to believe since every character harbors layer upon layer of secrets. The movie doesn’t explore the toll this takes on its characters, but it doesn’t have to: it’s plain to see in their resigned faces.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Brent Lorentson on May 16th, 2022
What do you get if you take The Sopranos and mix it with Animal Kingdom and place it in Ireland? That’s pretty much the best way I’d go about describing the first season of the new AMC television show Kin. The show only runs for eight episodes, but I have to say this is the most satisfying gangster story I’ve seen in some time. No, I’m not about to say it is better than The Sopranos, but it definitely has the potential to be in the same league if the show continues with the momentum it has going for it. What’s a shame, though, is that with so many cable channels and streaming services out there, this is a show that has gotten lost in the mass of content, and it deserves to be recognized. The Kinsellas family is a small-time crime family based in Dublin. The family runs their business under Eamon Cunningham (Ciaran Hinds) who is pretty much The Godfather over all of Ireland. Mostly Cunningham deals with drugs, but literally if you are involved with any sort of crime, he’s still collecting on it. Then there is Frank Kinsella (Aidan Gillen, aka “Little Finger” from Game of Thrones) who is in charge of the Kinsella family and their small ring of criminal activity. Frank is a fun and complicated character who is a crime boss with a bad habit of using coke but also gay dating apps. Frank is also a family man who not only is trying to do what’s best for the Kinsella family, he has to also deal with his hotheaded knucklehead of a son, Erik “Viking” (Sam Keeley). Amanda Kinsella (Clare Dunne) runs a car dealership that is used to help launder money for the family. Her husband, Jimmy (Emmet J. Scanlan) is one of the heads of the family who works beneath Frank. Frank’s brother, Michael (Charlie Cox) is recently released from prison, and he we can assume was the “heavy” for the family as we find out he’s responsible for a lot of deaths before his stint behind bars. And finally there is Bridget “Birdy” Goggins (Maria Doyle Kennedy), who is basically a family advisor. The power dynamics of this crime family are interesting, and how the show balances the “family” drama with the “crime” drama is definitely one of the show’s strengths.
Now that you’ve met the family, what is the show all about?
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Michael Durr on April 25th, 2022
Easter 2021. I'm sitting in a hotel room. My wife and son are asleep in the adjoining room. Meanwhile, I'm sitting in a chair flipping through channels on the television. I come upon PBS where music is typically opera or symphony-based. However, on this particular occasion, I am witnessing something far different. A lady dressed in a red vinyl dress is playing guitar at the Austin City Limits. It's clearly rock with a bit of indie and pop thrown in for good measure. But it's unique all its own and familiar at the same time. At first, I'm drawn in by her beauty, but I stay far longer once I hear her music and captivating sound. Within days, I'm buying Masseduction (and have bought several of her other CDs since then). Her name is St. Vincent. As it turns out, even before I was in that hotel room late at night, she was working on a mockumentary called The Nowhere Inn. After the film falling victim in part to COVID for its release, it finally made it's way to Blu-ray. Let's take a look.
A long, desolate highway. A limo passes by with Annie Clark, also known as musician St. Vincent. She is as it turns out doing just that: listening to music. The driver up front rolls down the windowed partition and asks who she is, because he's never heard of her. Annie tries to explain, but the limo driver just goes on and on about how neither he nor his friend have ever heard of her. Eventually he rolls up the partition and Annie goes back to listening to her music.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Michael Durr on April 11th, 2022
Most people want to do the right thing. It's usually far easier in your private life to do the right thing than it is, say, in a job environment where you have people constantly breathing down your neck. They are far more interested in the company's pocketbook or their image to society than what is right and wrong. Therefore, it often leads to a lot of decisions (especially those in places of power) that from a surface appear questionable. It's even worse when that company or organization is in the public eye every moment of the day. Today, we look at a film where an ex-cop has retreated to the mountains in search of a simpler life away from the grey choices of the police force. All based on trying to do the right thing. Let's take a look.
Charlie Waldo (played by Charlie Hunnam) stretches in the woods and sits in silence meditating on his life. Meanwhile we get some ecological narration about the future state of the planet and how awful the United States is at preserving it. (Trust me, kids, China is much, much worse.) After a brief morning, Charlie goes right back to meditating. He also washes his clothes the old fashioned way. All of the sudden he is greeted by a beeping horn of a car.
