Posted in: Disc Reviews by David Annandale on July 8th, 2007
Synopsis
Stephen King wrote, in Danse Macabre, back in 1981, something to the effect that horror on TV ranged in quality from the ridiculous to the workmanlike. This was, of course, before he became rather too involved with the medium himself. Things have improved since the, of course, but horror has yet to achieve the truly sublime on television, and this series certainly wasn’t that. It was, however, on the upmarket end of workmanlike, and some of these 15 episodes are pretty neat little eff...rts. The standout is, arguably, “You, Murderer.” Directed by Robert Zemeckis, its opening intro is a parody of the director’s Forrest Gump, and it then has the gall to cast Humphrey Bogart in the lead of a humorous murder tale. The whole thing is done in first-person perspective, à la Lady in the Lake, and co-stars John Lithgow, Isabella Rossellini and Sherilynn Fenn. Everybody has fun with the piece, including the audience, and, from beyond the grave, Bogart himself.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by David Annandale on July 8th, 2007
Synopsis
Whoah. MGM if really digging into the vaults to bring us these. Xaviera Hollander is not much more than the answer to a trivia question today, but for a while in the 70s, she had enough profile to warrant three films based first on her book, then more generally on her persona. Lynn Redgrave (!) plays her in The Happy Hooker (1975), which follows her arrival in the States and cheerful discovery of the life she was born, it seems, to lead. Mysteriously rated R, this is a film that could...have played without cuts on prime time TV twenty years ago. A film all about sex with no sex in it. Makes you long for Joe D’Amato and Laura Gemser to arrive and save the day.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by David Annandale on July 6th, 2007
Synopsis
Robin of Locksley returns to England from the Crusades to find the home he had left behind has taken a drastic turn for the worse under the tyrannical Sheriff of Nottingham. He is forced to take up an outlaw life, fighting for justice for the common man. Marian, fending off the advances of Guy of Gisborne, is his mole in the houses of power.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on July 6th, 2007
It’s no secret that horror films these days severely lack originality and overuse violence and gore instead of actually scaring the audience. Sometimes this works and when coinciding with an actual story can make for a good movie. The Hills Have Eyes remake from 2006 wasn’t half bad because there was a tiny amount of depth in the story, combined with the violence that audiences have come to love. But ultimately for me, it didn’t hit the mark, it was just another typical horror movie. I really don’t think the s...quel will offer anything beyond it, but here’s hoping it will.
The Hills Have Eyes 2 takes place two years after the 2006 film, and offers no closure on the events left open at the end of the original. There is now military presence in the area, and I can only assume that means the surviving family members of the first film informed the government of the mutants. Regardless, in the opening scenes of the film some research scientists are brutally murdered and it’s obvious that the mutants are still around and still pissed off. Meanwhile a group of soldiers is dispatched to the location of the scientists to deliver equipment, but upon arriving it’s discovered that the camp is abandoned. It now becomes a search and rescue mission, where the cannibalistic mutants begin picking off the soldiers one by one, hoping to capture the females for breading purposes. The group must now band together to overcome the threat of the mutants and ensure their very survival.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on July 5th, 2007
Disaster films are nothing new in Hollywood. While most disaster films tend to focus too much on destroying random objects, there’re are a film good disaster films that come around every so often that actual try to explain the film instead of giving us two hours of random explosions. One such film is 1997’s Dante’s Peak.
Harry Dalton (Pierce Brosnan) works for the US Geology Survey Team. Four years after experiencing a volcano eruption, Harry and a few other scientists are called to a town named Da...te’s Peak to research into the town’s dormant volcano. Harry immediately piques the interest of Mayor Wando (Linda Hamilton), quite possible for his looks not for his scientific merit. Most of the town and its members aren’t concerned about the volcano, simply because nothing has occurred for many years now. Obviously this doesn’t sit well with Harry. When two dead teenagers are discovered near the top of the mountain in a hot spring, Harry begins to think that this mountain is ready to explode. However, as per the typical natural disaster film, no one believes Harry (including his boss), despite numerous instances of proof (acidity levels increasing, dying animals, etc). Now Harry must race against time to prove this volcano is a ticking time bomb.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on July 5th, 2007
Adam Sandler plays Archie Moses, a man who works for drug lord Frank Colton (James Caan). Rock Keats (Damon Wayans) is Archie’s best friend and, secretly I might add, an undercover cop who’s trying to infiltrate Colton’s business. Archie, as per the typical earlier Sandler role, is completely oblivious to anything going on around him and doesn’t suspect Rock. Keats is ready to infiltrate Colton, but is mistakenly shot in the head by Archie. Keats, after learning to walk again, realizes Archie must testify against Col...on. Will this two meet up and work together or will fate finally come around and destroy both of them?
Ask anyone around me and they’ll tell you that I’m not the biggest fan of Sandler’s earlier work. While most seem to love his early comedic work like Billy Madison and Happy Gilmore, I find these films to be his worst. They aren’t funny and simply lack any real charm. In all honesty, I had never seen Bulletproof before this viewing. Well, the end result was kind of mixed. I found the film had a few funny, charming moments (mostly from Caan and a few from Sandler/Wayans), but too much of the film tried to be serious in a comedic tone, which rarely works.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on July 3rd, 2007
Be afraid. Be very afraid, if you are even thinking about picking up this rather lame title. There is absolutely nothing redeeming about this film. The only way that Kill House has any chance of giving you nightmares is by putting you to sleep. If only I had been so lucky. Beth Dewey was the “mastermind” behind the whole thing. She wrote, directed, and acted as the killer in this piece of crap. Dewey ought to be arrested for grand larceny if even one person paid any real money for this picture. I would tell you som...thing about the plot, but there isn’t one. If anyone can tell me what in the heck this film was about, please let me know. Near as I can figure Sunny (Dewey) is some sociopath realtor. There is no rythme or reason for anything that happens anywhere in the film. It almost looks like they were pretty much making it up as they went along. I give Dewey an F as a director, an F as a writer, and an F- as an actress. At least Dewey appears to understand the low budget concept of: if you have nothing of value to say with your film, show lots of boobs and someone will watch it.
Video
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on July 2nd, 2007
I wrote a few weeks back that it’s an odd feeling when you finally see that film that everyone and their brother has been exclaiming about for years. That is the exact feeling I felt after seeing The Big Lebowski. I knew for years that this film would be great, especially after seeing Fargo before. Boy was I right as The Big Lebowski was a huge humor trip.
Jeffrey Lebowski a.k.a. “The Dude” (Jeff Bridges) is your run of the mill slacker. He doesn’t really do much with his life besides ...et constantly stoned with his buddies at the local bowling alley. Donny (Steve Buscemi), Walter (John Goodman), and Jesus (John Turturro) are his buddies. One night Jeff comes home to find a pair of thugs sitting in his home. Turns out these thugs think Jeff is some type of ultra millionaire. They soon threaten his life, demanding he pay the debt he owes. Obviously Jeff is completely lost by this situation. After consulting his buddies, Jeff and his buddies soon find themselves wrapped up in a big kidnapping plot. The rest of the film sees our main characters bumble around in a manner that was consistently entertaining and amusing.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on July 1st, 2007
Synopsis
Timothy Dalton might have endured a bit of grief for his short tenure as James Bond, enduring comments equating him to Connery and Moore plagued his two film run, with this one being the last. However, this one was quite the doozy, and almost in the area of “forgotten gem” status.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on June 29th, 2007
As you might imagine, I am often asked for my opinion on the films I see. Inevitably I’m called upon to compare the film with some other work, which is at best quite unfair and at worst simply impossible to do. But I’ve gotten good at the game. So let us play it now. We’ll call Neverwas One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest meets Alice In Wonderland. Unfair, some might say, for they are actually the very same story. When you look at it carefully enough, they really are, although important differences do exist. My point i... all of this nonsense is this: There really is a razor fine line between insanity and fantasy. Neverwas blurs this distinction to an almost indefinable difference.
When Dr. Zack Riley (Eckhart) arrived at Millford Mental Health Institute, which once housed his father, he had no idea that his journey would take him full circle to a childhood he had been running from. Zack’s father (Nolte) was the author of a famous children’s story titled Neverwas. Zack has been running from Neverwas ever since. He changed his name and refused his inheritance of the book’s royalties. Here at Millford, Zack discovers a rather remarkable patient. Gabriel (McKellen) is not only intimately familiar with Neverwas and Zack himself, but claims to be her King. Zack finds himself confronted by a place he always believed came from his father’s imagination. It’s a wonderful story with an almost magical potential. Unfortunately this film takes too long to develop and never quite hits its stride. The film travels a trail of breadcrumbs laid out in such painstakingly slow motion that it is our patience and not our imagination that is finally put to the test. Writer/directors often commit the fatal sin of overcomplicating what often plays best in simpler terms. Joshua Michael Stern is guilty of it here. The film becomes too muddled, trying to show too much history and never trusting its audience enough to find their own way. You should know this IS NOT a children’s film.
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