Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on June 11th, 2006
Synopsis
A group of occultists horsing around with more than they know accidentally open up an evil portal and unleash a terrible force upon the world. Fortunately, there’s an organization of Demon Hunters on the job, determined to send this evil and all if its minions back where they came from.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on June 11th, 2006
Synopsis
Long before she paired up with Phil Donahue and the two went on to do..who knows what, Marlo Thomas appeared in some smaller TV shows from in the early '60s, until she got a break when she was given a TV show to utilize her talents. That Girl is the story of Ann Marie, who decided to move to New York City to try to find steady work as an actress, and over the course of the show's five year run, Ann Marie's exploits are documented in situation comedy fashion.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on June 11th, 2006
OK, I hope I'm not diving into a review that may fall into the "film scholar" category, and thus rule me out of being taken seriously. When there's a lull in buying new releases, sometimes my wallet gets cabin fever, and so I went out and picked up the Hitchcock set from Criterion, entitled Wrong Men and Notorious Women: Five Hitchcock Thrillers 1935-1946, and includes the previous Criterion releases from Hitchcock, namely Rebecca, Notorious, Spellbound and The Lady Vanishes. I'm tackling the earliest release of the bunch, entitled The 39 Steps. The story very much resembles another of Hitchcock's later works, North by Northwest, in the aspect that the wrong man is thrown into a spy chase. While Cary Grant is taken through New York, a cornfield, and Mount Rushmore in the later film, in The 39 Steps, Richard Hannay, played by Robert Donat, attends a Music Hall production, meets and takes home a women (Annabella Smith, played by Lucie Mannheim), who he later finds out is a spy who is being chased by two men attempting to kill her. In the middle of the night, Annabella comes into Richard's room, and falls over him, dead of a knife in the back. As the police chase him, looking to detain him for the murder, the two men, assuming that Richard has found out about the secret she held, start to pursue him in order to kill him. And whatever he does, some of Anabella's last words to him are not to trust a man missing the tip of his right pinkie (It sounds strange to write the word "pinkie" in a review of Hitchcock, so I hope it looks out of place as you're reading it).
This was one of Hitchcock's last works before coming over to America to wow us with the movies that have become legend. For all of my DVD collecting, I'm still a bit green when it comes to the older stuff. And after seeing The 39 Steps, I now realize what I've been missing. For its time, it's a pretty suspenseful film, with a lot of shots that are still used in movies today, and even the story has been used in some fashion or another over the years, though clearly not to the same effectiveness that Hitchcock has done. Despite the "Born On" date for this film, it's a very good one, and to see many of the same devices used today, both within the story and within Hitchcock's technical realm, make it an easy recommendation to those who are even casual film fans.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on June 9th, 2006
Limitations of budget and social conventions of the time prevent Murder, Inc. from being all it can be - still, the performances, and the captivating dynamic between hero (Stuart Whitman) and villain (Peter Falk) result in entertaining fare, so long as this film is allowed to be a movie and not a documentary. Whitman leads a fine cast as the mob lackey, who is constantly manipulated by a tough-talking contract killer. Part of the real life syndicate of hit-men "Murder, Inc.," Falk's baddie steals every ...cene he's in throughout this early career-making performance. He smacks of a young Brando, and comes across as just the type of ice-blooded villain, which gave the 1930's Brownsville mob its infamy. He'll lie, cheat, and steal, to get what he wants - whether it be conning Whitman's assistance to off a stale nightclub comedian (Morey Amsterdam), or brutally raping Whitman's wife (May Britt). And by "brutally," I mean "brutally for the times." The word "rape" is never used, and the explicit nature never goes beyond an aftermath scene, where a disheveled Britt anguishes, "Those filthy hands. Those dirty fingers."
A film like this could be revisited to great effect by a capable director like Scorcese. In fact, stylistically, Murder, Inc. shares many attributes with Scorcese's superior mob epics. It's the kind of film that influences better filmmakers to make better pictures - but I would only use the word "classic" to describe its age, and not its quality. For one, the narration is totally out of place, and - quite obviously - the result of a receding budget. The first bit of narration doesn't come into play until we're past the first act. And when it does finally appear, all we hear is a droll voice with zero personality. We only learn later the narrator is a character in the film - the heroic cop (Henry Morgan), who takes on the entire mob organization. Rather than give the film a documentary effect, the narration serves only to clumsily fill in cracks, where story should be. "Show, don't tell," this isn't. Another weak point is how the best element is often neglected - the Whitman-versus-Falk conflict with Britt caught in between. It seems like every time this story element gets rolling, we cut away to a less interesting sidebar. And when the angle is finally resolved, it happens with such anti-climax that we wonder why we even cared at all.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on June 9th, 2006
Synopsis
Not having seen the first season, I confess as to floundering somewhat in my encounter with the second. In the interest of keeping things simple and comprehensible, I thus present the synopsis provided by the box itself. The second season “finds Tommy Gavin (Denis Leary) away from his former crew . . . and working in a Staten Island firehouse. He must come to terms with the havoc his drinking has caused and realizes it’s time to get his problems under control. His comrades back at 62 Truck a...en’t faring much better. Chief Reilly struggles with the recent Alzheimer’s diagnosis of his wife and her deteriorating condition. Franco juggles the responsibilities of raising his daughter while trying to return to work. Lt. Shea discovers just how lonely the single life can be and Laura complicates house relations by getting involved with a colleague.”
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on June 9th, 2006
Synopsis
Jeremiah is taken at the age of five from his loving foster parents and turned over to the tender mercies of his white-trash mother, Sarah (Asia Argento, in an absolutely monstrous role). He is dragged down into the abusive nightmare of her life, being raped by her male partners when he is being beaten by them. There is an interlude where he is taken under the care of his fundamentalist grandparents (whicih is a nightmare in itself), but mother reclaims him, ultimately making him up as a gir... and having him turn tricks with her at truck stops.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on June 9th, 2006
Director Jonathan Mostow is an interesting director to say the least. He directed Kurt Russell is the great Breakdown where a man must fight to save his wife. He director Arnold Schwarzenegger in the third Terminator film where a machine must fight another machine to help save the human race; but before he made Terminator 3, he directed Matthew McConaughey and Bill Paxton in a film where men must fight against their wits to save themselves. Two of the three films are great and are a joy to watch,...while one is enjoyable to watch, but that is about it.
In U-571, Lt. Tyler (Matthew McConaughey) stars as a young man who wants nothing better than to jump into the command line. His commander, Lt. Commander Dahlgren (Bill Paxton) doesn’t see this though. Tyler isn’t experienced enough and isn’t ready to sacrifice the lives of his men for the lives of others or, more importantly, the safety of the mission at hand. This creates some heat between the two, but all that is quickly put aside when they’re called back to the boat. We soon learn that a German U-boat has become disabled in the middle of the Atlantic. On board this U-boat is a secret Enigma machine, which can be used to cipher messages. This exact Enigma machine was used by the Nazi’s to control all of their shipping lanes.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on June 8th, 2006
Synopsis
Photographer Timothy Greenfield-Sanders decided to do a series of portraits of some 30 porn stars. Two pictures of each, one clothed, one not, the same pose in both pictures. This is his documentary of that shoot. Scenes of the studio process are intercut with interviews with the various stars and talking-head moments from the likes of Karen Finley, Gore Vidal, John Waters and Whitley Streiber (!). We are at the other end of the porn spectrum from Dag Yngvesson’s Rated X – these are t...e top-paid performers, and so the overall experience is less depressing the world shown in Yngvesson’s film. (Though there is some inevitable overlap.) Many of the stars are very articulate (and not just from the expected sources such as porn star/activist Nina Hartley), and there is quite an interesting range of personalities and views presented here. Jenna Jameson is seen, but presumably was too expensive for an actual interview. Instead, she is talked about, and so accrues the semi-divine aura of an all-powerful, all-knowing, enigmatic Mona Lisa. One is left a bit wanting: one doesn’t learn very much about Greenfield-Sanders’ photographic process, and one wishes many of the interviews were longer and more in-depth. That said, a fascinating piece.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on June 7th, 2006
In 16 Blocks, Bruce Willis plays Jack Mosley, a NYPD detective who seems to be annoyed and tired of he job. He looks lethargic 90% of the time never wanting to really do his job. Jack is told that his boss wants him for another job; which is the last possible thing Jack wants right now. Jack has been told to transport a key witness 16 Blocks to a grand jury hearing. The witness must arrive in two hours before the grand jury's term expires. The witness is Eddie Bunker (Mos Def), who seems to have more lines tha... probably all of his film's combined as Eddie is constantly speaking his mind.
Luckily for Jack, the overall premise of the job seems rather easy. All he has to do is get in a car and drive a guy 16 Blocks. Not too difficult no. Well, this is a movie and nothing is ever easy. Poor old Jack can't drive even 16 Blocks without a quick stop. This quick stop is at a liquor store. When Jack leaves the liquor store, he sees the wrong kind of guy, and proceeds to shoot this guy. We soon learn that Jack's boss, Frank Nugent (David Morse) has two jobs, the first being Jack's boss and the second being the linchpin of a ring of corruption and drug dealing within his department. Sounds like an honest cop right? For some reason, Eddie and Jack seem to connect. As Jack quickly learns from Frank, a lot of people don't want Eddie to testify in Court a man named Jerry Shue will be going down on numerous charges. Just as Eddie is about to get shot in a plausible scenario Frank creates for Jack, Jack shoots a cop in the leg thus throwing himself on the same side of the law that Eddie is on. Now it's up to Jack as he must evade the police and get Eddie to the courthouse.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on June 7th, 2006
Synopsis
Rayne (Kristanna Loken) is a dhamphyr – a human/vampire hybrid. Escaping from the carnival where she is imprisoned as a freak, she sets out on a crusade against vampires, her ultimate target being the lord vampire Kagin (Ben Kingsley, an actor showing Michael Caine’s former penchant to whore himself out without shame), who also happens to be her father. Along the way, she forms an initially uneasy alliance with Michael Madsen, Michelle Rodriguez, and Will Sanderson – members of Brimstone, a ...ampire-hunting organization.
![U-571 [HD DVD] dvd cover art](https://upcomingdiscs.com/ecs_covers/u-571-hd-dvd-large.jpg)
