Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on October 13th, 2017
At first glance you would not expect 50 year old cartoon television specials to be this high on the UHD 4K list. Honestly, I was a bit surprised myself. But when you really think about the staying power of these cartoons you realize they've made an emotional connection to generations of children of all ages. I grew up on the Peanuts creations of Charles M. Schulz. Most of us have, in some way or another. His newspaper comic strip is one of the longest running and most successful strips of all time. The work has been translated into every language currently spoken on the planet. The images of Charlie Brown, Snoopy, Linus, and the rest of the Peanuts gang have appeared on just about any kind of product imaginable.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Brent Lorentson on October 13th, 2017
When a film like The Survivalist comes along, you somewhat have an idea what to expect when it’s being marketed as a “dystopian thriller”. I like these kinds of films, but for the most part many of them are just not very good and are just a carbon copy of previous dystopian films that came out prior to it. For years I’ d say the Mad Max series was the gold standard on what you should want to be. Waterworld at least attempted to be Mad Max, but rather than a desert wasteland it went the direction of the high seas. The Survivalist goes another direction; rather than a barren wasteland, or the ocean, it instead plunges deep into the wilderness after society has apparently collapsed and food has become scarce.
Posted in: No Huddle Reviews by Jeremy Butler on October 12th, 2017
When Calls the Heart returns with a six-movie collection that plays out more like a television season. I must confirm my initial concerns that given this was a movie collection, I feared that I would have trouble following the story from movie to movie; however, that is not the case, as each movie picks up exactly where the other left off. With that sigh of relief, I was able to enjoy the wholesome values that are displayed in this frontier drama. Things to appear to looking up for the town of Hope Valley, with the railroad coming to town, looking to build a main route through the town, which would mean more jobs and opportunities for the townsfolk.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Brent Lorentson on October 12th, 2017
In 2003 Open Water hit the screen; it was a success since at the time the found-footage genre hadn’t yet saturated the market. I thought it was a fun little movie that was creative, and what impressed me most of all was the use of the sharks in the film. The danger always felt real, and to a point it was a convincing film. It was inevitable that a sequel would follow, though it came and went so fast, it’s not big surprise that many seem to have forgotten the film existed. Now it’s nearly a decade since the sequel came out that we now have a third installment, Open Water 3: Cage Dive.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on October 11th, 2017
"C'mon, you apes, you wanna live forever? I have only one rule. Everybody fights, no one quits. The bugs have breached Mars, and the Federation's fleet is too far to help. It's up to us to save the planet. On the bounce, Troopers! The only good bug is a dead bug! Oorah!"
Robert Heinlein wrote the Starship Troopers novel in 1959. Since that time it has taken on many forms from pulp fiction to comic books.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on October 11th, 2017
Things are about to change in big ways for the Disney series Once Upon A Time. The sixth season is now out on Blu-ray, and the seventh season has just begun its run on ABC. If you try to go back and forth between these seasons, you might be puzzled more than usual. The show goes into a serious reboot this year. The economics of the show have been pulling it towards either cancellation or pulling in the purse strings. While the ratings aren't exactly blockbuster, it's been a clever way for the Mouse House to keep their properties buzzing as they continue to remake many of their fairy tales in live action these days.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by J C on October 11th, 2017
“You know, there comes a time when even the greatest leader has gone as far as he can go.”
Winston Churchill was once voted the Greatest Briton Ever, beating out the likes of Princess Diana and William Shakespeare. Although Churchill had a staggering number of accomplishments throughout his long life, he is most closely associated with being Great Britain’s prime minister during World War II. That’s why the notion that Churchill vehemently opposed the D-Day invasion at Normandy in the days leading up to the pivotal battle is a provocative premise for this well-crafted, well-acted movie. The only problem is that it remains unclear whether that was actually true.
Posted in: No Huddle Reviews by Brent Lorentson on October 10th, 2017
It’s hard to believe it has already been twenty years since Buffy the Vampire Slayer first aired on television. I was still in high school at the time, and when I first heard about the show, I couldn’t have been any less excited. All I could think about was the cheesy movie that had Luke Perry. At the time horror was having a weird revamping so to speak. Horror seemed to stop being scary and instead went the direction of trying to be cool and have slick visuals, rather than deliver genuine scary tales.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on October 10th, 2017
I was first introduced to The Who through the original Tommy album. It was one of my mother's favorites when I was young, and she had actually written out by hand her interpretation of the story the rock opera appeared to tell. I can't remember those scribblings, and I'm not even sure if they're still tucked away in that Decca album I have around here somewhere. But the music always stayed with me. Now, I didn't ever become a huge fan of the band. I always liked them and collected a couple of their albums over the years. I did play a lot of pinball, however. I fell more in with the likes of Elton John. So you can imagine how excited I was in the summer of 1975 when my favorite musician was cast to play the Pinball Wizard
Posted in: No Huddle Reviews by Gino Sassani on October 9th, 2017
"Welcome to The Vault, the most amazing library ever. An archive of the incredible. A repository of the impossible. A storehouse of secrets great and small. This is the untold history of America."
Things have not been going so well for Ichabod Crane and his fight against the supernatural. The show has had trouble finding an audience as well as a footing. Season Four marks the second time the show has been re-tooled in order to tweak whatever keeps it from completely catching on.
