Posted in: Disc Reviews by J C on March 5th, 2014
There’s a pretty good, southern gothic tale buried somewhere in Wicked Blood. Unfortunately, writer/director Mark Young isn’t quite able to extract it. Instead, we get a somewhat overqualified cast acting out Young’s down-and-dirty story of meth, chess and bikers that is exactly as messy, baffling and oddly intriguing as that description makes it sound. The film opens with a literal bang: we see the explosion of a shabby trailer. We don’t know who is inside, but we see a young girl stoically watching the flames from the outside.
Hannah (Abigail Breslin) is a teenage chess enthusiast and an orphan living with her older sister Amber (Alexa Vega) and her meth-addicted Uncle Donny (Lew Temple). The three of them live under the thumb of Uncle Frank (Sean Bean), a powerful local crime boss. (You can tell Uncle Frank is powerful because he barely gets out of his seat before the film’s final act; Bean projects menace by simply sitting behind a desk or a dining room table.) There’s also Uncle Frank’s unstable brother Bobby (Jake Busey), who seems to have an uncomfortable fondness for his niece, Amber.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by J C on February 19th, 2014
“Zombies…killer robots…nice town you got here.”
If nothing else, filmmaker Christopher Hatton definitely thought outside the box in his attempt to spice up the lumbering zombie genre. The random appearance of killer robots about halfway through the film is such an out-of-leftfield move — assuming you started watching this movie without looking at its Blu-ray cover (and, no…Dolph Lundgren is *not* one of the robots) — that I actually found it to be inspired. It’s a good thing too because the rest of Battle of the Damned is essentially a low-budget, paint splatter-by-numbers survival flick.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by J C on January 24th, 2014
In the 1990s, the French action films of Luc Besson (La Femme Nikita, Leon: The Professional) and Euro-centric offerings like John Frankenheimer’s Ronin provided a sleeker, more exotic alternative to the outsize, muscle-bound exploits of Stallone, Schwarzenegger and Van Damme. Besides movies with the words “Fast” or “Furious” in their title, American action flicks have mostly moved away from lo-fi, knucklehead thrills and turned to PG-13 heroes in CGI adventures. Meanwhile, European filmmakers have stayed in their stylish, car/foot-chase-loving lane. The result is entertaining yarns like The Prey/La Proie, which stands out thanks to its thuddingly simple action movie pleasures.
“Sure, Franck. You can trust me.”
Posted in: Disc Reviews by J C on December 30th, 2013
“Violence is never the answer.”
That statement is said unironically by a character in Sweetwater, but we know better; in the movies, violence is pretty much always the answer. This is especially true when it comes to the revenge genre which, the films of Quentin Tarantino notwithstanding, is largely a man’s game. (Risk-averse Hollywood studios are much less likely to greenlight WoMan on Fire.) This bloody, straightforward Western from twin filmmakers Logan and Noah Miller is not terribly original, but it does try to put its own spin on the hallowed tradition of cinematic payback.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by J C on November 11th, 2013
The most surprising thing about Ambushed is that it's not quite as generic as its completely uninspired title might suggest. (Off the top of my head, I can think of at least 15 movies that could credibly be re-titled Ambushed; I'm sure you can too.) This particular straight-to-DVD action thriller is being sold as The Expendables-lite, with tough guy supporting players (and Ambushed producers) Dolph Lundgren and Randy Couture — along with Vinnie Jones, who really should've been in an Expendables movie by now — glowering from the Blu-ray cover. But this stylish L.A. drama — which liberally borrows from superior crime flicks — has a few tricks of its own.
Despite the presence of Lundgren, Couture and Jones, Ambushed is technically the story of Frank (Daniel Bonjour), who narrates the film. Frank is a strip club owner in downtown Los Angeles who is also involved in the cocaine business along with best friend/brash Scotsman Eddie (Gianni Capaldi). Frank also has a sweet, staggeringly gullible girlfriend named Ashley (Cinthya Bornacelli), who is the only pure thing in his life. Since Frank eventually wants to leave the drug business and make a life with Ashley, he makes a bold, violent play to move up the cocaine food chain.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by J C on October 29th, 2013
The world of Bounty Killer is a barren wasteland that has been decimated by the unchecked greed of nefarious corporations. In other words, I can’t believe this movie is only set 20 years in the future! I’m not the kind of guy who uses exclamation points very often, so the fact that I threw one at the end of the previous sentence wasn’t an accident. This silly, stylish, thoroughly enjoyable revenge fantasy/satiric action flick is basically one giant exclamation point in movie form.
“The bounty killers compete for body count, fame, and a fat stack of cash.”
Posted in: Disc Reviews by J C on October 12th, 2013
“When people are desperate, they’ll do horrible things to survive.”
Sci-fi and horror have been exploring the dark side of human nature for as long as those genres have been around. Throw a group of people together in a high-stress situation — whether they’re running from The Walking Dead or hiding from whatever is in The Mist — and the base instinct to survive will eventually lead them to commit unspeakable atrocities. The Colony starts off as the sort of movie that explores the monstrous things people do to each other…and then the actual monsters show up.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by William O'Donnell on October 9th, 2013
This is the third stab at making an animated series about these radical reptiles. This particular DVD set is the latter half of this show's first season. We are privy to a wide array of toys...er, I mean, characters whose stories are firmly established at this point (roughly 13 episodes into a 26 episode season).
This is the first series presented as a 3D computer animation. The graphics are nicely rendered, but are sometimes hard to see since the movements, especially during fight scenes, are incredibly frantic. I certainly hope the fact that I find the pacing too fast isn’t a sign of old age arriving. The animators have clearly gone through a lot of trouble choreographing a fight that can sometimes have at least a couple dozen characters interacting (a very difficult thing to manage) and I’d appreciate it more if the speed didn’t make me feel like I need to feed the DVD Ritalin.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by J C on October 7th, 2013
“This story is based on a remarkable but true incident that took place in Africa in 1913 before the Great War, when the world was very different.”
The moviemaking business was also drastically different in 1976, the year this British, pre-WWI romp was released. Today, the risk-averse film industry has made large-scale adventures like Shout at the Devil — starring big personalities trekking across even bigger locations — all but extinct. I get that greenscreens and CGI are more cost-effective. But a movie’s ability to transport its audience gets an extra jolt when we know we’re looking at the real thing.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by J C on September 17th, 2013
Is the idea of a “low-budget epic” an oxymoron? I realize an ingenious filmmaker like Neill Blomkamp was able to make the $30 million District 9 look like it cost about five times that much, but I’m talking about really working with scraps. Heck, for $30 million, the filmmakers behind Viking drama Hammer of the Gods could’ve probably made this film 10 times. The Blu-ray case makes it seem like a SyFy-level production, but director Farren Blackburn admirably had his sights set considerably higher.
Viking ruler Bagsecg (James Cosmo) has been mortally wounded during his war against the growing Saxon resistance. From his deathbed, the king orders his son Steinar (Charlie Bewley) to locate banished oldest brother Hakan (Elliot Cowan) so that Hakan can take his rightful place on the throne. (Steinar has another older brother named Harald, played by Finlay Robertson, who also appears to have his sights set on the crown.) Steinar embarks on this mission flanked by his loyal crew: right-hand man Hagen (Clive Standen), superstitious Jokul (Guy Flanagan), and crass savage Grim (Michael Jibson). The foursome, along with a few unexpected allies, soon find themselves venturing into the heart of darkness.
