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Silver Spoons – The Complete First Season

Posted in Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on August 14th, 2007

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Written by Evan Braun

If I had to find one single word to completely encapsulate this show, and particularly its first season, it would be: Cute. No, wait … scratch that. Make it: Nauseauting.

Silver Spoons came a little before my time, which possibly explains why I have no real affection for it. Certainly I’m guilty of having fallen for a few nauseatingly cute shows of my own (say, Full House, to name but one). If I was 5-10 years older, I could have fallen for this, too.
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The Astronaut Farmer

Posted in Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on July 31st, 2007

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Throw reason out with the trash, and sit down to a feel-good movie that tries just a little too hard to be quirky. Thatâ€™s your best approach to The Astronaut Farmer, which pits Billy Bob Thornton against all odds to reach outer space by way of his farm-built rocket.

Everyone likes an inspirational story now and then, so Iâ€™m sure this film will find an appreciative audience. For me, there are better choices â€“ say, October Sky, for example. Here, instead of a boy who loves rockets, we have Charlie Farmer (Billy Bob, Sling Blade), a former astronaut who never made it to space.
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Jump In!

Posted in Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on April 15th, 2007

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In fairness to the folks at the Disney Channel and this movie’s target audience, I’m stepping into the shoes of an 11-year-old girl for this review. Boy, these are tight.

Jump In! is totally a fun movie. It was a Disney Channel original, but now you can buy it on DVD to watch whenever you feel like it. The movie is about Izzy Daniels, a teenage boy played by Corbin Bleu, who was like, so cool in High School Musical. Izzy lives with his dad and his kid sister, and he likes to box. His dad loves…
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Happy Feet

Posted in Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on April 5th, 2007

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This winner of the Oscar for best animated feature of 2006 is one fantastic movie.

Happy Feet is the story of Mumble, a teenager who – thanks to his daddy dropping him early on in life – is mildly physically challenged. You see, Mumble can’t sing like other Americans – he can only dance. As a result, he has never fit in with his people. When he accidentally crosses the border into Mexico, his disability and greater height over the small, energetic Mexicans earn him a sort of respect. With his newfoun…
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Are We There Yet? (Re-Release)

Posted in Disc Reviews by Michael Durr on March 25th, 2007

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Synopsis

Family pictures usually miss when viewed by a lonely dvd reviewer who has nothing better to do on a saturday morning. There are no kids to laugh at the bad jokes and slapstick mayhem, there are no wives to go awwwww and marvel at the cute kids. All that one man can hope for is a decent lead who provides thought provoking characterisms and smart laughs. Wait, I’m watching Are We There Yet?, so I have pretty much no chance of that. Are We There Yet? is the stor…
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Flicka (2006)

Posted in Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on February 15th, 2007

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Maria Bello gives a wasted performance in the Tim McGraw vehicle Flicka, a by-the-numbers family film that is such a retread of other more competent efforts, one wonders, What is the point? Alison Lohman plays McGraw’s teenage daughter and friend-to-Flicka, a role type that was much better utilized in classics, such as Old Yeller, Where the Red Fern Grows, and Summer of the Monkeys. Lohman is the precocious adolescent, who struggles through boarding school, and her relationship with gruf…
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The Year Without a Santa Claus (2006)

Posted in Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on January 3rd, 2007

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Two things you should know about me before reading this review: I’ll watch anything involving John Goodman, and I’ve never seen the animated classic this live-action version of The Year Without a Santa Claus is based on. So unlike when I watched the horrendous Jim Carrey-Ron Howard take on Dr. Seuss’ How the Grinch Stole Christmas, in this case I hold no special place for an original.
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Dr. Seuss’ How The Grinch Stole Christmas (HD DVD)

Posted in Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on December 20th, 2006

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Director Ron Howard is quite the puzzling man. He surely knows how to direct a fine film like A Beautiful Mind or even The Da Vinci Code, but still knows how to give us that random piece of crap. When word came that Howard was going to adapt Dr. Seussï¿½ timeless classic How The Grinch Stole Christmas, I immediately questioned why? After all wasnï¿½t the TNT special that airs oh 40-50 times a year good enough? I guess not for Hollywood as the 2000 remake made some serious bank with Jim Carrey portraying the lead character. The only unfortunate part here is that the film is absolutely horrendous.
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Miracle on 34th Street

Posted in Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on November 23rd, 2006

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Synopsis

This is another film one feels a little silly summarising, given that it must be an exercise in redundancy. At any rate, Macy’s department store gets a new Santa, and this one (a marvellous Edmund Gwenn) insists that he is the real thing. He sets about restoring the sense of wonder in hard-nosed Maureen O’Hara and her skeptical daughter (Natalie Wood), and John Payne winds up having to prove that our boy is who he says he is in a memorable court case.

Schmaltz is hard to avoid in C…
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Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory (HD DVD)

Posted in Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on October 26th, 2006

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Whichever generation you’re from I think we can all remember watching this movie as a child. I have great memories of this film, and when watching the newly released Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, I found myself comparing it to these memories. Finally I’ve gotten the chance to sit down and watch it again for the first time in years, and on HD DVD what a treat, so how does it hold up after all these years?

The movie centers on a young boy named Charlie Bucket, living with his mother and bedridden…
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Charlie & the Chocolate Factory (HD DVD)

Posted in Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on October 24th, 2006

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When the idea came to remake Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory, many wondered why would this need to be done? What in the world could be accomplished that Willy hadn’t previously done? Naturally that never stops Hollywood from making a film now does it? Thankfully, Warner Brothers decided to hire a feasible director in the visionary Tim Burton to helm this remake. Having made such previous visual masterpieces including The Nightmare Before Christmas, audiences knew they were in for quite the …
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Garfield 2: A Tale of Two Kitties

Posted in Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on October 17th, 2006

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Garfield 2: A Tale of Two Kitties is a lot better than I thought it would be. Kids would love it, and it’s not too obnoxious for adults.

It’s a decent story for kids. Just before he’s planning to propose to her, Jon Arbuckle’s girlfriend, Liz, announces that she’s been scheduled at the last minute to speak at a conference in London, and she must leave right away. Jon decides to follow her there to pop the question. Garfield wants to interfere, so he and Odie smuggle themselves in Jon’s luggage.

Hoot

Posted in Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on September 30th, 2006

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Synopsis

Thankfully, some of the larger studios are beginning to produce films that are either good old-fashioned family films, or are films touting religious value and piety. Walden Media, who were behind such films as Holes and How to Eat Fried Worms, have produced and released another film with similar concepts behind them, a charming little piece of celluloid entitled Hoot.

Based on the novel by Carl Hiaasen and adapted to film and directed by Wil Shriner (Peggy Sue Got…
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Millions

Posted in Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on May 16th, 2006

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To say that director Danny Boyle has quite an eclectic resume for his directing filmography may be a bit of an understatement. After an impressive first feature in Shallow Grave, he moved on to the cult classic film about heroin addiction called Trainspotting. From there he took an interesting part for a film called A Life Less Ordinary, followed by directing a hot commodity named Leonardo DiCaprio in The Beach. He took on an interesting zombie film called 28 Days Later, and that brings him up to the children’s film(?) called Millions.
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Dr. Dolittle 3

Posted in Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on April 26th, 2006

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Dr. Dolittle 3 is yet another unnecessary direct-to-DVD sequel of a film, whose glory has long since passed. Young actress Kyla Pratt takes center stage as the next generation of Dolittle to inherit the gift – or curse – of hearing animals speak. At the outset of the film, she is ashamed of her gift, and her lineage. But when she is sent to an old family friend’s ranch for the summer, she begins to see that a talent is what you make of it. Along with telegraphed comedy, lightweight rivalries, and a budding rom…
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Lemony Snicket’s A Series of Unfortunate Events

Posted in Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on April 10th, 2006

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I’m not in to the whole Harry Potter thing. I tried to watch couple of the movies, and I just found the whole thing to be bland, contrived and downright boring. I realize that I am in the minority on this, and that’s fine. I have no problem with that. If you enjoy it, then by all means, buy the books and watch the movies. I’m just saying that it is not for me.
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Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe

Posted in Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on March 24th, 2006

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After the transformation of the Harry Potter and The Lord of the Rings books into hugely successful films, it was only a matter of time before someone decided to tackle C.S. Lewis’s famous novels The Chronicles of Narnia. Both of the aforementioned books into movies were excellent because, even though they didn’t include every little detail presented in the novels, fans still embraced the films for what they were. They brought a majority of the presented themes and ideas in the books and showed u…
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Toy Story 2

Posted in Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on January 18th, 2006

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Disney continues to pull its disappearing acts on DVD with their limited time offers, this time using the new Toy Story 2 2-disc release as the proverbial carrot in front of the mule. While such marketing tactics may be a little annoying to those of us that don’t like to be told when we can or can’t see a movie, there should be no greater incentive to pick this up if you haven’t yet claimed a copy of the film. Toy Story 2 cemented Pixar’s name in quality animation and continued to prove the little studi…
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Muppet Christmas Carol, The

Posted in Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on December 29th, 2005

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Director Brian Henson continues a family tradition with father Jim’s creations, The Muppets. He also carries on another tradition, this time in the form of the long-told tale “A Christmas Carol” by legendary author Charles Dickens. The combination goes so well together I can hardly understand why it wasn’t done sooner, as in by Jim himself before his untimely death. Michael Caine does an extraordinary job, as usual, in the role of Ebenezer Scrooge, a hopeless miser, who receives visits from three very different ghost…
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Old Yeller 2-Movie Collection (Old Yeller/Savage Sam)

Posted in Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on December 4th, 2005

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Old Yeller is a hard film to take if you’re a child. I thought the same would be true as an adult, so needless to say, revisiting this family classic for the first time through an adult’s eyes promised to be a harrowing experience. In fact, for the longest time, I hated Old Yeller and berrated its merits as a film. I realize now after years of maturity and a second visit to the Coates family ranch my belittling of this film masterpiece was a defense mechanism to build up my own sense of machismo. The re…
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Cheaper by the Dozen

Posted in Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on November 22nd, 2005

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This remake ofCheaper by the Dozen, like the original, focuses on the Baker family. Father Tom Baker (Steve Martin) and mother Kate Baker (Bonnie Hunt) decided to have 12 children. The children range from 5 years old to 22 years old. Nora (Piper Perabo) is the oldest child and the one who lives outside the home. Tom coaches Division III football at the small Lincoln College. When Tom’s old teammate Shake Maguire (Richard Jenkins) shows up to offer Tom a big fat contract to coach Division I at Illinois Poly Uni…
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Muppets’ Wizard of Oz, The

Posted in Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on August 23rd, 2005

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Synopsis

Aspiring singer Ashanti (there’s some imaginative casting for you) and her pet Toto (Pepe the king prawn) are transported to Oz by a tornado. The story then plays out in familiar form, with the roles of the Scarecrow, Tin Man, Cowardly Lion and Wicked Witch of the West being essayed by, respectively, Kermit, Gonzo, Fozzy and Miss Piggy.

Though I have reservations about forging on with the Muppets after Jim Henson’s death, there is still evidence of the old spirit here. The Muppet S…
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Because of Winn-Dixie

Posted in Disc Reviews by David Annandale on July 27th, 2005

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Synopsis

Anna Sophia Robb is a little girl named Opal, who has just arrived in the small town of Naomis with her single-parent father (Jeff Daniels), a preacher. Opal finds it hard to fit in and make new friends, until she adopts a rambunctious dog she finds in the Winn-Dixie supermarket. The dog’s extroverted nature helps make connections not only between Opal and the town, but between the townspeople as well.

A very kind little movie, but a completely unoriginal one, too. Between this and…
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Ice Princess

Posted in Disc Reviews by David Annandale on July 21st, 2005

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Synopsis

Michelle Trachetenberg is a gifted science student, and her mother (Joan Cusack), a committed feminist, is pushing her to forge her way through college. But her Trachtenberg’s true love is figure skating, and she manages to combine the two in a physics project, which opens the door to more skating for her. What to do when she turns out to be really good at skating? That or more academic pursuits? Her opposite number is Hayden Panettiere, the stuck-up blonde whose mother (Kim Cattrall) is a f…
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Get a Clue

Posted in Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on June 9th, 2005

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Lindsay Lohan plays sassy Nancy Drew wanna be Lexy Gold. When one of her teachers goes missing (played by Ian Gomez), Lexy enlists her “hip” friends to help her crack the case. Another vehicle for Lohan. It’s a little boring, and the mystery plays out on the level of a Saved By the Bell episode. The point of the movie is to point out they sassiness of Lohan. She’s sooo hip. Like…totally.

Audio

The mix is in Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround. Not much originality in the mix. Some …
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