Disc Reviews

Before there were The Hunger Games or even The Running Man, there was a tiny little B-Film called Death Race 2000.  Long before the remake occurred with Jason Statham as the lead I was a fan of the original, and for all the wrong reasons.  I thought it was great, the notion of having a point system for people you’d hit with your car, the kind of thing you’d joke with friends about, but would never actually go through with.  With David Carradine wearing the black mask as immortal Frankenstein behind the wheel of his death machine, he was fun to root for.  I’m pretty sure, though, it was a young Sylvester Stallone as the bloodthirsty Machine Gun Joe who got so many people to see the original.  I’ll be honest, it’s what got me to rent the VHS, hoping to see Rambo in action, but instead it just opened my eyes to a new kind of cinema cool I wasn’t expecting.  I’ve seen the original film at least a dozen times, and it always delivers the over-the-top fun that films of the 70’s embraced. Now that Roger Corman has decided it is time to dust off his film and give it a reboot for a new generation.  Even with a bigger budget and more affordable technology, is it a wise decision to once again attempt to update a classic? There’s only one way to know for sure. Strap in, folks, because things are about to get messy.

It’s supposed to be the year 2050, and the government has developed a cross-country death race to hopefully whittle down the population while entertaining the masses in the process. The returning champ is Frankenstein (Manu Bennett). He’s the fan favorite in a leather suit and always wears a leather mask.  It’s hard to understand why he’d be such a beloved favorite, but this is a world that embraces a ruthless killing machine.  Other drivers are Minerva (Folake Olowofoyeku), a stylish hip-hop/Mad Max inspired mash-up, Jed Perfectus (Burt Grinstead), an egocentric madman who wants to be number one and adored by everyone, and then there is Tammy (Anessa Ramsey), an all-American religious leader who loves to pray and kill.  It’s a fun batch of drivers, along with a car that is controlled by AI that is simply known as Abe (voiced by DC Douglas).  The characters are all over the top, but unfortunately there is nothing in the way of depth to be found here.  There is an attempt at giving Frankenstein a deeper story, one that is far from being original, but really what’s going for the film is that you don’t watch a movie called Death Race 2050 and expect a heartwarming character study.  Instead, you’re here to be entertained, and it does so.

If asked about my favorite genre of film, romantic comedies would not be close to the top of the list. However, I have seen enough rom-coms that I wouldn’t mind watching a second time. The Babymooners would be a film that I’d give a second watch, simply because of its charming energy. Most of this charm can be attributed to Shaina Feinberg and Chris Manley, who co-wrote and directed the film. Through explicitly stating in the synopsis that the film is “clearly influenced by old Woody Allen films,” the filmmaking duo alert audiences to exactly what they should be expecting, and they are not far off. So if you are a fan of Woody Allen, rejoice, as that is not an empty promise.

Part documentary, part sketch comedy, part smart storytelling, The Babymooners is a story about a middle-aged artistic woman named Shaina, who is concerned about losing her creativity with the coming child. Set up as a video letter to her unborn son, she recounts the events that led to the conception, as well as details the complexities within the relationship between her and her partner. These events are largely told in vignettes, that are prefaced by either Shaina talking to her computer, or a talking-heads-style interview with Shaina’s parents recounting their experience with her.

The premise here was always dirt simple. They've taken the buddy cop idea and found a way to work in the forensics science fad and deliver a procedural with a few twists. The show is based on a series of mystery novels by Tess Gerritsen, who introduced us to Jane Rizzoli & Maura Isles in 2001. Tess makes a cameo appearance in this, the show's final season. The season is shorter than the usual 18 shows. There are 13, and in all of them you can feel the weight of the characters and their situations counting down until the final episode of the series. You'll be able to see where that's going pretty much from the beginning. After seven years, you can look forward to a tearful goodbye as the show exits on its own terms.

Angie Harmon plays Detective Rizzoli. She's wanted to be a cop all of her life and is living the dream, working with a special unit out of Boston PD. Her best friend in life happens to be Dr. Maura Isles, who is the Chief Medical Examiner for the unit and is played by Sasha Alexander. These are the kind of friends who finish each other's sentences and share a lot of history together. That's not to say they are at all alike.

“It’s been a long time getting from there to here.”

35 years, to be exact. Enterprise is the fourth spinoff from the original 1960’s hopeful series. The Earth is finally ready to send its first starship to explore the vast galaxy. This first starship Enterprise is smaller than the ships we’ve become used to. There are no shields or photon torpedoes. The transporter has only been cleared for inanimate objects. Not that this stands in the way of its occasional “emergency” use. The ship is very much like the cramped spaces of today's submarines. It adds an even greater sense of reality to the show. The crew is composed of Captain Jonathan Archer (Bakula), First Officer and Vulcan High Command liaison, T’Pol (Blalock), Chief Engineer Charles (Trip) Tucker (Trinneer), Tactical Officer Malcolm Reed (Keating), Denobulan Dr. Phlox (Billingsley), Pilot Travis Mayweather (Montgomery) and Linguist/Communications Officer Hoshi Sato (Park).

When a movie makes a bold claim such as being “a tour de force murder flick that defies classification,” it is inviting a hefty amount of preconceived criticisms prior to anyone actually viewing the film. It’s like titling a horror film This Will Scare You. Naturally, your first thought would be something along the lines of “Yeah, whatever, movie.” Needless to say, that want to criticize burns within you until you watch it. Then, with all the satisfaction in the world, you get to say “No, that wasn’t scary at all.” In the end, you are stuck with a movie that wasn’t what it promised to be, but realistically, you knew that would be the case anyway. It is a cheap marketing ploy that entices you to watch for all the wrong reasons.

On the surface, The Orphan Killer has a lot more in common with the Halloween franchise than it realizes. A homicidal maniac churns out an impressive body count in an attempt to destroy his own bloodline. The only difference is the plot of The Orphan Killer is anchored down to a Catholic orphanage, where the killer grew up. So in terms of being a film that “defies classification,” I would argue that is an objectively erroneous statement. It is a horror film, a slasher specifically, that uses a little more blood than its competition.