Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on July 26th, 2012
"Space... The final frontier. These are the voyages of the starship Enterprise. Its continuing mission, to explore strange new worlds. To seek out new life and new civilizations. To boldly go where no one has gone before."
Nearly 20 years after the original Star Trek left the network airwaves, Gene Roddenberry set out to discover if he could catch lightening in a bottle once again. Some say he did an even better job with Star Trek: The Next Generation. There are times I tend to agree. The Star Trek sequel series had a lot more advantages from the moment it was conceived. Star Trek, a series that barely registered on the ratings during its three-year primetime voyage, became a huge sensation in syndication. By the time Next Generation came on the scene, the original show had been syndicated in over 20 different languages all over the world. It had launched an animated series, and a fifth feature film was already in the early stages of consideration. So it isn't quite fair to judge the success or quality of The Next Generation over the original series. One thing is inarguable. The second would never have existed if not for the first.
Posted in: No Huddle Reviews by Gino Sassani on July 25th, 2012
"The North Yungas Road, better known as El Camino De La Muerto, The Death Road, was carved from the mountain in the 1930's by Paraguayan prisoners during the Chaco War. This road's still one of the only routes connecting the mountain city of La Paz to the Amazon lowlands..."
The Ice Road Truckers are back, but it's not the haul roads of Canada or Alaska they'll be facing this time. They've been taken to South America where they'll haul cargo across the continent’s death roads. This is the second season of the spin-off of Ice Road Truckers. This year the World's Deadliest Roads takes us to South America.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Michael Durr on July 25th, 2012
Hopefully, a lot of the readers had a chance to read my Transformers Prime: Season One on Blu-Ray review. In it, they would have found a fantastic animated series that is almost on equal level to the Generation one cartoons. The series has captivating characters, amazing sound and a better story than those silly live action movie sequels. Today to review, I have the Prime special dvd: One Shall Stand. The dvd has four episodes from season one and three new episodes from season two cut into one huge movie. Let’s go shall we?
As we open, we listen to Optimus Prime tell the crew of a doomsday prophecy known as the Covenant of Primus that has the potential to destroy the earth. It seems to be only a few days away and is connected to the Decepticon leader: Megatron. It would be best to squash this prophecy before it begins. Meanwhile, we are transported to the war ship of the Decepticons where Megatron has been on stasis. He was fixed up by fellow Decepticon, Knockout.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by J C on July 25th, 2012
I knew this movie was in big trouble as soon as it decided to kill off its most charismatic character/actor in the first 10 minutes. Don't worry, MMA fans: the poor soul who prematurely bites the dust is not played by UFC legend Randy Couture, who headlines this straight-to-DVD airplane "thriller" that makes you appreciate all the skill and care devoted to making even enjoyably junky action flicks like Passenger 57.
When a terrorist group known as The Tribe hijacks a luxury jumbo jet belonging to wealthy industrialist Bruce Lieb (Craig Fairbrass), they weren't counting on having Paul Ross (Couture) as a passenger. Ross is a government agent who has been doggedly pursuing the terrorist group. The Tribe demands a suspiciously specific payment of $2.73 billion or they will start executing hostages. Among the hostages is Ross's estranged ex-fiancee (Tiffany Dupont), because beefy action heroes have the worst luck when it comes to having cherished loved ones in peril.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on July 24th, 2012
"Satan has sent me Twins Of Evil."
Okay, it wasn't really Satan, at least I don't think it was. It was the folks over at Synapse who sent me the Blu-ray release for Hammer's Twins Of Evil, and I'm pretty glad that they did. If you're a horror fan of any worth and are old enough, you have some wonderfully frightful memories of Hammer's run of horror films starting in the late 1950's. Hammer pretty much began where Universal ended their celebrated cycle of horror films. Like Universal, the cycle produced a new generation of atmospheric horror films that included the classic creatures. Dracula, Frankenstein and The Mummy were all resurrected under the Hammer banner. The studio also delivered the next generation of classic horror actors led by Christopher Lee and Peter Cushing. While it's true that changes of the guard at Hammer and a lean toward more exploitation cinema led to a decline by the 1970's, there continued to be some notable exceptions. Twins Of Evil was one such exception.
Posted in: No Huddle Reviews by Brent Lorentson on July 23rd, 2012
There is a thin line between paying homage and ripping off another film. In the case of The Girl From The Naked Eye you may as well call it outright theft. If you’ve ever seen Sin City and you’re a fan, be ready to have your eyes roll and at times be offended at how blatantly these film makers rip off Frank Miller’s masterpiece The Hard Goodbye. Sure, there is nothing wrong with a little inspiration from a piece of work, but come on, you’re going to tell me it took three writers to get together and rip off Miller and come up with this? I could even appreciate them trying to do a film noir piece, but after watching this I have to question if any of the filmmakers ever watched a piece of film noir.
From the start this film is a mess. The narration by our antihero Jake (Jason Yee) just doesn’t hold up; they would have been better off with him saying as little as possible. He simply doesn’t have the voice for narration or for the kind of film they were attempting to make. To be fair, Mr. Yee was the only thing positive throughout this film. When he’s not talking and he’s simply stalking the halls or kicking ass, Yee is fun to watch, and I think he could make a nice career for himself.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by J C on July 21st, 2012
"An Asian man wearing a German uniform was discovered by the U.S. military at Normandy on D-Day. Upon questioning, he was identified as a Korean."
My Way cannily opens with this bit of real-life information. As the movie reaches its heartbreaking conclusion, we know only one of a pair of lifelong rivals-turned-friends — one Korean, one Japanese — will make it to the end.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on July 19th, 2012
"On the clearest of nights when the winds of the Etherium were calm and peaceful, the great merchant ships with their cargos of Arturian Solar Crystals felt safe and secure. Little did they suspect that they were being pursued by pirates."
Everybody loves a pirate story, and Walt Disney Studios has made a good bit of money from that particular fact. The Pirates of the Caribbean ride and eventual Johnny Depp films have gone a long way to fill the booty chests of the studio to overflow. But, of course, Disney didn't invent the pirate sensation, and they were not the first to fully capitalize on their popularity. That honor might well fall to Robert Louis Stevenson and his 1883 novel Treasure Island. The book has been a favorite of daydreaming young boys and girls for well near 150 years. More than just a story of pirates and adventure, it's a story of self-discovery and coming of age. It's quite a timeless tale and has had several film versions over the years. In 2002 Walt Disney Animation took on the task and created an animated feature that used the material rather loosely and opted for a grand space adventure. The result was Treasure Planet.
Posted in: No Huddle Reviews by Gino Sassani on July 19th, 2012
Three-time widower Ben Cartwright (Greene) runs his famous Ponderosa Ranch with the aid of his three grown sons from three different mothers. There’s Little Joe (Landon), Adam (Roberts) and Hoss (Blocker). Set some time in the mid 1800’s, this long-running series followed the family’s many exploits. In the late 1950’s westerns accounted for six of the top ten programs on TV. Only Gunsmoke had a longer run than Bonanza. From 1959 to 1973, Ben Cartwright and his boys rode across the small screen. Years later in syndication the series re-emerged as Ponderosa, and a handful of TV movies continued the tale into the 90’s.We never have grown tired of the genre that gave us such heroes as John Wayne and Clint Eastwood.
Unlike many of the 1960's Western television shows, Bonanza was all about the characters. You rarely saw a gunfight. There was often a bit of fisticuffs, but usually it ended with a lesson that violence never pays. The show prided itself on using the Western genre to deliver a family kind of show, and it's no surprise that series star Michael Landon would use many of the same kinds of stories and lessons on his own Little House On The Prairie. The Cartwrights are always helping widows, the wrongly accused, and the local Indian population. That help often lands them in hot water.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by J C on July 18th, 2012
"I will be 100 percent committed to this half the time."
This offbeat, knowingly unromantic declaration between long-time friends Jason and Julie kicks the plot of Friends with Kids into motion. The platonic pair decide to have a child together after watching the soul-sucking effect parenthood has had on their married friends. The plan is for Jason and Julie to share parental responsibilities right down the middle while living separate romantic lives. Don't worry. I was thinking the exact same thing as you and all the other characters in the movie when they hear about this harebrained scheme: "Good luck with that!"
