Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on December 31st, 2005
Synopsis
Jennifer Connelly is going through a messy divorce with Dougray Scott. They are feuding over the custody of their daughter. Trying to piece her life together, Connelly rents an apartment in a down-at-the-heels building on Roosevelt Island in New York City. A leak develops in her ceiling that keeps getting worse. Her daughter develops an imaginary friend. The supernatural events gather force, apparently determined to drive her out of her mind.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on December 29th, 2005
John(Owen Wilson) and Jeremy(Vince Vaughn) are divorce mediators faced with the daily struggle of attempting to reconcile fractured partners for long enough to enable them to reach some kind of settlement. But let's not worry about that too much because it’s nearly wedding season, a time when their entire agenda shifts focus. Why? Because John and Jeremy are wedding crashers. We're not talking about anything half-hearted either. These two are professional wedding crashers. They have rules, game-plans, and even fake f...mily trees to help them crash any party. Anglo or African-American, Italian or Spanish, Chinese or Korean, it does not matter to them—they just pretend to be some distant relative of a dead aunt and bluff their way through the rest. The purpose behind this cleverly conceived fraud? Simple, they want to get laid. They want no-strings-attached sex with beautiful, twenty-something women. Tons of them.
After a long and eventful season of fun weddings, these two come across the ultimate wedding to crash. The eldest daughter of a prominent Senator is getting married, and John and Jeremy simply cannot afford to miss such an illustrious event. When they arrive, however, it is not long before the plan goes out of the window and everything starts to fall apart. Although they appear to find their designated targets, and set about on their elaborate plans to seal the deal with these lovely ladies, it turns out that things are much more complicated than they seem because the girls are the two younger daughters of the Senator and they each come with their own share of woes. The boys may just have their work cut out for them if they want to close the deal but the real trouble comes when they start to realize that they may want more than just the one night.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on December 26th, 2005
Synopsis
Despite the upside of pro wrestling-being on worldwide TV and having people from ages 6 to 60 buy a shirt with your face on it, and cheer (or boo) you in the ring until they become hoarse, there is still a downside. A wrestler can be on the road for 250 days out of the year. The pay is comfortable, but there is the risk of injury, or worse, addictions to drugs to overcome the pain you can suffer from while on the road. And unlike John Q. Businessman, a lot of the wrestlers out there either don’t ha...e a health or pension plan, or can’t even afford either or both to begin with. Numerous wrestlers over the years have been incapacitated from the life, and at least that many have committed suicide, including several well known (to fans) wrestlers in the recent months. The upside can be great though, and a wrestler’s character can have a lasting impact on the public, long enough to maybe make them lifelong fans. I’m still watching it, off and on for (damn!) 20 years, and Barry Blaustein has the same identification with it, and uses it to help focus on several different people who have, and are, making their livelihood in the business, in Beyond the Mat.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on December 21st, 2005
Where does Dukes of Hazzard fall on the spectrum of TV show adaptations? Somewhere in the middle, which came as a surprise. I expected a stupid flick with no entertainment value, but I got a stupid flick with more than a few glimmers of amusement. The film’s plot borders on irrelevant, but I’ll recap it anyway. The flick focuses on the adventures of cousins Bo (Seann William Scott) and Luke (Johnny Knoxville) Duke. They deliver moonshine for their Uncle Jesse (Willie Nelson), and Bo also succeeds as a local ra...e driver. He looks forward to his fifth consecutive victory in the annual Hazzard County road race. However, an obstacle arrives when former four-time champion – and now pro driver – Billy Prickett (James Roday) returns to compete.
It turns out he’s there to create a diversion for local mogul Boss Hogg (Burt Reynolds). Hogg frames the Dukes to take over their land, and they learn that he’s done the same to claim other connected properties. With the aid of their sexy cousin Daisy (Jessica Simpson) and others, Bo and Luke attempt to find out Hogg’s plan and stop it. Along the way, they try to avoid law enforcement authorities and score with some babes – oh, and Bo still wants to win that race.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on December 5th, 2005
Posted by Kim Lee
This unauthorized biography by New Line Home Entertainment covers the life of Curtis “50 Cent” Jackson. The documentary describes 50 Cent’s expedition of dealing drugs at the corner of Jamaica and Queens, to boxing, to becoming a gangster rapper, and in the end a music industry icon.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on November 23rd, 2005
Written by Clayton Self
Alien vs. Predator had mixed reviews upon its initial release in theatres. Fox studios demanded a PG-13 rating (to gain a wider audience) and two weeks before the release, cuts were made to reduce the amount of human blood onscreen, and a few moments of character moments. This new, un-rated edition restores some of those cut scenes, adding just over 8 minutes of previously unseen footage.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on November 22nd, 2005
Synopsis
According to some reports, Fred Durst almost directed this thing, and if I ever wind up supporting anything Fred Durst does, I’ll kill myself. Having said that, Lords of Dogtown is a fond look back at the California skateboarding explosion in the late ‘70s. Since, like everything else, timing is everything, this film was largely neglected in a lot of circles, because it came out shortly after the outstanding documentary Dogtown and Z-Boys, which was written and directed by Stacy Peral...a, who was one of the members of the legendary Zephyr skating team. Peralta is one of the writers of Lords of Dogtown, which is a more dramatic look at the characters of the era.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on October 15th, 2005
Synopsis
Two friends – Marie and Alexia– head out to the country home of the latter’s parents. In the middle of the night, a killer breaks in, slaughters the family, and makes Alexia his prisoner. Marie is locked in a battle to save her friend and not become a victim herself.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on September 13th, 2005
Synopsis
After the events of the first film, Naomi Watts and her young son are starting a new life for themselves in a small town. But the curse of Samara reaches out to them, as not only are there more victims of the lethal videotape in this town (thus driving home Watts’ guilt for having copied the tape herself), but Samara strives to possess Watts’ son.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by David Annandale on June 20th, 2005
Synopsis
The superbly obnoxious Ben Stiller plans to have his Globo Gym take over and destroy the building that houses the apathetic Vince Vaughn’s Average Joe’s. Unless Vaughn and his friends raise $50,000.00 before the end of the month, all will be lost. Their only hope is to win a dodgeball championship. They’re no damn good, but help comes in the form of psychotic ex-dodgeball champ Rip Torn and Christine Taylor as an accountant with a killer throw.
