Posted in: Disc Reviews by David Annandale on March 28th, 2004
Synopsis
Amoral would-be dance star Roxie Hart (Ginger Rogers) is convinced by her agent and areporter to take the blame for a murder. The thinking is that no woman has ever been convictedof murder in Chicago, and the attendant publicity will do wonders for her career. Truer wordswere never spoke, as the cynical dance of lawyers and media begins.
Many readers will, of course, have seen this story recently in the musical Chicago.Here you get the story with none of the ...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by David Annandale on March 28th, 2004
Synopsis
The first manned mission to Mars goes wrong when the ship crash-lands, damaging itselfbeyond repair. Years will pass before any rescue mission can arrive, so the crew must find waysof surviving on the planet’s surface indefinitely. This will not be easy.
Nor will it be interesting. Though the special effects are pretty good for a lower-budget film,this Spanish effort is so boring, it’s almost a war crime. The dialogue moves beyond merebanality and into the absurd, a...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on March 28th, 2004
Often, the success of one film in theaters will bring on a wave of classics on DVD with a similar theme. In this case, the new films are Pirates of the Caribbean and Master and Commander. These modern box office successes have prompted 20th Century Fox to release some classic films about the high seas onto DVD. One such film is A High Wind in Jamaica.
There are quite a few problems with this film, but most of them lie within the narrative. The technical aspects are all handled well, wit...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by David Annandale on March 23rd, 2004
Synopsis
Bloodthirsty pirate Henry Morgan (Robert Stevens) is starving Jamaica by seizing almostany ship that tries to make it there. He seems impregnable in his fortress on the island of Tortuga.Privateer Captain Bart (Ken Scott) arrives to find some way to defeat Morgan. His journey to theCaribbean is complicated somewhat by the presence of stowaway Meg (Leticia Roman), aspririted...er... wench... who has dreams of being a lady.
You always thought My Fair Lady would...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by David Annandale on March 15th, 2004
Synopsis
Henry Fonda is Tom Joad, returning home after serving four years in prison for killing aman. He arrives to find the farms of Oklahoma devastated by drought, and all the familiesdispossessed of their land. He and his family become part of the great migration from the DustBowl to the Eden of California. There they face exploitation, persecution and misery, andFonda’s rage at the injustice grows.
John Steinbeck’s enormous novel found a stunning screen incarnation in th...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by David Annandale on March 6th, 2004
Synopsis
After the death of his mother, Elijah Wood is left with his uncle’s family while dad DavidMorse takes off for two weeks to settle their future. Uncle has two children: a little girl and anolder boy Wood’s age: Macaulay Culkin. Behind Culkin’s angelic visage, naturally, lurks thesoul of a devil. Wood suspects the evil, but no one will believe him, and so he is left alone totry to stop the increasingly deadly games his cousin is playing.
Director Joseph P. Ruben made ...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by David Annandale on March 2nd, 2004
Synopsis
A hectoring principal tells his audience of concerned parents the story, in flashback, of thetragedy that befalls Bill and Mary. The All-American couple is destroyed through the actions ofa drug ring that seduces high school kids with the Devil’s Weed. Marijuana, as portrayed here,works like a combination of LSD, crack and Spanish Fly. When tragedy strikes, and Bill isbrought up on murder charges, the drug ring goes into hiding, but their own addictions threatento break the...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by David Annandale on February 27th, 2004
Synopsis
Two young women, each with their own problems. Marilu is a con artist, currently involvedwith selling fake Mayan art. She has to deal with the Mexican police, and one officer inparticular, who has carnal designs on her. Aurelia is coming to the end of her maternity leave,and is facing going back to work at a sweatshop. Said sweathshop is in an area where some 250women have already been killed by a serial killer. Aurelia steals her drug-dealer boyfriend’s stashand money, and...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by David Annandale on February 23rd, 2004
Synopsis
After the mayor of a tiny hamlet is decapitated by an irate populace, the Powers That Be(mindful of an upcoming election) decide to appoint a total moron as temporary mayor. Thetheory is that an idiot won't get himself into trouble. The idiot they find is Juan Vargas (DamiánAlcázar), who arrives with his wife and a head filled with plans to do good things for thecommunity. We all know what is paved with good intentions, though, and confronted with acomplete lack of funds, o...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on February 22nd, 2004
Season three sees Futurama cooking on gas. This is THE SIMPSONS on some mind-altering substance. For the uninitiated (and if you have never watched the series before - watch seasons 1 and 2 first…duhhh!) pizza delivery boy Fry has awoken from cryogenic suspension and finds himself in the year 3000. Here he teams up with the girl of his dreams, one-eyed space captain Leela, the hard-drinking, wallet-lifting robot Bender (he bends things for a living), the frankly barmy Professor Farnsworth and an assorted bunch of ge...
