Posted in: Disc Reviews by David Annandale on March 27th, 2006
Synopsis
We begin with an ending: the final collapse of the marriage between Jeff Daniels and Laura Linney. He is a formerly renowned author who now can’t get himself arrested, let alone published. She is suddenly coming in to her own as a writer. He is pathologically self-obsessed. She is deeply insecure. Together, they spell bad news for their two sons, 16-year-old Jesse Eisenberg and 12-year-old Owen Kline. Both parents are a bit of a mess, but daddy is easily the worst offender, and is an absolut...ly poisonous influence on Eisenberg, who worships his father and viciously blames his mother for the split-up. What follows is primarily Eisenberg’s coming of age, where he must learn to see both of his parents (and, for that matter, himself) with real honesty.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by David Annandale on March 24th, 2006
Synopsis
French nuclear testing (?!) in the Pacific leads to the mutation of iguanas (!?), and giant one makes its way to New York to nest. Scientist Matthew Broderick hooks up with old-flame TV journalist Maria Pitillo and French secret service guy Jean Reno to try to stop the rampage.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by David Annandale on March 22nd, 2006
Synopsis
Five years after saving New York City from supernatural destruction, the Ghostbusters have fallen on hard times. Bill Murray and Sigourney Weaver have broken up, and he is now the host of a dubious psychic TV show. Dan Aykroyd and Ernie Hudson have been reduced to performing a children’s parties, what with the anti-spook outfit having been sued into non-existence. And so it goes. But then weird goop, powered by New York’s anger, rises from the ground to create havoc anew.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on March 19th, 2006
Synopsis
The world greatest rock band’s story about the rise to power, born from Satan, and ready to rock the world, may not be as accurate as one would perceive. As Jack Black and Kyle Gass (Jables and KG to those in the know), Tenacious D received a small run of episodes during the HBO series Mr. Show in 1999 that resulted in good word of mouth for the pair. It was only until last year, when the long-awaited first album finally dropped, that the world discovered just how good they were. And the alb...m is a very good indoctrination for new fans, and for longtime fans of the D, some of what they had seen was presented on the album in a surprising, but pleasant arrangement, featuring guest appearances by the Foo Fighters’ Dave Grohl and produced by The Dust Brothers.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on March 16th, 2006
Biographies are nothing brand new. Hollywood has been making these types of films for quite sometime. Some of the more famous biographies are about people like George S. Patton and political leader Ghandi. Most recently, audiences were invited into the world of Truman Capote. The two aforementioned biographies tended to cast actors that seemed not to necessarily play the person, but more so become the character almost channeling him. Phillip Seymour Hoffman, like George C. Scott and Ben Kingsley, channels Capote in a...rare and artful manner.
The film version of Capote tells the story of Truman Capote who on November 15th, 1959, noticed a news item about four members of a Kansas family who had been shot-gunned to death. Capote telephoned William Shawn, editor of The New Yorker, wondering if Shawn would be interested in an article about the murders. It was later said, by Capote, that this was a big mistake of his as this sole event resulted in the occurrence of a lot of bad events for one Capote.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on March 14th, 2006
Take every Catholic movie cliché you can find, wrap them up in a weak and predictable murder-mystery, throw in Christian Slater and Stephen Rea as they struggle for some semblance of the glory their careers once held, release direct-to-DVD, and you have The Confessor. Slater plays a priest struggling with his own faith, to the point he hasn’t prayed in years. His primary purpose to the Catholic Church is as a fundraiser for whatever causes they deem necessary to support. Of course, all of his higher-ups are st...dgy old men more grounded in public relations than decent living, and he grows more at odds with them as he delves deeper into the death of a disgraced (but, of course, innocent) priest, who is accused of a murder he didn’t commit, which leads to his mysterious death while awaiting trial. When Slater takes over the priest’s parish, he comes to terms with his own human frailties and finds out all his suspicions about the dead predecessor’s innocence are true – but if he didn’t do it, who did? That’s an answer you shouldn’t have any difficulty figuring out.
While the film lacks entertainment value, it is a useful training ground for Molly Parker, the lead actress (or “actor in a female role” for you strict readers). As the love interest of Slater, she commands attention, more so than any of the rest of this washed-up cast. And as for the rest of the cast, it isn’t that their performances are awful – they are simply too bored with the script to inject any passion into it. Everyone but Parker is doing no more than collecting a paycheck, and I certainly can’t blame them, because the script – with its amateurish expository dialogue containing lines that reiterate exactly what you’re seeing through the characters’ actions – is too poor to secure a green-light for production, much less the attached talent’s hard work and ingenuity. Now grant it, with horror stories about Hollywood ruining good scripts being a dime a dozen, it may not have been the writer’s fault – but the fact remains, the script is the film’s greatest drawback.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on March 12th, 2006
Sigh..Death Tunnel is another low-budget horror flick that is just so dull and mundane that it hurts to sit through the whole film. The film is over-directed, which some may think could be a good trait, but not in this case. Death Tunnel is about five college girls who all agree to spend a night in a horrific old asylum as part of a co-ed type event. Enter a few snickering boys trying to scare them and you have a horror film. Excuse me while I try to regain my thoughts as the film was a big yawn fest. < ...p>
The girls tend to walk around wearing next to nothing, which is one of the few positives about the film. They scream out each others’ names and wonder about until random people keep dropping dead. Naturally we have your standard semi-serious sentences like ‘this isn’t funny anymore’. The film is definitely right. The film isn’t funny anymore, nor did it ever get amusing or particularly good in any sense of the imagination.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on March 10th, 2006
Newsradio ran for five seasons. Four seasons gave us some of the best work of excellent comedic legend Phil Hartman, but the beginning of the fifth season marked a sadness period from which the show was never able to recover, as Hartman was shot to death by his wife, who committed suicide immediately following. It was the kind of tragedy you still can’t believe – even today – if you knew Hartman or his work. Luckily, season three offers some of his best moments, as well as the comic genius of the undera...preciated Stephen Root. Root will be known to many office workers as Milton from Office Space, but here, he plays Jimmy James. James is more egotistical and outspoken than Milton, but he’s no less funny. Last but not least, Vicki Lewis brings a surprising humor and sexual vitality to her role (I had only known her previously from her small part as George’s secretary on Seinfeld, and was shocked to see her out of that bookish mold).
But as much positive as there is to say about Newsradio, there are two drawbacks, which frequently slow the laughs and drag an otherwise high-quality show through the proverbial mud – and their names are Joe Rogan and Andy Dick. Neither has improved in the years since the show’s run ended, and the inclusion of either in more prominent roles only served to stifle the work of Root, Hartman, and Lewis. Joe Rogan is Joe Rogan, no matter what kind of show he’s in. He never acts; he just “is.” Andy Dick constantly overdoes it, and brings an obnoxious whininess to every scene he’s in. The rest of the cast just sort of watches the two extremes unfold with nothing significant to add – but then, they don’t detract either. Of course, some people are able to look at Rogan and Dick and see the charm – I am not one of them. But if that’s the case, then you should have no complaints regarding this season.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by David Annandale on March 3rd, 2006
Synopsis
In the late fifties, Lanny Morris (Kevin Bacon) and Vince Collins (Colin Firth) are a top-rated comedy duo, hosts of a polio telethon. At the height of their career, everything comes crashing down when the body of a young woman is discovered in the bathtub of their hotel suite. They have cast-iron alibis, but the team is dissolved. Fifteen years later, up-and-coming journalist Karen O’Connor (Alison Lohman) lands a sweetheart deal to write a book about Vince, and he is being paid a million d...llars to agree to in-depth interview. What Karen really wants to know is what really happened to that young woman, but she also quickly becomes ensnared in the angled web of guilt shared by the two men.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on March 3rd, 2006
Neil Gaiman’s Mirrormask is just the sort of mixed bag I expected. While parts are mesmerizing and the performance of Stephanie Leonidas is a joy in itself, the plot fails to make room for credibility when it’s desperately needed. The holes left behind from this weak story cause the film to masquerade as art while carefully avoiding admission to what it really is – a product of sloppy writing. Gaiman is a talented scribe, but with Mirrormask, he’s dangerously close to believing his own hype. Judging fro... the work, it’s as if he’s looking back at his own accomplishments and thinking his minions of fans will like whatever he first puts down on paper; and for the most part, I think his hunch will prove correct. But that doesn’t mean it’s good just because his followers refuse to see the fault. It’s not that his words and sentences aren’t impressive. They are. No one can fault the man’s abilities with the mechanics of the language, but on issues of plotting, it’s as though he came up with three-quarters of a good story and refused to develop it to completion. Of course, the excuse for such disjointedness is that he’s attempting to create a dreamlike quality with the work. He does succeed, but he gives up too much ground when it comes to credibility.
Still, Mirrormask is not a bad film. The imagination, which goes into every aspect of the feature, is wild and vividly rendered. The effects are spectacular and proof an eye candy piece can be made for less than $5 million. The one-eyeball spiders, the black mass of destruction, the vicious four-legged riddle-loving creatures with human faces – all these characters are rendered beautifully, and do a great job of appealing to older children on the cusp of junior high or high school. And I admire the way Gaiman doesn’t underestimate his audience’s intelligence. At its core, the film has a positive and useful message for kids, and it’s able to relate it without talking down to them. Last but not least, Leonidas will hypnotize you with her grace and beauty. She emits a sexuality that will disturb older viewers until they discover she’s really in her early twenties. But that speaks even more of her talent. Here she is, playing a convincing adolescent, while still oozing sensuality. She’s a talented young actress, who will leave you with some bizarre feelings. To borrow a line from Steve Carrell’s sexually charged boss in The 40-Year-Old Virgin, she will haunt your dreams.
