Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on January 27th, 2006
Synopsis
Based on the novel by Helen Cross, and adapted for the screen and directed by Pawel Pawlikowski, My Summer of Love is an interesting story about two girls in Ireland (or England) who find friendship in each other’s company among a sea of desolation.
Mona (Nathalie Press, Chromophobia) lives above a pub that her brother Phil (Paddy Considine, In America) owns. But Phil, an ex-con, has found religion, and plans to close the bar and turn it into a gathering place for fel...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on January 25th, 2006
No single television show defined the 1980’s as did Miami Vice. Did Vice influence the 80’s culture, or did the 80’s culture create Miami Vice? The line appears blurred. This much is unmistakable. Miami Vice dominated the pop culture of the time. The biggest names in music, from Joe Walsh to Phil Collins, have lent their music and (sometimes pitiful) acting skills. It was suddenly cool to walk around in pastel longboats. Don’t even get me started on the car. Were Ferraris ever not cool? Don Johnson was an overnight heartthrob to millions of teen girls across the nation.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on January 20th, 2006
Al Pacino is one of those actors who always seems to find himself in those type of roles that bring out the absolute best in him. In his last four films (Insomina, People I Know, Angels in America, and The Merchant of Venice) Pacino has brought the needed tension and power to his performances. Add 2005’s Two For The Money to that ever-growing list of excellent performances.
Pacino plays Walter who runs a sports betting hotline. Matthew McConaughey plays Brandon, the Vega...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on January 11th, 2006
Tessa Quayle (Rachel Weisz) is not your standard activist. She won’t be satisfied by simply standing on protest lines – she must be where the action is, and for her it’s in disease infested Kenya. When a pharmaceutical company sets up shop there to distribute a prototypical drug to the people, Tessa becomes involved in a conspiracy that will eventually costs her her life.
After Tessa turns up dead – and this is no spoiler – her death is featured in the opening scenes of the film, husband Justin (Ralph Fien...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on January 3rd, 2006
Synopsis
The Stiffler character from the Amercian Pie movies has, it turns out, a younger brother, who is also a loathsome creep. After sabotaging the high school band’s performance, his punishment is to attend band camp himself. He makes the best of a bad deal, planning to videotape raunchy goings on.
What can you say about a movie where ex-porn star Ginger Lynn Allen is the most convincingly human character present? Eugene Levy returns from the other movies to collect a paycheck as...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on January 2nd, 2006
Synopsis
Julian Morris is the new guy at an exclusive high school. Exclusive, presumably, because all the students look five to ten years too old to be high school students. At any rate, he falls in with the hip crowd, led by ice queen Lindy Booth, and they decide to play a game with the rest of the student body by sending out a hoax e-mail leading all and sundry to believe that a serial killer is loose on campus. But then it begins to appear that there IS a killer, and that he isn’t too happy about ...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on December 26th, 2005
Synopsis
There was a period in Francis Ford Coppola’s (The Godfather, Apocalypse Now) life where he went through a bit of a phase, where he was making films based on relatively obscure material. And he went through another smaller phase in the early ‘80s where he was making films from source material of author S.E. Hinton (The Outsiders). And Rumble Fish was one of those.
Based on Hinton’s novel, the film details the life in a small town, with a tough neighborhood kid n...
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...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on December 20th, 2005
It was an excitable time for this young 13 year old boy. No matter where you were in the house, the sound came to you. No matter what you were doing, it drew you to the living room television. No matter how bad things were going, that sound brought a smile to your face. Mike Post’s opening theme for The Rockford Files has to be one of the best in television history, and it lingers in my mind as a precious anthem of days gone by.
He was every young boy’s hero. How could you resist James Rockford? He had the toughness of Dirty Harry.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on December 18th, 2005
Synopsis
I would hope that with films like The Wedding Date, that the genre of films set around weddings is over and done with. There’s nothing left to mine, the horse is very dead, and in this case, the film is rather predictable. Or to put in another way, my wife said “this film will probably be stupid, but I’ll like it”. And when I was watching parts of the film, the story was so easy to follow that I could go and make a batch of chili, come back, and be caught up to the story.
Based on ...
