Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on August 29th, 2017
"From the day we arrive on the planet and blinking, step into the sun, there's more to see than can ever be seen. More to do than can ever be done. There's far too much to take in here. More to find than can ever be found..."
There's a period in the 1990's that has often been referred to as the second golden age of Disney animation. The studio had fallen from its once mighty perch, and most film historians tend to agree there was a creative dark ages through the 1980's. But the renaissance of the studio began with Aladdin in 1992 would go on to include such tremendous classics as Beauty And The Beast and The Little Mermaid. None of these films speak to the resurgence of the animated feature like The Lion King. The film set every animated record there was and holds some of those box office records today. It can be safely stated that the great flood of animated projects that followed can be traced to the impact of The Lion King. In 1996 Simba was the most popular name chosen for new housecats. Elton John saw his appeal extend to children, and there could be no mistake that the animated feature was back.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by J C on August 21st, 2017
“My name is Chuck Wepner. You don't know me...well, you do know me, but you don't know you know me.”
Unless you're a hardcore boxing fan (or a Jersey boy/girl), chances are you don't know the name Chuck Wepner. On the other hand, you don't have to be a sports buff or a movie buff to know the name Rocky Balboa. Wepner is a former heavyweight boxer, and his 1975 title bout with Muhammad Ali served as the inspiration for Sylvester Stallone's Oscar-winning classic. Originally titled The Bleeder (my two cents...they should've stuck with that title), Chuck is the story of “The Real Rocky.”
Posted in: Disc Reviews by J C on August 18th, 2017
Reboots are all the rage in Hollywood, in case you haven't heard. Even a relatively low-key property like the Diary of a Wimpy Kid Cinematic Universe series isn't immune. Based on the wildly popular books by author Jeff Kinney, the first three movies featured the same core group of likable actors and become rock solid hits made on modest budgets. So you can understand why Fox would want to keep the series going, even if original star Zachary Gordon became too old to play the perpetually put-upon (and middle school-aged) Greg Heffley. This latest offering features an all-new cast, but too much of the same cringeworthy and juvenile humor; it'll make you wish someone had hidden the reset button from this franchise.
“If there's one thing I've learned from my years of being a kid, it's that you have zero control over your own life.”
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on August 15th, 2017
"It is, I think, going to be a very harsh and unpleasant kind of business and will, I think, require an extremely harsh and unpleasant kind of man to see to it."
That man, of course, is John Wayne. They called him The Duke, and he was indeed western cinema royalty for six decades. He represented the American ideal of the tough guy who stood up for the weak and didn't shy away from a fight. His characters usually worked hard, and they played just as hard. He had a unique way of turning a phrase and has been one of the most widely impersonated Hollywood voices. By the time the 1970's rolled around, Wayne was coming to the end of a long career. Some of these later roles showed a somewhat softer side to The Duke, and he was rarely doing any of his own stunts. Two of those later films were Rio Lobo and Big Jake. They aren't two of his most prominent roles and haven't had much of a wide release in the days since their release. They would show up on late show broadcasts, and Rio Lobo had yet to reach high definition and Blu-ray release. CBS changes that little oversight with a nice package they call a John Wayne Double Feature. For those of us who remember the days of the double feature, these two films fit the double-bill quite nicely. Here are two of the better John Wayne films that you likely have never seen, at least uncut and in high definition.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by J C on August 10th, 2017
Big Little Lies — HBO’s star-studded and (deservedly) Emmy-nominated limited series — is structured like a typical murder mystery. We know someone has been killed, but we don’t know the perpetrator or even identity of the victim. On top of that, the limited series format promises that we’ll actually have an answer by time these episodes wrap up (**cough** The Killing). But the reason Big Little Lies shines— other than top-notch performances and stellar direction — is because beneath the murder-mystery veneer lies a darkly funny drama about all manner of adult relationships: husband/wife, ex-husband/ex-wife, mother/daughter, mother/fellow-mother, and so on.
“I love my grudges. I tend to them like little pets.”
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on August 10th, 2017
When we begin the second season of Blindspot, three months have passed since the first season's explosive finale. We are placed back in the action with the same time having passed on the show. Jane (Alexander) has been kept at a covert CIA black ops location where she is being tortured for information. It is a fortuitous time to rejoin the action, because we arrive just in time to see her engineer a clever escape. Meanwhile Kurt Weller (Stapleton) and his team have been back to more mundane FBI cases, and it's obvious they miss the excitement of working the tattoos. They're about to get their wish, and things are about to get pretty intense as we join the sophomore season of Martin Gero's Blindspot.
When Jane rejoins the team, there are now a lot of trust issues between them. She's upset that they allowed her to be taken and tortured, and the team has learned more about the organization that sent Jane to the FBI. Enter new co-leader of the team, NSA Agent Nas Kamel, played by The Good Wife alum Archie Panjabi. She has named the organization Sandstorm because of the fearful ones she experienced as a child. She had trusted the wrong agent, and it cost lives on her team when he betrayed them. Now it's a little personal, and she's not going to be quick to trust Jane.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by John Delia on August 9th, 2017
Putting a twist on the original movie Going in Style, director Zach Braff does a good job of reviving the comedy for modern-day audiences. He turns up the laughter with memorable situation comedy and actors who can deliver some of the best one-liners. It’s a lot of fun for a date night or just a chance to get away from the humdrum to laugh a little. Retired and trying to scrape by on his retirement check, Joe Harding (Michael Caine) is about to hit an unexpected brick wall. With his mortgage in jeopardy from lack of timely payments and his granddaughter needing help with tuition, he’s in a very tight spot. His best friends Albert Garner (Alan Arkin) and Willie Davis (Morgan Freeman), who have been living together for the past 25 years to curb expenses, are about to be in the same boat.
The company the three men have worked for has decided to close doors in America and movie their operation to a foreign country. This makes them not responsible for American retirement funds dumping all their former retirees and anyone being fired due to the dissolution and move to overseas operations. Now without their income, the three find themselves open to other measures. Joe comes up with a bright idea to rob the bank where their retirement funds are located. To add icing on the cake, it’s also the place where Joe has been bamboozled into one of those adjustable loans.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by J C on August 8th, 2017
“Extraordinary people come with singular issues and needs.”
On the surface, being blessed with a genius-level intellect seems like good thing, right? So it's interesting that movies about uncommonly smart people (Good Will Hunting, A Beautiful Mind, and The Imitation Game to name a few) tend to focus on the extreme isolation and inevitable exploitation of these individuals. Gifted is about a potential “one-in-a-billion” math prodigy and her weary, protective uncle, who carries himself like someone who's seen too many movies about exploited geniuses and knows full well that “nobody likes a smart-ass.”
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Brent Lorentson on August 4th, 2017
An action film with a running time of 89 minutes should mean that it’s going to be lean on the story and keep things moving at a fast pace. S.W.A.T: Under Siege delivers just that, but unfortunately in the process delivers something that we’ve seen many times before. The film is being branded as a sequel (by name only) to S.W.A.T (2003), the film with Colin Farrell which was an adaptation from the TV series from the 70’s. S.W.A.T: Under Siege has nothing to do with any of the previous incarnations, and has relocated from sunny California to Seattle Washington. But is the film worth checking out? Well I’m not a fan of sequels that go straight to DVD, but this film does dangle a wild card for the audience that convinced me to give this a shot, Michael Jai White (Spawn, Black Dynamite).
It’s the 4th of July and the S.W.A.T unit is ready to have a short and easy day so they can get home and enjoy the holiday with their families. But what kind of an action movie would it be if the holiday didn’t take a turn for the worse with terrorists and a lot of gun fire? The team gets a call about a big shipment that’s being made at a shipping yard, with the DEA taking lead they head to the warehouse that turns out to be something more dangerous than it seems. After an intense firefight, instead of finding drugs or guns in a shipping container, they find a man The Scorpion (Jai White).
Posted in: Disc Reviews by J C on August 4th, 2017
“It's not all it's cut out to be...it's not about being on stage all the time. It's about the killing of time.”
There certainly hasn't been a shortage of sitcoms starring stand-up comedians. Many of them (Roseanne, Home Improvement, Everybody Loves Raymond) have grafted the comic's persona onto a family-friendly format. Even the shows that have depicted the life of a comic tend to take a surreal approach (Louie) or fast-forward to the part where the star is an established comedian (Seinfeld). HBO's Crashing stands out because it honestly (and painfully) depicts the struggle of an aspiring stand-up...and makes it look very, very funny.
