Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on May 7th, 2003
Sam (Chad Donella) is a down on his luck artist who has just been told by his professor that he sucks as an artist and dumped by his girlfriend. The same wind that blows his life a way also brings him Hope (Erin Bartlett) who shows him how to get his smile back. As they part ways he writes down her phone number on his hand, this disappears though as it is raining heavily. After taking up a job as a delivery man for his friend’s coffee shop he finally finds her but, she is now in need of someone to show her her smile. On the way to restore Hope’s zest for life he finds his..
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on May 6th, 2003
Synopsis
Young Father Amaro arrives in a small rural parish. He is an instant hit with the locals, inparticular the obsessively devout Amelia, who abandons her more secular boyfriend. Amarobecomes entangled in the power games between the church and a reform-minded newspaper,which outed Amaro’s superior as being in the pocket of the local drug lord. Amaro also findshimself more and more attracted to Amelia, and eventually succumbs to temptation. The Crimeof Padre Amaro makes for inte...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on May 2nd, 2003
Synopsis
Steve McQueen and Robert Wagner are pilot and co-pilot of a B-17 Flying Fortress. Wagneris the sensitive type. McQueen, on the other hand “walks the thin line between hero andpsychopath” according the base doctor. Both men become interested in the same woman. Thoughthe film takes forever to get its plot in gear, and the bombing missions are very predictable (thefellow who shows Wagner photos and his wife and kid might as well be signing his own deathwarrant), the utter dist...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on April 26th, 2003
Synopsis
Tom (Gabriel Byrne) is adviser to Leo (Albert Finney), top boss of the Irish mob duringProhibition. Leo isn’t listening to Tom right now, and offends Johnny (Jon Polito), who leads theItalian gang. War between the rival mobs heats up, and Tom gets caught in the middle. I havejust oversimplified an incredibly complex plot, which you really should discover for yourself.Other discoveries that await are glorious cinematography by Barry Sonnenfeld, and endlesslyquotable dialogue...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on April 25th, 2003
Synopsis
Chow Yun-Fat is Godfrey (not “Jeff” as the case has him, though “Godfrey” is, to NorthAmerican ears, an odd name for an action hero), tough-as-nails leader of a group of friends inThailand. Godfrey’s weak cousin gets them involved in a heist masterminded by the Judge(Simon Yam), who leads a gang as flamboyant as they are nuts. Godfrey is betrayed and left fordead, but comes back a year later for revenge. Directed by Ringo Lam, Full Contact doesn’tachieve the heights of John Woo’s b...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on April 24th, 2003
Malevolent is a direct to video release staring Lou Diamond-Phillips. The cast is mostly made up of film and television character actors. While not exceptional, this is not a bad film either. It’s one of those “innocent guy framed for murder” films with enough plot holes to make Swiss cheese. If you’re willing to ignore the incredible coincidences needed to pull off the crime, an ending that falls a little flat, and some rather obvious continuity flaws, this one is worth at least a look.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on April 21st, 2003
Synopsis
Two classics from American International are what we have here, with lots of familiar namesinvovled. Psych-Out stars Susan Strasberg, Jack Nicholson, Dean Stockwell and Bruce Dern.The Trip, scripted by Nicholson, stars Strasberg, Dern, Dennis Hopper and Peter Fonda, and isdirected by Roger Corman. You can’t do much better for pedigree. The plots of both arerudimentary (at best). In Psych-Out, Strasberg (whose character is deaf for some reason),searches for her brother (Dern...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on April 20th, 2003
Long before computers began to provide movie-goers with vivid representations of dinosaurs and alien invasions, Willis O’Brien and a young protégé, Ray Harryhausen, were thrilling audiences with stop motion. O’Brien’s masterpiece, of course, was King Kong. Ray Harryhausen developed that painstaking process for films like Earth vs. The Flying Saucers. Jaded audiences of today might find it hard to imagine that the f/x on this film held the fans spellbound in their theatre seats. Now, with digitally remastered prints and the new alchemy of DVD, you can treat yourself to an early craft that has influenced the great pioneers of today’s filmmaking.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on April 17th, 2003
Synopsis
The film unfolds in a series of interlocking scenes, all occurring at different times. The talebeing told concerns the arrival in a small Oklahoma town of an ex-con (Kevin Anderson), whodeveloped a prison-correspondence romance with shy Martha Plimpton. In the present, SheriffHal Holbrook is investigating a murder, and the flashbacks to Anderson and Plimpton, as wellas another series of flashbacks involving a quiet, somewhat disturbed teenager (Nick Stahl),show us what led ...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on April 14th, 2003
Synopsis
Burt Lancaster, a member of the New England aristocracy, wanders out of the forest andleaps into some friends’ swimming pool. After much overly hearty banter, he realizes that thereis an unbroken link of swimming pools between here and his home. He sets off, and at each pool,there is a revelatory encounter of some sort. We gradually find out more and more about him, andit soon becomes clear that all is not sweetness and light in his world. The film is extremelystylized, and...
