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Fatal Attraction (Blu-ray)

Posted in Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on June 15th, 2009

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“One night stands can be murder.”

That’s the tagline for 1987’s Fatal Attraction. Perhaps it’s no coincidence that both Fatal Attraction and the later Indecent Proposal were both directed by Adrian Lyne. Both were quite controversial upon their release. Both dealt in a kind of “what if” scenario that got people talking around their water coolers and watering hole gatherings. While the latter was pretty much a morality or ethics drama, the former was a gut wrenching morality tale with a Grimm’s Fairy Tale twist.
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Indecent Proposal (Blu-ray)

Posted in Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on June 10th, 2009

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Back in the 1960’s the Beatles were telling, preaching, “Can’t Buy Me Love”. Of course this wasn’t a novel concept even then, and Lennon and McCartney certainly didn’t invent the phrase. In 1993 Indecent Proposal came along to question the age old expression. The film sparked one of those cultural philosophical debates that Hollywood loves to start. It meant that people would be talking about the film, and talk about it they did.
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Serveuses demandées

Posted in Disc Reviews by William O'Donnell on June 8th, 2009

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The main plot of the film is that of a young woman from Brazil named Priscilla, whose student Visa expires and is lead into working as an exotic dancer. The title of the film comes from the ad posted by the pimps and promoters of exotic dancers “Waitresses Wanted.” The film is bookended by the profiles of all the dancers featured in the film, all of whom are from a different nation, all beautiful, and all arrived in Canada with different careers in mind than to get involved with Columbian pimps or Russian mob lords.
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The Ramen Girl

Posted in Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on June 5th, 2009

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Recipe for Ramen Girl (serves 4)

Take one American girl, preferably in her early 20’s, and place her in Japan.

Add a touch of one self centered American male, also in his early 20’s, but sprinkle lightly, (After all, this is merely a subtle flavor that really doesn’t need to be all that well developed.)

Do not mix. (These ingredients will not mix. That’s the point)

Slowly stir in a cranky old Japanese ramen chef to taste.
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In Tranzit

Posted in Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on June 5th, 2009

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In Tranzit is one of these odd films that you can never quite get a handle on. Even now I’m not exactly sure what kind of a film it was intended to be. While it takes place at the end of World War II and involves some Nazi officers in a Russian POW camp, I’m not sure that the film has all that much to do with the war, or POW camps for that matter. The film remains a kind of abstract art form with a rather loosely told story.
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Eden Log (Blu-ray)

Posted in Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on June 3rd, 2009

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“So he Lord God banished him from the Garden Of Eden to serve the ground from which he had been taken.”

I love playing video games. I have since I was in my early 20’s and the first home console systems were being launched. Today I play platform games on my PS3. One of the unfortunate trends to come to modern video games is the ability to provide longer and more elaborate cut scenes.
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Yonkers Joe

Posted in Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on June 2nd, 2009

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Robert Calestino hasn’t had a lot of experience as either a writer or director, and it shows in Yonkers Joe. When he’s writing about the things he obviously knows and understands, the film is quite good and extremely engaging. Unfortunately, Calestino felt compelled to bring some heart into his picture in the person of Joe, Jr. While he thinks he’s adding a necessary emotional element to the story, he’s really delivering a distraction that makes the film somewhat less than it ought to be.
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Fanboys

Posted in Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on June 2nd, 2009

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“A short time ago in a galaxy not so far, far away…

The year is 1998 and it is a period of galactic civil war. Scratch that. There is no civil war. That would be crazy! However, the past 15 years have been a dark time for Star Wars fans. But there is hope. A new Star Wars film is on the horizon. In 199 days, 34 hours, 33 minutes and 28 seconds the most anticipated movie of all time will be released. In the remote state of Ohio, two best friends and lifelong Star Wars fans have drifted apart. Little do they know that on Halloween Night, their paths will cross again.”

Too many cooks can spoil the broth.
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Strictly Sexual

Posted in Disc Reviews by William O'Donnell on June 1st, 2009

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This film’s plot, on the surface, reads like a letter sent to Penthouse Forum. Strangely, said letter could have been written by either gender. Two out of work slabs of charming beefcake are mistaken for gigolos at a bar by two gorgeous and successful women. The women discover the truth about their one-night-stand partners but soon propose the idea of keeping them in the pool house as ‘cabana boys’ that will be fed beer and satellite TV until they are called inside for sex.
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Valkyrie (Blu-ray)

Posted in Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on May 27th, 2009

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“I swear by God this sacred oath: That I shall render unconditional obedience to Adolph Hitler, Fuhrer of the German Reich and people, Supreme Commander of the armed forces. And that I shall at all times be ready, as a brave soldier, to give my life for this oath.”

Taking a page from Roman history, Adolph Hitler required all of his armed troops to swear this oath, not to their country as most armed forces require, but to him personally.
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The Grudge 3

Posted in Disc Reviews by David Annandale on May 23rd, 2009

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Some weeks back, I wrote about Splinter, and opined that director Toby Wilkins showed real skill. I also expressed worry over the fact that this follow-up was this, the third entry in a franchise that began with a remake in the first place. So here we are. Was I right to worry? Sadly, yes.
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El Dorado (Centennial Collection)

Posted in Disc Reviews by Michael Durr on May 19th, 2009

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My history with Westerns isn’t exactly a vast one. I watched a bunch of Westerns with my dad growing up and I continued to watch the bigger ones of the modern era like Tombstone and Unforgiven as I progressed through my teenage years and young adulthood. John Wayne is kinda a mystery to me. He’s a huge gritty guy with a lot of patriotism and a funny way of talking. For lack of a better analogy, Sylvester Stallone is my generation’s John Wayne. Or Chuck Norris I guess. El Dorado is an interesting western flic because it was shot later in John Wayne’s career but he had still had the swagger of earlier pictures. A true classic revisited by the minds at Paramount.

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Wayne’s World (Blu-ray)

Posted in Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on May 15th, 2009

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“So you think you can stone me and spit in my eye. So you think you can love me and leave me to die. Oh Baby, just can’t do this to me baby. Just gotta get out, just gotta get right outta here… Nothing really matters. Anyone cane see. Nothing really matters, nothing really matters to me.”

I don’t think I can ever listen to Bohemian Rhapsody without conjuring up the image of the gang in the Mirth Mobile bobbing their heads up and down and singing to the Queen classic song.
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Wayne’s World 2 (Blu-ray)

Posted in Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on May 15th, 2009

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“White supremist world was cancelled.”

When you talk about Wayne’s World 2 you can’t help but talk about disappointment. I mentioned in my review for the first film that over the span of nearly 20 years the skit had lost some of its luster. I certainly wasn’t nearly as entertained now as I had been when I first saw the film in the early 1990’s. That same principle appears to have been true just a year later when Wayne’s World 2 was released.
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Black Sheep (Blu-ray)

Posted in Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on May 15th, 2009

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Have you seen the Chris Farley/David Spade film Tommy Boy? If you have, then you’ve also seen Black Sheep. The circumstances might have changed, but the general idea is still there. Farley plays the mentally challenged family member, yet again. This time he’s Mike Donnelly, and his brother Al (Matheson) is running for Governor of Washington state. Spade once again plays the faithful employee who is charged with babysitting Farley’s character and trying to keep him out of trouble.
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The Grudge (Blu-ray)

Posted in Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on May 12th, 2009

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“When someone dies in the grip of a powerful rage, a curse is born. It never forgives. It never forgets. The curse gathers in that place of death. Those who encounter it will be consumed by its fury.”

Here we go again with the American remake of the Asian classic. To be fair, The Grudge was one of the first after the great success of The Ring. There are some significant differences between this effort and the countless remakes we’ve encountered over the last decade or so.
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Deadly Sweet

Posted in Disc Reviews by David Annandale on May 4th, 2009

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Jean-Louis Trintignant (here dubbed into Italian) is a hard-boiled actor (!). Arriving at a night club to meet the proprietor, he instead finds the man dead, and the luscious Ewa Aulin standing over the corpse, protesting her innocence. Trintingnant believes her, and decides to help her out. The quest for the truth leads them though a series of encounters with various aspects of London nightlife and lowlife, 1967 vintage.
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The Uninvited (Blu-ray)

Posted in Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on May 1st, 2009

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The Uninvited is yet another in a long string of Asian films that are translated and retooled for American audiences. It’s been a rather strong and long running trend that was kicked off with the wildly successful The Ring, from the Asian classic, Ringu. But, for every effective spooky thriller that comes out of this Asian pipeline, there appear to be a dozen or more complete failures. Some American directors think that all they need to do is throw fast moving creepy ghosts at us and often have them inhabit some modern electronic device. Presto! You have a horror movie for the purposes of generated cash. I’m happy to report that The Uninvited is a fresh approach
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Uninvited, The

Posted in Disc Reviews by Michael Durr on May 1st, 2009

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Citing personal history, I don’t do really well with horror films. As mentioned in other reviews, my parents let me see scary movies such as Exorcist & Poltergeist (as well as R-rated action films) when I was no more than ten years old. While, Poltergeist sits proudly in my DVD collection, I still have trouble to this day with Exorcist. Yes, I can be a scaredy cat at times. To be also perfectly honest, I was a bit worried when I received The Uninvited in the mail to review. After all, it proclaims proudly on the cover that it is made by the producers of the Ring(which I absolutely hated) & Disturbia. By the end of the movie, I was very pleasantly surprised.
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Lionsgate’s 80’s Lost Collection

Posted in Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on April 24th, 2009

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“The best movies you totally forgot about”

That’s the marketing slogan for this Lionsgate collection of mostly 1980’s films that never really broke any ground in their box office releases. They are, for the most part, cheap comedies. A few have somewhat of a cult following. None of them ever really set the receipts on fire. At just under $15 each, likely less if you shop around, they are good for a couple of laughs, but little more than that.
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Arctic Tale (Blu-ray)

Posted in Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on April 23rd, 2009

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Animal films have done quite well at the box office in recent years. Who can forget the astounding appeal of March Of The Penguins. With wonderful cinematography and the commanding narration of Morgan Freeman, the film took the box office by storm. There have been countless efforts to reproduce those results ever since. The latest of these to hit Blu-ray is the indoctrination piece, Arctic Tale. I say indoctrination because this movie is never content with following the natural migration or struggles of the animals it depicts.
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Sin City (Blu-ray)

Posted in Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on April 23rd, 2009

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Sin City arrives in high definition with some pretty high expectations. You get both versions of the movie here, and I have to say that I’m very pleased to see that. By now fans of the movie have seen the recut version of Sin City and likely have your own opinions as to what you thought of it. The fan base appears to be somewhat divided on the effort. For me it’s never been a case of better or worse. It’s merely a case of different. The two versions are very different experiences. Watching the recut version is not really like watching a movie at all. Frank Miller presents them more akin to the original graphic novel experience.
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Splinter

Posted in Disc Reviews by David Annandale on April 21st, 2009

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So Toby Wilkins will be helming The Grudge 3. That’s a bit of a shame. Not because I think he’s the wrong man for the project. Rather, it’s the wrong project for the man. Or, less glibly but more precisely, he is showing real promise as a filmmaker, and it would be a shame to see more talent squandered on a franchise that should definitely be put out to pasture. I base this evaluation on the evidence presented in Splinter, a nifty little creature flick .
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Mean Girls (Blu-ray)

Posted in Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on April 16th, 2009

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Raise your hand if you’re sick and tired of Lindsay Lohan. Fortunately I can type with one hand. Honestly. How did this girl get to be so big? Why is she dominating our entertainment news cycles? Are there more than a handful of folks out there who think she has any talent at all? She’s nothing close to hot. It’s that wonderful modern phenomenon of being famous for being famous. It really does tend to color one’s opinions when you watch her in a film. She’s so overexposed, in more ways than one, that it’s impossible to watch her play any character without seeing the spoiled bratty whiner she has become so perfect at.
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Not Easily Broken (Blu-ray)

Posted in Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on April 14th, 2009

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“I found out that if you wanna know the purpose of a thing, you can’t ask the thing to tell you. A car doesn’t know why it’s a car; only the manufacturer knows what it was meant to do. And I guess that’s the same way it is with God.”

Not Easily Broken was written by a minister, Bishop T.D. Jakes. So you should expect a very spiritual message when you watch this movie. If that’s not your cup of tea, as they say, this really isn’t going to be the film for you.
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