Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on June 20th, 2003
Writer Norman Mailer and director Lawrence Schiller can’t get enough of the nation’s most intriguing criminals. Best known for the critically acclaimed Executioner’s Song, the duo are at it again with this CBS mini-series spruced up to an R rating for DVD.
To anyone who has seen the 60 Minutes piece or kept up with the story in their local paper, the story is familiar enough. Robert Hanssen spied for the Soviet Union for 22 years while a top level FBI agent. William Hurt delivers a rather deadpan performance as Hanssen, a man rife with contradictions.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on June 20th, 2003
Steven Seagal is certainly showing his age in Half Past Dead. To ardent fans of his tough-guy act, this might be a bad thing. To those of us just looking for a good film, I think it’s actually a good thing. With Seagal’s ass-kicking held more in check there appears more room for a story to grow. This one is above average. Seagal’s age also means a stronger supporting cast and this one has a nice one. Mia Peoples is stunning as one of the main villains. Ja Rule and Kurupt add the necessary urban reality and some comedy relief when called for.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on June 20th, 2003
In 1962 Ed Sabol purchased the rights to film the NFL and history was made. NFL films came to pioneer so many styles of filming that are still in use today like slow motion and the tight spiral football shot. The footage contained in these discs have never been seen before, it is old archived footage that was never used and it is amazing. The three discs are as follows…
Disc 1 – The Creation (1962-1965): This film looks at the beginning of what would become NFL Films. Watch as Ed Sabol and his ...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on June 20th, 2003
Synopsis
The Legend of the gunfighter who wears the red scorpion jacket has come to South Beach in Miami. When the parking valet at a local strip club gets pulled into the legend he hinds himself the target of a mob hit and running for his life. Throw a sociopathic blonde into the mix and he might as well finish himself off before someone does it for him.
Audio
This film has a number of gunfights and I expected the audio to be above average but, instead it is somewhat belo...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by David Annandale on June 19th, 2003
Dracula II drops all the characters from Dracula 2000, fudges the ending of that film, but retains the central idea of Dracula in fact being Judas Iscariot, cursed with eternal life. This time around, his sunlight-burned body is recovered by a group of grad students and their crippled professor with the hope of finding a miracle cure from the regenerative qualities of vampire blood. Meanwhile, a vampire-hunting priest named Uffizi (Jason Scott Lee, no more improbable as Italian than he was as Irish in Tale of the Mummy) is on the trail of Dracula (with minor help from Roy Scheider, putting in a few seconds of screen time).
Posted in: Disc Reviews by David Annandale on June 18th, 2003
Fred Ward is a tough, no-nonsense cop. One night (when for some reason he has no partner),he is the victim of an attack, and wakes up with a different face and a new identity. He has been recruited by a shadowy government organization (currently made up of three other people). He is trained by Korean master Chiun (Cabaret MC Joel Grey under lots of makeup) to become a fighting machine. Meanwhile, future starship captain Kate Mulgrew is an army major investigating an industrialist who seems to be fleecing the US military for billions of dollars. All paths will soon merge.
Posted in: Game Reviews by Archive Authors on June 18th, 2003
Few titles have the ability to be both cute and popular amongst all types of players, yet with Animal Crossing, this is exactly what one gets. The game has such great playability to it, that everyday brings something new and refreshing to the table. The character and town designs are almost unbearably cute--but in a good way that adds feel and depth to the overall game. Are you ready to be wowed by a classic Nintendo title? Then pack your bags--you’re moving to Animal Crossing !
Posted in: Disc Reviews by David Annandale on June 17th, 2003
This is closer to a being a tone poem than a narrative, so there is hardly any plot as such. We move through Berlin in the company of angels. They can hear our thoughts, but they cannot interfere or feel the physical world. Two of the angels -- Damiel (Bruno Ganz) and Cassiel (Otto Sander) are increasingly disenchanted with their existence, and Damiel, falling in love with a trapeze artist, wants to become mortal. This simple story is built on very gradually, and most of the film consists in our hearing the innermost thoughts of various characters, and all these thoughts are presented in poetic (often elliptical) words. The cinematography is quite extraordinarily beautiful.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on June 15th, 2003
This disc is a compilation of the 5 highest rated episodes of the Steve Harvey Show. This TV series ran from 1996-2002 on the WB network and features Steve Harvey (The Original King’s of Comedy) as Steve Hightower ex-1970’s R&B star turned music teacher and assistant principal and Cedric “The Entertainer” (Barbershop) as coach Cedric Wilson and Steve’s best friend and roommate. It also featured your usual high school sitcom cast of characters. The five episodes presented here are:
- That’s My Mama- Ste...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on June 15th, 2003
Forget Lethal Weapon and Beverly Hills Cop; Midnight Run has got to be one of the funniest cop-buddy films of the genre. True, Midnight Run did not break any records at the box office and was actually panned by a few well-known critics of the time, but the comic action just never lets up. Robert DeNiro and Charles Grodin share a rare chemistry. The overkill plot developments just wouldn’t work with any other combination. In all fairness, I wasn’t too thrilled about this one when it first hit the theatres. My wife suggested it and I agreed more out of guilt for all the genre films I’ve inflicted on her.
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