Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on May 31st, 2002
Monster’s Ball is a very raw and powerful film. The story and the cinematography are wonderful, as is the acting… thus the Best Actress Academy Award for Halle Berry.
“MONSTER’S BALL is a hard hitting Southern drama tempered by a story of powerful, life-changing love. It is the story of Hank (Billy Bob Thornton), an embittered prison guard working on Death Row who begins an unlikely, but emotionally charged affair with Leticia (Halle Berry), the wife of a man he has just executed.” – Lions Gate
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on May 30th, 2002
Synopsis
Child-like nun Meg Tilly is found one night lying on the floor of her cell, covered in blood, a strangled newborn in her wastebasket. Psychiatrist Jane Fonda is called in to determine whether or not Tilly is fit for trial. Mother Superior Anne Bancroft is convinced that she is not, and does not want skeptical Fonda destroying Tilly's innocence. Meanwhile, Tilly, it seems, cannot remember anything about that night, and certainly denies ever having been pregnant.
Audio
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Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on May 28th, 2002
Synopsis
The tale is told in flashback. We begin in 1950, in a labour camp in Czechoslovakia. Franta Sláma (Ondrej Vetch ) is imprisoned there for having flown with the RAF during World War II – his reward for having helped liberate his country. From this beginning, we move back to see Sláma's experiences in England, his fatherly relationship with his protégé Karel Vojtisek (Krystof Hádek), and their love triangle with the married Englishwoman Tara Fitzgerald.
The impressive battle sequence...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on May 25th, 2002
Film
Jack Black, in my opinion, is one of the funniest actors in Hollywood today. Black, along with Gwyneth Paltrow, stars in Shallow Hal… the latest in the line of crude Farrelly Brother’s comedies. This film fell short of its potential, but was still mildly amusing.
“Jack Black is Shallow Hal, a superficial skirt chaser who, after a mind-altering experience with a self-help guru, doesn’t realize that his gorgeous girlfriend (Gwyneth Paltrow) is actually a 300-pound not-do-hottie. Meanw...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by David Annandale on May 25th, 2002
Synopsis
Paul Newman's Frank Galvin has seen better days. Now he's a broken-down, alcoholic ambulance-chaser. But then his last chance arrives in the form of a negligence case being brought against two doctors who gave a young woman the wrong anaesthetic, reducing her to a vegetable. Though Galvin at first is planning to settle out of court, he changes his mind, and the result is a David-and-Goliath courtroom struggle.
Though a 1982 release, The Verdict still has much of the feel of a 70s f...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on May 23rd, 2002
“He’s gone for a little walk.” I’ve never forgotten the first time I saw the mad assistant describe the escape of the Mummy from his tomb and the maniacal laughter that accompanied it. Again it’s the combination of Boris Karloff and makeup genius Jack Pearce that defines a creature for generations to come. When most of us think of a mummy we recall the bandaged creeping terror of Karloff’s portrayal rather than the more mundane rotted corpses found in museums all over the world. With a powerful cast and grand set designs, The Mummy would wrap all of us up in horror for 60 years.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on May 23rd, 2002
Synopsis
Jeffrey Beaumont (Kyle MacLachlan), is on his way home from visiting his father at the hospital when he finds a human ear. He turns the ear over to the police, but the mystery eats at him, and, with the help of a detective's daughter (Laura Dern), he begins his own investigation. Very quickly, he gets in over his head, becoming involved with the masochistic Isabella Rossellini, and her deeply disturbed, deeply sadistic boyfriend, Dennis Hopper (in his most terrifying role).
This is...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on May 21st, 2002
By 1954 it seemed that Universal had run out its string of classic horror icons. Frankenstein’s Monster, The Mummy, and the Wolfman were forever gone from the backlots of Universal Studios. Enter Bud Westmore with a brand new monster design and The Creature soon joined the unholy 3 as the new face of horror. The Creature or Gillman would be the first Universal monster to be a full body suit and played by 2 actors in the same film (Browning for water and Chapman for land). Jack Arnold would bring a newly charged atmosphere and revitalize a genre.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on May 20th, 2002
“Even a man who is pure at heart and says his prayers at night can become a wolf when the wolfbane blooms and the moon is full and bright.” Curt Siodmak penned that poem over 60 years ago as the centerpiece for a film that was to feature Boris Karloff. The film was to be called “Destiny” and provide Karloff with a less lumbering creature than his Frankenstein’s monster. The project was put on hold and would eventually re-emerge as “The Wolf Man”, this time starring the son of the man of a thousand faces, Lon Chaney, Jr. Chaney would later in life claim this as his favorite role because unlike the Monster or the Mummy it was “completely my own”.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on May 18th, 2002
Film
The Mothman Prophecies is a nice little thriller. This Richard Gere film is quite dark and mysterious. The story and film are both hit and miss, but overall, it’s a good view.
“Distraught by the sudden, tragic death of his wife (Debra Messing), John Klein (Richard Gere), a journalist for The Washington Post, finds himself mysteriously drawn to a small West Virginia town when his car inexplicably strands him. Rescued by the sympathetic but skeptical local police sergeant...
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