Posted in: Disc Reviews by J C on June 6th, 2018
“The nail that sticks out gets hammered down.”
Freak Show centers on a flamboyant, fish-out-of-water teen who doesn’t fit in among his fellow high schoolers. The movie — a promising directorial debut from Trudie Styler, aka the wife of legendary musician Sting — works best when it finally lands on the notion that practically every teenager feels like a “freak” at one point or another. It’s a good, worthwhile message; the problem is other aspects of this film are about as subtle as Billy’s wardrobe and makeup choices.
Posted in: Tuesday Round Up by J C on June 5th, 2018
For this week's busy Round Up, we're going down to a certain fictional Colorado town and having ourselves a time. Paramount/Comedy Central releases South Park: Season 21 this week, and it's sure to both offend and crack you up. Elsewhere, Warner Bros. finds romance each and Every Day, while Cult Epics becomes acquainted with Frank & Lola. Cinedigm follows the yellow brick road with Steam Engines of Oz, while SKO looks at things from a new angle with Altered Perception. Meanwhile, Film Movement travels to Japan for unconventional romance Oh Lucy! and quiets down with The Great Silence. Rooster Teeth gets animated with RWBY: Volume 5, while Shout! Factory stands out in a fabulous way with Freak Show. Finally, Disney goes on an interdimensional adventure with A Wrinkle in Time and learns how to fly with Peter Pan: Multi-Screen Edition. (Read our review of the latter now.) You can also currently check out our reviews of Shout! Factory's Satellite Girl & Milk Cow, CBS' Jericho: The Complete Series and The Invaders: The Complete Series.
But wait...there's more! In addition to the home video titles we just mentioned, UpcomingDiscs is going to the movies a lot this week: we'll be checking into Hotel Artemis, dealing with family demons in Hereditary, getting in touch with our spiritual side with First Reformed, and pulling off the heist of a lifetime with Ocean's 8. One last reminder before signing off for the week: if you’re shopping for anything on Amazon and you do it through one of our links, it’ll help keep the lights on here at UpcomingDiscs. See ya next week!
Posted in: No Huddle Reviews by J C on June 4th, 2018
“Look, all funny guys are damaged.”
It's no secret that some of the greatest and most memorable stand-up comics of all time — Lenny Bruce, Richard Pryor and Robin Williams, to name a few — were as troubled as they were talented. Of course, turning their inner turmoil into comedy was a big part of what made them legends. Showtime's I'm Dying Up Here is a dramedy about a group of struggling Los Angeles comics in the 1970s. But the show is at its worst when it takes the art of stand-up comedy way too seriously.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on June 3rd, 2018
"All this has happened before and will all happen again. But this time it happened in London. It happened on a quiet street in Bloomsbury. That corner house is the house of the Darling family, and Peter Pan chose this particular house because these were people who believed in him..."
In 1953, with a little help from some Walt Disney magic, generations of children, and adults, of course, would learn to believe in the boy who never grew up. Peter Pan began in the imagination of writer J. M. Barrie.
Posted in: No Huddle Reviews by Gino Sassani on June 3rd, 2018
Just because you’re paranoid doesn’t mean they’re not really out to get you. That old axiom has never been more true than for David Vincent in the Martin Quinn series The Invaders. Quinn was best known for his police procedural shows like The FBI. At the time of the The Invaders, Quinn was coming going into the final season of one of his most popular shows, The Fugitive. While most people over the years has compared The Invaders to that Quinn production, they were really not as similar as all of that. In The Fugitive the hero, Richard Kimball played by David Janssen had a very specific mission. He was wrongly convicted of killing his wife and was on the trail of the real killer, whom he had witnessed.
Posted in: No Huddle Reviews by Gino Sassani on June 3rd, 2018
My very first impression was that this show was very ambitious from the gate. Perhaps the show’s fatal flaw is that it attempts to tackle far too many serious issues, complete with complex undertones, with the largest ensemble cast I’ve seen yet. Add this to the fact that the world is still a little sensitive to terrorist attacks, and you have a recipe for keeping your audience relatively small. None of these things are bad elements in and among themselves, and I’m certainly not suggesting that these issues need to be abandoned. I’ve been a high school teacher, and one thing any of us can tell you is that there’s only so much a person can absorb in a given amount of time.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Michael Durr on June 2nd, 2018
Much to the dismay of probably most of my family and friends, I like to watch lots of weird films. Films directed by David Lynch, Planet of the Apes movies, and Johnny Mnemonic (I freaking love that movie) among many others I have watched over and over again. This is even more true with animation as I love to find clever styles that goes beyond convention and still produce a wonderful and thrilling story. So today, I review Satellite Girl and Milk Cow, a Korean animation film that is sure to test the boundaries of my fondness for weirdness. Is it too much for this critic or is it right in my sweet spot? Let's find out.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Michael Durr on June 2nd, 2018
Much to the dismay of probably most of my family and friends, I like to watch lots of weird films. Films directed by David Lynch, Planet of the Apes movies, and Johnny Mnemonic (I freaking love that movie) among many others I have watched over and over again. This is even more true with animation as I love to find clever styles that goes beyond convention and still produce a wonderful and thrilling story. So today, I review Satellite Girl and Milk Cow, a Korean animation film that is sure to test the boundaries of my fondness for weirdness. Is it too much for this critic or is it right in my sweet spot? Let's find out.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on May 30th, 2018
“Welcome to Jurassic Park.”
With those words begin an adventure that started with the legacy of Willis O’Brien’s The Lost World. You see, dinosaur films are nothing new; they have held our childlike fascination since the industry was born. Jurassic Park was, however, something very new when it thundered into our cineplexes and forever into our imaginations 20 years ago. The marriage of brand new CGI technology with Stan Winston’s superbly detailed animatronics models transports you back 65 million years in time.
Posted in: The Reel World by Dan Holland on May 30th, 2018
This grouping from Film Movement has been my favorite to date. The theme that ties these films together is what I would label as “art as process.” Each film revolves around the philosophies of making, practicing, refining, and reflecting upon one’s own art. Featuring one narrative and two documentaries, this grouping really foregrounds the importance of the messiness when it comes to process. In order to be a true artist, a true expert in your craft, you can’t be afraid to get messy: to fail before persevering. My Art, The Paris Opera, and Conduct! Every Move Counts each share an appreciation for failure and the seeds of success it plants within aspiring artists, both young and old.
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