Posted in: Podcasts by Gino Sassani on October 14th, 2015
4GOT10 is out this week from Cinedigm. The film channels the spirit of Sergio Leone as the modern Spaghetti Western lives. The film also stars some pretty impressive action stars like Danny Trejo and Dolph Lundgren. Throw in Vivica Fox and Michael Pare and you have a pretty solid low budget ride. The film also stars Johnny Messner in the lead role of Brian. Brian wakes up with a van filled with drugs and money. The feds are on his trail along with a drug lord and a dirty cop. He's surrounded by dead bodies. The problem? He can't remember who he is or how he got here. And that's just the beginning. How do you play that part? That's exactly what I asked Johnny when I had the chance to talk with him. We talked about a few other things along the way. Bang it here to listen in on my chat with Johnny Messner
Posted in: No Huddle Reviews by J C on October 14th, 2015
“We'll get hit again...and it's going to be a bigger monster.”
The character who utters these words in San Andreas is referring to an impending earthquake that could literally rip California apart. But he could just as easily be talking about the summer movie season, when audiences who have just been rocked by a catastrophic quake have to deal with something called “Indominus Rex” a mere two weeks later. San Andreas almost certainly won't end up as the biggest bully on the Hollywood block, but it's a big, dumb, fun disaster flick the whole family can enjoy.
Posted in: No Huddle Reviews by Dan Holland on October 14th, 2015
I was very excited to see The Target come through Upcomingdiscs headquarters. I am an avid consumer of New Korean Cinema, and The Target actually shares a producer with Oldboy (2003), my favorite film of all time. However, as soon as the credits roll, you learn that the film is inspired by Point Blank (Á bout portant), a French film made in 2010. So, I am immediately torn between my love of New Korean Cinema and my disdain for remakes. I must say, The Target was a rather pleasant surprise. Tae-joon is a young doctor who begins treating an accused murder suspect, Yeo-hoon, after he is chased from the crime scene by two thugs. An unknown assailant kidnaps Tae-joon’s pregnant wife and gives him the instruction to release Yeo-hoon before he falls into the custody of the police. Soon thereafter, Yeo-hoon escapes and Tae-joon realizes the police are not as helpful as they seem.
One thing that is important to note is that the film’s screenplay is penned by Cheol-Hong Jeon, whose oeuvre includes impressive titles such as Crying Fist and Kundo: Age of the Rampant. That being said, I am thrilled that Jeon did not copy Point Blank’s original screenplay. While I did enjoy the original French feature, I am very impressed with the complexity of Jeon’s adaptation. There are a few key similarities involving character occupations and general story arch, but ultimately, the story is a refreshing new thriller.
Posted in: Contests, Tuesday Round Up by J C on October 13th, 2015
Ready to get Rocked? Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson headlines this week’s Tuesday Round Up, and he’s here to shake things up with Warner Bros.’ earthquake disaster hit San Andreas. Warner also hangs out at The Gallows, counts to The 100: Season 2, and develops quite The Following: Season 3. Shout! Factory answers our prayers with The Saint: Seasons 1&2, and Magnolia grieves The Little Death. Finally, we say farewell to Mad Men: The Final Season — Part 2 with a Coke and a smile.
Don't forget to tell us which of this week's Round Up offerings caught your eye? Once a month we’re going to give away a free DVD title to a lucky winner who comments in our weekly Round-Up posts. All you have to do is comment in a Round-Up post — like this one! — and tell us which of these titles you’re most excited to watch or read about. The winners and their prizes will be announced the first week of every month right here in our Tuesday Round-Up post. You can’t win if you don’t comment.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on October 13th, 2015
The Gallows starts off with a camcorder video shot of a high school play from 1993 in which a horrible accident occurs. It is immediately followed by video footage from 2013 that is labeled police evidence. That tips us off, if we didn't know, that this is found-footage material. The found footage genre has grown substantially since the phenomenally success of The Blair Witch Project in 1999. One of the reasons that The Blair Witch Project was so successful is that the concept was fresh at the time. It isn't any longer. It also made the actors genuinely confused and terrified during the process of filming. I don't think actors fall for that any more, but they often pretend they're terrified. Maybe they should pretend to act in the first place. The stars of The Gallows are all unknowns with the possible exception of Cassidy Gifford as Cassidy Spilker. If you used to watch Live with Regis and Kathie Lee before it became Live with Kelly and Michael, you would occasionally see the daughter of Kathie Lee and Frank Gifford show up on the set with her brother, Cody (or maybe you caught her on the fourth hour of The Today Show where Kathie Lee holds court lately). She is actually one of the best things in The Gallows and might have some potential in the future. I'm not saying she's great, but with a little work in a better movie, Cassidy might have something. The rest of the cast aren't terrible, but they're not experienced enough to be very good. That could be said of the writer directors, Travis Cluff and Chris Lofing. In the extras they seem very excited about coming up with a new kind of horror villain, the Hangman. I wish it was that simple to create a memorable character. They may be right that hanging hasn't been used often in horror films, but if they had plans to do something memorable they failed.
The movie is not long, but it is monotonous. It starts out with an obnoxious, homophobic jock making his buddy's life miserable because he's doing a play and hanging out with theater geeks. Eventually the obnoxious jerk convinces his so-called friend that he's a lousy actor and he needs to sneak in to the theater that night to destroy the set. Supposedly this will get him out of being in the play. The obnoxious jerk (Ryan Shoos as Ryan Shoos), the friend (Reese Mishler as Reese Houser), the jerk's girlfriend (Cassidy Gifford as Cassidy Spilker), and the star of the show (Pfeifer Brown as Pfeifer Ross) all get trapped in the school, and terrible things start happening. Basically the whole movie takes place in the dark school filmed by cell phones and one garbage camera. Half of the movie is basically screaming and really dark and chaotic footage. There are a couple of twists in the plot that are given brief attention before going back to the incoherent footage.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on October 12th, 2015
I grew up on the horror comics of the 1970's. Eerie and Creepy were two of my favorites. My father would buy them and pass them down to me when he finished reading them. They were black and white so that they could take advantage of a loophole in the Comics Code and often featured lurid and gory stories of horror and depravity. Probably not the most appropriate reading for a young boy, but I ate them up. Before those comics there were the EC horror comics from Bill Gaines in the 1950's. Titles like Tales From The Crypt and The Vault Of Horror called out to readers with gory and hideous covers. But it didn't really start there. It all goes back to 19th century England and the publication of weekly pamphlets that featured the same kind of ghoulish entertainment for the masses. They were called “penny dreadfuls”, describing the price and the material they contained. That tradition has evolved over the last century or so, and television has taken the place of that kind of literature. It was only a matter of time before that 19th century tradition would be reborn as a Showtime series called, appropriately enough, Penny Dreadful.
The series has used three popular horror novels as its foundation. You'll find characters and situations from Bram Stoker's Dracula, Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, and Oscar Wilde's The Picture Of Dorian Gray. John Logan, who brought us the thrilling Roman adventure Gladiator, takes these basic works of literature and weaves a complicated story that sprinkles in a few other horror elements to bring us something deliciously new. He whips them together in a period piece that is thick with atmosphere. He populates them with incredibly animated characters played by actors that are, for the most part, quite solid in their roles. We were introduced to them in the first season, but we hadn't been given that season to review. So let me give you a rundown of the characters you'll encounter.
Posted in: No Huddle Reviews by J C on October 12th, 2015
“It is upon us now...an old and faceless foe.”
In the second season of Reign, that foreboding statement refers to the plague and ensuing famine that lay siege to the court of King Francis II, Mary Queen of Scots, and their subjects. But in real-life terms, the most dangerous “old and faceless foe” for a promising series entering its second season is the “sophomore slump.” That's why I'm pleased to report the CW's sumptuous period drama was able to maintain the shamelessly soapy momentum from its guilty pleasure first season.
Posted in: No Huddle Reviews by Jeremy Butler on October 11th, 2015
Secrets abound in this horror more akin to The Omen rather than Carrie as I had originally suspected. I tell you, that life lesson about not judging a book by its cover still rings true. On the horror scale it does not really have that bone-chilling effect, but it holds its own, and the young talent does make an impression. Kennedy Brice plays the titular character, a little girl with an active imagination, or at least that’s what the grown-ups tell themselves as strange incidents keep happening around her.
As mentioned above, June is a little girl who has moved from foster home to foster home since being put into the system. Born into a cult that believed her to be the vessel for an entity that would bring judgement to the world, a massacre during a ceremony leads to her being brought into the system. After her latest placement ends in an occurrence that no one can explain, her social worker (Eddie Jemison) finds her a home with a loving couple, Dave and Lily Anderson (Casper Van Dien and Victoria Pratt).
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Dan Holland on October 10th, 2015
At first, Eaters looks like a pretty fun horror film. The cover depicts a well-dressed figure in a scarecrow-like mask and a bowler hat. Above him in typical horror font, the title is displayed, followed by a tagline that reads: “Prepare to meet a new breed of killer”. First impressions are everything, and this is promising a lot. After watching the film, I’ve come to realize that the title, Eaters, is very misleading. In fact, I’m almost positive that not a single person ate anything in the entire film. The film follows a group of five young adults taking a road trip through the desert. Complications arise at a rest stop, where one of the young women goes missing after running into a gang of drug-smuggling bikers. The group gathers enough courage to confront the bikers, only to be met with conflict. The group of friends talks their way out of the confrontation and end up in a seemingly deserted town occupied by a community of masked murderers.
For me, the film’s biggest flaw is in distribution: The cover is a little too enticing. It promises so many things that aren’t in the film at all. There is an implication that this “new breed of killer” eats their victims, but aside from that, there is no cannibalism. While the scene of a masked butcher chopping up his victim is very well crafted, the concept is nothing that I haven’t seen before. Unless the “new breed of killer” is a group of cannibals that die of starvation because they forget to eat, I’m not quite sure the film’s marketers even sat in on a screening.
Posted in: Podcasts by Gino Sassani on October 9th, 2015
If you happen to be a BMX cinema fan you already know who Bill Allen is. He played Clu, the hero in the classic BMX film Rad. It's been a long time since there's been a BMX film out there. Now there's Heroes Of The Dirt and Bill Allen is there. He plays the father of BMX rider Phineas Cooper. While Bill doesn't ride in this film the experience has inspired him to get back out there on a bike. I had a chance to talk with Bill about his role in both films. We talked about the BMX film genre quite a bit. Bang it here to listen in on my chat with Bill Allen. Heroes Of The Dirt will be out this Christmas on home video.
On The Web
Sponsors
