Posted in: The Reel World by Archive Authors on March 19th, 2014
A concussion is a brain injury that causes trauma, confusion, loss of concentration, and impairment of judgment balance and coordination. The new film Concussion starts with a woman getting hit in the head with baseball thrown by her stepson. Abby (Robin Weigert) is married to divorce lawyer Kate (Julie Fain Lawrence). They seem happy but bored in their relationship. Kate obviously probably was in a relationship with a man before but gave up on it. The two kids seem distant and grouchy toward Abby.
Posted in: The Reel World by Archive Authors on March 19th, 2014
Need for Speed is based on a video game. It caters to people who love the experience of speed. There is a huge audience for this sort of thing. To their credit, the writer and director makes every effort to create an actual story and real characters in this presentation. It is easy to compare it to Fast and Furious, but why bother. That gives these sorts of films too much credit. Fast and Furious and Need for Speed are designed to give people a thrill. If anything Need for Speed takes things more seriously than the Fast and Furious series. It also focuses more on beautiful and very expensive cars.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Brent Lorentson on March 18th, 2014
OK, in case you didn’t know this about me, I’m a sucker for South Korean action cinema. Sure, the 90’s were ruled by Hong Kong, but for about a decade South Korea has been killing it by putting out some of the most visually stunning action films in years. For a quick crash course in how simply bad-ass and epic their cinema is, I highly recommend checking out The Chaser and A Bittersweet Life. With Commitment we get a new entry in the spy genre that hasn’t been explored stateside.
Posted in: No Huddle Reviews by Gino Sassani on March 18th, 2014
Until recently DirecTV's Audience Network was a home for critically acclaimed shows that somehow lost their feet on another network. It started with Friday Night Lights and more recently with Damages. So DirecTV was no stranger to original series production. Now for the very first time the satellite carrier and network have developed their own television series. Rogue would be the first show on the network not to have played somewhere else first. The effort is a collaboration with eOne and Greenhouse Entertainment.
Posted in: No Huddle Reviews by Brent Lorentson on March 18th, 2014
SyFy Channel is at it again, a film about the near end of the world. With the backlog of disaster films, you would imagine if there ever was an emergency and the world was on the cusp of massive destruction, thankfully there is a film out there to at least give us an outside-the-box theory of how to prevent the end. After all it’s not as though NASA or the numerous geniuses working in labs in front of computers or telescopes would have any idea about what to do. It’s always someone nestled in a small town no one has ever heard of, but this resident has the answers to everything.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by J C on March 17th, 2014
“If something was to come your way, I mean something so irresistible that you just had to have it, do you think you could sacrifice everything for it and not regret it?”
When it comes to down-on-their-luck men in movies, that “something” could be any number of things. Oh, who am I kidding? It's pretty much always a woman or a large sum of money. In Swerve — a twisty Australian thriller that goes down a number of familiar roads — our hero is tempted by both.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Michael Durr on March 16th, 2014
Jeff Dunham has always had a talent for making people laugh. His style of ventriloquism has found its way into millions of homes and probably a billion YouTube views. Of course these standup specials have translated into tons of merchandising potential such as lunchboxes, t-shirts, and even the puppets turned into cute and sometimes furry stuffed dolls. Well, with one of the most beloved characters, Achmed, they decided to do an animated special. Let us see how well it turned out.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Michael Durr on March 16th, 2014
It is true what they say, every time you think you are done, you get pulled back in. I had been working on cleaning up my house and trying by any means necessary to get it on the market (42 gallon trash bags are your friend). But the big boss of Upcomingdiscs.com asked if I would like to review the final season of Flashpoint. I looked at my movie spinner and saw nestled between the Flash (the short lived TV series) and Freakazoid Season 1(okay, I'm odd, I get it), the first 5 volumes of Flashpoint. At that point, it was pretty much a done deal.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by J C on March 14th, 2014
“One small fact: you are going to die. Despite every effort, no one lives forever.”
The Book Thief is narrated by Death, who opens the film with these sobering words. It is also set in Germany during the years leading up to World War II. On paper, the best-case scenario for this film appears to be “well-executed, watchable downer”, while the worst-case scenario is “do we really need *another* movie about WWII?!” But fans of Aussie author Markus Zusak’s 2005 best-seller know better. The Book Thief uses the silky specter of death to tell a beautifully affecting story that celebrates life.
Posted in: No Huddle Reviews by William O'Donnell on March 14th, 2014
On a flight from London to Los Angeles, an artifact taken from an ancient, Druidic ritual site is being transported in secret. During this flight a malevolent deity looks to exact revenge on the passengers for the desecration of the site that was used for sacrifices (this bit of information is pretty disposable. Sacrifices just sound better when vaguely referring to a pagan religion in a modern story). Now it's up to a band of 1970s b-listers like Chuck Connors, Buddy Ebsen, Paul Winfield and (lord help us) William Shatner to fight off this killer spirit.
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