Posted in: Disc Reviews by Jonathan Foster on April 16th, 2013
“When I get a crush, it’s really bad.”
Everyone has experienced it before: you meet that special someone, and a crush sidelines you. They fill your head when you’re not with them. When they’re near, you act like an idiot. The downside comes when your crush is not reciprocated; or worse, they don’t even know you exist. Most people can move past the disappointment and heartbreak to get over a crush. But for an unlucky few, their crush can turn into a dangerous obsession.
Posted in: The Reel World by Gino Sassani on April 12th, 2013
"If you ride like lightning you're gonna crash like thunder".
The best film that you may not get an opportunity to see this year is The Place Beyond The Pines. The film has already scored great buzz at a few film festivals and is about to see a very limited theatrical release. It's one of those films that absolutely deserves better, but somehow as you watch it you realize that this limited environment is a perfect match for the movie. This is not because the film isn't good enough for wide release. It is. It's because the movie is a rather intimate experience that just doesn't seem like it belongs at your noisy cineplex where it must compete with the barrage of explosions and terrifyingly loud musical score. There's a place for everything, and perhaps The Place Beyond The Pines has found its place beyond the pines and away from the hustle of the big box office world.
Posted in: The Reel World by Jeremy Butler on April 12th, 2013
The power is in the mind, or at least it is in Trance, the latest psychological thriller from Academy Award winning director Danny Boyle. From the original trailer I saw of this film, I had the wrong impression of this film completely; I was intrigued by the film, but I just expected it to be another heist film. Now, for the record, I love heist films; I love the watching the thieves plan the heist, I love watching them execute the theft, and I even love the eventual double-cross that everyone always sees coming. To call Trance simply a heist film is to severely undersell its value.
Trance wastes no time getting into the action. From the opening bell we are introduced to Simon (James McAvoy, X-Men First Class), a fine arts auctioneer at a prominent auction house. Simon then proceeds to break the fourth wall and explain the evolution of art heist. “Back then all it took was a bit of muscle and a lot of nerve.” Simon then commences to instruct the audience on procedure in the event that a heist should be attempted, which immediately leads in to an actual heist occurring at the auction house. A four-man team led by Franck (Vincent Cassel, Black Swan) storms the building with guns, smoke grenades; the whole she-bang. As Simon tries to secure the painting in the vault, he is confronted by Franck, and while trying to protect the painting, suffers a blow to the head.
Posted in: The Reel World by Gino Sassani on April 12th, 2013
“You give me a uniform, you give me a number on my back — and I’ll give you the guts.”
More than any sport, baseball is all about numbers. Unfortunately, some of those numbers — like 73 (home runs in a single season) and 500 (career homers) — mean a little less in light of the steroid era. Others, like 56 (Joe DiMaggio’s legendary hitting streak), seem destined to live on forever. The most significant number on that shortlist might be 42, worn by Jackie Robinson when he broke Major League Baseball’s color line on April 15, 1947. 42 — the film, not the number — is significant for a somewhat surprising reason. The movie succeeds as rousing, crowd-pleasing entertainment by functioning less as a straight-up biopic and more as the story of how Robinson became, arguably, the country’s first African-American crossover star.
Posted in: The Reel World by Gino Sassani on April 11th, 2013
"Lucky Bastard was a pornographic website that invited fans to have sex with porn stars. The following footage is believed to be the last video shot for the site."
You know exactly what that kind of an intro means. You should. The found footage genre has been around even long before it was turned into a modern trend by The Blair Witch Project. Since that time the genre has appeared in both large and small budget films. The shaky footage usually covers a variety of sins by the filmmakers. Rarely does the genre have anything clever or new to dispense. That's not exactly true with Lucky Bastards.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by William O'Donnell on April 11th, 2013
The boogeyman, who goes by the name Pitch Black, is gaining power by turning children's dreams into nightmares. An alliance of fantasy characters, North (Santa Claus), (the Easter) Bunny, Sandman, and Tooth (Fairy), come together to face this opponent. They call themselves Guardians who have sworn to protect all of the world's children. In this adventure they recruit a new member, Jack Frost, who is on his own personal quest of discovery.
Big budget CG animated films are largely excuses to have enormous chase scenes, or other similarly fast pace sequences, which amount to being the equivalent of a guitar solo for computer animators. This film is no exception. At least here the graphics are justified since that we are dealing with characters who are rooted completely in imagination and fantasy. If we want the Easter Bunny to have super-teleporting abilities and to live in a complex network of tunnels that is populated by various sizes of walking eggs...we can imagine it so. If we want to see the Tooth Fairy work out of a floating palace that is teeming with hummingbird style minions...why not make it happen? Every scene is an enormous spectacle. Our main villain and the Sandman both deal with...well..sand particles that each move in their own pattern on the screen...I can only imagine the animators losing their minds over having to choreograph all of them.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Brent Lorentson on April 11th, 2013
Looking back, it’s amazing how far visual effects have come since 1988. I can remember sitting in the theater watching Willow for the first time and believing everything I saw up on the screen wasn’t the work of movie magic, but I believed it to be reality. Perhaps some far off land where there are swordsmen fighting evil sorcerers and trolls lurk in the shadows of abandoned castles. This is a thought I’d like to believe I’m not the only one that hoped this was a reality, but if I am I’m fine with that. Willow came out at a time when Hollywood was trying to bring large-scale fantasy to the screen with other releases like Excalibur, Legend and Conan. Though these films are their own kind of awesome, the digital effects still hadn’t quite reached the level they needed to be to make these worlds as immersive as the Lord of the Rings films, for instance. Where the film may not have held up over the years with the special effects, it’s the story that manages to captivate this viewer 25 years later.
Willow Ufgood (Warwick Davis) is not your ordinary hero, and for 1988 seeing a little person as the star of a film is even further for ordinary. But Willow isn’t about ordinary; it’s about a journey of fantastic proportions where even the tiniest of men can be the biggest of heroes. When Willow is tasked to return a baby to her people, he must venture away from his village to a land that seems to be on the verge of war, something Willow and his fellow dwarves want nothing to do with. During Willow’s journey to find a proper protector for the baby, he encounters Madmartigan (Val Kilmer), who claims to be the greatest swordsmen that ever lived; unfortunately when he’s found he’s been left for dead in a cage. This is one of the roles that has me wondering what happened to Kilmer; in this role he is simply fun to watch and dripping with charisma; the guy was meant to be a star. And when we do get to see Madmartigan in action, I couldn’t help but wonder what it would be like if Madmartigan and Aragorn were to ever cross paths.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Jeremy Butler on April 10th, 2013
“Why save a few when we can save them all?”
An excellent question; have you ever noticed that in disaster films as soon as an apocalyptic event is discovered, plans go into motion to protect the elite such as the president, his cabinet, and a few select others while the rest of the world is left out in the cold to be lambs to the slaughter? Well, in Earth’s Final Hours, the lambs fight back, working to save the many rather than just the few.
Posted in: No Huddle Reviews by Gino Sassani on April 10th, 2013
David McCallum has been a vital part of two outstanding television shows in his illustrious career. The Scottish-born actor played the Russian/British secret agent Illya Kuryakin in the spy series The Man From U.N.C.L.E. The series capitalized on the whole James Bond fad that was sweeping television both in England and in the United States in the 1960's. The series lasted five years and over 100 episodes. In recent years McCallum has added a 10-year run as pathologist Dr. Donald "Ducky" Mallard on the number one scripted show on television: the original NCIS. In between he's appeared on countless other shows both in England and the States. He appeared in a landmark Outer Limits episode and as a guest on countless films and shows over his 60 year acting career. He even found time to star in less successful shows. One of these was The Invisible Man.
The series was short-lived. It didn't even last a season. It lasted only 13 episodes, but the show still has many fans with fond memories of the series. McCallum played scientist Dr. Daniel Westin. He and his wife Dr. Kate Westin (Fee) worked for the government-sponsored Klae Corporation. He decided to use himself as a guinea pig for an experiment in invisibility. It worked with only one slight problem: there was no way to return him to normal. So, he had a Derma-plex mask and gloves painted over his skin to create a removable surface when he wanted to become invisible. Of course, the clothes would provide the rest. Klae agreed to fund his research for a cure provided that he and his wife performed "favors" from time to time. These involved missions where his special talent proved useful. They worked under the direction of Walter Carlson (Stevens). They were a bit naive about the spy business, and that inexperience often found them in life-threatening situations which Dan would narrowly escape with his invisibility.
Posted in: Contests, Expired Contests by Gino Sassani on April 9th, 2013
Our friends over at MPI want to help kick-off baseball season with a look at that ever-elusive pitch: The Knuckleball. Ricki Stern & Annie Sundberg give you an "inside baseball" look at the infamous pitch. It's called Knuckleball! and we have three copies for our Upcomingdisc readers.
To win just follow these instructions.
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