Posted in: Disc Reviews by Michael Durr on October 17th, 2008
My personal bias may be leaning through but I fully enjoy the Transformers. More than meets the eye, robots in disguise, Starscream for President! Well, he can’t be any worse than the two turkeys we got running right now. Anyhow, after the Generation 1 cartoon series came and gone, we got a slew of off-shoots and attempts at re-creating the cartoon hit that was the Transformers. In the middle of 2005, a series produced by a partnership between Hasbro and Takara came to the fold. It was a sequel to Transformers: Armada & Transformers: Energon. It was called Transformers: Cybertron. Fifty two episodes later, the series ended. Was it any good or did it just get sucked into a black hole?
Posted in: Disc Reviews by David Annandale on October 17th, 2008
Very much in the tradition of such other overheated Mexican emotional dramas as Amores Perros and Y Tu Mamá También, Drama/Mex gives us two intertwining plot strands, each dealing with relationships as tormented as they are sexual. In one, upper-class Fernanda’s bad boy ex-lover Chino resurfaces, takes her violently, but she doesn’t exactly hate it, and this has, as one might imagine, some awkward consequences for her relationship with current boyfriend Gonzalo. Meanwhile, a middle-aged man, guilt-ridden over what he has done to his daughter (take a guess), is contemplating suicide when he runs into a precocious teenage hustler. In other words, basically enough material to give Sarah Palin a fatal coronary.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Michael Durr on October 16th, 2008
Most people who know me know that Daredevil is my #1 Superhero of all time. Number #2 is Batman. Third is somewhat of a surprise for a lot of people. It’s the Punisher. It’s surprising because the Punisher is portrayed as a nemesis of Daredevil quite often in the comic books. However, like Batman and Daredevil, Punisher is a classic flawed hero. In the comics, his family was gunned down gangland style and he seeks out to “punish” those responsible. In the proceedings, he finds that the greatest enemy is not those who executed his family but himself. Drinking, suicidal thoughts, and endless pursuit to extract justice at any cost chip away at this very core. Enter 2004, and director Jonathan Hensleigh decides to bring the story of the Punisher to the big screen.
Posted in: Dare to Play the Game, News and Opinions by Michael Durr on October 15th, 2008
Xbox Live upgrades, World of Warcraft education & addictions, and the Age of Booty! - Welcome to the column would probably be delisted if Metacritic even ranked us in the first place known as Dare to Play the Game.
The Ike debris is gone, the Ike debris is gone. *Happy dance* *Just a jump to the left* *And then a step to the right* *Put your hands on your hips* *You bring your knees in tight* *But it’s the pelvic….errrr. Perhaps I should stop right there.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on October 14th, 2008
Kill Switch is a direct to video release marking Steven Seagal’s departure from Sony, where most of his low budget, and larger budget, films were made. This one is released by the much smaller First Look Studios. Unfortunately everything about this film is a considerable downgrade from even the silliest of Seagal’s recent film fare. Seagal writes this one, which likely accounts for the convoluted mess the script is. There are far too many plot points and characters to keep track of, and ultimately little development is made of any of them.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on October 14th, 2008
First of all, if you expect to find an actual cyborg soldier in this film, you will be looking for a long time. The title character played by UFC fighter Rich Franklin is actually a human who has been genetically engineered with amphibian DNA. There are some nanobites working inside the guy, but you won’t be finding a Borg clone in this low budget affair. Unfortunately, you won’t find much in the acting department either. Many of the show’s supporting cast are actors who are usually stunt performers and not often charged with doing the hard stuff… like delivering lines.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Michael Durr on October 13th, 2008
Standup comedians live interesting lives. The typical stand-up comic performs for fifteen to thirty minutes, two or three times a week. For many their sole purpose in life is to make people laugh. Many often suffer from depression when their acts bomb or they go through dry spells where they can’t get gigs or write new material. However, the best ones make their own breaks and find their way into their audience’s heart. Sometimes that can be accomplished through a MC. This MC or master of ceremonies can often take a grand event such as a tour that lasts 30 days & 30 nights and turn four men into superstars.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Michael Durr on October 13th, 2008
The day that Bruce Lee left us was truly a tragedy. The Game of Death was Lee’s pet project, the one where he could truly show off his skills for the world to see. He never finished it. Even though there was ninety minutes of footage, it was never completely restored to make a complete film. Instead, a mere eleven minutes and seven seconds was used in a 1978 movie called Game of Death. The plot was revised and every camera & stand-in trick was used in the book to finish the movie. The rest of the footage was either lost or found its way into the documentary, Bruce Lee: A Warrior’s Journey. One has to often wonder what the casting process behind casting a body double & stand-ins were like for somebody as unique as Bruce Lee. One also has to wonder how easy it would be to make fun of it.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Michael Durr on October 12th, 2008
One doesn’t usually admit they love puppets. There are many vehicles for this love all over the entertainment world. On one hand, you have those who perform standup with puppets like Jeff Dunham. Then you have those crazy puppets who live down in Fraggle Rock. But one can not forget the fairly recent invention of one Triumph, the Insult Comic Dog. A dog, sporting a cigar who likes to insult & poop on things. The idea of Triumph did not come from the Conan O’Brien show so much but instead came from the mind of Robert Smigel. Comedy Central’s TV Funhouse was that show that gave the real inspiration or birth to the character. At least I know now who to drag into the street and shoot.
Posted in: Brain Blasters by David Annandale on October 12th, 2008
The other day, I was watching Pathology, a release from Fox that is terminally mediocre, but is surprisingly gory for what is, minor-to-nil theatrical release aside, essentially a mainstream release. I won’t rehash its silly, empty-headed plot here, other to suggest that you look to spend your entertainment dollar elsewhere. What interests me about the film is that gore. As our characters about their titular activities, corpses are opened up and messed around with in a manner that, not too long ago, would have been unthinkable outside the realm of the more extreme exploitation flicks. For quite a while, since the horror film was revived at the end of the 90s, much of the chatter about violence in the films conveniently forgot just how graphic the situation was in the 70s and 80s, but over the last few years, the gap has been bridged. But that’s not what I want to talk about here. It isn’t the quantity of gore or its explicit nature that I’m ruminating about. Rather, is it still possible to distinguish the genuine, wholesome sleaze from its production-line counterpart emerging from the major studios.
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