Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on February 8th, 2007
Ever write off a movie based solely on the buzz? I did that with Hollywoodland before I'd ever heard the actual title - someone asked, "did you hear about Ben Affleck's new movie? I hear it stinks." Given Affleck's recent string of box office flops, that's all it took for me to avoid the film.
Of course, it's not just an Affleck movie; it also stars Adrien Brody (The Pianist), Diane Lane (Under the Tuscan Sun) and Bob Hoskins (Mrs. Henderson Presents).
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on February 8th, 2007
There are a few early sequences in Hollywoodland that show two important aspects of the film. First these sequences show us the type of man that George Reeves was trying to become (simply trying to get noticed) and, possibly more important, the type of actor that Affleck is becoming as his career becomes more about making quality films than making sure-fire moneymakers.
Posted in: Dare to Play the Game, News and Opinions by Michael Durr on February 7th, 2007
Super Mario World arrives, Mass Effect delayed and Duke Nukem never? - Welcome to the column that does not know if it’s coming or going known as Dare to Play the Game.
Welcome to another edition of Dare to Play the Game. I'm your host that like many watched the Superbowl. The game was rather boring after the first half but I stuck thru most of it until the Bears had firmly fallen apart. Prince was amazing, I wish I could find a good quality mpg or wmv to watch it again....
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on February 7th, 2007
The Force family is not your typical American Brady family. Then again, if they were, they wouldn’t be interesting enough to get their own reality television show. Still, just because you’re interesting doesn’t necessarily mean everyone will want to watch you. John Force is apparently the winningest drag racer in the sport’s history. His wife and three daughters live on his property but in a separate home. His daughters have decided to follow in Daddy Dearest’s track marks and are also circuit race car drivers.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on February 7th, 2007
The prologue to The Covenant tells us of people with supernatural powers. We're told of how these powerful warlocks and witches were hunted throughout Europe and escaped to the New England colonies in the New World. The information is provided with the contradictions of pseudogrunge music and pages of ancient texts. It doesn't take us long to meet young men, descendants from these immigrant families. We discover them flaunting their powers by jumping off a cliff on the way to a teen party.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on February 7th, 2007
Boy, this title really came out of left field. I am one of those DVD collectors who picks out their favorite television shows and collects all the full DVD season sets. I did this with Wonder Woman, with Kung Fu and with The West Wing. I also started collecting full season sets of Mad About You just a couple of months after I started with Friends. I finished all ten seasons of Friends in late 2005, yet I was only two seasons in to Mad About You's seven season run. What...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by David Annandale on February 5th, 2007
Three young couples on a road trip leave their turtled vehicle and march through the dark woods, hoping to find the highway again. (Clearly Mensa candidates, each and every one.) They stumble upon an apparently abandoned secret facility, and naturally blunder in. A psychically powered lunatic uses astral projection to do bad things to them. People start to die. No great loss.
Think through this equation for me, will you? Direct-to-video + walking-around-tunnels-plot + Tara Reid = ?
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on February 3rd, 2007
All, the early '90s! I spent my time counting the days until my military service ended by drinking as much beer as possible until I got to the bright red circle on my calendar. But when Martin Lawrence (House Party) pitched an idea for a sitcom with an African American cast, Fox picked up the show and added it to a then-fledging group of shows that balanced themselves between evening soap operas and raunchy family comedies.
Martin tells the story of Martin Payne (Lawrence), successful host of an urban radio station program in Detroit.
Posted in: Brain Blasters, News and Opinions by David Annandale on February 2nd, 2007
I thought this week I’d toss my two cents into the whole HD DVD/Blu-ray debate. Let’s be clear: I have no particular technical expertise, and I have no interest in attempting to judge which is the superior format (though I note with interest that, in the latest issue of Video Watchdog, editor Tim Lucas mentions that Blu-ray players are not compatible with standard DVDs). I’m approaching this from the point of view of a collector, and specifically a collector of cult films.
It may be that the format w...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on February 2nd, 2007
It’s a shame that there aren’t many stand-up comedians around anymore. And the ones that are still around (Chris Rock, Dane Cook) usually only use the medium as a launching pad into a flawed movie or television career that never equals the laugh factor and energy that exists in their stand-up comedy shows.
So along comes Damon Wayans’ Last Stand.
Wayans, in my opinion, was always a talented comedian. His characters on In Living Color made the show a pop-culture hit that rivaled S...
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