Critical Outcast

Blood - The Last Vampire

2009-11-12T06:20:00.000-05:00

Blood: The Last Vampire sets its sights on logic and restraint and promptly obliterate them with stupidity and bombast. I mean that in the best possible way. There is no way that the creative team looked at this movie and thought they were making anything good. Then again, it is possible that director Chris Nahon recognized fairly early on what type of movie this was and decided to infuse it with as much craziness as he could. That is likely to be the reason for the way this movie is the way that it is. It fits squarely within the definition of "guilty pleasure." This is the kind of movie you put on for a diversion, something to take you on a wild wide. If you like schoolgirls with samurai swords and gangs of bloodsuckers with the barest of background information, this is it

Based on an anime released back in 2000, Blood: The Last Vampire tells the story of a centuries old half-vampire who works with a mysterious Council to kill demons that have infested Japan. This particular part of her tale finds her embedded on an American military base that has shown a high amount of demon activity. Our hero, Saya (Gianna), poses as a student to gain access to the base and before you know it, she is saving the General's daughter, Alice (Allison Miller), killing demon students and roaming the streets looking for more.

Now, while the mysterious Council is dead set on stopping the demon menace, Saya has a smaller, more focused goal. Saya wants to kill the head demon, Onigen (Koyuki). To that end, she will not let anything get in her way. Along this path we see flashbacks to Saya's childhood, her training and the important events that led her to be in this position. However, they are mere speed bumps on the very linear path the story takes.

There scenes whose presence is purely for exposition. We are told some back story about Onigen, the demons, and Saya. What we do not get are the smaller details that bring everything together. Now, if the movie had taken itself seriously, this would be an issue. Fortunately, this is the kind of movie that strings together a thin plot as a means to get us from one action set piece to the next.

Blood: The Last Vampire is not about the epic tale of the eternal fight Saya wages on the demons. It is not about the origins of the Council or what their ulterior movies may be. All it is about are stylish, low-budget action sequences and the semblance of a big story.

It makes no bones about what it is. It has modest aspirations when it comes to actual quality. However, if all you want is a blast of action that is sure to make you smile, it fits the bill rather nicely. I sat there loving every sword-swinging moment.

The actors all perform their lines with utter seriousness. You would expect them to be delivered with perhaps a hint of irony, considering the film they are in. Oh no, this is all deadly serious and it only adds to the fun. Just watch Gianna strike a pose, or Allison Miller flash some seriously crazy eyes, or Liam Cunningham (as Councilman Michael) offer sincere words of encouragement. Even better, we get Yasuaki Kurata as Kato, an elderly martial arts master who raised Saya after the death of her parents always with intelligent words for his young student. You cannot rightfully have a movie like this without an elderly master, right

Now, with character and story aside, all you really need to focus on is the action. It is fun, wild, creative at moments, and pretty much non-stop. Besides the constant flashes of swordplay, be on the lookout for CG blood. Every swing of the blade, hammer blow, or whatever other weapons are handy, is accompanied with a splash of incredibly fake blood. At first I was annoyed by how much it stood out, but then I found it to be endearing. The fights are a blast, particularly the one where Saya is protecting Alice in the alley against the never ending gang of demons. Fun stuff.

Director Chris Nahon (Kiss of the Dragon) knows his way around action movies and while he cannot be called a visionary, he always makes sure not to be boring. To that end, he has enlisted the help of veteran action director Corey Yuen (Transporter) to handle the choreography. Together they make a fun action film that is memorable for its overall absurdity.

Audio/Video. The film is presented in its original aspect ratio of 2.35:1 and looks pretty good. It is not exactly the sharpest looking film and a lot of it is rather dark, but it still contains a good amount of detail an does not exhibit and digital artifacts or other noticeable flaws. Even during the fast paces action sequences, I may have lost character orientation but I did feel I lost any detail.

The audio track is Dolby Digital 5.1 and sounds pretty good. The surrounds are not overly active, but successfully draw you in, particularly during the fight sequences. The dialogue is centered and always clear. Overall, it is a good track that does its job without necessarily distinguishing itself.

Extras.

The Making of Blood: The Last Vampire. This featurette runs just over nineteen-minutes and includes a decent amount of interview and behind the scenes footage.
Battling Demons: Behind the Stunts. Nearly seventeen-minutes are devoted to the stunts. Why not? The stunts and action are a big part of the film, there certainly is enough of it here! Mixed with some interview footage, we get on the set and training footage for both martial arts and wire work.
Previews. Trailers are included for the Blood+, Dark Country, Hardwired, Moon, Blu-ray Disc, District 9, Assassination of a High School President, The Informers, The Sky Crawlers, REC, Messengers 2: The Scarecrow, Underworld: Rise of the Lycans, Resident Evil: Degeneration, Rise: Blood Hunter, and Fearnet.com.

Bottomline. This is a fun movie, no question about it. Is it a good movie? That is a highly debatable fact. It is more about what you want out of it. Not every movie is made for greatness, some are made just to be fun. This is one of those movies. There is certainly enough to flesh out into something bigger, but I found myself not caring. I just wanted a little fun.

Recommended.

Skeletonwitch - Breathing the Fire

2009-11-11T06:28:00.000-05:00

Listening to the latest (and my first) from Ohio-based metallers Skeletonwitch is like putting on that worn out, but comfortable shirt that you wore proudly for years. It may not look like much, but it still feels great and brings with it memories of years past. It recalls those school years where I would sit on the school bus with an old school Walkman and blast the Metallica, Slayer, Suicidal Tendencies, and Ozzy Osbourne. When music was aggressive, in your face, and more or less did not care about what the other guys were doing. It was an uncompromising era and Skeletonwitch does a good job of delivering music heavily influenced by that era while still standing on its own two feet.

Skeletonwitch is one of the bands in the growing sub genre of retro-thrash bands alongside the likes of Municipal Waste, Toxic Holocaust, and Warbringer. They are bands that are bringing back the sound and style of the 80's, but mixing it with modern influences and taking advantage of modern production techniques.

Skeletonwitch stands out in the way they have that 80's thrash down pat, but bring in some sounds that would be more at home in the black metal arena. So yes, this album could potentially be placed in the blackened thrash camp, I think it would be more appropriate to allow it to remain in the thrash corner, as the black that can be detected is more flavoring than a full on side dish.

Breathing the Fire does not waste any time getting up to speed, nor does it overstay its welcome. The twelve-song collection clocks in at just under 36-minutes. It is long enough to get its point across, short enough that it does not become repetitive, and catchy enough that you want to start it all over again as soon as it ends.

It is surprising to hear how well the pure old-school thrash meshes with the melodic brutality of black metal. On the surface the two sounds are quite different. The boys of Skeletonwitch prove they can play nicely together as the move the thrash sound forward a bit with new approaches.

The album is not exactly groundbreaking in what we get, but it is fresh. It still gets the job done. If you like aggression in your music, if you like your music with no frills or gimmicks, if you want riffs that kick you in the head, this is for you.

At the center of Skeletonwitch's attack are Nate Garnette and Scott Hedrick. The two guitar players deliver skull crushing trash riffs that seamlessly meld with melodic black metal attacks with a healthy dose of strong solo work. The sound is heavily waited to the guitar presence, without it the overall sound would greatly suffer. However, the work of Chance Garnette on vocals should not be underestimated, his distinctive growl brings a lot to how they are perceived. It is like a black metal vocalist found a new way to growl his way to the top by teaming with a thrash act.

Bottomline. This is a solid album that should find its way into the metal aficionado's collection. It is heavy, flawlessly produced, raw, and just really quite good. It is hard to go wrong with tracks like "Submit to the Suffering," "Released from the Catacombs," "Blinding Black Rage," and "And Into the Flames."

Recommended.

Box Office Update 11/6-11/8: A Christmas Carol Kicks off the Christmas Season

2009-11-10T10:27:00.000-05:00

As expected, Disney's new take on A Christmas Carol led the box office. It came in under expectations (well, mine at least) but still managed a gross the more than doubled its nearest competition. I have always wondered why Christmas-themed movies would get released so early in the season. However, it does make a little sense in this case, considering you have to slot it in for the 3D theaters and Avatar already has December sewn up. But that is neither here nor there. I am looking forward to it, especially now that I have learned it lifts much of the dialogue directly from Dickens text. So, in addition to the 3D animation, we get some authentic language. Interesting.

Coming in a distant second, but still respectable is the short run release of Michael Jackson's This Is It. In two weeks of release it has made more than $57 million, which is not bad considering it will likely be on home video in time for Christmas. I have not seen it, but this has to be considered a success.

Third place plays home to the next of this week's new releases. The latest George Clooney film, The Men Who Stare at Goats, opened to mediocre reviews but a respectable box office. The film offers moderate entertainment. It never digs very deep, relying on surface farce and the fact that it is based on supposedly true events. The performances are pretty good and it does have some good ideas, but in the end is rather lightweight and insubstantial.

Close behind in fourth place is the latest indie seeking to make a big splash. The Fourth Kind purports to be based on actual events and is chock full of archival footage. I cannot say I believe it to be real, but taken just as a movie it is done with style and energy and you will be drawn in. I am not sure how much replay value it has, but it is definitely worth one spin through.

There is one other new release on this week's list, The Box. This is Richard Kelly's latest offering and his first to go wide. This means that this is a big test for the young director. Does he pass? The jury is still out for me, although everything he has done has been quite intriguing. This latest film boils down to a simple morality tale, yet is filled with complex ideas on an epic scale that only sees a small fraction on the big screen. The Box is as simple or as complex as you want it to be. It may not do well at the box office, but will likely do well on home video and down the line.

Aside from the top ten, there is one big story in non-top ten land. Precious placed 12th and is poised to make a big splash. The film has had a lot of Oscar buzz floating around it and it appears the public may follow suit. The drama took in $1.8 million from just 16 theaters. Its per screen average was over $100,000. If that is not impressive, I do not know what is. Now I just need to see it.

Next week will see new competition from Roland Emmerich's latest disaster flick 2012 and the "based on a true story" film about rock and roll in Britain, Pirate Radio (formerly known as The Boat that Rocked).

Four films dropped off the list this week: Saw VI (11), The Stepfather (14), Amelia (13), and Cirque du Freak: The Vampire's Assistant (17).

This Week	Last Week	Title	Wknd Gross	Overall	Week in release
1	N	A Christmas Carol 3D	$30,051,075	$30,051,075	1
2	1	Michael Jackson's This Is It	$13,157,944	$57,013,286	2
3	N	The Men Who Stare at Goats	$12,706,654	$12,706,654	1
4	N	The Fourth Kind	$12,231,160	$12,231,160	1
5	2	Paranormal Activity	$8,278,605	$97,108,475	7
6	N	The Box	$7,571,417	$7,571,417	1
7	4	Couples Retreat	$6,129,045	$95,680,555	5
8	3	Law Abiding Citizen	$6,003,737	$60,704,335	4
9	5	Where the Wild Things Are	$4,177,249	$69,220,584	4
10	7	Astro Boy	$2,626,103	$15,110,804	3

Box Office Predictions Recap
Easily the worst weekend I have had in awhile, but that's all right. I think that is starting to become my weekly mantra! Eventually things will begin to look up, but who knows how far off that will be? Fortunately, I am just having a little fun with this and no ones jobs are at stake. I was a little surprised that A Christmas Carol did not open stronger, but it is a bit early for holiday cinema so I guess I shouldn't be surprised. What can I say about the rest? I was not really all that bad on the dollars, but my placings were awful. Perhaps next week will be better.

Here is how the field matched up:

Actual	Prediction	Title	Wknd Gross	Prediction
1	1	A Christmas Carol 3D	$30,051,075	$43 million
4	2	The Fourth Kind	$12,231,160	$13 million
6	3	The Box	$7,571,417	$12.5 million
2	4	Michael Jackson's This Is It	$13,157,944	$10.5 million
3	5	The Men Who Stare at Goats	$12,706,654	$9.5 million
5	6	Paranormal Activity	$8,278,605	$9 million
8	7	Law Abiding Citizen	$6,003,737	$4 million
7	8	Couples Retreat	$6,129,045	$3.5 million
9	9	Where the Wild Things Are	$4,177,249	$3 million
11	10	Saw VI	$2,031,944	$2.5 million

DVD Pick of the Week: Near Dark

2009-11-10T04:18:00.000-05:00

Welcome back! Well, to some of you, anyway. To the rest of you, glad you decided to stop by and I hope this humble column helps you navigate the stacks of new releases each week. My goal is to point you toward titles of interest and warn you away from those films that seek to do nothing but leech away your time and give you nothing in return.

Full disclosure: I have not seen many of these titles, and what follows are not necessarily reviews, but opinions based upon what I know of the titles I pluck from the new release lists I peruse. The opinions I give based on the new releases are my own, and my recommendations are based on my personal interest. In any case, I hope you enjoy and perhaps find something you like or a title to point me towards.

Near Dark (Blu-ray). Arriving on Blu-ray is one of the best vampire films ever made. Katherine Bigelow directs this 1987 film that never once utters the "v" word. It brings an innocent young man a whole world of trouble when it turns out the woman he is hitting on is a member of a traveling group of blood suckers. It is a gritty, involving film that will hold your attention from start to finish. The cast includes Adrian Pasdar, Jenny Wright, Lance Henriksen, Bill Paxton, and Jenette Goldstein. I wonder how much the high resolution upgrade will help it?

Up (also Blu-ray). Another week this would have been my top pick. It is one of the best films to hit the screens in 2009. This is an amazing film that works on so many levels. It gets to you on an emotional level. This movie nearly had me in tears inside of fifteen minutes before moving into a grand adventure. Through it all, you will be involved with the characters. Pixar has done it again and everyone needs to have this in their collection. It will be available in multiple versions, single and 2-disk DVD, and four disk Blu-ray. The only way to go is the four disk, as it has a DVD even if you don't have a Blu-ray player yet.

Monsters, Inc. (Blu-ray). Just like Up, this Pixar release is a four disk set that is sure to cover all the bases. It is not my favorite Pixar film, but there is no such thing (not yet, anyway) as a bad Pixar film. I am sure the Blu-ray will look spectacular, so it may be worth it to take a look.

Watchmen: The Ultimate Cut (also Blu-ray). Not sure I am going to pick this up, as I think the previous release covers most of the bases. If I am reading it right, the only difference is the inclusion of The Black Freighter, which had been previously been available separately. Still, it is an amazing film, that you should get if you haven't already.

The Three Stooges Collection, Vol. 7: 1952-1954. Volume seven already? I think I have missed a few. I own the first couple of releases and they are fantastic. Remastered and released in their original chronological order. There is nothing like old school comedy.

Heat (Blu-ray). Michael Mann's classic crime film was the first to put Al Pacino and Robert Deniro in the same frame for the very first time. It has been some time since I have seen it, but I do recall the opening heist sequence to be rather exciting. Perhaps I should pay it a revisit?

Sesame Street: 40 Years of Sunny Days. I grew up on Sesame Street, but it was in the days before Elmo threatened to take it all down. This set should give some great memories of my very young days.

The Accidental Husband. Did this ever reach the big screen? I remember seeing the trailers in theaters, but do not recall it ever having a release. The film stars Uma Thurman, Jeffrey Dean Morgan, and Colin Firth in an odd love triangle. I guess they realized it was not going to go anywhere and hope to recoup their costs on the home market.

The General (Blu-ray). The 1926 Buster Keaton comedy may be the first silent to arrive on Blu-ray. I cannot find reference to any others yet. It is a good one. Keaton is one of the greats of the silent era.

The Ugly Truth (also Blu-ray). Here is a movie that purports to put a spin on the romantic comedy, yet by the time the climax arrives it has slipped back into the tried and true cliches of the genre. Watch as Gerard Butler and Katherine Heigl spar on their way to the inevitable.

Logan's Run (Blu-ray). Classic from the 1970's. This film centers on a future society where everyone lives in a bubbled metropolis and have every need tended to as they pursue hedonism. All is smiles until they reach their thirtieth birthday and must attend Carousel. That is until Logan chooses to run. Michael York stars.

Godzilla (Blu-ray). The 1998 Roland Emmerich disaster arrives on Blu-ray. You know, with a couple of tweaks and a different name, this probably would not have been nearly as bad. As it, I bet it looks pretty snazzy in high definition.

Hurt. This horror film seems to have some good buzz floating around it. I cannot say I had heard of it before, but the idea of a good psychological horror film sounds good to me! It centers on a family whose patriarch dies and is forced to move in with his brother in an old junkyard and the things that happen upon their arrival.

The Echo (Blu-ray). The trailer for this feature looks like a Japanese ghost story told in an American setting. A man moves into an apartment building and begins seeing and hearing things that may be malevolent. May be good, may be derivative. Anyone out there know?

Star Wrecked. This is a fan made film that spoofs Star Trek and Babylon 5. I have not read much about the plot, but it seems to have been well received by the fans of both series. Maybe it is worth taking a look at.

I really need a Netflix account....

The Men Who Stare at Goats

2009-11-09T07:21:00.000-05:00

"More of this is true than you would believe."

With those words we are introduced to the potentially real world of psychic spies who possess and hone skills that allow them to see the other side of the world, walk through walls, get into the heads of their enemies, and kill goats by just staring at them (this could take hours). The Men Who Stare at Goats chronicles the real adventures of journalist Bob Wilton (Ewan McGregor) who was simply looking to make a name for himself in the early days of the war.

Bob Wilton was a reporter for a daily newspaper in Ann Arbor. He is assigned to interview a local man who claims to have been a member of a special arm of the military that focused on psychic abilities. He tells him of a man named Lyn Cassady, the top agent in their unit, and shows him video of hamster being killed with the powers of the mind.

Wilton rights him off as a loony and soon heads to Afghanistan in the hopes of furthering his career. However, he is unable to get into Iraq where all of the action was. This is when fate stepped in to take him on an adventure he will not likely forget.

He bumps into Cassady (Jeff Bridges), purely by chance, in Afghanistan. Together, the two journey into war torn Iraq in search of Bill Django (Jeff Bridges), the founder of the psychic soldiers. Together, they find themselves in all manner of scrapes where Lyn uses his "abilities" to rescue them, while Wilton tries to keep himself alive. All the while learning about Django through flashback. We get a front row sear to the pony-tailed Lebowski-esque Django as he leads his men as part of the New World Army, dancing, meditating, taking hallucinogens, and passing it all off as serious military work.

When it comes right down to it, The Men Who Stare at Goats is a road movie with McGregor playing the straight man to everyone else. It is amusing to watch as Clooney's Cassady tells of his Jedi ways to McGregor who has played a Jedi in three films. What does it all mean? That is for you to decide. Frankly, I am not so sure it really means anything. Would it surprise me to find out that everything is true and the government was/is trying to train paranormal soldiers? No, not really. I would not put any craziness past what someone in power is willing to try.

The movie floats by on the oddball actions of its characters, from Cassady's complete belief in his abilities, to Hooper (Kevin Spacey) despising him for it, to Django and his desire to further the program, to Wilton's perpetual amazement at what he is experiencing. Unfortunately, the film never really takes off. It is like they put the story on repeat where something weird happens to amaze Wilton, then goes through the motions over and over again.

This is not movie that I believe will have a long shelf life. It is fun while you watch it and it does not require much from the audience. I know I left the theater with a smile on my face. It is just tat in short order the warm feelings go away and are replaced with something more along the line of: "What did I just see?"

It helps that the cast has bought into their characters. What could have easily turned into dumb comedy retains a few shards of intelligence allowing the absurdity shine through in how serious it is all played.

Director Grant Heslov does a good job of keeping it all moving forward. The pacing does not slow down much, intent on keeping some level of absurdity on the screen at all times, lest you begin to give any of it deep thought.

Bottomline. I enjoyed it. In retrospect it comes off as a rather lightweight and insubstantial. It does offer some interesting thoughts on where some of our military spending may be going. The performances all hold up and the look is pretty good. It is worth checking out, just do not expect any deep thoughts afterward.

Recommended.

Powerman 5000 - Somewhere on the Other Side of Nowhere

2009-11-09T06:45:00.000-05:00

Every time a new Powerman 5000 album arrives, I stop and think: "those guys are still around?" Do not get me wrong, I love these guys but you could hardly call them prolific. On the other side of that coin, whenever a new album arrives the always manage to knock it out of the park. None of them are really reach the land of the classic, but they are always eminently listenable and invite you back time and time again. Not only that, they all tend to have different sounds while always coming from the same distinct voice.

Speaking of that distinct voice, I wonder when Powerman 500o will finally admit it is really just the Spider show? It seems there is significant turnover with the bands lineup in between each album. Why this seems to happen so often I do not know. Although, I will hazard a guess that it has to do with Spider's desire to head in different directions and not replicate what he has done before.

The desire not to repeat himself goes all the way back to what is arguably their biggest album. Tonight the Stars Revolt! That was released in 1999. The followup was slated for Summer 2001, but mere weeks before it was to come out Spider decided he did not want the follow up to sound so similar. The album, Anyone for Doomsday?, was canceled. A few of the band members left and they went back to the drawing board, releasing Transform in 2003. The album is a solid hard rock album and very different than what came before it.

Here we are in 2009 and Somewhere on the Other Side of Nowhere is here. It is step up from 2006's Destroy What You Enjoy (which was very much in the same vein as Transform). This new album strikes me as a cross between their current run of straight up hard rock and their electronic influenced past. At the same time it sounds fresh and just begs to be turned up loud!

The album opens with "Intelligent Creatures." It is brief intro of tones that sound like they are straight out of an old school Italian horror movie. This gives way to guitar noises and some rapid fire drums as we kick into the hard rocking "Show Me What You Go," a song that begs for audience participation. I can almost see the crowd bouncing to this one with hands raised high.

Next up is another rocker with perhaps a little more electro-influence, "Super Villain." This is a mid-tempo track that would probably play well with "Heroes and Villains," which appeared as a live track on Destroy What You Enjoy.

Among my favorite songs is "V is for Vampire." There is something about the beat, the pace, the vocal rhythm, that is just so inviting. It is very much like being drawn in by a vampire. Rock your head, sing along, and enjoy.

Other highlights include "Get Your Bones" and "Make Us Insane" before heading into the closing tune that hearkens back to the day of Mega! Kung Fu Radio. The song is called "Horror Show" and features Spider doing his back of the throat, laid back, rapping style that only peeks out once in a while.

Again, Somewhere on the Other Side of Nowhere is not a classic album, but it still features Spider doing his thing. No one really sounds like him. His music is never really all that serious and seems to be geared towards the live show, or at least for playing at parties.

I must admit to having a real soft spot for Powerman 5000. I cannot help but feel they should be bigger than they are. It hurts that they do not seem to get any promotion. I mean, when I am surprised each time a new album drops, what can that say for band visibility? Perhaps the final words of the album are a legitimate cry for help? Listen to the album and let me know what you think.

As for Somewhere on the Other Side of Nowhere? Do yourself a favor, pick up a copy, turn the volume up, and enjoy.

Recommended.

Beast Within

2009-11-08T20:36:00.000-05:00

Beast Within is a cheap horror film from Germany that was made with American audiences in mind. Why do I say that? All of the characters are speaking in English when it is clearly not their first language. This likely indicates this as not being targeted towards the native population, but specifically for export to English speaking countries with America being one of the big ones. I guess it does not much matter as I do not think speaking in their native language could save this movie.

Zombie movies are a dime a dozen these days. You cannot go anywhere near the horror section at your local store or rental chain and not be inundated with all manner of zombie flicks both known and unknown. If you are discriminating in your zombie dollar, you will not want to bother with this one. On the other hand, if you have burned through everything else, this will fill the need although it is not necessarily a zombie film. It is more like an "infected" movie where he result could be described as zombie-like.

All right, if you ignore the low-budget production values, poor script, and poor acting, this movie is not all that bad. Of course, it is not all that good either. As I sat there watching it, I kept waiting for it to take that turn into either unbelievably bad territory or into that realm of potentially good if they had more time and a better budget. Instead Beast Within moved along on autopilot.

It opens with a car crash, followed by some voice over about a doctor and a controversial vaccine for H5N1, aka Bird Flu. We see the old man attacked by birds and killed. Jump ahead a little bit and we pick up with Robert (Philipp Danne), the doctor's grandson and a doctor himself. He is traveling to his grandfather's remote mansion with a few of his friends to take care of remaining business and perhaps party a little bit.

No sooner has he gotten back to town that he bumps into an old nemesis, a tattooed hot dog delivery guy. Not only that, he also runs into his old flame. Of course, one thing leads to another and the girls are invited out to the mansion for a little partying.

Fast forward to that night. The guys are drinking and looking around the place. The girls show up, there is a little more drinking and fooling around (of course). However, their fun cannot last long. Apparently there are still infected birds around and they get to pecking at tattooed nemesis, turning him into a bird-flu infected zombie thing.

Infected guy heads to the mansion and mayhem ensues. Before you know it, the group of friends are barricaded indoors, one of their own infected, and more on the outside. Will they be able to survive the encounter? Only the night knows the answer!

That is about all there is to it. The biggest addition to the genre is the infection being a mutation of H5N1. If only they had thought a head a little bit they could have cashed in on H1N1. But who knew?

There really is nothing all that special here. The acting is poor, the screenplay is poor, there is no real depth to the story. Basically, only watch this if you have nothing else. It is not the worst film I have seen, heck, it isn't the worst I have seen in the past few days. That does not mean it should rank highly on anyone's list.

Bottomline. Directed by Wolf Wolff and written by Wolf Jahnke (That's a lot of Wolfs!) this movie fails to take flight while never imploding under ineptitude. It i just sort of there. I am sure if you wait long enough, it will pop up on the SyFy Channel.

Not Recommended.

Amelia (2009)

2009-11-08T17:41:00.000-05:00

Biopics are very hard to do right. Well, that is not exactly true. They are easy to get right, they are hard to make entertaining. After a while they all begin to look the same. The formula has been virtually set in stone. When you go into one most of you are probably pretty sure what you are going to see. The subjects life gets boiled down to the greatest hits version. All of the subtlety and nuance of their life has been stripped away leaving behind just the recognizable beats. While they tend to be good, there is really nothing different about them. It is rare that we get something truly original like I'm Not There (about Bob Dylan) or even something that tries a different approach while still catering to the mainstream like Julie & Julia (about Julia Child).

Now we are faced with a new take on the life of Amelia Earhart. It is a story that has been told numerous times before, but this will be the first one I have seen. I wonder how it ends? You would think it would prove to be an interesting tale. I strongly suspect there is a good film out there about her life and adventures. This is not it. Clocking in at just north of one hour and fifty-minutes it feels a lot longer, and it is rather dull. I cannot say I found this movie to be inspiring at all to want to look deeper into her life.

Amelia focuses primarily on her ill-fated flight around the world with side excursions to a couple of other events, like her two record-making trips across the Atlantic, and the creation of the Ninety-Nines (the organization for women pilots). Should be enough, one would think. However, it comes across as entirely dull and lifeless. This is especially egregious as there are elements that would have added a lot more flavor had the time been taken to explore them.

As it stands we hit all the expected beats. We get flashbacks to Amelia (Hilary Swank) as a young child with dreams of flight. We see her make the decision to fly the Atlantic. We see how she is not given much of a choice in how to do it, being relegated to little more than a passenger. We see her romance with George Putnam, and her apparent affair with Gene Vidal (Ewan McGregor). Witness her second, solo, flight across the Atlantic. Plus see everything leading up to her disappearance over the Pacific. I'm sorry, you didn't know that? Well, consider it a favor, now you are free to see a movie that has more life in it.

A lot of time is spent, understandably, up in the air. It seems to be the one place where Amelia Earhart was free to be herself, unfettered by the complications of life stuck on the land. No one was up there to tell her what to do or where to go. She did not have to play dress up or glad hand folks that do not understand her. Unfortunately for the audience, the flight does not really lend itself to much drama. It all serves a purpose, but we should have either cut back on the amount of time in the planes to allow for more drama on the ground, or just make the film longer and add in some more interesting elements.

There are two areas that jumped out at me for expansion. Two areas that could have aided in making this movie more interesting, potentially.The first would have to be the relationship that Amelia has with Gene Vidal. The film hints at it pretty strongly, but it never really goes anywhere. I would have liked to have seen more about what happened between them and whatever effects it had on other aspects of her life. The other would be the period of Amelia's fame that saw her used in advertisements for all sorts of products. This was relegated to little more than a montage, but could have proved much more interesting. This is especially true if more was done after the moment where her integrity was questioned.

I am sure their presence would have done nothing but help the movie. I am also sure there is much more to her life that did not find its way to the big screen. I just really wish there was more to it than what was shown. What we saw lacked energy making it a chore to sit through.

The performances were also rather listless. I cannot say that I cared about any of those involved. The big three failed to inject any sort of energy. Not to mention they do not have much in the way of chemistry with each other. Hilary Swank was too intent on her voice while Gere and McGregor are just sort of there.

Director Mira Nair (The Namesake, Mississippi Masala) does not do herself any favors. Pacing is slow, scenes limp through their paces, and it is generally uninteresting. The best I can say is there are some gorgeous shots, usually around the plane and of the ground passing by beneath. Unfortunately, it is not enough to make the movie work.

Bottomline. This could have been fascinating. It barely raises itself to the pedestrian. Dull performances, slow pacing, and lack of in depth story all add up to a movie that is destined to go nowhere and ultimately suffer a fate similar to that of its central characters.

Not Recommended.

Cirque du Freak: The Vampire's Assistant

2009-11-08T14:18:00.000-05:00

What are you going to do? The undead are hot these days, especially when you soften the edges and target them at a younger set. You cannot deny the Twilight craze, no matter how much the fanatical fan base hurts the film in the process. So, what is someone to do if they want to get a piece of the pie? Well, find another series to adapt to the big screen. Enter the Cirque du Freak series, it spans a dozen books and centers on a variety of other-worldly critters and freaks (primarily vampires), and targets young adults, specifically the male demographic. Let the girls have Twilight, the boys have their own vampire war to deal with.

The Vampire's Assistant takes part of the first three books in the series and re-imagines them into a new story that reflects the original stories but is not a direct adaptation. This is a fact that has fans of the series in something of an uproar. It was bound to happen. Anytime a novel/series is adapted to the big screen fans of the source are going to want a direct adaptation. I do not blame them. There is nothing worse than seeing a film of a favorite book get twisted by those who do not respect said source.

However, there needs to be an understanding that adaptation is exactly that. It is not going to be the exact thing from the book. Different mediums have different rules and conventions that need to be obeyed. In any case, do not expect to see the book(s) on screen when you go and see The Vampire's Assistant in theaters. For the record, I have not read any of the books to know what differences there really are.

This film centers on a couple of high school boys, best friends from opposite sides of the track, who inadvertently become embroiled in a war between two vampire factions. All right, let's back up a little bit, we are getting a little ahead of ourselves.

Darren (Chris Massoglia) and Steve (Josh Hutcherson) have been friends for a long time. They could not be more opposite. Darren is bright and has a good future ahead of him while Steve comes from a broken home and is more interested with cutting class than bettering himself. To further characterize these kids, Darren has a life long fascination with spiders and Steve is preoccupied with vampires. Hmm, I wonder if these facts will play a role later on?

The two find a flier telling of a freak show having a one-night only show. Intrigued, Darren and Steve head off of the old, rundown side of town where the show is to go in an old abandoned theater. Here they find a collection of freaks, the likes of which they have never seen before. They see a bearded woman, a snake boy, a monkey girl, and a vampire with a gigantic spider. What? A vampire with a giant spider you say?

After the show, Darren sneaks back to see the spider and ends up hiding in the closet while Steve confronts the vampire about being, well, a vampire. Our vampire goes by the name of Crepsley (John C. Reilley) and is the head of the non-killing vampire faction.

We also meet a big bald guy named Mr. Tiny. He is not a vampire, but has some working for him all from the kill for the sake of the kill vampires. He is very interested in both Darren and Steve, not to mention looking to kick off a war between the vampire factions.

Now, if that seems a little disjointed, the movie plays that way early on. I enjoyed it, but it is so disjointed through the first half to two thirds that while I enjoyed some of it, it was often hard to tell how everyone was getting around. It was like they became unstuck from space/time and could just be wherever they wanted or needed to be.

Anyway, the movie is fun, if insubstantial. It really is the story of brother versus brother with the vampire war as a back drop. Darren and Steve have reached a crossroads in their relationship and it is becoming manifest in their vampiric choices.

The best thing about the movie has to be John C. Reilley as Crepsley the vampire. The man is a well-rounded performer and he really brings some charisma to the role. He holds your attention and seems completely at home as a vampire. Fortunately, he makes up for the charismatic black hole that is Chris Massoglia's Darren. This guy has no wonder or amazement as this new world is revealed to him. Frankly, I would have preferred to have seen Josh Hutcherson, who plays Steve, had the Darren role. Hutcherson is a good young actor who may have brought more emotion and wonder to the central role.

Bottomline. However you want to look at it, The Vampire Diaries is a mediocre film. There is some entertainment value to be had and I am curious to see where a sequel could take it. However, it could have been better. Better editing early on would have gone a long way to helping it. Still, it is worth taking a peek for those into this sort of thing. Otherwise, an eventual rental should not be out of the question.

Mildly Recommended.

Mutants

2009-11-08T12:38:00.000-05:00

I recently reviewed a horror film called Carved that I described as a cure for insomnia. The film was boring and manipulative and not really worth your time. By comparison, Mutants makes that movie look like a barrel of excitement. Mutants is a movie that seems to have been made without anyone actually looking to see what they were making. The resulting movie is completely dull, totally uninteresting, and not worth anyones time.

The advertising claims that Mutants is "28 Days Later meets the apocalyptic I Am Legend." What? This movie is nothing like either of those films. This is the sort of movie you will stumble across at 2 in the morning on the SyFy Channel before finally nodding off. Again, I have to wonder if anyone actually looked at the film before writing up the advertising. Honestly, someone should have read the script before greenlighting it, or at least take a look at the dailies to see how bad everything looked.

Since no one seemed to look, the movie was finished and is now being marketed to the unsuspecting masses using the same cover art as was used for another low budget flick called The Salena Incident (aka Alien Invasion Arizona). Not only that, the critter on the cover looks nothing like anything that appears in Mutants.

Now, I am sure you are all wondering just what Mutants is about. They probably should have gone with something other than the incredibly generic sounding Mutants. Especially when you consider there are no real mutants to be found.

Anyway, Mutants centers on an evil company that makes food additives. More specifically, they focus on sugar. Yes, sugar. They have hired a Russian scientist, who is the son of some crazy guy who experimented on prisoners with various types of poison and such, to create an additive that is more addictive than cocaine or heroin. If you are thinking that sugar is already more addictive, you would be right, but that again falls on the fact no one read the script first.

The problem is that instead of being more addictive, it turns the people who ingest it into mutants. Rather, they look like really bad 28 Days Later-type zombies. They are all kept in an old warehouse where they are incessantly tested. Sounds exciting, right? Guess again.

The people in this movie talk, talk, talk, and talk some more. Offices, living rooms, open fields, in cars, with green eggs and ham, and with Sam I Am. All right, maybe not those last two, but I think you get the point. It is up to a security guy, his daughter, and some other random guys to uncover the truth.

There is very little action. When it does come time to face down some "mutants" it is like walking through a haunted house crossed with a shooting gallery. The good guys walk through the darkened warehouse and occasionally a guy in bad makeup will pop up growl, get shot, and fall down. Repeat this as often as necessary until you get to blow the whole place up in a cheesy fake explosion.

I am not always against low-to-no budget films. They can be quite good, they can demonstrate vision, creativity, and can be a lot of fun. Just take a look at any number of Full Moon Pictures releases for proof. This one is just bad.

I read Mutants had a $4 million budget. Where did it go? It certainly was not on the screen! My only guess is that much of it went to Michael Ironside who appears at the beginning and end of the film. He looks so bored to be here. I wonder if he lost a bet?

Bottomline. This should be avoided at all costs. It is bad and not in a "so bad it's good" way. It reeks of ineptitude from top to bottom.

Not Recommended.

Trick 'r Treat

2009-11-07T11:00:00.000-05:00

Here is a film that has had a long strange trip from conception and execution to arriving in your hands in the form of this Blu-ray (or DVD). It was on and off the Warner Brothers release schedule a number of times between October of 2007 and early 2009 before settling on this home video release. For the horror fan this has been a troubling time. Consider the steady stream of PG-13 and Saw-inspired fare from The Unborn to The Collector that we have gotten and the frustration becomes abundantly clear. Yes, we have had the occasional winner like Drag Me to Hell and The Last House on the Left, but those are the exceptions and not the rule. Add to that the fact that wherever Trick 'r Treat has played it has gotten rave reviews. Certainly looks like Warner had a hit on their hands. So what happened? I do not know and now that I have a copy, I do not care.

The movie is fun. Flat out entertaining. Yes, it is a horror movie, but it is also something much more. Writer/director Michael Dougherty takes us on a trip into Halloween by way of an 80's approach where the goal was to entertain and thrill. There is not an ounce of torture to be found here. Think of it as the anti-Saw. This movie is not so much a horror film as it is a Halloween film. That being true, it is probably the best Halloween-centric film I have ever seen. At least that I can remember, that is. No, I do not really consider Halloween or its sequels to be Halloween films, despite all taking place on the holiday, they are still more slasher horror than holiday horror.

Trick 'r Treat tells four interlocking tales that span one fateful Halloween night. Dylan Baker displays his plans for tricking Halloween revelers. Anna Paquin and her friends looking for dates to take to a party in woods. A group of younger trick or treaters collecting an offering to take to the site of a tragic accident. Finally, Brian Cox is visited by someone intent on teaching him the importance of the holiday's tradition.

Sounds like a lot of story. The film masterfully moves between each of the tales, allowing them to flow together as one. Not only that, we jump around in time as the stories move along their tracks. It is amazing how much this works to the films advantage and adds to the replayability. If you pay attention you will find characters overlapping in other stories, passing through in the background or with brief interaction with the main characters of the focus story. Then there is Sam, the one character who witnesses all of our stories. The little fellow in the sack mask who you should be wary of should you cross his path.

This film is so much fun. It really captures the feeling of Halloween. It is set in a nameless town where everyone in the town goes all out for the holiday. Everyone is in costume, jack-o-lanterns are everywhere, and there is one giant party going on. However, throughout all of the partying, you have these stories of death. It fits perfectly.

Trick 'r Treat marks Michael Dougherty's directorial debut. His prior credits include work on X2 and Superman Returns. This feels like his most personal film yet. It is not that I believe this to be autobiographical, so much as it has the distinct flavor of a singular voice. It is original and it is fun. He sets up the universe and plays by the rules. Everything successfully weaving together in what is sure to become a holiday classic.

The performances are all quite good. Dylan Baker is always fun to watch, this turn is no different. He walks the line between believability and over the top camp without going over. Brian Cox is suitably cranky as the grumpy old man in need of a lesson. Anna Paquin is absolutely adorable as Little Red Riding Hood in search of a date. This is just the tip of the iceberg as the ensemble cast really melds together.

Audio/Video. The film is presented in its original aspect ratio of 2.35:1 and looks gorgeous. There is a lot of color filling nearly every sequence and they are all perfectly rendered. Just watch as our characters walk past pumpkins with candles flickering inside, or as we follow people through streets crowded with folks in colorful costumes. It is simply gorgeous, warm and vibrant. The look is another reason this can be seen as the anti-Saw, no gritty drained imaged to be found here.

The audio is also very good. The track is 5.1 Dolby TrueHD and it is nice and loud, perfect dialogue clarity and really packs a punch for the jump scares and musical stings. The rears nicely bring you in with the rustling of leaves and wind. Very nice track.

Extras. This Warner Premiere release has some nice extras along with it.

Commentary. The track features Michael Dougherty and a few others involved with the production. It is a great track where they talk about the visual gags and the history of the production, casting process, effects, and plenty more. This is a fantastic track that you really should listen to.
Season's Greetings. This is the original animated short that introduced the Sam character. Delightful. There is also a commentary track for the short.
Additional Scenes. Extended and alternate takes of what appears in the film, also with optional commentary.
How Did Many of Our Scary Season Traditions Start? This is pretty cool. It is not so much about the film directly, but you can see elements that help the movie work so well.
School Bus FX Comparison. This is neat, it looks at the bus crash and the different FX pieces used to make it look the way it does in the film.

Bottomline. This is a great film with fun char actors, entertaining stories, and an infectious energy that welcomes you back over and over again. The movie also teaches you to respect the holiday, lest Sam pay you a visit. If you like horror movies, Halloween, or fun, this is the movie for you.

Highly Recommended.

New Movies and Box Office Predictions: 11/6

2009-11-06T19:17:00.000-05:00

This week's wide releases -
The Box
A Christmas Carol 3D
The Fourth Kind
The Men Who Stare at Goats

As you probably already know, I took last week off. I apologize to those of you who came looking for my predictions and did not find them. I hope you found something else good to read. I also hope that you all had a great Halloween! It is now time to get back into a rhythm as we start steaming towards Thanksgiving. To that end, this weekend brings us our first holiday film of the season. It will be weird seeing a Christmas film this early, but it is not the first time and it will surely not be the last.

The Box. (2009, 115 minutes, PG-13, thriller) This should be interesting. Richard Kelly is a talented filmmaker who has the skill to be an A-list type guy, but his last film was a glorious mess (Southland Tales). This movie will be a big test for him as a new voice. It looks like it could be a winner. Based on a story by Richard Matheson (I Am Legend), it tells of an offer made by a mysterious man (Frank Langella). He arrives with a box that has one button on it. Press the button and someone will die, but you will also receive one million dollars. Would you do it? The cast also includes Cameron Diaz and James Marsden.

A Christmas Carol 3D. (2009, 96 minutes, PG, animated) One of the trailers I saw said this as one of the greatest ghost stories ever told. I never thought of it like that, but it may be true. It is a very familiar story that has had a number of tellings over the years. Will this add anything? I am not sure, but I am curious to see it. Director Robert Zemeckis has been doing interesting work with the motion capture technology. It is also curious to see how there are not nearly as many remake complaints about it. Plus it is in 3D!

The Fourth Kind. (2009, 98 minutes, PG-13, fantasy) When I first saw the trailer for this movie, I thought it was going to be some sort of Syfy Channel movie. Come to find out it is going to be on the big screen and seems to want to replicate the success of Paranormal Activity. I do not think it will, but it still looks like an intriguing film. It recreates stories from Nome, Alaska, where there are reports of alien abductions. Not only that, everything in the film is supposedly backed by archive footage. I do not necessarily believe this, but if used creatively could aid in a compelling film. It does not hurt that I am a skeptic to begin with, although I am not so arrogant to believe we are alone in the universe. In any case, I am hoping for a decent movie.

The Men Who Stare at Goats. (2009, 90 minutes, PG-13, drama/comedy) Now this looks like fun! It centers on a reporter who is working on a story by a soldier who claims to be a psychic warrior. When he is reactivated, the reporter tags along on his mission across Iraq. That does not sound like much, but the idea of the US military training people to walk through walls and kill goats by staring at them is pretty funny. The cast includes Ewan McGregor, George Clooney, Kevin Spacey, and Jeff Bridges.

Also opening this week, but not near me:

La Danse: Le Ballet de L'Opera de Paris
Precious
Splinterheads
That Evening Sun

Box Office Predictions
Considering the fact I took Halloween off, I have to wonder if I will be off my game. Who am I kidding? My guesses are never that good to begin with! Remember, kids, my predictions are for entertainment purposes only. With that said, I am guessing that the bulk of this week's gross is going to come from one movie, the new animated A Christmas Carol. It is a classic tale that comes with the weight of Disney's might, plus Jim Carrey and Robert Zemeckis. The next nine slots will be a dog fight.

Here is how I think it could play out.

Rank	Title	Box Office
1	A Christmas Carol 3D	$43 million
2	The Fourth Kind	$13 million
3	The Box	$12.5 million
4	Michael Jackson's This Is It	$10.5 million
5	The Men Who Stare at Goats	$9.5 million
6	Paranormal Activity	$9 million
7	Law Abiding Citizen	$4 million
8	Couples Retreat	$3.5 million
9	Where the Wild Things Are	$3 million
10	Saw VI	$2.5 million

The Boondock Saints II - All Saints Day

2009-11-05T22:34:00.001-05:00

What a long, strange trip The Boondock Saints II: All Saints Day has had on its way to the big screen. The story begins way back in 1999 when writer/director Troy Duffy made the original film. It was barely in theaters long enough to have a cup of coffee. What it did do was begin a stir on the underground cult scene, such that when the DVD arrived back in 2001 it saw an explosion in popularity. I am pretty sure anyone and everyone in college during that time either saw the movie or was aware of it. It had a reputation as a wild action film. It also had the promise of a sequel.

If you do a quick search, I am sure you can find a plethora of information regarding Troy Duffy and the drama surrounding The Boondock Saints. I will not recount that here, suffice to say things happened causing the ten-year delay between the first and second films. There are reasons why Duffy has no known credits between then and now. Fortunately, none of these delays have to do with his talent. There is no question that Troy Duffy has talent, what he needs is someone to help him hone those skills to improve the onscreen product.

I remember first seeing The Boondock Saints and loving the over the top style, chopped up story telling, and the performances of all involved (including the ill-fated cat). I have recently revisited the movie and have found that it has not aged all that well. I still like it, there is still wild stuff to found within its frames. The problem is that it has the feel of warmed over Tarantino with a side of John Woo. Not to mention the way it keeps flashing back over all the action sequences is rather annoying. On the other hand, Sean Patrick Flanery and Norman Reedus have good chemistry as the brothers and Willem Dafoe is borderline brilliant as the bizarre FBI agent Smecker.

That brings us to the new film, sub-titled All Saints Day. We pick up the brothers living with their father (Billy Connolly) on a farm in Ireland, far from their days as street cleaners in Boston. However, when a priest is murdered back in Boston in the brothers signature fashion it is only a matter of time before Connor (Flanery) and Murphy (Reedus) learn this news, retrieve their weapons from storage and head back to the States.

All Saints Day follows a similar development arc as the first. The brothers come back to take care of business, enlist the aid of a local, and proceed to tear through the criminal underworld until they reach the man behind everything for a final explosive showdown. Along the way they run into a couple of familiar faces in the form of the comedic detective trio from the first film.

Among the new faces is Special Agent Eunice Bloom (Julie Benz). She is the new agent looking for the brothers since Smecker is no longer in the picture. Julie Benz takes hold of the character and chews nearly as much scenery as Willem Dafoe did in the first. While I found her to be quite entertaining, she was merely a copy of Dafoe in the first film. The way she is a little bit odd, the way she recreated what happened, all of it was Dafoe's Smecker.

The other principal new face is Romeo (Clifton Collins Jr.). He steps in to play the same role as David Della Rocco did in the first. You know the sort, the goofy side kick who will throw down but is essentially there for comedic value. Much like Benz, Collins really takes to the role and is quite funny in it. If only he had better material to work with.

When it comes right down to it, this is a fun action movie. It is nothing great and I fear the cult-hype machine will give this movie more credit than it deserves. I could hear it in the voices of others at the screening. They were walking out saying how great it was and how long they had been waiting for it. Considering it is a decent movie and how much fans have been looking forward to it, I would not doubt that perceptions will be clouded in light of the new movie at hand.

The movie is certainly fun, but it is essentially the same film with less story. The movie flows in essentially the same arc with similar characters filling similar roles with frequent stops for some over the top gun play.

Troy Duffy certainly knows how to make an entertaining movie. This just does not show any growth. It is almost like he has been in a holding pattern for the past ten years. Could Duffy have been in suspended animation waiting for the perfect time to make a comeback? That would explain the been there done that feel of All Saints Day.

Bottomline. When it comes right down to it, this is a fun movie. The performances are fine, the action is fun, and it should do well. Just do not expect any life changing experience. It still feels like warmed over Tarantino and Woo.

Mildly Recommended.

A Serious Man

2009-11-05T21:03:00.000-05:00

Joel and Ethan Coen have been very prolific film makers over the past two decades. Over that span they have delivered a number of great films (Fargo, O Brother, Where Art Thou?). During the same period they have also been behind some not so great films (The Ladykillers, Intolerable Cruelty). The best thing about the brothers is that even at their worst, they still turn in films that exist outside of the Hollywood machine. Their ability to remain independent should be applauded. This allows them to create films like A Serious Man, a film that lands decidedly in the middle of good and bad.

A Serious Man is an interesting film that I am positive I do not completely get. I walked in unsure of what it was going to be. My sole source of knowledge was the trailer, which is pretty fantastic if you ask me. Well, there I went, into that darkened theater looking forward to this latest Coen creation.

For the better part of two hours, I sat there mystified by what transpired. What was I watching. It all began with an opening sequence that I could not reconcile with the rest of the film. It is set in Poland at some time in the past. A man comes home and tells his wife of an amazingly fortuitous happening while out on the road. He is beaming, but his wife lays a bomb on him. Yes, it is an odd opening that I am sure means something to the rest of the movie, but I could not tell you what.

I could be accused of watching movies merely on the surface. I often find it difficult to pierce the veil between what the movie is and what the movie is about. I think I have gotten better at it over the years, but there are still moments where that veil is more like a brick wall around a panic room. That is what A Serious Man was like for me. I got some of it, I liked some of it, but I am not quite able to ultimately get what the big picture is really about.

At the center of the story is Larry Gopnik (Michael Stuhlbarg), a physics professor at a community college in a primarily Jewish community in Minnesota. He has tried to live his life as a serious man, doing his best to live up to a high moral code. That code is about to be tested, to be pushed to its breaking point by a series of events that will forever change the way he lives his life.

Larry believes in order, that there is a purpose for everything and everything can be explained. Much like the complicated mathematical proofs that he teaches. So, when life begins to spiral out of his grasp he is left lost at sea. He does not no where to turn and those he does seek help from seem to know less than he does.

He must deal with his wife, who has asked for a divorce and is cheating with a family friend, a son who listens to rock music at Hebrew school and is constantly chased by a pot-dealing classmate, a daughter who is stealing money for a nose job, a disgruntled student who is trying to bribe and sue him at the same time, and a tenure committee that is receiving anonymous libelous letters about him. Phew. That is a lot for one man to deal with, not to mention other speed bumps that he encounters along the way.

Worse than all of these things happening to him is the fact that they all come up at the same time. Larry is battered and bruised from everything that is going on. He does all that he can do to keep his head above water. The question is, is it enough?

I understand the idea that it can be a futile exercise to keep life fully ordered. You cannot predict everything and need to be able to adapt. This would seem to be Larry's biggest issue. He stands so long on logic and proof that he is unable to adapt.

I feel fairly certain that the Coens are saying something more than we cannot plan for everything. There is definitely more to it. Unfortunately I cannot pierce that veil of understanding. Perhaps with multiple viewings the murky depths will become clear.

Even without "getting it" this is a pretty good movie and one well worth seeing. It is the Coens, so you can be sure there will be interesting scenes to watch. However, the best part of the movie has to be Michael Stuhlbarg. His expressions, reactions, and all around demeanor are pitch perfect. He kind of reminds me of David Paymer, who I could have seen in this role ten years ago.

Bottomline. This is worth seeking out by those who like movies that have more beneath the surface than would appear at first glance. It is a movie that is decidedly different from the mainstream. A Serious Man offers laughs, drama, and more. It may not be a great film, but it is an interesting one. My inability to completely understand is more my fault than the film makers, but it still lessens the overal impact on me and my ability to fully enjoy the feature.

Mildly Recommended.

The Stepfather (2009)

2009-11-05T19:13:00.000-05:00

In 1987 Terry O'Quinn (Lost) took to the screen as a character that became something of a cult-icon. A killer that has thoughts of the perfect family on his mind. If they don't measure up to his high standards or get to close to learning the truth of his murderous past, he simply kills them, adjusts his look and moves on to a new town and another potential winning family.

It was not a big hit upon its original release, but it has gathered a following to itself over the years. Unfortunately, this is another one of those films that I have not seen, although I think I probably should. If for nothing else than to see O'Quinn before his career exploded.

Why the talk of this twenty-two year old film? Well, it has become the latest casualty of the remake/brand recognition mentality that has completely infected the studio system. It often seems that if a property is to be developed for a feature film everybody must already be familiar with what it is about, otherwise no one will go see it. I know this is not true. You know this is not true. The suits, however, do not seem to know.

So, we have this remake of the The Stepfather. Without ever seeing a frame you can tell it is not going to be any good. There are a number of signs pointing towards this fact. First, it is a remake of a film that doesn't really need it, although this can be said of the majority of remakes. Second, it is a PG-13 film, meaning they are looking to get a wider audience than an R-rating would permit. Finally the most telling hint is the choice of director. Nelson McCormick was selected to sit in the director's chair.

Why is this such a big indicator? The man chosen is not a director of vision, nor is it an up and coming film maker with something to prove. McCormick is no Rob Zombie (Halloween), Gore Verbinski (The Ring), or Zack Snyder (Dawn of the Dead). No, indeed. McCormick has spent most of his career on the small screen where he seems to be best suited. His biggest big screen credit? The horror remake Prom Night. You would have thought someone would have checked before signing him. Then again, proof positive that there was no interest in making this anything more than a play for cash.

I am sure you are wondering why I saw it. I am not sure I can answer it. It was something I felt compelled to see. Perhaps I wanted to take the bullet for the rest of you. Well, that cannot be right, if that were true I would have seen it opening weekend. In any case, I have seen it and I can confirm that it is an extraordinarily dull affair during which little happens and people insist on doing the opposite of what logic would appear to dictate.

The film opens with our resident killer, played by Dylan Walsh, It is Christmas time and we watch as he cuts off his beard, dyes his hair, and puts in colored contacts. He calmly walks downstairs and makes some toast before picking up a couple of bags and leaving. During his exit, we see the bodies of a woman and children around the house. It is pretty clear what happened here.

We jump ahead to find out killer, formerly known as Grady Edwards, using the name David Harris and flirting with recent divorcee Susan Harding (Sela Ward). All seems fine and dandy until son Michael (Penn Badgely) returns from military school. He senses something is not right. Soon enough there are enough pieces in place for an explosive finale where "David's" murderous tendencies are revealed.

This is a movie I would like to just push completely from my memory. Yes, I have seen worse movies so you will no hear me say this is the worst ever made. I think it commits an even bigger sin than a good number of so-called bad movies, it is boring. The film looks boring, all of the characters (save for Dylan Walsh) have zero personality, the story is not interesting, and it offers up nothing new.

The Stepfather does offer a number of lessons. Take the title, for example, the character is not even close to actually being a stepfather. For one, the characters are not married and for two, he must go through the adoption process, otherwise he is just some dude that mom married. You also do not need any identification to acquire a marriage license or to work in real estate. I also learned it is all right to keep locked cabinets with unknown contents in the home of a woman you have only known for six months. Another good lesson is if you suspect someone may be a murderer and you have evidence, be sure to not call the police.

The best thing I learned from The Stepfather is that it is absolutely imperative that Amber Heard remain in a bikini, or some attire that requires very little material. I mean, she does not have much to do, so why not? I am sure it will help keep some of the audience awake.

The brightest spot of the movie is Dylan Walsh. It appears that he recognized the fact the movie was not going to be good and adjusted his performance accordingly. He chews the scenery like there is no tomorrow. He is either the over-friendly family guy or the twisted faced psycho. He makes it work when nothing else does. Unfortunately, it is not enough to make this worth watching.

Bottomline. This is an utter bore. There is no reason to see this film. Yes, I new going in, but what can I say? I am not sure I could defend seeing this movie. the best recommendation is to avoid it, but if you must see it, pay attention to Amber Heard and Dylan Walsh, the films best assets.

Not Recommended.

Orphan

2009-11-04T10:34:00.001-05:00

When Orphan arrived in theaters earlier this year, I was sure it was going to be another generic "creepy kid" movie. How could I have known that it was going to be as god as it was? The movie turned out to be completely effective and rather insane in what it did. I cannot say that it broke new ground, but it took the conventions and made them work. This is a very good film that features strong writing, excellent performances, and a twist that really works. The big question going into watching the disk is whether or not the thrills and twists would stand up to multiple viewings.

Well, I watched it and I have to say that it does indeed stand up to multiple viewings. If anything, I just may have liked it more this time around. The second time around allows you to focus on different things. In this case, it was the performances that really stood out to me and how they took hold of the story and took it to the next level.

We begin with John (Peter Sarsgaard) and Kate Coleman (Vera Farmiga) arriving at a hospital just as Kate is about to give birth. However, something is definitely going wrong as they wheel Kate down to the delivery room. Kate realizes it was only a nightmare when she wakes to find she is at home in bed. The couple has lost a child, and have been struggling to recover from the loss. This healing process has found them with excess love that had been reserved for the child they lost and they want to share their abundance. In order to satiate their need to give, the couple has chosen to adopt a child to join their son Danny and daughter Max, who is also almost entirely deaf.

John and Kate visit an orphanage where they immediately connect with a 9 year-old Russian girl named Esther (Isabelle Fuhrman). She is sort of an odd youngster, opting to stay away from the other kids and painting by herself in a corner. She also wears frilly dresses and ribbons around her neck and wrists. Kate tells her, "There's nothing wrong with being different." We believe her, we all know this to be true, although that is usually tougher to deal with as a child. In any case, the papers are drawn up and Esther becomes a part of the Coleman family. They have no idea what they are in for.

No sooner has Esther entered their home that strange things begin to happen. Esther is not quite the little angel that Kate thought she was. The trappings of a domestic thriller begin to take shape as Esther seemingly plays them against each other while also protecting a secret about herself. It is interesting how Esther's craziness stirs up lingering issues between John and Kate that had been laying dormant. Of course, it is also interesting how none of their problems are caused by the other yet come together in an explosive mix of violence-laden insanity.

It is the sort of movie that shouldn't really work for multiple viewings, let alone one. Alex Mace (story) and David Johnson (screenplay) really hit on something special with this one. They breathed life into a sub-genre I did not have much faith in. They have written a story that, while not perfect, is gripping, thrilling, and completely believable. It is a story that is as surprising the second time as it was the first.

That screenplay was put in the hands of Jaume Collet-Serra (House of Wax). These hands proved themselves to be more than capable. Has taken these words and crafted them into a stylish thriller that has kept me hooked for multiple viewings. He builds tension, shows you what you need to see and lets your mind fill in the rest.

Now, back to those performances I mentioned earlier. When I first saw the film, there is a lot to absorb. Like with any movie, you watch the story and the images and the performances, splitting your attention between everything. Watching the film a second (or more) time allows other elements to pop out a bit more than they were able to the first time around. My second viewing allowed the work of the principle cast members to really stand out.

Vera Farmiga and Peter Sarsgaard are perfectly cast as the troubled couple. In particular, Vera Farmiga gives a compelling portrait of a woman struggling to keep everything together. She is cracking from the strain of losing a child and having been responsible for her daughter's deafness. Combine that with the fact that no one wants to believe anything she says and she has to fight an uphill battle throughout the film. Then you have Peter Sarsgaard, his character is not exactly squeaky clean, but his attempts to keep a level head throughout the growing ordeal cause him to discount much of his wife's suspicions. Everything quite believable.

As good as those two are, the real winner here is Isabelle Fuhrman. She plays Esther to absolute perfection. Alternately sweet, creepy, evil, and downright menacing. I believed her. When she made threats against Max (Aryanna Engineer) I believed her. She really is remarkable in how she makes Esther into this monster. It will be interesting to see how her career progresses.

Audio/Video. The video is presented in its original aspect ratio of 1.85:1 and looks really good. The blacks are solid and the under saturated colors have plenty of detail. It is a dark film and the transfer accurately reflects what I remember from the theater. It may actually look better here. There is no evidence of any digital noise or artifacts. Very good looking disk.

The audio is also quite strong. The Dolby TrueHD 5.1 track does the film justice. The surrounds are not all that active, but the score shines through and the dialogue is always crisp and clear. Listen as the sound occasionally gives way to silence as you build up to a musical sting, all adding to the tension that comes with the story.

Extras. This release is a little light in this area.

Bad Seeds and Evil Kids. This brief featurette takes a look at the films antagonist as well as evil kids throughout cinematic history. It does not get into this film terribly deeply, but it is an interesting watch.
Deleted Scenes. A few minutes of cut bits and an alternate ending. The alternate ending is not all that special and I am really glad they chose not to use it. Although, I must say that I have an idea of an addition that would have made the used ending a bit better.

Bottomline. This is a very good movie that is very much worth your time. Sure, you could nit pick it to near death, but I was won over by what is there on the screen. It surprised me, it scared me, it convinced me it was real. This is a great surprise.

Highly Recommended.

Box Office Update 10/30-11/1: Michael Jackson Moonwalks to the Top

2009-11-03T19:42:00.000-05:00

I skipped doing predictions this past weekend. There was only one movie opening nationally. Combine that with Halloween falling on a Saturday and the chaences for an exciting box office weekend drops dramatically. So, I hope you will forgive me, next week should get us all back on track with a number of new movies flooding local cinemas.

As for this weekend, it was a little on the slow side with a number of films suffering steep dips from last week. There were two bright spots in this weekend's numbers. There is the arrival of the Michael Jackson documentary and the continued success of Paranormal Activity. Beyond that, you have headlines about the step drops being suffered by the likes of Where the Wild Things Are and Saw VI.

Let's start at the top, shall we? There was much sadness in the wake of Michael Jackson's death, but with that sadness came those wondering how long it would take them to get a documentary or some such biopic up and running. The answer is not long at all. This documentary has some of the last Jackson footage ever filmed. It was taken during the rehearsals for his upcoming tour. Aside from that, I am not sure what else is in the film, but I do wonder if this footage was originally intended as some sort of bonus footage for a concert documentary for the tour? It will only be in theaters for two weeks, so if you want to see it, make sure you get out there!

Coming in second place with only a 22% dip from last week is that little movie that could, Paranormal Activity. The people behind the marketing for this movie have been brilliant. they knew exactly what they were doing. However, a big piece of the puzzle is that this movie is actually good. The movie will creep you out and you will not listen to the creeks and moans of a house the same way again. The movie has been an enormous success. Period.

At the other end of the scale you need look no further than Saw VI. Despite being a big step up from part five, it fell more than 62% from its debut, which was already below normal for the franchise. Could the series be showing signs of age and fatigue? Or maybe it was just swallowed up by the Paranormal juggernaut? I guess part seven will be real telling with regards to the series' future viability. Perhaps Jigsaw's reign of terror will be coming to an end. With that said, it should be noted that it has already doubled its budget, so it is not like the movie isn't still making money.

Next weekend will be a lot more interesting when four new films enter competition. The top film will likely be Disney's new take on A Christmas Carol. Other new competitors include Richard Kelly's The Box, the alien abduction film The Fourth Kind, and The Men Who Stare at Goats.

Two films dropped off the list this week: Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs (11) and Zombieland (12).

This Week	Last Week	Title	Wknd Gross	Overall	Week in release
1	N	Michael Jackson's This Is It	$23,234,394	$34,442,926	1
2	1	Paranormal Activity	$16,387,327	$84,627,372	6
3	4	Law Abiding Citizen	$7,403,630	$51,485,280	3
4	5	Couples Retreat	$6,460,525	$87,026,280	4
5	3	Where the Wild Things Are	$5,931,417	$62,650,379	3
6	2	Saw VI	$5,270,794	$22,534,749	2
7	6	Astro Boy	$3,460,651	$11,316,418	2
8	8	The Stepfather	$3,207,792	$24,555,801	3
9	7	The Vampire's Assistant	$3,098,185	$10,809,975	2
10	11	Amelia	$3,034,667	$8,340,499	2

DVD Pick of the Week: GI Joe - The Rise of Cobra

2009-11-02T22:14:00.000-05:00

Welcome back! Well, to some of you, anyway. To the rest of you, glad you decided to stop by and I hope this humble column helps you navigate the stacks of new releases each week. My goal is to point you toward titles of interest and warn you away from those films that seek to do nothing but leech away your time and give you nothing in return.

Full disclosure: I have not seen many of these titles, and what follows are not necessarily reviews, but opinions based upon what I know of the titles I pluck from the new release lists I peruse. The opinions I give based on the new releases are my own, and my recommendations are based on my personal interest. In any case, I hope you enjoy and perhaps find something you like or a title to point me towards.

G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra (also Blu-ray). I know, I know, you are probably shaking your head in disgust at this particular choice. I admit, it is not the best film coming out this week, not by a long shot. I will defend it as a fun piece of cheese. A candy bar that you can enjoy without giving a second thought to. Not every movie needs to be some sort of Oscar caliber masterpiece or genre bending game changer. Sometimes all a movie needs to be is fun. This fits the bill and is more effective at it than, say, Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen. This movie has plenty of action and explosions and stretches the ability to suspend disbelief to its breaking point and that its beauty. It is what it is and requires no effort whatsoever from the viewer. I enjoy it.

Star Wars: The Clone Wars - The Complete Season One. I have heard the series is pretty good. All I have seen was the episode mash up that passed for a film. I was not particularly fond of it. Being a Star Wars fan I suppose I should give this a look. Can anyone shed some light on the worthiness of the show?

North by Northwest: 50th Anniversary Edition (also Blu-ray). I cannot remember the last time I have seen this movie. I suspect I am going to have to revisit it soon. It is certainly hard to go wrong with Alfred Hitchcock and Jimmy Stewart. It centers on Stewart as an executive mistaken for a government agent who is pursued by foreign spies. Great movie.

The Taking of Pelham 1 2 3 (2009) (also Blu-ray) This remake proved to be a mediocre thriller that is carried by the work of Denzel Washington. It is let down by director Tony Scott, whose wild directing style comes across as annoying. Then there is John Travolta who seems more goofy than menacing most of the time, especially when he is called upon to drop the occasional f-bomb.

It's a Wonderful Life (Blu-ray). It took me an inordinately long time to get around to seeing this movie. It is a great feel good movie if there ever was one and I need to make a point to see it each holiday season. I look forward to seeing how much it benefits from the Blu-ray format.

Aliens in the Attic (also Blu-ray). This family film passed through theaters without much of a peep. It is one that I skipped on the big screen and will likely do again. It centers on aliens who attempt to stage an invasion from a family's attack. It ends up with he family taking on the small creatures. Could be fun, but I do not feel a strong need to see it.

Forrest Gump (Blu-ray). Multiple Oscar-winning film from the 90s arrives on Blu-ray. How will it look? Hopefully good. This is another film I have not seen in some time, but would not be against revisiting. Then again, it was not that long that I saw The Curious Case of Benjamin Button and that does have a similar feel.....

Love Actually (Blu-ray). Yet another movie that has not crossed my eyes recently. This is a multi-layered romantic comedy that really works. It follows a variety of couples as they navigate rocky relationships. Written and directed by Richard Curtis, the film features a strong ensemble cast.

Rocky: The Undisputed Collection (Blu-ray). From the Oscar winning original to the surprisingly excellent Rocky Balboa and everything in between, this box has them all. It is a nice package, although I have never been that big of a Rocky fan. The only ones I would want would be the first, the last, and part four (I have always had an affinity for that one).

I Love You, Beth Cooper (also Blu-ray). A nerd professes his love for the head cheerleader at their graduation. Later, the girl shows up and takes him on the ride of his life. It is a trifle of a movie, but still actually works. It is not something you should feel the need to run out right away and see, but if you are bored and cannot find anything else or come across it on cable, you could do worse.

National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation (Blu-ray). One of my favorite Christmas movies and easily one of the best things Chevy Chase has ever done. This Christmas classic is arriving on Blu-ray. Will it benefit? One would hope, but if not, it is still a hilarious film. This is what happens when you don't get a bonus and family shows up unexpectedly. Comedy ensues.

Will Ferrell: You're Welcome America. A Final Night with George W. Bush. This was a limited run show on Broadway that did very well. It is arriving on home video for the rest of us. I cannot imagine this not being funny. Can you?

DVD Review: Sheitan

2009-11-01T21:15:00.000-05:00

Before I sat down to watch the 2006 French horror film Sheitan, I was told that it was really good. However, I was given a caveat. This horror film is not nearly as extreme as other recent French offerings like Inside or Martyrs. All right, that was a little disappointing as I have become accustomed to these intense French horror experiences. I was then told, by the same person, that despite it being less graphic, it does have a feel reminiscent of Frontier(s). All right, that's something I can work with.

Sheitan begins innocently enough. A few friends are out at the club. The three are having a good time drinking, trying to dance with the ladies, and generally acting the fool. One of them, Thai, goes over to the bar where a lady friend is tending, while trying to hit on one of her attractive acquaintances. Meanwhile, the goofball of the bunch, Bart, gets a little too aggressive in his pursuit of a lady n the dance floor and ends up in fight. As they always end up, our goof ends battered, bloodied, and tossed out of the club.

Figuring it is time to leave, but with no one really wanting to go home, the group takes up the offer of their new found friend, the lovely Eve (Roxane Mesquida), to go to her home in the country. Off they go on the long drive out of Paris into the country. Not just any country, but out in the middle of nowhere kind of country where your house is looked over by a wild-eyed guy named Joseph (Vincent Cassell) and where your house is strewn with doll parts inside and wandering goats outside.

Now, this is where the horror fan watching the movie can see, hear, and feel the alarms going off. I know for me, the voice was screaming inside my skull. Don't trust her. Don't trust him. Does anyone else see something wrong here? Take a look around, there is nothing else for miles around. Did you see what is in his house? This not normal. Get out. Run. Go back to Paris. GO NOW!

Unfortunately, unlike me, these characters do not realize they are in a horror movie. They see this invite as a way to keep on partying and perhaps have a some fun with the lovely ladies that accompany them. I cannot say I blame them. It is easy to watch from the outside as the strangeness begins to slowly creep in and see that things are not right and know that something bad is about to happen. These guys are blinded by the possibility of some fun.

Still, you would think that wild-eyed and crazy Joseph would be a big hint to leave. These guys just sort of right him off as a local loon. I guess that is sort of understandable, they do not have any real reason to think that something really bad is about to happen.

Sheitan has three distinct portions. First we have the guys at the club and all that happens there. The second stage finds them looking to continue the fun out in the country. There is the usual awkwardness as they adjust to the new locale combined with Bart's general social ineptitude. Through this stage of the game there are some hints of future issues. Joseph's odd behavior, the appearance of some local bullies, and the doll parts all over the house.

Third act sees all hell break loose as true motives are revealed and our friends discover that they really are in danger. It may not be a bloody hell, but it is certainly unsettling and highly effective.

The cast is quite good all around. In particular we have Vincent Cassell who is a fine actor doing his best to act weird, crazy, and slightly dangerous without actually being any of those things. Well, at least until the time is right. Roxane Mesquida does a fine job of being the alluring and slightly dangerous girl that will catch your eye and will gladly follow into the mouth of hell. The third key component is Olivier Barthelemy as Bart. This guy is a goon and he plays it to the hilt. Much of the story seems to revolve around him. He is the sort of character you want to dislike but he is so pitiable that you can't help but get involved.

Kim Chapiron was in the director's chair for the film and does a fine job of luring you in, building tension, and springing the bear trap on your head. It will be interesting to where future projects take us. This film shows a skill for giving us character and tension in equal measure and showing that you do not need a bucket of blood to make effective horror (although I will not be disappointed if there is blood).

Audio/Video. The technical side of he disk is fine. It is not the greatest looking disk, but it is effective in getting the idea across. The anamorphic widescreen is clear, although not without noticeable grain. Detail is generally good, but I have seen sharper. The color palette is on the washed out side, but the country does not help matters with the predominance of browns.

Audio is solid. Dolby Digital 5.1 French track does the job. Dialogue is clear, crisp, and easy to understand. Nothing to really complain about as it does its job while not distinguishing itself.

Extras.

The Making of Sheitan. Twenty-three minute video on the making of the film. We get some interview and behind the scenes footage, but it is not terribly involving.
Original Trailer. Effectively gives you an idea of what to expect.
Tartan New Releases. Trailers for H6, Red Shoes, The Maid, Marebito.

Bottomline. No, not as graphic as other recent French horror offerings, but it is a nicely unsettling descent into hell that feels a mere step or two removed from reality. It is this reality that really sells it and ultimately gets you. This is a film to see.

Recommended.

A Halloween Treat: Horror Movie Clips and Trailers

2009-10-30T09:15:00.000-04:00

With Halloween literally hours away, I thought it would be fun to take a look at some trailers and clips that have made their way to YouTube. Some will be new and some will be old and there will be no particular flow to them.

This is in place of my usual New Movies and Box Office Predictions column. Since there is only one new wide release, I have decided to take a one week break to provide something a little more timely and fun.

Enjoy!

In the Mouth of Madness
This John Carpenter film is vastly underrated and I really need to pay it a revisit. It is a mash up of H.P. Lovecraft and Stephen King filtered through John Carpenter's sensibilities and featuring a strong performance from Sam Neill.

Two Thousand Maniacs
I have only seen the remake with Robert Englund, but some day I will get around to checking out some old school Herschell Gordon Lewis.

The Abominable Dr. Phibes
How can you go wrong with Vincent Price? The man is a master of his craft. From the way he carries himself to his distinctive voice. This is one of his more memorable roles.

Session 9
I remember picking this up as a blind DVD purchase alongside Donnie Darko. Needless to say, it was a good day for me. This movie leaves a lot to the imagination. Do yourself a favor and give it a spin.

The Devil's Backbone
This is a phenomenal ghost story set in an orphanage during the Spanish Civil Wat. Guillermo Del Toro directs to great effect. This is one creepy movie that drips with atmosphere.

Eyes Without a Face
This 1960 French film is one I have been meaning to see for some time. i believe I even own the Criterion release. It centers on a doctor attempting to surgical graft the face of a beautiful woman onto his daughter who was disfigured in an accident.

The Hills Have Eyes
The Wes Craven original is a gritty little film and shows why you should not wander into unknown terrain. You also get to see Michael Berryman who is one strange looking dude!

Suicide Club
This Japanese film is just plain strange, no other way to describe it. Instead of a trailer, here is an earlyu scene:

Captain Kronos Vampire Hunter
Hammer has made some excellent films. This is one of them. It is a little strange, but it is also quite good and deserving of some time.

The Fearless Vamipire Killers or Pardon Me but Your Teeth are in My Neck
Do you like a few laughs with your bloodsuckers? Check out Roman Polanski's horromedy.

City of the Living Dead
You want a bizarre zombie movie? Here it is. It is gross, bizarre, nonsensical, and fantastic. There is something special in the way Lucio Fulci could put a horror fil together.

Demons
Lamberto Bava directed this film for producer and co-screenwriter Dario Argento. I have this on DVD around here somewhere. I recall watching the VHS and seem to recall it being rather gooey.

The Burning
This early 80's horror film (featuring Jason Alexander, Holly Hunter, and Fisher Stevens, no less) is actually pretty good. Watching this trailer makes me think it was directly responsible for Edgar Wright's fake Don't trailer from Grindhouse.

Undead
This Australian zombie film is a blast. It brings to mind films like Evil Dead while still feeling fresh. This film also introduces the triple shotgun! It was directed by the Spierig Brothers who also helmed the upcoming Daybreakers.

Bride of Frankenstein
An undeniable horror classic. If you are a horror fan and have not seen this, check out now.

Tsui Hark's Vampire Hunters
Kung fu, Taoist monks, and vampires. How can you go wrong?

Sleepaway Camp
This is a decent slasher. Although it is probably mor famous for its ending than anything else. I actually think the second one is better (and features Bruce Springsteen's sister as one of the leads).

The Happiness of the Katakuris
Horror, comedy, murder, zombies, mayhem, singing, and dancing. This film from prolific Japanese director Takashi Miike is one of a kind. And that is saying something considering it is a remake of a Korean film!

Dead & Buried
Here is a spellbinding, low key zombie film. It is not in your face at all and it works. It is very atmospheric and creepy.

May
I think this film is pretty underrated. Most of the people I ask about it have never seen it. It is quite effective and has a good cast including Angela Bettis, Anna Farris, and Jeremy Sisto.

Well, that about wraps up this Halloween trailer treat. Well, I could go on, but we don't want to get carred away now, do we? HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAAAA

HAPPY HALLOWEEN!

Slaughter Night

2009-10-29T11:16:00.000-04:00

I am not sure what I was expecting, exactly, when I began watching Slaughter Night. The cover did have a quote from Slasherpool stating: "A whole lot of gore." Well, that certainly sounds promising. As you probably already know, I do like me some blood and guts with my movies! However, we also all know that gore alone does not a movie make. Was I in for one of those? Or was I in for something altogether different and special? I was really hoping for the latter.

I should have known better. This film from the Netherlands is as conventional as it gets. The only thing separating it from your average American horror film is the language. It certainly does seem like France has a stranglehold on the European horror market. It is hard to argue against many of the titles that have made their way across the pond. Of course, we are also used to only the upper crust breaking free and shipping themselves stateside where they seek success based on a boatload of hype and a little bit of hope. For all I know, France has the equivalent of Slaughter Night that has successfully remained locked away with the nation's borders.

Slaughter Night (aka Sl8 N8) does not waste time delivering a little blood and goo. It is a scene more than 100 years in the past, where a particularly nasty fellow named Adrien Martiens who was kidnapping and murdering children. He is shown with his handiwork around him. Great way to start, right?

Jump to the present. This is more like it! We pick up our main characters at a big and loud college party. Kristel (Victoria Koblenko) Leaves the party and is picked up by her father. The two argue a little about a trip Kristel is planning, causing daddy to be distracted and not see the truck bearing down on them. The resulting accident leaves Kristel without her father and with a boatload of guilt in its place.

Slaughter Night then turns into a bit of a road movie as Kristel and her friends take a long trip to the research location where her father was working. You see, he is a writer. Can you guess who his latest subject was? You got it. Adrien Martiens.

Anyway, the curious group take a tour of a nearby mine and learn more about Martiens. This is where the horror of out movie begins. They become trapped in the mine where they think it is a perfect time to play with a Ouija board.

If you thought: "What?" You had the same reaction I had while watching the movie. You're trapped in a mine after hearing about a child killer who died there. Sounds like the perfect time to pull out the old Ouija board and see if he's still hanging around. I mean if they didn't, this sure would be a short movie.

Right on cue, some demons show up, take control of one of the kids and everyone is off to the races. At this point all of the characters do one of three things: 1. Run, 2. Hide, and 3. Complain. Forget about any interesting characters, forget about any attempt to stretch beyond the basic. Oh yes, I forgot something: 4. Die.

There is definitely some good effects work here. The problem is that you cannot see any of it. Whenever a demon fight breaks out the camera starts to go wild, shaking and jerking all over. If you were hoping to have any idea of what exactly is going on, forget it. Abandon all hope.

The production quality of the film is quite good, it is just poorly executed with mediocre acting a second rate script, and plain direction. Nothing really elevates this beyond the mundane. I have certainly seen worse films. You could really do worse than Slaughter Night. Then again, you can also do a lot better.

Audio/Video. The video is presented in 1.85:1 anamorphic widescreen and sports a rather mediocre transfer, much like the film itself. It is dark, muddy, and lacking in detail. Add the fact that much of it takes place in dark tunnels, you are in for a lot of scenes where you cannot see much. Detail gets lost in the darkness and there there is plenty of grain to distract you. It only gets worse when any frantic scenes of demon action crop up, as soon as the camera begins to shake there is an ugly "digital" look that hurt my eyes. Again, I have seen worse.

The audio is not bad. The Dolby Digital 5.1 track delivers where it needs to. It is always clear and crisp. Dialog front and center and with good use of surrounds later on when the action picks up in the tunnels. Nothing mind blowing, but a solid track.

Extras. Palisades Tartan Video has given the film a nice little package.

The Making of Slaughter Night. This runs for 24-minutes and includes plenty of behind the scenes footage. We get a good look at the blood and gore effects. I also get the impression that they had a lot of fun making the film. Makes me wish the final product was better.
Outtakes. Nearly four minutes of the cast cutting up on set.
Original Trailer. The trailer used in hopes of enticing you to see the film. Does it work? Maybe a little.
Tartan Video New Releases. Trailers are included for H6, Hillside Strangler, Sheitan, Bloody Reunion, and Perth.

Bottomline. This is far from the worst film I have seen. I am most disappointed by how generic it is. There is nothing terribly interesting or original. It feels uninspired. Slaughter Night just is, a faceless horror film adrift in a see of horror movies hoping to find an audience. Sure, give it a peek, just don't expect much.

One more thing, the blonde in the red hoodie with the shotgun on the cover? Not in the movie. I think I might like to see where it came from.

Not Recommended.

Carved

2009-10-29T06:40:00.000-04:00

Carved is also known as A Slit-Mouthed Woman is a ghost story from Japan and with a title like that, how can you not be interested? If that isn't enough, how about the DVD cover blurb that claims: "The most frightening supernatural horror film of the year." All right, I am listening, keep talking. Take the next step and flip the case over. The plot description tells of a woman disfigured by a jealous husband whose ghost terrorized a town decades earlier. It also tells of her ghost wearing a surgical mask, asking if she is pretty, and committing violent murder. Wow. This certainly sounds like a winner! The capper has to be the bleak cover featuring a pale, blue-eyed woman with long hair, a slit mouth, and a pair of rusty looking scissors.

What should have been a slam dunk quickly turned into a 90-minute slog to the finish. This movie tested my ability to keep my eyes open through the dullest of films. I will admit that it opened strong and for a while I could be heard trying to convince myself that it would pay off on the opening, that it was slow and lyrical to great effect. It did not work and I was not right.

Let us begin with the good. As Carved opens we listen to kids, young 8-year old kids (as opposed to the usual teen/young adult fodder), talking about a town legend. It is the legend of the slit-mouthed woman who appears at dusk to abduct children. One young boy even keeps a note pad log of all the facts he has learned about the urban legend. All of the kids take the legend seriously, to the point that some stay out at a park in the hopes of seeing her. It is always a "friend of a friend" who say her until know.

The woman is back and kids are starting to disappear. What was just an urban legend is all too real and the town reacts as such. A teacher, Kyôko Yamashita (Eriko Satô), is a witness to one of these kidnappings, but she is laughed off by police and put on leave by the school. She teams with a fellow teacher, Noboru Matsuzaki (Haruhiko Katô), who seems to know a little more than he initially lets on.

So, now we follow them around for the bulk of the middle portion of the film we follow this dynamic duo around town. They are chasing a voice in Noboru's head that belongs to our ghostly killer. They end up where it all began for one final climactic showdown. Thrilling. Well, not really.

The pacing is lethargic, the acting is sub-par, and the look is washed out, sparse, and boring. The story never really takes off and it uses child abuse as an exploitative plot device. I hoped that point would pay off, but it doesn't. It is more of a tool used to induce, or attempt to induce, an emotional response.

There is one thing to be afraid of that they do not explicitly mention: the sniffles. It seems our ghostly villainess moves through sickness. If someone begins to cough, I would suggest running away from them (not unlike what we do in real life. What? You don't? You have heard of the flu, right? Be afraid!). I guess there really was a scary element!

Oh, I kid, I kid. This movie is not scary, not suspenseful, and plays like PG-13 Hollywood horror made in the hopes of catching some opening weekend cash. It is largely bloodless, tells its story in a straight line, and ends with a stinger.

I almost forgot, in addition to the good opening with the kids, the ending works as well. It gets rather strange and surreal as the final showdown takes place. I am not sure if it was odd way our ghost kept kicking Noboru, or final shot before the credits, but it was enough to get my attention back. If only for a moment.

In the end, this is not a movie I can recommend unless you are having trouble sleeping. I do think the underlying concept is a good one and with a better creative team it could have been something special. On top of that, the plot description has some complete fabrications in it. Better luck next time.

Audio/Video. The image is presented in anamorphic widescreen with a ratio of 1.85:1. I have seen worse disks, but this one is not pretty. Besides the washed out color palette, there is a distinct lack of detail throughout. Visually, this is very boring to look at. The audio, available in 5.1 and 2.0, is decent. It is not an active track as it is dialogue driven placing most of the sound front and center.

Extras. This Palisades Tartan Video release has a decent selection of extras.

The Making of Carved. Fifteen minutes of on the set footage and interview footage.
Cast Interview. Five minutes of interview footage with the two leads and the director.
Original Trailer. If the goal of a trailer is to make a movie look good, they do a nice job doing it.
TV Spots. Three spots are included, all of them do a pretty good job of making it look good. Too bad it isn't.
Tartan Asia Extreme New Releases. Trailers are included for Bloody Reunion, Cinderella, Shutter, The Red Shoes, and Koma.

Bottomline. I was really hoping this would be good. If you must watch it, watch the first ten minutes and the last ten minutes. That is all you really need. Man, I really think I need a Red Bull after that.

Not Recommended.

Programming a Halloween Horror Movie Marathon

2009-10-28T15:10:00.000-04:00

Halloween is right around the corner and I have no plans. That's right, no parties, no gatherings, no drunken night of debauchery, and I do not plan on answering the door either. So what is little ole me to do on the long, creepy, dark Halloween day? Well, barring any potential plan changes, I have decided that I am going to watch horror movies all day long and into the night.

Sounds like a good idea, right?

Yes, yes it does sound like a good idea. Now comes the tricky part. What do I watch? I cannot just reach to the shelf and grab the first thing I come across. No, that would be too easy and probably be a little boring. What if I stumble across the A Nightmare on Elm Street or Friday the 13th shelves. Yes, I do like them and they are worth watching, but that is a lot of movies that would probably suck up the entire day. I am going to have to give this a little thought.

There are a few factors I am going to need to consider in choosing the films that will comprise my marathon. The first thing is any movie I choose I have to own. This shouldn't be too hard as I have a pretty good sized collection. Why do I have to already own it? Easy, because I do not want to have to run around to rent or buy it anywhere. Using my own collection makes things a little easier. Next, I want to make sure to mix things up a little bit. I do not want to spend all day in slasherville, or Asian ghost-o-rama, or even in the realm classic Universal monsters. The horror genre is rich in variety, so why not take advantage of it?

As I continue writing this, I a not quite sure how my final play list will come together or if I will be able to get through all of my choices in a day. Still, it will certainly be fun to try. I have never attempted anything like this before and I am not sure I will again. For the moment, let us just enjoy it.

And now for the good part. Let's take a look at a few contenders for my Halloween Horror Movie Marathon.

Once the movies have been selected they will be mixed up. I do not want to have, say, two slashers in a row or anything like that.

I do now that I want to have a couple of classics in there, so let's begin with Frankenstein and Bride of Frankenstein. I have been meaning to revisit these for some time. I considered a little bit of Lugosi, but I don't feel the need for Dracula right now. Although, I may take a shot at the original Wolfman. The timing would be good considering the remake coming early next year.

Comedy is always a good mix with horror, so to satisfy that need I have two films in mind. If I can find it (my collection is not always easy to navigate) I would like Abbott and Costello meet Frankenstein. The other title is a recent Blu-ray acquisition in Evil Dead II.

I would like to get some Hammer in the mix. So, I am considering The Mummy and maybe one of their Dracula titles. I am pretty open to the Hammer possibilities. I must admit, I do like Captain Kronos Vampire Hunter and The Legend of the 7 Golden Vampires.

Let's movie into something a little more modern. I have been wanting to watch that Hostel Part 2 Blu-ray, that should help satiate some of the blood lust. I also have a copy of Laid to Rest somewhere that I am pretty sure wants to be seen. I have heard some good things about that direct to video slasher. I am pretty sure I know where my copy of High Tension is, so that could be fun.

Now, tell me, what is Halloween without a little Vincent Price? I have a Price boxset in my hands and there are two titles in that box that cry out to be watched. What are they? The Abominable Dr. Phibes and its sequel Dr. Phibes Rises Again, of course.

Asian horror is always pretty fascinating to watch, always high on the creep factor. Perhaps I will dig up a Takashi Miike picture like Audition or The Happiness of the Katikuris. There is also the more traditional creepy titles like Ju-on or Ringu.

You know, a trip to Italy may be in order. After reading about the potential remake of Suspiria that was going around earlier this year, maybe I should pop in the original? I would also say some Lucio Fulci zombie action is in order, but I watched a bunch of them not that long ago and think I can safely set him aside for now. I do have that Dawn of the Dead box set, maybe I could pull out the Dario Argento European cut. I never did see that particular version.

David Lynch may be appropriate as well. I have a copy of Eraserhead that has been crying for some attention. Or maybe I should go old school with Wes Craven and dig up the original The Hills Have Eyes for some mutant fun.

Hmm, have you ever seen May? I remember this being quite good, a different spin on the Frankenstein tale starring Angela Bettis and Anna Farris. If I can find that, maybe that could make the schedule.

The word "demon" just crossed my mind and now I am thinking of a couple of demon movies, titled simply enough Demons and Demons 2. I think I know where they are and I remember those being quite gooey. Or I could go the other route and check out Demonic Toys or one of the Puppet Master flicks. Not the bloodiest, but the dolls are cool.

I think I have to stop there. I have just gone through a lot of titles. There is no way I am going to be able to squeeze all of these into one day. I would love to go into the day with a set plan, a definite playlist of sorts. That is not likely to become reality. All I can really hope for is that I can find some of these titles come Saturday. Perhaps, if I feel really energetic I will take a look for them before hand.

I am also open to any suggestions you may have for me. I may not be able to take them right away, but I an add them to the ever growing list!

Oh yes, I plan on getting a early start Friday night. A local arthouse theater is screening Carnival of Souls, the original classic! That should be a blast!

Box Office Update 10/23-10/25: Saw Feels the Sting of Paranormal Activity

2009-10-27T22:20:00.000-04:00

Is there anyone out there who believed the top two films would end up in this order? I suspect there are very few to none. I feel very certain that there are probably a lot of horror fans who were hoping it would wind up like this but dared not dream it would actually happen. Ever since the first Saw surprised audiences, the series has been a rock year in and year out. To this point each of the sequels pulled in more than $30 million, then this happened. Saw VI failed to even top the $18 million of the original film. On the other hand, it is great to see Paranormal Activity doing as well as it is.

Paranormal Activity was marketed perfectly by Paramount. The slow burn of its release has paid off. Hype built and built and its release widened along with it. The film is uber-creepy and shows how effective a film can be when it plays with your mind rather than splattering everything across the screen. It will be interesting to see just how far they can take it.

As for Saw? Well, could the aging series be showing some kinks in its armor? Is its Halloween dominance nearing an end? Could the lackluster fifth entry have caused this dip to occur? Or could it just be the one off effect of a cinematic phenomenon known as Paranormal Activity. Of course, the movie is actually good, one of the better sequels. Perhaps word of mouth will help it out in coming weeks. It will be interesting to see if it has legs in coming weeks and if this showing will have an effect on the already announced part seven (in 3D, no less).

Where the Wild Things Are took a 57% hit in its second weekend out. I cannot say it was unexpected, but maybe a little disappointing. The movie is a masterstroke of storytelling that does lean a bit more towards the arthouse than the mainstream.

Two other new releases joined our top films this weeks top three films. Neither one did so well, finishing sixth and seventh, respectively. First is Astro Boy, the adaptation of the original anime series. It is better than its take would indicate. Right behind it is The Vampire's Assistant, which has not had a very warm reception from critics.

Next week it appears that the studios all got cold feet when it comes to going head to head with Halloween. So, when Friday rolls around there will be no new movies entering wide release. In fact, the only new title that you will be able to see nationwide is the new Michael Jackson documentary This Is It, which opens on Wednesday. It is not a movie high on my list to see, but I may give it a peak, otherwise it will be time to catch up on some movies I haven't seen yet.

Three films dropped off the list this week: Toy Story & Toy Story 2 3D (13), The Invention of Lying (15), and Surrogates (17).

This Week	Last Week	Title	Wknd Gross	Overall	Week in release
1	3	Paranormal Activity	$21,104,070	$61,580,588	5
2	N	Saw VI	$14,118,444	$14,118,444	1
3	1	Where the Wild Things Are	$14,019,406	$53,558,981	2
4	2	Law Abiding Citizen	$12,403,888	$40,008,703	2
5	4	Couples Retreat	$10,620,685	$77,736,885	3
6	N	Astro Boy	$6,702,923	$6,702,923	1
7	N	The Vampire's Assistant	$6,293,205	$6,293,205	1
8	5	The Stepfather	$6,230,969	$20,082,652	2
9	6	Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs	$5,250,541	$114,854,877	6
10	7	Zombieland	$4,205,812	$67,213,384	4

Box Office Predictions Recap
Easily the worst weekend I have had in awhile, but that's all right. I will be able to come through this with flying colors, none the worse for wear. Why? Because I doubt anyone picked the order of films correctly for this weekend past. Many of us hoped for the outcome of the top two films to wind up this way, but none dared believe it would actually happen. As for the rest of my guesses, I am most saddened by the under performance of Astro Boy. For all of its faults, it is a rather entertaining film.

Here is how the field matched up:

Actual	Prediction	Title	Wknd Gross	Prediction
2	1	Saw VI	$14,118,444	$27 million
1	2	Paranormal Activity	$21,104,070	$22 million
3	3	Where the Wild Things Are	$14,019,406	$18 million
6	4	Astro Boy	$6,702,923	$13 million
4	5	Law Abiding Citizen	$12,403,888	$11 million
7	6	The Vampire's Assistant	$6,293,205	$10 million
5	7	Couples Retreat	$10,620,685	$9.5 million
9	8	Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs	$5,250,541	$5 million
8	9	The Stepfather	$6,230,969	$4.5 million
10	10	Zombieland	$4,205,812	$3.5 million

DVD Pick of the Week: The Prisoner - The Complete Series

2009-10-27T04:55:00.000-04:00

Welcome back! Well, to some of you, anyway. To the rest of you, glad you decided to stop by and I hope this humble column helps you navigate the stacks of new releases each week. My goal is to point you toward titles of interest and warn you away from those films that seek to do nothing but leech away your time and give you nothing in return.

Full disclosure: I have not seen many of these titles, and what follows are not necessarily reviews, but opinions based upon what I know of the titles I pluck from the new release lists I peruse. The opinions I give based on the new releases are my own, and my recommendations are based on my personal interest. In any case, I hope you enjoy and perhaps find something you like or a title to point me towards.

The Prisoner: The Complete Series (Blu-ray). I have been wanting to see this series for a long time. I remember watching episodes of it on PBS, but never got to see the entire run. Many times I had considered purchasing the DVD set years ago, but it was always so expensive. It is now arriving on Blu-ray at a much more reasonable price (less than half of what the old DVD set was going for). The series stars Patrick McGoohan as Number Six. He is a former secret agent who is abducted and taken to an island, which serves as a very strange prison. His captors want information, he offers nothing and continually attempts escape. This series has been rumored to be turned into a feature in recent years with, I believe, Bryan Singer helming.

Battlestar Galactica: The Plan (also Blu-ray). Yes! More Battlestar! This has to be one of my favorite series. You know how it is when a favorite series goes away, you are always left wanting more. This film takes us all the way back to the beginning of the series and gives us the story through the eyes of the Cylons. I am looking forward to getting this new look at the conflict, not to mention some more Battlestar!

Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs (also Blu-ray). Despite being a step up from the second film, I cannot throw my support behind this one, as it still feels like a franchise stretched past its expiration date.This time out our ragtag group of critters find some dinosaur eggs and embark on a journey into dinosaur country underneath the ice. The kids will like it, but will likely move on to something else rather quickly.

Monty Python: Almost the Truth (also Blu-ray). The troupe reunites for the first time in decades. They take to the screen alongside some of today's top comics. I hear it is very funny and I look forward to giving it a spin at some point.

Night of the Creeps (also Blu-ray). Have wanted to see this for years. It is finally arriving on DVD and Blu-ray. The 1986 horror film from director Fred Dekker has alien brain parasites turning victims into killers. The way I understand it, Slither owes a lot to this film and I love Slither.

Stargate: 15th Anniversary Edition (Blu-ray). How often does a television series outshine the movie that spawned it? I can only think of two examples: Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Stargate. Still, this movie is quite good and I think better of it now than I have in the past. I remember being very impressed with one of the DVD releases of this film, will they be able to impress me again on Blu-ray?

Nothing Like the Holidays (also Blu-ray). This is a great slice of life holiday film centering on a Puerto Rican family living in Chicago. The movie feels very genuine in its portrayal of family, Everyone comes together and issues arise and a variety of things happen that may be considered cliche, but they are handled with skill and tact here.

Orphan (also Blu-ray). I loved this movie when I saw it on the big screen. It had a great build up, great characters, and was genuinely surprising. This is a film I had low expectations for, expecting just another creepy kid movie. I was so glad to discover that it was something much more than that. I look forward to revisiting it on Blu-ray.

Whatever Works (also Blu-ray). Rumor has it this script was written in the 1970's and was intended for Zero Mostel. It was shelved following Mostel's death. It has now been unearthed and repurposed for Larry David. The movie turns out to be quite funny and more in line with old school Woody Allen than anything he has done in years. It is quite cynical and talky, but works perfectly for Larry David.

42nd Street Forever 5: The Alamo Drafthouse Edition. Another collection of strange, weird, and bizarre trailers for movies none of you have ever seen. This set focuses on the collection found at Austin's Alamo Drafthouse theater, a theater I want to visit at some point in my life. If you want to see something weird, this is for you.

The Living Dead of Manchester Morgue (Blu-ray). This movie is also known as Let Sleeping Corpses Lie. It begins with police chasing hippies accused of Manson-like murders. Unbeknownst to them, the true culprits are zombies! This has been on my horror "to see" list for awhile after neglecting to pick up the DVD release. Perhaps I should jump on this one.

The Asphyx. I have read that this early 1970's movie is rather talky and has more in line with Hammer films than with The Exorcist and what followed. It follows a man;s search for immortality. He is intent on capturing his asphyx, an apparition that appears at the moment of death, but only shows on photo plates. Sounds good to me!

Night of Death This 1980 horror film is one I am not familiar with at all. I did read that is a good gore film. On top of that, the star is Isabelle Goguey. Can you think of a better name for a horror actress?

The Butcher. I recently viewed this film and it is either a brilliant piece of exploitative, bloody horror, or one of the biggest pieces of trash ever made. The film comes from South Korea and is the story of the making of a snuff film. It is shot first person on digital video and it will definitely get under your skin and cause a reaction.