Apr
12
We’re back with the newest episode of my independent film review radio series, THE INDIE ON DEMAND MOVIE REVIEW. This time, we’re looking at KINYARWANDA, a new drama in which director Alrick Brown uses a fractured timeline and mutable genres to portray how the Rwandan genocide of 1994 looked to those trapped in its madness, …
Apr
08
Tricky situation this week: Two genre releases, but one, while good, is getting a very limited release to start; the other, while making it to more venues, doesn’t quite merit the attention. So we’re dipping into our 50th Anniversary archives to bring out a goody from 1962: BURN, WITCH, BURN (a.k.a. NIGHT OF THE EAGLE). …
Apr
06
For some, it is Valhalla; for others, it is a seething, roiling, chaotic pit of humanity. For many, I suspect, it’s a phenomenon just slightly more indecipherable than Naked Lunch. It is San Diego Comic-Con, and documentary filmmaker Morgan Spurlock, with the help of Stan Lee, Joss Whedon, and aintitcool’s Harry Knowles, has endeavored to …
Apr
01
In the curious ecology that is Hollywood, a film that’s best known as a poster child for what not to do when converting 2D to 3D and for a declarative that become something of a pop-culture punchline has to, of course, have a sequel. In WRATH OF THE TITANS, there’s no Kraken-releasing, but that doesn’t …
Apr
01
It’s the rare film that comes along and totally redefines the medium, but such a film is BIRDEMIC: SHOCK AND TERROR. From its striking visual style to its Oscar-worthy performances to its dazzling special effects to its powerful, environmental subtext, this tale of a small, California town enduring the wrath of a vengeful Mother Nature …
Mar
31
This gangster is haunted, literally. KEYHOLE begins with an inversion — a group of criminals have to fight their way past a police barricade into a house — and only gets stranger from there. Turns out their boss Ulysses Pick (Jason Patric), isn’t after any kind of swag, but an exorcism of the past. The …
Mar
30
It’s a good year for Joss Whedon. As director, his take on THE AVENGERS is coming out in May; he managed to complete a version of MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING that may also see release this year; and he co-produced the Morgan Spurlock-directed documentary, COMIC-CON IV: A FAN’S HOPE, that’s coming out April 6. (Not …
Mar
28
The newest episode of my short radio series THE INDIE ON DEMAND MOVIE REVIEW takes a look at 4:44 LAST DAY ON EARTH, in which Willem Dafoe and Shanyn Leigh are cast as a New York couple awaiting the end of the world, and director Abel Ferrara — he of such nihilistic exercises as …
Mar
26
Hunger will compel people to some extreme acts: lie; kill; volunteer your child to appear on TODDLERS & TIARAS. Who knew it could also lead to one of the best movies of the year? The highly anticipated THE HUNGER GAMES takes the first book of the popular young adult series — about a dystopic future …
Mar
23
There’s hardly room in multiplexes these days for films about love, and most that do get in are b.s. (unless you’re really into romantic entanglements between moody teen girls and even moodier teen vampires). But even if we were in the middle of a romance glut, THE DEEP BLUE SEA would stand out as an …
