Kundo: Age Of The Rampant (Blu-ray Review)
Kundo: Age Of The Rampant, the international box office hit and Asia’s answer to Robin Hood, debuts on Blu-ray from Well Go USA Entertainment. Set in mid-19th century, the tongue-in-cheek historical comedy-action film depicts a power struggle between the unjust wealthy noblemen who run society and a group of righteous outlaws who steal from corrupt officials to give to the downtrodden and starving. Directed by Yun Jong-bin, Kundo stars Ha Jung-woo, Kang Dong-won, Lee Sung-min of The Good The Bad and The Weird fame and Ma Dong-seok. When the film opened this summer, it broke all existing opening day box office records in South Korea. Most notably for us over here in the states, it shattered Transformers: Dark Of The Moon‘s opening weekend record. Continue reading ‘Kundo: Age Of The Rampant (Blu-ray Review)’
Growing up as a child in the early 80s I fell in love with the old black-and-white Universal Monsters films that my dad would leave playing carelessly on the tube. For some reason, even as a young child, I just wasn’t scared of Lon Chaney as the Wolf Man or Boris Karloff as Frankenstein. Instead, I was obsessed. I just couldn’t get enough of the rich monster lore and their associated worlds, even if it was all in black-and-white. However, while I was still too young to remember this, a low budget independent movie hit the big screen in 1978 that forever changed the world of horror movies and was responsible for peaking the age of the “slasher” titles with rich iconic villains such as 
Today’s your lucky day and you just don’t know it yet, but I am going to tell you why. It’s with great enthusiasm and joy that I announce to you that this December 2nd you get to experience the first season of TV’s hottest, most blood-curdling sci-fi series from Executive Producers-Writers Guillermo Del Toro, Carlton Cuse and Chuck Hogan, The Strain Season One. Along with every blood sucking Season One episode that just finished airing a couple weeks back on FX you’ll be blessed with behind-the-scenes special features that explore the story’s journey from bestselling novel to hit show. How much more exciting can today get for you? Read on and find out!
Boyhood is a film that I was very interested in seeing this year, but try as I might I did not get around to it. It’s hailed as “a moving 12-year epic that isn’t quite like anything else in the history of cinema” (Andrew O’Hehir, Salon), “a breathtaking achievement” (Ann Hornaday, The Washington Post) and “a profound viewing experience” (Manohla Dargis, The New York Times). And now it’s official! Writer/director Richard Linklater’s extraordinary film Boyhood debuts on Blu-ray Combo Pack and DVD January 6, 2015 from Paramount Home Media Distribution. It should also be noted that the film arrives four weeks early on Digital HD December 9, 2014. I can’t wait to experience it! Check out the full press release below. 
Within in two months’ time, Scream Factory has brought horror fans two holy grails of their fandom. Last month it was the legendary producer’s cut of Halloween: The Curse Of Michael Myers which had been circulating on ratty VHS bootlegs for almost two decades. This month, its one that fans haven’t really been able to get their hands on but had heard about for years; Clive Barker’s intended version of his critical and box office disappointment, Nightbreed. Scream Factory, along with Barker and restoration producer Alan Miller have got on board to put together the film from recently found elements to put together the definitive cut of the movie. In this review I am only covering the release of the Director’s Cut standalone release. There is also a limited edition (limited to 10,000, still available as of writing this review) that contains the theatrical cut as well as a disc dedicated to more bonus material. 
New York Comic Con 2014 certainly went out with a bang, as Day 4 brought more surprises and gossip-filled panels for all the fans in attendance on Sunday. Once again it was the television panels that generated the most interest, with new Batman-origins show Gotham taking the top spot. The cast and crew were on-hand to answer questions and talk about their experiences on the show so far. Gotham fans were also treated to a special sneak peak of scenes from upcoming episodes. 
Summer blockbusters are always a thing to look forward to. Big movies are like events to hit up. Well, the small screen now has its own movie event tradition in the summer. Sharknado took viewers and social media by storm last July. A second film was inevitable. This past July, Ian Ziering, Tara Reid and director Anthony C Ferrante returned for Sharknado 2: The Second One. This time SyFy was ready and had this thing ready to be the social media viewing experience of the year. They even named the film from their contest to tweet them your idea for a title. They went with this one, even though I thought Patton Oswalt’s Shaknadeux was far more fun and clever. For a third go around, I’d like to throw my idea for it to be called Sharknado! Sharknado! Sharknado! into the basket. 
Life is full of disappointments. They can range from not getting a promotion you were up for, or your favorite restaurant closing down. However, few things in life can match the eye rolling anger that one gets when a favorite movie comes out on Blu-ray and disappoints us at every turn. It’s almost like the Chicago Cubs making it to the post season… you just can’t believe it. 
When it comes handheld console gaming, it is an undeniable fact that this is Nintendo’s world and we just live in it. From the Game Boy to the Nintendo DS and 3DS, the Big N’s systems repeatedly crush any and all opponents (Game Gear, Game.com or Atari Lynx anyone?). But when Sony threw their hat into the ring with the PlayStation Portable (PSP), they turned a few heads because of the immense popularity of the PlayStation brand name and Nintendo had not faced a corporate giant like Sony in the handheld world. The PlayStation and PlayStation 2 both outsold the competing Nintendo home consoles by a very comfortable margin, so could Sony do the same in the portable market? 
Pee-wee’s Playhouse was very much an integral part of my childhood viewing. I was the prime audience back in the day. Every Saturday morning I would get up, have my marshmallow-y cereal and watch my cartoons. Pee-wee’s Playhouse was always the very last show on in the morning. The networks usually transitioned by having some live action stuff on at the end of the morning, like say Saved By The Bell and California Dreams. Pee-wee’s Playhouse was all sorts of things to me. It was wild, hilarious, fun and even some of the things on the show made me uneasy and creeped me out. It was jam packed and loading me with all sorts of emotion. Watching the show was equivalent to a massive sugar rush. Everybody my age had themselves a Pee-Wee Herman doll with the pull string and we also constantly quoted him and had our own impressions of him finely tuned ready to dial up at the right moment. And now I get to relive all of that through this fantastic new Blu-ray release from the amazing folks over at Shout! Factory. 
Last October, Scream Factory ghoulishly delighted everyone for Halloween with the release of The Vincent Price Collection. Six of the iconic horror actor’s works in one set with some definite gems of bonus features. Of those, there were the introductions and parting words for many of the films from the Iowa PBS archives from the 80s that had price discussing each film before and after it in a haunting library like setting. This year, Scream Factory is back with another volume of Price, up’ing the ante to now seven titles. This box set also has more commercially appealing titles to it as well, as it contains classics like The Raven, The House On Haunted Hill, Return Of The Fly, The Comedy Of Terrors and The Last Man On Earth to name some. It is with great pleasure that I return to these and share my experience. 
