Archive Page 523
May 4th, 2012 by Jami Ferguson
America’s favorite – and quirkiest — exterminator is back for more unexpected on-the-job adventures with
Billy the Exterminator: The Complete Season Four! In this funny family docusoap about the zaniest pest removal company on the planet, we join Billy Bretherton, who runs Vexcon, one of Louisiana’s busiest pest removal companies, with the help of his brother Ricky, whom he describes as “just as crazy as me,” his father Bill Sr., and his sassy mom Donnie, who runs the office. In season four, sees Billy hit the road for the first time, in search of challenges that are bigger, better and badder than ever. Whether he’s going after giant pythons in the Florida Everglades, wrestling 10-foot gators in Texas, chasing a herd of razor-toothed javelina in Arizona, or fighting off an aerial attack by 30-pound geese in North Carolina, Billy comes to the rescue with humor, compassion… and a whole lot of attitude.
Continue reading ‘Billy the Exterminator: The Complete Season Four (DVD Review)’
May 4th, 2012 by Aaron Neuwirth
I love it when a plan comes together. In one of the most ambitious film proposals in recent memory, The Avengers has finally arrived and paid off greatly. Setting itself up back in 2008 with Iron Man and adding on layers through the other four Marvel Comic films that have come since, the massive gamble of bringing in multiple actors, directors, studios, and comic properties has led to what is basically the ultimate Marvel superhero film. Frankly, this film should not even exist. It seems unwieldy to think about combining so many elements into one feature and not have it topple due to the lack of fair balance or the lack of a cohesive and unifying story, but writer/director/comic geek Joss Whedon has managed to pull it off and deliver a ridiculously satisfying experience. Continue reading ‘‘The Avengers’ Assemble For A Comic Book Fever Dream Of Fun’
May 3rd, 2012 by Gregg Senko
Last week I released a story covering the rebirth of Valiant Comics along with reboot mentions of some of their best selling titles from the 1990’s. With X-O Manowar being the publisher’s flagship title back in the day, they made a common sense decision making the one-man army their first release in 2012. So was this do-over worth the read? Was the art worth a second look? You know the drill. Read on to check out the new Valiant’s exciting first release.
Continue reading ‘X-O Manowar – Issue 1 Reviewed’
May 3rd, 2012 by Aaron Neuwirth
Wednesday night, May 2, 2012, at the Newport Beach Film Festival gave me the chance to see something different for a change. As opposed to another independent comedy/drama (which was the type of film I saw at the next screening), the film I was able to catch a showing of was Detention of the Dead, a horror-comedy about high school students caught up in the middle of a zombie apocalypse. The film is very lighthearted, playing out as a riff on both The Breakfast Club and Shaun of the Dead, even though it never quite reaches those levels. Still, the film is a fun enough watch that is very cute overall, in a gore-filled, dumb comedy sort of way. It does not really add much to the genre, but it’s a fun little ode to the joy of seeing zombie movies. Continue reading ‘NBFF Review: Detention Of The Dead’
May 3rd, 2012 by Aaron Neuwirth
After seeing Supporting Characters at the Newport Beach Film Festival, the next film I saw that Tuesday night was Le Skylab, written and directed by Julie Delpy. The film is a French comedy/drama that features Delpy, among many other well cast individuals, all playing the members of a large family, gathering for a reunion of sorts, as they honor a grandmother’s birthday at her country home. The film plays around with the various dynamics seen between all of the different family members and has many moments of humor, emotion, and depth in understanding where everyone is coming from. It is more aimless than plot driven, but it is an enjoyable film that brings a lot out of its ensemble cast. Continue reading ‘NBFF Review: Le Skylab’
May 2nd, 2012 by Aaron Neuwirth
Tuesday night, May 1, 2012, at the Newport Beach Film Festival proved to be a pretty entertaining one. I managed to see a couple films, which were both very enjoyable. The first was Supporting Characters, a film about two young film editors in New York, who are in the middle of working on a film project that has lasted for months, while also sorting out their romantic relationships. Despite being set in modern times, the tone and handling of the characters and various scenes of dialogue definitely calls back to 70s Woody Allen, regardless of how successful it is in truly matching up. The film may be a little too loose and all over the place as a whole, but there was a charming quality to all that was occurring and I enjoyed the core friendship in this story. It is too well scripted to be described as breezy, but it certainly fits the type of being a film that gets by with ease. Continue reading ‘NBFF Review: Supporting Characters’
May 2nd, 2012 by Aaron Neuwirth
On April 26th, 2012, the opening night of the Newport Beach Film Festival saw the world premiere of Jewtopia. Based on one of the longest running off-Broadway plays, Jewtopia is the film adaptation, which revolves around two friends dealing with the prospect of finding love with Jewish women. Unfortunately, while billed as a “comedy”, I can’t recall ever even smiling during this terrible feature. Jewtopia turned out to be one of the worst films I have seen in recent time, managing to leave me so unsettled that I could not honestly write up a review immediately after I saw it, choosing to let my emotions simmer down instead. Now, even after having calmed down, I still have nothing very positive to say. The cast and crew may have had a good time, but the bad jokes, bad story, poorly established comedic style, among other factors, all proved to sum up to a bad time at the movies for me. Continue reading ‘NBFF Review: Jewtopia’
May 2nd, 2012 by Matt Goodman
After [intentionally] missing the theatrical release of One For the Money, I finally got around to watching one of 2012’s least-talked-about movies! I’m saying all of this due to the underwhelming 2% approval rating from Rotten Tomatoes and the many poor things I heard. Aside from that one film I liked of hers (Knocked Up), Katherine Heigl gives one of her worst roles, even topping her flop a few years ago, Killers. Enough of that, let’s get on to the goods: One for the Money, based on the best-selling book written by Janet Evanovich, is about a normal woman becoming a fake officer to do well on her cousin’s bail bond assignment. I guess she’s looking for a few not-so-good-men (wonderful tagline, folks)! Does One for the Money make the big bucks? Read on for more. Continue reading ‘One for the Money (Blu-ray Review)’
May 1st, 2012 by Gerard Iribe
Two brothers with very different ways of looking at the world come together to help each other find their way in the “whimsical comedy” (Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times) JEFF, WHO LIVES AT HOME, debuting on Blu-ray and DVD (both with UltraViolet™) June 19, 2012 from Paramount Home Media Distribution. The film will also be available On Demand and for Digital Download on June 15, 2012. Jason Segel (Forgetting Sarah Marshall) as the hapless title character, Ed Helms (The Hangover 1 & 2) as his slightly more accomplished brother and Academy Award® winner* Susan Sarandon as their long-suffering mother are “beyond wonderful”
(Peter Travers, Rolling Stone) in this quirky and hilarious comedy from Mark and Jay Duplass (Cyrus). Continue reading ‘‘Jeff, Who Lives at Home’ on Blu-ray June 19th’
May 1st, 2012 by Gerard Iribe
Kicking criminal butts and taking the law into his own hands, Danny Trejo (Machete, “Sons of Anarchy”) ignites the screen in the gritty, violent and enthralling film Bad Ass, arriving on Blu-ray and DVD June 5 from Twentieth Century Fox Home Entertainment. Inspired by the viral video of a vigilante citizen taking action into his own hands, Bad Ass also stars Ron Perlman (“Sons of Anarchy,” Hellboy) and Charles S. Dutton (Alien 3). Decorated Vietnam hero Frank Vega returns home only to get shunned by society leaving him without a job or his high school sweetheart. It’s not until 40 years later when an incident on a commuter bus, where he protects an elderly black man from a pair of skin heads, makes him a local hero and he’s suddenly celebrated once again. But his good fortune suddenly turns for the worse when his best friend Klondike is murdered and the police aren’t doing anything about it. Continue reading ‘‘Bad Ass’ on Blu-ray June 5th’
May 1st, 2012 by Aaron Neuwirth
Modern action stars are rare to come by these days. There are plenty of past action stars who occasionally star in action movies still and there are younger actors that have done a few action movies, but a true action star is not as big a commodity these days. One of the few still consistently putting out work is Jason Statham. It is unfortunate that Statham’s films continue to only pick up moderate success, as he has a cool, steely charisma and knows how to deliver a whoopin’, but at least the man is fairly consistent. Safe delivers a fairly conventional action film experience, which is made better in spurts do to the early work done to really establish the characters, before settling into crazy action mode. It helps that Statham adds some shades to his performance here, that distinguishes his character a bit more, this time around, but mainly, Safe delivers what fans would want in their standard Statham action film. Continue reading ‘You’re Generally ‘Safe’ In The Hands Of Statham’
May 1st, 2012 by Aaron Neuwirth
Chemistry can certainly make up for a film that is way too relaxed. The Five-Year Engagement is a film that follows a pretty standard formula, despite the few tweaks and R-rated sensibilities, but ultimately never rises above average at best, given effort to shove so much into a film that runs far too long. It is fortunate that the film has a large, funny, and mostly likable cast. The leads, in particular, have a strong chemistry together, which makes the film work better than it could have been, were it to be handled differently. Still, the over-reliance on various tangents and lack of a stronger core makes the film uneven overall, despite being quite funny when it shines best. The fact that drama plays heavily into the film also reflects on the tonal issues I had, but there is still enough here that I found nice enough to ease into a very mild recommendation for an easy rental. Continue reading ‘Some Laughs And Unevenness Throughout This ‘Five-Year Engagement’’
May 1st, 2012 by Aaron Neuwirth
Monday night, April 30, 2012, at the Newport Beach Film Festival proved to be fairly worthwhile, as I was able to see a fairly entertaining thriller. This was the Norwegian film Headhunters, which felt, in a lot of ways, like a nice follow up to other recent trashy thrillers such as Limitless or even The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (when referring the basic plot of that film). Headhunters is not so much a film that has deeper meanings as it is a film that simply sets up some key characters and lets various amounts of suspense and action follow suit. The film has some tonal issue, as the thrilling nature of the film is counterbalanced by some over-the-top elements, but for the most part, Headhunters is a pretty entertaining (and violent) way to spend a couple hours. Continue reading ‘NBFF Review: Headhunters’
April 29th, 2012 by Brian White
The world needed another Underworld film, right? Of course it did! Don’t kid yourself for one single minute that Kate Beckinsale’s tight, formfitting black leather outfit doesn’t fill theater seats. Of course it/she does! And don’t fret! Sony Pictures didn’t let us down. Not by a long shot, in my opinion. There’s plenty of Kate Beckinsale a$$ shots to go around. Rest assured…even if you’re Gregg Senko and this is your most anticipated film of 2012, it’s hard, again…in my opinion, not to at least have some fun with this a$$ kicking fourth entry in the Underworld franchise. Everyone loves a good time, right? Why so serious?! Continue reading ‘Underworld: Awakening (Blu-ray Review)’
April 28th, 2012 by Gerard Iribe
Steven Soderbergh is back with his latest indy film disguised as a big budget feature, which features an all-star cast and marks the debut of MMA female champion Gina Carano. Who’s in Haywire? Everyone. You’ve got Michael Douglas, Ewan McGregor, Antonio Banderas, Channing Tatum, Michael Fassbender, Bill Paxton, and a partridge and a pear tree. Seriously, with that much talent in front and behind the camera, one would be hard pressed to not think that the Haywire is something special. Well, we’re here to find out if all that awesomeness transcends into an awesome feature film. Keep reading and we’ll tell you. Boom! Continue reading ‘Haywire (Blu-ray Review)’
April 28th, 2012 by Jami Ferguson
Through portraits of its most influential Pharaohs, Planet Egypt investigates Egypt’s incredible legacy: King Narmer, who united more than 40 regional tribes into the first Egyptian civilization; Thutmose III, who expanded and secured Egypt’s borders; Amnenhotep III and his revolutionary son Akhenaten, who attempted to break the power of the priests and reorganize the traditional role of religion; and Ramsses II, the great builder of temples and tombs who devoted his life to the cult of death. Threaded throughout are intimate details of typical Egyptian daily life. From feats of engineering and the most ambitious construction projects in history, to its obsession with life, death and immortality, the amazing story of ancient Egypt still astounds us today. Continue reading ‘Planet Egypt (DVD Review)’
April 28th, 2012 by Aaron Neuwirth
Here is an example of a film that I wish was sillier. As it stands, The Raven is a slickly made thriller about a serial killer who goes to implausibly complex extents to recreate scenes from the more gruesome works of Edgar Allan Poe, but it suffers due to it not being much fun to watch. The film could have gone two ways to help itself out. The Raven could have gone a very serious route and played out like a 19th century Se7en. Or, the film could have added a layer of camp or more dark humor and turned out to be something like Tim Burton’s Sleepy Hollow. Unfortunately, The Raven falls somewhere in the middle; with John Cusack being the only thing to help it along, aside from some neat production aspects. The story never becomes more than bland; the other characters are equally uninteresting, and the results are fairly lackluster. What starts out as a neat idea is ultimately unfulfilling. Continue reading ‘I’ve Seenith ‘The Raven’, Nevermore’
April 28th, 2012 by Aaron Neuwirth
I will just start by not apologizing for my title, as I will easily sacrifice spelling for the sake of alliteration. With that out of the way, I think it is wonderful to see a new stop-animation motion picture from Aardman Animations. Being one who is a big fan of Wallace & Gromit, I was thrilled to be going back into a world of very specific character designs and some dry British humor. ‘Pirates!’ did manage to deliver quite a bit in that regard, even if it was a bit different from what I was expecting. Regardless, with plenty of jokes that range from subtle to off-kilter and an inherent level of sweetness that is always seen in Aardman Animations, The Pirates! A Band of Misfits is a fun take on a swashbuckling story and it has a great look to it. Continue reading ‘‘Pirates!’ Plunder A Plethora of Phun!’
