In her third horror remake within as many years, Jaime King (My Bloody Valentine 3D, Mother’s Day) stars as Aubrey Bradimore, a crossword-loving sheriff’s deputy forced to work on Christmas Eve — in particular, the annual Santa parade. She lives in a dreary small town where nothing really happens, but she’s in luck: There’s a […]
blu-ray
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Creep Van
For his sophomore effort, director Scott W. Mackinlay has reassembled much of his cast and crew from 2006’s Gag, including Brian Kolodziej, who takes the driver’s sear as Campbell, a young man forced to accept a lowly gig at a car wash after being fired from a grocery store for stealing porno magazines they don’t […]
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Bigfoot County
In li’l ol’ Siskiyou County, Calif., Bigfoot has been sighted 913 times in the last 25 years — so states the opening crawl of this found-footage film. Although the sought target is different, Bigfoot County copies The Blair Witch Project story template to a near T, what with sticks, tent rattling, heavy breathing at night […]
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A Vampire’s Tale
After unpacking his prized oldest obsidian mirror, Jacob inadvertently allows a time-traveling cowboy to cross over into our world, landing right smack in his barn. The cowboy, Phelan (Jonnie Hurn, The Zombie Diaries), is actually a hundreds-year-old vampire, not to mention one who makes references to The Shining, Army of Darkness and, um, City Slickers. […]
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Classic Albums: Peter Gabriel: So
To Classic Albums newcomers, the franchise delivers the “definitive authorised story” of a culture-shaking disc in feature-length form, relying on video clips, concert footage and many a talking-head interview from the talents who were there, on both sides of the studio glass. In this case, that includes Gabriel, other musicians, members of the tech team […]
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Painted Skin: The Resurrection
Five hundred years ago, a fox demon (Xun Zhou, Cloud Atlas) was imprisoned in the ice. Five hundred years later, she is freed, is nursed back to health, and wants to be human, yet has a heart hot enough to melt ice. This being an Asian epic fantasy, that doesn’t strike the other characters as […]
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Coma
Now, cable’s done the same thing with the perfectly fine ’70s sci-fi thriller Coma, which was directed by Crichton. Both updates come from director Mikael Salomon. It’s nice to see the lovely and talented Lauren Ambrose (Sleepwalk with Me) headlining the project as an idealistic med student who uncovers a conspiracy involving a remarkable number […]
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Kill ’Em All
Then, Saw-style, eight of them wake up locked in a dingy warehouse room dubbed The Killing Chamber, where hit men are taken to die. All of them are assassins, but only one will be allowed to leave after rounds and rounds of glorious mortal combat. So says Snakehead (Gordon Liu, the ’70s martial-arts superstar experiencing […]
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Big Tits Zombie
But I’ll give you several dozen more. Aoi plays Lena Jodo, the illiterate, chain-saw-wielding stripper heroine at the center of this unapologetic celebration of arterial spray and areola. As her club is being shut down, she and her fellow entertainers … wait, what’s that? I’m boring you? Apologies. How’s this instead: an old Asian midget, […]
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With Great Power …: The Stan Lee Story
But no household name has led a life devoid of conflict and drama, and the three-director doc skirts over those portions, because I assume this project was made with the subject’s full approval. It is — pardon my French — one ass-kisser of a career retrospective. To give credit where credit is due, Lee truly […]