From 2005, Hostel drops three collegians into Amsterdam for a debauched vacation of pot and poon, only to accidentally become victims in a bizarre business in which the wealthy pay big bucks to torture the kidnapped in an underground warehouse. Roth spares nothing, leaving viewers to cringe at every slice of the Achilles tendon, snipped […]
trailer
Posted inArts & Culture
Batman: The Dark Knight Returns, Part 1
Christopher Nolan’s recent trilogy, concluding with this summer’s The Dark Knight Rises, owes more to Miller than Tim Burton’s two versions did, and on Rises’ boot heels comes an animated adaptation of Miller’s source material in Batman: The Dark Knight Returns, Part 1, directed by Jay Oliva (Green Lantern: Emerald Knights). At an hour and […]
Posted inMusic
The Wrath of God
As Father Van Horne, Mitchum is part of a small group of non-natives “recruited” by the local military to kill the ruthless leader Thomas De La Plata (Frank Langella, Unknown) in order to end the senseless killing he orders. For doing so, Father and friends (including burly Victor Buono from TV’s Man from Atlantis) are […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Klown
In order to convince his pregnant girlfriend (Mia Lyhne) that he is indeed “father material,” the goofy, gawky Frank (Frank Hvam) essentially kidnaps her 12-year-old nephew, Bo (Marcuz Jess Peterson), who’s staying with them while his parents are on vacation, and takes the pudgy, timid boy on a planned canoe trip. This comes to the […]
Posted inArts & Culture
OC87: The Obsessive Compulsive, Major Depression, Bipolar, Asperger’s Movie
OC87: The Obsessive Compulsive, Major Depression, Bipolar, Asperger’s Movie is a different kind of “head trip” film: one that puts the audience in the mind of its subject and co-director, Bud Clayman, a middle-aged man inflicted with all the maladies that make up the unwieldy title. Those like him and those who care for people […]
Posted inArts & Culture
General Education
Then again, it might not. Levi Collins (Chris Sheffield, Transformers: Dark of the Moon) is a Rushmore-esque high school senior so smart-ass, he has a sidekick. He also has a full college scholarship for tennis, but that’s in danger when he flunks science. In order to save it, he has to attend summer school without […]
Posted inMusic
The Five Man Army
The multiculti cast is led by Peter Graves as The Dutchman. For someone who grew up on multiple viewings of Airplane!, seeing Graves as a badass outlaw is something of a trip. At the time, he was about midway through his run on TV’s Mission: Impossible, and like that long-running series, Five Man Army finds […]
Posted inArts & Culture
The Tall Man
In just under two hours, a 36-hour ordeal is told, focusing on Julia (Jessica Biel, Total Recall), a free-clinic nurse turned supermom when her Chucky doll-looking son is kidnapped by The Tall Man. He drives a rusty van that practically screams “child molester.” I’ll give the film by writer/director Pascal Laugier (Martyrs) this: It throws […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Sitting Target
Oh, and she’s preggo. It’s not his. That revelation causes Harry to bust through the glass that separates them so he can get his paws around her neck. It’s an indication that this not-so-ordinary crime tale intends to do the same to audiences. In its day, I’m sure it did, being the first British film […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Goats
Based on an assumedly semiautobiographical novel and well-directed by a member of the Coppola filmmaking dynasty — Christopher Neil, nephew of Francis — Goats centers on Ellis (Graham Phillips, TV’s The Good Wife), who leaves the remote Arizona desert home he shares with his trust-fund hippie mom (Vera Farmiga, Safe House) for a prestigious prep […]