Tits and Guns and Blood and Tits. Jason Statham‘s big-dick energy once again sees him running rampage in Los Angeles streets, mowing down gangsters, and getting laid in public. This movie’s predecessor, CRANK (2006) followed hitman Chev Chelios (Statham) after he was injected with a drug that would kill him if his adrenalin dropped below a certain level. Think SPEED … Read More
SAW VI
Would you like a little Death to go with your Life Insurance? Jigsaw’s back, and this time – he’s killing Health Insurance reps! And I think I speak for everyone when I say, “And?” It’s SAW VI, and vigilante Jigsaw (Tobin Bell, as ominous as ever!) has been terrorizing us for so long now (since 2004’s SAW), it was inevitable … Read More
FAST & FURIOUS
Too Furious To Act. FAST & FURIOUS is a dark horse in the F&F canon. This 4th film in the franchise is the least involving, as two men go after the same drug lord from different angles – one from the law, one from the street. Filled with pointless vignettes and exhilarating-yet-idiotic street racing, I lost interest as soon as … Read More
KISS | Sonic Boom
Classic Lightning, vocal frightening… t’s big and booming, it’s rock and roll and heavy metal, an homage to classic KISS and a testament to modern KISS. Sonic Boom is the 19th KISS studio album (after an 11-year gap since the last one – Psycho Circus, 1998); the 44th KISS release (counting Solos, Compilations and Live albums), the most successful KISS … Read More
DISTRICT 13: ULTIMATUM
We’ll Always Have Banlieue. Paris is burning. And only Parkour can save it. DISTRICT 13: ULTIMATUM is the high octane sequel to the atomic blast of DISTRICT 13 (2004). Like its predecessor, a guilty pleasure, full of the same running and jumping and skipping and flower arranging. At the conclusion of DISTRICT 13, undercover cop Damien (Cyril Raffaelli) united with … Read More
KNOWING
Not Knowing what’s coming next. Astrophysicist John Koestler (Nicolas Cage) discovers a page of handwritten numbers from a 50-year-old time-capsule opened at his son’s school, figuring out that they are dates when disasters occurred. Some of the dates have yet to arrive. Shades of numerology, CONTACT, Revelations, ANCIENT ALIENS, Chariots Of The Gods?, writers Ryne Douglas Pearson, Juliet Snowden and … Read More
LO
Lo and Behold. Ambitious, independent, smart and dumb at the same time, Travis Betz’s LO is about summoning demons, selling souls and whipping pussies. Justin (Ward Roberts) has lost his girlfriend April (Sarah Lassez), so summons the demon Lo (Jeremiah Burkett) to get her back. Not the usual modus operandi of getting drunk and scoring a hooker to numb the … Read More
HORSEMEN
HORSEMEN’s revelation is its downfall. Galloping over dell and dale comes HORSEMEN, one of those derivative films that makes you wish you were watching some of the films it was derived from. Music video director Jonas Åkerlund (Metallica, Madonna) helms this murder mystery surrounding bizarre torture-killings, involving Biblical messages, horrifying surgical procedures on conscious victims, custom-designed bondage devices and a … Read More
NOWHERE BOY
I Am The Baby Seal Jesus. It helps if you read this review with a nasal British accent. Bonus points for having a big cartoon nose. John Lennon’s high school principal tells him, “You’re going nowhere, son.” At that point, you’re meant to slap your thigh and exclaim “Hah! Little did he know!” Do you feel dirty yet? A mixture … Read More
IRON MAIDEN FLIGHT 666
Maiden Voyage. An incredible Iron Maiden backstage pass! For fans, non-fans and devil-worshippers alike. IRON MAIDEN FLIGHT 666 is not just onstage footage coupled with staged interviews. It is backstage, onstage, offstage and everything in between, settling in comfortably with heavy metal band Iron Maiden on their 2008 “Somewhere Back In Time” World Tour, which includes shows in Third World … Read More
REVOLUTIONARY ROAD
The Road To Nowhere leads straight through Suburbia… Most men lead lives of quiet desperation and go to the grave with the song still in them. — Henry David Thoreau. Leo and Kate–together again! For those emotionally trigger-happy TITANIC fans who thought REVOLUTIONARY ROAD would be a reteaming of their favorite star-crossed lovers to recapture lachrymose memories (like the manipulative … Read More
THE MEN WHO STARE AT GOATS
The Film That Stares Into Space. Your tax dollars at work. A few years ago, I read about the U.S. military exploring “paranormal combat techniques” in George W. Bush’s Fake War On Terror: using goats as test subjects, the Amerikan Military were trying to train soldiers to kill terrorists by staring at them to psychically stop their hearts. No, it’s … Read More
PANDORUM
Pablum-orum. PANDORUM is One Great Idea subsumed by all the bloodied action and trapped-in-space mayhem and frenzied filmstock required to hold a modern audience’s attention. But it frenzies up well, which accounts for its style-over-substance cucumber rating. Top-notch set design, direction, editing, all creating a claustrophobic impression of a star cruiser too long in space. Though PANDORUM is rife with … Read More
IN THE LOOP
So you like a little politics with your swearing… IN THE LOOP is a thunder-paced, dialogue-driven British comedy with corruption more insidious than SYRIANA and dialogue more fierce than PULP FICTION. Simon Foster (Tom Hollander) is a small-thinking, mealy-mouthed, indecisive, powerless British politician (i.e. your average politician, British or otherwise), craving to be taken seriously in the worst way. After … Read More
JULIE AND JULIA
The Cookie Monster Cometh. Before Wolfgang Puck, before Emeril, before Iron Chef – there was Julia Child. But which came first: this American pioneer and monster of home cooking, or Monty Python’s Pepperpots? Meryl Streep (as Julia Child) ululates her way through this exceptional little quasi-biopic sounding like Graham Chapman in a dress. JULIE AND JULIA parallels Julia Child’s life … Read More
PAUL BLART MALL COP
DIE HARD with a Segway. Kevin James is as funny as he can possibly be in PAUL BLART MALL COP – which means it’s a dull, uninspiring comedy that relies on him falling down and being fat a lot. In THE HANGOVER Ken Jeong laughs at plump Zack Gallifianakis clambering out of a car window with the comment, “It’s funny because … Read More
THE UGLY TRUTH
Uglier than we can imagine. THE UGLY TRUTH seems to be telling us that strong, intelligent women are not desirable, or at least, not as alluring as eye-candy T&A who exhibit only as much brainpower as required to breathe and fuck. Why does the movie make its leading lady an ambitious, intelligent, decisive woman until she is in the proximity … Read More
TOSH.0
Darwin Awards Redux. It’s nothing you can’t find on any jackass idiot moron website that collects videos of people doing jackass idiot moron things – but like a more biting version of MYSTERY SCIENCE THEATER 3000, like a retarded version of CANDID CAMERA, like a more intelligent version of comments posted under YouTube videos, television’s TOSH.0 is a wicked sign … Read More
INVICTUS
Pigskin Parable. Morgan Freeman gets South Africa to cheer together in a funny accent. INVICTUS follows South African president Nelson Mandela (Freeman) in 1995 as he fanatically throws his support behind the national rugby team, the Springboks, using them as a symbol to unify his nation riven by apartheid. It was a long shot, to be sure; he placed his … Read More
IT MIGHT GET LOUD
Whole Lotta Bruv. Three innovative guitarists three generations apart are brought together to talk guitar, live guitar and play guitar: Jack White, dynamo revolutionary red meat raw talent; Jimmy Page, who, along with Ritchie Blackmore, carved from caged lightning every riff that rock has ever known, and The Edge, who wears a nice wool cap. Written and directed by Davis … Read More