Better to Rule in War than Serve in Peace

When I think of samurais, I cannot say that Wes Bentley (P2) is high on my list of people who would play one. But there he is in a haircut the borders on a mullet in Hirokin: The Last Samurai (which is not to be confused with the Tom Cruise flick, another very Caucasian dude whose name does not conjure up visions of samurais). Like any good sci-fi flick, this movie starts off with a heavy back-story: humans came to a new, stole all its resources, and then left aside from a few who stayed to rule over the original inhabitants. That is until one hero (Bentley, of course), haunted by his past, has to find a way to help the rebels rise up against their oppressors.

It should be noted that the alien race look identical to humans except you can see veins in their hands so a lot of the character spend the movie sticking their hands out like Diana Ross telling you to stop in the name of love. It is actually not that hard to tell the two races apart because for some reason the human warriors wear helmets, on a desert planet, that look like a cross between the one Boba Fett and the Cylons from the original Battlestar Galactica.

Really you can make a drinking game out of the Star Wars references from the Tatooine-type setting, Bentley’s Obi Wan Kenobi type robe, there is even a character that has a duel (though non-light) saber. The movie does pull out some cool moves of its own like Bentley’s bungee sword and an extremely evil and twisted game the antagonists make locals play for his own enjoyment, but really, most the characters fall flat (there is a pair shoehorned in for comic relief that should have been shoehorned in a little more) thanks to a think plot while a few actors were clearly phoning it in.

The DVD is also thin on extras. There are a few deleted scenes, but the menu lacks a “Play All” option. There are also three featurettes but all of them are under five minutes each.

Full Disclosure Notice: This DVD was given to me by Lionsgate to review.

Will Obama's America Offer Real Solutions or More Slogans

In a measure of full disclosure I should first say I am a registered Republican. I did not vote for Barack Obama four years ago and do not plan to vote for him in two weeks. Although I really do not go around announcing my conservatism much lately because my party has become a party of nutjobs who spout the most unbelievable things like our president was not born in this country and is a Muslim (even though four years ago he was anti-American because his Christian minister once said negative things about this country). 2016: Obama's America is supposed to be the thinking man’s attack on the president. There are no accusations of being a Muslim or even being born in Kenya or even hints at them (it even points out two separate newspapers in Hawaii that announced Obama’s birth).

The movie is based on the book by Dinesh D’Souza, The Roots of Obama's Rage which he wrote in 2010. The tagline claims, “Love him, hate him… you don’t know him”. Except after watching the movie, there really was not much of the movie that I found new. There was one guy that Dinesh called one of Obama’s “founding fathers” (along with people like the 2008 buzz person Bill Ayers) who was a registered communist. Except like all the other “founding fathers” (aside from Reverend Wright) there are no pictures of Barry with any of these people (even the liberal communist were able to find one picture of George Bush with Jack Abramoff). If he was so close to these people to the point they shape his policy, why is he never pictured with them. And Dinesh sure likes his pictures because the one of Barry smoking (something) is shown multiple times.

Even in the film, D’Souza features a cable show where he tells some talking head that accusing Obama as a Muslim and a socialist have not worked, so he has moved to attack number three: Barack Obama is anti-imperialist. Who knew there were imperialists left to be anti to? (Ironically the day after I watch this movie, I read an article by conservative commentator Niall Ferguson reporting a story where Chinese nationalist surrounded the US ambassador to the nation chanting “Down with US imperialism!).

Why is Barack Obama an anti-imperialist? Because his father was Kenyan and Barack wants to continue the Mau Mau uprising that kicked out imperialist British Army. To all of the even keel thinkers out there that are wondering, “You mean that Barry, who was raised by two Kansas women, was influenced by a man that abandoned him and only met once in his life?” And before you suggest that abandoned sons usually distance themselves from their absentee father, Dinesh finds a psychologist who specializes abandonment where the two men, who never met Barack Obama theorize that he is the an exception to the rule. Keep in mind earlier in the film Dinesh theorizes what would have happened had he stayed in his native India where he thinks he would have had been in an arrange marriage and the like, yet Barack, growing up in America, still ended up like his Kenyan father that he barely knew.

The first anti-imperialist argument that D’Souza is that the first thing Obama did after being inaugurated was to return a bust of Winston Churchill that the White House had since the 60’s to England. Except the reality is that the bust from the 60’s is still there, and the bust that was returned was loaned (note loaned, not permanently given to) to George W. Bush after 9/11 and was cleared out of the Oval Office with all of the other art and furniture that Bush put in there during his two terms. Obama’s supposed anti- British streak continued when D’Souza says that Obama supports Argentina gaining control of the Falkland Island but when I did a simple Google search most articles I read said that Obama is neutral on the issue.

After an hour of Obama history, D’Souza finally gets to theorizing what 2016 will look like if we reelect the anti-imperialist Obama which includes a world where Obama gets rid of all of our nuclear weapons because he is on the record of wishing we could live in a world without nuclear weapons (confessed Reaganite Dinesh conveniently omits that Ronald Reagan said the exact same thing). He also theorizes that because of Obama’s foreign policy that in four years we may see “The United States of Islam” that would stretch from Morocco to Pakistan (surprisingly his map leaves out Obama’s ancestral home of Kenya) even though many of the countries in Islam Fantasyland hate each other as much as they hate us.

The only potential doomsday scenario that Dinesh exposes that I agree with is that our debt will bring down the country, though I disagree that Obama wants it to happen because of his anti-imperialism. But this is not a Barack Obama problem; both Democrats and Republican have a spending problem that they need to reign in. One of the commentators that D’Souza speaks to even dings George W. Bush for his overspending. Granted Dinesh does conveniently omit in his stat that Americans have lost a large percentage of their wealth since 2006 that two of those years were under Bush.

Politics aside, 2016: Obama’s America just looks just a step above student film with hilariously staged dramatization and bizarre sound choices. While talking about a debate he had with Jesse Jackson, the dramatization actually depicts a black dude walking into what looks like a biker bar where the white patrons give the black dude a birthday cake. But still is not as funny as Dinesh doing the hula while researching Obama’s past. And it was were in a taped phone conversation, which looked more staged than one on The Hills, the sound would inexplicably change depending if the camera was on Dinesh or the person he was talking to.

When it comes down to it, 2016: Obama’s America will only make the people who already have an irrational hated of Barack Obama crazier and will make Obama supporters laugh more than they did for this week’s episode Modern Family. While people in the middle will not bother to watch it unless their crazy uncle forces them to. Just take the movie as it is, just something Dinesh D’Souza put out to make money. Actually, Dinesh may have changed my vote, I had no intentions of voting for Obama, but now I kind of want to see how wrong his movie is. And since I live in Ohio, my vote may very well decide the election.


Full Discourse Notice: This DVD was given to me by Lionsgate for review.

Act Like Nothing’s Wrong, That’s What Mom Did

What do you do when all of your kids cancel on your family reunion the day before they are supposed to arrive? Well if you are Robert De Niro, you pack up a suitcase and take a cross country trip by train, bus, and even truck truck drive (from an all too brief cameo from Melissa Leo). Despite the cheery title Everybody's Fine (2009) and the smiles on the cover, the movie is not as humorous as it suggests. It is a family drama that will still have a few humor moments but your heart strings will be tickled more than your funny bone.

De Niro just lost his wife and this was the first time he was going to get together with all four children since she passed. The mom was the one that talked to the children while De Niro, who worked a menial job to give his children a better life, just got the Cliff Notes (hint, it is the title). So De Niro goes from New York City to Chicago to Denver to Las Vegas to catch up with his children, played by Kate Beckinsale, Sam Rockwell, and Drew Barrymore) to see what he was missing without the reunion. Sure the movie almost plays like a hundred minute version of Harry Chapin’s Cat's In the Cradle, but De Niro’s subtle performance makes the road less bumpy.

The 2009 film is on Blu-Ray for the very first time (which is a bit surprising considering even I had a Blu-Ray by then). It is light on extra; there is about ten minutes of deleted and extended scenes. There is another ten minute feature with Paul McCartney explains how he came to wrote the song that plays over the closing credits, (I Want To) Come Home.

Full Disclosure Notice: The Blu-Ray was given to me by Lionsgate for review.

Her Gift Made Her Obedient, but Her Heart Made Her Kind

Before she was Catwoman, Anne Hathaway was America’s sweetheart, every girl wanted to be her and every boy had a crush on her thanks to kid friendly fare like The Princess Diaries. She followed that up with other kind of fairytale Ella Enchanted. Much like the Diaries, Hathaway charm is on full display. After watching the film I am reminded how good Hathaway is at comedy and it is a shame she does not do more films that show off her humorous side (really the only comedies that she has appeared in the flesh since was the best part of the otherwise forgettable Valentine's Day).

Hathaway plays the titular character that was given the “gift” of obedience at birth. Every time someone tells her to do something, she has to do it. The spell is so powerful that she even has to do it even if it is a sarcastic demand like the time a classmate learns the hard way it may not be wise to tell Ella to “Bite me.” Somehow she makes adolescences unscathed without anyone realizing her curse. That is until her father remarries and her new step-sister, Lucy Punch (in one of her first American films before going on to steal scenes in movies like Dinner for Schmucks), realizes Ella does everything she asks and decides to use it to her advantage.

In true fairy tale tradition, Ella head out on a quest, this time to find the fairy who gave her the give of obedience (a tipsy Vivica A Fox, Independence Day) and collects a rag tag group of fairy tale outcasts (elves, giants, and ogres, oh my) on her trip as well as a handsome prince (Hugh Dancy, who really has not taken off here in the states but will fill the shoes of Will Graham in the upcoming televised version of Hannibal) that Ella just writes off as a pretty face. But the infatuation grows the ire of his evil uncle (Cary Elwes who knows a thing or two about princesses) that wants the crown for himself.

With the resurgence of fairy tales on Once Upon a Time and Grimm, it may be time to give Ella Enchanted another look (or a first one in you missed the 2004 the first time around and perfect for any girl that has been born since then) and the film is more family friendly that the two show. And for those wondering about Hathaway’s singing voice with her upcoming role as Fantine in the movie version of Les Miserables, she actually sings two songs in Ella Enchanted including Queen’s Somebody to Love. It is also a plus that the film has Monty Python’s Eric Idle as the narrator.

This is the first time Ella Enchanted has been available on Blu-Ray and it is actually a combo pack that includes a DVD copy too. Both disks include the same features (except the DVD features some DVD-ROM features) including deleted and extended scenes. There is also an audio commentary with Hathaway, Dancy, and director Tommy O’Haver. There is a half an hour featurette The Magical World of Ella Enchanted as well as Ella Enchanted Red Carpet Premiere Special hosted by Jesse McCartney and Kari Kimmel although both features share a lot of the same video. Kimmel’s music video for It’s Not Just Make Believe is also included.


Full Disclosure Notice: this Blu-Ray was given to me by Lionsgate for review.

It Wasn't Done for a Man to Reject a Woman who Freely Gave Herself

Really, what else is there to do on a hot summer days in Manhattan than to hook up with people? That is essentially the plot 30 Beats where ten extremely attractive New Yorkers get it on with each other one by one. No, this is not five vignettes of the characters pairing off. Instead the movie starts with two characters hooking up, and then one of them leaves to find a new person to spend special time with and so on until we meet all ten people in the film.

The cast has some familiar faces including Justin Kirk (Weeds), Lee Pace (Pushing Daisies), Jennifer Tilly (Bride of Chucky), and Paz de la Huerta (Boardwalk Empire). But do not expect to see much of any of them because no one gets more than ten minutes of screen time in the whole movie. Which also means it is hard to invest in any of the characters because by the time you start to care about them, they are already done with their part. I even thought they may pop up Lost style in other people stories, but that rarely happens during the film.

For a movie about ten people having sex with each other, you would think it would veer into Skinamax territory, but surprisingly every time two characters start to get down to business, the screen fades to black, and picture does not come back until some post- coitus time. Do not worry, the film is not completely void of skin, you will get to see plenty of beautiful French actress Vahina Giocante, and for the ladies, you will get to see Kirk getting into a bathtub.

30 Beats is the thinking (wo)man’s softcore porn movie, but without the actual sex being shown. Sure you take out the sex and most people will not care, but if you are into arty films about the human psyche, you may enjoy the film. For those that have seen it already and are thinking about adding it to your collection, be warned the only bonus feature on the DVD is the theatrical trailer, so you will not be getting anything new out of it.


Full Disclosure Notice: This DVD was given to me by BH Impact to review.

This Is No Fairytale, the Stories Are Real

Grimm finished up its early Monday run this week before returning to its regular Friday timeslot on the 28 (your TV Guide may say there is a new Grimm this Monday but it is wrong, NBC will be airing the Pilots of The New Normal and Go On at that time). If you need a Grimm fix over the next twenty-four days until a new episode airs, you can relive the first season on DVD or Blu-Ray on shelves now. Of course for those interested in give the show a shot, you can pick up the first season, then watch the first four episodes of season two, and be caught up by the time it returns (that is just over an episode a day).

For the unaware, Grimm was created by David Greenwalt who was a writer for Buffy the Vampire Slayer before going on to co-create the spin-off Angel with Joss Whedon. Grimm is very similar in tone to Angel in that is dark, creepy, with flashes of humor. But instead of a vampire, the lead is a Grimm, a descendant of the guys that wrote all the fairytales, except all the stories turned out to be based in reality and the Grimm’s were tasked to hunting down all the big bad wolfs and the like (Grimm’s have the ability to see the creatures in their true form when humans cannot) before they attack young girls wearing red.

But like his previous show, not everything that goes bump in the night is a bad guy. The Grimm even teams up with a modern Big Bad Wolf, known here as a Blutbad (all the creatures, or Wesen, have a German sounding name) that helps the Grimm identify everything he is up against and the sidekick turns out to be the best part of the show. And the Grimm has to do this while trying to keep his new reality from colliding with his life as cop (with a very shady boss who know more than he is letting on) and his long time girlfriend. Some of the other fairytales tacked in the first season include Goldilocks and the Three Bears, The Three Little Pigs, Rapunzel, Big Foot, and The Pied Piper.

Both the DVD and Blu-Ray are filled with extras including deleted and extended scenes from 13 episodes that add up to about and extra 30 minutes including a scene from the Pilot that shows Juliette in a very different job then she ended up having on the show. There is also a featurette The World of Grimm where you can learn the inspirations behind the storylines, characters and creatures. There is another one that focuses how the team brings the monsters to life. There is also a gag reel, highlight reels, and audition tapes which includes Reggie Lee (who would go on and be cast as Sergeant Wu) auditioning for the role of Hank. I also like that each episode includes its “Previously On” clip which is inexplicably not standard on all television box sets.

The Blu-Ray set is well made and even includes a glossary printed inside of all the monsters on the show (which I assume are also printed on the DVD set). I do like that the fold out box set comes with a Velcro type substance that holds it together when closed. I do not like that the disk are pulled out of a sleeve making it easier to scratch instead of the safer pop out version. For a limited time, each set comes with two collectable trading cards (I got the Blutbad and Hexenbiest) as well as an UltraViolet code which you have until 2015 to redeem by if you want to put off buying the season until later. The big reason to pick up the Blu-Ray over the DVD for those with HD capabilities is that the Blu-Ray version includes an Interactive Grimm Guide which look like pages out of the Grimm family books with a page dedicated to each Wesen from the first season (sorry, no previews of baddies to come or just hinted out in the first season) but also includes a video of each creature transforming from human to it true form.

Grimm returns Friday, September 28 at 9:00 on NBC. You can stream recent episodes on Hulu. You can also download Grimm on iTunes.


Full Disclose Notice: This Blu-Ray was given to me by NBC.

They Drew First Blood, Not Me

Sylvester Stallone is having a bit of career resurgence with the release of The Expendables a couple years ago when Sly joined up with some of his action heroes of a bygone era. The sequel is set to hit theaters this weekend and in honor of him being back on top, Lionsgate released today Stallone: 3-Film Collector’s Set featuring, three of his best received movies. Well, his three best movies that do not have the word “Rocky” in the title: Cop Land, Rambo: First Blood, and Lock Up.

Honestly, Sylvester Stallone was a bit before my time and I was a bit too young to be watching his violent movies, and before The Expendables, the only other films of his I had seen were the Rocky where he single handedly destroy the Soviet Union, Stop! Or My Mom Will Shoot (R.I.P. Estelle Getty), Victory (which needs a reboot but with women and starring Alex Morgan) and the greatest arm wrestling movie of all-time: Over the Top. Really, when I think of Stallone, I think of the Saturday Night Live sketch where Sly tries to help a dyeing Norm McDonald who insults his filmography with his final breaths.

Jokes aside, this three disk set is a good reminder did have a pretty good career. The highlight is the Cop Land from 1997 which showed to people like McDonald that Sly could act if given the right material as the sheriff of a town full of New York City police officers, who could not get a job himself in the city, who tries to root out corruption of dirty cops. The movie also has a stellar cast (well, a stellar cast and Michael Rappaport) including Harvey Keitel, Ray Liotta, Robert DeNiro, Peter Berg, Janeane Garofalo, Robert Patrick, Annabella Sciorra, Edie Falco, and Method Man in his very first acting role. It does seem like they put the old DVD’s from previous releases and stuck them into one package. The special features for the Cop Land DVD (which are the same for the Blu-Ray version) include an audio commentary with Sly, Patrick, writer / director James Mangold, and producer Cathy Producer. There are a couple deleted scenes with optional commentary, a behind the scenes featurette, and storyboard comparison.

First Blood of course features John Rambo, Sly’s second most famous character who goes H•A•M on a local sheriff department when they decide to mess around with the wrong green beret Vietnam veteran. After all the parodies, the 1982 film is a bit dated now, but there is still plenty of unintentional comedy to still enjoy it especially the extremely eighties song that plays over the credits. The DVD special features include a “Survivor Mode” that lets you access additional information while watching the film (you can also access these features on the main screen), which increases the rewatchability of the movie as well as an audio commentary with Sly and an alternative ending. The Blu-Ray also includes an audio commentary with novelist David Morrell, a featurette, and advanced trivia track.

Stallone fights the law again in Lock Up (1989) where he is a prisoner who takes on a sadistic warden in the form of Donald Sutherland. The special features on the DVD just include a cast and crew featurette, production notes, and the theatrical trailer. The blu-ray also features the trailer, as well as two other featurettes and a profile of Sylvester Stallone. If you are a fanatic of Sylvester Stallone, you probably already have all three movies in your collection and there is not enough new here to buy again (unless you need to upgrade your collection to blu-ray), but it a good starter kit for anyone new to the action hero. But you will also want to pick up the first couple Rocky films too.


Full Discourse Notice: This DVD set was provided to me by BHI Impact for review.

I Remember When We Used to Sit in the Government Yard in Trenchtown

I have never been a fan of bio-flicks. Why would I want to watch a fictional take on someone’s life especially if I was around to witness it firsthand? Why would I want to watch Walk the Line, when I could just spend those two hours listening to Johnny Cash songs? Or watch Will Smith pretend to be Muhammad Ali when I can just watch the documentary When We Were Kings instead? Thankfully no one has made a Bob Marley bio-flick (yet) and with the documentary Marley, the DVD released appropriately released a day after the fiftieth anniversary of Jamaica’s independence, there really is no need for a fictional version of his life.

Like most suburban white youth, I got into Bob Marley in high school where Legend might as well have been passed out at freshmen orientation. It was pure party music that could anyone moving no matter what other genres of music they listened to, and you may even learn something while you dance. While Redemption Song remains one of my favorite songs ever recorded. Like many other artists before my time, I pretty much stopped at the greatest hits (I got about fifty of his songs on my iPod) and really did not know much about his life other than a couple conspiracy theories involving the CIA.

If you are like me, you will definitely want to check out Marley to get the full experience, even the Bob Marley fanatic will probably find something new including a few unreleased tracks including a gospel, piano based demo of Redemption Song recorded with Peter Tosh (which sadly is not on the soundtrack). The documentary, from Kevin MacDonald (The Last King of Scotland), follows Marley’s life from his ska beginnings in Trenchtown, to revolutionary, to his last days fighting cancer. MacDonald got unprecedented access from the Marley family, former Wailers like Neville “Bunny” Livingston, Islands Records founder Chris Blackwell, the former Prime Minister, a couple mistresses, Bob’s first teacher, and eve a singer / janitor at Studio 1 where Bob recorded early material.

Even at two and a half hours, there is not a wasted minute and you may even find yourself wishing it went over three hours long. There are also plenty of features on the DVD. There are extended interviews with Bunny (who busts out a pipe that was made out of a carrot) and another of children’s memory from Ziggy, Stephan, and Cedella as well as clips of people listening to a very rare track called I’m Loose, so rare that it is the first time even some of the closest people to him are hearing it for the first time. There is an 18 minute “Around the World” feature that shows how Marley is celebrated around the globe, even in places you would not expect like Tunisia, India, and Tibet. There is also an audio commentary featuring director MacDonald and Ziggy as well as a photo gallery and theatrical trailer.


Full Discourse Notice: This DVD was provided to me by BHI Impact for review.

One Necessary Evil Leads to Another until One Day You Can’t Differentiate Between What’s Necessary and What’s Merely Expedient

Who would have guessed that a show that starts off with a character getting a very detailed diagnosis of a rare disease (it is kind of like Alzheimer’s crossed with Parkinson’s but not really either) would end up being the antagonist of the show. But there is Kelsey Grammer (X-Men: The Last Stand) at the start of Boss sitting in an abandoned warehouse getting his death sentence. Why an abandoned warehouse? Oh yeah, he is the mayor of Chicago and naturally would not want to be seen coming out of a doctor’s office, let alone a neurologist because it would be a sign of weakness.

Really the sickness could not have happened to a better person. Everything we fear that is happening behind closed doors, Grammer is doing: manipulating voting and voters, endangering constituents for personal and political gain, create fake scandals to hide his own, throwing anyone and everyone under the bus to save his political career, shutting down government instead of comprising, and pulling out every dirty trick in the book. And to make things worse, it looks like what little conscience he had left is slipping away as he holds onto his power as his mind slips away with his illness.

If there is one shred of humanity gained by Kelsey after his diagnosis is that he tries to reconnect with his only daughter Hanna Ware (Cop Out) after shunning her for years because of her drug use. Naturally their reconciliation is tense at first and culminates with the second biggest jaw dropping moment of the season so shocking I had to rewind a couple times to make sure I saw what I just saw. For all intents and purposes, the mayor is also estranged from his wife, but since Connie Nielsen (The Ice Harvest) also comes from a political family, she still puts on the mayor’s wife in public but stays clear of him in private.

As for the biggest jaw dropping moment of the season, that comes when Grammer sits down with his advisor Martin Donovan (Weeds) in the final episode of season. Really whenever these two do down to chew the fat it pretty awesome, but their final powwow of the season is particularly epic (for those that have seen the series and wonder what that final discussion meant, in the audio commentary, the creator says that you will know what exactly happened at the start of the second season).

Despite being a political show, it does not really make any political statement like The West Wing (or any Aaron Sorkin show). We never even learn the party affiliation of anyone on the show (although being Chicago, it I easy to assume everyone we see is a Democrat), there is no debate on health care, gun, abortions, or Michelle Bachman’s sanity. Really the only time they get into a hot button political subject is the handsome candidate for governor that Grammer is grooming who is quick to say the right thing to voters and even quicker to spot a female with a short skirt, which is a one of the few missteps the show takes when it veers to close to John Edwards (or any other philandering politician). Really I was more interested in his wife who steps out from the shadows later in the season (and I assume will have a bigger role next season as she is on the poster).

One other valid complaint and something I really hate on television shows are all the “dream sequences.” But since hallucinations are a side effect of the drugs he is on they are also necessary, especially because it is seems as though we are witnessing the whole show through his eyes. This means we get some shaky camera use and close ups so gratuitous and long it becomes claustrophobic as a viewer. Of course you should expect some weird things, even in a political show, when Gus Van Sant (Even Cowgirls Get the Blues) is the executive producer and directed the series premiere.

The special features on the Blu-ray are a little thin (the press release feature the same things although there are only two blu-ray dicks compared to three DVD’s), there is a featurette “The Mayor and His Maker” which features about a twenty minute discussion between Kelsey Grammer and creator Farhad Safinia. There is also an audio commentary with Safinia and director of photography for the premiere and Farhad is then joined by executive producer Richard Levine for the finale. With only eight episodes, it should be easy to catch up before the second season starts August 17. Although if you do not have Starz, it should be really easy to catch up by the time the second season is released on Blu-Ray and DVD is about a year. And for those that do not like the clutter of disks lying around, the series will also be available by digital download including iTunes starting today.



Full Disclosure Notice: This blu-ray was given to me by Bender / Helper Impact for the purpose of reviewing it.

We've Lost Our Kindness, We've Lost Our Soul

We have all wanted to smack a mean person every now and then, be it the idiots who talk on their cell phones during movies, protest soldier funerals, talking heads on twenty-four hour news channels, reality stars, or people who want to be reality television. I’m sure a few of us have even contemplating murdering these mean people to keep them from repopulating their meanness but do not act on it because of because of morals and stuff. For those who have ever thought about killing a fan one of those crappy vampire flicks, I have a movie for you: the appropriately titled God Bless America.

In God Bless America, Joel Murray (Shameless) has had it. Every channel there is a worse person than the previous channel and work is no refuge because all they talk about are the mentally challenged people singing karaoke on the television. And it is probably a good thing his daughter does not live with him because she is turning into one of the people he despises. So after a terminal diagnosis and one more episode of Happy Birthday Sweet Sixteen he has decided to end it all. That is until he gets a better idea: kill all the mean people of America, starting of course with the chick on Happy Birthday Sweet Sixteen.

So he goes on a cross country killing spree of the worst offender of the decline of Western civilization and somehow picks up a teenage Tara Lynn Barr (The Suite Life of Zack & Cody, Season 3) along the way to help with the carnage who may actually hate stupid people more that Murray does. Even when they are taking time off from killing people, they still take aim at everyone from Fall Out Boy, Diablo Cody and of course hippies. Sure Barr is no way near entertaining as Hit Girl, but a teenage girl killing and cursing is still pretty funny. Sure their relationship is a bit creepy no matter how many times Murray protest it is just platonic.

God Bless America does for mean people what Idiocracy did for stupid people (unfortunately there is no one as awesome as President Dwayne Elizondo Mountain Dew Herbert Camacho, I cannot confirm or deny I would vote for Camacho if he were on the upcoming ballot this November). The kills are graphic and their failed attempts managed to be even funnier than when they succeed. The movie does lag at time in-between killings (you would think with so many potential targets, you would think they would not need so much time to try and figure out whom to gun down next). Oh yeah, did I mention that the movie was written and directed Bobcat Goldthwait? Naturally he is also listed as auteur in the bonus features. Sure there is some irony in a guy best known for his work in the Police Academy movies writing one killing people laughing at a mentally unstable person, but that only adds to its charm.

The DVD comes with an audio commentary featuring Goldwait, Murray and Barr (where you learn where Spongbob Squarepants has a cameo and all the ties to Mad Men aside the obvious Freddy Rumsen and Anna Draper being featured in the film) as well as a thirty minute Behind the Scenes special. There are some deleted scenes of from the television shows that send Murray over the edge, a gag reel, interviews with the cast and Bobcat that is also around thirty minutes. There is also HDNet’s A Look at God Bless America.



Full Disclosure Notice: This DVD was given to me by Bender/Helper Impact for the purpose of reviewing it.

He Was About as Popular as a Snake in a Sleeping Bag

When you think of Australia you probably think of The Outback, but like every other continent, it has many other terrains including the forests of Tasmania, an island just south of the mainland which is home to the Tasmanian devil. The forests there were also home to the Tasmanian tiger, the last of which died in captivity in 1936. And though they have been believed to be extinct for over seven decades, there remain many sightings across Tasmania.

That is the basis for The Hunter where Willen Dafoe (Auto Focus) plays the titular character looking for the last remaining Tasmanian tiger for a company that wants the elusive animal for nefarious reasons. Naturally the locals, especially the loggers, are not too fond of foreigners even when they are poising as zoologists. It also does not help they he is stuck renting at the home of a bed stricken women with two kids and a husband who got lost in the same woods Defoe will be going into to do his tracking.

Of course Sam Neill (Happy Town) plays a mysterious figure who is more interregnal to the story than his initial meeting would have you believe (basically every Sam Neill role). With his introduction, we slowly learn there is more to the story and the characters involved that a simple animal capture. Even though it takes a while to unfold, the shots of the Tasmanian wilderness are beautiful and breathtaking (and I would assume are even more so on the blu-ray). And Dafoe’s performance, who spends half the film alone on the hunt) is memorizing to watch as he starts to realize just what he is getting himself into and how he plots to get out of.

The Hunter DVD comes with an audio commentary track with director Daniel Nettheim and producer Vincent Sheehan. The deleted scenes, which runs about eight minutes total, also have optional commentary. There is also a four part Making of The Hunter feature that runs about a half an hour.



Full Disclosure Notice: This DVD was given to me by Bender/Helper Impact for the purpose of reviewing it.

With Great Power Comes Great Responsibility

When they announced Marc Webb would direct the next Spider-Man I thought to myself, wait the dude from (500) Days of Summer? Yeah it was a good movie but I have no interest in seeing Spidy in a dance sequence to a Hall and Oates song. Seriously, why are we getting a reboot ten years after the last one when a fourth Sam Raimi would have been much better? What makes it worse is that a proposed fourth Raimi movie would have featured John Malkovich as Vulture in perfect type casting and Anne Hathaway as Felicia Handy, aka Black Cat (who ironically went on to playing a female cat person in another comic book movie). And since Webb cast Emma Stone in his movie I am going to have to begrudgingly rent it in a couple months.

Aside from a massive upgrade at love interest, I just cannot see the new version begging better than the Sam Rami version which is this month’s induction into the Scooter Hall of Fame. After the campiness of the later nineties Batman films almost killed off the superhero movies, they came back in a massive way in the early 00’s thanks to films like X-Men and Spider-Man who brought some seriousness back to the funny books and Sam Raimi’s love and respect for the story is shown throughout.

As cool as Spider-Man’s web slinging is, let’s face it, a superhero is only as good as his rouge’s gallery and Spidy’s is second only to Batman’s. And while some of my favorites were held back for future movies (Doc Ock, Sandman) , the Green Goblin was a worthy first opponent thanks to a stellar performance from Willem Defoe (even if he looked scarier with the mask off). And like any great nemesis, Green Goblin was a close relationship to Spider-Man as the father of Peter Packer’s best friend. J.K. Simmons also gave a great performance as Peter’s boss J. Jonah Jameson. And of course what Same Raimi film would be complete without a cameo from Bruce Campbell (who played three different roles in the three movies). Spider-Man is also notable for have one of the very few video game that not only did not suck massive but it was a really great game and even features Bruce Campbell as the Narrator all three game tie-ins.