Another Evil


Rated: Not Rated | Running Time: 90 Minutes
From: Dark Sky Films
Available in select theaters and Digital HD:  May 5, 2017
Get it via :  iTunes

Another Evil MovieGosh, it sucks when your house is haunted, especially when it’s your vacation home. All you want to do is relax and work on your painting, but you are creeped out, especially when the entities mess with your stuff. Who ya gonna call? Well you could call The Ghostbusters, but sadly they are just characters in a movie. In the real world you start with the hippie, ghost whisperer, Joey Lee (Dan Bakkedahl) who refuses to get rid of your ghosts because, well, “The ghosts are kind of cool.” What? Yup, he feels Dan (Steve Zissis) and his wife Mary (Jennifer Irwin) are lucky to have them.

Man, good ghost hunter people are hard to find. The movie is “Another Evil,” a quirky horror movie where the real horror just might not be the ghosts.

Let’s get to the rest of the story…

Continue reading Another Evil

Catfight


Rated: Not Rated | Running Time: 95 Minutes
From: Dark Sky Films
Available on Blu-ray and DVD:  April 25, 2017
Get it via : Amazon | iTunes

Sandra Oh and Anne Heche in CatfightYou’d like to release some pent-up anger sometimes, wouldn’t you? I mean, we go through our lives, day to day, holding back from completely blasting someone who annoys us because, well, we probably suck at fighting, don’t want to end up in jail, and in the end it isn’t a nice thing to do. But come on, there are times when in your head you want to completely beat the crap out of someone, and probably would, if it weren’t for the “ending up in jail” thing.

Lucky for Ashley and Veronica jail really isn’t a part of their anger release.

The movie is “Catfight,” and hand-to-hand beating the crap out of each other is the norm for our heroines.

Let’s get to the story… Continue reading Catfight

Silver Skies


Rated: Not Rated | Running Time: 96 Minutes
From: Virgil Films
Available on DVD, Digital HD, and VOD:  April 4, 2017
Get it via : Amazon | iTunes

Silver Skies on on DVD and Digital April 4, 2017Everything was coming up gold for me when watching “Silver Skies,” a movie about a bunch of seniors getting evicted from their apartment complex community, but then the movie took a dark turn that seemed better for shock value than to finish up the film. Suddenly we were down to bronze.

Let’s get to the story…

George Hamilton is Phil. He thinks he is Dean Martin, which is funny at times, until you keep remembering he thinks he is Dean Martin because he has Alzheimers. Jack McGee is Nick. He lives with Phil, is the best friend, and is doing everything he can to prolong Phil’s time in society instead of going to an institution.

The problem for our heroes, and the rest of elders? It seems their apartment complex is going condo as the owner, who is also the uncle of the manager of the complex, is getting rid of the place, and now Continue reading Silver Skies

Is That a Gun In Your Pocket?…


Rated: R | Running Time: 97 Minutes
From: Area 23a
Available on Digital HD, and VOD:  March 31, 2017
Get it via : iTunes

Cloris Leachman in Is That a Gun In Your Pocket?While watching “Is That a Gun in Your Pocket?…,” and living in Chicago-land, I couldn’t help but immediately think of the Spike Lee movie “Chi-raq.” Why? Because the basis for the story is the same, built off of the classic, Aristophanes comedy “Lysistrata”: Women withhold sex from their men until there is peace, or in this case, no guns. “Chi-raq” was met with controversy and critical acclaim, but the voting public of IMDB and Rotten Tomatoes didn’t seem to care for it. “Is That a Gun in Your Pocket?…” has most critics seeming to hate it, but the voting public liking it. Weird.

For this movie you get the fictitious town of Rockford, Texas, population 6,969. That should hip you immediately to the kind of humor in the movie. Continue reading Is That a Gun In Your Pocket?…

Hidden Figures


Rated: PG | Running Time: 127 Minutes
From: Twentieth Century Fox Home Entertainment
Available on Digital HD: March 28, 2017
Available on DVD, Blu-ray, and 4K Ultra HD:  April 11, 2017
Get it via : Amazon | iTunes

Jim Parsons, Taraji P. Henson, and Kevin Costner in Hidden FiguresThree women working at NASA as an engineer, a mathematician, and a computer scientist, in the early 1960’s would be story enough. Have them be three, strong-willed, African-American women, women with the desire to live the life they believe they were destined to live, in a United States that was a lot less close to acceptance of African-Americans than it is today, and you have history. It’s a history many people don’t realize occurred, nor the influence these three, African-American women had on that history, but damn, it’s a great story, and a great movie.

It’s “Hidden Figures.”

It’s 1961. It’s the space race. It’s the state of Virginia. Katherine Johnson (Taraji P. Henson) is fantastic at math, Dorothy Vaughan (Octavia Spencer) is a computer scientist though she doesn’t know it yet, and Mary Jackson (Janelle Monáe) is an engineer. Continue reading Hidden Figures

Assassin’s Creed


Rated: PG-13 | Running Time: 115 Minutes
From: Twentieth Century Fox Home Entertainment
Available on Digital HD: March 10, 2017
Available on 4k Ultra HD, Blu-ray, DVD: March 21, 2017
Get it via : Amazon | iTunes

Michael Fassbender is Callum in Assassin's CreedSo close, yet so far. The movie is “Assassin’s Creed,” and after I got past the fact the Assassins were protecting an Apple I was enjoying the film.

Then came the ending. Really? That’s what you leave me with, a bunch of wussy Templars?

I suppose let’s get to the good stuff of the movie…

The underlying premise of “Assassin’s Creed” is that that Assassins take an oath. This oath is to protect the Apple of Eden from the Knights of the Templar order. The Templar folks will stop at nothing to get the Apple. What is it with the Apple? Continue reading Assassin’s Creed

Elle


Rated: R | Running Time: 130 Minutes
From: Sony Pictures Home Entertainment
Available on Blu-ray, DVD, and Digital:  March 14, 2017
Get it via : Amazon | iTunes

Isabelle Huppert is Michele in ElleWow, that was a rough movie to watch. Great, but rough.

The movie is “Elle,” it’s directed by Paul Verhoeven, and it stars Isabelle Huppert as Michèle. It starts with the rape of Michèle, and it’s graphic. Then she gets raped again, and it’s still graphic. And there are flashbacks, and they are graphic. Yes, this movie is a hard “R,” and yet the movie is still a really great movie.

I figured I would get that out of the way at the start as that may stop those who are offended, or have no interest in watching any scenes such as that. Yes, the movie at its core is supposed to be about a woman who doesn’t want to be a victim, a woman who is empowered, but wow, it’s a rough watch. It’s also in French with subtitles so if you don’t want to “read” a movie because you don’t know French, heck, that might also be a turn-off. Still, it’s a great movie.

Let’s get to the story… Continue reading Elle

Lost Cat Corona


Rated: Unrated | Running Time: 83 Minutes
From: Virgil Films
Available in Select Theaters: February 24, 2017
Available on VOD & HD Digital: February 28, 2017
Get it via : Amazon | iTunes

Ralph Macchio and Paul Sorvino in Lost Cat CoronaI will admit there are times when I get movies to review and I will start the movie at near about the same time I open my laptop. Usually it’s because the movie seems like it will be a “there’s 90 minutes I will never get back” kind of film, so I try to at least keep a few of the minutes to myself as multitasking sometimes becomes the order of the movie-watching. “Lost Cat Corona” started much the same way as the synopsis seemed kind of generic – Man goes out looking for a lost cat and funny ensues, and no offense to Ralph Macchio, but having Ralph Macchio, who hasn’t been really tearing up the silver screen lately, almost made it seem like one of those “He’s trying to make a come-back” films.

Quickly, however, the laptop was closed, and dammit, funny did ensue.

Dominic (Macchio) is married to Connie (the wonderful Gina Gershon). Connie is kind of a pill when it comes to being a wife, and Dominic is kind of a wimp. Continue reading Lost Cat Corona

Blood on the Mountain


Rated: Unrated | Running Time: 93 Minutes
From: Virgil Films and Entertainment
Available on DVD and Digital HD:  February 21, 2017
Get it via : Amazon | iTunes

Blood on the Mountain - DocumentaryWell crap. Now I’m depressed. Don’t get me wrong, “Blood on the Mountain” is a fantastic documentary, but damn, the story it tell just sucks.

I’m not sure if that was the end intention of “Blood on the Mountain,” a documentary about the coal industry mostly centered around West Virginia, and I’m sure a lot of it is meant to raise awareness of the corporate and government atrocities associated with everything coal, but even for me there is only so much badness I can take.

“Blood on the Mountain” came pretty damn close to putting me over the edge.

The thing is I knew that the general aspect of coal mining sucked, I just didn’t realize it was this bad, nor how brainwashed most of the people involved seem to be. This hit me in some of the interviews where people would say things like, “We have all of these health issues, but it’s normal, we were in the coal mines.” Continue reading Blood on the Mountain

Rules Don’t Apply


Rated: PG-13 | Running Time: 127 Minutes
From: Twentieth Century Fox Home Entertainment
Available on Digital HD: February 14, 2017
Available on Blu-ray & DVD: February 28, 2017
Get it via : Amazon | iTunes

Lily Collins as Marla in Rules Don't ApplyIs it wrong that I found Lily Collins’ acting refreshing and more enjoyable than that of Warren Beatty’s in “Rules Don’t Apply”? I mean, here’s Warren Beatty, screen legend and not really losing any steps, playing the eccentric Howard Hughes, but Lily was a spitfire as Marla, the wannabe actress looking for her big break in a Hughes’ movie.

All apologies to Warren, but that’s my feelings, and I’m sticking to them.

Let’s get to the movie…

Continue reading Rules Don’t Apply