New Releases for Tuesday, Feb. 7, 2012

Posted Feb 11, 2012 by John Allman

Updated Feb 11, 2012 at 12:00 PM

What’s new in stores and on video shelves this week:

Stormhouse
Genre: Paranormal Horror
Directed by: Dan Turner
Run time: 88 minutes
Rating: R
Format: DVD

The Lowdown: “Stormhouse” is a surprisingly effective British paranormal thriller that is worth your time to seek out. The filmmakers will be glad you did, even though they and the creative marketing team tried their best to discourage you from watching their little ghost movie.

You wouldn’t know that “Stormhouse” is a seriously creepy spook story by looking at the ridiculous DVD box cover art, which does absolutely nothing to whet viewer appetites by putting two unknown actors’ faces on the cover with a shadow figure standing behind them.

The back art is even worse. Someone actually took the time to insert a tornado funnel cloud onto an image pulled from the film where the military and scientific crew is standing inside a tunnel grate looking out at a fenced containment area.

This person obviously had not watched “Stormhouse” because the damn movie has nothing to do with the weather! It’s about a secret British, underground military facility named Stormhouse where a government team has managed to capture a paranormal entity.

Being the government, they think they can possibly use the entity as a weapon against Muslim extremists. Oh, this is a key plot point because the film is set in 2002 just weeks prior to the start of U.S. invasion of Iraq. And, supposedly, “Stormhouse” is based, in part, on actual events.

Once you actually start watching the film, you still have to overcome a few other obstacles before you can comfortably sit back and enjoy the show.

For one, the would-be “ghost whisperer” that the military brings in to coax its ghost into activity looks and dresses like a hippie college student who would rather be baking marijuana brownies. It’s near impossible to take her seriously for the first 20 minutes or so because the film offers no introduction, no set-up to her arrival at Stormhouse.

Once the ghost whisperer makes it down below, nine levels underground, the film course-corrects and starts taking itself seriously. And the scenes inside the fenced containment area are effectively creepy as hell, with solid use of light and shadow to create ominous imagery.

You can tell “Stormhouse” was produced on a low budget. Each shot is framed just so to maximize its surroundings, whether inside the cafeteria mess hall, the cramped living areas or the main control room. It looks like the crew took over a high school and transformed it into an underground facility. Somehow, it works. The containment area, with its 10-foot fences and loops of razor wire, is particularly well-done.

So as not to oversell “Stormhouse,” I will remind you, again, that this is a low-budget, indie production, but one done with thought and actual concern for the craft of filmmaking.

There are some decent, gory effects employed. A few scenes that actually make the hairs on the back of your neck prick up. And a really nice twist at the end that I didn’t see coming.

Check it out.

The Stuff You Care About:
Hot chicks – One, yes.
Nudity – No.
Gore – Yes, a couple of effective scenes
Drug use – No.
Bad Guys/Killers – Duh, the military, man, who else.
Buy/Rent – Rent it.

A Very Harold and Kumar Christmas: Extra Dope Edition (Warner Bros., 96 minutes, R, Blu-Ray): Many people have tried over the years to craft the perfect stoner movie experience. Many have failed. Only a handful – “Half Baked,” “Pineapple Express,” maybe “How High” – really registered a mild to mellow to excellent buzz.

Back in 2004, with the release of “Harold and Kumar Go To White Castle,” stoner-movie champions banged loud and long on their bongs, proclaiming the film to be the top tier of wacky weed hysterics.

I didn’t like it. At all. In fact, I won’t even watch it in reruns on cable. I didn’t get the humor, it felt forced and even the odd but awesome against-type, stunt casting of Neil Patrick Harris didn’t salvage the film for me.

Four years later, the pothead pals returned with “Harold & Kumar Escape from Guantanamo Bay.” I never saw it. Still haven’t.

How weird it is then to find myself about to write the following words: “A Very Harold and Kumar Christmas,” at least the ‘Extra Dope’ extended version I watched, complete with claymation shout-out to the old Christmas specials like “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer,” another hysterical star turn by NPH, a seriously funny sequence inside a crime lord’s teenage daughter’s holiday soiree, with beer pong and sexual innuendos aplenty, is a fantastically funny, uproariously enjoyable romp that, indeed, qualifies to become regaled as a stoner comedy classic.

Puff, puff, but don’t pass this one by.

Yakuza Weapon (Well Go USA, 106 minutes, Unrated, Blu-Ray): “Yakuza Weapon” is like a big, bloody comic book filled with absurd panels that come together to form some insane patchwork quilt of carnage. You will love it if you have ever turned on a movie like “Robo-Geisha” and found it impossible to turn off. Be warned, though – “Yakuza” isn’t as good, in my opinion, as “Versus,” which was an unexpected rare gem of a find when it first appeared. A lot of the same people involved helped helm both movies, but “Versus” actually was a little more linear, as nutty as it is to say. But if you like spurting geysers of blood, hacked off limbs, odd inanimate weapons inserted into bloody stumps and ridiculous plot twists, then this is a flick you need to see. 

Also Available:

3 – The director of “Run Lola Run” turns to an erotic comedy in this take on Ménage à trios.

Metal Shifters – Low-budget Syfy Channel take on “Transformers.”

Anonymous – Roland Emmerich does not blow up the Earth, just history and the Bard.

Father Dowling Mysteries: The First Season – Tom Bosley, as a priest detective. Hey, you believed Fonzi was a teenager.

Project Nim – Real-life Planet of the Apes.

C.S.I.: Grave Danger – Quentin Tarantino’s two-part “C.S.I.: Crime Scene Investigation” episode where he buried George Eads alive. It was good then, it’s good now.

Fireflies in the Garden – Julia Roberts and Ryan Reynolds in a direct-to-DVD dramedy.

Rocko’s Modern Life: Season Two – The continuing adventures of Rocko, Spunky and Heffer. You’re welcome.

Fred 2: Night of the Living Fred – I’m all for Internet sensations, but I don’t get this whole character created by Lucas Cruikshank. WWE fans will be happy to know John Cena is in the house, though.

The Phantom of the Opera at the Royal Albert Hall – It’s the 25th anniversary celebration concert.

Lady and the Tramp – One of Disney’s all-time classics makes it first appearance on Blu-Ray. Hooray!

The Hour – This crackling good BBC miniseries is as good as “State of Play,” and now it’s in high definition.

Ocean Heaven – Remember when Sylvester Stallone decided to try something other than action movies, and he made “Rhinestone” with Dolly Parton? This is nowhere near the trainwreck that Stallone singing country music was, but it is Jet Li’s first time acting without kicking the snot out of people, and some fans may feel light-headed and confused.

Police Woman: The Second Season – I’ll let Tori Amos take this one away: “But now I’m wishing/For my best impression/Of my best Angie Dickinson/But now I’ve got to worry
Cause boy you still look pretty/When you’re putting the damage on.”

The Rebound – Justin Bartha stars in a movie where he doesn’t get locked on a roof and miss huge chunks of screen time. And he gets to rub up on Catherine Zeta-Jones.

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New Releases for Tuesday, Jan. 31, 2012

Posted Feb 4, 2012 by John Allman

Updated Feb 4, 2012 at 12:25 PM

What’s new in stores and on video shelves this week:

Dead Hooker in a Trunk
Genre: Grindhouse/Independent
Directed by: The Soska Sisters
Run time: 89 minutes
Rating: Unrated
Format: DVD

The Lowdown: Here’s the deal, genre fans. When a shoestring-budget, DIY-production comes along, and it’s written and directed by two hot twin sisters and it’s filled with gore and gags and it’s called “Dead Hooker in a Trunk,” we are practically obligated to champion the movie.

But that doesn’t mean we can’t be honest, too.

And, so, here’s the honest truth: “Dead Hooker in a Trunk,”  the debut feature from Jen and Sylvia Soska, is a lot like “Machete” and not enough like “Death Proof,” and at moments when you want it to boldly launch into the rarified air of “Army of Darkness,” it mostly hits just above “Feast 2: Sloppy Seconds,” which is not a slam by any means.

What does that mean? That means it has moments of goodness but overall it’s not the movie you want and hope it’s going to be. “Dead Hooker” is a fun movie, but it’s not a great movie. And that’s OK. This is their first try, let’s give them a little time and see what follows. Even John Carpenter gave us “Assault on Precinct 13” before “Halloween,” and I really like “Precinct 13.”

The Soska sisters try to do too much, which is a commendable criticism because it shows their eagerness and enthusiasm. It’s like running your first marathon. After training forever, you often forget to pace yourself and you just burst out of the gate, giving it all you’ve got, forgetting the miles to go before the finish line.

“Dead Hooker” feels like a sprint at times. It’s disjointed, uneven and wildly erratic – like a first feature often is. Ideas are introduced – one of the sisters’ arms bursts into flame upon entering a church – but not followed up on in a way that makes much sense. Major characters endure vicious injuries that should incapacitate them, but they manage to walk away with little more than a band-aid solution.

Some of this is intentional, of course. The sisters are mining the Drive-In genre, after all. There are no established rules for life, death and personal injury. Just look at a Roger Corman picture. 

These moments of inspired lunacy are meant to be regarded as cool and subversive, not fact-based and realistic.

But there should be a more cohesive story backing up the action, and honestly, it’s pretty difficult to follow. There are these guys, and they hurt people, and they end up following the sisters and their friends, hurting them and tormenting them until the tables get turned.

Where the girls get major props is in the creatively department. They accomplish a lot with a little when it comes to special effects, and they manage to hit upon several Holy Crap! moments that completely catch you off guard, which is awesome.

This is a disc that you need to go out and buy immediately for two reasons: We need to support and champion filmmakers like Jen and Sylvia Soska. These women are the future of genre films. Not just them, of course, but creative folks like them. Filmmakers who have the guts to take the chance and put themselves out there and say here’s my art, deal with it.

Secondly, years from now, I predict that “Dead Hooker in a Trunk” will be regarded as a gory, fun entry in a long list of well-regarded and revered films, an early harbinger of the types of projects that would define a career.

And you can say, I knew them when and I’ve been a fan all along.

The Stuff You Care About:
Hot chicks – Yes.
Nudity – Brief.
Gore – Yes.
Drug use – Yes.
Bad Guys/Killers – Hoodie-wearing, baseball bat-wielding hoodlums who like to inflict pain.
Buy/Rent – Buy it.
On the Web – http://www.deadhookerinatrunk.com/

Drive (Sony, 100 minutes, R, Blu-Ray): That there are people out there who fully and vocally loathe Nicolas Winding Refn’s amazing deconstruction of tough guy action movies is simply shocking to me.

“Drive” is the definition of square-jawed cool. It’s a 5-hour energy shot of testosterone. It’s a masterpiece of precision filmmaking where every frame, every line of dialogue, every musical cue means something.

So what if we never learn anything about Ryan Gosling’s character, not even his name. He says more by just twirling a matchstick between his teeth than most actors says with an extended soliloquy. And when he erupts, he goes off like you always imagined you would go off if put in a movie-like situation where you had one chance to be the badass you always envisioned yourself to be.

This is one of the best films of 2011, an instant genre classic, and a film that years from now will be revered as a masterpiece, in my humble opinion.

In Time (Fox, 109 minutes, PG-13, Blu-Ray): I hate to consider it, but it’s looking more and more like writer/director Andrew Niccol may forever be a two-hit wonder, having scripted the wonderful “The Truman Show” and written and directed the delightful slice of sci-fi, “Gattaca.”

I sincerely doubt that his selection as the helmer of the Next Big Thing from author Stephanie Meyer, aka “The Host,” is going to be anything too special. Meyer is responsible for the Twilight series, after all, and seems to know little about actual story craft. Hell, her damn book basically exposed all the things that you wish you could forgive about Catherine Hardwicke’s style but can never now overlook.

“In Time” is a perfect example. Niccol’s latest film, which has to have one of the best looking casts in ages – Justin Timberlake, Amanda Seyfried, Cillian Murphy, Olivia Wilde and Matt Bomer – is a mess. A big, loud, time-sucking mess. The irony of course is that Niccol’s film is all about the precious nature of time, and how it should not be taken for granted or wasted. And he basically blows two hours on a project that completely jumps the shark midway through.

It’s a shame too. Timberlake is good here, better than he was in “Bad Teacher,” and Seyfried is unbelievably sexy with her straight bangs and pouty lips. The real star is Bomer, who just smolders during his brief screen time. Someone give that guy a chance to top-line an action movie or thriller. Even Murphy is better than he should be in the type of clichéd role that usually goes to someone like Willem Dafoe.

Niccol has an interesting idea, but he fails to develop it fully, and before long, he boxes himself into a straight B-grade action corner where logic goes bye-bye and he has to completely ignore, and not explain, how two people in a convertible could survive a horrendous, off a cliff, flipping car crash and not be dead.

That moment comes about 45 minutes in, and that’s exactly where I checked out.

The Thing (Universal, 103 minutes, R, Blu-Ray): As a prequel to John Carpenter’s far superior, nay classic, remake of the Howard Hawks-produced original, “The Thing” does nothing to distinguish itself or establish its own universe to populate with original ideas or even creative explorations of the rules that were established in his 1982 movie. As a remake of Carpenter’s film, the 2011 version is completely unnecessary. 

Dream House (Universal, 92 minutes, Unrated, Blu-Ray): Eleven years after “What Lies Beneath” gave away the store in its theatrical trailer, “Dream House” went and did the same thing, throwing the only legitimate surprise in its bag out for all to see, and spoiling the most interesting aspect of an otherwise forgettable thriller. Oscar-winner Rachel Weisz looks lost, Oscar-winning director Jim Sheridan forgets everything he ever learned about pacing and the story just meanders along with no tether to keep us invested. It’s not the worst movie ever made. Just one of the least memorable.

The Other F Word (Oscilloscope Pictures, 98 minutes, Unrated, DVD): A wonderful, touching, highly enjoyable documentary about aging punk rockers who have been forced to re-evaluate their lives once they had children. “The Other F Word” is filled with genuinely funny moments as some of the biggest names in punk and post-punk, from Jim Lindberg of Pennywise, Mark Hoppus of blink-182 and Flea of Red Hot Chili Peppers share insight into their lives and how their own fathers shaped the kind of Dads they wanted to be. The film tackles challenging issues – like how a guy who screamed screw authority for years from stage might have to conform to meet the expectations of a society he raged against in order to provide the best life possible for his baby girl or boy. Unlike many documentaries, director Andrea Blaugrund Nevins finds a narrative thread that helps to keep the film chugging along. She follows Lindberg on tour for the last time with Pennywise, as he struggles with his obligations to his band and the responsibility he feels he is neglecting at home. It’s a touching story and it provides exactly the right moral compass for the film.

Outrage: Way of the Yakuza (Magnet/Magnolia, 109 minutes, R, Blu-Ray): Director Takeshi Kitano returns with a vicious, bloody, brutal allegory about loyalty, tradition, honor and corruption. Kitano contrasts the ways of the old-guard yakuza with the less disciplined rising generation, managing to show that no matter what side one falls on, life as a gangster is fated to end painfully and suddenly in a blistering hail of bullets or with the savage thrust of a blade.

Spiderhole (IFC, 82 minutes, Unrated, DVD): Writer/director Daniel Simpson clearly appreciates the aesthetic and the shock value of films like “Hostel” and “Saw,” but he fails to find anything fresh to contribute to the genre with “Spiderhole,” an exercise in tedium about four friends who decide to squat in a supposedly abandoned house that, naturally, is still populated by a madman with a secret medical laboratory.

Texas Killing Fields (Anchor Bay, 105 minutes, R, Blu-Ray): At first, you wonder why a film starring such popular acting heavyweights as Sam Worthington, Jeffrey Dean Morgan, Jessica Chastain and Chloë Grace Moretz went straight to DVD. Then you get about 30 minutes into “Texas Killing Fields” and it makes sense. This would-be gritty, Texas-tinged slice of serial killing goodness wants to be “Se7en” or “Zodiac,” but it keeps tripping over its best intentions, creating a muddy mess of red herrings and ominous overtures that go nowhere and are never fully fleshed out.

Night Train Murders (Blue Underground, 94 minutes, Unrated, Blu-Ray): It’s time, once again, to credit Blue Underground with dusting off another long lost genre classic and upgrading it to high-definition to remind older fans how films used to model themselves after one another but still managed to make an indelible impression all their own.

“Night Train Murders,” the once-banned Italian shocker, also known as “Last Stop on the Night Train,” and unofficially as the sequel to Wes Craven’s “Last House on the Left,” is a delicious slice of sadistic sexual subversion, rape and revenge.

Director Aldo Lado’s 1975 flick, which features a beguiling score by Ennio Morricone, nicely builds tension and toys with society’s acceptance of overtly sexual behavior and quasi-closeted fetishism until it climaxes in an unnerving, unforgiving orgy of violence and depravity.

And that’s just the first two acts.

“Night Train,” honestly, is better than Craven’s “Last House.” Technically, it’s a better made film, for sure. The acting is more consistent, the story hues to many of the same themes but explores them in different ways and the sexual assaults are more unsettling, if that’s even possible.

If you haven’t ever seen it, or even heard of it, like me, then you owe it to yourself to seek it out.

Also Available:

Spork – Think Napoleon Dynamite as a 13-year-old girl.

To Kill a Mockingbird: 50th Anniversary Edition – A gorgeous hardbacked Digibook with photos, essays and more to commemorate one of the all-time great films. 

The Comic Strip Presents: The Complete Collection – Finally, the full collection of short films by some of Britain’s best and most inventive comics comes together in a nine-disc boxed set. If you loved “The Young Ones” or “Absolutely Fabulous,” you won’t want to miss this chance to see some of the same stars making early, edgy steps toward comedic greatness.

Monsignor – A guilty pleasure from 1983 that ranks as one of the late Christopher Reeves’ best cheesy roles, right up there with “Somewhere in Time.”

Chalet Girl – Why is Bill Nighy in this movie? Seriously.

The Double – Another entry into the Give Away the Whole Movie in the Trailer genre.

Star Trek: The Next Generation – Next Level – It’s dubbed “A Taste of TNG in High Definition,” and that’s exactly what this three-episode teaser is, a taste of what fans can expect later this year when the entire series rolls out on Blu-Ray.

Thunder Soul – A funky documentary about a high school music teacher who inspired his students to greatness.

Shakespeare in Love, The English Patient, Cold Mountain, The Piano, Frida – Beloved classics get the high-definition upgrade.

Hey Dude: Season 2 – Second season of the popular Nickelodeon series.

The Big Year – It’s really saying something when a new comedy starring Steve Martin, Jack Black and Owen Wilson falls flat, but this one sure does.

Annie Hall, Manhattan, Notorious, Rebecca, Spellbound, The Apartment – MGM rolls out some of the best films by icons Alfred Hitchcock, Woody Allen and Billy Wilder.

Not to Be Overlooked:

Undocumented (IFC, 96 minutes, Unrated, DVD): There’s half of “Undocumented” that really works well as a contemporary thriller that plays off the timeliness of America’s ongoing debate about illegal immigration. Filmed in a documentary, handheld style, the first 30 minutes or so are intense, unsettling and claustrophobic.

But director Chris Peckover gets a little too ambitious when he introduces a Tea Party-esque band of domestic Patriots who have fun capturing border-crossing Mexicans and subjecting them to unspeakable torture, death and indentured servitude.

Peckover has the right intentions, though. He nails several scenes, particularly a chilling history test where an undocumented illegal who doesn’t speak English is asked a series of questions from the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services Naturalization Self-Test. For each correct answer, the man’s wife will have a limb unlocked from a torture rack. Every wrong answer means the rack will be tightened to the point of possibly ripping her apart.

Such moments sprinkled throughout make “Undocumented” an interesting watch, even if it coasts along for too long on images and ideas we’ve seen before.

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New Releases for Tuesday, Jan. 24, 2012

Posted Jan 29, 2012 by John Allman

Updated Jan 29, 2012 at 12:30 PM

What’s new in stores and on video shelves this week:

The Woman
Genre: Horror/Sequel
Directed by: Lucky McKee
Run time: 101 minutes
Rating: R
Format: DVD

The Lowdown: If you haven’t seen it, there’s a video on YouTube from the 2011 Sundance Festival where an audience member walks out of a screening of Lucky McKee’s “The Woman” and just goes off on theater management.

The man, a registered IMDb actor, is appalled by what he’s just witnessed. And by appalled, I mean he is furious at the theater for even showing the film.

He rails against the film for degrading and denigrating women everywhere. He condemns the misogynistic central theme that propels the narrative.

He wants “The Woman” to be banned and copies of the film to be burned.

Is it a real video featuring a genuine reaction? I think so, yes.

Is his criticism warranted? No, he pretty much completely misses the mark. But that’s OK.

“The Woman” is a film open to interpretation. It’s not an easy film to watch at points. It challenges its viewers in ways that few movies, horror or otherwise, rarely do. It pulls out some heady twists at the end. But it’s not “I Spit on Your Grave” or some other exploitation torture porn featuring an orgiastic onslaught of male on female violence.

In fact, I would say that the same misogynistic overtures that cause Mr. Sundance to lose his marbles are, in reality, nothing but a red herring, a clever ruse.

“The Woman,” you see, doesn’t pander to violence against women for entertainment’s sake. It sets up a reveal that is unexpected, and satisfying, in ways that mob justice might sate a crowd’s thirst for blood.

McKee wants you to be appalled because only then will you be able to accept that anyone and everyone who commits, condones or causes to continue any violence against women is deserving of some very painful, likely permanent, lessons about right and wrong.

But getting to the moral of the story requires you to wade through some rough waters, and not everyone may be strong of stomach enough to make the trip.

“The Woman” is actually a sequel, or a companion film, to “Offspring,” a 2009 feature written by Jack Ketchum, which was one of After Dark Films’ 8 Films to Die For.

Pollyanna McIntosh played “The Woman” in both movies. Her character is a matriarch of sorts to a feral pack of people who live in the wild and live off the land. They’re also cannibals. That might be an important distinction to point out.

McKee structures his movie like some hellish version of “My Fair Lady” where a country attorney, Chris Cleek, who has a wife and three children of his own, finds The Woman one day while he is out hunting. He traps her and hauls her back to his secluded house where he chains her up in a barn and begins a nightmarish breakdown of her body and soul, abusing her physically and sexually, in an attempt to “humanize” her.

In a sick twist, the lawyer’s entire family, including matriarch Belle Cleek (Angela Bettis, a McKee regular) and her children, know about Daddy’s dark secret. His son even exhibits unnerving aptitude for the family hobby, as well as mimicking his father’s worst traits.

Mr. Cleek doesn’t think too highly of women, including his own wife and daughters. They basically exist to serve him and his son, and not speak back or share an opinion. And if they upset him, then it’s OK to put a little fear in their hearts by smacking them down.

McKee pays particular attention to Ms. Cleek’s reaction, and lack of action, when her husband abuses The Woman and her own daughters. The Woman is paying attention too, and in the film’s uber-violent, ultra-graphic third act, when all hell literally breaks loose, the carnage that’s meted out is both visceral and cathartic, not to mention unforgiving.

“The Woman” is a well-made independent horror film. It doesn’t shy away from controversial ideas and visuals, but I don’t think it exists simply to court controversy either.

This isn’t torture porn. This isn’t brutality for brutality’s sake. There is a message here, and McKee presents it in both subtle, detailed brush strokes and vibrant, unexpected splashes of blood red.

The Stuff You Care About:
Hot chicks – Yes, depending on what you consider hot.
Nudity – Yes.
Gore – Considerable.
Drug use – No.
Bad Guys/Killers – Not who you would expect.
Buy/Rent – Buy it.

50/50 (Summit. 100 minutes, R, DVD): Warning, warning. If you have lost a loved one to cancer, this might be the most difficult movie you will try to watch in a long time, if ever. It uncorks the tears on par with “Brian’s Song,” but unlike most tearjerkers, there are a plethora of riotous, insanely filthy zingers peppered throughout the laser-sharp script to keep you laughing hysterically amid the tears. Joseph Gordon-Levitt does a wonderful job playing the newly diagnosed, and Seth Rogen makes you remember why you loved him so much in “The 40-Year-Old Virgin” and “Knocked Up.”

Roger Corman’s Cult Classics Lethal Ladies Collection 2: The Arena, Cover Girl Models, Fly Me (Shout! Factory, 235 minutes, Unrated, DVD): There’s no instant classic here like with “Too Hot to Handle” from the first Lethal Ladies collection, but the bonafide grindhouse gem here is “Fly Me,” an absurd slice of kung fu cinema that pits flight attendants against gang thugs. The movie kicks off with gratuitous nudity AND Dick Miller, and only gets more ridiculous from there. The fight scenes break out with little warning and make even less sense, but they are fun. And the grainy, over-saturated print complete with cigarette burns, choppy editing and occasionally uneven audio track make you feel like you’ve ducked into a rundown theater back in 1973.

Also Available:

Real Steel - The comparisons to “Rocky” in all the advertising materials aren’t misleading, but they don’t tell the whole story. This live-action Rock-Em-Sock-Em-Robots would have been just fine without the schmaltzy, over-indulgent bad Dad storyline that saddles likeable Hugh Jackman with a really tough role to sell and detracts from the giddy fanboy fun of watching giant robots beat the crap out of each other.

Punished - A brutal revenge thriller about a bodyguard ordered to execute the people involved in kidnapping his boss’s daughter. Oh, and he has to videotape each of the killings. Gruesome goodness ensues.

Ancient Aliens: Season Three – I love this show. It’s fascinating, rooted in science and history, and it gives credence to all of us who firmly believe we’re not waiting for first contact – It already happened a long time ago.

WWII in 3D – Archival war footage, converted to high def and 3D. I’m still holding out for the Korean Conflict Special Edition in Mono with grainy stock footage.

Tales of an Ancient Empire – Kevin Sorbo, people. ‘Nuff said. Make the popcorn and take a seat.

Mannix: The Sixth Season – Everytime I type “Mannix,” I think “Manimal.” Now that’s a show I’d like to see again on DVD.

Meet the Browns: Season Four – More stereotypical situation comedy from Tyler Perry, the unfunniest rich guy ever.

The Whistleblower – Oscar winner Rachel Weisz battles human traffickers in a gritty thriller about a topic most people don’t like to acknowledge exists.

Limelight – Fascinating documentary about one of the wildest nightclubs in New York City before Mayor Rudy forced them to shutter and close.

Restless – Gus Van Sant, working on a smaller scale than his usual films, but with no less impact.

Not To Be Overlooked:

Fire of Conscience (Indomina, 106 minutes, R, DVD): It takes a little while for the realization to sink in, but “Fire of Conscience,” an incredibly taunt Japanese crime thriller, mines the best elements of “Heat” and “The Departed” to concoct a film that seems very familiar yet wholly unique at the same time. I really enjoyed the story, especially the final act. This is one to look for on Netflix. 

Devil’s Playground (Indomina, 93 minutes, Unrated, DVD): This British zombie flick gets high marks for basically repackaging “Resident Evil” and “28 Days Later” with a not-so-original, but still enjoyable, story of one soldier’s attempt to rescue a woman whose blood could help develop a cure. Die-hard zombie fans may be divided about director Mark McQueen’s decision to not only allow his undead hordes to move swiftly, but to have them all suddenly skilled in the art of Parkour, the French method of maximizing spatial awareness to give one’s body the opportunity to slip, slide and glide over, around or through incredibly tight openings.  Personally, it didn’t detract from the overall story, simply because everyone infected with the disease suddenly seemed capable of flipping, leaping and flying over any obstacle between them and fresh meat. It kind of made the zombies more intimidating, even if they still got bludgeoned fairly easily by the good guys.

True Legend (Indomina, 116 minutes, R, DVD): “True Legend,” the epic story of Su Qi-Er, is told through massive kung-fu battles, set against lavish backdrops from exotic temples to mountain fortress retreats. Fans know that these type of stories follow a predictable pattern of introducing the hero, tracking his success, his fall from grace, his rebirth and his eventual victory against all odds, and “True Legend” does not disappoint, providing an interesting redemptive story arc along with some astounding fight choreography from the guys who worked on “The Matrix” and “Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon.”  This one is pretty great.

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A Conversation With: Adrián García Bogliano

Posted Jan 21, 2012 by John Allman

Updated Jan 21, 2012 at 03:54 PM

For a director with a penchant for raw violence and disturbing imagery, Adrián García Bogliano decided to go in a totally different direction for his latest film, “Cold Sweat,” an unpredictable and often surprising exercise in mounting tension that flips traditional movie conventions and plays against expectations.

“Cold Sweat” tells the story of Roman and Ali, two friends with a blossoming affection who set out to find Roman’s ex-girlfriend Jackie, who went missing shortly after meeting a young man during an online chat.

The two young adults use modern technology to track Jackie to an unassuming two-story house in a non-descript neighborhood. What they find inside is a veritable house of horrors where every room holds a new, shocking surprise.

Bogliano, with his eighth feature film, masterfully ratchets up the tension, offering two elderly, villainous foes who like to play with liquid nitroglycerine to torture their victims. Several scenes play out like a Master’s Thesis in Filmmaking, deliberately drawing out the action until every movement, every breath, every drip of sweat and drop of liquid nitro could spell certain doom.

In between these long stretches of mounting dread, the director inserts well-placed humor and unexpected gore, keeping both his cast and his audience off balance and unsure what might happen next.

Bogliano, 31, of Spain drew inspiration from two films by two directors that couldn’t be further apart in style and execution.

He looked first to Steven Spielberg’s “Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom,” the largely underrated second adventure in the ongoing franchise, which portrayed a darker, almost sadistic streak that divided fans expecting a fun thrill ride like “Raiders of the Lost Ark.”

And he turned to his all-time favorite film, “Sorcerer,” by William Friedkin, a 1977 thriller made after “The French Connection” and “The Exorcist” that never achieved the same level of success or acclaim.

“Sorcerer” is about a group of men in South America who are hired to drive six crates of volatile dynamite across miles of insanely rugged terrain, including sheer mountain roads, stretches of dense jungle, a rotting suspended rope bridge and finally a surreal stretch of desert.

With this month’s release of “Cold Sweat,” as well as the upcoming release of “I’ll Never Die Alone,” a brutal rape and revenge thriller that looks even more malicious than the exploitation classic “I Spit On Your Grave,” and “Penumbra,” 2012 could well be the year that launches Bogliano into the upper echelon of today’s hottest genre directors.

Bogliano, who now lives in Mexico, took time from filming his next feature, “Here Comes the Devil,” to speak with BVB: Blood, Violence and Babes by phone.

BVB: First off, I loved “Cold Sweat.” I thought it did so many things right, and different, from your typical horror film, that it felt really fresh and exciting. Is that what you were going for – to play against expectations?

AGB: Exactly. That was exactly, to play against expectations is a perfect way to say it because we were thinking with this film the villains have to be the opposite of what you’re expecting, the big guy, the strong guy with a mask. Having these two old men was a way to do that, and also having them not use knives or something like that, instead drops of something you don’t know what it is in the beginning of the film. That was exactly the effect we wanted to cause.

BVB: I really thought in addition to having villains who were completely unexpected, I felt like your movie, and I watch a lot of horror movies. I watch some really good ones and some really awful ones. And I felt like your characters felt very real. They felt like young adults. I loved how they were constantly referencing Facebook. I loved when Roman posted his status as, Help, we’re trapped in a house with two maniacs…

AGB: I saw the news the other day that something like that actually happened. I felt like when I was writing this, if you only had the Internet and not like in the United States, the system of 911, if somebody is going to know exactly who to ask for help through the Internet.

BVB: Were you just trying to show this is kind of the world we live in now. If you’re in your mid-20s, that’s probably something you think to do instead of call 911, if I can’t get an outside line, I’ll go to Facebook or I’ll go to social media.

AGB: Absolutely. I’m pretty sure that probably in a few years, that joke is going to be so 2011, right? A joke of a certain moment of time. It doesn’t matter to me. It’s a movie made in a certain time and a certain place. I don’t feel afraid to make movies that look like the place they were made and the moment they were made.

BVB: I felt like your film really did that. Not to give away anything, I try very hard not to spoil the films for my readers, but I’m hoping by the time this posts later in the week, with the movie releasing today, they will have had time to check it out. I loved that you made a horror film where the main characters all actually survived. You definitely went against the Final Girl pattern where there’s always just one survivor battling the bad guys. I thought that was really cool. Was that something you wanted to do to set yourself apart?

AGB: Yeah, yeah, yeah – I discussed it a lot with my brother (co-writer, Ramiro García Bogliano) and the other co-writer (Hernán Moyano) of the film. They were more into killing some of them. At the moment where I wrote the script, my feeling was more optimistic, so I said it can be that way because we were making films before this one, my previous films were more pessimistic, more violent. The previous one to this was one called, “I’ll Never Die Alone,” that’s going to be released now in the U.S. It’s so violent and it’s pretty disturbing. You finish that film and you want to cut your veins. I said I don’t want to do that anymore, I don’t want to do that again. I wanted to make something different, something for a teenage audience, something more energetic and more fun.

BVB: How deliberate was it on your part to let certain scenes play out in an extended fashion, like the nitroglycerine disrobing scene with Roman and Jackie. It really seemed to be a direct homage to old-school filmmaking like Hitchcock and Kubrick, who took their time and let the action unfold organically.

AGB: You mean the sequence where she gets down from the table to the floor? To me, that’s the heart of the movie. I have a very good friend who I always show my films as soon as I make the first cut, I show the films to him, I trust a lot his opinion. He just told me that, that was the scene of the movie, and I felt so good when he said that because that’s exactly what I felt. Everything else can be or not be there, it doesn’t matter. But the moment I really wanted to have in the movie was that moment. Like the homage I wanted to make the most was to ‘Sorcerer” by William Friedkin. I love “Sorcerer.” And to me, this was like a big homage. I think one of the most brilliant sequences in film history is that sequence with the hanging bridge of “Sorcerer.” That’s probably my favorite sequence ever. I wanted to make a homage to that. The way he keeps the tension, he keeps building the tension. It’s like the scene is never going to end. That’s exactly what I wanted for this sequence. I actually wanted it to last longer.

BVB: I mentioned earlier to you the criticism. After I saw the film I went to see what other people thought and one of the things that really struck me, I read some reviews and I saw some people criticizing, there was another scene where Ali sneaks into the study and the old man is on the computer and she’s trying to find a weapon, or a pair of scissors to help free them, and I thought that scene was wonderfully tense, but it seemed like there were people criticizing it who thought that she should have just gone all Rambo and try to grab the knife, or grab the scissors, and kill the old man. I didn’t understand that.

AGB: I don’t understand that. Well, I do understand that. Let me tell you what I think about it. I think a lot of people believe that they would act in a violent situation, they think they would act like in the movies, that they would say something, they would fight him. I believe that most people would try to go quietly, try to save the girl and get out of there and call the police. I think they’re thinking, two old men, dealing with nitroglycerine and they just exploded the head of a girl. I won’t play Rambo. They are old and everything, but they still have nitroglycerine in their hands, they’re still…killers.

BVB: I have to ask you, I loved this, you had so many things in the film that were very much grounded in my mind in reality, like that scene with the girl, instead of trying to kill the guy, she got what she needed and snuck back off. Then we get into this moment in the film where they stumble upon this basement, this cellar with these blind, cannibal, mole-like women and the film just goes into a whole other place, which is just awesome. Where did you come up with that? What was the inspiration for that? I thought that was just wonderful.

AGB: It had a lot to do with the previous film, “I’ll Never Die Alone.” It’s a rape and revenge film, but it’s straight one way. A bunch of girls, they see a murder and then the murderers come after them. They rape them, they kill a couple of them and then they seek revenge. I didn’t want it to be anything other than a very straight story. For this film, I thought let’s do something different. After 35 minutes, 40 minutes of the film, you think you know exactly where it’s going, and you don’t. That was the idea. That kind of film you rarely see. You don’t know what the hell is going on, but you like it. I’m hooked. These characters were, in a way, they were something we used to add more excitement to the film. We were thinking of a film that didn’t have to have a very strong structure, very strong logic. We wanted a film where every five or 10 minutes, something strange, something you don’t know where it comes from, happens. We used a lot what we read about how they structured the second Indiana Jones film. This kind of thing where anything goes. We wanted to use this kind of idea for the structure and we wanted to create not a very serious horror film, but more of a roller coaster.

BVB: That’s funny, I don’t think I would have ever thought to hear you compare that sequence of the film to Indiana Jones, but I like it. I know exactly what you mean, where all of a sudden hearts are getting ripped out, monkey brains are getting eaten.

AGB: Absolutely. We used a couple of the classic Indiana Jones shots where a character is watching something off camera and he sees something before you do and you just see his reaction. Spielberg used to do that a lot and it’s an amazing kind of shot. It’s a really funny device. We didn’t have a lot of time to work with the actors, but they gave everything for the cameras.

BVB: Tell me a little about “Here Comes the Devil.” It’s set where a family is camping and two young children go missing and something happens.

AGB: Exactly. When they come back, they’re not the same. Something has changed in them. The parents try to realize what is it. I’m really excited about it. It’s a supernatural horror film, a genre I’m not so familiar with. I’ve worked with supernatural subjects, but not as much as this film. It’s really exciting.

BVB: Now did you write this one yourself, or did you collaborate with your brother?

AGB: No, this one I wrote it by myself. It was an idea I had in mind for a certain time. I think it’s going to be pretty, again, like my previous one, this is going to be pretty disturbing, violent and disturbing.

BVB: We like violent and disturbing.

AGB: Even when I work with comedy elements, I like it when the horror parts take place, I want it to be really strong and really violent.

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New Releases for Tuesday, Jan. 17, 2012

Posted Jan 17, 2012 by John Allman

Updated Jan 17, 2012 at 08:04 PM

What’s new in stores and on video shelves this week:

Cold Sweat
Genre: Thriller
Directed by: Adrián García Bogliano
Run time: 90 minutes
Rating: Unrated
Format: DVD

The Lowdown: We all know how most horror movies play out: A group of kids wander into a bad situation. They make reckless, often ridiculous decisions. They die, horribly, one by one, until there is usually a Final Girl left standing to battle it out with the big bad menace, whoever or whatever that might be.

Adrián García Bogliano has seen plenty of those movies too, and as a director, he set out to totally flip normal plot conventions on their ear with “Cold Sweat,” a Spanish import that honestly zigs when almost every other movie zags.

Bogliano offers up believable young adults who don’t make rash decisions, other than to survive. He concocts two completely unique villains in two elderly former freedom fighters who have managed to get ahold of a cache of long-lost dynamite.

One of the men is a scientist who has mastered the technique of distilling nitroglycerine into its liquid essence, a highly volatile creation that he gleefully applies to his victims drop by drop, forcing them to fight their own bodies and restrict all movement for fear of going Boom. The other man is the brute, the enforcer, the cleanup guy responsible for mopping up the mess whenever another young victim loses the fight and accidentally lets their head fall on the tiniest pin-sized dollop of the liquid boom-boom.

Inside their home, a non-descript two-story house, the scientist uses the Internet to lure victims to visit, positioning a young boy in front of a webcam so that females think they are talking to him. The boy has been severely mutilated, and is unable to fight back.

“Cold Sweat” starts with Roman and Ali trying to find Roman’s missing girlfriend, Jackie, who was having an online fling with who she believed to be a good-looking young man. Because they’re tech-savvy, Roman and Ali trace the IP address of the person Jackie was chatting with to the house. Ali strikes up a chat and gets invited to visit. Bad things happen quickly from there.

Bogliano is just 31, but he manipulates his audience like a seasoned professional, allowing the tension to ratchet up organically as some scenes play on indefinitely, his camera lens focused on each bead of sweat that drips down a victim’s body part drenched in liquid nitro. It’s incredible unnerving, and Bogliano keeps upping the ante until he reaches a highwater mark near the movie’s midpoint with a scene that would make Steven Spielberg proud. It’s a directing showcase worthy of a highlight reel, and it marks the arrival of a formidable talent.

He’s not content to stop there, however.

Bogliano injects a new, unexpected horror about every 15 minutes, keeping his characters and his audience off-balance. Whether it’s a taunt game of cat and mouse played out over an intercom, where any noise, even a deep breath, might give away Roman’s location, or a hidden subterranean basement filled with the ghoulish subjects who have been experimented on for years by the two elderly men, “Cold Sweat” creates just that – a palatable sense of creeping, delicious dread that, literally, explodes at the most unexpected of moments.

I don’t ever like to give away a film’s ending, and I’m not going to spoil the whirlwind conclusion, but I will say this – Bogliano saves his best trick for last, smashing through the tired cliché that all horror movie victims are just that, victims.

“Cold Sweat” is a fun, gory, gleefully over the top roller coaster ride that shouldn’t be missed.

The Stuff You Care About:
Hot chicks – Yes.
Nudity – Yes.
Gore – Considerable.
Drug use – No.
Bad Guys/Killers – Two elderly, demented ex-patriots who have converted a simple brownstone into a house of experimental horrors.
Buy/Rent – Buy it.

The Ides of March (Sony, 101 minutes, R, Blu-Ray): My personal favorite political allegory ever put to film is “Bob Roberts,” the wonderful Kennedy-esque satire that marked the writing/directing debut of Tim Robbins.

“The Ides of March” is right up there.

It’s better than “Bulworth” or “Primary Colors,” even if some of the twists are predictable, because the acting is spot-on, the writing is laser sharp and the direction by George Clooney is simply superb.

Everybody brings their A-game, from Ryan Gosling as the moral compass of the film, to Phillip Seymour Hoffman and Paul Giamatti as rival campaign strategists, and even Marisa Tomei as a nosy New York Times reporter trying to get the latest scoop. Clooney is spectacular, playing in just a few scenes, as an Obama-like candidate who inspires his faithful. And Evan Rachel Wood is heartbreaking as the young intern who gets swept up into the political machine following a very human, but disastrous mistake.

Also Available:

The Coast Guard – What might look like a standard military action film on the surface, this Korean import actually takes the very-real tensions that exist along the North-South Korean border and explores what happens when the zeal to kill the enemy clouds one’s better judgment and sets in motion an awful domino effect.

Abduction – Remember when John Singleton was heralded as the next Spike Lee? Those hopes and expectations dissolved somewhere around “Shaft.” Remember when Taylor Lautner was supposed to be the next big action hero? No, actually.

Bucky Larson: Born to Be a Star – Produced and co-written by Adam Sandler, this vehicle for his comedy buddy Nick Swardson centers around the quest of young, dumb Bucky who decides he’s going to be a porn star to make his parents proud, despite the fact that he’s sporting next to nothing in the junk department.

Adam-12: Season 6 – The spin-off from “Dragnet” continues in its sixth season, portraying actual cases and crimes reported in Los Angeles.

Dirty Girl – Juno Temple, daughter of director Julian Temple, is a smoking hot, hold the movie all on her own star.

Dead Poets Society – Robin Williams, acting somberly.

Good Morning Vietnam – Robin Williams, yelling loudly.

Merlin: The Complete Third Season – The BBC takes an interesting spin on the legend of King Arthur and Merlin, setting its wizards and dragons serial back before either man was legendary, back when they were both foolish, headstrong young men.

Age of Heroes – Sean Bean kicking butt. It never gets old.

Romeos – Coming of age tale about a young pre-op transgender boy who falls for a young gay man, and the journey that they experience together. 

Division III: Football’s Finest – Starring Andy Dick. As a football coach. ‘Nuff said.

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