The Movie:

The feature directorial debut of stunt coordinator Nick Powell, 2014's Outcast begins with an opening scene in which two hardened swordsmen, the elder Gallain (Nicolas Cage) and a younger man named Jacob (Hayden Christensen) are embroiled in a fierce battle during the Crusades. From here, we skip ahead a few years to China where the dying king king (Shi Liang) declares that his teenage son shall take his place on the throne. Unfortunately for the young heir, his older brother Shing (Andy On), himself a warrior type, had his eye on the throne and isn't particularly thrilled that his younger sibling was chosen over him. He solves this problem by sending his ailing father to an early grave and making it out to look like his sibling was the one responsible for the murder.

Now wrongfully accused of killing his father, the heir and his sister Lian (Liu Yifei) flee thei...Read the entire review

There are probably quite a few iceberg jokes I could make in regards to Iceberg Slim: Portrait of a Pimp if I wanted to take the time, but the most obvious is also the most apropos. Its set-up involves the bulk of any iceberg actually being below the surface, and so we can't trust what we see in the open air to represent the entire mass. This is also true about Iceberg Slim, a.k.a. Robert Beck, the late author and reformed criminal--something Jorge Hinojosa's documentary regularly forgets.

I'll admit to hating Iceberg Slim: Portrait of a Pimp when it first started. The initial commentators, including Ice T (who also produced the film), Chris Rock, Snoop Lion, and an effusive Henry Rollins, as well as critics and scholars and other expected talking heads, bend la...Read the entire review

The Film:
The daughter of a good friend recently discovered Jackie Chan, and has since fallen in love with the master of comedic kung fu and his death-defying stunt work. She's watched most of Jackie's movies, and we've had some great conversations about him and his work. And did I mention that she's only nine years old? That's right, she's nine, and she loves Jackie Chan. But at the same time, she has no idea who Bruce Lee, Gordon Liu, or Jet Li are, nor does she really care. I figure, at some point, if she wants to know more about kung fu movies, I can always show her the documentary, Films of Fury: The Kung Fu Movie Movie. And if she doesn't ever want to know more about martial arts mayhem and wushu asskickery, the DVD can collect dust until I meet another kid who might possibly appreciate this documentary, because to be perfectly honest, I don't see how anyone other than a child ca...Read the entire review

The Movie:

I'm a sucker for DVD cover art that features beautiful naked or almost naked women being dragged to their possible deaths by monsters or unseen forces. The mind runs wild at the possibilities, so why not give Absentia a shot? It did do its job by catching my eye.

Absentia takes place in a fictitious town of some kind (Glendale, CA, actually) where Callie (Katie Parker) has come to stay with her sister Tricia (Courtney Bell). Tricia's husband Daniel has been missing for seven years now and she is finalizing the paper work to declare him "dead by absentia." Callie is there to lend moral support and has also finished "touring" the Unites States. She's had problems with her family for a long time and has put that behind her.

Tricia finally starts to get on with her life when she starts seeing Daniel wherever she turns. She tries to keep this on the hush-hush fro...Read the entire review

The Tagline:

The Movie:

Richard Gabai's Insight (or IN/SIGHT as the opening credits sequence would have it) is one of those films that shamelessly dive into the cliché pool, soaking every possible drop of character stereotype and plot convention it can into a cable TV friendly 90-minute package. I don't mean that necessarily as a criticism; sometimes formula stories can be like comfort food - and this psychological (with hints of the supernatural) thriller certainly delivers a tasty snack: pleasant tasting though ultimately lacking in nutrition and substance. I kind of liked i...Read the entire review

THE MOVIE:

Allow me to be perfectly blunt. Watching A Darker Reality is a miserable way to spend 90 minutes of your life. I'm not just saying that because the film asks us to wallow in endless depravity with no rhyme or reason (which it does). The real problem is that this movie is the shoddy product of a starved imagination (shared by director Chris Kazmier and writer Sxv'leithan Essex) which hopes to cover up a complete lack of originality by throwing steaming piles of misogyny and torture at the audience.

Ostensibly a sequel to Dark Reality (haven't seen it and don't plan on doing so), the film follows a sick serial killer known as the Ghost (Daniel Baldwin). He has managed to rack up a body count of 85 victims in just 3 short years. Given his prolific nature, you would think the local police force would have some solid leads on the guy but you'd be wrong. This is...Read the entire review

The Tagline:

The Movie:

When DVD Talk sent me Phase 4 Film's latest low budget horror DVD release, The Open Door, to review, I anticipated, based upon it description, another clever supernatural twist on the teen slasher formula along the lines of Forget Me Not released by the distributor earlier this year. It did seem a little odd that this film, apparently made in 2008 here in the United States, was only now - at the end of 2011 - getting a US home video release. But, eh, such things can happen.

The ...Read the entire review

What we have here is a horror film with a catchy title made by a first-time director starring a handful of actors known for their television work (sort of). I have always had a soft-spot for a good old fashioned directorial debut, and as a movie geek I tend to look at these films a bit differently as I try to see the glimmer of potential talent in the making, of someone in the infancy of honing their craft and making their mark. While typically handcuffed by general newbie-ness and budget constraints, naturally all the limitations that come with those unshakable anchors there still could be the opportunity to maybe peer through the virgin-osity to see if there just might be something there.

My guess is that Kill Katie Malone is probably not the film writer/director Carlos Ramos Jr. intended to make in his mind, or at least I hope it wasn't. As a horror film it has a general concept that p...Read the entire review

THE MOVIE:

Marriage isn't easy. It takes work and demands patience. This is especially true if you have to dig up bodies and 'replant' them in order to protect the good name of your husband who happens to be a serial killer. (Okay, so that became oddly specific.)

Ben (Colin Hanks) isn't terribly happy which is surprising since he just won 36 million dollars in an Iowa lottery. I guess he's worried about the fact that the winning ticket came off the body of a dead woman currently stashed in his basement. It also doesn't help that Ben's murderous ways are directly responsible for her present lifeless state. If there's a silver lining to this cloud, it's that he's going to get a lot more attention from his lifelong crush, Lucy (Ari Graynor) who bears a strong resemblance to the dead woman. In fact, Lucy looks a lot like the last three women he killed but I'm getting ahead of myself....Read the entire review

When I was working on my undergraduate degree in Theatre Performance (I know, I know), I took an introductory playwriting class. One of the first lessons we learned was a simple equation: conflict = drama. Of course, it's not that simple; all conflict isn't automatically dramatic, and conflict isn't necessarily defined by yelling, screaming, and crying. At some point, these important caveats should've been whispered to Sam Levinson, the writer/director of Another Happy Day, who squanders an excellent cast and inherently dramatic situation by amping up the volume and the tears. If you're looking to watch people yell at each other for 119 minutes, boy do I have the movie for you.

To be fair, Levinson at least works his way up to that fever pitch. The opening scen...Read the entire review

The Movie:

Can a hairstylist change the world?

That's the main question posed by Vidal Sassoon: The Movie, a comprehensive documentary on a man that some may know as the creator of the most hard-edged hairstyles known to womankind, an innovator of '60s Mod aesthetics, or that "If You Don't Look Good, We Don't Look Good" shampoo commercial guy. Director Craig Teper opens the film with shots of a beaming (and terrifically fit) Sassoon walking along in beatific slo-mo while various voiceovers proclaim the man's monumental greatness. Somewhat over-the-top, perhaps -- but by the time the film ended, this viewer was inclined to agree with all that praise. In Sassoon's case, a hairstylist truly can change the world.

Vidal Sassoon: The Movie is bookended with footage of the 81 year-old Sassoon examining the mockup designs for a coffee table book about his life and career. ...Read the entire review

The Movie:

In a fairly gross exaggeration, the cover art for House Of Fallen offers up some intriguingly ominous imagery, the kind that draws in horror fans looking for a few good scares, maybe some tension, some shocks, some bloodshed, maybe even some suspense - you know, all those things that add up to make a good horror movie just that. There's a hint of mystery to that cover art, you don't quite know what the movie is about by looking at it but hey, it's piqued your curiosity and now you want to learn more, right?

Don't bother. While the movie has a few interesting ideas, the end result is boring and padded. What's that? You want more? Fair enough.

The movie opens with a text screen that fills us in on thousands of years of history in about a minute. It seems that when God created the world he sent down a bunch of angels to keep tabs on mankind but that this backfire...Read the entire review

Judging the challenge of art by the final product is a slippery slope. Musicians have visible talent. Everyone grasps that good at karaoke night and good at Carnegie Hall are two different things. Actors have visible talent. The mere act of memorizing the script is a skill set in and of itself. Hell, since this is a review of a film called Mayor Cupcake, even chefs have visible talent. Some of it can be learned; cooking is half science, but watch any Food Network competition and it's clear that inspiration is an equally important second half. Film direction, on the other hand, is sort of intangible for many and hard to grasp. Obviously, many films are visually stunning or technically complicated, but plenty of films are pretty simple, so it's easy to think, "Hey, I could do that." This is the kind of thinking that results in movies like Mayor Cupcake.

Lea Thompson plays Mary Maroni, a ...Read the entire review

THE PROGRAM

Clocking in at a paltry 76 minutes, "BloodRayne: The Third Reich" finally manages to deliver a film somewhat similar to the premise of the game series that inspired the feature-length medieval big screen clunker that director Uwe Boll followed up with an even worse wild west outing. Boll returns to the helm, taking Rayne, the series' heroine, still played by Natassia Malthe (who replaced original film star Kristanna Lokken), to Nazi Germany to kill Nazis and stop Ekart Brand (Boll regular Michael Paré), an insane Nazi (is there any other kind?) who has acquired Rayne's unique vampiric mutation, which any viewer whose seen "Blade" will recognize: the ability to function in daylight.

At this point, anyone coming into the "BloodRayne" series (I cr...Read the entire review

THE FILM

"Dear Lemon Lima" is a delightful expedition into the drive of adolescence. It's a film basted in eccentricity, yet successfully navigates the pictorial troubles of the teenaged mind, submitting a meticulously constructed, organic comedy that passes along some enchanting flights of fancy, using its exquisite Alaskan settings to mold a unique personality that further enhances the viewing experience.

Forever tied to her first boyfriend, Phillip (Shayne Topp), Vanessa (Savanah Wiltfong) is struggling with their abrupt break-up in Fairbanks, Alaska, refusing to believe love has gone kaput. Enrolling in Phillip's private school, Vanessa hopes to impress her former beau, only to find her ex a popular fixture of the sophomore class, while the staff (including Beth Grant and Elaine Hendrix) treat the new student with kid gloves, hoping she'll explore her absentee father...Read the entire review

The Movie:

The third film in the (ongoing?) Bloodrayne series of video game adaptation once again puts the enigmatic Uwe Boll in the director's chair to an hour and a half's worth of tits, blood and Nazis. If that sounds like your idea of a good time, read on - there's something to be said for Boll's gleefully exploitative tendencies and like many of his 'better' films, this recent offering is pretty damn entertaining. If you're not appreciative of his style or his traits at this point in the game, however, Bloodrayne: Third Reich will not do anything to sway your opinion.

In the opening sequence, we witness the Nazis shipping a trainload of Jewish prisoners to a death camp when, as they open the doors to unload their cargo, much to their surprise they're attacked by a group of underground resistance fighters. Lead by a man named Nathanial (Brendan Fletcher), they la...Read the entire review

The Taglines:

The Movie:

It's so easy to become jaded if you watch a lot of low budget horror, either as a fan or as a critic (or both, in my case). There is just so much of it, with a week that doesn't go by without several micro-budget productions flung out onto DVD shelves, NetFlix queues, RedBox kiosks, and SyFy's weekend schedules. And a large percentage of it, let's be honest, is highly derivative and hardly memorable. There are, however, always those diamonds in the rough: films that either ...Read the entire review

THE FILM

There's not a drop of originality to "Knockout," which largely plays out like a photocopy of "The Karate Kid" set in the high school boxing realm. The picture lacks a great deal of innovation, but it retains an impressive reservoir of charisma to help squeak it through the rough patches, making for an atypically pleasant picture from star Steve Austin, who takes a slightly less knuckle-sandwich position of caring in this underdog sports drama.

A new kid in a small town high school, Matthew (Daniel Madger) is a doughy nerd with an affinity for boxing history, taking interest in the sport of his grandfather. When school bully Hector (Jaren Brandt Bartlett) traps Matthew in a game of intimidation and abuse, the frightened freshman finds comfort in Dan (Steve Austin), the school janitor and former boxing prodigy. Accepting Matthew's request to help him train in the...Read the entire review

THE FILM

There's not a drop of originality to "Knockout," which largely plays out like a photocopy of "The Karate Kid" set in the high school boxing realm. The picture lacks a great deal of innovation, but it retains an impressive reservoir of charisma to help squeak it through the rough patches, making for an atypically pleasant picture from star Steve Austin, who takes a slightly less knuckle-sandwich position of caring in this underdog sports drama.

A new kid in a small town high school, Matthew (Daniel Madger) is a doughy nerd with an affinity for boxing history, taking interest in the sport of his grandfather. When school bully Hector (Jaren Brandt Bartlett) traps Matthew in a game of intimidation and abuse, the frightened freshman finds comfort in Dan (Steve Austin), the school janitor and former boxing prodigy. Accepting Matthew's request to help him train in the...Read the entire review

The Taglines:

The Movie:

Phase 4 Films' provocative cover art for their recent release of Darryn W. Welch's Slave hints to the uninformed that it is one of those torture films in the vein of Hostel or Saw, especially given the brief prurient blurb on its back that throws in verbiage like "brutal sadomasochist submission." However, while Slave does have its dark moments, it is anything but a violent horror film. This 2009 production, instead, is much more reminiscent (perhaps deliberatel...Read the entire review

From the blatant to the obvious, Hollywood is founded on the adage "if it ain't broke, don't fix it." From the subtle to the obvious (think Deep Impact and Armageddon), the film industry feels that the best way to know what the audience wants is to wait until something makes money, and then keep doing it until it doesn't make money anymore. From this mentality is borne films like Adventures of Power, a film with clear aspirations for the same "outcast hero"/"quirky indie" throne Napoleon Dynamite claimed in 2004.

Power (Ari Gold) is a a man with one thing on his mind: the incredibly unsubtle art of air drumming. He scrapes by with a crappy job at the local mine where his father (Michael McKean) works, and lives with his aunt (Jane Lynch). Times are tough, and when the mine workers decide to go on strike, Power strikes out on his own, eventually landing a job in an NYC nood...Read the entire review

THE FILM

The strain of love and marriage goes mumblecore in Katie Aselton's 'The Freebie," which takes a largely improvised peek at the struggle of fidelity. Though cursed with a clichéd shaky HD presentation, Aselton (who's married to co-producer/mumblecore maestro Mark Duplass) proves herself to be a formidable filmmaker with a keen eye for shame, making the picture something of a surprise, especially with its sense of marital realism.

Annie (Katie Aselton) and Darren (Dax Shepard) are a loving married couple stuck in a serious sexual rut. Despite their clear chemistry and fluid sense of communication, the two can't jumpstart their bedroom antics, leading Darren to suggest something drastic to reawaken their libidos. For one night only, Annie and Darren agree to take off and find a "freebie" sexual encounter to help refresh their passions, sticking to a rule that no ...Read the entire review

Based on the digital cover artwork available in the DVDTalk Screener Pool, Slave looked like little more than a grungy domestic kidnapping story, about someone locked in a basement. Instead, Slave is more in keeping with the recent rise of taken tourist films like Hostel and Turistas, but even then, it adopts a more old-fashioned tactic of sticking with the guy left behind rather than the kidnap victim. At first, surprisingly strong direction keeps the film afloat, but the film's focus crumbles during the third act.

David Dunsmore (Sam Page) is a young man looking to start a life with his girlfriend Georgie (Natassia Malthe). He proposes and she accepts, on the condition that he let her in more when it comes to his family. In particular, Sam has a strained relationship with his father Robert Dunsmore (Michael Maxwell), who got a divorce from Sam's mother when Sam was young...Read the entire review

THE PROGRAM

Uwe Boll has a made a good movie. Let that sink in for a moment. After years of earning a reputation as a prolific hack, butchering countless adaptations of video games, Boll took an interesting detour for the serious with the film "Tunnel Rats" telling the little known story of US Soldiers in Vietnam tasked with clearing VC tunnels and "Stoic" a film recounting a true story of horrific abuse in a prison. While I have not seen the latter, I did bear witness to the former and ultimately found Boll guilty of torpedoing his own production with some heavy-handed moral outrage and unfocused exploitation. Imagine my horror and curiosity when I heard Boll intended to make a movie about the genocide in Darfur. Now imagine a world in which Uwe Boll not only made a good movie, but an important one.

"Attac...Read the entire review

The Movie:

Directed and co-written by Ryan Combs, Caged Animal was actually originally released with the more appropriate title of Wraith Of Cain - in fact, it was released on DVD in the UK under that title. Why it's been retitled here is anyone's guess, though it was likely a marketing ploy to make this prison film seem more fierce and violent than it actually is and to appeal to the action movie crowd.

The film stars Ving Rhames as Miles 'Cain' Skinner, a former nightclub owner who had some criminal ties who is currently incarcerated for life. He was put behind bars when a rival gangster named Redfoot (Robert Lasardo) stormed into his club and got into a firefight with him over a turf dispute. The results left Skinner's girlfriend dead, though somehow Redfoot managed to evade capture. This all changes when he's busted by the cops and sent to the same prison where C...Read the entire review

The Tagline:

The Movie:

Deadland, a low budget postapocalyptic romp filmed in the woods of Georgia, has a well-made introduction. We are introduced to the film's protagonist, Sean Kalos (played by Gary Weeks, who also penned the screenplay). Sean pulls into a dilapidated gas station and attempts to make amends on a cell phone with his estranged wife Katie. His phone goes dead, so he walks into the station and requests a phone from the clerk, who at first seems rude when he absentmindedly tosses Sean his cell. That phone is dead too, and Sean soon discovers that the clerk is ...Read the entire review

THE MOVIE:

There are several different levels of admiration and/or disgust that one can feel about Hugh Hefner, often simultaneously. But the complexity of our feelings about the Playboy founder isn't really on the table in Brigette Berman's documentary Hugh Hefner: Playboy, Activist, and Rebel, which is less an examination of Hefner than it is a celebration of him. Make no mistake, there are things about him worth celebrating, no matter where you stand on the magazine he is irrevocably tied to. But it's a sliding scale, and for all of its virtues, the primary flaw of Berman's film is that it sees him in black and white terms: you're either with him or you're against him.

Hefner's story is certainly ripe for the documentary treatment--this isn't his first time at the center of one, in fact. Berman doesn't dwell too much on his early years; Hef is founding the magazine ...Read the entire review

All American Orgy is one of those ideas that probably sounds really funny when it's being pitched in a living room amongst a bunch of comedians, but by the time it reaches the screen, it's been thought and rethought well beyond its breaking point. Three couples have arranged for an orgy in the woods -- no particular reason, just because, hey, why not? -- and the movie documents everyone arriving at the secluded farm where they've scheduled the shindig, and its eventual, inevitable collapse. While the premise is fertile and a few of the more absurd jokes are worth a chuckle, writer Ted Beck and director Andrew Drazek struggle to find a tone that isn't slimy.

Obviously, the simplest reason a bunch of neurotic couples would all agree to a situation like the one presented here is that they're interested in one of the other participants, or disinterested in their current partner. Alan (Adam Busch) ...Read the entire review

The Series:

One of the more successful Canadian comedy TV shows to come around in some time, The Trailer Park Boys has become a bit of a sensation in its homeland and has developed a fairly strong cult following south of the border as well. With the show having proven quite successful, Screen Media Films released the two feature films that were spawned from the series onto DVD, and now Phase 4 dips their toes into the water and brings American audiences the complete first season of the show - all six episodes, uncut.

The series follows the misadventures of three friends who all live in the same Nova Scotia trailer park - a bumbling pompadour wearing small time pot farmer named Ricky (Robb Wells), his buff but rather dim pal Julian (John Paul Tremblay) with rum and coke always in hand, and the strange bespectacled and kitten obsessed Bubbles (Mike Smith). The park is watched...Read the entire review

I Do & I Don't:
Nominal pros such as myself grow insanely leery of straight-to-DVD offerings. If it were Vegas, we'd have our fingers broken on a daily basis, for all the sucker bets we take watching such movies. This time, a 2007 Jane Lynch (Glee) headliner about the perils of marriage finds me happily flexing my intact digits. Funny, truthful and crass, this delightful comedy overcomes a shaky start to provide plenty of hearty laughs and a satisfying finish.

Bob Jacobs (Mad TV's Bryan Callen) loves Cheryl Murphy (Alexie Gilmore) enough to want to marry her. Cheryl's parents hate Bob enough to want to put him through hell in order to earn that right. Part of that trial involves Church-mandated couple-to-couple counseling. No big deal, just three Saturdays in a row. Yet when they first meet their counselors, older, experienced married couple Dick and Nora Stelmack (Matt Se...Read the entire review

The Movie:

Written by, directed by and starring Ace Cruz, Outrage (or, as it's been retitled for this North American DVD, Outage Born In Terror, is a moderately entertaining thriller even if it isn't a film that really brings anything new to the genre. The movie follows pretty young woman named Christine (Katie Fountain) who brings her friends, Molly (Natasha Lyonne) and Jack (Derek Lee Nixon) deep into the woods to help her close up the family's hunting lodge which she intends to put up for sale. You might think this would be a business opportunity for clever young Christine, but she associates some very bad memories from her childhood with this place and would just as soon get it out of her life for good.

How unfortunate for our travelers then that a middle aged lunatic named Farragut (Michael Madsen) and his three cohorts, the Loomis Brothers, are using the lodge as ...Read the entire review

The Freebie is the kind of movie that surprises you with its boldness, and then disappoints you with its timidity. It deals in matters of monogamous intimacy with a frankness and honesty that is downright refreshing in the current cinema, independent or otherwise, but then gets itself all hung up in conventional conflicts and fake-outs. It builds up a tremendous amount of power and goodwill in its first two acts, and then, unfortunately, chips a good chunk of it away.

Director Katie Aselton stars as Annie, who is in an affectionate and practical, if somewhat passionately stagnant, marriage to Darren (Dax Shepard). They pride themselves on being completely honest with each other (and make fun of their couple friends who aren't), but it's still painful for Annie to admi...Read the entire review

The Movie:

Directed by Alex De Rakoff, Dead Man Running is yet another movie about yet another guy who owes some bad men money. This time around the story takes place in London, the guy in question is named Nick (Tamer Hassen) and the bad man who he owes the money to is a loan shark named Mr. Thigo (played by Curtis Jackson, who you may know better as 50 Cent). When it becomes obvious that there's no way Nick's going to come up with the money by the promised due date, Thigo gives him twenty-four hours to come up with the cash or pay with his life. If that weren't bad enough, Thigo is intending to use Nick as an example to other would be welchers, and so he goes out of his way to make it impossible for Nick to pay him back - and on top of that, he kidnaps Nick's poor wheelchair bound mother (Brenda Blethyn) and holds her hostage.

With nowhere else to turn, Nick turns to his bes...Read the entire review

THE FILM

Nothing provides the foundation for a tender romantic comedy quite like the adult film industry. Attempting to marry the art of love with the business of sex, Julie Davis's "Finding Bliss" is a tone-deaf motion picture that sours a perfectly ripe opportunity to slap around the world of porn, forgoing satire to make googly eyes with characters unworthy of such warm contemplation.

Film school graduate Jody Balaban (Leelee Sobieski) is finding life in L.A. far more difficult than she expected. Desperate for work, Jody takes an editing gig with Grind Productions, quickly learning the company specializes in pornography. Sensing a ripe opportunity to try her hand at filmmaking, Jody spends her days surveying dirty footage shot by ace director Jeff Drake (Matthew Davis), while using the office space at night to film her own relationship motion picture, using a cast o...Read the entire review

As many as four years ago, I stumbled upon the teaser trailer for Timer on YouTube by accident. The hook: in the not-too-distant future, people have wrist-implanted countdown clocks indicating the moment they'll meet their true love. It's one of those movie gimmicks that could easily turn out terribly, but it captured the imagination long enough that when the movie showed up on the DVDTalk request list this year, I remembered what it was

From the teaser, one might think the Timer process occurs at birth, but it turns out it's a voluntary process, and if your soulmate doesn't have one, your Timer will be blank until that person takes the plunge. Oona (Emma Caulfield) is one of those people hounded by a blank readout; time after time she brings unadorned guys to the Timer store to get injected, and time after time, her numbers don't come up. Her situation helps strengthen her bond with her sist...Read the entire review