Blu-Ray News: ASH VS. EVIL DEAD SEASON 2 on Blu-ray & DVD 8/22

Hail to the King as  

Ash vs Evil Dead: Season 2

Slices its Way to Blu-ray and DVD August 22 from Lionsgate

SANTA MONICA, CA (June 12, 2017) – Evil just can’t catch a break as the hilarious, critically acclaimed horror series “Ash vs Evil Dead”: Season 2 arrives on Blu-ray (plus Digital HD) and DVD August 22 from Lionsgate. Locked and loaded with the same twisted humor and gory kill scenes groovy fans of the franchise are used to, “Ash vs Evil Dead”: Season 2 continues the chainsaw-slicing, shotgun-blasting fun from the first season. “Ash vs Evil Dead”: Season 2 stars Bruce Campbell (The Evil Dead franchise), Lucy Lawless (TV’s “Spartacus: War of the Damned”), Ray Santiago (In Time), and Dana DeLorenzo (A Very Harold & Kumar 3D Christmas), as well as this season’s introduction of Lee Majors (TV’s “The Six Million Dollar Man”) as Ash’s father.

This season roars back into action with Ash leaving his beloved Jacksonville and returning to his home town of Elk Grove. There, he confronts Ruby, only to find that she too is now a victim of evil and in need of Ash’s help. The former enemies have to form an uneasy alliance to give them a chance of success as Elk Grove soon becomes the nucleus of evil.

VIEW THE TRAILER:

 

Blu-Ray Review: KILL 'EM ALL

Starring Jean-Claude Van Damme, Autumn Reeser, Peter Stormare, Maria Conchita Alonso, Daniel Bernhardt. Directed by Peter Malota. (2017, 96 min).

SONY

It wouldn't kill Jean-Claude Van Damme to just say no every now and then. In the past, with the right directors (like John Woo or Peter Hyams), he's actually cranked out a few decent movies. In recent years, he's even demonstrated a willingness to poke fun at his own image, with amusing results, in movies and TV shows on numerous occasions. Unfortunately, Van Damme still falls in with the wrong crowd way too often.

The wrong crowd this time are those responsible for Kill 'Em All, a low-wattage action fest thrown together by folks who've obviously seen Die Hard and The Usual Suspects too many times. In fact, if I were Bryan Singer & Christopher McQuarrie, I'd consider suing.

Van Damme is Phillip, a revenge-minded assassin who's brought to a hospital with serious injuries, as is his quarry, a Yugoslavian crimelord. The man's gang of thugs - each given a flashy intro - arrive to kill Phillip. Rather than try and escape, Phillip stays to finish the job and kill everybody one-by-one, with the reluctant help of Suzanne (Autumn Reeser), a plucky nurse with a convenient set of deadly skills of her own.

"After I kill you, my agent is next."

This is all told in flashback by Suzanne, being grilled by two of the most useless CIA agents in movie history (Peter Stormare & Maria Conchita Alonso, both of whom are surprisingly terrible). They appear to serve no real purpose other than to threaten Suzanne and provide most of the plot & character exposition. In several instances, the viewer might even be prompted to ask, "If you already know so goddamn much, why the hell are you treating this hapless nurse like a war criminal?" The film eventually explains everything - sort of - but it actually renders the previous 90 minutes more pointless and nonsensical.

It's a premise and twist lifted straight out of The Usual Suspects, with none of Singer and McQuarrie's skill, kind of like hearing Beethoven 9th symphony performed by a middle school band class. None of the characters are remotely interesting either...the bad guys all smirk, sneer and show no fear, even when getting the shit kicked out of them. Van Damme himself does a decent job, though not required to do more than look haggard and crack limbs. While it's reassuring to see he can still deliver a hearty roundhouse kick, he really doesn't look very healthy. Sure, no one stays young forever, but even without the cuts and contusions, he's starting to resemble Eddie on all those Iron Maiden album covers.

Jean-Claude Van Damme has cranked-out so many cheap, budget-bin fight-fests since his heyday that I can't imagine Kill 'Em All appealing to anyone but his staunchest fans. It's just another generic, derivative and depressing hodge-podge of ideas ripped-off from better films. I'm sure Van Damme appreciates the paycheck, but he needs to go back to hanging out with a better crowd before he ends up on Dancing with the Stars or an A&E reality show.

EXTRA KIBBLES

None

KITTY CONSENSUS:

BLEH...LIKE COUGHING UP A HAIRBALL

Rest in Peace, Adam West

Adam West (1928-2017)

Rest in Peace, Glenne Headly

Glenne Headly (1955-2017)

Blu-Ray Review: MINE

Starring Armie Hammer, Annabelle Wallis, Tom Cullen, Clint Dyer. Directed by Fabio Guaglione & Fabio Resinaro. (2016, 107 min).

WELL GO USA

Movies which which primarily feature a single character in a simple-but-perilous predicament are inherently intriguing, though difficult to pull off well. The best ones - The Shallows is a great recent example - are gripping, visceral experiences where the viewer can't help but put themselves in the character's shoes. Others feel too slight and unnecessarily padded out to feature length. Mine falls somewhere in between.

The premise is terrific. Armie Hammer plays Mike Stevens, a marine sniper deployed in Africa to kill a reported terrorist. After the mission fails, he and buddy Tommy Madison (Tom Cullen) must walk across a massive desert on-foot for extraction. Along the way, they stumble into a minefield. Mike steps on one, which will detonate if he lifts his foot. Tommy's not so lucky; his legs are blown off and he eventually kills himself, leaving Mike alone, miles from the nearest village.

He manages to contact his superiors, who inform him they can't come in for a rescue for 52 hours. With almost no water, Mike must remain nearly immobile while fending off nocturnal predators and dealing with the elements (including desert heat and a massive sand storm).

"Man, some of that's gonna get in my shorts."

These scenes - Mike alone in the desert, his chances for survival dropping each hour - are fairly gripping. Hammer delivers a suitably gritty performance, effectively conveying both stoicism and desperation. Less effective are numerous flashback scenes, mostly involving his abusive father (Geoff Bell) or his fiancee, Jenny (Annabelle Wallis). While they're obviously meant to provide a bit of background to the character, the overuse of flashbacks is somewhat intrusive, repeatedly sucking the viewer out of Mike's current predicament.

I also could have done without Berber (Clint Dyer), a village local who frequently visits Mike throughout his ordeal. He initially provides Mike with water, but later ends up offering metaphors about life and fate. Seemingly serving as a host for the Mike's hallucinations, the character's actual purpose grows increasingly baffling with each scene.

While there's a good argument that Mine might have been more effective as a short subject, the scenario alone keeps us interested enough to power through the padding and see it through to the end. The film comes to a fairly satisfying - and amusingly ironic - conclusion that more-or-less justifies our time.

EXTRA KIBBLES

MAKING-OF FEATURETTE

VFX & STORYBOARDS

DELETED SCENES

TRAILER

DVD COPY

KITTY CONSENSUS:

 NOT BAD...LIKE CAT CHOW

Movie News: VALERIAN: CITY OF ALPHA: Mobile Game of Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets

Valerian: City of Alpha, the official mobile game of the upcoming Luc Besson feature film Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets will launch this summer from Spil Games. Players can dive into the Valerian universe as the game will explore the metropolis of Alpha and its thousands of species. 

View the game trailer:

Blu-Ray Review: OPERATION MEKONG

Starring Zhang Hanyu, Eddie Peng, Feng Wenjuon, Sun Chun, Liu Xianda, Jonathan, Zhao Jian, Shi Zhanjie, Wu Xudong, Pawalit Mongokolpisit, Chen Baoguo. Directed by Dante Lam. (2016, 124 min).

WELL GO USA

If you ever wanted to watch a coked-up child play Russian Roulette and lose, have I got a movie for you...

Supposedly inspired on real events - though you'll scarcely believe a minute of it - Operation Mekong is a Chinese action film loaded with bombastic, bloody mayhem. Gao Gang (Zhang Hanyu) and Fang Xinwu (Eddie Peng) are two drug enforcement agents who go undercover with a team of mercenaries to try and stop the flow of drugs from the Golden Triangle, a region along the Mekong River where powerful cartels control everything and everyone.

The most vicious & chemically imbalanced of the drug-lords is Naw Kham (Pawalit Mongokolpisit, sporting the mother of all mullets), who essentially declares war on the Chinese police. In addition to surrounding himself with a legion of murderous thugs, scores of kidnapped drug-addicted kids (little kids) live with him. He keeps them busy, though...walking into police stations with bombs and protecting his compound with machine guns. Father of the year, he ain't.

"Oochy-koochy-koo, you son of a bitch!"

Character development - and a majority of the plot, for that matter - mostly takes a backseat to explosive action and brutal violence. Some of the latter is truly unnerving, such as the aforementioned Russian Roulette scene and the fate of an innocent woman at the wrong end of a knife, though none of it's particularly exploitative. As for the action...Dante Lam directs like a graduate from the Michael Bay Academy, which isn't quite as terrible as the comparison implies. Sometimes big & ballsy is the way to go, and when your movie already stretches credibility to the breaking point, why not toss in a shoot-out/car chase that destroys an entire shopping mall?

Operation Mekong seldom slows down long enough for the viewer to think too much about its plausibility. The violence involving children is a little tough to take - and not real really necessary - but other than that, the film is fairly enjoyable way to kill a few hours.

EXTRA KIBBLES

A six-part making-of documentary

KITTY CONSENSUS:

NOT BAD...LIKE CAT CHOW

Movie News: WONDER WOMAN Online Store

In Celebration of Warner Bros. Pictures’ action-adventure film WONDER WOMAN, featuring the most empowered and unstoppable heroine of the DC Universe! Packed with a treasure trove of Wonder Woman gear, the officially licensed shop of Warner Bros. Consumer Products is stocked with collectibles, clothing and accessories for every hero in your life. Lasso yourself some wonderful art, iPhone covers, blankets, drinkware, jackets, handbags and much, much more — this store is the first stop for all your Amazonian accessories!

 Visit http://www.WonderWomanShop.com today!

Rest in Peace, Peter Sallis

Peter Sallis (1921-2017)

Blu-Ray Review: BAMBI - ANNIVERSARY EDITION

Starring the voices of Donnie Dunagan, Hardy Albright, John Sutherland, Tim Davis, Sam Edwards, Paula Winslowe, Sterling Holloway, Will Wright, Ann Gillis. Numerous Directors (supervised by David Hand). (1942, 70 min).

WALT DISNEY

What more can you say about Bambi?

If not the best animated film released during Walt's watch, it's arguably the most ambitious, artistic and influential. And along with Pinocchio, Bambi has aged remarkably well, both narratively and aesthetically. 75 years (!) later, it's lost none of its power to enthrall, amuse, charm and horrify.

Speaking of horrifying, it goes without saying that Bambi's legacy extends beyond the silver screen. This is, of course, the movie that ruined a million childhoods by introducing the concept of death to them for the first time. Not the demise of a villain or any of that "circle of life" nonsense...real death, which doesn't always play fair, often comes without warning, takes loved ones away and doesn't give them back.

In the interest of journalistic integrity, I'll save the spoilers for the few who might be clueless to what scene I'm referring to. But I will argue that the main reason it remains so emotionally shredding - more-so than a similar segment in Disney's The Lion King - is its unsentimental, sugar-free cruelty. Death swiftly strikes and moves on. So does the film, without giving its audience a chance to process and fully accept what's happened. In a way, the fact we're forced to move forward with no reassurance is ultimately what makes the event so devastating (especially for the wee ones).

"Mama said I'm not s'pposed to talk about Fight Club."

That aside, Bambi remains a triumph of minimalist storytelling. Seeing it for the first time in at least 30 years, I noticed how little dialogue there actually is, using imagery, action and music to manipulate the audience more effectively than verbal exposition. From a visual and technical standpoint, Bambi not only changed how animated films are made, it's loaded with striking imagery, beautiful backgrounds and painstaking attention to the tiniest details.

This "Anniversary Edition" isn't Bambi's first Blu-Ray rodeo, though. It sports the same gorgeous picture & sound as 2011's Diamond Edition. It also duplicates most of that version's supplemental features, along with a handful of new ones (listed below). And like the previous disc, there are three ways to watch the film: the straight theatrical version, "Inside Walt's Story Meetings" (a picture-in-picture feature where we see and hear transcripts of the original production meetings as the film is playing) and "Disney View," where the sidebars are filled with paintings by artist Lisa Keene (includes a brief Keene bio).

For Disney fans - not-to-mention serious cinephiles - Bambi is a must-own on Blu-Ray. If it's not yet in your collection, this one is worth picking up over the older disc, mainly because it also includes a digital copy. However, with the exception of a digital-only tribute to the film's late lead artist and an early black & white cartoon made by Walt Disney before he was Walt Disney, the remaining new features are of the fluffy variety. Those who own the Diamond Edition may want to consider that before double-dipping.

EXTRA KIBBLES - NEW

FEATURETTES:

"Bambi Fawn Facts"

"The Bambi Effect"

"Studio Stories: Bambi"

"Celebrating Tyrus Wong" (Available on digital copy only) - The late Tyrus Wong was the film's lead artist

ANIMATED SHORT: "Oswald, the Lucky Rabbit: Africa Before Dark"

2 DELETED SCENES

TYRUS WONG LITHOGRAPH

DVD & DIGITAL COPIES

EXTRA KIBBLES - "CLASSIC BONUS FEATURES" (from previous home video releases)

FEATURETTES: "Tricks of Our Trade"; "Inside the Disney Archives"; "The Making of Bambi"; "The Golden Age"

ANIMATED SHORT: "The Old Mill"

3 DELETED SCENES

DELETED SONG: "Twitterpated"

TRAILER

KITTY CONSENSUS:

MEE-OW! IF YOU DON'T ALREADY OWN IT, WHAT ARE YOU WAITING FOR?