November 2006

Comic Book Shelf

Hey there true believers!  Today the sixteenth issue of our Comic Book Shelf edition hits our newsstand.  Want to know what’s getting released today at the old comic shop but too busy, or lazy (not that there’s anything wrong with that), to bother?  Well no sweat Bat-fans as we’ve got the scoop of what comics and graphic novels are hitting the shelves today.

This week’s releases include Batman, Crossing Midnight, Deathblow, Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man, Ghost in the Shell 1.5, Guy Gardner: Collateral Damage, Immortal Iron Fist, Stan Lee Meets Dr. Doom, Trials of Shazam!, and more!

If you’re looking for graphic novels you don’t want to miss Avengers: Galactic Storm Vol.2, Batman: The Dark Knight Archives Vol. 5, Essential Man-Thing Vol.1, Green Lantern: Revenge of the Green Lanterns, Gungrave Archives, and more.

For the full list check inside…

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Superman Returns to DVD

Superman Returns was a big hit at the theaters this summer, though not as big as the studio had hoped (despite making just over $200 million it came up short of making back its $270 million price tag).  Still Superman proved he could be a powerful force at the box office.  The film comes out on DVD today and we’ve got a quick look.

Superman Returns
Custom Rating

I enjoyed Superman Returns in the theater, but had some problems with the script, continuity errors, and the lack of originality (all of which you can read more about in my original review).  December liked the film a little more than me (as you can read here).  So it’s been a couple months, and now it’s out on DVD, so let’s get to it.

After a five-year absence Kal-El (Brandon Routh) returns from the wreckage of Krypton to his adopted home of Earth.  On arriving he discovers life has moved on without him.  Lois Lane (Kate Bosworth) is engaged and has a young son, and Lex Luthor (Kevin Spacey) has been busy making some withdrawals from the Fortress of Solitude.

The film works as well, if not slightly better on DVD than in the theater, given it’s length and breadth, though you also have more opportunity to wonder at the lunacy of Lex Luthor’s plan.  The effects work just as well on DVD and with a proper stereo system you can sit back and crank John Williams score.

I stick by my qualms with the film.  However, I will say that with each viewing I like Brandon Routh and Kate Bosworth more and more in their respected roles.  Though Routh is no Christopher Reeve, he does have a little of his openness and charm that grows on you.  And Bosworth shines in what is one of the oddest casting decisions of the year.

But I still hate that new suit!

Is it a must have for your collection?  Probably not.  But the DVD does give you the remastered John Williams score and some nice performances and fun moments.  Aside from the look at the Marlon Brando scenes, I’m not sure the Special Edition warrants the added cost, except for huge fans of the film, and I think the single disc will serve most viewers just fine.

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This Week

So what’s out there this week?  It’s an interesting week at the movie plex coming to a theater near you and in limited release: 3 Needles, The Architect, Christmas at Maxwell’s, National Lampoon’s Van Wilder: The Rise of Taj, The Nativity Story and Turistas.

C’mon in and let us get you ready for the week!

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Here’s what’s scheduled to hit theaters this week.  Want to know more?  Just click on the title for film info including a full cast list.  Want a closer look?  Just click on the poster to watch the trailer.

Opening Friday:

National Lampoon’s Van Wilder: The Rise of Taj

Just in case the first bomb wasn’t enough for you, here is another. National Lampoon is back again and in it’s usual color. They should have stopped with National Lampoon’s Christmas and left it at that. Now we have to suffer through some film that should have went straight to DVD. How do they get such bad humor green lit?  Taj, Van Wilder’s geeky apprentice from the first film, goes international. He heads off to Camden University in England and adopts a group of misfit geeks and teaches them a little Wilder magic. Plenty of T & A and nerds being picked on, but they win in the end.

Rated R for pervasive crude sexual content (like the first), some nudity and language. Projected bomb.

The Nativity Story

Director Catherine Hardwicke and crew painstakingly produce this story down to the finest detail. A great deal of work and fine-tuning went into the set design, costuming and location. Well acted and written, The Nativity Story comes to the big screen in all its marvelous wonder glory. I don’t feel I need to summarize the film, it’s well known throughout. Just in time for the holidays and family gatherings.

Rated PG for some violent content. Projected 3.5 out of 5 razors.

Turistas

Just in case the first bomb wasn’t enough for you, here is another. National Lampoon is back again and in it’s usual color. They should have stopped with National Lampoon’s Christmas and left it at that. Now we have to suffer through some film that should have went straight to DVD. How do they get such bad humor green lit? As if Hostel wasn’t enough, now we have Turistas. A group of young and beautiful Americans go on vacation off the beaten path in beautiful exotic Brazil. After a bus crash and being a little shook up, the group runs into a couple of British travelers and some kind locals.

As the night draws on and the exotic drinks keep coming, the tourists wake up the next morning on the beach with no wallets, id’s or passports. Left in a country with no way out, they trust a local boy to take them to a safe house, or not. They find other passports and photo ids’s from past tourists and start to become unnerved. Sleeping in groups with one eye open, they are attacked in the middle of the night, but by whom? Horrible tortures and experiments locked in a cage and trying to escape the “Turistas” may not make it through their lavish vacation. After some of the films released this year and last, I may never want to travel out of the U.S., or my own hometown, for that matter, again.

Rated R for strong graphic violence and disturbing content, sexuality, nudity, drug use and language. On a fear factor and pure adrenaline projected 4 out 5 razors. You must remember I’m rating this based on the genre, not the Oscars.

Limited Release:

3 Needles

Beautiful visuals and touching stories, 3 Needles hits on 3 continents, South Africa, China and North America. In South Africa, Clara (Chloe Sevigny) tries to lead the dying to Jesus before it’s too late. She and her crew run across a group of orphans and she finds herself making a deal with a wealthy plantation owner to by the safety of the orphans. In China, Jin Ping (Lucy Liu) sets up a blood collection service. A local farmer, Tong Sam (Tanabadee Chokpikultong), has the flu and cannot sell his blood, so he lies about his daughter’s age and sells hers. He uses the money to make improvements on his farm, but when his farm finally prospers his daughter and wife mysteriously die.

Sam sets out on a journey to find out what caused their deaths and when he returns, he finds the whole town ill and the mobile blood collection out of business. In North America, Denny (Shawn Ashmore) is a porn star that passes his blood tests with his father’s blood. He is busted and the family falls on extremely hard times. His mother, Olive (Stockard Channing), takes out a large life insurance policy, purposely contracts a life threatening disease and sells her life insurance for a settlement worth millions. All stories have a strong tie to a particular disease and blood, each story is human and touching and spread through out the world. Projected 4 out of 5 razors.

Christmas at Maxwell’s

From the site:Christmas at Maxwell’s is an inspirational but light romantic Christmas drama, a story about the human struggle, the power of love, forgiveness, trust and uplifting the human spirit. It is the story of a fortysomething man confronting the overwhelming effect his past actions seem to be taking on his life and his family. Christmas at Maxwell’s was created to supplement the lack of family-friendly movies on the market today. It is inspired by a true story of faith, hope, love, and forgiveness, and is a movie based on traditional spiritual values.

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Jack and Kyle Strike Back

Despite a terrific opening and some pretty darn good music there’s something desperately wrong with Tenacious D in The Pick of Destiny.  Parody, fart jokes, and a stoner two-some can only take you so far, ask Kevin Smith.  Actually the film feels quite like Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back.  I’m all for copying Smith’s style, but couldn’t you have done one of his better films?

Tenacious D in The Pick of Destiny
3 Stars

It’s not as bad as I feared it would be, but it’s nowhere near as good as it should be.  Tenacious D in The Pick of Destiny tells the “true story” of how the band got together and discovered their talent.  The thing is, there just isn’t much talent in the film.  It steals most of its bits and moments by parodying other films, held together by dick and fart jokes, rather than craft a coherent and compelling story.  Well, at least it’s not Nacho Libre.

The first ten minutes of Tenacious D in The Pick of Destiny rock.  In an ode to rock opera, the film opens in a flashback scene as the young JB (voiced by Jack Black) is chastised by his father (Meat Loaf) for his his love of Rock.  Having his posters taken and his hide tanned, the youngster heads out to find the land of Rock, Hollywood.  (It’s bad for a film when your best moments all come in the first ten minutes.)

Years later JB finally reaches his destination and meets up with a fellow musician, KG (Kyle Gass), who agrees to train him.  Insert many parodies from Star Wars to the Karate Kid here.  Finally the two become a band, naming themselves after the matching birthmarks on their asses.  Um, yeah…

The band struggles for an audience despite their “awesomeness.”  When a guitar shop owner (Ben Stiller) tells the legend of a magic guitar pick made from the tooth of Satan (David Grohl) the two set out to the Rock Museum (conveniently relocated to Sacramento for the movie) to steal the pick and earn fame and glory.

The film isn’t much of a story, there’s the intro to the characters, the long training scenes, and the trip to steal the pick, all of which contain countless parodies from other films, music, television, and more.  The list contains Entrapment, Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back, “The Devil Went Down to Georgia,” Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure, and many others.

There’s just such little original content here it’s hard to view the film as anything more than a funnier than avearage 93 minute SNL sketch, with a couple of good hosts and musical guests.

Despite some funny bits and some pretty good animation sequence and title cards there’s little here that’s memorable.  You’ll laugh, you’ll groan, but leaving the theater you’ll promptly forget about the film, about the wasted potential, and the broken promise of “awesomeness” those first ten minutes.  Sure you’ll enjoy yourself, but in the end, there’s just not enough there worth remembering.

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Haven’t I Seen This Before?

  • Title: Deja Vu
  • IMDB: link

deja-vu-posterA cop goes back in time to prevent the murder of a woman who will give birth to the future leader of the human race and lead them against the machines run by Skynet … um, I mean a woman who, well, isn’t really that important at all.  But she’s cute, so there’s that.  Yeah…

When a ferry explodes killing Naval officers and civilians, ATF agent Doug Carlin (Denzel Washington) is called in on the case.  The discovery of a woman (Paula Patton)  killed moments before the explosion leads Carlin on the path of a terrorist (James Caviezel), but even if he succeeds he can’t save the girl.  Or can he?

A new top secret military project (headed up by Val Kilmer and Adam Goldberg) allows a team to look back exactly 100 hours into the past to discover the events that led to Clarie’s death and the identity of the terrorist.  Doug joins the team to find the identity of the killer, but also begins to wonder if it might not be possible to journey through time and chance the past.

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