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DVD Review - Julia (2014)

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DVD Review - The Deadly Mantis (1957)

DVD Review - Invoked (2015)

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DVD Review - Foxcatcher

Genre:
Drama, Sports |
Distributor:
Entertainment One |
DVD Release Date:
18th May 2015 (UK) |
Rating: 15 |
Director:
Bennett Miller |
Cast:
Steve Carell, Channing Tatum, Mark Ruffalo, Sienna Miller
| Buy: [DVD]

I'm aware that it's just the timing of the new home media releases, but I've had a run of true story Oscar bait titles recently. The two I've previously reviewed, Unbroken and The Theory of Everything, both shared the problem of feeling like they were more interested in being Academy catered affairs than being stand alone proper takes on what actually happened. I've always found the approach to making Academy pandering prestige pics to be just as shallow and calculated as the way something like Transformers is tailor-made to appeal to young teenage boys. I explain this to qualify my trepidation in reviewing Foxcatcher, which even without the reviewing streak I've been on, seemed like it belonged with the other two in being a true story with tons of awards buzz about it. I'm happy to say I was wrong. Foxcatcher is easily my favourite of the three films and definitely deserved better, if only to recognise the great performances held within.

Foxcatcher is based on a real story of obsession and murder, directed by Bennett Miller. Channing Tatum plays Mark Schultz, an Olympic wrestling gold medal winner. He, along with his fellow gold medallist brother Dave (Mark Ruffalo) are in training for the next big global competition. Mark is soon recruited by eccentric millionaire John Du Pont (Steve Carell) to have access to Du Pont's state-of-the-art gym and equipment in return for joining Du Pont's Team Foxcatcher. If you don't know the actual story, I won't spoil it for you, but suffice to say this is one bleak film. It's a dark and twisted little story that leaves you with more questions than when you started. The film certainly holds up its end of the bargain by making itself just as vague as to the actual motives behind what eventually transpired, but it certainly offers up some compelling theories.

Channing Tatum is really impressive as Mark. His character is not one to verbally express how he's feeling, so Tatum cranks up the physical storytelling. For one, Mark has a bit of a Neanderthal thing about him, with a furrowed brow and a stuck out chin. It's even down to the way he walks, kind of round-shouldered, like a Silverback gorilla. It's an intense performance and Tatum does really well. With this and Magic Mike can we stop calling the guy a bad actor now? He definitely isn't. Steve Carell's performance beneath a ridiculous prosthetic nose is a great one. Carell's roles normally require massively broad strokes and lots of yelling, but Du Pont is like an alien wearing a human suit. Everything from the way he shuffles around to the way he unconvincingly gives motivational speeches is straight from the uncanny. The performance does go comedic occasionally and it adds great depth to the character. At one point, Du Pont tells Mark that now they're friends, Mark doesn't have to call him “sir” any more. He then goes on to tell Mark, straight-faced and unironically, that his friends call him “Eagle” or “Golden Eagle”. Written down it looks like a joke from Step Brothers, but in practice, it's clear that Du Pont's got himself a bad case of arrested development, stuck in childish ways because he never had a proper childhood to grow out of .Overall, it's a great performance by Carell, I just wish the prosthetics had been toned down slightly. He looks more like a character in a comedy sketch than the real guy. Mark Ruffalo gives an incredibly naturalistic performance as Schultz Snr. Both Tatum and Carell are quite theatrical in their roles whearas Ruffalo plays an everyman dad and plays it straight down the line. He's a foil to the bigger acting and it works perfectly.

I didn't really enjoy Foxcatcher, but that's the point. It was never going to be a pizza and beer Friday night Netflix choice. It's a cold and bleak film that intentionally doesn't offer any easy answers when it comes to explaining what went down and why. It kept me glued to my seat. I was really taken in by the main three and no matter how uncomfortable I felt as things built up, I knew I had to finish it. Highly recommended, but not for date night.

★★★★
Ben Browne

Dead by Dawn 2015 Review - Tusk

Genre:
Horror,Comedy
Distributor:
Sony Pictures HE
Rating: 15
DVD Release Date:
8th June 2015 (UK)
Screened:
Dead By Dawn 2015
Director:
Kevin Smith
Cast:
Michael Parks, Justin Long, Genesis Rodriguez, Haley Joel Osment, Harley Morenstein
Buy:Tusk [DVD]

Kevin Smith is one brazen son of a gun. His first foray into horror, Tusk is a tricky sell, too silly to be scary, to nihilistic to be widely enjoyed. But screw it, this isn’t about making flavour of the month, Smith’s latest is bold as far as genre mash-ups go. Tusk mashes rural craziness with body horror, ultra-nihilism, and laugh-out-loud silliness to create a truly unique feature. It’s a searing shot of monstrous black comedy that’s made for the thicker skinned viewer.

Wallace (Justin Long) is a successful podcaster and a bit of an asshole, travelling to Canada for a tasteless interview. After the interview is cancelled, Wallace contacts Howard Howe (Michael Parks), an old recluse living in an ancient house who just wants to share the stories of his seafaring adventures. Soon, Wallace is at the whim of a madman with an unfortunate obsession with Walrus.

Michael Parks is the heart and soul of the film, committing 100% to one of modern horror’s best nutters. A close thematic relation to Dieter Laser’s terrifying Dr Heiter in The Human Centipede, Howe proves a far deeper, more gripping, and worryingly likable character. Long is actually superb as a prime caricature of American success, but as a viewer it’s impossible to deny Parks’ gravitas in the pair’s shared screen time. The preposterous narrative benefits hugely from Park’s careful and charismatic performance along with Smith’s dialogue, which is in turns barmy and touching. Without Parks’ long stretches of storytelling, Tusk could have proved a one-trick pony, and even though the story will seem increasingly tenuous, Smith’s characters prove worthy anchors for the plot.

               
There’s plenty of stuff that’s relatively off: the attempt to build a mysterious love triangle falls flat and a certain celebrity cameo pushes the Inspector Clouseau thing so far it threatens to snap the film’s integrity. There are dumb-sized plot holes that could piss you off, but it’s more bother than it’s worth to get stuck in them. Sure, legs get severed with outrageous ease, Walrus fights are daft, and the resolution may leave some exasperated, but I guess its tough shit. This is an experiment in contemporary gothic informed by a brisk and cynical look at paparazzi culture and the animosity between America and Canada. Its bombastic, shameless, stupid, and oddly beautiful. It’s a story about a crazy old man who wants to turn folk into animals via horrific mutilation, and it’s hilarious.

Tusk is unapologetically nuts, sometimes stupid, but always enjoyable. Michael Parks is utterly superb, Smith’s dialogue deserves to be quoted for years to come, and bonus points to Justin Long, whose guttural screams will haunt my dreams forever.

★★★★
Scott Clark

Win Eduardo Sánchez's EXISTS On DVD

To celebrate the release of Exists - on DVD 6th April 2015 - we have a DVD copy to giveaway courtesy of Entertainment One.

The creator of The Blair Witch Project, Eduardo Sánchez, returns to found-footage horror, the sub-genre he defined back in ’99 and proves he can still terrify audiences with his masterful ability and technique to create high levels of suspense.

This time around, Sánchez turns the lens on America’s favourite monster – Bigfoot, and as Exists’ gang of doomed road-trippers is about to discover, this Sasquatch is the most terrifying incarnation ever seen on screen.

Exists is available to order on Amazon today: http://amzn.to/1ClKAKu

When a group of friends head into the remote Texas woods for a weekend of non-stop partying, their car hits a huge mysterious animal, which quickly disappears back into the darkness.

But as the gang arrives at an isolated cabin, one of them realizes that the woods are home to a bloodthirsty Bigfoot, and it’s only a matter of time before he seeks them out.

Soon enough, their weekend trip turns into a terrifying ordeal of survival of the fittest.



To Win Exists on DVD please answer the following question...

Q.What U.S Film Festival Did Blair Witch Project Make it's Name at that which set it on the road to becoming a worldwide success?

Deadline is Sunday 26th April  2015 (23:59pm),If you haven’t done already Like us and stay with us at our Facebook page (if you are already liking us just share this post on twitter and facebook). Must be 15  or older to enter.

1.The competition is not opened to employees, family, friends of The Peoples Movies, cinehouse, ,Entertainment One 15 years or older to enter 3.Failure to include any information required to enter could result in your entry been void.  4.automated entries are not allowed and will be disqualified, which could result you been banned, DO NOT INCLUDE telephone numbers as for security reason your entry will be deleted.5.If you are friend or like us at facebook for every competition you enter you get double entry, but you must stay friend/like us all the time,or future entries maybe considered one entry if you are liking us share the post on facebook and re-tweet the post.6.The Peoples Movies, Cinehouse takes no responsibility for delayed, lost, stolen prizes 7.Prizes may take from days to a few months for delivery which is out of our control so please do not complain 8.The winning entries will be picked at random and contacted by email for postal details and will be announced via facebook, sometimes we are unable to confirm winners. Uk & Irish entries only

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DVD Review - The ABCs of Death 2 (2014)

Genre:
Horror, Anthology
Distributor:
Monster Pictures
DVD Release Date:
30th March 2015 (UK)
Rating: 18
Directors:
Julian Gilbey, Erik Matti, E.L. Katz, Jen Soska,
+26 more
Cast:
Jen Soska, Sylvia Soska, Martina García, Béatrice Dalle, Ian Virgo
Buy:The Abcs Of Death 2 [Blu-ray]
The ABC’s of Death 2 is a far more accomplished and enjoyable anthology horror than its predecessor. My hopes had perhaps been too high for the first instalment, expecting the epic project (26 directors, 26 short films all instigated by a letter of the alphabet) to showcase the future of horror whilst simultaneously saving it. Well, The ABCs of Death 2 literally streaks past the first to deliver a whooping containment of disgraceful goodies courtesy of the most exciting people in the business.
                The nice thing about the ABCs is that it doesn’t seem to favour one director more than the other. The first instalment had problems with consistency mainly because some of the films were crazy longer than others, but here it seems everyone’s been given a max run-time. It just helps to keep the film moving and- more to the point- the less interesting ones won’t be on for long. But what an eclectic array of phantasmagorical delight and nightmarish titillation! The entries are a spectrum of horror if ever there was one. They go from grungy to sleek, gory to squeaky clean, it’s all impressive as an argument for horror’s flexibility. Sci-fi dystopia, folk tales, thrillers, slashers, creature features, character pieces, there’s a wealth of great material.

A is for Amateur (E.L. Katz- Cheap Thrills) and S is for Split (Juan Martinez Moreno-Lobos de Arga) go down the thriller route, tackling synth beat pulp and split-screen home invasion respectively. The Japanese entries are 2 of the best this time around with innovation overriding bamboozlement in both Hajimi Ohata’s O is for Ochlocracy and Soichi Umezawa’s Y is for Youth. Y is particularly impressive, the stunning stop-motion manifestations of a young girl’s rage prove a grotesque but entirely unique presentation for Umezawa’s debut.

Other animation ventures strike gold by pushing the boat out and having fun with the ideas of horror. If you haven’t checked out Robert Morgan’s animations then I urge you to do so; never before has the landscape of nightmares been so aptly manifested. His particular style is a haunting ode to Kafka and Cronenberg, a foul Wallace and Gromit that crawled up out of your subconscious, and in D is for Deloused he’s on tip-top nasty form. On the other hand, Bill Plimton’s H is for Head Games is effortlessly funny and just plain pleasing in its simplicity.

Rodney Ascher’s Q is for Questionnaire is strangely obvious considering the filmmaker’s exquisite deconstruction of The Shining and clear understanding of subtext. Even then it’s still entertaining to watch. The only really bad shorts are Todd Rohal’s P-P-P-P Scary! and Alejandro Bruques’(Juan of the Dead) E is for Equilibrium, though even E doesn’t infuriate as much as Rohal’s excruciating waste of a letter, which fails to get laughs from a hoakey exploitation of stuttering and Lynch.

The most impressive films are K is for Knell (Bruno Samper), a stark and haunting sci-fi tale with a plethora of terrific imagery, Robert Boocheck’s M for Masticate for shameless hilarious drugsploitation and Marvin Kren’s black and white treat R is for Roulette. Steven Kostanski (Manborg) delivers more dark retro fun in W for Wish and proves yet again that he is a particular and talented filmmaker. In the end, The ABCs of Death 2 leaves us on a higher note than the first, climaxing with Chris Nash’s Z is for Zygote and stealing the show as the most ideologically horrific, practically disgusting, film of the anthology.

                I could write a few hundred words on each film, but that would be pointless and to be honest I just wouldn’t want to ruin it for you. Even if you hated the first, give the second a go, it’s a consummate expression of horror in all its forms and a showcase of the most vibrant and enjoyable kind.