New in theaters this weekend Friday April 19, 2013
Last Weeks top Box Office:
1 – 42
2 – Scary MoVie
3 – The Croods
4 – G.I. Joe:Retaliation
5 – Evil Dead
The Weinstein Company, Columbia Pictures,
Jamie Foxx, Christoph Waltz, Leonardo DiCaprio, Kerry Washington, Samuel L. Jackson, Walton Goggins, Dennis Christopher, James Remar, Michael Parks, Don Johnson
Django (Jamie Foxx) is an escaped slave who is in trouble. He’s chained and being taken back for sale when German dentist/ bounty hunter Dr. King Schultz (Christop Waltz) shows up looking for him and wanting to purchase his freedom. Django set out as a team to capture the bad guys and turn them in for cash, while Django’s ultimate goal is to find and rescue his wife who was sold to another slave owner and reek havoc all along the way.
This is a homage to the spaghetti westerns of the 70’s from the music and ambiance all the way down to the cheesy titles in the beginning. It truly succeeds at that. I fondly remember the days when these movies were really exciting. This film mixes that genre with the Kill Bill/Pulp Fiction style which is prevalent in other Quentin Tarantino films, and gives the film the unbelievable gun fights that make very little sense and the ultra slow motion views of bodies blowing apart and such. This is exactly what you’d expect from a Tarantino homage to the previously stated films. Jamie Foxx does a pretty decent job of playing the Clint Eastwood guy who’s supposed to be a hero, but that is one thing I think fails a little bit in this film. Clint Eastwood’s hero/good guy thing is perfect because he has a strong understanding of right and wrong, good and bad, and so on. Eastwood is a really hard guy, says little, and still you know and understand his sense of right and wrong. Django, on the other hand, is a little tougher to read. We understand that he’s had a horrible life, and has really been wronged. We also feel for him that he has a right to go after the guys that did him wrong, but somehow there’s just a little too much glee in the revenge angle. He had a bit too much fun killing these guys. Then again, it may be just a bit of resentment I bring to the movie after Jamie Foxx’s Saturday Night Live performance which was so over the line. The whole monologue bit about “I got to kill all the white people! How awesome is that?” bit kind of struck me as a bit over the line. I was a fan of Jamie’s since the In Living Color days which was one of my favorite comedy shows back in the day, but he’s gotten a lot more militant in his “I hate white people” rants in recent years. I’m sorry he hates me so much when I don’t even know him. So perhaps some of that has tainted my enjoyment of his glee in killing white people in this movie.
Christoph Waltz was really good in this film. He brought a lot of humor to the movie, and was a really good, yet quirky guy, that is perfect for the film. I think the homage to the westerns of old is very well pulled off. Certainly Jamie Foxx does a very good job of the hard edged, cool headed angel of death as well. The camera work was very well done, and the setting was very good. For Tarantino fans, this is every bit as good as his other top notch work, and I can see why it was up for so many awards. There is not a lot wrong with this movie, and it deserved all the nods that it got. Remember, however, that if you’re turned off by violence and gore, this, like any other Tarantino work is very graphic. But if you can look past it, this is very well worth watching.
I have not mentioned the original 1966 Django film starring Franco Nero. It’s a similar story, and one many attribute the entire spaghetti western genre. It is a totally different film though, and has no relation to this story at all (other than the general feel to it) so there is no reason to really compare the two. This is not a remake. However, Tarantino says he was researching the director of Django (Sergio Corbucci) and decided to make what he called a “southern” which is a “western” staged in the deep south. Franco Nero, who starred in the original Django actually had a cameo role in Django Unchained.
EdG – EdsReview Dot Com – A Movie Review Blog
Gold Circle Films,
Abigail Spencer, Chad Michael Murray, Katee Sackhoff, Emily Alyn Lind, Cicely Tyson, Andrea Frankle, Brad James, Lance E. Nichols
This story, based on the real life Wyrick family, is about a little girl who was born with a veil, allowing her to have psychic powers. Like her mother and grandmother, the women in the family are very sensitive to spirits. Shortly after moving into their historic old house, young Heidi begins to see an old man she calls Mr. Gordy, who warns her that something bad is coming. It turns out that the house has a history, and that history is coming back to bite them in a bad way.
This is a highly fictional story based on a real life family of psychics. There is a special feature on the DVD with an interview with the family and they tell the real story. But this movie is a horror ride into hell, literally. It’s got great sound, good scares, and real terror. It follows the typical story of the child who knows the truth, but nobody will believe her, but she turns it around and it’s a really funny scene. Abigail Spencer, as Heidi, does a really great job in this film. She carries the film and is a heck of an actress. Another special feature on the CD is a few outtakes from the film, and one of these with Abigail shows how really professional this kid is. She is the true star. But the rest of the cast is pretty decent too. Cicely Tyson has one small scene, but she’s really a great add to the story. If you’re a fan of horror, this is a pretty decent rental film, and well worth watching.
There are a few rather big plot holes that I can’t quite figure out, but I haven’t watched the deleted scenes yet, so it may be that some of them are answered in the scenes that were cut. For one thing, Dad brings Heidi home a dog to protect the family, and he’s really good at letting us know when someone bad is about to appear. But Heidi ends up missing, and the whole family are out searching for her. Where’s the dog? Nowhere to be seen. Now he could probably locate her in a few seconds, but Chief is nowhere to be found. Then suddenly in the end, he’s back again, just when he’s needed for another plot point. That’s kind of silly not to use the dog, but I guess we can overlook that. But in the end, it’s a creepy story with plenty of ghosts and demons and moments that will make you jump for sure. Not worth a lot of money to see in the theater, but well worth a rental on DVD.
EdG – EdsReview Dot Com – A Movie Review Blog
Movie Rentals Releasing Tuesday April 16, 2013
BKGTH Productions, Bad Kids, Spiderwood Studios,
Judd Nelson, Ben Browder, Cameron Deane Stewart, Ali Faulkner, Roger Edwards, Marc Donato, Augie Duke, Amanda Alch, Jeffrey Schmidt, Chanel Ryan
It was a dark and stormy Saturday, and six students of the prestigious Crestline Academy show up to serve their detention at Saturday School. Only the principal and a maintenance man are there, and the kids are locked alone in the library to serve their sentence. As the eight hours ticks by slowly, one by one the bodies start to pile up as one by one the students fall to mysterious accidents. Based on the popular comic book series and graphic novel, this is The Breakfast Club mixed with horror/supernatural.
Gee, I have to say I hated this movie. I held on to it all week, and decided to watch it late on Friday night. I popped it in the DVD player, and hit play. What I got was a mess. Essentially the movie just starts with the jock showing up very early at the school requesting to serve his detention even though he’s not on the list for that day. Then the rest come in, and it just got worse and worse. The gimmicks in this film are really corny, and I didn’t get into the story in the least. I didn’t care about any of the kids, and couldn’t wait for some of them to get killed to shut them up. Now I am not familiar with the “work” that this is based on, and I’m obviously not a comic book fan, or even acquainted with that world. So if you’re a fan of the series, then from what I heard the movie was pretty close to the comic books. But I’m judging it based on a stand alone motion picture, and I really didn’t enjoy it in the least. This was one of the worst horror films I have ever seen, really. The print wasn’t very clear, and there were no subtitles on the DVD, so I was having trouble hearing what was going on a lot of the time, but the look just wasn’t very good. Some very low budget Japanese horror films look so much better than this. I just did not get any enjoyment from this film. I don’t recommend it, unless as I said, you are familiar with the comics and a fan of the series. I’d be glad to hear from anyone who really liked this movie. Comment below, and let me know what I’m missing!
EdG – EdsReview Dot Com – A Movie Review Blog
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