Ed's Review Dot Com

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

Arcade Pictures, Iron Fists,

Russell Crowe, Cung Le, Lucy Liu, RZA, Rick Yune, Batista, Jamie Chung, Byron Mann, Daniel Wu, Zhu Zhu

Combining Martial Arts and Hip-Hop, a band of warriors, assassins, and a British soldier all arrive at a village in ancient China, where a humble blacksmith (RZA) looks to defend himself and his fellow villagers from the marauders seeking a treasure of gold.

This movie has Quentin Tarantino all over it, but I can’t see where he’s involved in the film in the least, nor do I see any of his style of film making. I suspect he just put up the money for the project. RZA, whatever the hell that is, is a rapper from the infamous Wu-Tang Clan who has dreamed (according to the special features on the film) of making a Kung Fu movie since his early teens. Well, now he’s got a boatload of money and is able to do whatever he wants. So it’s his directorial debut, as well as his chance to play the lead in the film. Now some long time professional actors have tried to act and direct at the same time, with some very iffy mixed results. But for a first timer to take this on, is really dubious. What results is an amateur looking mess that looks like a high school project shot after school. Now they spent the money to travel to China to film this, but the script is really weak, and the performances are dreadful. With such well knows actors as Russell Crowe and Lucy Liu, it looks like they were trying to get some talent in there, but the script is so bad, they can’t pull anything out of the sewer. Basically this may be just an attempt for RZA to have a platform for his music, and the stuff in here is really incompatible with a martial arts film.

Now I am a big martial arts fan, and am usually pretty forgiving, but I really think this is one of the worst messes I have ever seen, and I cannot recommend this at all. I imagine that the professional critics must agree on this stinker, and all you need to do is to watch the self serving special features on the CD to see where it went wrong. Just let this one go, it’s not even worth the rental.

EdG – EdsReview Dot Com – A Movie Review Blog

CCI Entertainment, Really Real Films,

Elaine Hendrix, Sergio Di Zio, Sean Michael Kyer, Christopher Lloyd, Jessica Harmon, Adrian Holmes

John (Sergio Di Zio) and Grace (Elaine Hendrix) love each other, and her 10 year old son Zachary (Sean Michael Kyer). But there are problems. John absolutely hates Christmas. He despises the holidays, but Grace on the other hand, is a fanatic about Christmas. She loves the holiday to extreme. Grace was hoping John would propose over the holidays, but instead they get into a huge spat, and trying to make it up makes things spin out of control. Both have deep secrets, and unless they can get them out in the open, their relationship is doomed.

This is really a pretty silly movie. They try really hard to pull on the heart strings, but I can’t imagine anyone over 12 buying any of this. The two characters are so hideously unlikeable, and the setup is so extreme. Someone who absolutely hates Christmas must have a really good reason, but this guy has no good reason at all to be like he is, nor should he flip so quickly from hatred of the season to a holly jolly Santa. And Grace is a whiny spineless thing that has no reason to be such a Christmas fanatic. To top it all off, John has an ex that is so over the top, and Grace’s ex is such a cartoon. To try to cram these two together is such a stupid plot device that this should be a cartoon. Truth be told, the Christmas these clowns all spend in the same house (Yes even the two exes) is so incredulous that even the under 12 crowd won’t buy this. But after collecting a whole houseful of misfits, even more show up to add to the chaos. What was Christopher Lloyd thinking to do this movie? This is a new ION TV premier for 2012, and they are really scraping the bottom of the barrel. If this were funny, or even remotely humorous, it might make sense, but as it is, this movie is really a waste of video. There are so many good films for the holidays, don’t waste your time on this clunker!

Here is the home page for this 2012 Christmas film from ION TV.

Moody Independent,

Mark Ajemian, Nick Apostolides, Julie Marie Berman, Justin Bruening, Katilin Doubleday, Melissa Famigletti, Molly Kunz

This holiday film is a modern day reworking of the Louisa May Alcott novel Little Women with modern times, costumes, and setting. While Mom and Dad are away, the girls hatch a plan to save the family home. Meanwhile, the boy next door attracts their attention, as well as an old flame and a brand new acquaintence to give us some romantic interests. A new version of an old story

I’m afraid the rework simply did not cut it for me. I was kind of excited to see this film, and was looking forward to it, but was really disappointed in the way it was done. Like the Leonardo DiCaprio reworking of Romeo and Juliet with street gangs and drive bys, hearing the March sisters discussing the upcoming holidays and say something to the effect of “We have to throw a Kick-ass party” didn’t give me the feeling of Little Women. The plot vaguely follows the novel, and the character names are the same, but the plot was downright silly. They tried to make it a hip modern tale with iPad’s and Wi-Fi, but the basic things these girls did were really dumb. It just completely bored me. I really disliked all the girls in this family, and found them uninteresting and overly contentious. I think they would have done better to write a better story, rather than butchering a classic novel without giving it much thought. It’s a new for 2012 Christmas film, but one I, for one, could certainly do without.

No trailer available at this point, but here is the link for the Lifetime Channel home page for this film.

Skyscraper Films,

Christopher Denham, Nicole Vicius, Brit Marling, Avery Pohl, Davenia McFadden, Kandice Stroh, Richard Wharton, Matthew Carey

Peter (Christopher Denham), a jounalist, and his girlfriend Lorna (Nicole Vicius) set out to film a secret documentary. They infiltrate a cult headed by Maggie (Brit Marling) who claims to be from the future. But as Peter begins to forget about the documentary and seems under the power of Maggie, Lorna tries to get him to either quit, or to bring him back into focus in what he’s doing.

In this Sundance film festival film, we get twists and turns and a somewhat surprising, if not confusing ending. The problem with this film is that it’s typical film school, Sundance style, experimental film type stuff. There’s little action, too much dreary dialog, and nothing much going on, at least for the first 45 minutes of the film. Then just when you’ve gotten fed up and are ready to turn off this drivel, they head off to the La Brea Tar Pits on a field trip that gets pretty suspenseful. Suddenly I couldn’t take my eyes off the screen. Just when I though I didn’t care, it got pretty interesting. There was a twist that really caught my attention. But the film is only 84 minutes long, and as I realized there was no time left to resolve this, I was right. The ending makes you say, “Hmmm” but doesn’t give you anything to go on. Now there are some films that make you talk about what it all means for weeks after you watch it. This isn’t that kind of film. This one feels like a cheap shot to the stomach that makes you more mad than curious. I am afraid, despite the second half that looked like it was going to be good, it left me really wanting some kind, any kind, of resolution. But you’re not going to get it. I was expecting to hate this film, but then found myself kind of liking it, only to be sadly disappointed at the end.

Skip it.

EdG – EdsReview Dot Com – A Movie Review Blog