Teenage superheroes, rogue cops, undercover crossdressering butlers - this week's got it all. Check out the full list inside. 

Continue Reading New and Coming Releases: May 15, 2012.

Reviewer: Jeffrey M. Anderson
Ratings (out of five): ** 1/2

Yet another horror remake, this one comes from an almost forgotten and not very well-liked Troma release from 1980, written and directed by Lloyd Kaufman's brother Charles. It was a rape thriller, which probably explains its reputation today. Fortunately, the remake chooses another path. Rather than three women going camping and running into a sadistic mother and her scumbag sons, the plot becomes slightly more complex.

Continue Reading Mother's Day

Reviewer: James van Maanen
Ratings (out of five): ***

The Kreutzer Sonata, directed and co-written (with Lisa Enos) by Bernard Rose tracks the journey of a jealous husband's relationship with his pianist wife. A modern adaptation of a Tolstoy novella, the film has a number of good things to warrant a recommendation. The movie leaves all credit information, save its title, to the end, a fact I was grateful for when I finished considering the quality of the director's previous works (Paperhouse, Candyman, Immortal Beloved and Anna Karenina). Yet, it is my second favorite of his films I've seen so far (his most recent work, Mr. Nice with Rhys Ifans, is even better). 

Continue Reading The Kreutzer Sonata

There's a little something for everyone this week: whether you're into absurdist "comedy," sweeping blockbuster romance, action, or horror, you'll find something up your alley this releasing week. Enjoy!

Continue Reading New and Coming Releases:May 8, 2012.

It's a small week for DVDs but still lots to enjoy, including a Scorcese-directed documentary biography, Soderberg in box-office form, and more. 

Continue Reading New and Coming Releases: May 1, 2012.

Reviewer: Philip M Tatler IV
Ratings (out of five): *** 1/2

There’s a key piece of editing about halfway into The Organizer, Mario Monicelli’s 1963 film about a worker’s strike in late 1800s Turin. A factory worker has travelled to the outskirts of town to bring funds to a family living below poverty conditions. The funds are to show solidarity because the family’s breadwinner has been jailed due to issues stemming from the strike. While making the rounds of the family’s dirt-floored shanty, the factory worker opens a wooden flap, revealing a grinning, barefoot toddler squatting on the ground. The film then cuts to a group of society women preening in their sparkling white gowns during a social function.

Continue Reading The Organizer (Criterion)

Reviewer: Philip M Tatler IV
Ratings (out of five): *** 1/2

In The Sky Turns, filmmaker Mercedes Álvarez returns to her birthplace: the small Castilian village of Aldealseñor. Nearly four decades earlier, Álvarez became the last child to be born in Aldealseñor and, upon her return, she discovers a place out of time in both senses of the phrase – the way of life the village has clung to since prehistory remains an anachronism and the village inhabitants are finally yielding to the death knell of modernity.

Continue Reading The Sky Turns

This weeks packs an emotionally complex wallop, with character studies of a coming-of-age closeted lesbian, a returning Iraq vet who must re-assume her roles as wife and mother, and even a young Goethe in love. More, plus lots of other genres - inside!

Continue Reading New and Coming Releases: April 24, 2012.

We've got some directing heavyweights on the slate this week, featuring a Roger Corman compliation, the newest from BFA star Steve McQueen, and a ground-breaking immigration film from indie filmmaker Robert M. Young. Dive in, inside!

Continue Reading New and Coming Releases: April 17, 2012.

Reviewer: Jeffrey M. Anderson
Ratings (out of five): ****

Thanks to the happy success of Martin Scorsese's Hugo, the French silent era filmmaker Georges Méliès is now far better known to the general public. Flicker Alley, which distributed a massive box set of surviving Méliès films, has now released a special new two-disc "steelbook" set. It features a brand-new, restored version of Méliès' most famous film, the 14-minute A Trip to the Moon, with the original hand-tinted color back in place, and a new score by Air.

Continue Reading A Trip to the Moon (Restored Limited Edition)