April 2013

CHICAGO – “Darkstalkers: Resurrection” is the latest effort in a series of attempts by Capcom to capitalize on their storied past by releasing compilations of popular games to the XBLA. “Resurrection” collects the bizarrely titled “Night Warriors: Darkstalkers Revenge” and “Darkstalkers 3”, into one convenient package along with an assortment of goodies including bonus videos, art, youtube replays, and a bunch of other stuff to hopefully satiate the desires of the long neglected fan base.

CHICAGO – “The Guilt Trip” is hideously uninspired dreck of the most shameful variety. It casts two major yet mismatched talents and refuses to utilize their distinctive gifts for the entirety of its running time. All they’re required to do is sleepwalk through a plot so uninspired that audiences will have no problem predicting its path with their eyes closed and their ears covered.

CHICAGO – One of the many things I love about The Criterion Collection is the even battlefield that it creates within its own archives. A film by Alfred Hitchcock or Akira Kurosawa or Charles Chaplin can sit next to a cult hit like “Repo Man.” I grew up in the era of “Repo Man“‘s growing cult status and it’s amazing to me to see this midnight movie given the same level of respect as films widely recognized as classics. “Repo Man” is a classic in its own way and the people at Criterion recognize that. Fans of the movie, and there are MANY, will be more than satisfied.

CHICAGO – When a film promises to tackle a timely topic like fracking, it has raised the bar of expectations considerably. Sure, the filmmakers don’t need to take a stand on the issues they raise, but they have an obligation to explore them with some level of depth or insight. Otherwise, they risk getting charged with committing a “bait and switch,” and that’s precisely what Gus Van Sant’s “Promised Land” does.

CHICAGO – Beneath every honorable warrior is a cold-hearted opportunist hell-bent on dominating his victimized prey at all costs. That’s a theory indelibly illustrated by Teinosuke Kinugasa’s revered 1953 classic, “Gate of Hell,” a melodrama populated by such frustrating characters that it nearly loses the viewer’s interest before its admittedly splendid finale, when the tale takes on grand dimensions of Greek tragedy.

CHICAGO – The Chicago Comic and Entertainment Expo (C2E2) is happening in the Windy City over the weekend of April 26th-28th, with special guests, seminars, autograph booths and vendors covering the huge floors of the McCormick Place Convention Center. Among the special guests is Bruce Boxleitner, representing his former TV series Babylon 5, and several new science fiction projects.

Rating: 2.0/5.0

CHICAGO – In what could be subtitled, “The Challenge of American Accents,” the new release “Arthur Newman” has a laugh-inducing U.S. inflection face-off between Brits Colin Firth and Emily Blunt. Amid that obstacle, there is a lame road picture that emotionally is false, and makes no sense.

Rating: 2.5/5.0

CHICAGO – “Once you’re involved in the shit, you can’t get out.” Ken Loach, filmmaker of the working class and longtime supporter of people who are just trying to better their lives knows this kind of statement isn’t true. We can all climb out of the shit. And his latest, “The Angels’ Share,” is yet another tale of a young man who has made some mistakes in his life beginning that climb to adulthood and responsibility. While it has some likable characters, particularly its charismatic lead, it’s impossible to shake the feeling that we’ve seen this movie before. To be blunt, I never had a reason to care, which is not something that can be said about most of Loach’s films. This one is just bland.

CHICAGO – “The Big Wedding” begins with Robert De Niro performing a particular love making maneuver on Susan Sarandon, and is caught in the act by Diane Keaton. What could have happened in a cutting-edge indie feature in 1981 is the basis of a lame bit in 2013, and so it goes for the rest of the film.

CHICAGO – Naming a picture after two of the great artistic minds in human history is quite a high bar to set. Director/co-writer Gilles Bourdos attempts to tell the tale of both impressionist painter Pierre-Auguste Renoir (Michel Bouquet) and his son, the future filmmaker Jean Renoir (Vincent Rottiers), who would go on to helm controversial masterpieces such as 1939’s “The Rules of the Game.” These are fascinating people, but the script doesn’t even begin to do them justice.

CHICAGO – This weekend is the Turner Classic Movies (TCM) Classic Film Festival, and few movie stars alive represent that classic status better than Miss Mitzi Gaynor. Whether co-starring in movies with Gene Kelly, Frank Sinatra and Marilyn Monroe, or starring in the film version of “South Pacific,” Mitzi Gaynor always inspires the old “razzle dazzle.”

CHICAGO – Sometimes it’s difficult to pinpoint the precise moment when one falls in love with a movie. Other times, it’s as effortless and intuitive as the day one stumbles upon a soul mate. That moment struck me like a bolt of lightning early on in Jeff Nichols’s “Mud,” the most richly satisfying and purely enjoyable moviegoing experience I’ve had thus far in 2013.

Rating: 2.5/5.0

CHICAGO – There’s something deeper going on in “Eddie: The Sleepwalking Cannibal,” opening tomorrow at Music Box. I think. It’s about a struggling artist who finds inspiration in a small town when he’s forced to serve as guardian for the title character. Don’t all artists have something in common with cannibals given the way they turn their own (or other people’s) insides into fuel for their creativity? While that’s an engaging and interesting starting place for a horror-comedy, Boris Rodriguez’s movie sadly ends up being neither an effective horror movie nor a memorable satire. It just kind of, pardon me for going there, sleepwalks through its clever set-up.

CHICAGO – Michael Bay’s “Pain & Gain” tells such a ridiculous story that it has to be true. Based on the infamous case of the Sun Gym Gang, a trio of bodybuilders who committed some unspeakable, bizarre crimes, “Pain & Gain” nearly works through the sheer charisma and talent of its A-list cast.