Review Category: DVD/Blu Ray

Big Fish & Begonia tells the tale of Chun, a girl from another world who, when visiting ours, is saved by a human boy at the cost of his own life, then decides to bring him back. In another movie that might have been the whole plot, but it only describes this film’s set up. The meat of the narrative takes place after she has brought his soul back from death (in the form of a fish she names Kun), and explores their bonding and the consequences of Chun’s actions.

When the film works, it really works. Chun is a sympathetic character with easily understood motivations, her friend Qiu is an example of unrequited love that doesn’t venture into “nice guy” territory, and Kun is a wonderfully expressive character, despite spending most of the movie as a fish without dialogue. Most importantly, the movie is able to hit the emotional notes it is aiming for.

The movie’s main failings are in its plot structure and pacing. The set-up is perfect, establishing the characters and what drives them. However, once it hits the middle point it starts to lose its focus; it finds it again a scene or two later, but this part of the movie feels less cohesive than what comes before or after it. The film reaches a point which feels like the ending, and then keeps going. Emotionally speaking the payoff is there, but the mechanics of the plot don’t gel as smoothly as they could.

The movie has two main special features on offer. The first is a look behind the scenes, and it does something a bit different. Big Fish & Begonia spent a long time in development, and its creation is explored within the context of when certain milestones happened. It gives a great sense of how much time and work went into making the movie a reality. It is supplemented quite nicely by the second feature, the short movie from 2004 which led to this film’s creation. Viewing them together serve to show just how far this movie has come, and what its success means to its creators.

Big Fish & Begonia might stumble once or twice when it comes to building its plot, but it more than succeeds at conveying the emotions of its story. It is a beautifully told story with compelling characters and a vibrant, colourful world. The emotional impact is matched by getting to see how it was made, the bonus Making Of centring on the human element of the movie’s production whilst still being informative. Animation lovers should definitely watch it!

Special Features: Making Of / Big Fish & Begonia short (2004)

BIG FISH & BEGONIA / CERT: PG / DIRECTORS: XUAN LIANG, CHUN ZHANG / SCREENWRITERS: DANIEL CHUBA, XUAN LIANG / STARRING: STEPHANIE SHEH, TODD HABERKORN, JOHNNY YONG BOSCH, GREG CHUN, CASSANDRA MORRIS, FONG SHUNG / RELEASE DATE: 9th JULY

It’s been nearly forty years since Indiana Jones originally crossed our screens (himself an Allan Quatermain update), and more than twenty since Lara Croft’s first video game appearance; in the meantime we’ve had a fairly crowded market of imitators, and a big legacy for our new Lara to live up to. How does she fare?

Worldwide box office of nearly $275m suggests rather well, although in truth the film is a bit of a mixed bag. The plot is, bar for a couple of neat twists in the latter stages, somewhat pedestrian, the supporting cast made up of high impact day-players – with most of the larger roles given over to less effective Richard Chamberlain lookalikes. The success of Tomb Raider (2018), then, essentially rests on the performances of two people: Alicia Vikander as the series’ heroine, and Norwegian director Roar Uthaug’s handling of the all-important action sequences. Both of which prove to be good choices.

The plot is relatively simple, the decision to make this an origins story (reflecting the 2013 game reboot) turning out to be an inspired one. Twenty-something Lara’s father has disappeared, and she refuses to take up her inheritance as she considers that a confirmation that his seven-year absence marks his death; instead she works as a bicycle courier and kickboxes (only moderately successfully) in her downtime. However, a conversation with her father’s chief associate sets Lara on a path to discovering his whereabouts, at the end of which she will find a conspiracy, a secret, and a tomb.

Vikander is terrific. The kickboxing and biking allow her just enough toughness to be convincing when called upon, but the lack of field experience lets Vikander imbue this latest Lara with a vulnerability and humanity that previous iterations have lacked. The film itself is perhaps a touch short on levity, but what humour there is generally comes from Lara and her interactions with those around her, and Vikander brings considerably more charm and personality to the part than her predecessor, Angelina Jolie. Comparisons are inevitable, of course, but the 2018 character and icon is considerably more down-to-earth and thus far easier to identify and empathise with. Daniel Wu, as her accomplice, is also terrifically charming if underused, and were there to be sequels he’d be a welcome regular.

Director Uthaug keeps the frequent action sequences relatively brief, which might sound an error given the franchise, but actually works much to its benefit. Rather than relentlessly emulating the playing experience aspect, instead Lara is given the opportunity to charm the audience as she gradually transforms into the character we know and expect – and her challenges become more testing and substantial as she becomes more tenacious and able to cope.

There’s nothing in the story that seasoned audiences won’t have seen many times before, though, and its predictability is the film’s only real downside. So unfortunately, Tomb Raider (2018) is very much not the ideal story from which to re-start the film series – but the execution of it is successful enough to just about paper over its shortcomings.

REVIEW: TOMB RAIDER / CERT: 12 / DIRECTOR: ROAR UTHAUG / SCREENPLAY: GENEVA ROBERTSON-DWORET, ALASTAIR SIDDONS / STARRING: ALICIA VIKANDER, DANIEL WU, DOMINIC WEST, WALTON GOGGINS, KRISTIN SCOTT THOMAS, DEREK JACOBI, NICK FROST / RELEASE DATE: 16^TH JULY

Extras: four featurettes, including Evolution of an Icon

If the only thing to fear, as the old adage goes, is fear itself, then A Taste of Phobia should have been the scariest anthology movie of all time. Boasting 14 directors each helming a short piece about their own personal terrors, this is a film chock-full of phobias. There’s another old saying though – the one about good intentions, and the road to hell.

The first cook, however, delivers the base for a tasty broth. With Lorenzo Zanoni and Alessandro Sisti’s Chaetophobia, this anthology comes storming out of the gates hard, with its best entry, about a man and his love of razors and hot wax. Sadly, it’s all downhill from there. Anthology movies have a reputation for being wildly unpredictable in their quality, but this is one of the most consistent ever made – sadly, it’s consistently average, and consistently ugly, its terrors evoking more shrugs than shudders. It even manages to render a phobia of pooping uninteresting, through bad special effects and a barely coherent story.

That this should be released at the same time as the ghoulishly nasty German Angst makes it doubly disappointing, all 14 paling in comparison next to the work of Jorg Buttgereit, Andreas Marschall and Goran Mimica. They’d be a hard act to follow at the best of times, but A Taste of Phobia does nobody any favours. Out of 14 filmmakers, not even one comes close here. Most of them wouldn’t even make the cut in an ABCs of Death movie.

That’s a shame, as the phobias catalogued here are a diverse, promising lot, and could have been the basis for something truly horrifying. Unfortunately, the majority of its directors simply don’t have the ability to pass their phobias on to their audience; nobody watching Partenophobia, for example, is going to come away with a newfound fear of virgins. Were it not for the title cards preceding every vignette, most of the time you’d have trouble guessing what many of them are even supposed to be about. How do you render a fear of the dark unscary? Nyctophobia manages it. One could try to blame the low budget, but this isn’t exactly high-concept filmmaking – there’s better stuff out there on YouTube, if you look hard enough.

A Taste of Phobia has all of the right ingredients, but rather than being delightfully tasteless, it’s instead disappointingly rather bland.

A TASTE OF PHOBIA / DIRECTORS: DOMIZIANO CRISTOPHARO, JASON IMPEY, SUNNY KING, SAM MASON-BELL, TONY NEWTON, ALESSANDRO SISTI, ROB ULITSKI, JACKSON BATCHELOR, SOPHIA CACCIOLA, MICHAEL J. EPSTEIN, DUSTIN FERGUSON, ALESSANDRO GIORDANI, CHRIS MILEWSKI, DAVIDE PESCA, ALESSANDRO REDAELLI, LORENZO ZANONI / SCREENPLAY: SOPHIA CACCIOLA, ANDREA CAVALETTO, MICHAEL J. EPSTEIN, ALESSANDRO GIORDANI, RUGGERO MELIS, CHRIS MILEWSKI, TONY NEWTON, ALESSANDRO REDAELLI / STARRING: ROBERTA GEMMA, LIANNE O’SHEA, MARTIN W. PAYNE, MICHAEL J. EPSTEIN / RELEASE DATE: OUT NOW (US), TBC (UK)

There are two things one expects from extreme horror director Jorg Buttgereit – Germany, angst. Although the sick mind behind Nekromantik is only one of the three moving parts which makes up this anthology film, few could complain that they’re not getting what they signed up for; namely angst, German style.

Three German horror directors, three short films. Of the three, Buttgereit’s is the most straightforward, a take on Hard Candy, Jorg Buttgereit style. Weighing in at barely fifteen minutes, one is glad the director didn’t stretch it to feature length, as there’s more than enough forced surgery and dismemberment (with the emphasis on the member) here as it is. The second film, by Michal Kosawaski is less conventional but equally horrible – a depressingly timely body swap story with a neo-Nazi twist. There’s no catharsis to be had in seeing the Nazi swap places with his victim though, and this too is punishing viewing, in terms of the violence and the shrieking, purposefully annoying acting. One is glad when it comes to an end and wary too, dreading what else the anthology has in store.

Thankfully, it saves its most reserved, paced-out story until last, in Andreas Marschall’s Alraune, an erotic odyssey in which a snotty artist, enamoured with an escort he met in a Berlin nightclub, finds himself embroiled in an underground world of designer drugs and steamy sex. It’s something of a relief from the violence and torture of the first two stories at first, but no less troubling, its extra breathing room only giving it further space to draw the audience in before bringing on the trauma.

Together, the three stories deliver a miserable, grotesque snapshot of modern Germany. There’s a slight emphasis on punishing the guilty, but the theme is a loose one. Buttgereit is generous to his less established co-stars, not delivering too hard an act to follow, but still setting the mood in remarkable style.

Although there’s nothing here that will trouble those who have suffered through Nekromantik and its sequel, German Angst certainly delivers on the intense, upsetting arthouse horror expected from its talent. As the 2004 movie Three… Extremes was to Korea, this is the extreme German horror movement in a nutshell. You can’t say you weren’t warned.

GERMAN ANGST / DIRECTOR: JÖRG BUTTGEREIT, MICHAL KOSAKOWSKI, ANDREAS MARSCHALL / SCREENPLAY: JÖRG BUTTGEREIT, MICHAL KOSAKOWSKI, ANDREAS MARSCHALL, GORAN MIMICA / STARRING: LOLA GAVE, AXEL HOLST, MICHAEL ZENNER, LILA LORANE / RELEASE DATE: OUT NOW (US), TBC (UK)

In almost the same vein as Mickey Mouse and Bugs Bunny, Popeye is a character that is universally recognised and a major icon in animation history. Plus, his signature theme song is annoyingly catchy as hell! Adapted from the original comic strip by E.C. Segar, the legendary sailor man launched himself into the public consciousness through the Fleischer cartoons on the silver screen, and it was from there that we have endured him and his merry adventures and escapades through years of TV repeats and home video releases, captivating many generations as the years went by. Usually, the running formula for these episodes involves Popeye, with his elephantiasis arms, having to save the spaghetti-arms-and-legs waving girlfriend Olive Oyl from a certain peril of circumstance or typically from the hairy gorilla bully with Bluto, and at some point towards the end, Popeye resorts to his lucky can of spinach (must be some different form of Captain America’s super-soldier serum!) to save the day.

As formulaic as that may sound, that is easily glossed over by the fact that these cartoons are so charming, entrancing and enjoyable to watch even now. The short stories are straight and simple, yet they don’t feel cynical or half-hearted at all, which puts it leagues ahead of some cartoon series. One surprise is how violent it can be, despite its cartoonish nature, so it’s no surprising that The Simpsons parodied that in their Itchy and Scratchy vignettes. Beyond the stories, we have the wonderfully creative animation, and even now, there’s a real visual flow to these cartoons, and it’s clear that the Fleischer’s contributed to revolution in animation around that time with both this and their equally impressive Superman cartoons. They clearly stayed faithful to Segar’s designs, going for a more liquid, boldly-rendered look for the character, which works nicely and moves with ease, and that allows for more creative humour to be implemented when needed.

Another advancement in technology back then was their inclusion of colour, and during that time, the Fleischer’s created three blockbuster episodes that were twice as long as their normal cartoons, and are by far the stand out episodes of the set. These include Popeye the Sailor Meets Sinbad the Sailor, Popeye the Sailor Meets Ali Baba’s Forty Thieves and Aladdin and his Wonderful Lamp. The first two combine character animation with three-dimensional background models, which was a common technique for an innovative studio at the time, but together, these three short films are a remarkable feat. There’s a greater focus on story, there are songs included that are used to advance the plot, and they allowed the Fleischer’s to exploit their classic characters in certain roles to make them fit within Popeye’s world, like having Bluto be Sinbad or Popeye as Aladdin. The Sinbad short in particular is one of the top 15 greatest animated shorts of all time because of the way they combined visual gags with the eye-popping visuals was incredibly ingenious at the time, plus the action was hilariously epic.

This set contains 34 classic Popeye shorts, which spans from 1936-1957, and you see the evolution while also embracing the hilarity. You see some of the best animation to date that hasn’t lost its touch after all these years, and that makes this collection worth the price of admission alone. Now is the time to rejoice with that classic sailor man!

POPEYE THE SAILOR MAN – THE ANIMATED COLLECTION / PUBLISHER: UMBRELLA ENTERTAINMENT / RELEASE DATE: OUT NOW

It’s remarkable that, over 30 years since its release, Re-Animator still stands as the best film-adaptation of any H.P. Lovecraft story to date. That’s probably, at least in part, down to Re-Animator being much more conventional than most of Lovecraft’s work – it isn’t an open-ended, existential study of existential dread surrounding the human condition, for a start. The source material, Herbert West – Re-Animator was written as a cynical parody of Frankenstein, essentially mocking it by inserting copious amounts of gore.

The film stays true to that Frankenstein vibe, though in a way that feels far more akin to fellow zombie-comedy classics of the ‘80s. It’s a testament to the strength of Re-Animator that it can confidently stand toe-to-toe with the likes of The Return of the Living Dead and the Evil Dead trilogy.

Jeffrey Combs’ phenomenal performance as Herbert West caps off the film, which stands as an expert blend of legitimate horror with a dark streak of humour ranging from wry, intelligent quips to good, old-fashioned splatstick,

But, the film was released in 1985. What else is new? Well, Umbrella’s Blu-ray release of the film, for one. The discs contain a selection of special features taken from previous releases of the film – audio commentaries, the Re-Animator Resurrectus documentary, deleted scenes, interviews and more, but the really exciting thing here are two cuts of the film, both taken from utterly beautiful transfers of the film sourced from a recent 4k restoration.

The original cut of the film was given an NC-17 age certificate in America – a rating that was something of a death-sentence for films wanting to make any money on their theatrical run. As a result, director Stuart Gordon set about re-editing the film to remove the offending sequences and get it a softer R rating. However, with the gore and sexy bits trimmed, the film was too short so Gordon padded the running time with some previously cut material that offered additional insight into things like character motivation and context.

The milder, theatrical cut went on to become Gordon’s favoured version of the film, but the original and bloodier unrated cut has become something of the standard version of the film due to its prominence on its DVD releases.

This 2-disc set includes both the 86-minute unrated cut and a recently assembled 104-minute “integral cut”, offering all of the extra scenes featured in the theatrical version of the film combined with all of the extra scenes from the unrated cut – basically, you get all that character development without having to sacrifice any of the gore!

Just over a decade ago, there was serious talk of a fourth film in the series set in The White House. Intended as a satire of the Bush administration, House of Re-Animator quietly disappeared after the presidential baton was handed to Obama. Given the current state of American politics, the time has seemingly never been better for Stuart Gordon to re-animate the project, but failing that, this new release does an admirable job of keeping the franchise alive.

Extras: Unrated Version (86 mins) / Integral Cut (104 mins) / Audio commentaries: Director Stuart Gordon, Producer Brian Yuzna, actors, Jeffrey Combs, Barbara Crampton, Bruce Abbott and Robert Sampson / Re-Animator Resurrectus documentary / 16 extended scenes / Deleted scenes / Interviews with: Director Stuart Gordon, Producer Brian Yuzna, Writer Denis Paoli, Composer Richard Band, Former Fangoria editor Tony Timpone / Music analysis by Composer Richard Band / TV Spots / Theatrical trailer

RE-ANIMATOR / DIRECTOR: STUART GORDON / SCREENPLAY: STUART GORDON, WILLIAM NORRIS, DENNIS PAOLI / STARRING: JEFFREY COMBS, BRUCE ABBOT, BARBARA CRAMPTON, DAVID GALE / RELEASE DATE: OUT NOW

Hello! Kinmoza! is a slice of life anime about a group of students and their teachers (one of whom is from the UK), and their adventures in high school. Complete Season 2 collects the final of Hello! Kinmoza!’s two seasons, and while the girls are now in their second year, that fact doesn’t seem to change much (if anything) about the show, and it’s essentially more of the same.

There isn’t much plot to speak of in a given episode of Kinmoza. There is a basic episode structure, but it often feels like the second part of an episode belongs in a separate episode from the first. Each episode is mostly a different situation to which the characters react, and for the writers to have fun with said character’s various personality quirks.

Consequently, this is a show which lives and dies on how any given viewer reacts to the characters. If a viewer is drawn in by their personalities and interaction then Hello! Kinmoza! Is a charming, quirky experience, in which friends make the most of being in high school and cement their various bonds. For a viewer who is not sucked in by the main characters however, there just isn’t anything here. Without any connection to Karen, Alice, Shino, or the others the episodes become something of a slog and there would be little to nothing to recommend about it. The culture shock that Alice experiences being an English girl in Japan occasionally mixes things up but the show doesn’t take advantage of that nearly as often as it should. Apart from the way other characters react to Alice’s blonde hair there is very little that her nationality adds to the show.

In terms of special features, Hello! Kinmoza! Complete Season 2 has the usual offerings that can be expected of a release like this: textless animation, and some trailers for other anime produced by Sentai Filmworks. This is a purchase which should only be made by people who already know they are a fan of the show. For everyone else this set can be safely avoided.

Special Features: Textless Opening Animations / Textless Closing Animations/ Also Available from Sentai Filmworks

HELLO! KINMOZA! COMPLETE SEASON 2 / CERT: 12 / DIRECTOR: TANAKA MOTOKI / WRITERS: VARIOUS / STARRING: TOUYAMA NAO, TANEDA RISA, TANAKA MANAMI, UCHIYAMA YUMI, NISHIASUKA / RELEASE DATE: 2ND JULY