Review Category: DVD/Blu Ray

If you felt that the first season felt like a long drawn-out version of the 1996 cult classic, then that won’t be such a problem here with this second season going outside of the original film’s narrative, expanding on the mythology and focusing on an original narrative. However, that doesn’t necessarily mean it’s all plain sailing from there; in fact, this series ends up being something of a muddled disappointment after the semi-promising first series. This new 10-episode run has so much going on with varying storylines and multitudes of characters, as well as trying its best to be fresh and original, it just ends up feeling lacking because of it.

This series is certainly much more interesting this time round now that it doesn’t feel like a rehash of the original film and it delivers some fascinating new storylines for our collection of antiheroes: Santanico Pandemonium is now free from the confines of the Titty Twister thanks to a newly converted Richie Gecko and is planning on using him as a means of exacting her big revenge scheme, Seth Gecko is trying to find a way back in the game, Kate Fuller trying to save her brother Scott after he was converted into a Culebra in the last series, and Eddie Gonzalez is summoned once again to deal with Culebra menace as he’s trying to lead a normal life. These storylines sound promising, but by the time they reach their end by the show’s climax, they sort of all fall flat.

Given the fact that Scott’s become sort of a bad guy, it’s hard to feel involved in his and Kate’s storyline, especially given at how repetitively Kate keeps being undecided as to whether or not she can save him. Eddie Gonzalez ultimately feels as though he’s just along for the ride, and Richie and Seth’s stories were solid, if uninspired, plus even after all this time, it’s still hard to be invested in them seeing as they are both ultimately immature jerks. Also, despite the last series having a clear main antagonist in Carlos Madrigal, this series can’t decide who its ultimate antagonist is, flopping back and forth between Carlos or new big bad Lord Amancio Malvado, so it all ends up being a wash in the end. Oh, and “Sex Machine” is completely wasted here this time round.

That being said, this series is ultimately held strong thanks to Eiza González’s Santanico and her big revenge storyline. The fact that Santanico has been given a hero’s pursuit this series feels like a real step forward with Santanico talking about shedding her former self (“shedding old skin”), which was telling as the series went on. Just like before, Eiza González is really becoming the true standout of the entire show, especially now that she’s going the full hero route. González’s sultry beauty and overall sheer magnetic presence is one of the show’s real advantages and whenever she comes into play, she lights up the screen, despite the fact that she surely suffers whenever she’s paired up with Zane Holtz’s monotone Richie. Also, both Wilmer Valderrama and Esai Morales are superbly chilling and menacing as the two main villains, and Danny Trejo as “the Regulator” is still bad as ever, despite not being given much to do.

The idea of doing a From Dusk Till Dawn TV series was an interesting one at first, but now, it sort of feels like a zombie: it isn’t dead, but that doesn’t mean it’s alive. Eiza González’s performance and her character arc saves the overarching storyline, the villains are fun, and there are some pulpy thrills to be had along the way. However, some of the main protagonists feel more uninteresting this time round while some are wasted or just there, and the whole thing started to run of steam towards the end. But most of all, it just feels somewhat flat and joyless overall, still being unable to justify its existence.

FROM DUSK TILL DAWN / CERT: 18 / DIRECTOR: ROBERT RODRIGEZ / SCREENPLAY: VARIOUS / STARRING: DJ COTRONA, ZANE HOLTZ, ELIZA GONZALEZ, JESSE GARCIA / RELEASE DATE: OUT NOW
 

As somebody who hasn’t really sat down to watch a episodic mini-series in ages, I came to Thicker Than Water with fresh eyes. Produced in 2013 by Swedish Television, it appears to have come on the back of the success of the big-screen Stieg Larssen Millenium films and certainly contains a fair amount of sexual tension and subtext that belongs more potently in a cinematic world. That said, there is sufficient in Thicker Than Water to entice fans weaned on other successes like The Bridge.

This DVD collection of 10 episodes, lasting approximately one hour each, could be retitled An Unfinished Family Buisiness and encompasses much of the theme and context that the Salander phenomenon is well known for.

The backdrop is a lodging house on an island. The matriarch of the family, Anna-Lisa Waldermar (Stina Ekblad), calls her three children together, Oskar (Joel Spira) who runs the lodging house, Lasse (Bjorn Bengtsson), who owns a restaurant in Stockholm and Jonna (Aliette Opheim) , a professional actress in film and theatre, for a fateful meeting and gives them each a cryptic message pertaining to the future running of the house after she is gone. This comes a lot sooner, when she takes a rowboat out into the middle of a nearby lake and shoots herself. The legal rep regarding the will, reveals that Anna-Lisa was suffering from cancer and didn’t want to prolong the agony for her children. She also reveals that the will will not be honored unless they successfully run together the lodging house from the summer till the end of September.

As is too often the case, this is just the start-off point for a lot of revelation and delayed conflicts that have emerged over the decades, with numerous hidden secrets and denials coming to the fore, not least in an issue between the

Waldemars and their closest neighbors, the Pahkinen’s, who own an house on the island. Lasse is under pressure from loan sharks from the outset with major debts and has a daughter, Kim (Molly Nutley) who stays with him. There is a fair amount of sibling rivalry and an overwhelming desire to try and make things right for everyone….

We’ve provided a little bit of exposition to get you enticed into Thicker Than Water, but not enough to spoil it. Although the series can be classified as Nordic Noir, there is considerably more focus on the family drama as opposed to the noir. It is well-acted and Opheim reminds one of a blonde Kate Middleton. It certainly holds the attention. Whether or not it will hit the heights of other more high-profile series from the region remains to be seen, but purists and addicts of Scandinavian drama will find much to recommend and appreciate. We did enjoy it, but there isn’t a great deal of humor in this, which heightens the serious tone.

If there is one criticism, it’s that the drama is drawn out over a longer period, when three or four episodes would have sufficed, but all in all, Thicker Than Water remains a solid, well-structured noirish drama and one that deserves to do well when it is released.

THICKER THAN WATER / CERT: 15 / DIRECTOR: HENRIK JANSSON-SCHWEIZER / SCREENPLAY: VARIOUS / STARRING: JOEL SPIRA, BJORN BENGTSSON / RELEASE DATE: OUT NOW
 

1950s Mid-Western America… dusty, barren landscapes, well-meaning townsfolk, innocent farm girls, not so innocent farm hands, and alien invaders. At a time when post-war Cold War paranoia was rife, cinema capitalised on a public’s fears by ushering in a golden age of sci-fi, and to the fore was the alien invasion movie. The decade saw the release of classics such as War of the Worlds, The Day the Earth Stood Still and Invasion of the Body Snatchers. Inevitably, a wave of inferior films also arrived and The Beast with 1,000,000 Eyes! is one such offender. Do not be drawn in by that vaguely interesting title; this is a terrible film, so terrible in fact that it doesn’t register even a single point on the so-bad-it’s-good spectrum. This is not a review: it is a warning.

The Kelley family already have their fair share of problems before a mysterious force begins to meddle in their lives. Their date farm is failing, mother can no longer bake, father seems to spend most of his time staring wistfully into the distance, and daughter Sandy can only speak in exasperated bursts while being creepily stalked by a mute farm helper known only as “Him”. When Sandy’s dog Duke attacks mother, father’s car is attacked by a gang of angry blackbirds, and neighbour Ben is trampled by a malevolent, stampeding cow, the Kelleys suspect something is afoot.

The Beast with 1,000,000 Eyes! is a tediously dull affair punctuated by brief moments of awkwardly unintentional humour. If this wasn’t such an earnest film full of performances desperately striving for intensity, you would think it was all an elaborate joke; a spoof of the alien invasion trend of the decade, mocking the seriousness of a nation’s paranoia. Instead, this is a hopelessly disjointed film that challenges you to make it through to the ridiculous finale. The script is woefully unconvincing, with lines being delivered with all the flair of the worst amateur dramatics you can imagine. There is swooning and sighing, shaking and shouting, as the cast attempt to instil some emotion into dialogue that feels as if it was written by someone with only a passing understanding of the English language. Everything minutely interesting also seems to happen off screen; the aforementioned rampage of the berserking beef is brought to a swift conclusion off camera, with only a strained reaction shot giving you any hint of what took place.

Do not be fooled or tempted to seek the narcissistic pleasure that can be found in a terrible film. No, The Beast with 1,000,000 Eyes! is a film so bad it’s just, well, bad.

THE BEAST WITH 1,000,000 EYES! / CERT: PG / DIRECTOR: DAVID KRAMARSKY, ROGER CORMAN / SCREENPLAY: TOM FILER / STARRING: PAUL BIRCH, LORNA THAYER, DONA COLE, DICK SARGENT / RELEASE DATE: JULY 4TH

As you can probably imagine, a film entitled Even Lambs Have Teeth was bound to get us dusting off some obvious and utterly irresistible cheap jokes in anticipation of a lo-fi, low-budget, low-quality straight-to-DVD horror shocker. The fun we could have had complaining about “wooly” scripting and warning you that the film is a “shear waste of time”. But sadly we have to put away the jokebook because Only Lambs Have Teeth has defied our expectations and, some quibbles aside, turns out to be a rather good little revenge thriller which lurches – quite uneasily it has to be said – from the genuinely quite disturbing to the genuinely quite silly.

Best friends forever Sloane and Katie set off to spend some time at an organic farm, but after they befriend a couple of likely local lads at a diner they’re driven out to a wilderness farmhouse and drugged. They wake up, stripped to their underwear, and chained up inside a couple of grim industrial container units deep in the forest. Under pain of death they’re – there’s no pleasant way of putting this – used and abused by any number of grubby low-lifes (including the local sheriff and a priest who prefers to wear a grotesque pig mask) who pay handsomely for the privilege. This is actually uncomfortable stuff for a while; the girls’ dilemma is genuinely appalling and degrading and the indignities they suffer aren’t just unpleasant, they verge on the voyeuristic. But, as the film’s title warns us, even lambs have teeth. Inevitably the girls turn the tables and manage to free themselves – whereupon they tool up and set off looking for bloody revenge on everyone who has tormented and humiliated them over the last few days.

Fortunately, the film’s tone lightens somewhat once the girls are free; we’re mercifully spared any more of their ordeal and it becomes a more stylised and fairly predictable revenge romp. Logic and realism are hurled out of the window as the girls – still in their pants and covered in blood – hack and hammer their way around the neighbourhood dispensing their very own brand of justice, at least one example of which is sure to bring tears to the eyes of the gentlemen in the audience. The film ignores the fact that the girls have effectively been repeatedly raped; they don’t seem especially traumatised by their experiences and they slip into their new roles as ruthless, calculating killers with unlikely ease. It’s surely best to not worry about the giant plot-holes and the extraordinary half-time change of tone as this snappy, no-nonsense bloodbath canters towards the finishing line and the girls merrily batter and immolate their tormentors.

Even Lambs Have Teeth is a bit all over the place but it’s hard not to admire its guts and its chutzpah. Despite his over-reliance on irritating jump-cuts, Terry Miles directs his own snappy script with gusto and the performances are pretty much just about as competent as they need to be for what is, in essence, a better-than-average B-movie exploitation flick. If you can cope with the first forty minutes or so, which promise an entirely different and much darker film than the one we finally end up with, we think ewe’ll find that Even Lambs Have Teeth is worth dipping into. (Hang on now… – Ed)

EVEN LAMBS HAVE TEETH / CERT: 18 / DIRECTOR & SCREENPLAY: TERRY MILES / STARRING: KRISTEN PROUT, TIERA SKOVBYE, MICHAEL KARL RICHARDS, CRAIG MARCH / RELEASE DATE: OUT NOW

 

It obscures the matter a little, but the title does not lie – those mad bastards at Full Moon went and made five Evil Bong movies. What, haven’t seen Evil Bong 1-4? Don’t worry; the plotting here isn’t aimed at mere casual potheads, but rather the absolutely near-braindead blotto, like Cbeebies for imbeciles or Seth MacFarlane humour at its very worst. Their girlfriends held hostage by EeBee the Evil Bong, the film’s heroes must try and raise their ransom by selling pot, smoking pot and talking about pot. Relentlessly.

Evil Bong party game: every time someone smokes weed, talks about smoking weed or smokes some more weed, take a hit. To the face preferably, with the nearest blunt instrument (your bong will do), until either blacking out or seeing enough sense to put Pineapple Express on instead. There’s stoner humour and then there’s the complete and utter laziness of Evil Bong, which doesn’t even attempt to cater to anyone beyond the hardcore weed-sucking crowd. With its faux-Reggae soundtrack, bong-laden landscapes and deeply luminescent plumes of Re-Animator smoke, it takes stoner humour to the next level: using weed as the setup and the punchline to every joke, pausing only to swear and charmlessly hoof a bit of merchandise or spin-off.

Although, in all fairness to our stoner audience, it’s hard to imagine even the most pie-eyed finding anything to enjoy in High-5. There’s no drug on Earth strong enough to make it seem funny, or even, in fact, tolerable. Certainly not when you could be watching Adventure Time or SpongeBob Squarepants instead, and not alienating your non-baked friends in the process.

The smallest of small mercies: EeBee is barely in it, sparing us at least a little bit of stupid, offensive shit in a movie rammed to the hilt with stupid, offensive shit. The Gingerdead Man (not Gary Busey anymore) gets plenty of time to shine, the closest thing to being amusing in a movie in which absolutely nothing is remotely amusing. Certainly not the boring swearing, rubbish puns (Poon-isher, geddit), racist caricatures or shockingly un-erotic nudity. The whole thing strikes as written by a man who has never smoked a joint in his life, looking to cash in on those who willingly watch Sharknado, put things like ‘weed lover’ in their social media profiles and own an actual bong in life.

That all this comes from the mind of Mister Charles Band makes it all the more depressing, the continued devolution of Full Moon into purveyors of the unwatchable, tarnishing its director’s once (alright, semi) respected horror name. Weed, it’s said, may or may not kill off brain cells, but there’s not a single one to be found in the entirety of Evil Bong: High-5. Bummer, dude.

EVIL BONG: HIGH-5 / DIRECTOR: CHARLES BAND / SCREENPLAY: CHARLES BAND, KENT ROUDEBUSH / STARRING: SONNY CARL DAVIS, ROBIN SYDNEY, AMY PAFFRATH, JOHN PATRICK JORDAN / RELEASE DATE: JUNE 22ND

The Club follows a group of priests and their housekeeper living in an isolated town, but it’s as far from Father Ted as you could get. This is a house where priests are sent to repent for horrible crimes – crimes that the Church won’t report to the authorities for fear of scandal. Yes, you’ve probably guessed correctly – though not all of the priests have committed that particular sin, Pablo Larraín’s film deals with the horrific sexual abuse scandal within the Catholic Church, already brought to our attention this year by the awards-sweeping Spotlight.

One day, a new priest joins the house and is immediately accosted by Sandokan (Farías), a man he’d abused as a child, leading to the priest committing suicide. This draws the attention of Father Garcia (Alonso), a younger priest intent on shutting the ‘retirement home’ down.

Where Spotlight excelled was in drawing attention to the horrors of the scandal by giving voice to its victims rather than the Church’s attempts to defend itself. It’s immediately evident from the concept of The Club that this film has a much tougher ask, and many viewers will be understandably put off by the very idea of a film focusing on characters who could commit such monstrous crimes. However, this is no clichéd and undeserved tale of repentance – indeed, some of the priests still commit quite a nasty act towards the end. Larraín and his co-writers approach this subject matter with no agenda other than to explore the psychological and moral complexities behind the situation; for example, Father Garcia’s interrogations of the priests go into how the church’s suppression of priests’ sexuality could lead to the abuse of the vulnerable.

The film, however, would not be half as interesting without the character of Sandoken, who sticks around in the town to torment the other priests. He’s a very complex figure, his views on sexuality and religion having been screwed up by his childhood traumas. It’s very upsetting, both for the viewer and for Garcia, to see how hateful and directionless he has become as a result of his abuse, and his presence in the town sparks a lot of conflict as the film nears its end. 

But don’t expect a dramatically satisfying ending; perhaps fittingly for the very real issues it explores, The Club is a melancholy film which offers more questions than answers. Though at times frustrating, particularly when the focus is on characters who’ve committed the most horrible of crimes, Larraín approaches the issues with care and complexity, and for that reason this is a tough but recommended watch.

Extras: Pablo Larraín Interview / Trailer

THE CLUB / CERT: 18 / DIRECTOR: PABLO LARRAÍN / SCREENPLAY: GUILLERMO CALDERÓN, PABLO LARRAÍN, DANIEL VILLALOBOS / STARRING: ALFREDO CASTRO, ROBERTO FARÍAS, ANTONIA ZEGERS, MARCELO ALONSO / RELEASE DATE: OUT NOW

 

A gang led by Michael Atwood (Chiwetel Ejiofor) robs a deposit box containing information that could get a Russian mafia boss out of jail. But it’s not enough, and the team is lumped with another job – and the threat of murder if they don’t complete it. The thing is, this data’s in a high security facility and there’s no way they can lift it before the cops show up. Their idea is to initiate a ‘Triple 9’ scenario – if a police officer is shot elsewhere in town, all the cops will converge there, giving the gang their opportunity. Luckily, two of the robbers (Anthony Mackie and Clifton Collins, Jr.) are corrupt officers themselves, and one has an overzealous new partner (Casey Affleck) who could be the perfect target.

The key to a good genre film is to provide the familiar thrills of the genre in question while finding an original hook that sets the film apart. As a crime flick, John Hillcoat’s Triple 9 ticks these boxes – you’re never far from a car chase or a heist (the opening chase sequence is particularly suspenseful), and the ‘cops within the gang’ angle provides a fresh take on a well-worn dynamic.

What’s also noteworthy is that Triple 9 has one hell of a cast, with barely a face you won’t recognise; in addition to those mentioned already, there’s Aaron Paul and Normal Reedus, plus Woody Harrelson appears as a typically louche police captain, and Kate Winslet tries out her best Russian accent as the mafia don’s wife. 

But Triple 9 fails to live up to all its promise. As all these characters are introduced, all bringing their own sub-plots and the story becomes more convoluted than it really should; this leads to the film’s big heist sequence being a let-down, as certain plot points contrive to get everyone into place, and the tension and clarity are jarred by the clumsy way in which the film cuts between all the events happening simultaneously. And then, rather than satisfyingly tying up all its character stories, the film’s final act descends into repetitive nastiness; Hillcoat and screenwriter Matt Cook seem to have decided that “and then they all shoot each other” is a satisfying ending to almost every part of the story. It’s rather nihilistic. 

Triple 9, then, is reminiscent of Hillcoat’s Lawless – a promising crime movie that ends up disappointingly mediocre. Fans of the genre will find some enjoyment in the action, particularly the opening sequence, but the convoluted plot and underdeveloped characters make for difficult viewing, and an incredibly good cast is utterly wasted. 

Special Features: Featurettes / Deleted Scenes / Cast Interviews

TRIPLE 9 / CERT: 15 / DIRECTOR: JOHN HILLCOAT / SCREENPLAY: MATT COOK / STARRING: CHIWETEL EJIOFOR, CASEY AFFLECK, ANTHONY MACKIE, WOODY HARRELSON, AARON PAUL, KATE WINSLET / RELEASE DATE: JUNE 27TH

It’s humans versus big, spindly, skeletal robots in this lively and unbelievably low-budget sci-fi actioner whose focus is very firmly on its hardware and special effects rather than its human interest. Fair enough. You won’t give a mechanical monkey’s uncle what happens to any of the generic grunts (and one female human/robot hybrid) who populate the first full-length feature by FX guru Steven Gomez but there’s still some fun to be had in the well-executed action sequences and superbly-realised killer robots brought to the screen on a budget of… wait for it… just one million dollars.

The snappy, if perfunctory, script takes us to the near future (although it looks a bit like the far future to us) where an elite squad of marines is dumped on a remote island on what’s intended to be a routine training exercise. Of course, this is precisely what it isn’t. The group is cut off from civilisation and their communications are down. Enter an army of psychopathic murderous robots – incredibly advanced military killing machines – and as the shooting and the dying starts, the group realises that the computer-interfaced semi-human Mills (Kirby) is able to forge some sort of command connection to the tireless robots. But the trouble is, they can’t really be sure whose side she’s on and who exactly she is…

Kill Command is really all about those visuals. For the money available the effects are pretty outstanding, a blend of Starship Troopers dropships and Terminator-like robots. The resemblance to genre forebears doesn’t end there, though; worryingly, it initially looks as if our heroes have pitched up in an early episode of TV’s Stargate (via the first Predator) as they find themselves wandering around familiar-looking pine forests. Fortunately, scenes of the multi-legged robots stomping around the woods en masse indulging in furious gun battles with the grunts is enough to distract us from the mundanity of the location until the story shifts into a more interesting industrial setting as the survivors take refuge in a nearby devastated test installation. Having already set out its familiar stall with its survival-of-the-fittest hunter-becomes-hunted scenario Kill Command never really surprise in terms of its narrative; Hills’ machine connection is signposted well enough advance for the audience to at least have a fair idea where and how the story’s going to play out but there’s still some tension and edginess at the climax when she finally confronts the boss robot and makes what might well be irrevocable decision about her own destiny.

Kill Command isn’t necessarily one you’ll be in hurry to rewatch with your mates but taken on its own terms, and especially with the resources available to realise it, it’s a brisk, accomplished effort with a lot more wit, integrity, and intelligence than some of the more lavishly-budgeted genre movies which overwhelm the multiplexes. Our command… watch Kill Command.

KILL COMMAND / CERT: 15 / DIRECTOR & SCREENPLAY: STEVEN GOMEZ / STARRING: VANESSA KIRBY, THURE LINDHARDT, DAVID AJALA, BENTLEY KALU / RELEASE DATE: JUNE 27TH

Before talking about the first season of CSI: Cyber it is important to note that not only has the show been cancelled after its second season, but CBS has yet to announce a new CSI spin-off. This suggests that this could the end of the CSI franchise and it is hard not to view CSI in that context.

To its credit, CSI Cyber does try to mix up the formula of the show. As the name implies CSI: Cyber chooses to focus on cyber crime. At first, this would seem like a rather limited area to focus on. Thankfully this isn’t true. Across the thirteen episodes that make up Season One, the cast manages to deal with an impressive variety of cyber related crimes. One episode may deal with kidnapping while the next might deal with arson. The key is that each one of these crimes was caused by hacking in some way.

The downside to focusing on cyber crime is that generally speaking, the perpetrators do not know the victims. This changes a dynamic that was crucial to the original CSI. In CSI, the story unfolds as the main cast spend time investigating the scene and the people who knew the victim. This means that we get to know characters that only show up for one episode. In particular, this attention benefits the perpetrator of the crime in terms of storytelling. Meanwhile, the cast of CSI: Cyber spend relatively little time talking to the victims and they have no real need to go to the scene of the crime. All of this combines to make the crimes committed in individual episodes feel less focussed on the people involved.

As a failing, this is made up for by the quality of the cast. The actors all play their plays well and they have a natural chemistry with one another. We get some glimpses into the lives of these characters and what drives them. These revelations fuel a few of the episodes, both in terms of quieter moments and the main plot. Between them, the cast do a good job in making up for the weaknesses in the structure of the show. They are able to inject real tension into scenes that may have lacked it.

CSI: Cyber is a fun show, and in its own right it might have seen another season. The problem is that it comes off the back of CSI and was expected to carry what was once a massive franchise. Ultimately, CSI: Cyber may be judged by the expectations of its predecessor when people look back on it. If you can go into it without preconceptions though you might still have a good time.

Extras: CSI episode 1421 “Kitty”/ Iit can happen to you: Season 1 of CSI: Cyber/ Welcome to CTOC: Encoding CSI: Cyber/ CGI-Cyber; Tech Tools of the trade/ Gag Reel: A bug in the system/ Deleted scenes/ Audio commentary on select episodes/ Launch promos

CSI: CYBER – COMPLETE SEASON ONE / CERT: 15 / STARRING: PATRICIA ARQUETTE, TED DANSON, JAMES VAN DER BEEK, SHAD MOSS, PETER MACNICOL / RELEASE DATE: JUNE 27TH