Magnificent. Triumphant. THIS is the movie I saw in my mind’s eye when I first read Dune in 1984 when I was anticipating the Lynch film (which I love for its own reasons). The visual aesthetic, the sound and production design, the score (I swear Hans Zimmer isn’t the only one throwing a few nods…
Tag: vfx
Mission to Mars (2000) – Brian De Palma
Director Brian De Palma delivers what feels like his spin on Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey, unfortunately the shoddy and very obvious CGI in a number of the sequences of the film, and especially during the climax when a practical effects would have served better, and leant a stronger reality to the film, which needed…
Free Guy (2021) – Shawn Levy
Inane, silly, and filled with laughs that gamers will delight in Ryan Reynolds new film, Free Guy, hits theatres this week. With a story that feels a little bit like a riff on the classic 1982 sci-fi film, Tron, a programmer, Millie (Jodie Comer) is working her way through the program and game known as…
A Quiet Place Part II (2020) -4K Review
For those of you who may not have Amazon’s Prime streaming service, or like me, and love physical media, Paramount Pictures has released the much anticipated follow-up to the horror thriller A Quiet Place directed by John Krasinski. The sequel, A Quiet Place Part II, written and directed by Krasinski, is now available on 4K,…
Deep Rising (1998) – Stephen Sommers
Writer/director Stephen Sommers delivers a fun creature feature romp that, even with some dated VFX, is still a lot of fun. Treat Williams leads a cast that includes Famke Janssen, Wes Studi, Jason Flemyng, Anthony Heald, and Kevin O’Connor. Williams plays Finnegan, a kind of Han Solo of the high seas. He and his crew…
Gemini Man (2019) – Blu-Ray Review
It should have worked. An Academy Award winning director (though action is not his forte), a bankable lead actor, a solid supporting cast, and the seed of a solid story. Will Smith gets his Bourne on (a couple of times) in Gemini Man, the Ang Lee action film that comes home on blu-ray and DVD from…
Extraterrestrial (2014) – The Vicious Brothers
I quite enjoyed the Vicious Brothers previous efforts – Grave Encounters and Grave Encounters 2, and were curious how they took on subject matter that really unnerved me, so I dug into Extraterrestrial, which is currently available on VOD and iTunes, and had a look. Whereas with Grave Encounters I felt they took on…
Interstellar (2014) – Christopher Nolan
Sure, it took me a while to get to this one, but it’s been a big month, and for me this is worth the wait. With recognizable influences from 2001: A Space Odyssey (the return of silence to space, and walking, talking robots that resemble the iconic Monolith) and Contact (not the least of…
RoboCop (2014) – Jose Padiha
The other remake I watched this week, after the Evil Dead debacle, was the new Robocop. Lacking the over-the-top violence and comic book nature, not to mention the skewering social commentary of the original, there’s not a lot to redeem this film. And I feel sorry for viewers who come to this one first…
The Hindenberg (2011) – Philipp Kadelbach
Releasing to DVD this week, Anchor Bay oversees the historic disaster that summarily ended the sophisticated age of travel that was the zeppelin, Hindenburg. Filmed as a German mini-series but shot in English, this excursion is a bit of a mixed bag. There are some really good things about this three-hour epic, and there…
The Mind Reels 