// Category Archive for: Movies

DVD Review: Into The White

By Jemiah Jefferson

I won’t lie—I was interested in seeing this film because it’s one of the post-Harry Potter performances by everyone’s favorite snub-nosed ginger, Rupert Grint, now quite grown up and no longer shackled to the limitations of being good-guy sidekick Ron Weasley (who, admittedly, is a vastly more tolerable character on screen than in the novels, thanks to the talents of Mr. Grint). I have yet to see the other “adult” roles Rupert Grint has done, but he more than holds his own in this admirable historical European indie.

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DVD Review: My Amityville Horror

By Brad Henderson

Some look at The Amityville Horror as just a movie. It has been dismissed many times by many people, but no one can deny that something happened in that house; whatever it may be, something happened. Recently, IFC Films released a documentary that focuses on Daniel Lutz, the oldest of the children in the Lutz family, and his story and confessions on what happened during those 28 terrifying days spent at 112 Ocean Avenue.

I’m one of those that believe that some of the events that were “recorded” actually happened in that house. I do believe that George Lutz was full of shit and that they fabricated a lot to sell their story. However, I also believe that certain events occurred, and then the family just went with it.

In My Amityville Horror, Daniel Lutz tells his side of the story, and he sells it. Yeah, he could be bullshitting, but the way he speaks is very convincing. If he is lying, he is the best liar in the world.

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Blu-Ray Review: Antiviral

By Brad Henderson

How far would people go to be closer to their favorite celebrity? We already know society is obsessed with celebrities, with mimicking their features and hair. Come on, you have seen this: Aniston’s hair, Jolie’s lips, Lopez’s buttocks, and the list keeps going. This is the basis of the story that Brandon Cronenberg follows with Antiviral, but he takes it to the next level.

Brandon Cronenberg (yes, David Cronenberg’s son) delivers a haunting look into the obsession with celebrities and the public and how far people will go to be like their idols.

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Movie Review: The Conjuring

By Lisa Anderson

Sometimes, even a well-made horror movie can be left in the theater. You can see it and then go home and head straight for bed, without averting your glance from your mirrors or imagining the film’s antagonist sliding through the dark of your room. Horror movie fans, especially, do not lose sleep over most horror movies, or find themselves haunted by them days later.

The Conjuring was not such a movie for me, and it may not be for you either.

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Assemblog: August 9, 2013

Michael Fassbender in The Counselor

New this week on Popshifter: Stuart likes the way Scared To Get Happy: A Story of Indie-Pop 1980 – 1989 tells a story with music; Melissa thinks that the debut of The Fun Boy Three still sounds immediate after all these years; Paul compiles a listener’s guide for R&B in this new millennium; I throw chum into the water in the form of a blog post about Frenzy, an illustrated novel with a Kickstarter campaign; and recommend the sweet and the bitter in Minks’ new album Tides End.

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Assemblog: August 2, 2013

Rinko Kikuchi as Mako Mori in Pacific Rim

New this week on Popshifter: Brad reviews yet another Scream Factory reissue, this time it’s The Burning; Jeff finishes up this month’s Waxing Nostalgic Cover Albums series with Replicants’ eponymous album; Paul informs critics that being average is not worse than being bad; John pays tribute to The Olivia Tremor Control’s Bill Doss; I embrace the post-punk transvestite stylings of The Garden on their new album The Life And Times Of A Paperclip; and enjoy a lot of good movies new on home video and in theaters: Trance, Kiss of the Damned, The Last Will and Testament of Rosalind Leigh, and Berberian Sound Studio.

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DVD Review: The Last Will and Testament of Rosalind Leigh

By Less Lee Moore

The Last Will and Testament of Rosalind Leigh is the feature film debut of Rodrigo Gudiño, founder of Rue Morgue magazine. It hearkens back to the Gothic thrillers of the 1960s but it isn’t a period piece. It’s more of a slow burn than most slow burning films, but once it catches flame it becomes genuinely sinister.

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Movie Review: Berberian Sound Studio

By Less Lee Moore

Berberian Sound Studio is a wonderfully self-reflexive film. It is as much about the effects of cinema as it is about the special effects that go into creating it. These ideas converge in Gilderoy, a British sound engineer who moves to Italy in the 1970s to work on The Equestrian Vortex, a giallo concerning black magic rituals.

Gilderoy, imbued with fragile realism by Toby Jones, is a fish so far out of the water that he’s gasping for air on the first day of his employment, ostracized by language and cultural barriers that he’s too polite and timid to overcome. His discomfort is so palpable as to be excruciating. He’s also uncomfortable with the subject matter of the film, which involves drowning, stabbing, hair pulling, and hot pokers shoved inside of women. Director Peter Strickland never shows us the harrowing scenes that trouble Gilderoy’s psyche; we see their impact on his face and eventually his entire persona, as he becomes completely unraveled both physically and mentally.

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DVD Review: Kiss Of The Damned

By Less Lee Moore

If anything could be more thrilling and sexy than Kiss of the Damned, it would be the fact that this is writer and director Xan Cassevetes’s first film. The daughter of John Cassavetes and Gena Rowlands, her pedigree is as assured as her talent.

Kiss of the Damned is the vampire movie that we’ve all been waiting for, engorged with atmosphere, sex, betrayal, and blood. It’s indebted to films like Daughters of Darkness, The Hunger, and the oeuvres of Jean Rollin and Jess Franco. Yet it feels fresh and invigorating and not like a retread at all.

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Blu-Ray Review: Trance

By Less Lee Moore

Trance is a very odd film. Director Danny Boyle has crafted a good career out of odd films, mostly because he refuses—admirably—to hew to one specific genre. Trance is particularly Boylean then, veering from genre to genre at a discombobulating pace.

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