Opening This Week: Battle: Los Angeles Nationwide - A $100-million extravaganza of soul-sucking chaos and bombast. It is so excruciatingly apathetic, amateurish and brain-dead that, were an actual valid thought to enter the proceedings at any time, the entire film would likely self-destruct from the sheer shock of it all. Black Death OnDemand and Select Cities - "Black Death" carries authentic aesthetics, a dread-drenched tone, and provocative food-for-thought ideas involving religious hysteria that prove timely even in the 21st-century. The horrors within the story derive from the brutality and ruthlessness of human nature and the danger that comes with extreme belief systems. Ceremony OnDemand, In Select Cities April 8 - The feature writing-directing debut of Max Winkler, "Ceremony" is innocuous but underwritten. An indie romantic comedy-drama that provides the occasional snicker and a low-key level of emotional urgency, the picture nonetheless comes up lacking in both development and charisma. Mars Needs Moms Nationwide - It looks dazzling, and will no doubt look even better once it's on glorious 2D Blu-Ray. The material that surrounds its look is what doesn't work. It's bland and neither here-nor-there, an adventure-fantasy that could have used more story innovation to go along with its state-of-the-art aesthetics. Red Riding Hood Nationwide - Wasting an eclectic cast doing forgettable work and shot on chintzy soundstages that look like the sets from "Fraggle Rock," "Red Riding Hood" is a botched turkey that never takes off. It doesn't work as horror, as whimsical folk tale, or as a romance. It does, however, work on occasion as bad dinner theatre. Rubber OnDemand, In Select Cities April 1 - "Rubber" doesn't try to be the least bit creepy, only graphically violent. Its humor at the onset is cute, but it's there to make an early point about the disparateness of filmgoers and their overall propensity for suspending disbelief. Otherwise, the picture is, no pun intended, extraordinarily middle-of-the-road. 3 Backyards NYC - A tonal poem about the desires, mistakes, serendipitous encounters, and ultimate disappointments that a single day can have in store for any one of us, "3 Backyards" is a motion picture small of means, yet incalculably immense in its exploration of nothing less than the human condition. Wrecked OnDemand, In Select Cities April 1 - As a situational thriller, "Wrecked" enthralls for the length of its running time. For first-time director Michael Greenspan, it also stands as a future calling card to show just how much intrigue and audience involvement he can rile up with such a minimalist plot. |
© 2011 Dustin Putman |
Friday, March 11, 2011
going to the movies this weekend?
