Starring a Charlize Theron who lives up to the Queen required by the story to be both raving beauty and aging crone, an appropriately scruffy Chris Hemsworth and numerous fine actors, this is maybe not the darkest telling of the fairytale we’ve seen, but it is certainly action packed and epic, bringing new ideas to a story that’s tempting to think we know all too well. There are some amazing effects, most of which look great, though there is the occasional rendering that doesn’t look as good on Blu-ray as it did on the movie screen (such as one of the Queen’s transformations). The only weakness in the film is the casting of Kristen Stewart, who doesn’t quite seem to live up to the designation of fairest in the land (unless “fairest” means something other than physical beauty).

Now before all you Twihards write me nasty emails, let’s just step back for a moment and be honest. Stewart’s casting seems a strategic move more than any sort of typecasting. She has a huge fan base as a result of the Twilight movies, and while she makes an empathetic vampire-in-the-making, she seems a bit miscast in this film. Yes, she’s pretty, but it’s hard to see her at any point being a rival to Theron’s queen, at least in the beauty department. Her performance also seems a bit too mannered at times (or maybe just vacant), and her best performance moments here are probably those last 30 seconds or so of the film. This may be why discussions of a sequel for the film have moved away from a second film with Snow White and towards a Huntsman-only version with Hemsworth.

Regardless of whether a sequel is made and despite afore mentioned casting issues, the film is enjoyable, and Universal has put together a solid Blu-ray/DVD package that fans of the film and new viewers will not be disappointed in.

As well as this somewhat new genre of “found footage” cinema stories, Area 407 owes to low budget horror films such as The Evil Dead and larger budget films (which I’ll refrain from naming because to do so would be a bit of a spoiler, but when you see the monster in this film, you’ll have a pretty good sense of what those larger budget films might be).

Without getting into all the nuances of the set up, the footage that we watch has been recovered from the site of a plane crash and was for the most part recorded by two teenaged sisters.  The film starts as they board a flight home, and we meet various characters who will survive the crash and fight to survive during a long night of confusing, frightening and potentially conspiratorial events.  The plane crash and some of the sequences are quite effective, with the tension building as the survivors are killed one by one by something in the darkness.  One of the eeriest moments is when they seem to have been found and rescue is imminent.

The film is satisfyingly bleak, and Melanie Lyons stands out as Laura, whom we learn more about as the film progresses – she was the one character/performance I believed pretty much throughout.  Lyons is definitely someone to watch out for.  The rest of the cast does decently with the material, though there moments when the film seems to spend more time than necessary having characters scream – in general and at each other – as a way to build suspense.  Those moments eventually lose their impact and could benefit from some tighter editing.  These moments being to reflect some weaknesses in the writing and characterizations; for example, responses to the crash primarily seem to be within a very narrow range (loud panic) – this may be why Laura is a bit of fresh air in the scenario, and one wishes for other characters who are either so in shock as to not have much emotional affect or who are able to talk without screaming and arguing.  Pretty soon it begins to feel a bit like there’s nothing for these characters to really do (other than scream) and that the film is starting to stretch its concept a bit thin.  Which is too bad, because it’s a solid concept and there is nice use of the plane, a deserted town and a cabin.

Earlier I said that these types of films require a different kind of suspension of disbelief, and the one thing that began to disrupt that for me is the way in which the light on the camera is constantly aimed at and shining into people’s eyes and faces in a way that would make it impossible for them to see anything that was happening – it becomes “movie lighting” that is contrary to any motivation within the events on the screen.  There’s no doubt that lighting is a challenge in this kind of film, which is partly why some of the ways in which the plane crash site itself is shot becomes frustrating (why can’t we see to the left of the wreckage?).  The film works best when it forgets that we need to see people’s faces and the camera work seems more organic, getting lost in the moment (and the events on the screen) such as moving through the deserted town or calling out to a moving car.  Daylight ultimately comes as a relief, and the final moments of the film are pretty significantly foreshadowed and yet seem appropriate to the story we’ve just seen.

While not perfect, Area 407is an interesting little thriller.

Besides the softcore erotic nature of the artwork, there are the not-unusual insinuations of incest and child molestation that are somewhat glossed over, at least until you’re about eight episodes in, where at least one aspect of them is made more explicit.  In that sense, the story reminds me a bit of an inverted Gunslinger Girl, wherein it’s now older girls taking on young boys as their companions and battle partners.

The anime starts by introducing Satellizer el Bridget, a powerful Pandora or girl genetically modified to have superior fighting skills in order to combat aliens from another dimension (aliens known as the Nova).  Pandoras are most effective when they are paired with a younger male Limiter.   Satellizer has not selected her Limiter yet, and during a school-sanctioned battle demonstration, she is distracted by and interrupted by an arriving transfer student named Kazuya Aoi, a young man who has just learned that his Pandora sister died in battle and who seems destined to be Satellizer’s Limiter, whether she wants him or not.

The story becomes a type of love story between Satellizer and Aoi, as each has to overcome their own fears, awkwardness and traumas.  This is the arena in which the story excels and engages.  And as it becomes more and more apparent to his new schoolmates (and instructors) that Aoi, though a boy, has many attributes considered unique to Pandoras, his and Satelli’s bonding seems more and more likely.

When the episodes are watched back to back, it can begin to feel a bit like this is a boarding school from hell with everyone out to get Satelli – this girl has a knack for making lots of enemies among her classmates, and Aoi has to continually come to her defense.  There are a lot of battles, most basically superpower-filled girl fights.  But when this was parsed out episode by episode, that feeling was probably less prevalent.

Funimation has done a great job with the packaging and transfers, and if you’re a fan of teen romance, anime/manga or seinen in particular, you’ll probably enjoy this.

The Casserole Club’s all California ’60s mod, offering timely resonances for those who are currently obsessed with the TV show Mad Men and effectively mines a similar bleakness as Ang Lee’s The Ice Storm.  Anchored by three news events from 1969, the film focuses on a group of housewives who begin hosting dinner parties that are basically competitions to determine who made the best casserole, as judged by the husbands.  What starts as a playful reason to get together becomes a darker competition as the underlying boredom and self-interest of these suburbanites’ lives gradually rises.  Passion, love, indifference, boredom, doubt, irresponsibility – all quickly mix together into a something less than tasty for the characters and remarkably satisfying for us the audience.

Purity and innocence cannot last long in these environs, and tragically, they don’t.  Every actor here deserves praise, and the film won five Independent Vision Awards, including Best Actor (Kevin Richardson), Best Actress (Susan Traylor) in addition to Best Picture, Best Director and Best Production Design.  All are well-deserved.  Besides Richardson and Traylor, the other performances that have stayed with me include Daniela Sea’s and Jennifer Grace’s.  The two portray women who seem at the opposite extremes of coolness and yet each have a slowly evidenced vulnerability that when exposed, makes us feel the discomfort of seeing something perhaps too personal.

Michael Maize, Pleasant Gehman, Starina Johnson, Mark Booker, Hunter Bodine, Garrett Swann.  The Casserole Club’s strengths are its actors and Balderson’s willingness to allow the story to feel understated in its examination of this intimate group of neighbors who are not quite prepared for the intimacy that results from their get togethers (and I’m not talking about the sex).  I should say that the film is not all doom and gloom – while its view of humanity is rather piercing, there are characters who seem to have found ways to navigate the murky waters of marriage and relationships with a certain honesty and love.  But perhaps what most stays with us are the cautionary aspects of the tale.

I don’t know how to convey how haunting this film is – I was expecting to enjoy the fluffy novelty of some favorite celebrities in an indie film, only to discover as I watched something much more nuanced and heartfelt than I expected.  This film stayed with me for days.  Not because of any great cinematic feats – while the production design feels right on, the camera work is rather mundane.  No, it stayed with me because it’s a bit audacious: the director and actors took risks.  They took a scenario that could have been simply a gimmick played for its camp value or for its surface textures and instead made it into a reflection of the disquiet that can infiltrate our souls.

The Casserole Club is now available on DVD.

The opening credits establish that something apocalyptic (perhaps nuclear) has happened, cities have fallen into ruins, and the world has retrogressed into a feudal society of warlords fighting for land and wealth.

The film has an interesting structure in that the story starts with a warlord’s military adviser/soldier, Xan (Kyle Walsh), on the eve of battle.  Xan is haunted by flashbacks to his childhood at the edge of the Shadowlands, the feared destruction zone that reportedly has monsters and seems to surround the ruins of a major city.  What seems to be relatively simple backstory or character motif ultimately plays a more major role in the plot than expected, as not all of Xan’s actions are what they first seem.  This shifting understanding of Xan’s motivations helps keep the film from simply being a lot of people running through the woods to escape both the warlord they have betrayed and the monster of Xan’s childhood memory.

Xan’s companions include his best friend Cal (Aaron Farb, evidently the most experienced film actor here, who has appeared as a minor character in several movies or TV show episodes, including Grimm, and as a main character in Operation: WASTE.LAND) – and by the end, the story’s focus has shifted from Xan to Cal and the masked ninja-like assassin Tana (Debra Lopez).  All are well cast.

The film, known by several other titles including Ferocious and Dark Knight (as its listed on IMDB), is being released on Blu-ray, DVD, VOD and digital download by MTI Home Video in July 2012.  The filmmaker Drew Maxwell comes from the tradition of making a lot of film for little money by doing it all – writing, directing, cinematography, editing, special effects – and one of his previous films, Carnivorous, has gained a decent reputation among fans of low budget horror.  Dark Nemesis is reportedly shot for a much lower budget than that film, and the green screen work becomes obvious at times, with actors voices clearly being recorded indoors despite the exterior setting we see, and some of the effects less effective (the bridge, for example) than others (the opening scene’s fires, torches and smoky 300-esque setting).  These are balanced by actual locations (forest, bunkers) and creature effects.

Maxwell is clearly ambitious and has been trying to make a film every year or two since 2005.  One has to admire that perseverance, and this is a guy who definitely has ideas and loves genre.  For that alone, his films are worth watching.  Any weaknesses to his films may be more a result of him trying to do everything and not being able to fully devote all his energy and time to doing one thing (like directing or screenwriting or cinematography or editing) really really well.  Dark Nemesis demonstrates that he has the kind of clear vision and ability to get good performances from his leads that would seem to make him a director with a lot of potential, especially if he finds good collaborators to help with or shoulder the screenwriting, cinematography and editing.

MTI’s packaging is handsome though its artwork does not exactly reflect the story content, making it seems more like a story of classic dragons, knights and castles.  As you can tell from this review, the story is a bit more ambitious, though it will definitely appeal most to those who like sword-wielding heroes.  If that’s you, welcome to the Shadowlands!

Dark Nemesis is available for purchase on Blu-ray, DVD, VOD and digital download on July 10, 2012.

Mark Salisbury, former editor of Britain’s top-selling movie magazine Empire and author of movie books such as Alice in Wonderland: A Visual Companion and Burton on Burton, has created an impressive companion to the film, evidently the only official book tie-in with the film.  Whether you liked the film or not, you were probably wowed by the visuals, and you will probably enjoy this book.  The added bonus is that the book reveals certain backstory information or assumptions about events that may have been a bit too vague in the film.  I know, I know, it sounds like I’m first saying the film is too literal, too direct, and then noting that certain things were too vague.  Exactly.

Despite the strength of its evocative visuals, the film’s story seems to alternate between being simplistically literal and being unnecessarily obscure: having the main character wear a cross to stand in for statements about faith and religion is undergraduate filmmaking 101, especially when the android removes it from her and then she later takes it back; the opening scene’s notion of how the engineers create life may create more of a “huh?” response than form the foundation for a progressive and cumulative understanding of the larger story as the film unspools.

If it were just one or the other, the film might be easier to assess.  Too simplistic or too literal, and we have a film that assumes we’re need everything spelled out – a film that fails because it spoon feeds us.  Too obscure and inconsistent in its presentation of narrative information – juxtaposed with production design elements and the audience’s knowledge of the story and aesthetic elements of the Alien films – and you end up with a film that fails because of its own incoherence.

A masterpiece lies somewhere between these two extremes, but Prometheus doesn’t find that balance, sadly.  And this book helps you begin to figure out why, to identify the ways in which the film succumbs to too much slavishness to the original Alien films’ set pieces (flamethrowers! Chest bursting!) and not enough slavishness to the original films’ story elements that add up and make sense in the audience’s mind.  For example, and spoiler here, the final alien we see in Prometheus seems as if it’s the precursor to the aliens Ripley will eventually encounter.  But then, if that’s the case, how do we make sense of the Giger-inspired crucifixion relief carving the crew finds in the pyramid before that type of alien even existed.  I could better accept that Scott is deliberately challenging the audience to figure things out (such as what the Engineer actually says to David before ripping his head off), if those things we figured out didn’t seem at odds with other information we get either through character development, other story events or most noticeably in the production design.

I’ve seen some really great analysis of the film on both sides of the equation (basically, the trainwreck – masterpiece dichotomy), and Prometheus: The Art of the Film surprisingly helps clarify some of the film’s narrative details (or confirm their meaning), but careful study and you can see how the film is trying to pull in two directions at once.  The book probably best exemplifies this in Scott’s final quote – speculating on what he could do in Prometheus 2, in effect destroying any argument that Prometheus is a masterpiece, where its ending is not about launching a franchise but about demonstrating humanity’s tragic inability to accept the answers they get.  The book tips Scott’s hand, and is consistent with the fact that the original script is in effect two different scripts, each with different goals and intentions.

Somewhere in here, there was a film that could have been as powerfully mind bending as Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey or even Tarkovsky’s original Solaris, a film that could have blended religious literature and science fiction in all the ways it has the potential to do.  What we’re left with is a film that has a lot of interesting ideas that don’t quite come together because it owes too much to its Alien DNA (as Scott loves calling it).

Where the film does succeed is in its look – the ways in which set, art direction, costuming, lighting and all the elements of mise-en-scene work together to create a mood and tone that can almost standalone.

Prometheus: The Art of the Film gives us the chance to dive into those elements wholeheartedly.  The visuals and production design are exquisitely documented in this book, and they are effective because certain details almost seem to fade into the dark monochromatic elements of the production design (and the book’s design).  Some set elements seem as if they have been weathered by time and others seem more pristine, but all seem just a bit beyond our vision, our ability to perceive them clearly.  For the visuals, that is evocative and mysterious.  For the film, not so much.

Falling Skies chronicles the chaotic aftermath of an alien attack that has left most of the world completely incapacitated.  As second-in-command, Tom Mason (Noah Wyle), a former history professor, has become an unlikely leader of the 2^nd Massachusetts civilian resistance.  After making sure that humans were enough of a nuisance to give the aliens pause, Tom went willingly with them on one of their space ships at the end of last season.

Three months have passed.  The civilian resistance continues despite heavy casualties and no confirmation of other survivors or military efforts besides this small group.  Mason’s sudden return is cause for celebration and concern, testing the bonds and finding the cracks in a variety of relationships.  The premiere reveals at least some of what happened to Mason after he boarded the ship and further lays the parameters of the sibling rivalry between Mason’s teenaged sons Hal (Drew Roy) and Ben (Connor Jessup), a tension that owes as much to Ben’s having been harnessed by the aliens before being reunited with his family last season as to adolescent bravado and the need to grow up fast in this war-torn world.  Mason’s third son, Matt (Maxim Knight) is only 8 and wants to help the resistance but does not have the experience to temper his eagerness, making decisions that have unexpected consequences.

More quickly than The Walking Dead TV series has addressed, the first four episodes of this new season of Falling Skies begin to raise questions about childhood, growing up and how to be a responsible parent (or how to raise children) in an apocalyptic world.  This may be because Falling Skies has a greater presence of children, literally – as with Mason’s and other kids among the survivors – and nostalgically, as with Weaver’s (Will Patton) looking out for one of Matt’s orphaned friends while wondering what happened to his own daughter.  As a result, Falling Skies has a similar family-centered scenario to Terra Nova but dramatically mines that much more effectively.  Falling Skies deserves its praise and success.

Season Two has some new faces and will introduce more aliens, but some of the surprises have more to do with characters we’ve gotten to know through the first season.  Moon Bloodgood returns as the doctor and Mason’s love interest.  Colin Cunningham keeps John Pope true to his nature.  All of the leads are strong; let’s face it, the show is filled with good actors, but Connor Jessup is the standout so far in Season Two, making Ben the character to watch.  This is partly the writing, sure, but Jessup delivers on the performance and makes Ben more complex and emotionally nuanced than I anticipated last season.

For those who love the cinematic work of directors and cinematographers, there’s interesting blocking of several moving conversations that are choreographed in long traveling shots, weaving in and out of frame both visually and aurally.  In terms of the look and atmosphere of the series, the new season feels grittier to me, perhaps befitting of the warzone aspects of the landscape and the characters’ desperation and doubt being emphasized more.

As you might guess, Mason’s little trip on the spaceship did not result in the truce we might have hoped for.  The war is not over yet.  But all does not seem lost.  Mason, his clan and the couple of hundred survivors he helps shepherd have a long road ahead of them.  Luckily, they’re bringing us along for the ride.

Falling Skies’ 2nd Season Premieres Sunday June 17th, 9pm (ET/PT), on TNT.

With the Scotland series of DVDs recently released from BFS Entertainment, I no longer need a plane ticket to recapture some of my awe and love for Scotland.  The 3 sets – Highlands, Mountains and Islands – each consist of 6 episodes and 150 minutes of aerial photography and panoramic views.  The scale of the landscape is incredible, and each collection has its own focus and style.

Highlands

 Of the three DVD sets, Highlands is the most overtly historical perspective, with John Michie (of Taggart and Coronation Street fame) guiding us through a series of interviews and bite-sized historical facts as he takes us on a tour of the Highlands geography.  The people he encounters include historians, rangers and local residents.

Unlike the other two Scotland DVD packages, the case for Highlands does not list the specific episodes or provide their content, partly because Michie provides a more comprehensive narrative approach to the history rather than a series of stand-alone travelogue-type portrayals of specific areas of the Highlands.

Episode 1 is titled “The Landscapes of Our Time” and introduces us to a recreated township in order to help us better understand the traditional clan system and way of life from medieval times until the 1800s.  This first episode creates a context for us to view the following segments.  The township is enlightening, castles are beautiful, and it’s hard to imagine that anyone has not heard of Loch Ness.

Episode 2 (“Perth”) dives more fully into a historical overview, concentrating on the Great Glen border between the Highlands and the rest of Scotland.  Michie helps us understand the difference between Highlanders and Lowlanders.  I was surprised by the fact that the English and Lowlanders of the time generally knew more about mainland Europe than the Highlands’ culture.  The history of Fort William and the Glencoe Massacre is interwoven with breathtaking images of the region, so the history never feels ponderous.

Episode 3 gives us perspective on Bonnie Prince Charlie and the truth behind the myths of the Jacobites, while Episode 4 concentrates on the west coast of the Highlands and what happened to the highland culture after their Jacobite defeat: life after Battle of Culloden and the military occupation of the highlands.

Episode 5 brings us into the 19^th Century, with the Highland Clearances and the migration of the highlanders to the coastal regions.  Episode 6 picks up after the clearances and follows the Highlander migration south to industrial cities, such as Glasgow.  This episode also becomes a bit wistful as it asks people to imagine what the Highlands would have been like if the Clearances had never happened.

For those interested in a better understanding of Scotland’s history, particularly the past several centuries, this is like walking along with your own personal guide and encountering the occasional local who weaves historical recollections with stunning landscapes.  The episodes on this particular DVD work best if watched in order.  However, the other two collections about Scotland are much more conducive to skipping around or even turning the sound off.

Mountains

 Described as an aerial adventure across dramatic Scottish Highland landscapes, Mountains is narrated by Fiona MacKinnon providing general information about the images on the screen.  Overlaid maps help identify what will be covered in each specific episode.  I quite enjoyed MacKinnon’s narration, but one of the advantages of this disc set is that you could turn off the sound and simply use the imagery as video wallpaper, the images are that good.

The packaging does include a listing of each episode and the areas covered; the first five episodes visit the Trossachs, Rannoch Moor, mid Scotland and the southern Highlands, Nevis, Glencoe, The Grampians, remnants of the Caledonian forest, Torridon and the far north, the far northwest, the isle of Skye, the mountains of Kintail and the Five Sisters.

Episode 6 is a “Best of the Mountains of Scotland,” kind of a recap of all the places visited in the previous 5 episodes plus additional footage.  That in itself is

Islands

Gaelic broadcaster John Carmichael provides a voice over that includes a variety of facts, descriptions and anecdotes about the Islands around Scotland: Skye, the Orkneys, Islay, Jura, Colonsay, Gigha, the Shetlands, Mull, Coll, Iona, Tiree, Staffa and the Western Isles.  Aerial photography provides sweeping vistas of the islands; as with Mountains, you can turn off the sound and simply enjoy the images as video wallpaper.

Having visited friends on Iona several times and traversing Mull to get there, Islands is probably my personal favorite of the three DVD sets, but that’s simply because it taps most of my many memories of good people, good food, good drink and good times, all things in abundance in any part of Scotland you could visit.  For sheer vistas, Mountains is hard to beat, and for the history buff, Highlands is pure dead brilliant.  Scotland is here waiting.  Haste ye back.

Of course that inaugural episode of Bob’s Burgers said it was all a big misunderstanding. They weren’t really serving human meat. People just thought they were. But now we know the truth.

The first season of Bob’s Burgers is on DVD and ready for takeout. There are some delectable morsels like the original short film created to pitch the series and the subsequent demo pilot (particularly fun to see), proof that the original concept was indeed a cannibalistic family. Of course, for prime time television, they no longer were. And they got nose jobs. But that kind of irreverent humor is still at play, and if you ever wondered how creators pitch a concept to networks and how it develops from there, here’s a great example.

More amazingly, there is commentary on every single episode, sometimes by the creator/writers and sometimes by the talent. And talent is the right word. The voice actors include Kristen Shaal from The Daily Show, 30 Rock and Flight of the Concords, H. Jon Benjamin from Archer, Eugene Mirman (Flight of the Concords, Aqua Unit Patrol Squad 1) and Dan Mintz (Crank Yankers, Human Giant).

One of the nice elements of all these DVD extras is that the menu lists exactly who is in the room for each of the audio commentaries, and you get the inside scoop on the process of making each episode. There’s even a music video and audio outtakes, both of which allow you to see some of the real people behind the scenes as well as a bit more of the process of making this series. My only quibble is that the audio outtakes might be even funnier if we could see video footage of the actors delivering the lines. We instead see some general footage of them in a recording session and then still photographs and animation cells to help orient us to who’s speaking (both in terms of the actor and the animated character). But that’s a small quibble. This seems like one of the more generous DVD extras packages for a TV series that I’ve seen in awhile.

The writing is sly – in “Human Flesh,” the burger joint is squeezed between the funeral home and a PETA storefront with a “meat is murder” poster in its window. Of course, that particular storefront is constantly hosting some new (and evidently struggling) business – a briss anyone? Fertilizer? And daughter Louise (Schaal) finds disturbing names for the day’s special burger on a blackboard that she also treats as if it were a magic mirror.

Season 2 is currently airing on Fox Sunday nights, but you owe it to yourself to sample all the dishes, and with Season 1 now on DVD, you can do some Sexy Dance Fighting in the Crawl Space while enjoying Hamburger Dinner Theater’s production of Spaghetti Western and Meatballs. Bob’s Burgers finds the right recipe to mash up family, workplace and animation humor into a nice pink slime that you actually want to eat. More please.