Tower Block (2012) [Blu-Ray]

Moral indifference and rationalization of cowardice is something only city dwellers can relate to. Living in ghettos will especially leave you on your own if you’re involved in a scuffle or mugging, since most–if not all–tenants in a low rent neighborhood will stand by the doors doing nothing. When the time comes to speak up, no one heard a thing, or saw a thing. They’ll even swear they weren’t even on the same planet during the time of the crime. “Tower Block” is a top notch morality thriller based around residents that end up being punished for doing nothing when the time came for them to step up.

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Least Among Saints (2012) (DVD)

It’s not often indie dramas can compel and pull off a story so steeped in melodrama without being a cloying sickening glorified TV movie. Thankfully, Martin Papazian’s drama about two mentally unstable outcasts finding one another in the sadness manages to be a fantastic bittersweet drama filled with rich performances all around. Director Papazian manages to bring the film down to a level that doesn’t try for sap and sugary sweet, and keeps its characters grounded enough to where their conflicts and dilemmas feel realistic and warrant audiences empathies.

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The Kentucky Fried Movie (1977)

HKAEHhhThe team of Zucker and Abrams is a shocking bit of cinematic lunacy that many comedy directors attempt and rarely achieve. “The Kentucky Fried Movie” is nothing but an endless barrage of brilliant comedy, and laugh out loud sight gags that appeal to an audience of an era that lived on television and movies. Though dated in some respects, “The Kentucky Fried Movie” manages to be one of the funniest and incredibly sharp lampoons that’s fearless, bold, and absolutely original.

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Dumb & Dumber (1994)

I wonder if the Farrelly Brothers knew they were creating a potentially epic storyline when they invented Harry and Lloyd. There are comedy characters that are good enough for one movie, and then there are character duos like Harry and Lloyd, both of whom may be having adventures well in to their sixties. Harry and Lloyd are perpetually moronic best friends oblivious to how utterly dumb they are.

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The Three Stooges (2012)

The Farrelly Brothers, after a long stretch of production issues, have seemingly taken The Three Stooges and turned it in to their own unofficial sequel to “Dumb and Dumber.” Except the Three Stooges are now the unofficial ancestors to Harry and Lloyd, three inept and woefully moronic men unaware that everything they do is beyond social norms. The world around them is vastly different to the world they inhabit. With a shockingly respectable cast of folks like Jennifer Hudson, Jane Lynch, Larry David in drag, and model Kate Upton (mainly cast for a money shot of her in a bikini), the Farrelly’s come with all guns loaded for the sake of keeping the comedy moving non-stop. As a hardcore fan of the trio, I was open to the potential that the Farrellys would do justice to the classic comedy team, and thankfully they pull it off for the most part.

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Ordinary People (1980)

Guilt is a complex anomaly in the human psyche. It’s remorseless, it’s unbiased, it lingers for decades, and many times it takes on different forms. It can take on the form of blame, and it can form into blame of the most unlikely people, just to make sense of the senseless in our lives. In the face of tragedy some people just need to point fingers and blame the innocent just to help us cope with a horrible trauma, and the same can be said for the characters featured in one of my favorite dramas of all time.

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The Land Before Time (1988)

I really can’t imagine a film like “The Land Before Time” being released today. As a kids film it teaches about strength, courage, and the willingness to look for hope in darkness. But as a film in general, director Don Bluth offers a story drenched in sadness, terror, and an almost endless amount of sadness. “The Land Before Time,” like much of Bluth’s work, has held up monumentally well over the year with a beautiful eye for detail, painting a massive world on the threshold of evolving in to something new, while also losing much of its own species to death and turmoil.

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