Any Given Sunday (1999) 15th Anniversary Director’s Cut [Blu-ray]

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Oliver Stone’s “Any Given Sunday” is a film that literally anyone can watch. Because while it’s certainly a sport films centered on the industry of football, its central themes are relatable to anyone. While on the surface it’s about business and athletes, and competing, mainly “Any Given Sunday” is about a group of people trying desperately to out run the clock of time, and gain some sense of security for their future before father time catches up on them. When we meet these people in the narrative, many of them are at the beginning of their short careers trying to build a future, while others find their windows of opportunity closing and desperately cling to any chance to secure their future for themselves and their family. Stone composes a very richly defined ensemble drama about the football industry and how demanding it is both as an arena for skilled athletes, and athletes anxiously trying to bank on the momentum of their popularity, as fleeting it may be.

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The Slave (1969) [Blu-ray/DVD]

It’s really tough to approach “The Slave” (also known as “Check To The Queen”) on a level where you would an average film. By all respects, Pasquale Festa Campanile’s drama is a unique and surreal drama based around a sadist-masochist relationship. For a long time I’d all but been convinced that “Secretary” was as good as film of this ilk got, but “The Slave” comes close to conquering this small sub-genre well. Pasquale Festa Campanile’s film is solely based around a young girl whose own lust for pain and humiliation is rivaled by her unusual obsession with her vanity.

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“The Flash” Season One, Episode One: City of Heroes Review

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It’s great to see DC and Warner bros. finally giving The Flash his due after so many years in limbo. “The Flash” has always been a wonderful character from the DC universe that was way too science fiction based to ever become a respectable series or movie, so for years fans had nothing. Surely John Wesley Shippe’s “The Flash” was a solid adaptation, but beyond that, it was merely table scraps. “The Flash” fully realizes what an amazing character the titular speedster is and completely sets up nothing but storylines and sub-plots in the pilot, while also telling a great origin tale of how a scientist became the fastest man alive.

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Similo (2014)

In a dying world how far would you go to keep the environment you loved? And more importantly, in a world where you’ve lost the only person you’ve loved, can you ever really get them back? Is it worth trying to pretend you’re still where you were decades ago, or isn’t it just easier to let go and accept your fate? “Similo” is a brilliant and beautifully directed science fiction short that uses the world our character Heve lives in as an allegory for the relationship she lost a long time ago.

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Our Top Five “Spaced” Episodes

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If you haven’t seen “Spaced,” the odds are you’re missing out on the final puzzle that will cement you as a fan of Simon Pegg, Nick Frost, or Edgar Wright. The UK series was a massive hit for two seasons, and fifteen years later it still has a major following today. Many of the series’ stars went on to huge things in America and their home countries, including Simon Pegg, series director Edgar Wright, Nick Frost, and Jessica Hynes.

Fifteen years later, the show is still fresh, hilarious, and worth the hooplah it garnered when it finally arrived to the US a few years ago. It’s never too late to explore “Spaced,” so here are five essential episodes you should look out for while coasting through its fourteen episode run.

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Ghoulies III: Ghoulies Go to College (1991)

ghouliesiiiThis is about as low as sequels go. At least for third rate horror franchises. “Ghoulies” was never sure what the hell it ever wanted to be, and “Goes to College” shows. The third part in the series shows them as nothing more than annoying little monsters that wreak havoc by inflicting pain, though never really murdering anyone. In fact they’re really nothing but third wheels in what feels like a stale campus comedy about prank wars with the Ghoulies attached for a wider audience. Before the ghoulies actually pop out to terrorize people, “Ghoulies Goes to College” watches like a fourth rate “Revenge of the Nerds” wannabe, about two warring frats and their ever lasting prank war.

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“Gotham” Season One, Episode One: Pilot Review

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(Spoilers Abound)

“Gotham” can be really goofy; almost “Smallville” goofy. And it seems to be revising the Batman lore again for a new audience that may not be familiar with the Batman mythology. The first twenty minutes of the pilot are brutally cheesy with a lot of clunky exposition, plays on morality, corruption, and immense focus on how hard boiled Harvey Bullock and James Gordon are. They’re tough men that have seen the worst life can offer, and dagnabit, they’re at odds like Murtaugh and Riggs from “Lethal Weapon” when we first see them. Well really they’re kind of an after thought. The focus of the first five minutes of the premiere is on a prepubescent street thief who walks Gotham, stealing to survive, and galloping along fire escapes. Almost like a cat of some kind. Get it, yet?

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