In the past three years there has been a boom in versus films. And that’s primarily attributed to the boom of the direct to DVD industry that relies solely on gimmicks and plagiarism to fuel its economy and one of the primary cash cows of the market is the versus gimmick. We’ve seen every monster fight every warrior this side of folklore and what we see with “Battle Los Angeles” is pretty much soldiers versus aliens. In fact with less money and star power, Jonathan Liebesman’s film could very well have been titled “Aliens vs. Soldiers,” a roughneck balls to the wall action science fiction film that just doesn’t try too hard to bring us in close to its characters.
Tag Archives: Drama
Scalene (2011)
Margo Martindale is amazing. That was my first reaction upon viewing her portrayal as the mentally anguished mother Janice Trimble in Zack Parker’s brutally demented and compelling revenge drama “Scalene,” a movie about points of view and how sometimes our own is all we need to get us through the night. Martindale commands an ingenious movie about the end of a tragedy and the beginning of lunacy where mom Janice Trimble is forced to confront many issues in the run time of the film. One of which is the possibility that her mentally disabled son brutally raped a college girl.
Rubber (2010)
Robert is a tire. Robert is in the ground. Robert gains a consciousness and decides he doesn’t want to be rubble. Robert gets up and starts rolling down the road. He blows things up with its will. It squashes bugs. Now that it’s caught the eye (?) of a gorgeous young traveler, Robert is rolling down after her and is intent on garnering her attention.
Why? No reason.
Does there have to be a reason?
Xero: Two Disc Edition (2010)
Director Jack the Zipper’s “Xero” is one of the most artistically inclined bits of girl on girl porno ever conceived, it’s a masterful and visually brilliant pornographic film that is clearly just about the girl on girl sequences, but also has something to say with its depiction of sex scenes. Clocking in at an hour long, “Xero” is an endless stream of women going down on one another and engaging in heavy cunnilingus but this is all depicted in a single barn setting through the eyes of a dark haired woman. This dark haired woman is being tormented by an appetite for women that’s insatiable.
A Mind Beside Itself (2011)
Director PJ Starks has managed to create something of a very gripping and heartbreaking short film that doesn’t exactly lead audiences where one would expect. All along I suspected director Starks was going for an exploitative horror twist, but in reality the gut wrenching turn that ensues is far from horror and more horrific. But while the center piece is the overall hook to the story, “A Mind Beside Itself” is a testament to the power of grief, and the endless nightmare that is regret and guilt. Regret that we didn’t appreciate our loved ones while we had them. And guilt that it’s much too late to do anything about it. Tristan is a man who has just met the love of his life and they’re experiencing an amazing romance that will define his life forever.
The Octopus (2011)
On director Josh Hughes press website, he explains how “The Octopus” is a very personal film for him but intentionally cryptic. For many, it’s garnered a lot of definitions and dimensions. As well it’s also garnered some hidden meanings that Hughes is surprised to discover from his audience. No matter what you pull from his two and a half minute animated short, there’s not a single doubt that “The Octopus” is a truly powerful and startling animated short about a couple on the brink of destruction and the child that will inevitably pay for their pain.
The Town (2010)
Ben Affleck impressed with his debut as director for “Gone Baby Gone,” a criminally underrated film. And he manages to impress yet again with “The Town,” a film about crime becoming a way of life, and death just another consequence for a profession. When is enough finally enough for someone? This is examined with Doug McRay, a man who has resorted to robbing banks for a living after a descent in to drugs. He’s mastered bank robbing down to a fine art, and one he specializes in that keeps him and his group of gun toting guns for hire constantly on the verge of being murdered on the job. As examined by the prologue, crime is often a way of life for folks in their city, and with Charlestown being the number one source for bank robbers, Doug only knows how to commit crimes, and is a veteran of such an common trade that he can barely remember what life was like before it.