Tag Archives: Musical

“Dirty Dancing” 2017: A Truly Awful Remake in an Increasingly Tired Trend

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ABC Television’s remake of “Dirty Dancing” is a god awful and ill conceived version of the eighties classic. I don’t say that as a fan of the original, or an eighties kid, but as someone who just can’t abide a truly awful reworking for a film that didn’t need it. Did we forget “Havana Nights” already? ABC goes for an over two and a half hour remake that is just about as listless and ridiculous as you can imagine. For some reason the writers thought it’d be a good idea to add a story frame for the actual story that ensues between Baby and Johnny.

Then there’s a verbatim remake of the original, a goofy melodrama about Baby coming of age, and a musical that stages a bunch of forgettable tunes. Not to mention a relationship drama about Baby’s parents experiencing a crossroads in their marriage. Lest we forget an interracial romance with Baby’s sister falling in love with an African American singer for the country resort, and the steamy torrid love affair between Johnny and a local middle aged resort guest (as played by Katey Segal).

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Sing (2016)

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“Sing” is a lot like many of the other movies from Illumination Studios. It’s basically a moving greeting card. It’s cute for a few minutes, and then you’ll eventually find yourself tucking it away and looking for something more stimulating. As per most of the films from Illumination, “Sing” is just a middle of the road film that barely gets by because of the neat animation. “Sing” is cute. And that’s about it. It’s cute. And it packs a humongous soundtrack filled with pop songs both old and new that are meant to basically distract from the fact that it’s a very barebones animated movie with a paper thin narrative, that does little to convey to its audience something more meaningful.

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Life’s a Beach: 10 Movie Collection (DVD)

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Whether we like it or not, summer is right around the corner, and Mill Creek Entertainment is helping movie lover ring in the season with a marathon of ten great beach and summer movies. Well, great is a broad term, as most of these movies are goofy eighties nonsense and action schlock you can enjoy with some beers and nachos. At fifteen hours, this collection is compiled in to three DVD’s and packs in some new titles along with Mill Creek’s more prominent comedy titles.

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Streets of Fire (1984): Collector’s Edition [Blu-Ray]

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After years of just being available on DVD and Blu-Ray in other countries and regions, Shout Factory comes to the rescue to deliver fans a deluxe edition of one of the most underrated action films ever made. Something of a spiritual sequel to Walter Hill’s “The Warriors,” director Hill sets his latest gang land picture in an undisclosed period between the 20’s and 40’s in what is apparently New York. Sadly, Hill intended the film to be the first of a trilogy, but while we never got that wish, “Streets of Fire” still manages to be a single adventure rich in character and pulp appeal. Starring the incredible beautiful Diane Lane, and the fantastic Michael Pare, “Streets of Fire” is a rock and roll musical, romance, gangster, action, adventure. It has everything for mostly everyone and it gets better with every viewing.

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Cinema Crazed Covers The 2016 Oscar Contenders

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It’s that time of year again, where Hollywood either guides us in to celebrating actual works of cinematic art, or will likely arouse the ire of cineastes for years to come by playing it safe with the obvious crowd pleasers once again. In either case, “Oscar” night 2017 promises to be an interesting and controversial one. With the political landscape, racial landscape, and current crop of movies nominated at this years’ ceremony, a lot of us are hoping the Academy celebrates films that hold a miror to society rather than simply celebrate the safe, and light hearted fare that pass itself at “escapism.” That said, while we are a bit of cynics, we have a good time every year with the pageantry, the fun, and celebration of film.

To remind you of who is nominated this year, we covered a lot of Oscar nominees. If you want to a refresher course of what we thought of a lot of the films up for an award this year, we’ve compiled a list of movies reviewed by the Cinema Crazed contributors. Feel free to voice your own opinions on these films and many others in the comments!

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The Talk of Hollywood (1929)

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This year marks the 90th anniversary of the release of “The Jazz Singer,” which forever changed the way audiences see and hear films. Today, it is difficult to imagine the chaos that sound recording brought to the film industry, but back in the day the introduction of the microphone and the sound engineer resulted in the destruction of some prominent careers.

The 1929 independent feature “The Talk of Hollywood” was the first film to detail the impact that the “talkies” had on the motion picture capital. The production also takes advantage of the lenient Pre-Code era by incorporating racy and politically incorrect humor into its often-savage satire of the business side of the movie world.

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Pearl (2016)

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ACADEMY AWARD NOMINEE – Director Patrick Osborne gave audiences the beautiful and sweet animated short “Feast” about a dog’s love for food and his owner. With “Pearl,” Osborne breaks out of that smaller narrative to create a sweet, touching, and incredible ode to music and the power of family. Patrick Osborne created “Pearl” as one of the first VR animated short films that allowed audiences to experience the movie in 360 degrees.

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