New Releases for the Week of February 18, 2022

UNCHARTED

(Columbia) Tom Holland, Mark Wahlberg, Sophia Ali, Tati Gabrielle, Antonio Banderas, Stephen Waddington, Tiernan Jones, Rudy Pankow. Directed by Reuben Fleischer

Based on the best-selling videogame, this long-in-gestation project features Nathan Drake at the very beginning of his adventures. A street-wise thief, he hooks up with a seasoned treasure hunter to search for a fabulous treasure that Nate’s brother was also on the hunt for before he disappeared, but other, less savory, characters are also looking for it.

See the trailer here
For more on the movie this is the website
Genre: Adventure
Now Playing: Wide
Rating: PG-13 (for violence/action, and language)

A Fairy Tale After All

(Vertical) Emily Shenaut, Gabriel Burrafato, Tobin Cleary, Amy Morse. A stubborn teenage girl finds herself magically transported to a kingdom of magic and fantastic creatures.

See the trailer here
For more on the movie this is the website
Genre: Fantasy
Now Playing: Studio Movie Grille Sunset Walk
Rating: NR

The Cursed

(LD Entertainment) Boyd Holbrook, Kelly Reilly, Alistair Petrie, Roxane Duran. In the late 1800s, a peaceful country village is suffering from uncharacteristic murders and disappearances. A big city pathologist is summoned to help discover what’s behind it, but he discovers an evil far more insidious than anything he could have imagined.

See the trailer here
For more on the movie this is the website
Genre: Horror
Now Playing: Wide
Rating: R (for strong violence, grisly images and brief nudity)

Dog

(United Artists) Channing Tatum, Jane Adams, Kevin Nash, Q’orianka Kilcher. A former Army Ranger is tasked with bringing a bomb-sniffing dog with PTSD to the funeral of the dog’s former partner. Each battling their own demons, they find themselves on the trip of a lifetime.

See the trailer here
For more on the movie this is the website
Genre: Comedy
Now Playing: Wide
Rating: PG-13 (for language, thematic elements, drug content and some suggestive material)

Finding Carlos

(Vertical) Maximus White, Michael Andreaus, Branjae, Jabee Williams. A teenager with a skateboard has to learn to live with his estranged dad, even as he pursues his passion for hip-hop and dance. The story is inspired by the classic holiday celebration of The Nutcracker.

See the trailer here
For more on the movie this is the website
Genre: Family
Now Playing: Studio Movie Grille Sunset Walk
Rating: NR

Jockey

(Sony Classics) Clifton Collins Jr., Molly Parker, Moises Arias, Logan Cormier. An aging jockey, looking to win one last championship, has his life turned upside down when a talented young jockey confesses that he is the older jockey’s son. Previously reviewed in Cinema365; see link below under “Scheduled to Be Reviewed.”

See the trailer here
For more on the movie this is the website
Genre: Drama
Now Playing: Cinematique Daytona
Rating: R (for language)

The Ledge

(Saban) Brittany Ashworth, Ben Lamb, Louis Boyer, Nathan Welsh. A young woman out on a rock climbing trip witnesses the murder of her best friend, capturing it on her cell phone. The killers will stop at nothing to escape justice, so she is forced to climb a treacherous mountain path, knowing that one wrong step could be fatal.

See the trailer here
For more on the movie this is the website
Genre: Action
Now Playing: Studio Movie Grille Sunset Walk
Rating: R (for strong violence, language including crude sexual references, and some drug use)

Ted K

(Super LTD) Sharlto Copley, Drew Powell, Travis W. Bruyer, Wayne Pile. A former university professor, appalled at how technology had begun to take over our lives, removes himself to an isolated cabin in the Montana woods. But despite his efforts to remain secluded, the modern world intrudes, driving him to acts of local sabotage and, eventually, sending deadly bombs, earning him the nickname of The Unabomber.

See the trailer here
For more on the movie this is the website
Genre: Biographical Drama
Now Playing: Enzian
Rating: R (for language, some sexual content and brief nudity)

COMING TO VIRTUAL CINEMA/VOD:

A Banquet (Friday)
Caught In His Web (Saturday)
Downfall: The Case Against Boeing (Friday)
Double Play (Tuesday)
Erax (Thursday)
Fistful of Vengeance (Thursday)
Incarnation (Friday)
King Knight (Thursday)
Swim Instructor Nightmare (Sunday)
Texas Chainsaw Massacre (Friday)
They Live in the Grey (Thursday)

SCHEDULED FOR REVIEW:

A Banquet
The Cursed
Dog
Downfall: The Case Against Boeing
Fistful of Vengeance
Jockey
Ted K
Texas Chainsaw Massacre
Uncharted

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Jockey

A prayer in jockey’s silks.

(2021) Sports Drama (Sony Classics) Clifton Collins Jr., Logan Cormier, Vincent Francia, Molly Parker, Marlon St. Julien, Moises Arias, Danny Garcia, Ryan Barber, Martin Bourdieu, Aki Kato, Richard Lull, Scott Stevens, Carl “The Truth” Williams, Michael Ybarra, Joe Johnson, Daillon Luker, Oscar Quiroz, John Shumaker, Willie Whitehouse, Stacey Nottingham, Colleen Hartnett. Directed by Clint Bentley

 

They call horse racing the sport of kings, and there is an intense beauty to it; the overwhelming majesty of the horses, the colorful silks of their riders, the pounding hoofs kicking up clods of dirt, the intensity of competition. But not every race is the Kentucky Derby; not every jockey wins the race.

Jackson Silva (Collins) has had a storied career, but he is reaching the end of the line, and he knows it. His battered body, mauled in falls off of his mounts, has begun to manifest some disturbing symptoms, ranging from hand tremors to outright seizures. His doctor – well, the vet at the local race track in Phoenix where he plies his trade – urges him to retire, but Jackson isn’t about to do that, when there is one more championship to win, and the trainer he works with, Ruth (Parker), has just the horse that might get him that last ring.

But onto the scene comes Gabriel (Arias), a brash young man with talent by the bucket load. He also claims to be Jackson’s son. At first, he doesn’t believe it but as he watches the boy ride, he realizes that the kid could well be the legacy he wants to leave behind. He takes Gabriel under his wing as a mentor, but time is not his friend and as his condition worsens that last championship is tantalizingly close – but just out of reach. Can he urge his mount forward just a little faster to catch that brass ring?

Jockey is both a conventional sports drama and an unconventional one; it carries many of the same beats as traditional sports dramas do, and relies on some of the tropes, but it is unconventional in the way that the film is shot and in that Bentley doesn’t seem overly concerned with the outcomes of the few races he does show – most out of focus on a TV screen in a bar. The only way we can tell who won or lost the race is by Collins’ facial expression.

Speaking of Collins, his name may not be familiar but his face should be. He’s a veteran character actor who’s been in the business since the Nineties, generally playing supporting roles. This is a rare opportunity for him to play the lead, and he runs with it, turning in the performance that he will undoubtedly be remembered for. Jackson isn’t necessarily a man who wears his emotions on his sleeve, but he does wear them in his eyes and much of Collins’ acting is done there. He is sometimes mournful, sometimes joyful, often frustrated but rarely uninteresting.

Bentley and cinematographer Adolpho Veloso have a good eye, but unfortunately, they are more interested in getting unusual shots. There are tons of gorgeous panoramas at dawn and dusk, with the sun low or gone from the Arizona sky. Cinematographers call this the “golden hour” and it makes for some beautiful pictures, but they use it to distraction. They also spend a lot of time in close up on Collins’ face and that, in itself, is not a bad thing, but there is a tendency to shoot from unusual angles above and below the actors’ head, which also gets distracting. I’m not sure if the filmmakers didn’t have faith in the script that they felt they had to jazz it up with the low-light close-ups.

Which is a shame because there is a lot to like about the movie; the camaraderie among the jockeys in the tack room as they sit around the card table, shooting the breeze, lamenting about their injuries, laughing about past glories and commiserating over the state of the business. The filmmakers used a lot of actual equestrians and persons associated with the horse racing world, and that authenticity is evident throughout the film. When they get together, talking about what’s going on in their lives, those scenes are absolutely a delight, some of the best in the film.

This is probably not a film for everybody; it has a fairly languid pace, and there’s really no antagonist in the cast to root against. It’s kind of a slice of life sports drama, one in which tough people weather tough days and nights at the track on the backs of beautiful animals, and the love between horse and rider is clearly felt, and it is a real element, not something canned like many a Hollywood horse racing film. It’s worth taking a chance on. The movie made a qualifying Oscar run at the end of December, and is opening in selected markets on February 4^th, expanding to a wider release the following week.

REASONS TO SEE: Collins gives a career-defining performance. There’s an authenticity to the environment.
REASONS TO AVOID: There’s an overreliance on close-ups, silhouettes and low-light dusk shots.
FAMILY VALUES: There is a fair amount of profanity.
TRIVIAL PURSUITS: Bentley’s father was a jockey.
CRITICAL MASS: As of 2/3/22: Rotten Tomatoes: 90% positive reviews; Metacritic: 76/100.
COMPARISON SHOPPING: Lean on Pete
FINAL RATING: 7/10
NEXT: 7 Prisoners

Words on Bathroom Walls

Tripping the light fantastic.

(2020) Drama (Roadside Attractions) Charlie Plummer, Taylor Russell, Andy Garcia, AnnaSophia Robb, Beth Grant, Devon Bostick, Lobo Sebastian, Molly Parker, Walton Goggins, Evan Whitten, Drew Schend, Jared Bankens, Reinaldo Faberlie, Aaron Dominguez, Cruz Abelita, Ellie Dusek, Sean Michael Weber, Dominique Hayes, Linzi Gray, Julianna Barkas, Ashley Victoria. Directed by Thor Freudenthal

There was a time when made-for-TV movies tended to feature a “disease of the week.” That trend has finally made it to Young Adult novels and the movies based on them.

Here the disease is treatment-resistant schizophrenia. It’s the sort that manifests itself in sounds nobody else can hear and sights nobody else can see – visual and auditory hallucinations. The condition is admittedly fairly rare, but as it is a fairly dramatic mental disease, makes for good fictional fodder by author Julia Walton, adapted here by screenwriter Nick Naveda.

The afflicted party is Adam (Plummer), a high school senior with aspirations towards culinary school. For Adam, the hallucinations take the shape of three humans – the oily Joaquin (Bostick) who represents his libido, the free-spirited Earth mama Rebecca (Robb) who represents his good intentions, the burly bodyguard (Sebastian) who represents his fear, and a swirling black cloud that represents the chaos inside him.

He has successfully hidden his condition from friends and school administrators until a breakdown in a chemistry class leads to a horrific accident. Adam is summarily expelled as a danger to other students, and eventually ends up in a strict Catholic school, whose principal Sister Catherine (Grant) informs Charlie and his desperate mom (Parker) and her new boyfriend Paul (Goggins) that the condition for acceptance into the school is that Adam stay on his new drug treatment, and keep the school apprised of his progress in therapy sessions (in a nifty twist, Plummer plays the therapy sessions to the camera, putting the audience in the role of psychiatrist – well, at least we critics had pen and notepad handy to further reinforce the illusion).

Adam aims to lay low and keep his head down until graduation so that he can achieve his dreams, but he is having issues with his math class. Enter Maya (Russell), the class valedictorian who has some hidden issues of her own, who agrees to tutor Adam for a princely sum. Teen hormones being what they are, Adam soon falls for the fetching Maya who in turn begins to develop some affections for the good-hearted Adam.

But the meds that Adam is on are affecting his taste buds, and a budding chef can’t have that, so he ditches the meds which is the kind of decision you’d expect a teen to make – with predictable results. With Adam teetering on the edge of losing everything, can he keep it together long enough to get through to graduation?

The movie plays it safe on most subjects, preferring feel-good moments to gritty realism with some exceptions (as when Adam encounters a clearly potential older version of himself on a bus, talking to himself). Throw in the usual teen movie clichés – the feeling of being an outsider, the different-is-okay message that goes against the teen instinct for conformity, the awkward attempts at romantic connection, the prom disaster, and the graduation speech that Solves Everything. There are the straight-arrow adults who Don’t Understand, and the unexpectedly hip adult mentor/role model – in this case, Andy Garcia as Father Patrick, a combination of Sigmund Freud, Yoda and Father O’Malley of The Bells of St. Mary’s.

The movie is largely saved by an attractive cast. Plummer and Russell are two of the better actors in the teen movie genre, and they not only deliver solid performances separately, they also have great chemistry together. Parker is terrific as the mama bear who fiercely defends her cub, even against himself, and Goggins is particularly wonderful in a small but important role as the stepdad with whom Adam has a contentious relationship. It is also nice (and fitting) to see Robb and Bostick, both teen movie mainstays not long ago but who have moved on to more adult roles.

One of my issues with the film is that it uses Adam’s mental disease as almost a gimmick; yes, there are those who suffer through these sorts of hallucinations but I would have liked to see a more common form of schizophrenia that more kids suffer from and that they might relate to better. It’s a very difficult subject to tackle, mental illness is, and I’m not sure there’s a good way to do so without feeling like exploitation.

This is one of the first films back in theaters after the major theater chains have reopened, which will work in the film’s bottom line favor. Likely it would have been lost in the late summer shuffle of blockbusters and back-to-school releases. Currently, it is only available in theaters so for those in places that have not allowed theaters to reopen, or for those who are not comfortable with going out to theaters quite yet, you’ll have to wait a bit to catch this one at home.

REASONS TO SEE: Strong performances by Plummer and Russell particularly, but also Goggins and Parker.
REASONS TO AVOID: Full of teen movie clichés while at times trivializing the mental illness subject matter.
FAMILY VALUES: There is profanity, sexual references and serious adult themes regarding mental illness.
TRIVIAL PURSUIT: Parker and Russell play mother and daughter on the Netflix series reboot of Lost in Space.
CRITICAL MASS: As of 8/23/20: Rotten Tomatoes: 82% positive reviews: Metacritic: 62/100
COMPARISON SHOPPING: Paper Towns
FINAL RATING: 6.5/10
NEXT: Ravage

New Releases for the Week of September 7, 2018

THE NUN

(New Line) Demián Bichir, Taissa Farmiga, Jonas Bloquet, Bonnie Aarons, Ingrid Bisu, Charlotte Hope, Sandra Teles, August Maturo, Jack Falk, Lynnette Gaza. Directed by Corin Hardy

A young novitiate and a priest with a disturbing past are sent to investigate the mysterious death of a nun in a remote abbey in Romania. There they discover a malevolent force that threatens not only their lives but their souls. Realizing that there is more at stake than just themselves, they rely on their crumbling faith to do battle with the damned in this latest installment in the Conjuring series.

See the trailer and video featurettes here
For more on the movie this is the website
Release Formats: Standard, DBOX, Dolby, IMAX, RPX, XD
Genre: Horror
Now Playing: Wide Release
Rating: R (for terror, violence and disturbing/bloody images)

God Bless the Broken Road

(Freestyle) Lindsay Pulsipher, Jordin Sparks, LaDamian Tomlinson, Robin Givens. While grieving for her husband who was lost in Afghanistan, a young mother meets a race car driver who restores both her hope and her faith. This is loosely based on the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band song of the same name.

See the trailer here
For more on the movie this is the website
Release Formats: Standard
Genre: Faith-Based Drama
Now Playing: AMC Altamonte Mall, AMC Disney Springs, AMC Lake Square, Barnstorm Theater,  Cinemark Artegon Marketplace, Regal Oviedo Mall, Regal Pavilion Port Orange, Regal The Loop, Regal Waterford Lakes, Regal Winter Park Village
Rating: PG (for thematic elements and some combat action)

Madeline’s Madeline

(Oscilloscope) Helena Howard, Miranda July, Molly Parker, Sunita Mani. A theater director gets a whole lot more than they bargained for when the lead actress in their latest project takes her role a bit too seriously. Reality and fantasy begin to blur as a fierce tug of war takes place between the director, her young star and the actress’ mother.

See the trailer and a video featurette here
For more on the movie this is the website
Release Formats: Standard
Genre: Mystery
Now Playing: Regal Winter Park Village
Rating: NR

Peppermint

(STX) Jennifer Garner, John Gallagher Jr., John Ortiz, Method Man. When a woman’s family is killed by members of a drug cartel, she finds no justice in a corrupt system in which judges, cops and politicians are all bought and paid for by the cartel. Realizing that she’s a target, she goes underground for five years. When she returns she goes on a revenge spree that would make Stallone proud.

See the trailer, interviews, clips and B-roll video here.
For more on the movie this is the website
Release Formats: Standard
Genre: Action
Now Playing: Wide Release
Rating: R (for strong violence and language throughout)

The Wife

(Sony Classics) Glenn Close, Jonathan Pryce, Christian Slater, Elizabeth McGovern. The wife of an acclaimed author accompanies him to Stockholm to receive the Nobel Prize for Literature. There, her years of being taken for granted, her own writing skills appropriated and her life a shadow of what she imagined it to be come to the surface.

See the trailer, clips and video featurettes here
For more on the movie this is the website
Release Formats: Standard
Genre: Drama
Now Playing: Regal Winter Park Village, Rialto Spanish Springs Square
Rating: R (for language and some sexual content)

ALSO OPENING IN ORLANDO/DAYTONA:

Alright Now
C/O Kancharapalem
The Hows of Us
Manu
Nancy
Slipaway

ALSO OPENING IN MIAMI/FT. LAUDERDALE:

Age of Summer
C/O Kancharapalem
Destination Wedding
Get My Gun
The Hows of Us
Manu
No Date, No Signature
Silly Fellows
Support the Girls

ALSO OPENING IN TAMPA/ST. PETERSBURG:

The Favorite
The Hows of Us
Manu
Stilly Fellows

ALSO OPENING IN JACKSONVILLE/ST. AUGUSTINE:

C/O Kancharapalem
The Hows of Us
Manu
Summer of ‘84

SCHEDULED FOR REVIEW:

The Nun
Peppermint
Support the Girls
Summer of ‘84

Small Crimes

I was just starting to look up to Nicolaj Coster-Waldau.

(2017) Crime Drama (Netflix) Nikolaj Coster-Waldau, Robert Forster, Jacki Weaver, Molly Parker, Gary Cole, Macon Blair, Michael Kinney, Daniela Sandiford, Shawn Lawrence, Pat Healy, Eddie Holland, Jasson Finney, Anatoly Zinoviev, Glen Bowser, Larry Fessenden, Tara Yelland, Derek Barnes, Tyrone Benskin, Frank Schorpion, Alex Stines, Stéphane Julien, Julia Dawi. Directed by E.L. Katz

 

There are those who say they make their own luck and I suppose there is some truth to that. Some people absolutely refuse to let themselves get down; they do whatever it takes to succeed. Conversely there are also people who always seem to be on the losing end of life; they self-sabotage through bad decision making. They truly seem born to lose.

Joe Denton (Coster-Waldau) is one such sort. Recently released from prison after a six year stint, he was once a police officer in a rural Midwestern town who was convicted of conspiracy of trying to murder the district attorney Phil Coakley (Kinney). Corrupt and a raging alcoholic as a law enforcement officer, he has found sobriety in the joint and emerges hoping to turn his life around.

He moves back in with his parents Joe Sr. (Forster) and Irma (Weaver). Ma Denton in particular is suspicious of her son; she doesn’t really believe he’s truly capable of change. Joe is looking to reconnect with his ex-wife and resume being a father again but a single telephone call is sufficient for Joe to back off after a half-hearted attempt.

His ex-partner Lt. Pleasant (Cole) has some worries of his own; not so much about Joe who kept quiet about his involvement even in the face of a prison sentence, but against local crime boss Manny Vassey (Lawrence) who is dying of cancer and has found Jesus; Pleasant is concerned that Vassey might decide to unburden his soul before departing this green earth and in the process incriminate Pleasant.

Joe makes a bee line for the nearest bar and before you know it has fallen off the wagon. He begins to sink into old habits, alarming his mother and a botched attempt to kill Manny brings Joe under the watchful psychotic eye of the mobster’s son Junior (Healy). The lone bright spot in Joe’s life is his budding romance with hospice nurse Charlotte Boyd (Parker) who has baggage of her own, but even this potential game-changer may not be what it appears to be; Charlotte’s only client is Manny Vassey. And so things are beginning to spiral down towards a confrontation as Joe struggles to figure out how to get out of this rapidly deteriorating situation. Knowing Joe, things won’t end well for anybody.

This film had a solid debut at South by Southwest last year followed up with a fairly inconspicuous release on Netflix. The streaming giant has been a big player on the film festival circuit, snagging some prestige properties for their service while showing off some of their own original content. This one, while purchased at SXSW falls more in the mold of filler.

Coster-Waldau is best known as Jamie Lannister on the HBO hit series Game of Thrones and has enormous upside. He plays both hero and villain well which makes sense as Jamie is a little bit of both. He’s had a few high-profile roles but none have really put him over that cinematic hump yet. Here the best moments belong to Forster who is absolutely marvelous. Joe Sr. hopes against hope that his son will turn the corner but the guarded look in his eyes tells us that he doesn’t really expect him to.

I was heartened to find out this was written by Macon Blair, who directed the marvelous Blue Ruin and has written a number of highly regarded gritty indie films. Based on a David Zeltserman novel of the same name, the movie is unrelentingly downbeat. Blair has almost no exposition in the movie whatsoever other than some desultory pillow talk late in the movie; mysterious events are referred to and characters pop in and out of the movie that Joe apparently has some sort of previous relationship with but we are never informed about the nature of those events or the relationships with these people.

Blair is outstanding when it comes to writing male-oriented tough guy material but there is a little too much testosterone flowing for my own personal tastes, a little bit too much macho preening. At the end of the day this is a fairly typical “ex-con struggles to get his life back together despite enormous obstacles and a past that won’t let him go” type of film and although there are a few interesting twists and turns here, eventually when all is said and done Small Crimes adds nothing to the genre. The characters across the board are all unlikable and despite Coster-Waldau’s native charm, he isn’t able to make the character rise above his own flaws and be relatable. By the end of the movie most viewers will pretty much have written off Joe much as his parents have, much as everyone else around him has. Some people, this movie seems to opine, are genetically pre-disposed to fail and that’s such a bleak outlook on people that I find it hard to support a movie that believes that.

REASONS TO GO: Coster-Waldau is always engaging and the rest of the cast does exemplary work. The filmmakers pull no punches.
REASONS TO STAY: There’s a little too much testosterone flowing for my own taste. The film is very much a downer.
FAMILY VALUES: There is plenty of profanity, violence, drug use and some sexuality.
TRIVIAL PURSUIT: In the novel that the film is based on, Phil Coakley and his daughter are both white; in the film, they’re African-Americans.
BEYOND THE THEATER: Netflix
CRITICAL MASS: As of 1/17/18: Rotten Tomatoes: 62% positive reviews. Metacritic: 60/100.
COMPARISON SHOPPING: I Don’t Feel at Home in This World Anymore
FINAL RATING: 5.5/10
NEXT: The Justice League

New Releases for the Week of April 5, 2013

EVIL DEAD

(Tri-Star) Shiloh Fernandez, Lou Taylor Pucci, Jane Levy, Jessica Lucas, Elizabeth Blackmore, Jim McLarty, Rupert Degas (voice), Randal Wilson. Directed by Fede Alvarez

You’ve seen it before but you’ve never seen it like this. The 1981 cult hit gets a new coat of paint as a group of young people go to a remote cabin in the woods where they find (da-da-DAAAAAAAAH) the Book of the Dead. Even though they’re warned not to of course one of them reads aloud from it, unleashing demonic possession and all kinds of carnage. You’d think people would know by now…

See the trailer, clips and a promo here.

For more on the movie this is the website.

Release formats: Standard

Genre: Horror

Rating: R (for strong bloody violence and gore, some sexual content and language)

6 Souls

(Radius) Julianne Moore, Jonathan Rhys-Meyers, Jeffrey DeMunn, Frances Conroy. After the death of her husband, a psychiatrist has lost her faith in God, choosing to believe only in science. She is then introduced to a patient with multiple personalities who takes on the physical characteristics of each personality. As she discovers that each of those personalities is the soul of a murder victim living inside him, she discovers that what is happening may transcend science and have deadly consequences for her and those she loves.

See the trailer, clips and a link to download the full move on Amazon here.

For more on the movie this is the website.

Release formats: Standard

Genre: Horror

Rating: R (for violent content, disturbing images and terror)

Himmatwala

(UTV) Ajay Devgn, Tamanna Bhatia, Paresh Rawal, Zarina Wahab. A remake of a 1983 blockbuster in India, a shy schoolteacher inadvertently witnesses a local thug commit a crime, only to see him go free after his testimony. Ashamed and terrified, he leaves his village. His family then sets out to redeem his good name.

See the trailer here.

For more on the movie this is the website.

Release formats: Standard

Genre: Bollywood

Rating: NR

Jurassic Park 3D

(Universal) Sam Neill, Laura Dern, Richard Attenborough, Jeff Goldblum. The question is, does post-converting this ’90s classic add anything to the experience that your imagination didn’t already put there? Thought not…

See the trailer, clips, a featurette and a link to download the full move on Amazon here.

For more on the movie this is the website.

Release formats: Standard, 3D

Genre: Adventure

Rating: PG-13 (for intense science fiction terror) 

The Playroom

(Freestyle Releasing) John Hawkes, Molly Parker, Olivia Harris, Jonathan Brooks. A teenager is forced to become a surrogate mother to her younger siblings during the 70s. She tells them fantastic stories to mask the realization that their parents’ drinking is raging way out of control.

See the trailer and a link to download the full movie on Amazon here.

For more on the movie this is the website.

Release formats: Standard

Genre: Drama

Rating: NR 

Tattoo Nation

(D&E Entertainment) Danny Trejo, Don Ed Hardy, Freddy Negrete, Travis Barker. How did tattoos go from being something sailors got when drunk on shore leave in Singapore or something prisoners got to identify themselves as criminals to becoming “body art” and where 25% of all young adults under the age of 40 now have one? It’s actually a pretty good question…

See the trailer here.

For more on the movie this is the website.

Release formats: Standard

Genre: Documentary

Rating: NR