Category: Movie Reviews

Wedding Night Blues: LFM Reviews [REC] 3: Genesis

Leticia Doleria as Clara.

By Joe Bendel. It sounds awful to have the undead terrorizing your wedding, but at least that means there is a priest on hand. Indeed, it turns out that a good Father is useful to have around when it comes to holding off the zombie hordes in Placo Plaza’s [REC] 3: Genesis (trailer here), the third and penultimate installment of the Spanish walking dead franchise, which opens today in New York.

Clara and Koldo are meant for each other. She has something important to tell him, but they are unable to get five minutes of peace together, even before the zombies attack. Cousin Adria and Atun, a professional videographer, are recording the wedding and reception, in established [REC] style. Uncle Victor does not look so good, though. He was bitten by a dog or something. Then he starts biting people and they start biting people, and so on and so on.

Poor Clara and Koldo get separated in carnage, but they are determined to get back together. The bride in particular is willing to do what it takes to find her groom. Why yes, that is a chainsaw she’s carrying. The Padre is also helpful, keeping the unholy multitude at bay with prayer. As in the previous film, there is a religious element to [REC] 3 that distinguishes the series from the zombie pack.

What a rough wedding night looks like.

Shockingly, Plaza breaks format early in the second act, abandoning the found footage motif in favor of a traditional omniscient viewpoint. While shaky cam can be annoying, Plaza and Jaime Balagueró, co-director of the first two RECs, have a good handle on how to use it. More than a gimmick, in the previous films, they shrewdly used the video-camera POV to control the audience’s perspective, literally keeping them in the dark at times, which rather works in context. After all, things seen fleetingly out of the corner of the eye are always more unnerving than well lit but ridiculously over the top soundstage shots.

At times, [REC] 3 also goes for laughs, relatively successfully. The wedding setting is an inspired set-up device. Hasn’t everyone been to a reception that was totally dead but refused to die? [REC] 3 is like that except more so. Plaza and his leads also sell the newlyweds’ earnest devotion fairly convincingly. Diego Martin’s Koldo is a bit of a bland screen presence, but he develops some presentable chemistry with Leticia Doleria, as the power tool wielding Clara. As horror heroines go, she certainly has her moments.

There are some clever bits in [REC] 3 that should satisfy zombie fans, but it is the weakest link of the series, so far (whereas [REC] 2 was the high water mark). It will be interesting to see what happens when Balagueró assumes the solo helm of the forthcoming and final [REC] 4. The comedic elements are fine, but he should probably stick to the franchise format. Still, for those who enjoy gore and black humor with a touch of Catholicism, [REC] 3 delivers just enough. Recommended for the core fanbase, the stand-alone [REC] 3: Genesis opens today (9/7) in New York at the Cinema Village.

LFM GRADE: B-

Posted on September 7th, 2012 at 12:43pm.

The Bhatts Do 3D: LFM Reviews Raaz 3

By Joe Bendel. The Bhatts are back and they are Bhattier than ever. Shortly after giving the world Sunny Leone’s mainstream-ish debut, India’s sensationalistic filmmaking family has returned with the first Bollywood horror movie to receive an R rating from the MPAA. Not to worry, it is almost entirely for scenes of supernatural terror. There is plenty of uncanny skullduggery afoot in Vikram Bhatt’s thematic stand-alone sequel Raaz 3 (trailer here), which opens today in New York.

Shenaya Shekhar used to be the hottest thing going in Bollywood, but she got ever so slightly older. Now, it is the younger, cuter Sanjana Krishnan who gets all the plum parts and awards. That does not sit well with Shekhar, who also carries a deeper grudge against the oblivious starlet, for reasons which will be revealed in good time. Not exactly a model of emotional stability, Shekhar is ripe for the enticement of the dark side.

The demonic Taradutt is always willing to make a deal and Shekhar is definitely someone he can do business with. Her goals are simple: to preserve her celebrity status and make Krishnan suffer. Taradutt is happy to oblige with some black magic. However, her rival will need frequent doses of his soul-enslaving potion. The Mickey-slipping job will fall to Aditya Arora, Shekhar’s indebted lover who happens to be directing Krishnan’s next picture. Though guilt-wracked, Arora complies, only to find himself falling for Krishnan as she succumbs to Taradutt’s evil influence.

If you are going to see a Bhatt-helmed film, go to one of Vikram’s supernatural forays rather than Pooja’s naughty melodramas. As far as horror-paranormal romance crossovers go, Raaz 3 has its moments. The scenes involving Hindu deities and demons work rather well, making a nice change of pace from typically materialistic horror films. Since its characters work in Bollywood, the film can also sneak in dance numbers in ways that do not sacrifice verisimilitude. Still, the cast is stuck with some absolute howlers in Shagufta Rafique’s script and nobody’s performance is exactly subtle in the first place.

Give her credit, though, Bipasha Basu vamps it up something fierce as Shekhar, always in cleavage-emphasizing wardrobe that must have restricted the poor woman’s breathing. Anything for art. At least she gets it. Emraan Hashmi just lacks presence as Arora. Instead of a tortured brooder, he just looks somewhat nauseous. In the innocent victim role, Esha Gupta’s Krishnan is sorely underwritten, but she is aces in her big dance number.

See Bipasha Basu in 3D in "Raaz 3."

Cinematographer Pravin Bhatt gets the dark and stormy atmospherics right, but the CGI is of sub-Hollywood standards.  Frankly, the 3D is also completely unnecessary here. The only instances where it really works are during the musical interludes. Most of the time, it is more of a distraction than an enhancement. For Bollywood fans, the songs are palatable, but not distinctive.

Bipasha Basu’s demon-loving diva could go toe-to-toe with Eva Green’s Angelique Bouchard in Burton’s Dark Shadows reboot. They are the real reasons to see both films, which is definitely something in either case. Recommended for those who enjoy a campy, larger-than-life star-turn rather than for likely to be disappointed horror genre fans, Raaz 3 opens today in New York, with the 2D version playing at the Big Cinemas Manhattan 1 and the 3D running at the AMC Empire. It also opens in the Bay Area, with 3D screenings at the AMC Mercado and Cinemark Union City, with the 2D showing at the Fremont Big Cities 7.

Posted on September 7th, 2012 at 12:42pm.

A Family Survives Mao’s Cultural Revolution: LFM Reviews Mulberry Child, Narrated by Jacqueline Bisset

By Joe Bendel. Paradoxically, it might have been the ardent loyalty of Jian Ping’s persecuted parents that saved them during the Cultural Revolution. At least, they never said anything incriminating their children would have been forced to repeat. Yet, the lingering trauma of the experience makes it difficult for her to relate to her Americanized daughter, Lisa Xia. By exploring their family history, the two women come to terms with their own relationship in Susan Morgan Cooper’s hybrid-documentary, Mulberry Child, which opens this Friday in New York at the Quad Cinema.

True believers, Hou Kai and Gu Wenxiu met and married through the Chinese Communist Party. They bought into the Party’s early rhetoric, which proved to be a profound mistake during the “Anti-Rightist Campaign.” Trying to defend a wrongfully accused colleague, Hou only succeeded in putting himself in the Party’s crosshairs. Despite some trying moments, Jian’s father made it through the first reign of terror, demoted but relatively unscathed. The Cultural Revolution would be a different story entirely.

As a school administer, Jian’s mother was directly in the line of fire. To make matters worse, her father’s history as a one-time Japanese POW was a red flag for the empowered zealots. As the institutionalized madness escalated, Jian’s father was imprisoned and her mother was held a de-facto captive in her school’s boiler room, forced to write self-criticism and pressured to denounce her husband. Largely raised by their grandmother, the children went months without seeing either parent.

How cowardly and cruel must an ideology be that it would force a seven year old girl to condemn her father in school? Yet, the Maoist cult continues to seduce Western academics who never had to live through it. Somehow, though, Jian’s parents still cling to their faith, as if by acknowledging that the source of the horror they lived through—the Chinese Communist Party—would somehow make all their suffering for naught.

Gu Wenxiu (actor Bruce Akoni) and Hou Kai (actress Jody Choi) in film.

Jian and her daughter can apprise the past with more clarity, but they remain susceptible to a romanticized vision of contemporary China. Ironically, their big coming together moment happens during the Beijing Olympic Games, against the backdrop of the striking Bird’s Nest stadium, designed by Ai Weiwei. Yet, the government’s relentless campaign against the artist and teacher ought to undermine the superficial images the Party tries to present to the world.

Nonetheless, when looking backward, Mulberry is quite forceful and moving. Combining Jacqueline Bisset’s voice-overs with dramatized episodes from Jian’s memoir, Morgan Cooper vividly conveys an innocent child’s perspective on an era of state sanctioned insanity. Jody Choi and Bruce Akoni Yong are particularly affecting as young Jian and the much abused Hou (“The Big Traitor”), respectively. However, the candid-style mother-daughter conversations do not carry the same dramatic weight. Yes, there is something universal to their generational disconnect, but it pales in comparison to her experience visiting her father in prison—unaccompanied because only a seven year old girl could visit a suspected enemy of the state without reprisals.

Of course, the difficulties survivors like Jian have expressing affection are the least of the Cultural Revolution’s tragic legacy, but it is what most directly affects her and her daughter. Sensitively produced, Mulberry Child is recommended for its up-close-and-personal insight into the chaos unleashed by Mao’s regime (rather than its wishful thinking for today’s China) when it opens this Friday (9/7) at New York’s Quad Cinema.

LFM GRADE: B

Posted on September 4th, 2012 at 2:34pm.

The Birth of the Han Dynasty: LFM Reviews White Vengeance on Blu-ray/DVD

By Joe Bendel. Power corrupts and the pursuit of power corrupts just as absolutely. This is the lesson an ancient mystery man has for a pompous scholar and his students, startled while paying their respects in the first Han Emperor’s tomb. He will tell them the real story of the Hongmen Banquet and the struggle to succeed the fallen Qin Dynasty in Daniel Lee’s mistitled White Vengeance (trailer here), which is now available on DVD and Blu-ray today from Well Go USA.

The tyrannical Qin Emperor is dead and nobody misses him, least of all Han leader Liu Bang and Chu nobleman Xiang Yu, rival generals who forged an uneasy alliance against the Qin. Of course, the emperor’s death prompts a rather obvious question: who will succeed him? Fearing for his own neck, the caretaker emperor decrees the first to control the Qin capitol of Xianyang wins the throne, hoping to play the warriors against each other. It works.

As sworn brothers turned bitter rivals, there are still a lot of unresolved issues between Liu Bang and Xiang Yu, particularly concerning the royal consort Yu Ji, the latter’s lover entrusted to the former for safekeeping. Among many things, Vengeance is an elegantly austere, almost chaste, love triangle.

There is also plenty of period warfighting in Vengeance, rendered with grit and scope. Lee is definitely in his element staging huge clashes of armies. He really shows viewers exactly what it means to be outflanked and why it is a bad thing. Yet, the film’s real battle is that between the military strategists, Xiang Yu’s longtime family advisor Fan Zeng and the freelance Obiwan Zhang Liang, who sides with his rival because of Liu Bang’s professed lack of ambition. When the two counselors match wits during a game of weiqi, the stakes are significant and bloody.

Liu Yifei in "White Vengeance."

Boasting an all-star HK and Chinese cast, Vengeance features memorable supporting performances from top to bottom. Not surprisingly, Anthony Wong dominates the film as the blind but all-seeing Fan Zeng, instantly bringing the gravitas necessary for the cunning yet classically tragic figure. Still, as the crafty Zhang Liang, Hanyu Zhang holds his own with the recognizable Johnnie To veteran.

Unfortunately, neither Feng Shaofeng nor Leon Lai displays the same commanding screen presence as the rival generals. Actually, they are rather bland. In contrast, Jordan Chan packs quite the late inning punch as Han loyalist Fan Kuai, while (Crystal) Liu Yifei is appropriately orchid-like as Yu Ji, but she also makes the most of a bigtime dramatic close-up down the stretch.

Lee rather dexterously shifts viewer sympathies in ways that might even be considered subversive. Indeed, there is definitely a point in Vengeance about the high cost of taking and keeping power. What they say about good intentions still holds true. An ambitious historical epic with plenty of action, White Vengeance is recommended with considerable enthusiasm for fans of Hong Kong cinema. It releases today (9/4) on DVD and Blu-ray from Well Go USA.

LFM GRADE: B+

Posted on September 4th, 2012 at 2:32pm.

LFM Reviews The Tall Man

By Joe Bendel. It is the town even country music forgot. It has the grim name of Cold Rock, Washington, but it might as well be called “Stimulus Village.” When the mine closed, the jobs disappeared, but that was just the start of their problems. A prolonged epidemic of child abductions continues to plague the town. Sketchy sightings of a shadowy figure have given rise to a new urban legend, but one desperate woman will confront the truth behind the bogeyman in Pascal Laugier’s The Tall Man (trailer here), which opened Friday in New York.

Julia Denning is registered nurse and the only remaining medical care-provider left in Cold Rock. While her late husband was a beloved pillar of the community, many of the locals never really warmed to her. Yet, she stays out of a sense of duty. Then one fateful night, she wakes to find little David has been spirited away. More resourceful than her neighbors, Denning gives chase, nearly reclaiming David from his abductor. However, when Lieutenant Dodd, the big city copper on loan to the overwhelmed small town, deposits the battered and distraught Denning at the local diner for safekeeping, she finds her fellow townspeople are acting suspiciously squirrely.

There is a huge game-changing twist in Tall Man, but Laugier drops it comparatively early in the game. Instead of an M. Night Shyamalan ending intended to make viewers feel stupid for buying into his films’ ostensive premises, Laugier allows at least a good third of the picture to explore the implications of his revelation. While the big surprise eventually leads to credibility questions that would be spoilery to explain, it is executed quite smoothly.

Jessica Biel in "The Tall Man."

As Denning, Jessica Biel plays a critical role selling the gotcha, rather decisively subverting the woman-in-jeopardy archetype. Stephen McHattie (star of Pontypool, probably the best zombie film since the original Night of the Living Dead) brings genre cred and a cool, steely presence to Lt. Dodd. Unfortunately, the rest of the ensemble is largely underwhelming as underwritten stock characters. Still, it is somewhat amusing to see William B. Davis, the cigarette smoking man in The X-Files, as the ineffectual Sheriff Chestnut. You wonder why they keep re-electing him, given the circumstances.

Tricky to categorize, Tall Man largely inhabits the zone where horror movies and dark thrillers overlap. Laugier is quite effective establishing the dark, eerie vibe, but his third act-denouement suffers from a lack of tension. Still, The Tall Man is far more distinctive than other disposable horror-ish films that stumbled into theaters this year, such as ATM and Beneath the Darkness. Soon to be an interesting VOD or rental choice, The Tall Man just does not quite have enough thrills or scares for current New York City movie ticket prices. Maybe worth keeping in mind for later, it opened Friday (8/31) at the AMC Village 7.

LFM GRADE: C+

Posted on September 4th, 2012 at 2:32pm.

Bombs and Bikes: LFM Reviews Quick on Blu-ray/DVD

By Joe Bendel. Safety first, kids. Remember, you never know what some psychopath could sneak into your helmet, so you are better off not wearing one – regardless of how recklessly you might race through the city’s streets. One biker turned messenger learns this the hard way in Jo Bum-gu’s Quick, which releases today on DVD and Blu-ray from Shout Factory.

In 2004, Han Ki-su broke up rather spectacularly with his girlfriend, Choon-sim. It is a heck of a pile-up. Seven years later, she has reinvented herself as Ah-rom, the lead singer of an up-and-coming girl group, while he has de-invented himself as motorbike deliveryman. Still fearless on a bike, Han delivers a bomb for a mysterious client unaware of its contents. There will be more where that came from. Unfortunately, his ex Ah-rom will become a part of the madness when she books Han to whisk her off to a gig. Putting on his helmet, she sees a rather ominous countdown clock where there shouldn’t be one. As the voice on Han’s cell phone explains, he has thirty minutes to make a series of deliveries or the helmet goes boom.

While Quick owes an obvious debt of inspiration to Speed, it could also be considered the motorized forerunner to Premium Rush – but with a more talented cast. There will be plenty of breakneck weaving through traffic and unlikely Evel Knievel jumps. There is also a yakuza backstory to the mad bomber’s crime spree so convoluted, even the cops can’t keep it straight. For stunt driving, though, Quick is hard to beat. The hospitalized stuntmen seen visited by cast members during the closing credits can attest to that.

Granted, Kang Ye-won is considerably less annoying than Sandra Bullock, but her character’s initial diva act is a bit cringy for a while. If nothing else, having a bomb attached to your head ought to inspire clarity of thought. Still, she looks good in vinyl as her character eventually settles in and gets serious.

Frankly, the humor in Quick is rather broad and does not travel well. Fortunately, Lee Min-ki never goes for laughs as Han, mostly brooding like a rebel without a cause, except when he is raging against their tormentor. As biker movie protagonists go, he is pretty good really. However, since the identity of the evil mastermind is kept secret until well into the third act, Quick does not have a lot of moustache-twisting villainy.

To recap, Quick has a whole lot of explosions and chase scenes. It is also nice to see the fim’s shout out to the stunt personnel, given the rate the Korean film industry chews them up and spits them out (at least according to stuntman-filmmaker Jung Byung-gil’s documentary Action Boys, which screened at NYAFF four years ago). Never lacking adrenaline, Quick is easily recommended for action fans. It is now available at most online retailers from Shout Factory.

LFM GRADE: B-

Posted on September 4th, 2012 at 2:30pm.