Author Archives
Founder: Elements of Madness | Past Bylines at CLTure, Pretty Vacant One, FilmFed, & Mountain Xpress | NC Film Critics Association, Southeastern Film Critics Association, & Critics Choice Association member | Rotten Tomatoes approved individual critic
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“Kill Butterfly Kill” Blu-ray Giveaway
This month, Cauldron Films is set to release a new 4K restoration using the surviving elements of the IFD Films crime thriller Kill Butterfly Kill. But it’s not just a 4K restoration, it’s a two-disc release that includes bonus features… Read More ›
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“Weird: The Al Yankovic Story” is mandatory fun you can have while running with scissors at home during a bad hair day thanks to Shout! Studios.
“Life is like a parody of your favorite song. Just when you think you know all the words: surprise, you don’t know anything.” – Grizzled Narrator, Weird: The Al Yankovic Story It’s so incredibly easy to take a musician like… Read More ›
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Sony Pictures re-releases Rob Reiner’s “Stand by Me” in a limited edition 4K UHD Blu-ray combo steelbook.
“The blood of the covenant is thicker than the water of the womb.” When it comes to premiere tales of horror in the modern era, novelist Stephen King is among the first names mentioned. His novels and short stories alike… Read More ›
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Have yourself a “Merry Little Batman” and start a new family adventure tradition.
For decades now, when it came to comic book movies and Christmas, there was only one film that fit the bill, Tim Burton’s Batman Returns (1992). It’s a film that introduced audiences to cinematic versions of Selina Kyle/Catwoman (Michelle Pfeiffer)… Read More ›
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Regulators! Mount up for this 35th anniversary first-time HD and 4K UHD edition of “Young Guns.”
“We regulate any stealing of his property. We’re daaaamn good, too. Mr. Tunstall’s got a soft-spot for runaways, derelicts, vagrant types. But you can’t be any geek off the street. You gotta be handy with the steel, if you know… Read More ›
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Paul King’s “Wonka” reminds that kindness and generosity don’t make one weak, they make the world collectively strong.
“If we’re kind and polite, the world will be right.” – Paddington in Paddington (2014). There’s this strange belief that in order for something to be great or successful, it must be exclusive. That, for whatever reason, the scarcity of… Read More ›
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Director Martin Bourboulon’s “The Three Musketeers – Part I: D’Artagnan” is a thrilling adventure that’ll incite an immediate desire for “Part II.”
What you think of when you hear “Alexandre Dumas’s The Three Musketeers” is dependent on your age. Since 1916 with director Charles Swickard’s cinematic adaptation, Dumas’s swashbuckling tale of loyalty, friendship, religion, and revolution has seen so many cinematic versions,… Read More ›
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“Full Body Massage” Blu-ray Giveaway
Last month, Unearthed Films released the 1995 Nicolas Roeg drama Full Body Massage on Blu-ray for the first time. The bonus materials are meager, but if you’ve wanted to enjoy this particular Mimi Rogers/Bryan Brown tale in high-definition, then your… Read More ›
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“Shaun the Sheep: The Complete Series” Blu-ray Giveaway
There are many respected names in animation and one of them is Aardman Animations. They are the house of Wallace & Gromit, Chicken Run (and its soon to be released sequel), Arthur Christmas, and, of course, Shaun the Sheep. Now, Shout! Studios is set… Read More ›
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Chose to raise or call on VCI Entertainment’s Blu-ray restoration of dramedy “The Gamblers.”
You never count your money When you’re sittin’ at the table There’ll be time enough for countin’ When the dealin’s done – “The Gambler,” made famous by singer Kenny Rogers. When it comes to gambling, there aren’t many songs as… Read More ›
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Xun Sero’s documentary “Mamá” covers a lot of ground in its simple premise of a mother/son conversation. [imageNATIVE]
When we’re children, we look to our parents for our needs. We rejoice when we get what we ask for, and we encounter terrible pains when we don’t. That pain can turn into resentment to the point where it festers… Read More ›
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Director John Woo ensures the nearly dialogue-less “Silent Night” is also a very Holey Night.
2003, director John Woo unleashed the sci-fi action thriller Paycheck starring Ben Affleck (Air), Uma Thurman (Kill Bill: The Whole Bloody Affair), Aaron Eckhart (Rumble Through The Dark), and Paul Giamatti (The Holdovers) unto the world. It should have been… Read More ›
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Yang Bingjia’s blind swordsman tale “Eye for an Eye” thrusts its way onto home video thanks to Well Go USA.
There’s a long history of the blind swordsman in storytelling, though the style of action-oriented martial arts films are often referred to as within the subgenre called “zatoichi,” itself a reference to the title character of a Kan Shimozawa story… Read More ›
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Charming play-turned-film “Inky Pinky Ponky” is a star-making vehicle for co-writer/lead Amanaki Prescott-Faletau. [imagineNATIVE]
As children, there’re all kinds of games available to entertain and to instill a little competition. The trick is that some of those games can end up with some players feeling a little left out, especially when the point of… Read More ›
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After cruising the festival circuit, filmmaker Tian Xiaopeng’s fantastical “Deep Sea” comes to berth in American waters.
“Animation to me is the purest form of art …” – Guillermo del Toro, director of Pinocchio There’s this strange perception of animation as lesser-than in terms of storytelling. Perhaps it’s due to generations of children who grew up with… Read More ›
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The Cine-Men, Episode 96: Film Noir with special guest Marya E. Gates
Of the many things associated with November these days, in the cinema world, there’s only Noirvember. On this incredibly special episode of The Cine-Men, hosts Darryl Mansel and I are joined by the creator of Noirvember, Marya E. Gates. After… Read More ›
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Walt Disney Studios caps their 100th celebration with a very meta animated adventure, “Wish.”
2023 has been full of studio celebrations for their centennials and none have done it the way that Walt Disney Studios has. More than just redesigning their film intro-logo or releasing special edition home collections of all their films, Walt… Read More ›


