“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 ›
fantasy
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 ›
Nia DaCosta’s “The Marvels” reminds us that superhero movies can be fun while pushing things higher, further, and faster.
“What You Seek Is Seeking You.” The words inscribed on the bangle worn by Kamala Khan (superhero name: Ms. Marvel) is a lovely phrase, with interpretations literal and metaphorical. The script from director Nia DaCosta (Candyman; Little Woods) and first-time feature… Read More ›
Filmmaker Kurando Mitsutake first studio project, “Lion-Girl,” roars onto home video with robust bonus features fans can dive into.
Trigger Warning: The fighting in Lion-Girl is often accompanied by stylized lighting that strobes. As such, photosensitive viewers should take caution before watching. It’s not frequent enough to be problematic, but present enough that it could disturb sensitive viewers. These… Read More ›
“It’s a Wonderful Knife” is a new-fashioned holiday horror-comedy slay-ride.
Trigger Warning: There are two scenes in the film which feature either strobing or flashing lights which may prove problematic for photosensitive viewers. Neither are particularly long, both involve the killer’s activities, and nothing is generally lost by listening versus… Read More ›
Celebrate 35 years of Richard Donner’s classic holiday classic “Scrooged” with a first-time 4K UHD release.
The Charles Dickens classic A Christmas Carol has been adapted and transformed, told and retold, in a variety of ways for decades. It’s been adapted for a Doctor Who story, one of the better Muppet adventures, and simply as a… Read More ›
Dive deep into the making of director Ángel Manuel Soto’s surprisingly thematically complex “Blue Beetle” via thorough features on the home release.
If you’ve been keeping track of the goings-on at Warner Bros. Pictures over the last few years, their handling of the DC Comics live-action properties has been wildly mismanaged. In their race to build their own interconnected universe akin to… Read More ›
The Justice League and RWBY crossover adventure concludes with “Part Two” on home video.
In April of this year, WB Animation brought the characters of DC Comics’s Justice League to the world of Monty Oum’s RWBY in an adaptation of a RWBY/Justice League and DC/RWBY comic storyline. Applying a fish out of water approach,… Read More ›
New “Mortal Kombat Legends” prequel tale “Cage Match” answers the age old question: WWJCD?
Since 2020’s Mortal Kombat Legends: Scorpion’s Revenge, a new animated film within this version of the MK universe has released each year. The first follow-up, Battle of the Realms (2021), is a direct sequel, carrying over the events of Scorpion’s… Read More ›
The Cine-Men, Episode 93: Fantasy Films
As we near Episode 100, The Cine-Men turn their attention to another genre to explore: the realm of fantasy. Turns out that the hosts, Douglas and Darryl, have a lot more in common than may be expected (much to Douglas’s… Read More ›
Bring home the aquatic coming-of-age adventure “Ruby Gillman, Teenage Kraken” from DreamWorks now.
DreamWorks Animation has a stable of productions that range from the wildly entertaining (The Bad Guys) to the grossly moving (Shrek series) to the emotionally thrilling (How to Train Your Dragon series). Each one of them was a showcase in… Read More ›
Director Keiichi Hara’s “Lonely Castle in the Mirror” transports to home video via Shout! Studios.
It is not uncommon for a film to be based on material from a different medium. For one, it allows the filmmakers a sense of whether there’s a desire for the film before they even start pre-production. For two, audiences… Read More ›
Wuershan’s “Creation of the Gods I: Kingdom of Storms” is a relentless and epic kick-off appropriate for a legendary tale.
In just about every culture on Earth there is a story involving the creation of existence. There are stories of emergence, of coming out of nothingness, of being born from chaos, and more. In each culture, these stories serve as… Read More ›
Leap further into the complex strands of “Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse” via home video.
“Don’t watch the mouth; watch the hands.” – Peter B. Parker (voiced by Jake Johnson) in Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse In 2018, a brand-new Spider-Man story hit theaters and audiences would not be the same. That’s an enormous statement and,… Read More ›
MVD Rewind Collection’s “Ghoulies” will up your spook-season viewing game in 4K.
I’m not saying that history is inaccurate, but I adamantly and blatantly refuse to believe that directors Luca Bercovici and Joe Dante had similar ideas about green terrifying creatures coming to torment humanity. I know sometimes ideas are borrowed from… Read More ›
Explore the surprising depths of Peter Sohn’s “Elemental” via its home release materials.
Whether we’re willing to admit it or not, the majority of us in the United States are immigrants. Unless we can track our lineage to the Indigenous peoples of the land, we come from the United Kingdom, Ireland, Scotland, China,… Read More ›
Explore under the sea and out of the water in the home release edition of Rob Marshall’s live-action adaptation of “The Little Mermaid.”
Over the last several years, Walt Disney Studios has made a point to adapt one of their well-regarded animated films into live action. Appreciation for each one ultimately comes down to two things: what relationship the audience has to the… Read More ›
Huang Jianming’s animated fantasy adventure “Goodbye Monster” brings home an opportunity for families to have hard conversations.
In August 2022, director Huang Jianming (Bobby the Hedgehog) took audiences on an adventure on the island of Kunlun wherein a banished doctor tried to make things right. It’s a colorful tale featuring a collection of characters that seem inspired… Read More ›
We may not know why “The Flash” breaks its own rules, but the home release includes enough bonus features to know how they pulled it all off.
Despite being in development for years, the Warner Bros. Pictures release The Flash landed with more of a thud than most would have guessed. It centers a beloved DC Comics character in their first solo live action outing, utilizes a… Read More ›
West African film “Mami Wata” is a contender for Best Looking Film of 2023. [Fantasia International Film Festival]
As the ocean rises and falls, and the tide is the guarantor of its own return, so too does the astonishing black and white photography of Mami Wata step return a bygone style to modern folklore for a modern moment…. Read More ›