Tuesday, August 20, 2013

BLU-RAY TUESDAY: 'Epic' Goes on Pint-Sized Blu-ray Adventure, 'Scary Movie V' Rehashes 'Paranormal' Parody




















Caught in a summer where schooled monsters and an army of Minions laid claim to the animated box office, Blue Sky Entertainment's Epic takes the adventure home to Blu-ray. Epic leads this week's new releases which also include: Scary Movie V, Amour, Scooby Doo: Stage Fright, Star Trek: Enterprise - The Complete Second Season and Boardwalk Empire: The Complete Third Season.

Based on William Joyce's children's book, The Leaf Men and the Brave Good Bugs, Epic follows a teenage girl (Amanda Seyfried) magically transported to the unseen world of little people living in her own backyard. Together with the help of Leafmen soldiers, a slug and a snail, she must protect a pod from evil forces in the forest. Epic is distributed on Blu-ray by 20th Century Fox in various formats including the standard Blu-ray, DVD, UltraViolet combo pack as well as a 3D edition. However, Target is releasing an exclusive 24-page Digibook.   

Tuesday, August 13, 2013

BLU-RAY TUESDAY: 'Olympus Has Fallen' Leads Week's Blu-ray Assault, 'Muppet Movie' Re-Released for Near Anniversary




















Before Channing Tatum and Jamie Foxx teamed up to survive an full-fledged assault on the White House in Roland Emmerich's explosion-fest, White House Down, another film with the same exact plot hit theaters this past spring. Olympus Has Fallen leads this week's new Blu-ray releases which also include: The Muppet Movie (The Nearly 35th Anniversary Edition), Once Upon a Time: The Complete Second Season, The Big Wedding and What Maisie Knew.

Much like Emmerich's White House Down, Gerard Butler takes on the Channing Tatum role, playing a Secret Service agent assigned to protect the President of the United States (Aaron Eckhart) after the White House is under siege by North Koreans. Olympus Has Fallen is released on Blu-ray by Sony Pictures as a Blu-ray, DVD, UltraViolet combo pack and is directed by Antoine Fuqua (Training Day).

Wednesday, August 7, 2013

BLU-RAY TUESDAY: 'Oblivion' Blasts Home on Blu-ray with Metalpak and Other Retail Exclusives




















Tom Cruise just keeps missing the elusive century mark with his three latest outings (his most recent $100 million hit being 2011's Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol), however audiences have the opportunity to check out his dystopian futuristic film Oblivion this week on Blu-ray. Also set to release this week are The Place Beyond the Pines, Mud, The Borgias: The Complete Third Season and several Disney classics. 

In Oblivion, Jack Harper (Cruise) is the one of the few drone repairman stationed on 2077 Earth alongside his communications partner and romantic interest, Victoria (Andrea Riseborough). However after a routine checkup turns south, Harper begins to realize that all that he's known may not exactly be the truth.

Tuesday, July 30, 2013

BLU-RAY TUESDAY: 'G.I. Joe: Retaliation' Seeks Vengeance with Steelbook, Extended Cut Exclusives




















Without much resistance Cobra took command over the White House this past spring, now the villainous organization has its sights on the home media market as G.I. Joe: Retaliation makes its way to Blu-ray this Tuesday. Also scheduled for release are Justice League: The Flashpoint Paradox, Star Trek: The Next Generation - Season 4 and Star Trek: The Next Generation - Redemption.

G.I. Joe: Retaliation is the sequel to 2009's cartoonish G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra, featuring old and new Joes who have been targeted by the terrorist organization Cobra, who have infiltrated and assumed absolute control over the United States government. Roadblock (Dwayne 'The Rock' Johnson), Snake Eyes (Ray Park) and Lady Jaye (Adrianne Palicki) are a few of the Joes who survived Cobra's extermination and band together to seek vengeance on the evil group.

Tuesday, July 23, 2013

BLU-RAY TUESDAY: Danny Boyle's 'Trance' Leads Quiet Week For Blu-Ray New Releases




















With no major studio releases set to street this Tuesday, audiences however can choose between a few new titles that only received limited exposure beyond the Toronto International Film Festival and a handful of independent markets.

Director Danny Boyle is prominently known for his use of vivid color palettes featured in 2008 Best Picture winner, Slumdog Millionaire and 2010 Best Picture nominee, 127 Hours. His latest psychological caper, Trance is equally stylized while audiences delve deep into the mind of an art auctioneer (James McAvoy), whose memories are the key to locating a misplaced piece of art. 

Wednesday, July 17, 2013

BLU-RAY TUESDAY: 'Evil Dead' Reboot Scares Up Various Exclusives, '42' Hits Home Run on Blu-Ray




















Jackie Robinson, Sylvester Stallone and the Evil Dead are as remotely different from one another as possible, but all three go head-to-head on home media as 42: The Jackie Robinson Story, Bullet to the Head and Evil Dead street this week on Blu-Ray.

42 was released in theaters this past April just in time for the start of the 2013 Major League Baseball season and now finds itself on Blu-Ray precisely for the league's All-Star game. 42 is Jackie Robinson's biography onscreen detailing his initial year playing for the Brooklyn Dodgers as the first player to break the color barrier in the sport in 1947. 

Wednesday, June 19, 2013

BLU-RAY TUESDAY: Fairy Tale Adaptation 'Jack the Giant Slayer' Ascends to New Heights on Blu-Ray




















Fee-Fi-Fo-Fum! Hollywood's latest fairy tale re-imagination, Jack the Giant Slayer, leads this Tuesday's pack of new release Blu-Rays. Directed by Bryan Singer (X-Men, Superman Returns), Jack the Giant Slayer expands on the classic "Jack and the Beanstalk" story, as poor farmboy Jack (Nicolas Hoult) joins an expedition up a beanstalk to rescue a princess from CGI giants dwelling above the clouds.

Jack the Giant Slayer is released in two formats on Blu-Ray from Warner Bros. including a Blu-Ray, DVD, Digital Copy, UltraViolet combo pack as well as a 3D edition that includes the standard combo pack discs. 

Tuesday, June 11, 2013

BLU-RAY TUESDAY: Disney's 'Oz' Sees Green, 'Hansel & Gretel' Battle Fairy-Tale Witches on Blu-Ray




















The first major blockbuster of 2013 makes its way on Blu-Ray this Tuesday, roughly three months after its theatrical release in early March. Oz the Great and Powerful, starring James Franco, Rachel Weisz and Mila Kunis, is set before the 1939 classic when Dorothy arrives in the world of wizards, witches and singing Munchkins exploring how the Wizard of Oz became the mysterious floating head ruling from the confines of Emerald City.

Oz the Great and Powerful is released in multiple formats on Blu-Ray including a Blu-Ray, DVD, Digital Copy combo pack, a Blu-Ray, Digital Copy combo pack and a Blu-Ray 3D, Digital Copy combo pack.

Tuesday, June 4, 2013

BLU-RAY TUESDAY: 'Warm Bodies' Professes Zombie Love, 'Identity Thief' Continues to Steal on Blu-Ray

The first Tuesday of June is fully loaded with several new choices to check out this week. Four theatrical releases include Warm Bodies, A Good Day to Die Hard, Identity Thief and Escape From Planet Earth, while the latest seasons of Breaking Bad and Falling Skies also street for television audiences.

First up is Warm Bodies, a zombie apocalypse comedy that twists the Shakespeare's classic love story, Romeo & Juliet. "R" (a zombie iteration of Romeo) played by Nicholas Hoult falls in love with human Julie (Teresa Palmer). Together, the two are forced to hide their forbidden love from the humans and zombies, who are at war with one another.

Tuesday, April 16, 2013

Tarantino's 'Django' Drives Old-Fashioned Revenge Home on Blu-Ray

Candie (Leonardo DiCaprio) stands in the way of Django (Jamie Foxx) reclaiming his enslaved wife.




















One of the perks of being Quentin Tarantino is wielding the power to end the lives of countless onscreen characters in the most stylistic bloody ways imaginable. Feel free to say that's a sadistic manner of thinking, but for Tarantino, that alone defines him as a director he is today and answers the reasoning behind the Spaghetti Western bloodbath simply known as Django Unchained.

After his recent cult classics, Kill Bill and Inglourious Basterds, Tarantino has no issues amping up his blood-stained cinematic canvas set against a touchy subject such as American slavery and what's necessary to be free of the shackles of servitude. Enduring many years of hard service, Django (Jamie Foxx) finds himself freed by Dr. King Schultz (Christoph Waltz) and now with the means to seek revenge on a charismatic plantation owner keeping his wife all for himself.

Wednesday, March 20, 2013

'Hobbit' Digibook Leads Off Epic Middle-Earth Trilogy

Cornered and nowhere to run, this is the perfect place to keep audiences hanging another year.






Harsh criticisms such as overindulgences and cheap marketing ploys have been thrown around the film circles a bit too much regarding Peter Jackson's return to Middle-Earth in nearly a decade. Sure, The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey only covers 1/3 of a 300-page children's book, leaving audiences hanging for two more 3-hour sequels, but there's nothing wrong than building up a little anticipation. Not at all.

In the first leg of this three-movie trek, Bilbo Baggins (Martin Freeman) sets out from his comfortable hobbit hole in the midst of the Shire's green pastures to join 13 dwarves who have been displaced by a  dragon plundering their mountain stronghold. For those joining the adventures of fantastical Middle-Earth for the very first time should know that along the way, birds, beasts and a gangly creature called Gollum are obstacles in the way of reclaiming the Lonely Mountain.


Saturday, March 9, 2013

Disney's "Wreck-It Ralph" Levels Up on Blu-Ray

Tired of being the bad guy, Ralph (John C. Reilly) tells other arcade baddies his concerns.




















If you're one of the millions out there logged into XBOX Live or World of Warcraft hours and hours at a time, or perhaps spent your childhood battling side-scrolling adventures with Mario or Link, Disney's latest animated release, Wreck-It Ralph speaks to gamers regardless of age.

Wreck-It Ralph begins in the 8-bit world of Fix-It Felix Jr., reminiscent of a classic 1980s arcade game that borrows heavily on Mario and Donkey Kong. For 30 years, Wreck-It Ralph (John C. Reilly) has been programmed to be the bad guy, whose only job is to demolish a solitary penthouse before his cheery hammer-wielding adversary, Felix fixes the wreckage. For once, Ralph just wants to be adored as the good guy and decides to venture off to other games in the arcade to win a medal. After battling bugs in a sci-fi first-person shooter, Ralph lands himself in a candy-coated go-kart game where everything isn't as sweet as it seems.