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.


Monday, March 18, 2013

Ready 'Guardians' Blu-Ray for Those Easter Baskets

The greatest gift is seeing all these mythological characters sharing the same screen.




















Somebody in the Dreamworks Animation marketing department is an absolute genius. Release Rise of the Guardians in theaters right before the Christmas rush and likewise, its Blu-ray release just in nick of time for Easter. Coincidence? Hardly.

Rise of the Guardians is best summed up as the Avengers of mythological beings - the best of the best joining forces to rid the world of evil in the form of Pitch Black (Jude Law) and his deathly steeds. A thickly Russian accented Santa Claus (Alec Baldwin) and a boomerang-wielding Easter Bunny (Hugh Jackson) are givens to protect the children of the world from the Boogeyman. Joining them in this eternal struggle are the lesser known (or ones without holidays) Tooth Fairy and Sandman. And collectively, they stand united as Earth's Mightiest Heroes...sorry Guardians.

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.