Category: Reviews

Microwave Massacre (1979)

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One of the things I absolutely love about the abundance of Boutique Blu-ray labels we have now is that they sometimes find these ridiculous, obscure, weirdo movies and clean them up, restore them, and release them on Blu-ray with loads of extras.

Microwave Massacre is a terrible film. It is a movie about a serial killing cannibal, and it is a comedy. Or at least it is supposed to be a comedy. But according to my review (which was written in 2016 which you can read here), there are no laughs to be found.

And yet, it got a killer release from Arrow Video. You gotta love the audacity of that.

Delicatessen (1991) 4K UHD Review

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My wife speaks French. She has a Masters Degree in French Linguistics. She taught French at university for a time. She loves all things French. Especially movies. Obviously, I love movies and I dig foreign language films. I’ve seen a lot more movies than here, but she is the expert in French cinema in our house. She turned me on to director Jean-Pierre Jeunet with his absolutely delightful film Amelie. Then she hit me with his stranger, darker films Delicatessen and City of Lost Children.

Delicatessen is a visually stunning tale set in a post-apocalyptic world in which a butcher puts a help-wanted ad in the paper then murders those who answer and sells their meat to the rest of the apartment. It is romantic, funny, and a delight. You can read my full review here.

Trick Or Treat (1986)

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I love me some silly 1980s horror and Trick or Treat is some terrifically silly 1980s horror. Marc Price (of Family Ties fame). He plays a metalhead who accidentally unleashes the ghost of his favorite rocker after he mysteriously dies. At first, the dude helps him prank his bullies but then things (naturally) turn deadly. You can read my full review here.

Venom (1981) Blu-ray Review

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Venom is basically your standard hostage-taking gone wrong thriller by way of The Desperate Hours with a poisonous snake thrown in for good measure. I love it when movies do that – take a pretty basic plot and then add something nutty to make it interesting. This one would be pretty forgettable except it stars Klaus Kinski and Oliver Reed as the villains and Sterling Hayden as the good guy. Plus Sarah Miles is the snake doctor.

Anyway, you can read my full review here.

My Girl (1991)4K UHD Reivew

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When my copy of this disc arrived in the mail, I was confused and a little disappointed. Confused because I couldn’t remember ordering it and disappointed because I knew I had to review it. I do that sometimes – I’ll get a series of PR emails offering all sorts of discs and that little kid inside of me who can’t believe they actually send me free movies if I’ll just write a few paragraphs about them gets all excited. I say “yes” to everything and then when they arrive I wonder what the heck I’m doing.

Generally, I love getting movies in the mail – watching them and reviewing them. But sometimes I get a little overwhelmed with them and I start thinking about the other movies I want to watch. Movies that might fit my monthly theme or something and I’m annoyed at being forced to do something. It is like in school when the teacher makes you read a book. You don’t want to do it even if it sounds interesting.

I was disappointed at receiving My Girl because my memory of it (admittedly a very vague one) was that I didn’t really like the film. Looking at Letterboxd confirmed that opinion with the general consensus being that it wasn’t great.

But I had to watch it and so I did. It was better than I remembered. It is a cute little coming-of-age tale set in the 1970s with a strong performance by the central moppet. It isn’t amazing or anything, but I’m glad I watched it again.

You can read my full review here.

Weak Spot (1975) Blu-ray Review

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Weak Spot is a film that is difficult to explain or sum up. I reviewed it for Cinema Sentries a little over a month ago. I’ve been meaning to link to that review in these pages. I’ve literally queued it up at least four different times. But each time I’ve stared at this blank page not knowing how to write this little summary to get you interested enough to click over and read my review.

It is a French-Italian-German coproduction based on a Greek novel. It takes place in an unnamed location that is under totalitarian rule. It follows a man who may or may not be a subversive who is caught possibly passing a secret message onto another subversive. He is very casually taken to the capital city for questions by police who don’t seem all that interested in their jobs.

It is full of ridiculous situations played totally straight. It is confusing and weird and rather delightful.

I recommend watching it. I hope this intrigues you enough to click on this link and read my full review.

Full Moon In Blue Water (1988)

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There is a certain type of film that Hollywood doesn’t seem to make anymore. They used to make a lot of mid-budget dramas that were made for adults but weren’t necessarily rated with a hard “R.” They’d have solid directors and well-known actors. They weren’t always the best movies, but they were well-made and enjoyable enough. Now it seems like everything is made to please the algorithm, with stars that have to have enough social media followers in order to get made.

Full Moon In Blue Water is exactly the kind of movie I’m talking about. It isn’t a great movie by any means, but it is a good one. The kind of film you can watch on a lazy Sunday afternoon and be glad you did. They don’t make this kind of film very much anymore, but I’m glad they are at least releasing them on Blu-ray.

You can read my full thoughts on it here.

The Substance (2024)

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As you’ve seen I’ve started writing my Five Cool Things articles again. The basic idea is to write a couple of paragraphs about the interesting things I discover every couple of weeks. These aren’t full reviews, but just some concise thoughts on why I liked whatever it is I’m talking about.

This week The Substance was one of the five things. I submitted it to Cinema Sentries and the owner of the site sent me a little note. Turns out he’s trying to get reviews of all the Oscar-nominated films on his site, and wondered if I’d let him make my three-paragraphs on The Substance into a regular review.

Me being me I said that was okay but I’d rather flesh it out a little more and make it a full-on review rather than my less formal tidbit for Five Cool Things.

And now you can read it.

Agatha Christie’s Poirot: Series 13 Review

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I’ve written about these Poirot movies starring David Suchet before. This is the very last set, containing the very last films with the actor. Nothing went wrong, the actor is very much alive and working (though not as much as he used to – he is 78 after all) nor did the series get cancelled. They simply filmed every Hercule Poirot story Agatha Christie ever wrote. That’s astonishing. You can literally now read every story and then turn on a pretty good adaptation of it.

You can read my full review of this set here.