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DVD Review: A man’s home is his castle

June 30, 2011 by butlerscinemascene

“DELIVER US FROM EVIL”   (Available June 28)

This gritty Scandinavian thriller clearly was inspired by Sam Peckinpah’s seminal “Straw Dogs” (which, perhaps not coincidentally, is the subject of an American  remake set for September release).

It begins as a sort of dysfunctional family drama. Johannes (Lasse Rimmer) is a well-to-do lawyer who has returned to his small hometown in Jutland’s lowlands. He’s got a sexy wife, a couple of kids and lots of big-city ideas that the brutish locals find amusing and somewhat irritating.

Among these primitives is Johannes’ ne’er-do-well brother Lars (Jens Andersen), an over-the-road trucker who, while fumbling with a cell phone, drives over a local woman. Hiding her body near the highway, Continue Reading »

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DVD review: Eluding Big Brother

June 30, 2011 by butlerscinemascene

“ERASING DAVID” (Available June 28)

In this hugely thought-provoking doc from Britain, filmmaker David Bond kisses his child and pregnant wife goodbye and attempts to disappear.

His goal: to elude for one full month a pair of  professional investigators  he’s hired to track him down.

For anyone who has ever though it might be cool to simply pack it all in and live off the information grid, “Erasing David” will be a sobering reality check. Continue Reading »

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“TRANSFORMERS: DARK OF THE MOON”: Soulless smackdown

June 27, 2011 by butlerscinemascene

“TRANSFORMERS: DARK OF THE MOON” My rating: C (Opens wide June 29)

153 minutes | Audience rating: PG-13

I’m not going to tell you that Michael Bay has no soul. Only that I’ve never seen evidence of one in any of his films.

The irony, of course, is that by commercial standards Bay is the filmmaker of his generation, able to hits the mass audience’s sweet spot with a fusion of flash, noise, endless f/x and eye-blurring action.

Characterization? Content? Subtext?

Who needs ‘em?

Continue Reading »

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Buck Brannaman: Quiet dignity

June 27, 2011 by butlerscinemascene

Cowboy culture is tough, rough and taciturn, right?

Slow-talking guys in jeans and Stetsons.

Yep.

Nope.

Thank you, Ma’am.

Not a whole lot of touchy-feely.

But here’s Buck Brannaman, quite possibly the most important cowboy in America, talking to the documentary camera about his abuse-filled childhood.

About how his widowed father would go on drunken tears and beat Buck and older brother Smokey.

About the winter night when young Buck, terrified of another session of torment, fled into sub-zero weather in his pajamas and survived by sharing a ranch dog’s straw-filled barrel.

Ironically, that tortured childhood may have been instrumental in creating the man Buck Brannaman is today, a real-life horse whisperer whose clinics for horses and their owners are legendary, whose methodology rejects “breaking” an animal and instead relies on his ability to get on the equine wavelength.

After a session with the gentle Brannaman, a horse seems to know telepathically what he wants it do do.

“I dream about horses,” Brannaman said Continue Reading »

Posted in Art house fare, Documentaries | Tagged , , , | 3 Comments »

DVDs: Brainiacs

June 24, 2011 by butlerscinemascene

A balloon the size of a football stadium will lift the BLAST telescope array above Earth's atmosphere to photograph deep space.

The science is hands on and way out there in two recent documentaries just out on DVD:

“BLAST!”:  The title stands for “balloon-bourne large aperture submillimeter telescope” which, I’ll grant you, doesn’t sound all that sexy.

Wrong. Wrong. Wrong.

Paul Devlin’s documentary is about a group of astrophysicists who hope to photograph deep space by using a massive balloon — it’s the size of a football stadium — to lift a sophisticated telescope above our atmosphere. There it can drift for several days, taking pictures of parts of our universe never before seen.

Most of the team members — professionals and grad students — hail from the University of Pennsylvania and the University of Toronto.

Devlin’s film follows months of preparation as the telescope is hand crafted. Then his cameras tag along Continue Reading »

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“CARS 2”: Thrown rods

June 24, 2011 by butlerscinemascene

“CARS 2”  My rating: C- (Opening wide on June 24)

105 minutes | MPAA rating: G

The animation wizards at Pixar are yet to make a genuinely bad movie.

But with “Cars 2” they’ve made a truly mediocre one.

Continue Reading »

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“ANOTHER HARVEST MOON” : Not going gently

June 24, 2011 by butlerscinemascene

“ANOTHER HARVEST MOON”  My rating: C (Opening June 24 at the Glenwood Arts)

88 minutes | MPAA rating: PG-13

With “Another Harvest Moon” we get about 300 years of acting experience up there on the movie screen.

Too bad that talent is put it to such unremarkable use.

Continue Reading »

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Our ex-dog

June 23, 2011 by butlerscinemascene

(This piece has nothing to do with movies. Occasionally I feel the need to write about something different. Enjoy.)

Some years ago, my wife Ellen came home from her job at the Kansas City Art Institute with a wriggling bundle of joy.

It was a puppy given to her by one of the students (kids were always trying to balance their studies with pet ownership and failing), who said it was a black Lab.

Our daughter named him Josh.

Josh was loyal, loving, dumb and destructive in ways that only an energetic, tail-wagging Labrador retriever can be.  Also, it turned out that while there might have been a black Lab in his family tree, there was a lot more Great Dane. This was one big dog. Continue Reading »

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GayFest’s best

June 21, 2011 by butlerscinemascene

Get your tickets and gird your loins.

GayFest is upon us.

That’s the Gay & Lesbian Film Festival of Kansas City, for the uninitiated, and it gets underway Friday, June 24 at the Tivoli Theatre in Westport.

I’ve been able to pre-screen several of this year’s titles; what follows is one guy’s picks of the best of the fest: Continue Reading »

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My meeting with Malick

June 20, 2011 by butlerscinemascene

I have met Terrence Malick.

I’ve talked to Terrence Malick.

In a manner of speaking, I interviewed Terrence Malick…to my knowledge, I’m the only journalist ever to have done so.

Flashback to 1979:

Malick, whose “The Tree of Life” is currently in theaters dividing audiences like a hot knife through a stick of butter, was attending Show-A-Rama, a gathering of movie exhibitors and studio reps that for more than 20 years was held in Kansas City. (It subsequently evolved into ShowWest and moved to Las Vegas).

That year the relatively unknown Malick was named Show-A-Rama’s Director of the Year and showed up to claim his plaque. (At this May’s Cannes Film Festival he declined to make an appearance to collect his Palme d’Or for “Tree.”) Continue Reading »

Posted in Art house fare, Deep thoughts...maybe | Tagged , , , , , , | 5 Comments »

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