Contagion has some things going for it, but mainly from an acting and technical level rather than the story. The cast is mostly good despite having a limited amount of screen time and Soderbergh’s visual style, while nothing new from what he’s done in the past, still looks stunning.
The Twilight Zone revamp, produced and narrated by Jordan Peele arrives on DVD with both seasons in one set and includes featurettes, deleted scenes and episode commentaries.
Blade is far from perfect and has moments that scream 1990s in its editing but I do like Snipes in the lead and the movie as a whole was somewhat entertaining, warts and all.
The Affair: The Complete Series includes all five seasons of the drama-mystery starring Dominic West, Maura Tierney, Ruth Wilson, Joshua Jackson and Anna Paquin.
Out of Time is a serviceable suspense-thriller mainly for the charisma of its cast, primarily Denzel Washington and to some extent, Eva Mendes, as well as John Billingsley in the comedy relief role.
American Assassin doesn’t manage to standout amongst the numerous other espionage thrillers out there and yet I found it entertaining mostly for the cast, namely Dylan O’Brien and Michael Keaton, not to mention relative newcomer Shiva Negar, more so than the plot.
It’s easy to see why Approaching the Unknown has received less than stellar reviews and if you’re not into slow moving, character-driven flicks, this one might bore you to tears. However, I found it mostly to be entrancing mainly for Mark Strong.
Now You See Me 2 is not the type of movie that will tax your mind but instead is a perfectly serviceable caper-comedy, one that succeeds more on the chemistry with the ensemble, with newcomer Lizzy Caplan being the highlight, rather than anything to do with the thin plot, though I did appreciate some of the magic even if it’s CGI-generated.
The Perfect Guy is a forgettable yet still watchable suspense thriller with fine performances from Sanaa Lathan and Morris Chestnut while Michael Ealy is quite as effective outside of being a creep. That said, it is a plot seen in numerous number of Lifetime Original Movies just with better production values and talent.
Masters of the Universe is a silly movie that seems to be better regarded today than it was back in 1987. The visual effects at times is lame, the acting fairly substandard save for Frank Langella and the story is fairly thin, though given the source material (a toy line and cartoon series), one has to give credit to the writer for doing his best.
The Avengers is one of the funnier movies of 2012. It perfectly brings together these heroes into a story that, albeit, is fairly mundane but with action and adventure which is both fun and thrilling under the tutelage of Joss Whedon..
Snow White and the Huntsman had great potential between the cast (Charlize Theron especially), adequate direction from Rupert Sanders, and some truly impressive art and production design. However, for all the good the film has going for it, everything else is kind of bland. The opening of the movie is fine but the middle portion meanders and Kristen Stewart has limited emotions making it difficult to really care about what happens to her.