The Wave

IMDb
Even though awaited, no-one is really ready when the mountain pass of Åkneset above the scenic narrow Norwegian fjord Geiranger falls out and creates a 85 meter high violent tsunami. A geologist is one of those caught in the middle of it.



Variety

COURTESY OF TIFF

SEPTEMBER 25, 2015 | 06:44PM PT

Norse disaster movie imagines what would happen if Akerneset mountain were to collapes into the fjord, sending a massive CG tsunami down on a family of stock characters.

Peter Debruge

Chief International Film Critic@AskDebruge

With “The Wave,” awesomely named Norwegian helmer Roar Uthaug has made an equally impressive tsunami-peril thriller — a thunderous rumble-rumble-hustle-hustle-glub-glub nerve-racker that hits all the same beats as its Hollywood equivalents, right down to the implausible group hug at the end. Not to be confused with last year’s deeply upsetting Scandi avalanche-aftermath drama, “Force Majeure,” which delved into the profound psychological damage these disasters can also wreak, “The Wave” sticks mostly to the big-studio formula (albeit on a much smaller budget), introducing a handful of bland soon-to-be-victims before bombarding them with spectacular digital effects. Having already made a big splash in Norway, the country’s foreign-language Oscar submission may be too popcorn-populist to get nominated, but should attract decent specialty business when Magnolia releases Stateside.

Whereas most nature’s-angry movies exploit relatively far-fetched fears (“Sharknado,” anyone?), “The Wave” anticipates a dauntingly plausible disaster scenario. According to Uthaug, with 300 unstable mountainsides in Norway, sooner or later, his countrymen will have to contend with the sort of massive landslide and subsequent 250-foot tidal wave he so enthusiastically imagines crashing down into the fjord, sending a wall of water toward the sleepy tourist hamlet of Geiranger, where family-man geologist Kristian Eikfjord (Kristoffer Joner) has all but extricated his brood — working wife Idun (Ane Dahl Torp); sullen, skaterboarding teenager son Sondre (Jonas Hoff Oftebro) and cheek-pinchably adorable young daughter Julia (Edith Haagenrud-Sande) — when the big one comes.

That means, had it taken place 24 hours earlier, Roar could have called his disaster movie “The Move,” as the first act centers on a perfectly normal family relocation that gets rapidly accelerated the instant the Akerneset emergency alarms go off. But first, we get to watch the family box up their belongings, as Kristian says his good-byes as work, Sondre huffs about how he won’t make friends in the new city and Julia begs to spend one last night in their old home — the sort of yawn-inducing luxuries that become perfectly laughable when nature decides to dump a jillion gallons of seething water on you.

It should be said that Geiranger is a remarkably picturesque place to destroy, and d.p. John Christian Rosenlund’s widescreen lensing gives us plenty of opportunity to admire this soon-to-be-doomed corner of the world during the film’s pokey opening. Then, idly gazing over at the Jenga app on his son’s iPhone, Kristian realizes that the ground water measured by a series of Akerneset mountain gauges didn’t simply disappear, as his colleagues believe. Rather, it means the cables were cut! And if the cables were cut, then yes, Chicken Little, the sky is falling.

Uthaug must have tested the film and realized that this science-y eureka moment wasn’t quite as sexy as he’d first imagined. He keeps a scene in which Kristian tips over a stack of three-ring binders, Jenga-style, to demonstrate his theory that a landslide is imminent, but there are clear signs of reshoots in which Kristian and his co-worker helicopter off to a remote crevice, shimmy down its depths and retrieve a length of severed cable. If this were a Perry Mason episode, the frayed wire would be the big reveal (Dah-dah-dum! “Your honor, nature did it!”), but here, the scene appears awkwardly wedged in the middle of another where Kristian swings by the office and asks his kids to wait — and wait and wait — in the car.

No wonder Sondre decides to get out and rejoin his mother back at the hotel where she works, effectively splitting the family in two. When Kristian’s worst fears prove correct and the mountain does collapse — this time, crushing a co-worker caught in a now-redundant spelunking scene — dad and Julia are on one side of the scenic gorge above Geiranger, while Idun and Sondre are stuck in town, smack in the bull’s eye of where The Wave will do its worst damage. As if giving all of Geiranger’s residents 10 minutes’ warning to pack up their lives and run for the hills weren’t dramatic enough, screenwriters John Kare Rake and Harald Rosenlow Eeg decide to send Sondre down to the hotel basement, where the pouty teen dons his headphones, cranks up the volume and skateboards around halls that will soon become a watery grave.

So, at the moment audiences have been waiting for, in which a stunningly rendered slosh of angry-looking water comes barreling toward Geiranger, Kristian and Julia are running uphill (dad ducks into a car at the last minute to help an injured family friend, giving us a passenger-seat view of the big impact), while Idun and Sondre are searching for one another in the hotel. Somewhere in between, a cute co-worker Sondre had been flirting with mere hours before and few thousand other victims are drowning off-camera, more or less ignored as the film shifts into reunite-the-family mode.

Here, it’s hard not to think of J.A. Bayona’s vastly superior “The Impossible,” and while the human drama of “The Wave” feels emotionally puny compared to that post-tsunami family triumph, it should be said that Uthaug and his writing team have surpassed the low bar offered by nearly every other Hollywood disaster movie in recent memory (including Clint Eastwood’s waterlogged “Hereafter”).

Augmenting an immersive Dolby Atmos-mixed sound design with the bombast of a big orchestral score, Uthaug combines Norway-shot location footage with Romanian stagework, blending the two via handheld camerawork that draws us into the action. The helmer maximizes the few big visual effects shots the deceptively frugal production could afford before ending on a wide shot where our eyes drift from the battered survivors in the foreground to the CG-rendered carnage all around. Good for one last quake is the fun pre-credits factoid that “experts agree,” with so many unstable mountain in Norway, it’s a matter of when — not if — all we’ve just witnessed will actually come to pass. Let’s hope the documentary has a happier ending.

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Marvel's Jessica Jones

IMDb
A former super-hero decides to reboot her life by becoming a private investigator.


Hollywood Reporter

Krysten Ritter glowers and shines in Marvel's strong 'Daredevil' follow-up on Netflix.

Premiering on Netflix on Nov. 20, Marvel's Jessica Jones looks and feels a bit like a cable antihero series — but it's really more of a post-hero story, making it fascinating and unique in a marketplace that doesn't lack for costumed do-gooders of all types. Through seven episodes, Jessica Jones looks like another Netflix success for Marvel, following the spring launch of Daredevil.

Jessica Jones (Krysten Ritter), granted yet-to-be-fully explored powers in a yet-to-be-fully explained accident, tried to do the superhero thing, save lives and make New York City a better place. Things went pear-shaped. Tragedy ensued. Now, Jessica is running a ramshackle private-eye business, mostly taking pictures of cheating husbands. She's dodging her best friend (Rachael Taylor as a former child star turned radio personality) and taking a particular interest in a local bartender (Mike Colter). It's very early on that an abduction case involving college athlete Hope (Erin Moriarty) pulls Jessica back into the sphere of the purple-clad Kilgrave (David Tennant), the mysterious man who was the ruination of her dreams of heroism.

Working off a relatively new Marvel character created by Brian Michael Bendis, series creator Melissa Rosenberg is approaching Jessica Jones as a piece of hard-boiled noir, with Jessica as the brooding hero rather than the femme fatale. Jessica is haunted by her past and prone to outbursts of anger, self-medication with prodigious amounts of cheap booze and world-weary voiceover narration that propels the story. That she happens to be outrageously strong, able to leap to the fire escapes of tall buildings in a single bound and heal impressively fast, is secondary because even if the world can't hurt Jessica Jones, she's doing a pretty good job self-flagellating on her own.

While slight of stature, Ritter inhabits Jessica's callused mindset in a way that suggests her sarcastic quips only barely cover her real pain. It's a mix of the attitude Ritter brought to ABC's Don't Trust the B---- in Apartment 23 and the wounded soul she brought to Breaking Bad, with a new swagger that comes from knowing your character could beat the snot out of nearly everybody in the world. We know from flashbacks that Jessica always had been adrift, but her brief run as a hero gave her purpose and fortitude, both of which were stripped away by Tennant's Purple Man. How do you handle being a survivor instead of a hero?

Read more: 'Jessica Jones' Boss Says Netflix Show Will Be 'Wildly Different' From 'Daredevil'

If Ritter's Jessica is the noir protagonist, that makes Tennant's character the femme fatale. Introduced initially in creepy and insinuating vocal appearances — Tennant's native accent is back after thatGracepoint strangeness last fall — and only teased through brief glimpses in the earliest episodes, Kilgrave is the catalyst for the series' action, the untrustworthy figure whom people can't help but trust. Rather than luring people into credulity through sex wiles, this homme fatale lures women (and men) through mind control. Civilians are easy prey, but Jessica is nearly unstoppable physically, in a way enhancing the threat that comes from Kilgrave's violations of her mind. Jessica Jones therefore becomes a series about consent, abuse and trespass of the most intimate and troubling kind — a series about the impact of rape and trauma without the depiction of literal rape. New York City, even in its darkest, scuzziest alleys, is Jessica Jones' home, her security. But Kilgrave can do what thugs and deviants cannot: take away her security. Tennant makes the character seductive and crazed.

If Jessica Jones has a serious flaw in the early-going, it's that, as intriguing as Kilgrave is, the show shares Jessica's monomaniacal fixation on the character, and the result is a sort of narrative claustrophobia. Even Jessica's interest in the man we quickly learn is Luke Cage is Kilgrave-related. Taylor's Trish becomes part of Jessica's Kilgrave fascination and even ties in thematically because of the manipulation she experienced in her days as a young actress, as well as some other dark events that have Trish learning Krav Maga in a fortress of an apartment. Everything in these opening episodes ties back to Kilgrave, and Kilgrave is such a twisted figure that it's hard for any light to get in.

Fortunately, Ritter's co-stars are good enough on their own that the insularity doesn't rankle. Colter has been a valuable part of the Good Wife extended universe, but his assertive star power here instantly whets appetites for the Luke Cage Marvel/Netflix series that will be coming next. It's hard to watch Colter and not think that TV and movies should have been trying to give this guy franchise vehicles for years. Taylor, in contrast, has been a pet project of casting directors through at least three quickly canceled network shows, but this is the first time her potential properly is utilized. Jessica's relationships with Luke and Trish are driven by different needs — love, lust, friendship, forgiveness — and that keeps the Kilgrave of it all from overwhelming.

The rest of the Jessica Jones supporting cast is solidly populated, though I'm still waiting for Carrie-Anne Moss to have anything meaty to do and for Aussie actor Wil Traval to decide where his character's accent hails from.

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Yakuza Apocalypse

IMDb
In the ruthless underground world of the yakuza, no one is more legendary than boss Kamiura. Rumored to be invincible, the truth is he is a vampire-a bloodsucking yakuza vampire boss! Among Kamiura's gang is Kageyama, his most loyal underling. However, the others in the gang view Kageyama with disdain and ridicule him for his inability to get tattooed due to sensitive skin. One day, assassins aware of boss Kamiura's secret arrive from abroad and deliver him an ultimatum: Return to the international syndicate he left years ago, or die. Kamiura refuses and, during a fierce battle with anime-otaku martial-arts expert Kyoken, is torn limb from limb. With his dying breath, Kamiura bites Kageyama, passing on his vampire powers to the unsuspecting yakuza. As he begins to awaken to his newfound abilities, Kageyama's desire to avenge the murder of boss Kamiura sets him on a course for a violent confrontation with Kaeru-kun, the foreign syndicate's mysterious and seemingly unstoppable leader!



RogerEbert
You should know whether or not you're on the same wavelength as Japanese enfant terrible Takashi Miike's crazy-go-nutty gangsters-vs.-vampires action-comedy "Yakuza Apocalypse" by the time the karate-fighting, grenade-squelching frog terrorist transforms into a giant Godzilla-sized monster, and goes on a spree. I'm not exaggerating or funning around: there is a character named Kaeru-kun in this film who is described as "the world's toughest terrorist," and he dresses up in a frog mascot costume, and he knows kung fu. Really, really good kung fu. Still, before you meet Kaeru-kun, several burning questions are asked and sometimes answered, like what is a yakuza vampire, how do they eat, and what do they want? But viewers of "Yakuza Apocalypse" shouldn't worry about understanding the "why"s of the film. That may sound like self-indulgent nonsense, but Miike ("Audition," "Ichi the Killer"), the hyper-prolific creator of way too many deranged barn-burners to count, deserves your indulgence. "Yakuza Apocalypse" is a movie that operates under the assumption that there is nothing new under the sun, not after Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear disaster nor the Tōhoku Earthquake, so we might as well throw a whole lot of things together, and make something singularly screwy. "Yakuza Apocalypse" is, in that sense, a very good film, but only if you're willing to inevitably submit to its anarchic sensibility.

That may sound like a tall order, especially given how impenetrable "Yakuza Apocalypse" seems in the beginning. Don't panic—nothing has to make sense. Kageyama (Hayato Ichihara) is an apprentice to yakuza mob boss Kamiura (Lily Franky, of "Like Father, Like Son"). And Kamiura is a vampire. Kageyama is very loyal, earnest, and determined to become a great yakuza gangster. He's also unprepared to be turned into a vampire after Kamiura is dispatched by dweeby-looking martial artist (Yayan Ruhian, of both "The Raid" films), and a doofy-looking, gun-slinging puritan with a coffin-strapped to his back. Yes, it's a "Django" reference in a yakuza movie. No, it doesn't really matter. 

Kageyama has a tough time transitioning from a recognizably human character into a blood-sucking vampire. You would find it difficult too if you went from tender, quiet romantic scenes with girlfriend Kyōko (Riko Narumi) to taking a couple of slugs to the chest and then dispatching bad guys while your palms get so hot that they are literally hot enough to cook an egg. Kageyama learns the basics of vampire existence from a fellow blood-sucker—civilians are more nourishing than yakuza, but civilian victims also become yakuza vampires—and is then turned loose shortly before he has to face off with Kaeru-kun, a villain whose arrival is foretold in hushed whispers: "He's coming."

That's thankfully not a warning viewers need to pay too much attention to. Miike isn't trying to shock de-sensitized viewers by overloading them with too much weird-ness. "Yakuza Apocalypse" is confident in its goofiness. It's the work of an older, more experienced button-pusher who still doesn't care to tell a traditional narrative. The film's confident fits of surreal, slapstick-y humor brings to mind the work of Ken Russell, specifically "Lair of the White Worm," a mid-period work for Russell, who at the time had become an accomplished provocateur. 

Still, restless viewers may spend the first half of "Yakuza Apocalypse" hoping that Miike and screenwriter Yoshitaka Yamaguchi will settle down, and emphasize Kageyama's stabilizing romance with Kyōko. But that's not what "Yakuza Apocalypse" is all about. Kyōko and Kageyama's romance is earnest and very delicate, making it that much more bizarre, though no less out of place in Yamaguchi's unstable narrative. If all things can exist, including a torture dungeon full of crocheting humans, and a kappa/turtle demon, why not love? Or a butt-kicking frog terrorist?

I mean, look: "Yakuza Apocalypse" is an endurance test. It's almost two hours long, but it doesn't feel that long by the time it ends with a comically punishing fist fight, and then, oh, never mind, you won't believe me until you see it. There are moments when the film feels like a runaway train fueled by sheer chutzpah. But when you get to the end, and the frog terrorist gets hit by a truck—that's when you'll either start howling with insane joy, or swear off movies for a while. Either way, don't flinch—here comes the end of the world.

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Re-Kill

IMDb

It's been 5 years since the outbreak that wiped out 85% of the world's population, but the war between Re-Animates (Re-Ans) and Humans wages on. Most of the major cities are still uninhabitable. Within the few surviving cities, the Re-Ans have been segregated into "zones" and are policed by the R-Division of the QUASI S.W.A.T. Unit who hunt to re-kill the Re-Ans in the hope of quelling a second outbreak.

- Written by Svetlio Svilenov



Dread Central

Sttt Adkins, Bruce Payne, Daniella Alonso

Directed by Valeri Milev

---

Although After Dark Films’ “8 Films to Die For” seemed to meet a quiet end just a few years back, we announced this summer that a new partnership with 20th Century Fox was able to give new life to the series, the films from which will finally premiere this Friday. Given that the series has produced a handful of some pretty great genre entries in the past (The Gravedancers, Frontier(s), Lake Mungo), this is exciting news for those of us who love a chance to seek out the hidden horror gems that do not always make it to wide release. This also means that Valeri Milev’s Re-Kill, one of the long-anticipated entries from After Dark Films (we first reported on the film in 2010!), will finally see its long-awaited debut this weekend. So the question remains: Was this one worth the wait of almost five years?

The film begins in a post-apocalyptic world where a virus has taken over 85% of the planet’s population. In this world, humans are still in the midst of war with zomb– er, Re-Animates (“Re-Ans” here). These Re-Ans have been segregated into off-limits zones that are policed by a S.W.A.T.-style task force known as the R-Division (think Resident Evil’s  S.T.A.R.S. team). In this world, “Re-Kill” is the most popular guerrilla style news show on television, following R-Division units regularly and documenting their attempts to keep their respective divisions safe by “re-killing” off the undead. After the death of a “Re-Kill” field reporter during an unsuspecting attack, novice videographer Jimmy Mitchell assumes the role for the program, particularly following the R-Division 8 team. As the team descends into multiple danger zones and the camera keeps rolling, we come to fear that perhaps Jimmy is capturing the final moments in the lives of these modern-day soldiers.

Given that “The Walking Dead” is now in its sixth season and we have all seen more than a few cinematic spins on the zombie apocalypse tale over the last decade, its safe to say that Re-Kill has always had its fare share of challenges to overcome if it was ever to make any kind of mark in the horror community. Unfortunately, it’s the kind of film that has not particularly benefited from sitting on the shelf for five years, as nothing about it is particularly ahead of its time. The film plays out as an extended episode of “Re-Kill,” complete with commercial breaks and a guiding commentary from our unseen videographer. To its credit, this device starts off as a rather interesting way of dipping in on a day in the life of men and women fighting for what’s left of the world. This primetime structure, introduced on a television screen in an abandoned suburban home in the film’s opening moments, is at times quite a bit of fun — especially when Michael Hurst’s script dips into comedic territory via the futuristic commercials (more on that later). However, the overarching story lags more often than not, and a lack of meaningful character development cuts a lot of the intended narrative impact once we start losing characters.

The apocalyptic battlefield backdrop of Re-Kill is an all-too-familiar one and Milev’s virus-ridden wasteland offers nothing new by way of visual stimulation; our Re-An-thrashing soldiers are fearlessly self-assured, the once thriving city backdrop constantly emits post-explosion smoke, our civilian’s camera movement is frenzied and stomach-turning, and the hordes of the undead descend upon our soldiers swiftly and without warning. These tropes are not at all executed poorly here, but they are also things we have seen done to more fresh and exciting degrees in Dawn of the Dead, Quarantine, and even the Resident Evil series. 

While well-worn subgenre cliches can occasionally be overlooked at times when a film can produce rich characters or drama instead, this sadly not the case with Re-Kill. In fact, the bulk of our team members on which we find heavy focus placed — particularly religious fanatic Winston (Payne) and macho war veteran Parker (Adkins) — are quite insufferable. It’s a shame that Falkirk, an R-Division arring Scorookie and the most endearing of the first characters we meet, doesn’t last longer, as he would have provided a nice reprieve to the misplaced religious rantings or obnoxious displays of overt masculinity we’re subjected to in Winston and Parker’s one-on-ones with Jimmy. To its credit, the post-death character “confessionals” that air after team members meet their end effectively touch on the emotional weight it’s clear Milev and Hurst were going for in the main narrative arc. It would have been refreshing to showcase more genuine moments like these that focused on the humanity behind these post-apocalyptic soldiers.

Elsewhere, another issue that plagues the large middle chunk of the film is its pacing. For a film set in a zombie warzone, there are disappointingly few exciting action sequences and plot turns (it is very straightforward story of R-Division infiltrating various dangerous Re-An zones). While many of the shootouts and zombie attacks come in quick waves that may have been aimed to reflect the realism of war journalism, they also get muddled, unfocused, and a bit repetitive by the midpoint. This does make the occasional times in which we do get closeups of an impressive decaying corpse or a scene that relies heavily on suspense all the more enjoyable, though they are few and far between for much of the film. Luckily, Re-Kill does find a groove in the last fifteen minutes that provides some of the most enjoyable action, beginning with an awesomely threatening overhead shot of a hoard of Re-Ans in an abandoned area of New York City called The Zone. At one point earlier in the film Sarge (Roger R. Cross, one of the few consistently tolerable characters) openly admits that he knows humans will never win this war; it’s only in this moment quite late in the film that we absolutely understand why, a real vision of the world in which R-Division fights that would been nice to have seen more of.

While the core story is inarguably uneven here, the aforementioned commercial breaks between our time in the war zone are a winky riot, even if they often feel like they belong in an entirely different film (namely Starship Troopers). These ads actually take up a good portion of the film and range from PSA’s that promote smoking (because cigarettes won’t kill you any faster than the Re-Ans will) to ads that try to entice everyone to have sex for the sake of procreation (“Good for her, good for him, good for America.”). My personal favorites were segments in which civilians — a dimwitted Texan and a ditzy bad girl — recount where they were the day the learned about the virus. These scenes are played straight to the best effect (I’d compare them to a faux news segment from The Onion), and although they in effect highlight how much less interesting the main storyline is, I admittedly may have enjoyed the film more had it refocused its overall tone in a way that allowed for more of this.

Re-Kill is not going to shed new light on the zombie apocalypse or found footage subgenres, but it does feature some notable bright spots that make it worth the watch, probably more so if you are taking it in with the whole of the 2015 “8 Films to Die For” selections. It’s a shame, though, since I feel like we could have had something particularly unique for the often stale subgenre here with some tighter pacing and a more focused tone. There are definitely some spirited ideas at work underneath what is otherwise heavily treaded ground, and it’s a shame that they weren’t completely realized. For a studio that has produced some very underrated staples in modern horror, Re-Kill is hardly an unforgivable misstep for After Dark Films, and I still have faith that there will be some noteworthy efforts in this new crop of films. For me, this is just not one of them.

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The Deep

IMDb
A pair of young vacationers are involved in a dangerous conflict with treasure hunters when they discover a way into a deadly wreck in Bermuda waters. Featuring extended underwater sequences and a look into the affairs of treasure hunting. Based on a novel by Peter 'Jaws' Benchley.




Rotten Tomatoes
In this film, scuba divers David Sanders and Gail Burke, assisted by Romer Treece, discover a sunken treasure off the Bermuda Coast. They also find a stash of narcotics. David and Gail spend the rest of the picture avoiding bad guys who want the drugs and the treasure.


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Raze

IMDb
Raze, a horror/action film, focuses on two abducted women & 50 other women who are forced to fight each other using their bare hands.



Rotten Tomatoes
A young woman is abducted by an elite, secret society and wakes to find herself in the company of fifty other women who are, just like her, forced to fight for their lives in an unimaginable hell. (c) IFC Films


RogerEbert
If "Raze" had been released in 1975, Quentin Tarantino would never shut up about it. He still might not shut up about it because it stars Zoe Bell, the New Zealand stuntwoman who doubled for Uma Thurman in the "Kill Bill" films and clung to the hood of Stuntman Mike's car in "Death Proof." Directed by Josh C. Waller from a screenplay by Robert Beaucage, this tale of captive women fighting to the death has the poker-faced craziness of a 1970s or early '80s midnight flick, the kind that made audiences howl for blood. 

"Raze" starts with an obvious fake-out, making you think it's about another character when it's obviously about Sabrina, whose raging face adorns the film's poster. A young woman (Rachel Nichols) wakes up on the floor of the dungeon following a one-night stand with a hunky guy she picked up in a bar, wanders the prison halls and runs into Sabrina, who fights and kills her in a close-quarters confrontation filmed in Jason Bourne whiplash-cam.

Then it's on to the premise, the characters and their backstories. The prison is a family-run institution that's pitted women against each other for generations. The guards are male, the prisoners female. The current jailers are a creepy, ostentatiously moralistic married couple (Sherilyn Fenn and Doug Jones) who dote on each other when they aren't berating the prisoners for their sins. The inmates all have experience fighting, professionally or otherwise. Most studied martial arts for self-defense; the wiseass Phoebe, played like a sneering Lee Marvin villain by Rebecca Marshall, has been physically and sexually abused since childhood. The jailers compel the women by threatening their loved ones, images of whom are piped in via closed-circuit TV. These human insurance policies have no idea they're being monitored, much less marked for death.

The best genre movies create their own reality, then fill it with situations compelling enough that the viewer is rarely distracted by what Alfred Hitchcock called "refrigerator logic." How did the jailers successfully kidnap so many strong women? Why are the women conventionally beautiful enough to be catalog models? Do the jailers buy their sweatpants in bulk? You don't ask such questions of "Raze" because it's a dream logic movie comprised of bits and pieces of other dream logic movies: "Battle Royale," the Hunger Games series, "The Most Dangerous Game," a smidgen of "Fight Club," a dollop of "Oldboy." The characters are sketched with two or three details, then filled in by the actors' furiously physical performances. In place of a standard three-act structure, "Raze" is presented as a series of bouts joined by thin strands of dramatic connective tissue. Onscreen fight cards tell you who's up next.

Of course "Raze" begs to be read as allegory, perhaps for the way patriarchal society treats women as objects, entertainments, prisoners or slaves, pits them against one another for the prize of male approval, and pressures them to conform to limiting roles: girlfriend, wife, mother, tramp. Tantalizing fragments of meaning ricochet in the film's margins, but they never freeze long enough to let you look at them.

That's probably for the best. "Raze" is not an especially political or even introspective work, though it sometimes poses as one. If its direction and fight choreography were a more imaginative—if each showdown had a strikingly different look, or were built around a different concept, as in Tarantino's "Kill Bill" movies—it might have been a classic of sorts. Instead it's a solid feature with a few inspired moments. Its dark virtues are visceral and emotional: the amped-up sound effects of heels and knuckles bruising flesh and cracking bone; the intelligence in Sabrina's eyes as she plots against her jailers; the weirdly powerful confrontation between two combatants, one of whom tries to psych out her opponent by repeatedly asking her, "How's your mother?"

This is a women's prison picture, but not the kind you're thinking of. There are no rape scenes or shower scenes. Moments in which men intimidate or overpower women are about bulk and intensity, not sexual terrorism. "Raze" doesn't objectify its female fighters any more than the Olympics objectify their athletes. Its women are posed and shot like hounded Amazons, and the director gives every major character a spot-lit pirouette; the best finds Marshall taunting future adversaries in the cellblock hall, then stepping through an entryway and giving the finger—to the viewer, or so it seems—before the doors slide shut. The female characters are gladiators. Sabrina is Spartacus in a tank top.

Bell's performance is the best reason to see "Raze." She's just right as Sabrina, a strong-silent type in Steve McQueen-Clint Eastwood mode. The character mangles adversaries with her fists, feet, forehead and thumbs, but Bell's most fascinating moments are quiet ones where you watch her Hellenic face in close-up, thinking. How was this actress not cast as Wonder Woman? Can anything be done to remedy this injustice?

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The Covenant

IMDb
Four young men who belong to a supernatural legacy are forced to battle a fifth power long thought to have died out. Another great force they must contend with is the jealousy and suspicion that threatens to tear them apart.


RottenTomatoes

MOVIE INFO

In 1692, in the Ipswich Colony of Massachusetts, five families with untold power formed a covenant of silence. One family, lusting for more, was banished; its bloodline disappearing without a trace--until now. This thriller tells the story of the Sons of Ipswich, four young students at the elite Spencer Academy who are bound by their sacred ancestry. As descendants of the original families who settled in Ipswich Colony in the 1600s, the boys have all been born with special powers. When the body of a dead student is discovered after a party, secrets begin to unravel which threaten to break the covenant of silence that has protected their families for hundreds of years.

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Transporter Refueled

IMDb
In the south of France, former special-ops mercenary Frank Martin enters into a game of chess with a femme-fatale and her three sidekicks who are looking for revenge against a sinister Russian kingpin.




Rotten Tomatoes

MOVIE INFO

Frank Martin (played by newcomer Ed Skrein), a former special-ops mercenary, is now living a less perilous life - or so he thinks - transporting classified packages for questionable people. When Frank's father (Ray Stevenson) pays him a visit in the south of France, their father-son bonding weekend takes a turn for the worse when Frank is engaged by a cunning femme-fatale, Anna (Loan Chabanol), and her three seductive sidekicks to orchestrate the bank heist of the century. Frank must use his covert expertise and knowledge of fast cars, fast driving and fast women to outrun a sinister Russian kingpin, and worse than that, he is thrust into a dangerous game of chess with a team of gorgeous women out for revenge.

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Essex Boys: Law of Survival

IMDb
Danny an ex street thug takes on the Essex Underworld after they turn his life upside down.



Xmovie8
Storyline: Danny an ex street thug takes on the Essex Underworld after they turn his life upside down.


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Everly

IMDb
An action/thriller centered on a woman who faces down hitmen sent by her ex, a mob boss, while holed up in her apartment.



RobertEbert

Nothing like a trashy, all-hell-breaks-loose onslaught of blood, bullets and babes that borrows inspiration from a recycling bin stuffed with leftovers from ‘60s grindhouse films, Japanese horror, “Kill Bill,” “Saw” and splatter-fest videogames to cleanse one’s visual palate of those highbrow Oscar contenders.

In “Everly,” Salma Hayek throws herself with admirable abandon into the role of an avenging victim of sex slavery held against her will for years in a luxury high-rise apartment by misogynistic Asian mobsters. She exhibits such fire-breathing ferocity, it is hard to know whether this excessively cruel exercise in ultra-violence is exploiting her or she is exploiting it. Lord knows, she is by far the best thing about it.

The one-time Best Actress nominee for the splendid 2002 biopic “Frida” turned second-string player opposite Adam Sandler in those wretched “Grown Ups” comedies appears to have re-embraced her B-movie action roots. She hasn’t been such a red-hot pistol since the days of “Desperado” and “From Dusk Till Dawn,” and if the film does anything right, it reminds us that now-48-year-old Hayek is one heck of a forceful presence when she is allowed to be.

As they once said of Foxy Brown, her Everly is a whole lot of woman.

Too bad “Everly” itself is not exactly a whole lot of movie. What could have been a female-charged adrenaline rush is too hung up on queasy brutality and too quick to rely on a side plot involving Everly’s estranged mother and the toddler daughter she barely has gotten to know as a kind of counter-balance to the over-the-top nastiness.

Director Joe Lynch (“Knights of Badassdom,” “Wrong Turn 2: Dead End”) and writer Yale Hannon shamelessly borrow not just the contained space concept from the Bruce Willis classic "Die Hard" but also make ironic use of a Christmas setting—all the better to blare jazzy renditions of holiday tunes on the soundtrack while madness and mayhem messily deck the walls along with the halls. 

“Everly” wastes no time going into carnage overdrive with at least 20 killings in the first 20 minutes. In a stylish overhead shot, we witness Hayek, naked save for the ornate Japanese tattoo on her back, dig out a pistol and a phone stashed in her toilet tank and don a skimpy slip from her dirty laundry hamper. She begins to systematically shoot the thugs lurking about that have been presumably beating and gang-raping her minutes before (we only hear her agonizing screams while the screen remains black). Everly also takes a bullet to the gut during the relentless gunfire, and the resulting holes are only slightly worse than those that riddle the script.

In between arranging to keep her mother and her cutie-pie daughter safe from harm and trying to contact a detective who promised to help her, she ends up having to single-handedly fend off a series of trained killers and prostitute assassins in fetishized costumes that pour forth from other apartments in the makeshift brothel. They come and go through Everly’s door like critters in a whack-a-mole game after being alerted that a bounty has been placed on her head. 

A period of relative silence follows so certain plot details can be elaborated upon and for one dead body to briefly revive to provide Hayek with some human interaction. Everly is able to keep an eye on activity in the building via a video monitor and eventually realizes there is no escape while ever more threatening visitors arrive. Of particular note is a vicious attack dog named Bonzai who learns the hard way that grenades are not to be toyed with and the Sadist, a cravat-wearing creep who brings along a half-naked masochist locked in a cage. 

It would take a Quentin Tarantino or maybe a Luc Besson to be able to smoothly blend such gruesome doings (the increasingly outlandish array of weaponry, from samurai swords to rocket launchers, is rather impressive if you are into such things) with scenes of matriarchal love and devotion. But Lynch and his writer are more adept at oozing guts than heartfelt emotion. And given the not-exactly-conducive circumstances, Hayek’s sexual charisma more or less goes untapped save for her body-clinging apparel (she eventually dons a low-cut tank top and yoga pants).

Odd how there are two current films in theaters about women being punished and abused for the benefit of men. Unlike “Fifty Shades of Grey,” however, “Everly” does not romanticize its intentions. It even allows room for a brief flicker of female dignity. When one of the bad guys taunting Everly looks around at the dead bodies littering her place and dismissively sneers, "That's a lot of dead whores," she angrily retorts, "You don't get to call them that." And that is as close to enlightenment as “Everly” gets.

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Tiger House

IMDb
An injured gymnast must defend her boyfriend's house from a gang of armed robbers.



Xmovie8
toryline: Kelly sneaks into her boyfriend's house but tonight, she's not the only unwelcome visitor. Now, she must draw on her reserves of strength and skills of dexterity to escape. As the situation spirals out of control, the suburban house becomes a terrifying arena for violence. 


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Avengers:Age of Ultron

Movies

FULL SYNOPSIS

This sequel to the smash-hit comic-book epic finds the iconic superhero team dealing with a threat of their own making: a sentient robot called Ultron (voice of James Spader), who was originally designed as part of a peacekeeping program. Since the events of the last film, Captain America (Chris Evans), Iron Man (Robert Downey Jr.), the Hulk (Mark Ruffalo), Thor (Chris Hemsworth), Hawkeye (Jeremy Renner), and Black Widow (Scarlett Johansson) have been working to take down various cells of a secret society of villains known as HYDRA. Their zeal to make the world a better, safer place inspires Tony Stark, genius billionaire and alter ego of Iron Man, to create Ultron in order to respond to additional threats that the Avengers aren't able to handle. Ultron, unfortunately, takes this directive way too seriously -- he believes that world peace can only be achieved by exterminating humanity, and he'll stop at nothing to accomplish this goal. The battle between the Avengers and Ultron is further complicated by the appearance of superpowered siblings Quicksilver (Aaron Taylor-Johnson) and Scarlet Witch (Elizabeth Olsen), who ally themselves with the homicidal android. Samuel L. Jackson and Cobie Smulders co-star as, respectively, S.H.I.E.L.D. operatives Nick Fury and Maria Hill. Joss Whedon, writer and director of the previous Joss Whedon movie, returns in both capacities here. ~ Jack Rodgers, Rovi

IMDb

When Tony Stark and Bruce Banner try to jump-start a dormant peacekeeping program called Ultron, things go horribly wrong and it's up to Earth's Mightiest Heroes to stop the villainous Ultron from enacting his terrible plans.

Rotten Tomatoes

MOVIE INFO

When Tony Stark jumpstarts a dormant peacekeeping program, things go awry and Earth's Mightiest Heroes, including Iron Man, Captain America, Thor, The Incredible Hulk, Black Widow and Hawkeye, are put to the ultimate test as they battle to save the planet from destruction at the hands of the villainous Ultron.

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