Alpha Dog

(2007, 118 min) Alpha Dog is based on a true story concerning former fugitive Jesse James Hollywood – played as Johnny Truelove by Emile Hirsch. Truelove leads of gang of privileged young white kids (namely Justin Timberlake and Shawn Hatosy) who earn a decent amount of pocket cash in petty drug transactions. The group emulates the indulgent criminal lifestyle glorified and glamorized in hip-hop videos that loop in the background of their spacious Los Angeles living rooms. They bite off much more than they can chew when they spontaneously kidnap 15-year-old Zach (Anton Yelchin) over a $1,200 debt owed by his older brother (Ben Foster). With no intentions of causing Zach harm, they allow him to party with older kids and introduce him to two lovely young blondes who take his virginity. Things take a major turn for the worse, however, when the gang members become cognizant of the fact that their prank could feasibly result in life imprisonment.

The fact that the offspring of John Cassavetes has been chiefly responsible for Hollywood schlock like John Q and The Notebook is enough to greatly confuse just about any cinephile – especially when considering that his first two films (Unhook the Stars and She's So Lovely) showed promise that he might follow in his father’s seminal footsteps. Alpha Dog, Nick Cassavetes's fifth directorial effort, suggests that he is walking a fine line between meaningful and carelessly commercial material. Though it is recognized primarily as a vehicle for pop-idol Timberlake, it attempts to take an unflinching look at the impression that the fame and fortune-obsessed media has left on much of the younger MTV generation.

Though a structural device where characters are interviewed about the aftermath of the story's events is used inconsistently, and each member of the impressive ensemble (also included are Bruce Willis, Sharon Stone, Dominique Swain Amanda Seyfried, Lukas Haas and Harry Dean Stanton) is given much more screen time and overly dramatic dialog than their relevance to the plot would ordinarily allow, Alpha Dog does contain enough memorably affecting moments to redeem at least half of its flaws. Stand-out performances are delivered by Ben Foster and Anton Yelchin. Foster masters the Stanislavski system to convey the intensity of drug-addled anger and frustration while Yelchin steals the entire show with a hopeful innocence and naïveté that is bound to generate more than a few tears.

– Robert O'Neill

© TLA Entertainment Group

The History Boys

(2006, 109 min) The joy of learning and the beauty of teenage boys are the two intertwined themes in Nicholas Hytner (The Madness of King George) and Alan Bennett's (Prick Up Your Ears) glorious adaptation of their stage play. In order to preserve the original feeling of the award-winning production these two men rushed the film into being with the original cast intact. What a great decision that was, as we've got a fresh interpretation of the gay schoolboy film to enjoy.

An old-school eccentric Hector (Richard Griffiths) is getting his prize students ready to enter Oxford or Cambridge. He feeds the boys gobbets (delicate, delicious morsels of knowlege) they can pepper their entrance exams with. He's a married homosexual who delights in giving the boys rides home on his motorcycle – complete with an obligatory feel. The school has much riding on these boys so they hire Irwin (Stephen Campbell Moore), who will fill the boys' heads with more conventional knowlege they can actually use to pass their exams. He's also gay, but hides it better! The film is most focused on handsome charismatic Dakin (Dominic Cooper) who's having an affair with the school secretary. With his eyes clearly delighting on Dakin is Posner (Samuel Barnett), the gay student who sings songs of love to his beloved – who isn't all that interested in men – or is he? Posner's rendition of "Bewitched, Bothered and Bewildered" is the gayest thing this writer has seen in a film this year! There is also a jock, an overweight boy, a Muslim, a black and a Christian, but they are more stock characters compared to the two flamboyant boys and the teachers.

With its great soundtrack and captivating story, The History Boys is a film we treasure.

– Scott Cranin

© TLA Entertainment Group

Darwin's Nightmare

(2004, 111 min) Not your average exposé, this Oscar®-nominated film is an extremely powerful documentary about the exploitation of Africans in present-day Tanzania. There, fish is the only export, and the locals can't even afford to buy their own product. The filmmakers imbed themselves in the community and get incredible footage of fishermen, prostitutes, homeless local children, the pilots and traffic controllers who participate in the trade, and eventually even get some stunning conspiratorial revelations. There's no condescending voiceover, just the mesmerizing voice of a people betrayed by the government and the corporations that (perhaps unwittingly) do the bidding. This is the real-life Lord of War, and is a hundred times more compelling and affecting.

– David Gorgos

© TLA Entertainment Group

Volver

(2006, 121 min) Volver observes three generations of strong-willed Spanish women from La Mancha, beloved director Pedro Almodóvar's old stomping ground. In Almodóvar's La Mancha, female residents tidy the graves of their departed loved ones – and often their own – in a celebratory weekly tradition, while fighting against an unrelenting wind that is known to cause mental breakdown.

In the cemetery, Raimunda (Penélope Cruz), her daughter Paula (Yohana Cobo) and sister Sole (Lola Dueñas) are introduced. They have returned to La Mancha from Madrid to visit their elderly Aunt Paula (Chus Lampreave) and neighboring family friend Agustina (Blanca Portillo). Aunt Paula claims that Irene (Carmen Maura), Raimunda and Sole’s deceased mother, is present in the house and has been her primary care-giver for many years. Shortly after, Raimunda faces a deadly family crisis. At the same time, Irene returns and appears to Sole in an effort to comfort her daughters and reveal secrets about her mysterious death that closely compare with Raimunda's current predicament.

Abundant in his radiant use of color, melodramatic narrative structure and heartfelt praise of triumphant female endurance, Volver fits snugly amidst Almodóvar's cumulative catalog of classics and continues a streak of profuse critical praise that boomed louder than ever before with 1999's All About My Mother. Current fans will be undoubtedly pleased while those unfamiliar with Almodóvar's previous works should not have a difficult time relating to the universal sentiment at which the film arrives.

While all of the cast members perform proficiently, particular attention is earned by Penélope Cruz and Blanca Portillo. Cruz is given the opportunity to show off the dramatic capacity and range that has been missing in her Hollywood career while Portillo is often heart-breaking as the pot-smoking family friend who tries to dismiss the pain that she feels over her own mother's abandonment.

– Robert O'Neill

© TLA Entertainment Group

The Hitcher

(2007, 84 min) Grace and Jim (Sophia Bush and Zachary Knighton), two unusually dimwitted young lovers, are driving across the country for some completely irrelevant reason. Their casual pace and sunset canoodling are cut short with the arrival of John Ryder (Sean Bean), a tall, dark and handsome vagabond who psychologically tortures and murders travelers for amusement. Feeling guilty after nearly running him down with their car, Grace and Jim agree to give John a ride and narrowly escape with their lives. The surprisingly boring remainder of the film follows the couple as they attempt to track John down after he inadvertently frames them for the slaughter of an entire family.

The Hitcher is the newest insult to horror fans from money-hungry action producer Michael Bay's Platinum Dunes, the same production company responsible for remaking The Texas Chainsaw Massacre and The Amityville Horror (also in the works are updated versions of Friday the 13th and The Birds). Bay oversees half-assed commercial projects wherein the quality and content of the movie have much less importance than the fact that the title and plot are taken directly from a previously established and respected work. This time, music video director Dave Meyers was hired to update the original 1986 thriller and offers nothing stylistically that can't be found in the average car commercial.

Though marketed as a horror movie, The Hitcher is greatly lacking in shocks and scares. Instead, mediocre car-chase sequences occur too few and far between to redeem the film as a whole. Sophia Bush and Zachary Knighton are given at least 90% of the screen time and spend all of it struggling with atrociously unrealistic dialog like students in a freshmen acting class while Sean Bean weakly attempts to impersonate the raspy-voiced intensity that Rutger Hauer (the original Hitcher) built his entire career on.

– Robert O'Neill

© TLA Entertainment Group

Dave Chappelle's Block Party

(2006, 102 min) Sort of a kinder, gentler Wattstax (and also directed by an unlikely white dude), Dave Chappelle's Block Party boasts an all-star hip-hop lineup and an overt fight-the-power undertone. Yet as hosted by the affable Chappelle, it feels like not only could the revolution be televised, it could be done over pizza and cigarettes at the corner store.

At the September 18, 2004 concert there are the expected powerhouse performances by the reunited Fugees, Kanye West, The Roots and Erykah Badu (with and without an enormous afro), but it's Jill Scott who holds the audience most rapt with her tremendous voice and accompanying heavy guitars. The surprise of the show goes to Chappelle's fave Dead Prez, overtly political and conspicuously absent from the radio. All this takes place on a gentrifying corner in Bed-Stuy, where Chappelle and director Michel Gondry take the time to meet the neighbors and gently ad-lib.

It's also a love letter to Chappelle's hometown outside of Dayton Ohio, despite the racism simmering under the surface of that small city's 'burbs (and every small town for that matter). That's where he recruits many of the concertgoers, including a college marching band that's more ecstatic than the Three 6 Mafia's Oscars® appearance. They steal the show with their pragmatic optimism, and a killer cover of Kanye West's "Overnight Celebrity" that rivals anything onstage. Utilizing his newfound fortune, Dave Chappelle says "This is the concert I've always wanted to see"; afterwards, it's a good bet you'll feel the same way.

– David Gorgos

© TLA Entertainment Group

Neil Young: Heart of Gold

(2006, 103 min) A concert film is an unlikely candidate for "tearjerker of the year" status, but that's precisely what Jonathan Demme and Neil Young deliver in the bracingly intimate Heart of Gold. A minimal pre-show set-up introduces the band members on the way to Nashville's glorious Ryman Auditorium. It is in this somewhat banal dialogue that we learn that Young is just months removed from having had dangerous surgery to repair a brain aneurysm and losing his father as well. So as the concert opens, with songs off the heartfelt and personal "Prarie Wind" album, the recurring themes of death and loss seem ever more palpable.

Demme gets his cameras close up to all the performers, especially Young, and resists the urge for rhythmic cutting. Young's new material is simple, and the music is somewhat forgettable, but the emotion and delivery are breathtaking. Curiously, as the songs begin to seque into a greatest hits parade (Old Man, Needle and the Damage Done etc.), the performance fades even as the songs become stronger. Yet the themes still shine through and burn deep, all the way through the closing credits and a plaintive solo performance of "The Old Laughing Lady." It all feels like a beautiful elegy for a man who still has many good years left in him, thank God.

– David Gorgos

© TLA Entertainment Group

We Jam Econo: The Story of the Minutemen

(2006, 91 min) Even the majority of folks who grew up in the '80s had never heard of the blistering yet unclassifiable band The Minutemen who, despite constant touring, never achieved the breakout status of contemporaries Sonic Youth and Black Flag. Defying all convention, their music blended punk with elements of ska, surf, jazz and everything in-between, all the while keeping their songs around the 2-minute mark. Staying true to their San Pedro roots, they dressed working-class, and didn't live particularly fast, though their lead singer D. Boon died young — in a tragically ordinary car accident in 1985.

That left filmmaker Tim Irwin with a small collection of lo-fi concert footage and interviews with which to assemble the story of this hardworking band, but luckily, their lasting influence has also allowed Irwin access to interviews with a great many people you may have heard of: Flea, Henry Rollins, Jello Biafra and many others from the scene. Bassist Mike Watt has not aged particularly well, sounding like a classic California burnout in his spacey ramblings, but the essence of the band is there. It's not your typical Behind the Music story, just three friends who cared for each other and their music in equal portions.

Despite the inclusion of many complete songs, the feature film itself should leave viewers hungry for more... and this amazing 2-DVD set delivers with three complete concerts featuring over 60 songs in their entirety. Far from polished, these are still quite a step up from the bootlegs that have circulated for decades, capturing the band with all of their personality and raw intensity intact. It's the second disc that makes this an essential addition to the collection of any fan of punk and '80s indie music.

– David Gorgos

© TLA Entertainment Group

The Number 23

(2007, 95 min) Director Joel Schumacher tries his hand at the twisty psychological thriller genre to mixed results. The Number 23 pulls elements from such lackluster modern thrillers as Secret Window and Hide & Seek in order to elaborate upon a somewhat interesting gimmick involving the relevance of the number 23. From the sum of the digits in famous disasters (ex. 09-11-2001) to the number of chromosomes inherited from a parent, that pesky number seems to just pop up everywhere. It's a conspiracy theorist's playground, although the film itself admits that the lengths to which the concept is stretched are a bit much at times.

Walter Sparrow (Jim Carrey) leads an ordinary life as an animal controller until one day he is bitten by a mysterious dog who follows him throughout the film. This incident is recounted by Sparrow in a voice over that explains how it eventually led to his receiving a book entitled "The Number 23." The book concerns a detective (also Carrey, but a mean, Colin Farrell-in-Miami Vice-looking Carrey) who becomes obsessed with the number after a curse of sorts is passed on to him. Sparrow's home life begins mirroring that of the book, conspiracies are explored, and the inevitable big twist (or two) come and go without much involvement from the audience. The film's conclusion is a lengthy explanation that reveals occurrences rather than clues. Clues are required to logically lead the clever audience to the mystery's solution before the big reveal, but all this long series of flashbacks does is expose the naiveté of the scriptwriter who was obviously much too proud of his basic premise. The DVD will surely include at least a few alternate endings.

Carrey never seems truly comfortable in either of his roles, but he certainly does act his heart out. His saxophone playing tattooed detective is just plain goofy, but he carries it out to the best of his abilities with a menacing stare and a raspy voice. None of these high contrast, super saturated dime store novel scenes really work, but at least they make up the small percentage of the film that is blatant Schumacher.

It won't be remembered as one of the worst movies of the year (in fact it probably won't be remembered at all), but The Number 23 could easily have been a lot worse.

– Eric Bresler

© TLA Entertainment Group

Reno 911!: Miami

(2007, 84 min) Reno's bumbling police force heads to the big screen in this adaptation of the cult hit cable series. Comedy Central's film output in the past has ranged from the sublime (South Park: Bigger, Longer and Uncut) to the abysmal (Strangers with Candy) with Reno 911!: Miami, falling smack in the middle. The laughs are hit-or-miss, but the cast members seem more enthusiastic about their roles than ever before.

The faux-"Cops" style of the original series is preserved as the cameras follow Reno's finest to a police convention in Miami. Introductions are provided for the uninitiated although the characters themselves are such archetypes (the slut, the closet gays, the snappy black woman, etc.) that any viewer will immediately be in on the joke. Due to a clerical error they are refused admission to the convention and are thus unleashed upon the city like a bunch of college students on spring break. A plot is soon introduced involving a quarantine at the convention center, which results in the Reno fuzz being called upon to protect a defenseless city. This leads to the much shorter than expected series of hilarious encounters with Miami residents as well as one tagalong character from back home (Terry, the flamboyant, roller skating male prostitute, who is funnier than ever thanks to Nick Swardson). The quarantine eventually ties into the criminal activities of a mumbling, Scarface wannabe (played by Paul Rudd who is visibly enjoying himself) and the Reno cops return home heroes of a sort.

The film was written by its three main stars (two of which were also responsible for last year's mega-hit Night at the Museum) who were members of mid-'90s cult favorite comedy troupe The State. Its worth noting that all of the troupe's members appear in the film, although some of their screen times amount to mere seconds. There are plenty of guest stars and cameos from name actors that range from annoying (Danny Devito) to amusing (The Rock, Paul Reubens). Character actor/comedian Toby Huss hands in the film’s funniest performance as a vulgar hotel clerk that shouts obscenities at his residents. It's much funnier than it sounds.

Those who are unfamiliar with the television series will probably be scared off by a title that includes an exclamation point followed by a colon, but fans will be justly rewarded.

– Eric Bresler

© TLA Entertainment Group