AMC’s ‘The Killing’: Episode 8 – “Stonewalled”

If you’re behind, maybe read these first:
–  AMC’s ‘The Killing’: Episodes 1 to 5 – Suspect List
– AMC’s ‘The Killing’: Episode 6 – “What You Have Left”
AMC’s ‘The Killing’: Episode 7 – “Vengeance”

Tonight’s episode I thought really picked up the pace from last week. We are now 8 days into the investigation of Rosie’s murder. Linden still hasn’t left Seattle and when we last saw our Detectives they had just been ordered to the floor by and FBI Tactical Unit…

As always, the show is broken into 3 interwoven chapters, all running concurrent, each focusing one of three groups: The Detectives, the Larsens, or the Richmond campaign.

This episode opens with Holder and Linden are in handcuffs and we get to see some of the room they broke into. Linden noticed a pink sweatshirt and makes clear that she not only believes a girl was held captive in this room, but that Rosie was that girl. The Feds are investigating terrorist activity and believe that Linden and Holder have just jeopardized their case. It doesn’t help that crime scene photos have somehow been leaked to the press, and Linden suspects Holder is behind it.

The FBI sequesters all of the Police files on the Larsen case and we learn it was Linden’s son who betrayed her by sharing crime scene photos with his friends, which obviously then made way to the press. Sarah Linden is then basically told to leave town by her boss, as it would be ‘best for everyone’. Very High Noon. For those unfamiliar with the Gary Cooper classic, it’s about a lawman who hands in his badge in hopes of leaving town and moving on towards a peaceful retirement with his new spouse. On the day he is to leave, evil returns to town only to draw him back in to finish what he started without the backing of the town, most of whom think trouble could just be avoided all together if he just left. Quite a humbling experience. Sound familiar?

This episode also finally shows us who Holder is, a repentant man who has made mistakes and is now attempting amends. This is the episode where Holder is really becomes more than a set piece, and can finally be accepted by not only Sarah Linden, but the audience as well. Linden’s brutal humbling brings her to see Holder in a new light and they finally seem to be on the same page moving forward.

The Richmond campaign seems to be continuing it’s downward spiral as Darren himself is attending the parole hearing for the woman who killed his wife. While there is has to contemplate weither or not to release some damning info on Mayor Adams and tarnish his moral standing. The emotion of the parole hearing drives him to play dirty and news comes out that the Mayor has been supposedly keeping a mistress/former intern. If the cops are our principal point of view, and the politicians our the hierarchy, than the Larsens must be the common man perspective.

A lot of what happens in the Larsen household seems small scale compared the war for the Mayoral title or the investigation into the killing, but it reminds us of the stakes for which the character’s actions play into. The Larsen family seems to be falling apart. In the week plus since their daughter’s body was found life seems to be moving at a crawl. Mitch’s condition is not helped when she sees photos of her dead daughter on the news, which leads to some careless parenting. Stan knows that a change is needed and starts to pack up Rosie’s room. This is where we really see the seam split. Mitch and Stan both blame the other for what happened and you can already see a major strain on a marriage, that just a week earlier seemed still full of passion.

Overall I really liked this episode. For the first time it solidified the Detectives as a team, proved Darren a fighter, and gave a valuable look into the break down of a family. Oh, and did I mention it ended with a phone call that put our old friend Bennett firmly back a top the suspect list? This show has found its flow and seems to really be moving now.

I give the episode 4 out of 5 Bears.

Review: HBO’s Game of Thrones, Episode 5 – ‘The Wolf and The Lion’

After such a cliffhanger last week I’m sure everyone is just eager as hell to get into this week’s episode. Once more, the opening title showed us a new place the show will be visiting: The Eyrie, which is the home to Catelyn Stark’s sister and John Arryn’s widow Lysa Arryn. I think everyone will get a kick out of her.

The episode starts out with the tournament of the King’s Hand still proceeding. Ned gets to see the body of Ser Hugh, musing as to how he was so lucky to face down the Mountain. The joust continues in the next scene where get to see a lot more of Ser Gregor and are introduced to Loras Tyrell “The Knight of Flowers” who is a bit of a pretty boy. The joust goes well, but not for Gregor again, as he is unseated by Tyrell. Gregor definitely knows that Tyrell’s mare was in heat and caused his stallion to be a little skittish. But before he takes out his frustrations on Ser Loras, he gives his horse a final reminder of keeping in line… by chopping it’s head off!

Picture courtesy of Warming Glow

His attack on Loras falls short as the Hound and brother to Gregor steps in to stop in. This is more due to his hatred of Gregor than any goodwill to the Tyrells.

Gregor is a badass

Continue reading Review: HBO’s Game of Thrones, Episode 5 – ‘The Wolf and The Lion’

Vintage Reviews: Phantasm

The problem with Phantasm is that on one level it’s rubbish. And that is as far as some people will see, but if you look a little deeper you’ll find a gem – although it is in the rough.

Phantasm is about Jody (Bill Thornbury), his younger brother Mike (A. Michael Baldwin) and their friend Reggie (Reggie Bannister) – who is an ice cream man – and their attempt to stop ‘The Tall Man’ (Angus Scrimm – Femme Fatales) from stealing corpses to turn into an undead, dwarf slave army. It’s that simple.

It is – unsurprisingly – a horror film, but it’s more of an old school horror film. It’s quite low on gruesome horror and gore. Most of the film is blood free – or yellow gloop free, as that passes for monster blood here – and there are only three on-screen deaths. It isn’t low on terror though. It’s the slow building kind.


The Tall Man and the glimpse of a hooded dwarf figure is all you get at the start of the film. Even though it pretty much begins with a death. It isn’t untill Mike breaks in to the funeral home that things change and the horror becomes full force.

It’s at this point in the movie that one of the most famous – iconic, no doubt – horror creations appears. The thing that most people will associate with Phantasm. The Silver Ball.

If a person knows nothing else about Phantasm they’ll probably know about the ball. It’s more recognizable than The Tall Man. So it is a surprise how little it’s in the film. It appears at this change point in the film, when the terror goes from unknown dread to full on attack. It whooshes into the film with no explanation, looking impressive. It’s here that the second death occurs. And it is the most bloodiest.

Picture courtesy of Phantasm Archives…

The ball only appears once more. It’s on-screen for less than 5 minutes. But boy does it create a lasting impression. However, there is no explanation for it. Like the old fortune-teller near the start of the film, it’s introduced and the it’s gone. No reason.

There are other elements that show up; things that make no sense; apparent holes in the story. From the Lady in Lavender to the weird red planet to the strange photograph Mike finds in the antique shop that’s never mentioned again. There is Myrtle, the house maid, who is introduced just to startle Reggie and is never seen again. The list seems long…

The Lady in Lavender…

This slightly haphazard approach to story telling could be seen as a weakness, but it wasn’t the original intention. Most of it occurred through editing of the film to get it down from a bloated – though more logical – 3 hours to a more cinema friendly 90 minutes.

The film gets more and more bizarre untill it reaches its climax, and doesn’t so much end as implode! The ending could leave you scratching your head, in which case you’ve kind of missed the point. The whole film plays out like a nightmare. The sort that starts out strange and then drags you into the darkness.

There are dark lonely roads. Endless pursuit. An evil presence that just can’t be stopped. The terror when you think you’ve awoken, but you’re still asleep. This why it seems to make no sense, because dreams – and nightmares – seldom do.

There are a few niggles. The acting is, at times, hammy, and the special effects are a little ropey. Considering though that most of the actor where fairly inexperienced, it was made on a small budget, and this was only the third film made by Don Coscarelli, I’m willing to over look these. Released just a year after John Carpenter‘s Halloween, this movie helped to usher in the ‘Decade of Horror’ know as the the 1980’s.

It is, over all, extremely entertaining, as long as you’re willing to just go along for the ride. Try and make too much sense out of it all and you’ll not enjoy it – and have a headache.

I’m giving it 4/5 Bears.

Blitz: Jason Statham and the Cop Killer

In a rare departure from his usual role, Jason Statham will play a hard-ass cop who beats the crap out of people. But the big change is that it’s supposed to be good. Don’t get me wrong, I enjoy seeing the Stath lay the beat-down as much as the next guy, but most of his movies aren’t what you call…plot heavy. Well this one might not be either, but currently on IMDb it has a 9/10, and Rotten Tomatoes has yet to give it a negative review.

The story is about a guy – Blitz – who is going around and murdering cops. That’s not nice. Statham is a cop who doesn’t want to be murdered by some hipster in neon colored glasses, so he gets proactive. Here is the trailer…

Aside from the Stath, we also get Blitz himself, played by Aidan Gillen who was on the master work HBO show The Wire, and is currently on the master work HBO show A Game of Thrones.

Also showing up in the trailer was Paddy Considine, who was in Cinderella Man, and more importantly, the Edgar Wright masterpiece Hot Fuzz. Guy is great.

So what do you think – Yeah or Nay?

Movie Trailer Roundup: The Way Back, Wrecked, & Terri

Here are a few trailers that might have passed you by, because they passed me by…

THE WAY BACK
This first trailer is for a movie that hit theater with a limited release a few months back and I never saw sight one of it. It stars Jim Sturgess (Across the Universe), Mark Strong (Green Lantern), Ed Harris (Creepshow), Colin Farrell (Fright Night, Horrible Bosses) and Saoirse Ronan (Hanna). It’s about a group of Siberian Gulag escapees walk 4000 miles overland to freedom in India.

Wrecked
Staring DJ Qualls Adrien Brody as an amnesic car crash victim who might also be a bank robber and murderer. I thought it looked interesting, but people who saw didn’t seem impressed. It has only a 4.9/10 on IMDb and a 57% on Rotten Tomatoes. It’s currently available On Demand for Comcast customers…

Terri
This one is actually still new, it comes out July 1st and stars John C. Reilly (Step Brothers, Chicago), Creed Bratton (The Office), and new comer Jacob Wysocki. This is getting pretty high marks all around, and compiles to Reilly’s already long list of indie-movie comedies.

http://youtu.be/YLGW6sdHy0g

So that’s it for this first Trailer Roundup. Hope you saw something you might want to see.

Hemsworth Is The Huntsman In Snow White

The role that Hugh Jackman, Johnny Depp and Viggo Mortensen all passed on has now been claimed by the Mighty Thor – Chris Hemsworth. He will star in Snow White and the Huntsman along with Kristen Stewart.

Hemsworth will of course play said Huntsman and Stewart will play perhaps the ugliest Snow White there could have ever been. She has the face of a rodent and I stand by that claim no matter what anyone says. So don’t anyone challenge me on it. Here is a plot synopsis, which of course could be completely different by the time a trailer is released:

An updated take on the Brothers Grimm tale, “Snow White and the Huntsman” follows Snow White (Kristen Stewart) after The Evil Queen (Charlize Theron) calls upon The Huntsman (Chris Hemsworth), to try to kill her. The Huntsman, who is haunted by the death of his wife by a white wolf, goes off to kill the innocent princess but then has a change of heart. He decides to mentor her and teach her to fight off The Evil Queen, thus turning her into a legendary heroine. –MovieNewz

I’m not sure what to make of this movie at all, but I can’t blame Hemsworth for taking the role. After Thor he’s going to be all over the place. He’s already set to star in Joss Whedon’s Cabin in the Woods and of course the Avengers. He is also starring in the remake of Red Dawn (filmed locally) which has already completed filming. The sky is the limit for this guy.

Someone try and dispute that!