Big Gay Picture Show

Taking a look at the world of film through gay eyes - news, reviews, trailers, gay film, queer cinema and more

Taking a look at the world of film through gay eyes - news, reviews, trailers, gay film, queer cinema & more

DVD and BLU-RAY REVIEWS

The latest reviews from the world of home entertainment

Ouija: Origin Of Evil (Blu-ray Review) – The spirit board unlocks evil in the 1960s

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Set 50 years before 2014’s Ouija movie, this prequel takes us into the same house in the late 1960s. Alice Zander (Elisabeth Reaser) is running a fake séance business from the property, telling her clients what they want to hear about their deceased love ones. She decides a good gimmick would be to add a Ouija board to the ‘act’. However, as soon a she starts using it, her youngest daughter, Doris (Lulu Wilson), starts hearing voices that she believes are her dead father contacting her.

Alice initially thinks this is great, as Doris’ gift means that they can do the psychic thing for real and maybe even reconnect with the dead dad, but her other daughter, Lina (Annalise Basso), isn’t so sure. Turns out Lina’s uncertainty is well founded, as evil forces within the house start to possess Doris and make their malevolent presence known. [Read more…]

Mildred Pierce (Criterion Blu-ray Review) – The ultimate Joan Crawford film returns

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In the annals of film noir there’s nothing quite like Mildred Pierce, which manages not just to touch the bases of that particular brand of crime drama, but which is also a ‘women’s picture’, taking the issues of a working mother seriously. Even at the time it was made it was an unusual film, as evidenced by the original trailer, which presents Joan Crawford as a noir femme fatale full of malice, while in the actual movie she’s someone rather different.

Crawford is the titular Mildred, a housewife with two daughters and a rocky marriage. She’s keen to give her kids everything they want, especially the demanding Veda (Anny Blyth), who wants the best clothes, the most sophisticated life and plenty of money. After the total breakdown of Mildred’s marriage, she starts up a restaurant, hoping to give Veda the life she wants. [Read more…]

The 9th Life Of Louis Drax (DVD Review) – Jamie Dornan gets mysterious and magical realist

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The biggest problem with The 9th Life Of Louis Drax is the constant sense that this is a movie that could have been absolutely brilliant, but it sadly isn’t. It’s not bad, and there’s plenty that’s interesting about it (although it could have been fascinating), but it never quite manages to work out what it’s doing.

The titular Louis Drax is an accident prone nine-year-old boy, whose parents have recently separated. After falling from a cliff on an outing with his mother and father, he is rushed to the hospital in a coma, where he comes under the care of Dr. Allan Pascal (Jamie Dornan). Louis also needs protection, as it’s believed his father, Peter (Aaron Paul), caused the accident and is now on the run. [Read more…]

Urban Hymn (DVD Review) – Can music bring hope to a discarded youth?

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Jamie (Letitia Wright) is a young woman who’s been brought up in children’s homes and is used to being treated as a problem to be ‘handled’. Together with her tough best friend Leanne (Isabella Laughland) she’s not averse to getting into a bit of trouble, including getting involved in the 2011 London riots.

When new children’s home worker Kate (Shirley Henderson) shows an interest in her music, Jamie assumes this is just another do-gooder with no clue how to actually help. However, after Kate invites Jamie to audition for the choir she’s a part of, Jamie starts to wonder whether there really is a new opportunity here and someone who really wants to help and support her. However, it’s not going to be an easy road, especially as Leanne is determined not to accept any help, and with her need to violently retaliating to maintain status and to demand people meet her on her dangerous terms, she could prevent Jamie from making the most of the opportunities her music could offer. [Read more…]

Deepwater Horizon (Blu-ray Review) – Mark Wahlberg faces a real-life maritime disaster

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In 2010 the worst maritime oil spill ever took place in the Gulf Of Mexico, after an explosion on the Deepwater Horizon drilling platform. At the time, the media was so fixated on the oil that it was easy to overlook the fact that the initial disaster on Deepwater Horizon was truly cataclysmic and resulted in the deaths of 11 people.

Peter Berg’s movie sets out to redress the balance somewhat, depicting what happened on the platform and the horrific events the survivors endured. [Read more…]

Blair Witch (Blu-ray Review) – Back into the supernatural Black Hills woods for more found footage

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When it was announced at Comic Con that Adam Wingard’s The Woods (which already had a bit of hype about it even though no one knew much about it) was actually a sequel to The Blair Witch Project, it seemed a bit of a masterstroke of marketing. Immediately a movie that might otherwise have elicited shrugs and accusations of cashing in on a dead franchise, instead jumped to the top of horror fanboys interest lists.

Now though it’s starting to seem like it might have worked a little too well, as it raised the hype level so high that unless the actual movie turned out to be a surprising and zeitgeist-capturing as the original 1999 film, it was bound to be seen as disappointing. And that’s just what happened when it was released in cinemas, with most people seeing it as more of remake than a sequel – and it was actually outgrossed by the almost universally derided earlier follow-up, Book Of Shadows. [Read more…]

The Infiltrator (Blu-ray Review) – Bryan Cranston goes undercover laundering drug money

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Bryan Cranston is US Customs Official Bob Mazur, who specialises in going undercover to take down the bad guys. Following a successful sting where he gets injured, he’s told he’s eligible to retire. Instead he takes on a new job, going back undercover as shady business Robert Musella.

While his partner, Emir (John Leguizamo), infiltrates the lower ranks of the drug world, Bob works his way into the trust of those higher up the narcotics chain, posing as a man capable of laundering millions of dollars for Pablo Escobar’s Medellin drug cartel. The further into this world he goes the more dangerous it gets, necessitating the need for a fake fiancée (Diane Kruger), and having to pretend his wife is his secretary to help ensure his real family is kept safe, all while knowing that if he’s found out he’ll get a bullet in the brain. [Read more…]

Kubo and the Two Strings (Blu-ray Review) – Into Laika’s incredible stop-motion Samurai world

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Kubo is a young boy, living secluded with his mother inside a mountain. Each day he goes to the nearby village and tells stories, using his magic to enact them to the villagers with moving origami figures. He tells the story of his heroic father, who was killed trying to save Kubo from his evil grandfather, the Moon King. Kubo lost an eye in the attack, but he and his mother managed to escape.

Kubo’s mother has told him there is one big rule – he must be home before darkness falls. However, while trying to honour his dead father the sun goes down and he comes under attack from his aunts. His mother uses the last magic to get Kubo to safety, telling him that his only way to protect himself is to find three magical pieces of armour that will make him nearly invulnerable. With his mother gone, Kubo’s only protection comes from Monkey, a charm that his mother brought to life as part of her final act, as well as Beetle, a man-size warrior bug they come across, who’s had his memory erased. [Read more…]

Donnie Darko (2-Disc Blu-ray Review) – Donnie & Frank the rabbit get an upgrade

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Quite often, movies that were quirky, unusual flavours-of-the-month have been quietly forgotten after 15 years, and when you do come across them again, you wonder what all the fuss was about. Not so with Donnie Darko, which retains both its cult and mainstream appeal, with enough love that it recently got a small cinema re-release and now Arrow Video have come up with one hell of a Blu-ray package for it.

Not only do you get the film in both its Theatrical and Director’s Cut form, but they’re based on a brand new 4K restoration supervised by Richard Kelly (although by necessity it’s only 2K resolution on the Blu-ray), and it comes with an almost ridiculous amount of special features both old and new. [Read more…]

Julieta (Blu-ray Review) – Pedro Almodovar returns with a new Spanish tale

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The latest from Spanish auteur Pedro Almodovar follows Julieta (Emma Suarez), a middle-aged woman contemplating leaving Madrid and going to live in Portugal with her boyfriend Lorenzo (Darío Grandinetti). A chance encounter with a childhood friend of her daughter who informs her that her estranged child is now living in Switzerland and has three children, causes Julieta to rethink her plan to leave Madrid, in case her child ever wants to contact her again.

The film then takes us back to a young Julieta (Adriana Ugarte), a woman just starting out in life, who meets Galician fisherman Xoan (Daniel Grao) on a train, where their passionate encounter results in both a pregnancy and the start of a love affair. Once their child, Antia, is born, Julieta tries to juggle her job, motherhood and Xoan, attempting to create an idyll for their child. However, a terrible accident changes everything and eventually leads to a separation. [Read more…]