Donkey X (Includes Digital Copy)

Rucio's Unique Version of a Literary Classic
If you're new to my animation feature film review library, I should begin this review by disclaiming a trend in the genre that nearly always ends disastrously: Domestic studios importing foreign films, slapping an English vocal track atop of the material, and claiming it as their own. The list of films guilty of this technique is long and ever growing. Considering Donkey X falls into this category, there was a strong suspicion going in that this one would be a proverbial train wreck. Worse still, the few reviews I was able to track down seemed to confirm such reservations. Fortunately I can begin this critique by assuring prospective viewers that of all the foreign translation jobs, this one is perhaps the most pleasant.

Released in Spain back in 2007, Donkey X (or "Donkey Xote" as it was originally called) tells the tale of a small town (La Mancha) where there resides a dreamer named Don Quixote (voiced by Steve Salazar).

Don is able to convince his close...

A nice, fun, and respectful take on a classic
As a Spaniard I was a little skeptical of retake on the literary classic of Don Quijote. However, the project was dominated by Spaniards who are able to respect the original work and poke fun it at the same time. My seven year old loved it and laughed his head off. I was also impressed with the attention to detail. For example the moon waxes and wanes along with the story accurately. Donkey Xote

H-O-R-R-I-B-L-E
Please don't put yourself through this. Even worse, don't put your kids through this. The movie tries hard to be intelligent but fails miserably. It was difficult to follow the convoluted plot which kids will never figure out. Even IF the dialog was written well, lines go by too fast to make sense of what they are talking about. Maybe it makes more sense in Spanish but I highly doubt it. Do your family a favor and pass on this one because it will be 90 minutes of your life you can never get back ;) Oh yeah, the graphics were decent.

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Secret of the Cave

Great family movie - Beautifully shot!
Just purchased and viewed this film for the first time. This will make you want to travel to Ireland! Truly breathtaking vistas are faithful to what we enjoyed on our trip.

The film is an interesting look into the life of a small village that is truly a community. The plot involves a mystery surrounding the death of a local villager, and the strange happenings that follow during and immediately following the funeral. I recommend this for the whole family!

One of the very best family films of the year, maybe the decade.
"Secret of the Cave" is an outstanding film that takes place in Scotland. It was put together as a college project by Southern Adventist University and the viewer will have no doubt that all those connected have a great career ahead of them. It is not a film that pushes any one faith or doctrine other than how we can relate to each other and to God. Unlike so many films made by beginners, this film is very professional and there is no way any thing connected in its making can be faulted. The extras alone are worth the price. I fully applaud this project and hope the school and the young people involved will continue the good work. We need more Christian film makers like this.

Secret of the Cave - fantastic buy
This movie is breathtaking. It's a great movie for children and adults alike. Wonderful plot that keeps your attention all the way through.

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The Wild Man of the Navidad

Funny
Made on no budget, this was a decent first feature. The genre gets a reboot; this is very grindhouse, go-go 70s-style, so you'd need to be a fan of those to enjoy it.

I love southern horror!
'The Wild Man of the Navidad' definitely has that 70's camp feel to it! When watching it, I could clearly see that it pays homage to such films as: 'The Texas Chainsaw Massacre', 'The Legend of Boggy Creek', 'Creature From Black Lake' etc. Even though it does pay homage to those films, it doesn't over do it in such a way that it would be ripping off its predecessors. It is truly original and I can easily see this becoming a cult classic over time. It just has to! Besides this being a low low budget flick, I could tell the makers behind it wanted their legendary wild man to say as campy as if it were depicted in 70's cinema. And by that I mean this isn't the scariest beastly-looking man that is seen by todays Horror movie standards (today being the keyword). Don't get me wrong, this wild man does play out a creepy vibe! I love how the wild man is portrayed. It's realistic. It's believable. Some viewers will not get it. I'm going to go out on a limb and say younger audiences...

arthouse/grindhouse
Not bad for a micro-budget 1st feature...
I'll give it an "A" for ingenuity...
& it really is a nice-looking film...
I like the way they tweaked the digital imagery
to almost fool you into thinking you're looking
at 16mm reversal blown up to 35
to show on some drive-in circuit!

& the thoughtfully cheezy script is nicely whack...
Combine that with a brilliant supporting local cast
& you're in for almost 90 minutes of free wheelin' no budget fun!

the monster suit is pretty much film school surreal...
& I mean this mostly in a positive way...
You know the thing about how seeing the zipper in the monster suit
breaks the spell of our suspension of disbelief...
Well, this monster suit is made of nothing BUT zippers!
The result is a sort of dissociative archetypal thing that ends up
slamming you face first into a real arthouse/grindhouse boogeyman...

More fun than too scarey...which adds to...

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Lonely Street

Lonely Street better than expected
Okay, straight to DVD didn't hold much promise, but I couldn't resist the price. The truth is, it's really rather good. I agree with other viewers, the actor playing Elvis was superb. And don't miss the video (under special features) "When the Rebel Comes Home" - worth the price of the DVD alone. Entirely plausible, you could well imagine this is what the King would have looked like if he'd lived and decided to make a comeback - and I'm not even remotely an Elvis fan. P.S. Ignore the review saying Jay Mohr is constantly naked throughout; there is no nudity, male or female.

Lonely Street
If you are looking for a funny movie that has an idea that has not been beat to the ground like so many, this is the one! Cast is good and Robert Patrick as the KING is worth the price of the film alone!

Loved 75 year old Elvis
We saw this movie on the big screen in a theatre in Bartlett (Memphis) Tennessee. We four Elvis fans loved how Robert Patrick portrayed Elvis at 75. The make-up was great, and Robert did a great job of bringing a healthy Elvis to life. The movie was funny, and if you're an Elvis fan, you'll really enjoy how he is represented in this movie.

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Fragments

Unpredicted Terror, Unexpected Consequences
FRAGMENTS (AKA Winged Creatures) is an uncomfortable movie: the subject matter of spontaneous unsuspected violence and the subsequent impact on the lives of those who survive a near death situation is terrifying. FRAGMENTS takes a moment in time and then reveals how that moment alters the psyche and behavior of numerous people from children to adults. It is disconcerting to watch, but at the same time it makes us face the possibilities of how isolated cracks in the universe can alter our lives. As the tagline suggests 'You have to lose your way to find it.'

The film opens with a day in a Los Angeles diner where a gunman enters and randomly opens fire on the customers at the tables and the staff serving them and then kills himself. We are forced to watch this happen but through the eyes of the people attempting to dodge the attack. Among these are a waitress (Kate Beckinsale), a man seated at the counter being denied attention as he glances at his new brochures on...

Was pleased with the overall performances...bare bones DVD though
There have been inevitable comparisons to a slew of other films for this one, but in the end it manages to convey its own little message of loss and PTSD fallout (in various age groups).

The four main story lines and one subplot of a restaurant shooting are mixed into a time line of flashbacks and present day tapestry. For me, Dakota Fanning was the central character and had the biggest epiphany moment at the end, so I think fans of hers will be pleased. Forest Whitaker stumbled onto the set from his last four films of a similar nature, so I rate this on a higher element because of the editing alone, maybe the music and the moment of clarity given to the central story at the end. Since Kate Beckinsale's and Guy Pearce's characters were both totally unlikeable and despicable, I have to call this a Fanning film again.

The sound and picture are solid, but the supplement was inconsequential. I did listen to most of the commentary, but it was one of those that...

Worth a Look
Fragments is a similar movie to "Crash" and "Babel" in that it juggles several stories simultaneously. The difference here is that we follow the stories after they diverge from a single violent act.

A man walks into a diner, pulls a gun, and starts shooting people at random. Some are killed. Some are wounded. He finally turns the gun on himself and the episode is over. We follow the aftermath of several of the survivors and how the incident has changed their lives.

This is a fine ensemble cast of veterans who all do a good job with their rolls. It's acted well and directed well. The music is somewhere between spooky and somber and doesn't intrude on the proceedings.

I suppose my problem with the film lies at the script level. We follow several stories but three of them are key and a couple of them I didn't really understand. The third (with Dakota Fanning) involved a particular point that maybe shouldn't have been so devastating to her and might not...

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Cravings

WORTH A LOOK
This is a sick little movie. It's not a vampire flick, but it is about some seriously disturbed people, some of whom have a demented addiction to the taste of blood.

A psychiatrist who has recently faced the suicide of his wife and the accidental death of his mother, tries to overcome his deep grief by resuming his activities as a psychiatrist at a local hospital. He is assigned to the case of a teenage girl who has been cutting herself. Turns out she's not only cutting herself, but others as well, and drinking the resulting blood.

The psychiatrist eventually gets involved intimately with the girl's attractive widowed mother, which turns out to be a bad idea.

The progression of the movie wanders a bit, there is a suggestion that the psychiatrist is being haunted by the presence of his desceased wife..., the bathtub she died in keeps mysteriously filling itself up every night. But this part of the movie never fleshes out and is sort of left hanging...

A better film than its dishonest promotion would suggest
This is an interesting little psychological thriller, if more than a bit sadistic, which was unfortunately promoted dishonestly in the U.S. by Lionsgate as a vampire flick. (Lionsgate even changed the title from Daddy's Girl to Cravings.) Many disappointed viewers, taken in by this crooked advertising, hated the film from the get-go.

The movie is about a psychiatrist, wonderfully played by Welsh actor Richard Harrington (Lark Rise to Candleford), who is at an extremely low point in his life. His wife has recently committed suicide by slitting her wrists and his mother is near death from leukemia. Returning to work before he's ready, he takes on a new patient, a teenage girl who likes to cut herself so that she can drink her own blood.

We're told she is suffering from Renfield's Syndrome. (Renfield was the non-vampire character in Dracula who craved blood.) Before long, the psychiatrist learns the hard way that the girl's blood cravings are not restricted to...

Daddy's Girl (Cravings)
I almost didn't watch this film because of the over-abundance of ridiculous Vampire movies, shows, novels, and all else which have flooded the market within the past few months. Personally, I'm sick to death of the entire genre and what they have done to the traditional folklore reguarding Vampires. Yet, it was highly recommended that I ignore the deceptive cover art and watch this particular film. And, I must say that I was not disappointed in the least. The whole product was excellent. The cast, their acting abilities, the story, the realistic quslity of the effects, etc. Wonderful film. Now, I highly recommend that you watch this film.

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Gorehouse Greats Collection (12 Movie Collection)

Amazing Value! Even if only a fraction are really good!
The Gorehouse Greats 3-disc DVD collection is a fantastic set if you love horror movies of any kind, including dated, low-budget, drive-in or grindhousey ones, because that's what you get here. This set holds 12 feature films, an amazing amount for the price you can sometimes find this at, considering that these aren't the same public domain horror films that have been on dollar DVD releases for years. These films are all from Crown International Pictures, released by Mill Creek Entertainment in a pretty cool looking case, and are a really nice variety of plots. I'll describe the films below, pointing out my faves. Bear with me though, as I'm listing them as they're listed on the back of the DVD case, and they just happened to list the best ones near the bottom...

"Blood of Dracula's Castle": A young couple inherits a castle in the middle of nowhere, but to move in they have to first evict the current tenants, Dracula and his wife and staff. This ended up being the last...

Good deal for late night horror fans
If you are like me and grew up with late night "creature feature" type programs. You have probably seen at least some of these movies before. None are really that "gory", but all are fun bad movies. There are actually a few actually good little flicks hidden in this collection as well. For this price you can't really go wrong. I have many of Millcreek Entertainments other sets and have been happy with most of them. I'm pleased to say that none of these movies has yet to be repeaded in any of their 20 or 50 movie sets.

Scratchy classics, just like the 70's drive-in
Let me just start off with saying not everyone will go for these movies, but if you were a true drive-in goer from the early days, you'll probably lap these up, scratchy prints and all (I remember some prints at the drive-in were indeed very scratchy)
As this set features everything from Hitlers head, snakes to wax dummies, now how can you beat a collection like that?
I have to take my hat off to Mill Creek, what they can lack in quality and to be fair some prints are quite good, they sure make up in quantity and price, while offering some very rare gems, warts and all.

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