Title: The Best and the Brightest Director: Josh Shelov Starring: Neil Patrick Harris, Bonnie Somerville, Amy Sedaris, Jenna Stern, Peter Serafinowicz, Christopher McDonald, Kate Mulgrew, Bridget Regan, John Hodgman, Stephen Park, Kelly Coffield Park Most big screen comedies — even a lot of independently mounted affairs — trade in the familiar, at least on a narrative level, operating under the assumption that audiences want to see witty banter and outlandish comeuppance visited upon recognizable scenarios that are easily transposed to a viewer’s own life, whether that’s workplace misery or the fickle nature of love. It’s unusual, then, to see something like The Best and the Brightest, a movie which eschews a more  [ Read More ]

Title: Conan O’Brien Can’t Stop Director: Rodman Flender Featuring: Conan O’Brien, Andy Richter and others After being very publicly forced out of his dream job as host of ‘The Tonight Show’ in order to make way for the return of Jay Leno (and his equally large contract and chin), Conan O’Brien was at a place most of us have been in our lives — very angry, but in front of a large group of people, and unable to really express or address it. Of course, O’Brien was being paid millions of dollars not to say anything, as the final legal details of his buyout and exit were hammered out. Still,  [ Read More ]

Title: The Pill Writer-director: J.C. Khoury Starring: Noah Bean, Rachel Boston, Anna Chlumsky, Dreama Walker, Al Thompson, Jean Brassard, Lue McWilliams A lot of Hollywood romantic comedies unfold in worlds that are virtually unrecognizable from the real one, where couples meet in strange fashion and relationships often overlap in messy ways. Writer-director J.C. Khoury’s engaging The Pill, which just enjoyed its world premiere at the 14th annual Dances With Films festival, is thankfully not one of those efforts. The movie centers around Fred (Noah Bean, Rose Byrne’s murdered fiance on Damages), a New Yorker who hooks up with the free-spirited Mindy (Rachel Boston), has pleasantly drunken but unfortunately unprotected sex, wakes up, and  [ Read More ]

Title: Stan Director: Evald Johnson Starring: John F. Schaffer, Gioia Marchese, Christina Diaz, Adam Lamb, Todd Patrick Breaugh, David Michie Watching the new indie dramedy ‘Stan’, which just had its world premiere at the ongoing, 14th annual Dances With Films festival, one could be forgiven, if they were so inclined, for letting their mind wander and recall the title track of Ben Folds’ excellent ‘Rockin’ the Suburbs’, in which he bemoans being “all alone in [his] white boy pain.” It’s not, after all, that the movie has no dramatic stakes, it’s just that they seem so small and quaint and, well, adorably solvable. A low-key effort, ‘Stan’ is more interested  [ Read More ]

Title: Stags Writer-director: Jamie Greenberg Starring: Benim Foster, Jesse Joyce, Mark Giordano, Jessica Faller, Matthew Rauch, Kimmy Gatewood For all the visual thrill that modern studio moviemaking provides, there’s still a special charge that comes from discovering or submitting to, essentially, just a wordsmith — someone with a fresh, canted comedic perspective, damn any sort of slick camera razzmatazz. It’s just that sort of loose-limbed joy one finds with ‘Stags’, a New York-set, sort of Jewish-inflected version of ‘Swingers’, in which an on-the-prowl group of guys approaching 40 cope with a friend’s marriage and sudden death. The feature film directorial debut of television veteran Jamie Greenberg (co-creator of ‘Where in  [ Read More ]

Title: Blood Night – The Legend of Mary Hatchet Directed by: Frank Sabatella Starring: Danielle Harris, Bill Moseley and Nate Dushku Running Time: 85 minutes, Rated R In 1978 during a thunderstorm, 12 year old Mary got her first period, cut off all her hair and kills her entire family with a hatchet. She was placed into a mental institution and 10 years later she was raped and impregnated by a perverse night guard. She loses the baby and goes on another rampage, killing the entire institutional staff in various ways. She is then gunned down by the police and becomes a sort of urban legend folk story. A handful  [ Read More ]

Title: True Blood Season 3 Directed by: Daniel Minahan, Scott Winant, Michael Lehmann, John Dahl, Lesli Linka Glatter and Anthony Hemingway Starring: Anna Paquin, Stephen Moyer, Sam Trammell, Ryan Kwanten, Alexander Skarsgard, Rutina Wesley, Nelsan Ellis, Deborah Ann Woll and Kristen Bauer van Straten. Running time: 720 minutes, Rated TV-MA, Available on Blu-ray Sookie and the rest of the residents of Bon Temps are back to fight off werewolves, werepanthers, and new vampire villains. Werewolves hooked on V (vampire blood which acts as a narcotic), kidnap vampire Bill and take him to Russell Edgington (Denis O’Hare), the vampire “King of Missisippi” where he once again comes face to face with  [ Read More ]

Title: Hector – Badge of Carnage: We Negotiate with Terrorists Developer: Telltale Games Downloadable on Windows XP, Vista or 7 and Mac You are Inspector Detective Hector, a portly badass Brit with an attitude. You are the only one who can negotiate  with a terrorist in order to save the lives of the hostages and possibly save the dwindling numbers of the Clappers Wreake police force. The game itself is fairly simple, click and double click to interact with characters and objects in order to advance each scene. There are objects in the game that you need to collect and combine to complete tasks; choose the wrong ones, and you  [ Read More ]

Pandora has now added comedy channels to its streaming content, joining the ranks of previously established outlets such as The Laugh Button. Both outlets provide streaming comedy audio for their users. The Laugh Button’s Editor-in-Chief Matt Kleinschmidt said this about Pandora’s new endeavors, “The Laugh Button Player had humble beginnings as a widget-only installation and has since grown to a full-blown website with a large catalog of comedy and just as much editorial content. The launch of Pandora’s comedy channel really does enhance what The Laugh Button has done for the last five years…It’s been a great few years for comedy and as more outlets embrace the public’s desire for  [ Read More ]

We might be partial to reviewing CDs of musical tracks, but it is invigorating when a CD falls into our lap that doesn’t consist of instruments and tempos infused with vocals. We might be new to evaluating comedic CDs, but Doug Stanhope’s, Oslo: Burning the Bridge to Nowhere , was a good place to start with our newest career addition. Stanhope’s premiere CD/DVD dropped May 3rd, via Roadrunner Comedy. The biggest mystery of the disc is where it was actually recorded. Clearly, being humorous isn’t within us, but it was worth an attempt. Oslo: Burning the Bridge to Nowhere was recorded in an abandoned factory in the suburb of, drum  [ Read More ]

Title: Killer Bong 3-D: The Wrath of Bong Directed by: Charles Band (Puppet Master) Starring: Dena Kollar, Christina DeRosa and John Patrick Jordan A meteor crash lands in a wooded park near Venice Beach and an old man who just buried his freshly murdered wife in a shallow grave. The meteor opens up to reveal an alien bong inside and a strange “plant” is sprouting out of the rock. The old man takes the bong to a local headshop on the Venice boardwalk where we are re-introduced to the stoners from the Evil Bong and Evil Bong II: King Bong films. The old guy sells the bong, stoner Bachman decides  [ Read More ]

Title: Win Win Director: Thomas McCarthy Starring: Paul Giamatti, Jeffrey Tambor, Amy Ryan, Alex Shaffer, Burt Young, Bobby Cannavale, Melanie Lynskey “Win Win” dabbles in a few genres. By doing so, the qualities of all these genres are delivered in a subtle manner. There is an ample amount of comedy and drama laced throughout; typically known as the modern-day dramedy. Add in the high school wrestling backdrop, and a nice little sport subplot is on display. In certain sequences, it may remind one of Hoosiers. Other times, it can feel like The Blind Side, with regards to the family-drama angle. Yet it cannot emulate the emotional value either of those  [ Read More ]

Title: Rare Exports: A Christmas Tale Director: Jalmari Helander Starring: Per Christian Ellefsen, Peter Jakobi, Tommi Korpela, Jorma Tommila, Jonathan Hutchings, Onni Tommila, Risto Salmi, Rauno Juvonen, Ilmari Jarvenpaa There’s nothing like a good tease every now and then. Rare Exports: A Christmas Tale is an 80 minute version of strip club teasing. Although one always want more, the majority of club patrons usually leave satisfied. This is the feeling when one will have after seeing this dark, humorous take on Santa and his elves. Having said that, even though the above gentlemen’s club reference rings true, there is the other aspect or reaction of being teased…Frustration. Since the trailer  [ Read More ]

Title: I Love You Phillip Morris Directors: Glenn Ficarra & John Requa Starring: Jim Carrey, Ewan McGregor, Leslie Mann, Rodrigo Santoro, Brennan Brown, David Jensen Just about everyone has heard the phrase, “Don’t mess with Texas.” Apparently, Steven Russell didn’t get that memo. He not only messed with Texas, he thoroughly embarrassed the lone star state time and time again. The manner in which he forges his way through life in this 102 minute feature titled I Love You Phillip Morris, has Hollywood scripting written all over it. But here’s the catch…This story really happened. Based on the exploits of con man extraordinaire – a.k.a. “King Con” – Phillip Morris  [ Read More ]

In this video from the Los Angeles premiere of “Shrek Forever After” on May 17th, Actors Mike Myers, Eddie Murphy and Antonio Banderas bid adieu to the ‘Shrek’ film series. The upcoming animated film “Shrek Forever After” aka Shrek Forever After: An IMAX 3D Experience by director Mike Mitchell (Sky High, Surviving Christmas) stars Cameron Diaz (Bobbie Sue, The Box), Eddie Murphy (Beverly Hills Cop IV, The Incredible Shrinking Man), Mike Myers (Inglourious Basterds), Antonio Banderas (Puss in Boots, Dali) and Ian McShane (Deadwood, Kings). Synopsis: Shrek is trapped in an alter Far Far Away where he must undo all mischief created by deal maker, Rumplestiltskin. In this alter universe,  [ Read More ]