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| Norwalk hosts 3 movie theaters in town - the Sono Regent 8 (tickets and showtimes), Royale 6 (tickets and showtimes) and Garden Cinema, along with the Maritime Aquarium's IMAX theater, and there are a number of other theaters within a 20 minute drive, including theaters in Stamford, New Canaan, Wilton, Bridgeport and Fairfield. The Norwalk Web Site is proud to present "Shadow Reviews", Robert Sodaro's column of selected movie reviews. Please let us know what you think, and if the reviews are helpful. We look forward to hearing from you. Current Reviews: X-Men Origins: Wolverine Drag Me to Hell X-Men Origins: Wolverine Rated PG-13 (107 Minutes)Starring: Hugh Jackman, Liev Schreiber, Danny Huston, Dominic Monaghan, Ryan ReynoldsDirected by: Gavin Hood Well, it is here, the long-awaited Wolverine prequel to the extremely-popular X-Men trilogy. And well, it was —quite frankly — everything that I figured it was going to be (actually, in spite of reading comics for 45 years, I only recently learned that Wolverine was like 150 years old. I mean, I knew he fought in WWII but that was about it). Needless to say, this is that back story. The film is supposed to capsulize all of that in a couple of hours, giving us all of the excitement of an X-Men comic (film) without the complete cast. Does it do it? As far as I’m concerned (in spite of the all of the faux fanboy whining), it totally delivers the goods. I enjoyed the backstory which let us in on the fact that Wolverine (and his brother, who winds up being Sabertooth), are about 150 years old, and then we watch as the two lads grow up and fight in virtually every single armed conflict from the mid 1800s to Vietnam, which is when the real story begins. (Interestingly enough, the opening sequence felt a bit like the opening to Watchmen, only with not as cool a soundtrack.) The film is fast and furious and plays well into the legions of who Wolverine is - hey, I’ve been reading comics since the very early ‘60s and until recently I didn’t know that Wolvie had this much back story (I stopped regularly reading X-Men in the mid ‘90s). Anyway, even though I recognized many of the characters (there were a couple I couldn’t completely place) and was aware of much of the plot threads that ran through the film, I still rather enjoyed what was going on in the film version of his past. The interaction between Logan (Jackman) and Creed (Liev Schreiber) plays well and you can see some of the animosity that will keep them at each other’s throats. We get to see how an already clawed Logan has Adamantium (a super-cool, wicked-hard comicbook metal) infused into his bones, and why and how he lost him memories (which he doesn’t fully regain until the X-Men trilogy). On the down side, those of you who don’t know as much about his visceral past might find some of this film a tad tedious, plus as this is all prequel there are no colorful costumes, and many of the characters that you might have gotten used to seeing in the first films simply aren’t here. Some folks might feel that most fans coming to view the film might want to see more of the kind of large-scale action from the first films, which is missing from this film, as it is much more of a personal story. As for spoilers, well I have a few of those if you care:
Top Drag Me to Hell Rated PG-13 (99 Minutes)Starring: Alison Lohman, Justin Long, Lorna Raver, Dileep Rao, David PaymerDirected by: Sam Raimi If you are a big horror fan or even if you're not such a big fan of horror (like the reviewer), this film is a wonderful gem of a film that hits on all cylinders, as it not only is intellectual and entertaining but delivers all the chills and jolts that you expect from a horror film without an overabundance of splatter gore. The film kick starts with a gypsy woman battling a demon that is coming after a young boy who was cursed by another woman for stealing from her. The gypsy is unable to prevent the youth from being dragged off to Hell. Flash forward three decades to get us to the main story. The story revolves around Christine Brown, an officer in a local bank who is competing with another loan officer for assistant branch manager. The branch manager tells her all she need do is deny a loan extension to an elderly gypsy woman. Christine (something of a soft touch) feels for the woman, but is told in no uncertain terms by the branch manager that she'll have a better chance at the promotion if she denies the woman the extension (which she does). As expected, this sets the woman off. First she begs for the extension, then she threatens, and finally curses Christine, after causing a scene and being forcibly ejected from the bank. That night as Christine leaves work she is attacked in the parking garage by the woman in a spectacular assault that trashes her car and nets the woman a button from Christine's coat (important later). From this point forward the creepiness of the film begins to ratchet up exponentially. Again, this is not a splatterpunk gorefest, but strange and spooky, and freakishly bizarre. Ultimately Christine meets w/a spookologist and sets up a meeting with the woman who fought the demon at the film's beginning. In the final analysis this is a fun, scary film that will make you jump but not gross you out. The film's conclusion isn't set in stone, nor is it entirely telegraphed, making for a pleasant surprise at the film's outcome, and returning Raimi to his horror roots. Top All Shadow movie reviews are copyright © 2009 Freelance Ink, All rights reserved. Reviews cannot be reprinted without specific, written permission from the author. Robert J. Sodaro has been writing professionally for over 20 years. During that time, his movie reviews and articles have appeared in numerous publications; currently his reviews appear on the Web here, at Popthought.com, and in print in MoreSugar. The opinions expressed in these reviews are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Norwalk Web Site. |
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