Twilight is beautiful to look at, with its sweeping vistas, picturesque small town streets and almost inhumanly beautiful cast. It’s well filmed, though there are far too many close-ups and tight two-shots for my taste. The editing is flawlessly; Catherine Hardwicke does a perfectly fine job of eliciting performances from the cast – and the casting is as close to perfect as humanly possible [though Edward really should be a redhead if you want a precise translation from the novel which, yes, I read in anticipation of the movie].

Robert Pattinson and Kristen Stewart work well as Edward Cullen and Isabella “Bella” Swan. Their chemistry is almost overwhelming in those close-ups and two-shots. Billy Burke is spot on as Bella’s police chief dad, Charlie, and Sarah Clarke is as effective as her mother, Renee Dwyer. Both the school kids and Edward’s family are equally appropriate – though Ashley Greene’s Alice is a small scale revelation.

So why doesn’t Twilight work?

Well, there are far too many moments that might work for fans, but there are as many that will be a source of humor to people who come in to the film cold. Plus there are moments where the film is perhaps too faithful to the books. The lingering looks that Edward and Bella exchange over the course of Twilight could amount to nothing more than two adolescents mooning over each other [“You’re so pretty,” or “You smell so good”]. It comes down to the script isn’t really structured well. There’s too much of the so-close-you-see-the-valleys-in-their-pores close-ups, and the use of a narrator is more than occasionally intrusive [the movie rule being “show – don’t tell”].

If you’re a student of film, you can certainly appreciate how well the film is made. Technically, it’s pretty damn close to perfect – from casting through final edit. If only the the story wasn’t so thin. All that angst and mooning might work in a Harlequin Romance, but in a moving picture [emphasis on “moving”], it simply doesn’t cut it – and not even the brawl between Edward and the evil James [Cam Gigandet] can save it.

Final Grade: C-

It’s been thirty years since a little horror movie changed the genre forever and gave John Carpenter a career. Halloween was something completely different – a story about a killer child who grew up to become the personification of evil, Michael Myers. To celebrate this anniversary, Anchor Bay Entertainment has packaged the three best films in the series along with a documentary on the Halloween phenomenon in a gorgeous display package featuring what they describe as “an exclusive display replica of the Michael Myers mask, which has become THE face of horror for the last three decades [sorry, head not included]! The six-disc set contains three versions of Halloween, Halloween 4: The Return of Michael Myers and Halloween 5: The Revenge of Michael Myers.

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Here is something fun. The folks behind the upcoming Indie Horror DVD Trailer Park of Terror give us a sneak at the film and a behind the scenes look at the makeup effects, that were created by the world class Drac Studios, the folks who also did the makeup effects on the upcoming Watchmen movie. Featuring top production values, the film’s special makeup effects were created by the Academy Award winning effects house Drac Studios (Todd Tucker, Harvey Lowry, Greg Cannom), whose numerous film credits include the upcoming Brad Pitt starrer The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, Mrs. Doubtfire, Bram Stoker’s Dracula, Pirates of the Caribbean, Apocalypto and Titanic. Trailer has already become a fan favorite at five film festivals including Slamdance (Park City, UT), Fangoria’s Weekend of Horrors (LA) and Fantasia (Montréal).

In Trailer Park of Terror, six troubled high school students and their chaperon, an optimistic youth ministries Pastor, return from an outdoor character building retreat in the mountains. During a raging storm, their bus crashes, hopelessly stranding them in the middle of the Trucker’s Triangle, a forgotten locus of consummate evil in the middle of nowhere. The hapless group seeks shelter for the night in a seemingly abandoned trailer park they find down the road. However, when the sun sets, it’s not refuge they find. Instead, terror finds them in the form of Norma, a damned redneck reaper with a killer body who dispenses vengeance and death aided by her cursed companions, a bloodthirsty brood of Undead trailer trash.

The Sci Fi Channel’s new series, Sanctuary [Fridays, 9/8C] is adapted from the internet series of the same name. It revolves around Dr. Helen Magnus and her “sanctuary for all.”

Dr. Will Zimmerman [Robin Dunne] is a mess. A forensic psychologist, he’s lost his job with the FBI and now plies his trade with a police force that pays no attention to his theories and opinions. When he attempts to help the police investigate a triple homicide – including two police officers – he begins an adventure that will clear up mysteries that have tormented him since he was eight years old, even as he encounters new mysteries that will change the way he thinks, acts and maybe even dreams.

Who is Dr. Helen Magnus [Amanda Tapping]? Who is the blonde Valkyrie [Emilie Ullerup] on the motorcycle? And who is the tall, bald, sinister apparition [Christopher Heyerdahl] who can seemingly move faster than bullets? And what do they have to do with a scared ten-year old boy of Slavic ancestry? And what is Magnus’ semi-simian chauffeur, anyway?

Sanctuary’s two-hour premiere, Sanctuary For All, answers these questions and leads into a series that explores the concept that every creature from folklore and mythology is real. The physical Sanctuary is the place where Magnus and her team provide safety for those creatures who seek refuge, and confinement for those whose predatory natures threaten humanity.

Shot almost completely in CGI [only the cast and essential props are live action], Sanctuary has a unique look [think classic Universal horror mixed with urban cop show] and an equally unique feel. The premiere introduces the aforementioned characters plus a tall humanoid who might well be the so-called Missing Link. The ten-year old boy fits right in as a genetic mutation from Chechnya.

The script is solid, if not inspiring, and intriguing – especially since it gives us enough answers to make us wonder just how many more questions are out there waiting to be answered. The acting is, for the most part, adequate. Tapping’s English accent may wobble from time to time, but emotionally, she’s spot on. Dunne makes Zimmerman, who is almost a Daniel Jackson clone, seem fresh and different. There’s even a cameo from Battlestar Galactica alumnus Kandyse McClure as Zimmerman’s ex – just to emphasize how damaged he is.

The keyword here is potential. The premiere lays out an intriguing premise and gives us sufficient background to make us feel like we can relate that that specific world. It may be a bit stilted, but it manages to convey its concepts relatively clearly, and the cast of characters is an odd mix or near-immortal, exuberant youth, damaged professional and surly/quirky tech master. The mix of science and myth works, for the most part – and so does Sanctuary.

Final Grade: B-

One of the mixed blessings of the continuing advancement of CG effects is that they make it possible for movies that might not otherwise exist to reach the public – usually in the form of sequels and/or prequels to theatrical films that earned enough to warrant a sequel/prequel, but maybe not quite enough to warrant a blockbuster – like The Scorpion King 2: Rise of a Warrior.

The Scorpion King 2: Rise of a Warrior is, essentially, the story of how the young Mathayus [Michael Copon] became the warrior who would eventually become the Scorpion King. TSK2 is a jaunty little B-movie given more flare than it deserves by director Russell Mulcahy [Highlander], who almost made the resident Evil franchise interesting. Of course, in his RE movie, he didn’t have to contend with the stolid Randy Couture as Sargon, the brutish trainer of would-be Black Scorpion warriors and assassin of the king. Couture looks good in fight sequences, but has the acting chops of Howdy Doody.

Still, the adventures of Mathayus and his friends, Layla [Karen David] and the poet Aristophenes of Naxos – not Aristophenes of Corinth [that hack!] – [Simon Quarterman], are rousing fun in the tradition of spear & sandal/sword & sorcery epics of the sixties. You’ve got travel to exotic lands, messed up myths, and even an angry/jealous/lonely goddess [Astarte, played with cheerful malevolence by Natalie Becker].

Mulcahy keeps things moving at a quick enough pace that you might not even notice a scantily clad member of the group suddenly sprouting a couple of dangerous [and long] swords, and the effects are above average for a direct-to-DVD release. Plus, we get the usual gang of just-there-to-die-horribly characters to add the possibility of danger.

For a straight-to-DVD fantasy, TSK2 has a pretty decent assortment of bonus features: Deleted Scenes; Gag Reel; Fight Like an Akkadian: Black Scorpion Boot Camp [again, not quite the in-depth look at training it suggests, but still fun] Making of TSK2 [more a behind-the-scenes glimpse than an actual look at the making of the film]; Becoming Sargon: One on One Randy Couture [Couture discusses his time making the film]; On set With The Beautiful Leading Ladies [behind-the-scenes with Karen David and Natalie Becker]; Creating a Whole New World [Production design], and The Visual Effects of TSK2.

Grade: The Scorpion King 2: Rise of a Warrior – B-

Grade: Features: B+

Final Grade: B

The first two Mummy movies may not have been critical successes, but they did have an off-kilter charm that made them hits with the masses. As one member of those masses, I have to say that I did enjoy them, myself. So, why then, do I not care for the third instalment in the series?

Writer/director Stephen Sommers only produced this film. They recast Evelyn O’Connell – and Maria Bello ain’t Rachel Weisz, not by half. Luke Ford, who plays the O’Connell’s grown son, Alex, has the charisma of a box of Shreddies. Brendan Fraser, who threw himself into Journey to the Center of the Earth, seems to be going through the motions here. John Hannah’s exclamation, “I hate mummies! They never play fair!” is the height of the wit in this installment’s banter [you know you’re in trouble when Hannah has to force his dialogue...]. The action set pieces – and the CG, for that matter – have a been there/done that feel about them.

On the plus side of the ledger, we have Jet Li, whose energetic and charismatic villain might have been fun if he’d a script worthy of him; Michelle Yeoh, who manages to rise above the morass that is this film, as an immortal witch whose one true love was drawn and quartered by Li’s Dragon emperor, and Isabella Leong brings some badly needed spirit to the proceedings as Lin, the witch’s equally immortal daughter, who incomprehensibly develops a thing for Alex.

Despite director Rob Cohen’s best efforts, The Mummy: The Tomb of the Dragon Emperor galumphs along at a lacklustre pace for a would-be summer blockbuster. If it wasn’t for the performances by the key Asian actors, this would be a complete disaster. Thanks to them, there are enough bright spots to avoid an F.

Final Grade: D

Although technically not a superhero movie, Hellboy II: The Golden Army is one of the most beautifully visual films of this or any other year. It’s also a combination of a lot of genres: comic book movie, action flick, fairytale, horror story, eco-fable, romantic drama, pulpy noir, FX flick. The thing is, because of writer/director Guillermo Del Toro’s love of the characters, and his amazing visual sense, all of these genres fuse into a whole that is ever-so-slightly greater than the sum of its parts.

Hellboy [Ron Perlman] and Liz Sherman [Selma Blair are together in this film – a situation that is more a bit awkward. As Abe Sapien [Doug Jones] puts it, “They have their good days and their bad days… and their really bad days. Complicating matters are Hellboy’s longings to go public – FBI liaison Tom Manning [a woefully underused Jeffrey Tambor] is particularly put out by a photo which the big guy posed for… and autographed!

Into this chipper little situation comes an elvish prince named Nuada [Luke Goss], who wants to raise the legendary Golden Army to destroy mankind as mankind has been replacing nature with shopping malls and parking lots. His twin sister, Nuala [Anna Walton] is dead set against this and flees – encountering Abe in the Troll Market [think a fusion of the Star Wars Cantina and the Floating Market from Neil Gaiman’s Neverwhere], where he helps save her from a troll. Everything escalates from there.

Perhaps The Golden Army’s greatest asset is Del Toro’s amazing visuals. All of the film’s creatures are beautiful [sometimes in very disturbing ways] and the sets are enthralling. The creatures are mostly practical and the prostheses and animatronics are absolutely state of the art. Of course, they wouldn’t mean anything if the story and the characters didn’t support them – but they do.

The film is probably hardest on Abe, who encounters romance for the first time in his life, but the Hellboy/Liz relationship takes some interesting and powerful turns as well. Then there’s the new kid on the block, Johann Strauss [voiced by Seth McFarlane], a Teutonic being of ectoplasm housed in an encounter suit that resembles the old spider-Man villain, Mysterio. Brought in to bring Hellboy to heal, Strauss shows some unique abilities, but can’t contain the curmudgeonly demon.

Del Toro shows that Pan’s Labyrinth was no fluke as he sets up action sequences and emotional situations that are simultaneously larger than life and as real as oxygen. He puts his characters through trials of epic proportion, while keeping their feet firmly on the metaphoric ground. The only real flaw of the film is that it may be too rich, too full. There’s so much going on – on every level – that it’s hard to get it all in one viewing. The cliché, “I laughed. I cried. It became part of me,” may actually apply here – Hellboy II: The Golden Army has an effect that lingers long after you’ve left the theater.

Final Grade: A

Anchor Bay Entertainment is known for finding film oddities that are worth bringing back to new audiences and putting together packages that reward the viewer for buying them. In large part responsible for making the films of Mario Bava and Dario Argento available to North American audiences once again, Anchor Bay has repackaged five of Argento’s [“the Italian Hitchcock”] films [Do You Like Hitchcock?, Phenomena, Tenebre, The Card Player, and Trauma] in a cool “steelbox” edition. Individual reviews are separated by photos of their original DVD releases.

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What begins as an effort to get “a little culture” before a spring break filled with partying ends, turns into a descent into a new kind of hell.

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I went in to Aliens vs. Predator: Requiem expecting a terrible film. After all, the first one [on which I burned a free DVD rental coupon] was hideous beyond belief [so much so that I couldn’t believe that Uwe Boll hadn’t directed it]. I was in the mood for a big screen bonanza of senseless violence and mayhem – especially since this AvP edition carried an R rating. To my extreme disappointment, it was a decent enough timewaster.

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