Reel Reviews - Official Site

At one point in Just Mercy, the new film from director, co-writer Destin Daniel Cretton (The Glass Castle), the film’s main character Bryan Stevenson (Michael B. Jordan) points out that “the opposite of poverty isn’t wealth, it’s justice.” Those words set the tone for the tangle of legal and  ...

Read more: Just Mercy - Blu-ray Review

Anyone have some change? Frank and Josie are back! I am not sure if it is the whole Generation X side of me, but Career Opportunities - which is essentially The Breakfast Club set inside Home Alone - was my jam back in high school.  There’s a part of me that still ...

Read more: Career Opportunities (1991) - Blu-ray Review

Where have you been, Guy Ritchie? We’ve missed your language, your punch, your sleight of hand, and that self-referential swagger that defined your early days as a filmmaker. We got hardly any of that as you set out for more commercial ventures like Swept Away, The Man From U.N.C.L.E.,  ...

Read more: The Gentlemen - Blu-ray Review

Oscar Winners Martin Landau and José Ferrar in a monster movie with grand laughs?  Sign me up! A very nude girl paints her toes in her bedroom.  It is night and she’s clueless as to what foul beast is lurking just outside her house.  It is a slug-like monster the size of a bear and ...

Read more: The Being: 2K Scan (1982) - Blu-ray Review

2005 saw the end of the prequel trilogy, and what a job it had before it to finally deliver what we’d been promised since the trilogy was announced: the descent of Anakin Skywalker to the dark side and the rise of Darth Vader ...

Read more: Star Wars: Episode III - Revenge of the Sith (2005) - 4K blu-ray Review

Genevieve is completely CRACKERS and I love it! Nicholas Michael Jacobs, independent film director of Night, Urban Fears, and Tales from Six Feet Under, is back with his latest horror/comedy, Genevieve.  This time out his take on the whole Annabelle doll haunting series of flicks gets served ...

Read more: Genevieve (2021) - Movie Review

Episode 2 made a couple of firsts in Star Wars history. Firstly, it would be the first of them shot entirely digital. Secondly, and unfortunately, it would be the first of the episodes to debut with a now tarnished perception. The Phantom Menace had not gone down well with the critics and a great ...

Read more: Star Wars: Episode II - Attack of the Clones (2002) - 4K Blu-ray Review

Recycled!  Repurposed!  These riot girls RULE the battleground known as the GridIron! Opening with a very brief scene involving the collection of freshly sawed off limbs and then a much longer all girl punk rock band beatdown, Spare Parts welcomes us all back to the bloody arena of ...

Read more: Spare Parts (2020) - Blu-ray Review

There’s a reason Cats had such a successful Broadway run as one of the longest-running musicals in history with over 7,000 performances spanning some 18 years. Many reasons, actually. The biggest being the brilliant songs and catchy tunes from Andrew Lloyd Webber. They are simply wonderful, and  ...

Read more: Cats (2019) - Blu-ray Review

In which Joe Dante, the director of Piranha, The Howling, Gremlins, The Burbs, Matinee, Innerspace, and other cult classics, turns toys into objects of delightful HORROR!  It’s as if The Puppetmaster and Toy Story met in a dark alley and had a quickie, giving birth to this cult classic 9 months  ...

Read more: Small Soldiers (1998) - Blu-ray Review

 Twice now, in different decades, Star Wars has resurrected itself and rewarded Lucas handsomely. With the recent sequel trilogy now behind us, the parallels between their reception and the era of the prequel trilogy are difficult to ignore. Both critics and the Star Wars fan base have major issues with ...

Read more: Star Wars: Episode I - The Phantom Menace - 4K Blu-ray Review

Freedom! Adventure!  Flying like Peter Pan across . . . a circuit board?!  Damn straight!  Forget about Neverland, folks!  Back when Explorers was originally made, it was the digital age that we were venturing into and, with an opening flying montage as Ethan Hawke bursts through heavy  ...

Read more: Explorers: Collector's Edition (1985) - Blu-ray Review

This film would be the culmination for a generation of Star Wars fans, and we couldn’t have been better primed for it. We would wait three years to learn the answers to the most tantalizing cliffhangers ever conceived. Was Han Solo gone forever? Was Darth Vader lying to Luke? I can  ...

Read more: Star Wars: Episode VI - Return of the Jedi - 4K Bluray Review

Guns! Sin! And bathtub gin! In this women-centered d♀uble feature from Shout! Factory, Crazy Mama takes a commanding lead for Producer Roger Corman as Academy Award winner Cloris Leachman pulls off yet another crazy character with that of Melba Stokes as she and her crazy family  embark on a road trip like ...

Read more: Crazy Mama/The Lady in Red D♀uble Feature (1975, 1979) - Blu-ray Review

Raise your hand if the news of yet another adaptation of Louisa May Alcott’s beloved novel, Little Women coming to theaters on Christmas Day failed to jingle your bells. Okay, we can all put them down now. After all, with so many previous adaptations – including 1949’s version starring Elizabeth Taylor and ...

Read more: Little Women (2019) - Blu-ray Review

It might be intense and rather somber, but there’s no mistaking the meaning behind Revenge of the Bushido Blade!  Someone is out for BLOOD! Presented for the first time in a brilliant and shockingly glossy 4K remaster, Revenge of the Bushido Blade (aka The Last Reunion or  ...

Read more: Revenge of the Bushido Blade (1978) - Blu-ray Review

Boobs!  Bullets!  Bawdy Babes!  What’s not to love about Angie Dickinson in Big Bad Mama?!  Nothing!  Absolutely nothing!  And producer Roger Corman knows it which is why Big Bad Mama is a curvaceous cult classic.  The sequel made in 1987?  Well, not so much, but - hey- (going  ...

Read more: Big Bad Mama/Big Bad Mama II: Big Bad Double Feature (1974, 1987) - Blu-ray Review

If your maitre d’s offer of free private access to a secluded beach that you will share with only a few select fellow guests seems too good to be true, it’s probably because it is. ...

Read more: Old - 4K UHD Blu-ray Best Buy Exclusive Steelbook Review

The greatest sequel ever made… There. Done… Oh, you want more? All right then. Star Wars changed cinema forever. Some say to its detriment. Its penetration into the world’s lexicon was all encompassing. It was in everyone’s vernacular after 1977, and made the left of field auteur George Lucas the ...

Read more: Star Wars: Episode V - The Empire Strikes Back - 4K Blu-ray Review

Because the “good old boy” way of doing things needs to get steamrolled by a 1942 M4 Sherman tank from time to time! There are a few valuable lessons to be learned from this sometimes witty Smokey and the Bandit wannabe title ...

Read more: Tank (1984) - Blu-ray Review

Star Wars’ new caretakers, Disney, have gone to painstaking work to be able to release this series of films for the first time in 4K. After purchasing the franchise from George Lucas, acquiring 20th Century Fox, and continuing the Star Wars saga with (so far) 5 new ...

Read more: Star Wars: Episode IV - A New Hope - 4k Blu-ray Review

“I’m on TV!  I’m on TV!” Because we all love the scene-stealing LUNACY of a Cage-centered meltdown, especially when his character is named Rick Santoro!  Go, Tyler! Go, Tyler! Goooooooooo!  ...

Read more: Snake Eyes (1998) - Blu-ray Review

If one of the final moments of director J. J. Abrams’ Star Wars Episode IX: The Rise of Skywalker - two lightsabers sinking into the sands of Tattooine - hits you rather hollow, it is by the director’s choice.  The Skywalker Saga is over with this film, but what’s shocking is that it really doesn’t feel ...

Read more: Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker - Blu-ray Review

The spongy post-apocalyptic trip that is Waterworld, Dear Readers, is NOT the belly flop you were looking for.  Dances with Waves?  Think again.  This film, warts and bruises and all, continues to arrive safely upon receptive shores with yet another new transfer which carries the same message ...

Read more: Waterworld: Arrow Video Restoration (1995) - Blu-ray Review

Filmmaker Sam Mendes gets down and personal with his new film, 1917 about two young British soldiers sent on an impossible mission to save hundreds of their fellow soldiers. Though largely fictionalized, his tale comes from an actual account told by his paternal grandfather who served in the ...

Read more: 1917 - 4K Blu-ray Review

Timeless TWO-COLOR Technicolor terror!  It’s the return of the Moon Killer and this time it is thanks to a superb 4K restoration!  That’s what awaits cult enthusiasts within the sheer horror that is 1932’s Doctor X, a pre-code murder-minded marvel in which rape and cannibalism get a headlining  ...

Read more: Doctor X: Warner Archive Collection (1932) - Blu-ray Review

The latest iteration of Bob Clark’s ultra-gory yule tide slasher, Black Christmas, promises a modern take on the cult horror classic that stoked the fears of every sorority girl back in 1974  ...

Read more: Black Christmas (2019) - Blu-ray Review

In which the cult-approved Nicolas Cage fights off demonic animatronic mascots! He even dances in one key sequence as he gets ready for the ultimate battle against the last remaining heavy, ol Willy himself! I mean, seriously, HOW CAN YOU GO WRONG WITH THIS IDEA? ...

Read more: Willy's Wonderland (2021) - Blu-ray Review

There’s a shocking, telling moment late in the movie Harriet (2019). Referring to a group of escaped slaves, the villain Gideon (Joe Elwyn) calls them “three bucks and a female with foal.” Of course, he does much worse throughout the movie. But that ...

Read more: Harriet - DVD Review

Mention independent director Andy Milligan in the wrong company and - WOW - you might find yourself submerged in the River of Jordan or receiving an exorcist by Father Merrin himself.  He is that reviled by church-going folk, but then so is Rob Zombie, so maybe you should reconsider the  ...

Read more: The Dungeon of Andy Milligan Collection (1968 - 1984)