Princess Ka’iulani was Hawaiian royalty of Scottish/Hawaiian descent.  She was the niece of Queen Liliuokalani and was next in line to the throne.  She died at 23, shortly after the military takeover and subsequent annexation of the islands of Hawai’i.

This biopic was given a limited release across the US. It met with a lot of criticism over the way Sanford Dole (the pineapple grower) was depicted as a sort of benevolent character who was reluctant about the takeover and tried to help the Hawaiians.  Historically, Dole was actually one of the major forces behind the takeover because the Hawaiians did …

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Waiting For Superman, the critically acclaimed documentary on America’s failing public school system is now available on DVD, blu-ray, and on-demand and is easily one of the best movies of the year. If this doc doesn’t piss you off, it’s time to start checking for a pulse. Filmmaker Davis Guggenheim is one angry liberal who uses facts and hipster animation and charts (very similiar to Michael Moore’s influential style) to illustrate his points about how our public school system is broken and ways it might be fixed. Guggenheim wisely keeps the focus on the kids he profiles and a few educators …

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The Next Three Days is an overlong but entertaining thriller starring Russell Crowe and written and directed by Paul Haggis. Haggis’s movie Crash won best picture but that picture was divisive and overrated. The Next Three Days drops the preaching of Crash in favor of solid, straight-ahead thrills. The movie is far from perfect though. It’s at least 15-20 minutes too long and a few of the scenes strain credibility to the breaking point.

The Next Three Days is about a teacher whose wife is arrested for a murder he is sure she hasn’t committed and his plan to break her …

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Dwayne Johnson aka WWE superstar The Rock stars in this ultra-violent, stylish revenge thriller as a man looking for revenge after a long stay in prision. He (and his brother) were set up after a bank robbery and his brother was murdered. The Rock is out for revenge in this homage to the B-movie revenge movies of the 70s. Filled to the brim with film-noir cliches and characters with no names (The Rock is billed only as Driver), Faster is a lot of fun. It is grim and often pretentious but that just makes it even more amusing. Some of the …

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The horror movie The Last Exorcism didn’t look great from trailers. It reminded me of the overrated slop The Blair Witch Project, but The Last Exorcism turns out to be something of a surprise after all. A well-made, creepy chiller and look at exorcism in the rural heartland of America. The movie is also fairly well-acted (another thing Blair Witch was not) and has a few creepy moments along the way. The movie is set up as a documentary following a smug fraud preacher named Reverend Cotton (well-played by actor Patrick Fabian) who visits a family where the father believes his …

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Monsters is well-made and well-shot on a tiny budget (under a million, around 800K), but if you’re going by the title alone, the movie is ultimately a failure. There just aren’t enough monsters in Monsters to make it a must-see for fans of creature features like Godzilla or The Host. Monsters is a mix of Cloverfield and District 9, and while it’s not great, at least it’s not racist, gory and pointless like District 9 was. Monsters is a parable about immigration and that’s a worthy subject, even if it is handled in a ham-fisted, obvious manner.

A photographer and the …

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So you just got a blu-ray player recently. Maybe it was a gift or you bought it with your tax return, congratulations, lets get started on my picks for building a badass collection of blu-rays. Many of the newer releases come as a “combo pack”. You get both the blu-ray disc and a standard DVD, a great idea, in case you want to watch your favorite movies in a bedroom or kitchen that may not be equipped with a blu-ray player, and only has a standard DVD player. Lets check out the list:

Inception– Inception has both a blu ray …

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It’s another snowy and messy winter here in the northeast so I decided it was time to give everyone 10 more movies to add to your netflix queue right now. January is traditionally the worst month for movies on the box office calendar and this January is no different so far, so stay home, stay warm and rent some really good movies that flew under the radar right now.

Stardust-This was a big budget fantasy movie that didn’t exactly fly under the radar, but has never achieved the classic status it so richly deserved. The best fantasy movie in years, …

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The time has come when podcasts become tv shows!

This is what happened to the most downloaded podcast in history, The Ricky Gervais Show.  The podcast has three Brits talk about their daily lives: comedian Ricky Gervais (Office creator), Stephen Merchant and the weird but likeable, Karl Pilkington.  The 30 minute show talks about various subjects from Pilkington hating charities to the vicous dolphins.  The discussions are pretty pointless but that’s what makes it funny.  These guys could debate about a subject that no one really cares about for the whole show.  Pilkington is the glue of this show.  He’s the …

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It is possible to make an engaging and entertaining documentary about the modeling industry. Unzipped is a good example. It may have been lightweight and superficial, but it made for a zippy 90 minutes and was quite fun. Picture Me: A Model’s Diary is a cheesy look at the modeling industry through the eyes of model Sara Ziff. Filmed by Sara’s boyfriend Ole, Picture Me has nothing interesting or illuminating to say about the world of modeling. There is nothing but a kind of rant against the dark side of the modeling world while Sara cashes huge checks for preening and …

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