Your Mid-Week Guide To DVD And Streaming: God Bless Kirk Cameron's American Dream

There’s not a lot happening in terms of new DVDs this week.  In fact, there aren’t any mainstream Hollywood flicks getting released at all. That doesn’t mean there’s nothing worth getting excited about, though.  We’ve got the latest from writer/director Bobcat Goldthwait, as well as flicks starring Willem Dafoe, Josh Hutcherson, and Snoop Dogg. There’s Kirk Cameron and his buddy, Jesus Henry Christ.  We’ve even got soap box racers and casseroles. All that and even some guy who kills people.

The DVDs:
God Bless America
The Hunter
Mac & Devin Go To High School
Jesus Henry Christ
The Forger
Monumental: In Search Of America’s National Treasure
Some Guy Who Kills People
25 Hill
The Casserole Club
Battle Force
Karma Calling
The American Dream

There’s no better way to kick off your pre-Independence Day celebrations like reading about DVDs, so continue on to the next page. If you’re a god-damned foreigner who doesn’t love Liberty, Freedom, and the U.S.of A., click here for this week’s Netflix instant streaming showcase.*

 

*Netflix instant streaming titles may only be available in the United States.


God Bless America

This is the flick where Bill Murray’s brother and a teenage girl go on a killing spree. They start out initially targeting reality-tv fame whores, but eventually execute anyone who they find to be unduly discourteous or selfish.  I’ve seen this film and that’s really all there is to it. I admit it’s nothing special, and is really just one joke told over and over, but given what that one joke is, I liked it. If that sounds like your thing, dive right in.  It was certainly my thing.  It’s not that I can’t stand idiots like Kim Kardashian or Bristol Palin, it’s that I hate the fact that I know people who, for some unholy reason, look up to them. I guess the thinking goes that fame doesn’t come to the undeserving and therefore famous people must have other enviable qualities. I actually know a person who once said, “I trust Jenny McCarthy.  I can’t imagine someone of her fame would just say that vaccines cause autism without actually doing all the research first.”  The person who said this, by the way, has a master’s degree.  In education.  God bless America, indeed. I’m just saying, we live in a time in which a Playboy playmate receives a ‘genius’ visa for ‘inventing’ a twitter hashtag.  I know this movie was intended as a satire, but maybe it should be taken more literally. After all, basing one’s ideology on a film written and directed by a guy named Bobcat who is best known from the Police Academy films is actually fairly sane by today’s standards. It’s for damn sure a better moral choice than watching Toddlers & Tiaras.


The Hunter

A nefarious biotech firm (are there any other kind?) hires Willem Dafoe to hunt down the last Tasmanian tiger.  I really enjoyed this movie quite a lot.  It’s very quiet and very slow, but because Willem Dafoe is Willem Dafoe, it’s also very engrossing. Plus, despite playing a mercenary loner on the hunt for an endangered animal, he’s actually quite likeable and not all that creepy.  There’s even a scene in which Dafoe shares a bath with some young kids that you could even call sweet.  The trailer makes it seem as if this is an action suspense thriller, but it really isn’t.  It’s honestly about Willem Dafoe hunting in the Tasmanian wilderness and, when not hunting, spending time in close quarters with some overly trusting kids.  I’m pretty sure the title refers to the wilderness part and not the kids.  I think.


Mac & Devin Go To High School

Wiz Khalifa plays Devin, the school’s valedictorian and Snoop Dogg plays Mac, the school’s 15th-year senior and resident drug dealer. Devin realizes he spent his high school days studying instead of living, and Mac realizes that he needs to graduate in order to screw his teacher.  They decide to help each other out.  The trailer looks as stupid as that synopsis sounds, but I’m not going to act like this won’t appeal to some people.  I know a lot of people find Snoop Dogg’s act entertaining, and this is certainly in his wheelhouse. It looks like everyone involved had fun and nobody worked too hard, so good for them, I guess.  The soundtrack came out last year and the movie’s coming out straight-to-DVD today, and that type of thing is usually a bad sign, but in this case it may not be an indicator of poor quality.  I tried sorting this whole thing out, but I gave up.  One thing I read said that the film was created as a way to build upon the success of the album, and another thing I read said that the album was created as a way to create buzz for the forthcoming film.  I don’t honestly care.  Mystikal voices a talking joint named Slow Burn; I’m not gonna over think this one.


Jesus Henry Christ

A 10-year-old boy conceived in a petri-dish and raised by a feminist mother seeks out his biological father. His mom is played by Toni Collette and his dad turns out to be Michael Sheen with a beard and glasses and that pretty much seems to telegraph what this whole movie is. Vince gave this flick a little bit of attention back in March and this was his general take:

So you’re saying a precocious child follows a string of mysterious notes to uncover a message from his absent father while soaring folk guitar plays? I don’t think I want to see it, but if we ever decide to use upper middle class intellectuals for energy like in The Matrix, this will be the gruel pumped through the feeding tube.

All that I care to add is that I hate the title. I know it’s supposed to be provocative and intriguing but instead it’s just annoying. We get it, indie quirk-fest about a precious kid and the adults in his life who seem like polar opposites, but undoubtedly end up getting together, thus making a ‘real’ family -you’re very clever. Just look at that title. You’re swell. Way to be. I’m sure all the fly-over conservatives will get upset, just like you wanted. Really, though, was Jesus F*cking Christ already taken? Oh, it’s because the kid is named Henry, and, being a petri-dish baby, he was conceived immaculately? Oh I see. Of course, the Immaculate Conception refers to the conception of the Virgin Mary, and not Jesus, but I’m sure you knew that already. Because you’re very clever.


The Forger

The guy from The Hunger Games who isn’t that other guy from The Hunger Games (we’re talking about the shorter guy -the one who’s really good at painting because he decorated cakes, not the other guy –the one who gets his dick scraped on Miley Cyrus’ horse teeth every night) stars in this flick that couldn’t be less like The Hunger Games, despite what the box-art wants you to think.  Look at that font. Look at that fire. Look at that weird chick from Heroes, it’s like The Asylum made this flick.  Actually, the truth is much more sad.  This flick started out life as Carmel-by-the-sea, an independent drama about a teen boy from the wrong side of the tracks, and the people who discover his talent for art forgeries.  Will they help him or exploit him?  Will he discover that he’s more than just a copy cat?  What the hell is screen legend Lauren Bacall doing in this flick?  The world almost never got the answers to these questions, because back in 2009 production halted when the film ran out of money.  Eventually an entirely new company bought the rights and resumed production two years later. None of the original actors were available, so they used doubles and relied on aerial photography while shooting the remaining scenes  Now, a full three years since production began, they’ve changed the title, and are ready to make a buck off of confused fans of a completely unrelated film. (Yes, I know it’s the same actor and he plays a painter in both films, but f*ck you.  They’re unrelated.) Still, they made the right call with the box-art.  The original poster is horrendous.  I debated showing it, but I decided to link to it instead.  I didn’t want it to sneak up on you as you scrolled down the page.  Click here, and prepare to lose the rest of your day in its hypnotic thrall.


Monumental: In Search Of America’s National Treasure

This is that Kirk Cameron documentary about American history and why we’re all going to hell if we don’t make some changes.  Vince’s post about this flick covered everything you need to know, and there’s even some heated debate about religion and politics in the comments.  Because there’s no better place for intellectual discourse and debate than the comments section on a website that regularly photoshops Vince Vaughn into pictures that don’t already include Vince Vaughn.  AND EVEN SOME THAT DO. For real, I don’t care what Kirk Cameron has to say about anything just like I don’t care what Sean Penn has to say about anything.  I’m basically including this flick in today’s column to keep the final tally divisible by four.  If this looks like a film you’d like, good for you.  If not, watch it ironically.  Or don’t.  It’s just that freedom of choice that America’s founding fathers wanted you to have. As long as you were a land-owning white male. Happy Independence Day!


Some Guy Who Kills People

Well, no points for subtlety with that title.  John Landis, who once directed some of your favorite films (Animal House, The Blues Brothers, An American Werewolf in London, Trading Places), executive produces this flick. His career of late (as in the last twenty years) hasn’t been as prestigious.  His most recent film, Burke and Hare, only played on one screen in the U.S. and made a whopping $4,833 –despite starring Simon Pegg and a non-mo-capped Andy Serkis. We shouldn’t hold Landis’ failings against this film, however; it looks like it could be decent. Kevin Corrigan (who is one of those character actors you definitely recognize even if you don’t know his name) stars as sad-sack mother*cker who, having just been released from the mental hospital, decides to get revenge on those he blames for putting him there.  This is definitely a case where the people involved has more to do with the appeal of the project than the actual plot.  Besides Corrigan -who I always like- there’s the dude who played Brad in Rocky Horror, the dude who kept giving everyone AIDS in Kids, the British Pam from the British Office, and the dude who played Jar Jar Binks as the mayor.  OK, so maybe the cast doesn’t elevate the material, but the trailer sure makes it looks promising.  Best decapitated-head vaudeville routine I’ve seen since Abbott and Costello Meet Anne Boleyn.


25 Hill

Corbin Bernsen writes, directs, and stars in this uplifting family drama. When his father dies in Afghanistan, 12-year-old Trey is left with an unfinished soap box derby car, but when he meets Roy, a crusty old firefighter who also happens to be an ex-derby champion and the father of a son killed on 9/11, they find a connection that extends past the world of homemade cars rolling down hills.  Roy gets a new son, Trey gets a new dad, and they may even get a little trophy to put on the shelf next to the flags that were draped over a couple of caskets.  I’m sure this movie’s very pleasant and everything, but I just can’t accept that kid’s haircut.  Why do kids in movies and TV shows always have this haircut?  I never see any kids in real life with that haircut anymore.  It’s just like how most kids in movies and TV shows have horrible lisps.  Most kids in real life get their asses beat for sounding like that, but in a movie it’s considered charming.  But for real, this kid’s hair.  It’s awful.  I’m not saying I want to beat this kid up, but I am saying that he might be more punchable than the kid from Extremely Loud And Incredibly Close.  Also, none of this has anything to do with the time when I was 12 and my friend wouldn’t let me try out his soap box racer because, as he put it, I wouldn’t know what to do because ‘that’s man stuff’ and I didn’t ‘have a dad to teach me man stuff’, even though he was the jackass with the stupid mushroom-top bowl cut and who kept saying stupid sh*t like, “My dad’th totally taking me to thee Jurathic Park, but you can’t come cuth you need a legal guardian to get in cuth ith PG-13, and you’re only twelth and you don’t have a legal guardian cuth you don’t have a dad.” F*ck you, Corbin Bernsen.


The Casserole Club

There’s a lot to digest in this dish of a film! As I’m sure you’ve figured out, this is yet another low-budget flick set in the 1960s about suburbanites wife-swapping. What a tired genre. The trailer’s fascinating though.  First of all, there’s the critic’s quotes that say things like, “Magnificent, another tour-de-force by the best kept secret in American cinema,” which itself isn’t that remarkable, but then you see the critic’s name, M.J. Simpson, and you wonder who that could be, especially since the next quote is also by M.J. Simpson, who has no associated publication or website or anything.  Everything’s just ‘M.J. Simpson’, and just when you conclude that they made the name and the critic’s blurbs up just like that idiot in high school English who would write their own poem, credit it to ‘Anonymous’, and then write a report about it, BOOM, a new critic gets a blurb and the critic is named Dr. Joseph Suglia.  DOCTOR!  That slays me.  Still no publication listed, just a name, but he’s a doctor, so who am I to question his taste in cinema? Anyhow, the good Dr. Suglia calls it Balderson’s masterwork, so I decided to look this director up, and it may very well be his masterwork. That doesn’t mean it’s good, just that his handful of other flicks look worse.  Plus, in pulling up the IMDb listing, I discovered that the one dude with the snazzy mustache is one of the Backstreet Boys, so there’s that.  If nothing else, watch the trailer from 1:28-1:34 for this week’s best worst line reading.  It is fantastic.


Battle Force

Remember Inglourious Basterds?  Of course you do, it was very popular.  Well here is its lower-rent straight-to-DVD cousin.  It’s literally the same movie.  For real, they lifted every last detail right down to the snarky squad leader and the charismatic German officer out to hunt them. They even copied the text-laid-over-blood-splatter thing from this Inglourious Basterds trailer. Obviously this won’t have that film’s budget, star power, or writing, but it definitely has the same plot: lots of Nazis getting blown to bits by a small group of Americans.  I would watch this movie. It looks dumb and violent, but at the same time it looks dumb and violent and fun.  If nothing else, it’s refreshing to see a low-budget, American made, straight-to-DVD WWII flick that isn’t sympathetic towards the Germans for a change.


Karma Calling

Here we have a quirky romantic comedy that centers on an Indian call-center and the wackiness that ensues when you’re entire job is to try to convince already pissed-off Americans that you aren’t actually in India and that you know what the hell you’re talking about.  I don’t have the slightest clue why the people behind this flick would think that anyone would find a comedy about an Indian call-center appealing.  It’s insulting. Whenever you call these places you always know they aren’t in Bridgeport, Connecticut, because they say things like, “How’s the weather in Chicago, Illinois?” and they say ‘Ill-ih-noys’, and, oh yeah, they have a f*cking Indian f*cking accent! Plus, yes, I’ve checked that the router’s plugged in, how else could I tell you that the top three lights on the display are blinking?  Look, this movie looks absolutely awful but I wanted to include it because the trailer is narrated by Paulie Walnuts from The Sopranos.  F*ck if I know why, though.


The American Dream

I usually reserve this last spot for the worst film getting released each week, but this time I wanted to do things differently because tomorrow’s Independence Day.  I wanted to find a flick that truly celebrates being American and not just leave things with the ironic God Bless America or the preachy Monumental, both of which arguably criticize America more than they celebrate it.  Unfortunately, this film is the best I could do.  It’s a found-footage movie about two friends joining the Marines. Why is it found-footage?  Because I was this close to making it to end of this column without including any found-footage movies and, clearly, God hates me.  Oh, well.  At least this week there weren’t any flicks about vampires, aliens, zombies or werewolves.  Kirk Cameron’s pretty creepy, though, so he’s kind of this week’s equivalent, I guess.

With so few new films hitting DVD this week, it isn’t really all that surprising that none of them are available through Netflix streaming. But, as always, I’ve dug up some gems for your viewing pleasure. For those of you who have been patiently waiting since reading about its DVD debut, Golf In The Kingdom is now available. Now I know that news will satisfy most people, but on the off chance that there are one or two folks somehow not interested in that fine film, here are this week’s suggestions:

World’s Greatest Dad

God Bless America isn’t Bobcat Goldthwait’s first time writing/directing a film.  Just so, it’s downright mainstream compared to some of his other movies.  World’s Greatest Dad (pictured above) stars Robin Williams as a guy who exploits his child’s tragic death for personal gain. It’s a comedy, of course. If that isn’t out there enough for you, another Goldthwait flick is streaming, Sleeping Dogs Lie.  It’s a romantic comedy about bestiality.  For real, one of the IMDb plot keywords is ‘Dog Semen’.  Check it out!

Body Of Evidence

I commended Willem Dafoe’s performance in The Hunter and basically said that for once he’s not playing a creepy guy.  Well, everything is creepy about this greasy flop, and not in any way that was intentional.  In this erotic thriller, Madonna plays a woman accused of committing murder-by-sex, and Dafoe’s her attorney.  Of course they start having kinky sex with each other, and the creepy part is that the makers of this film thought that the pairing of these two ugly monsters in sweaty, naked embraces would turn people on.  I’ve seen this film and it was like watching a snake and a bat trying to kill each other -while grunting and dripping hot wax on Madonna’s tits.

Fireproof

Kirk Cameron sure is versatile.  When he’s not being preachy and off-putting in documentaries like Monumental, he’s being preachy and off-putting in church-funded flicks like this.  As I’m sure you’ll recall, this is the one where he blames the computer for tempting him with porn so he beats it with a baseball bat.  It’s also the one where Cameron’s real wife had to be brought in as a kissing-double because he refuses to even stage kiss another woman.  Willem Dafoe should’ve used that excuse to get out of going down on Madonna in Body Of Evidence.

Buffalo ‘66

Kevin Corrigan is proud to headline Some Guy Who Kills People, but he actually had his name taken off of this movie.  It’s a shame, too, because it’s really good. Corrigan has a memorable supporting role as Rocky the Goon, but the real star is writer/director Vincent Gallo who will sell you his sperm. That has nothing to do with this film, but it always bears mentioning. Gallo plays a crazy dude who kidnaps Christina Ricci so he can convince his parents he has a girlfriend.  Mickey Rourke’s in it too, and he plays one of the more normal characters.  That alone should pique your interest. If not, watch this film anyway and try to imagine why anyone would ever want to buy this dude’s sperm. I bet it’s just like chewing tobacco spit.

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