The only reason I watched Ejecta for a second time was because Scream! Factory made the decision to release the film on Blu-ray. I admit I didn’t loathe the film near as much this time around as I did that initial viewing, not that this should be viewed as some sort of massive reversal in opinion.

The Salvation (2015) doesn’t do anything new, it just does what it wants to do very, very well, director Kristian Levring crafting a beautifully austere Western that builds to a suitably bullet-riddled conclusion overflowing in emotion. Fans of the genre owe it to themselves to lasso up this Blu-ray and give it a look as soon as they can.

There is a joyous, devil-may-care enthusiasm to this big screen adaptation, the filmmaker reveling in the humor, the charm and the characters instead of focusing on the requisite whiz-bang and over-the-top action theatrics this sort of production typically revels in. In short, it’s excellent, and for my money the best television-to-movie adaptation since 1993’s The Fugitive.

Playing with false identities, constantly keeping things anchored on Nelly and all that she is thinking and feeling, the movie builds with pinpoint precision as it moves towards its destination. Never what I thought it would be, [Phoenix (2015)] plays on convention and expectation, flipping the script and dropping the mic going out with a bang that echoes with nothing less than greatness.

Right now, with all they affectingly put voice to suddenly back into the zeitgeist once again, with police violence against minorities being documented in a way it never has been before, it feels like this couldn’t have been released at a more appropriate moment. Straight Outta Compton isn’t just a great musical biopic, it’s a great movie, period, and as such seeing it should be at the top of everyone’s list no matter what their racial, social, political or gender background might be the entire world over.

But, not only is the villain’s reasons for seeking the end of the world as we know it exceedingly lame in a Greta Garbo I-want-to-be-alone sort of way, the fashion in which the heroes unite to stop him is even more nauseatingly ill-advised. [Fantastic Four (2015) is] a dimwitted descent into dullsville, the only clobbering going on the wallop delivered to the audience’s jaw as they sit there watching things fall apart right in front of their collective eyes.

If you think you know where The Gift (2015) is headed from there you’d be dead wrong, Edgerton taking things into far more disturbing and devastatingly insidious psychological terrain than anything I could have anticipated beforehand.

In the end, though, it’s Streep who elevates things to the heights they ultimately ascend to. Demme cannily keeps her in the center of the stage, so even when others are shining it is Ricki we’re thinking about. It’s as terrific a performance as any the veteran four-time Academy Award-winning actress has given over the last handful of years, Ricki and the Flash topping the charts in large part solely because of her.

Here’s what’s happening in Episode #16 (download .mp3): It’s Cinema Squabble time as the Seattle Movie Critics round table is back discussing a broad cross-section of the past 2 weeks in cinema. Reviews of Mission: Impossible – Rogue Nation / Vacation / Shaun the Sheep Movie / The Gift / Ricki and the Flash / Fantastic Four Discussion on the Great Comedic Actors […]