Not a lot for us this week, but I’m still waiting on multiple deliveries including a few running a week or so late. Up first is the best of the bunch, Nefarious. From Mill Creek Entertainment it comes in both Blu-ray or DVD and it was a pleasant surprise. The underrated Sean Patrick Flanery plays an inmate on death row who must be psychologically cleared before he is executed. Flanery claims he’s possessed by a demon and the demon made him commit the murders. The psychiatrist immediately writes him off as insane, but as the day progresses Flanery starts saying things he shouldn’t know. It’s a classic cat & mouse, but Flanery’s performance drives the film. It’s easily his best work in years if not his entire career. I was completely entralled by him and you never quite know if he’s nuts or actually possessed. I hope it finds an audience on home video because Flanery fans will love it, but I think overall it will surprise people as well. Easily my favorite film of the week.
Second we have Kill Shot which unfortunately is as generic as its title. It had potential, but it’s just another non-mainstream action movie that thinks it’s better than what it is and has a twist you should guess almost immediately. The lead actor plays a former Navy SEAL, but he’s up against other military special ops types, but does away with them with ease. The lead actress is gorgeous, but that’s all you’ll take away from her performance. I don’t know if it even makes sense or truly explains why the thing they are all fighting over is even in that location. It opens in Afghanistan and uses the fall of Afghanistan as its original plot point, but then it becomes about the lead taking the model on a hunting trip where they run into the bad guys tracking down the thing from Afghanistan. Of course there’s the tough chick character with tattoos and very little hand to hand fighting. The short runtime is a major positive because by the time the twist ending comes I was done with it. I can’t say it’s a major disappointment because I didn’t know anything about it in the first place.
Third we have Aloners which really doesn’t explain itself all too well either. The movie is about a woman who works at a call center and is their top employee. She’s tasked at training a new girl. Her mother had died recently and her estranged father is back in the picture. She has a neighbor who talks to her when she gets home, but it turns out he’s dead and a new man moves in. She goes to work, watches her father on her phone through a camera she installed and doesn’t want to train the new girl. I have no idea what any of it means. I have no idea if it’s supposed to be a supernatural thriller. Maybe she’s dead. I have no idea. I completely missed the point of the film which is a shame because I thought the lead actress was good. Oh well.
Last we have Seire a Korean film that’s sort of a thriller, but has some supernatural elements. Well not supernatural exactly so I’ll explain. Some people think the first 21 days of a child’s life they are vulnerable to curses, bad luck and evil spirits. The folk tradition is called Seire. The father of a newborn finds out his ex-girlfriend killed herself and he goes to her funeral without really explaining the situation to his wife. She’s a traditionalist who takes Seire very seriously and it causes issues with them when he goes out and leaves her and the baby. He sees old friends and the dead woman’s twin sister. As the story unravels it gets into the real reason they broke up and why he might have a curse on him. It’s a lot easier to follow in the movie even without knowing a thing about the folklore. The lead actor is very good as are both actresses who play the wife and dead woman/sister. It’s relatively quick and grabs your attention right away. A nice little surprise of a film.
The Nerds Templar 