VOD Review: Midnighters (2017)

"A character-driven neo-noir that packs a twisty punch."

We love us a thrilling neo-noir, and ever since Starry Eyes (review HERE) we love us some Alex Essoe too. So the idea of Midnighters offering us both in one movie was just too good to resist.

We're not going to reveal too much about the plot below, because this is a movie that has some twists and reveals, and to do so would kinda kill the vibe of the whole thing, but I will say that Midnighters makes for a fun ride through noir country, even if there are a few bumps in the road along the way.

On the way home from a New Years Eve party, Jeff tries to get a little frisky with his wife Lindsey, taking his eyes from the road for just a few seconds, which ends with him hitting some poor sap walking down the middle of the road. Given that they're both drunk, they decide to take the body home, wait a few hours until they're sober, then report the tragic accident to the police.

YUPPIE PROBLEMS.

Of course that plan goes to hell for a number of reasons, which we wont go into here, because that would spoil the way the movie unfolds its mysteries and reveals, but suffice it to say that things get complicated due to marital issues, money, Lindsey's little sister showing up out of nowhere, and a creepy dude who knows too much about all of them.

WEREN'T EXPECTING THAT, WERE YOU?

Midnighters is one of those movies that showcase people making really stupid decisions that lead to disastrous results, which is typically the kind of movie that we hate. Accidentally killing someone and hiding the body instead of calling the police never seems like it's going to end well, and that type of plot line usually ends up making for a frustrating movie-watching experience for us.

With Midnighters though, director Julius Ramsay and screenwriter brother Alston have taken that trope, and made it fresh. It's still frustrating in general, but the fact that the danger that is closing in around the couple is one that would have still been present whether they made a bad decision or not, basically kills the whole "You should have called the cops!" argument. It also takes the movie in a twisty direction that we weren't expecting.

The movie has strong pace that keeps some of those frustrating moments from dragging it down, and the cast all turns in solid performances which make the whole thing even more compelling. Alex Essoe has been doing solid genre work for years now, and she continues her streak of quality work in quality films in this one. The real surprise for us was Perla Haney-Jardine who played troubled little sister Hannah; she played B.B. in Kill Bill Volume 2, and it looks like she's all grown up now, as have her acting abilities. They both stole the show in this one.

HELL HATH NO FURY LIKE A WOMAN TIED UP AND TERRORIZED.

There are some genuinely uncomfortable moments of torture in this one, but it's not an overtly-bloody movie.

THAT'S NOT HOW YOU PROPERLY HOLD A KNIFE.

Not that kind of flick.

THIS TRICKY BITCH RIGHT HERE...

Relationships are tough. Also, always call the Cops. Always!

WILL THEIR LOVE ENDURE?

Midnighters is a tense, effective thriller that may have you calling the characters dumbasses at times, but redeems their foolish actions by wrapping them in a story that you just can't help but get caught up in.

If you like a good neo-noir anchored by a solid cast, then give this one a go.

B

Midnighters is available now on VOD.

Alex Essoe and Perla Haney-Jardine.

Netflix Review: Altered Carbon, Season One (2018)

"This is exactly the kind of TV show that we crave."

(aka Our Eventual Future.)
Release Date: February 2nd (Netflix)
Country: USA.
Rating: TV-MA.
Written by: Richard Morgan, Various.
Directed by: Various.
Showrunner: Laeta Kalogridis.
Starring: Joel Kinnaman, Martha Higareda, James Purefoy, Ato Essandoh, Chris Conner, Dichen Lachman, and Renee Elise Goldsberry.

Every time we (and most likely a lot of Sci-Fi fans) get wind of something like Altered Carbon, the movie Blade Runner instantly comes to mind. It's a Sci-Fi classic that painted the future as a bleak one, where things are run by big corporations, and the Police are ever present, keeping order in the over-crowded streets. The environment is in decay, the divide between the rich and the poor is wider than ever, and technology rules everything.

It's an escalated reflection of our times, which is classic dystopian setting.

Altered Carbon may well inhabit that same sort of dystopian future, but its got its own stories to tell, and so please go into this one knowing that it is NOT a Blade Runner clone or rip-off, but that the movie's influences are undeniable, none the less.

In the future, death is not the end. Our bodies are merely sleeves used to hold storage devices called cortical stacks, which house human consciousness in our spines. If your stack is destroyed, it's game over, but as long as it remains intact, it can be housed in any available sleeve, at any time, making a person virtually immortal. Of course, the richer you are, the more choice you have as to which sleeve you get, so for the poor, it's pretty much take what you can get.

SHE TAKES WHAT SHE WANTS.

The richest of the rich (Meths) live in massive, gorgeous skyscrapers that reach above the clouds, and they live lives of absolute privilege; while the poorest humans (Grounders) dwell on the dirty, over-crowded ground, living in hand-to-mouth squalor. When Bancroft, one of the richest Meths, suspects his sleeve was murdered, a former Envoy (a badass soldier of sorts) named Takeshi Kovacs is awakened from his 250-year stint on ice to find out what happened.

OH LOOK, HE'S WAKING UP... AND HE ISN'T ASIAN ANY MORE.

Along with a hot Latina Cop (who kicks all sorts of ass); a computer A.I. who thinks it's Edgar Allen Poe; and a dude who wants bloody revenge for what happened to his wife and daughter, Kovacs uncovers the details of the intricate plot behind Bancroft's sleeve death, which reaches into his past in ways he could have never imagined.

Let's just say that shit goes down.

YOU DO NOT MESS WITH AN ENVOY.

The world of Altered Carbon is as breathtaking and captivating as it is terrifying. The way people are re-sleeved; the virtual way that people can be tortured to death over and over again, and how it's completely legal; pleasure centers where prostitutes are literally screwed to death, their bodies discarded like trash; husbands and wives fighting to the death, all in an effort to make enough money to get better sleeves, and live better lives... The way the Meths view everyone else as disposable entertainment is frightening, because that's how many rich and powerful people in today's world behave, albeit not to such extreme levels. Usually.

This is a Neo-Noir detective story as much as it is anything, and we're completely fine with that. Tak Kovacs is brooding, death-dealing hero who drinks too much, lovers cyber-hookers, and doesn't care about anything, but of course, he has a heart of gold underneath it all. Sure, it's cliche' as hell, but he's such a great character, and Joel Kinnaman plays his so perfectly, that it doesn't matter, because not only does he dazzle us with his badassery, but he makes us care about him, and that's the whole battle right there.

Even better, his gang of misfit friends are all each as likable, and we cared about their stories too. How do you not love Poe, and his killer hotel, not to mention his love for a human girl that leads him to heal her, making her into something new? How do you not want to see Elliot reunited with his family as much as he does? Or how do you not want Ortega to get naked, because dammit, it's her body, and she can do what she wants to with it! Even the villains are compelling as hell.

Great characters, inhabited by great actors.

Of course it's hard to a watch a show like Altered Carbon in this day and age and not draw parallels between its story and the current state of world affairs. The book may have been written in 2002, but the rich vs. poor angle of its central story is one that is always relevant, and one that always will be. The show isn't here to preach, but it does make some strong statements about how people are valued in our society, and who truly controls things, which makes it all extra compelling.

LIKE A BOSS.

The second season of Altered Carbon will most likely feature an entirely new cast, because the story of Takeshi Kovacs moves to a different world, and that sucks, because everyone did such great work here, that we'd love to see more from their characters in the future.

WHAT A GREAT DUO.

Why does the best damned supporting character in every son of a bitching TV show that we watch and love, have to die?!?? The one damn person we wanted to live died painfully in this one, and it sucked!!!!

THAT'S ABOUT HOW WE FELT.

There is a liberal amount of blood and violence on display throughout this one, some of which is downright uncomfortable to watch. Isn't that great?

KILL 'EM, BABY. KILL 'EM ALL!

There's no shortage of sex and nudity in the future, and there's plenty of both on display throughout the entire season.

BABY GOT FRONT.

• The beginning scene at the hotel with Kovacs.
• The A.I. hotel coming to violent life.
• The arena fight.
• The re-birth of Lizzie.
• The Ortega vs. Mr. Leung showdown.
• Just about every fight scene.

KOVACS WAS AWESOME IN BOTH SLEEVES.

It's not a perfect show, and the end felt way to over-convoluted and messy, but overall Altered Carbon was an engrossing, 10-hour look into a nightmare world that dazzled and horrified us at the same time.

We tend to get more satisfaction these days out of TV shows that we do movies, because with TV, you get more of the story and characters that you grow to love. That is exactly the case with Altered Carbon, and if you're looking to immerse yourself in a truly bingable world for a few hours, then add it to your Netflix lists pronto.

A

Altered Carbon is steaming on Netflix, now.

The future might be scary, but it's filled with gorgeous women who kick ass, so we deal.

VOD Review: Jigsaw (2017)

"And you thought "The Final Chapter" meant it was over. Ha!"

(aka Part 8.)
Release Date: January 23rd (Blu-ray)
Country: USA.
Rating: R.
Written by: Pete Goldfinger and Josh Stolberg.
Directed by: The Spierig Brothers.
Starring: Tobin Bell, Callum Keith Rennie, Laura Vandervoort, Matt Passmore, Brittany Allen, and Hannah Emily Anderson.

It's been 7 years since Saw 3D "ended" the franchise that probably should have ended with part 4, if not part 3. People love Jigsaw and his traps though, so you knew that Twisted Pictures and Lionsgate would milk it for all its worth. It's a billion dollar franchise, so someone out there will always want more.

The Spierig Brothers have a small but impressive body of work to their credit including Undead (review HERE), Daybreakers (review HERE), and Predestination (review HERE), and so with them at the helm, we had a reasonable amount of hope that they could breathe some life back into the franchise with Jigsaw, or at the very least, make it a "better than the last 4 " kind of entry.

And they did a pretty decent job.

5 people wake up in a room with buckets chained to their heads, and out of nowhere, Jigsaw's voice tells them that they're all evil fuckers that have to pay for their sins. That payment involves saw blades embedded in doors, which is pretty cute, because the series is called Saw.

HERE WE GO AGAIN.

After the initial game, the 4 remaining survivors realize what's going on, and they are forced to play Jigsaw's games, to atone for the shady shit that they did which caused harm to other people. One of them, Anna, seems up to the task of beating Jigsaw at his own game, which makes us wonder just who in the hell she really is.

HMM...

All the while, detectives Halloran and Hunt are finding bodies all over town that seem to suggest that The Jigsaw Killer is still alive and well, and is starting up his social rehabilitation program for social deviants again. With the help of a a pair of doctors (one of whom is a smoking hot redhead who looks like trouble), they race against time to find Jigsaw, and stop his newest game before another group of scumbags is killed in clever, and fairly fitting ways.

THAT'S GONNA HURT.

I've got to admit that I liked Jigsaw way more than I thought I would. It's not without its flaws,. but the heart of its series has always been the punishment that bad people receive via Jigsaw's judgment, which is played out via a series of brutal and painfully relevant games, and this movie has no shortage of that.

The Saw movies have always been great because Jigsaw, and his motivations, have always been intriguing as hell, and it was nice to see Tobin Bell back in action. There's something compelling about him as an actor, and as Jigsaw, you can't help but like the guy, what he does, and why he does it, because he's got a point.

You know what you're getting with the average Saw movie: bloody, creative traps; and a silly plot that makes you think "Hey, I could write movies!", but that's alright, because sometimes we're in it for the visceral thrill, and on that level, Jigsaw delivers.

READ THE DOOR, DUMMY!

This movie needed more Jigsaw, because at 75-years-old, Tobin Bell still plays a hell of a villain.

WE WOULDN'T MIND A RETURN IN SOME FORM OF AMANDA, EITHER.

The real problem with these movies after lets say, Part 3, is that their plots get so over-complicated and unbelievable, that they make us roll our eyes. It's like they kept coming up with implausible and very convenient ways to keep the series going long after its titular villain had been killed, and that irks us a bit.

Jigsaw is no different in that way, stretching our limits of believability and giving us two twists that existed only to allow another Saw movie to be made, albeit in a way that made sense.

NEVER TRUST A SEXY GIRL WITH AN ARM SLEEVE!

Lots of bloody goodness throughout this one, courtesy of Jigsaw's new traps. The bike trap and the laser were our faves.

THAT ONE WAS PRETTY GOOD TOO.

No such luck.

FOR SHAME.

The first Saw movie is one of the best Horror films of the new millennium, and even though Jigsaw, the 8th installment in the series, comes nowhere near the original in terms of quality, it keeps the spirit of the series alive and well, and gives fans another dose of the mayhem that they've come to expect from the films.

If you like the Saw series for what it is, then Jigsaw will most likely make you happy.

C+

Jigsaw is available now on Blu-ray, DVD, and VOD.

Hannah, Laura, and Brittany: the lovely victims of Jigsaw.