Burying The Ex
Release Date: OUT NOW!
2014 | 12 | Blu- ray/ DVD Director: Dean Israelite Cast: Johnny Weston, Sofia Black- D’Elia, Ginny Gardner, Amy Landecker, Katie Garfield
The geek
heroes of this breezy, undemanding time travel tale come prepped for quantum cliché. “You have to kill Hitler!” says one. “Have you never seen Timecop?” asks another. Someone references the rules of “Terminators 1 through 4”. Someone else declares “Boom! We’re Doctor Who!” If only it was that easy, kids.
In truth Project Almanac feels like an ’ 80s Amblin movie reengineered for Generation Y. It has the wide- eyed, sweet- natured vibe of Explorers or an episode of Spielberg ’s Amazing Stories, its wish- fulfilment premise distilled into a single line of dialogue: “So you’re telling me dad left a time machine in the basement?”
Stumbling upon this experimental piece of military tech, the kids go wild in the fourth dimension. Well, no, they hit a Lollapalooza festival they missed. And fix high school indignities. And run down a street, yesterday, whooping, as if on a giant Red Bull rush. Because, y’know, time travel, bro.
It’s shot found- footage style, and while that gives the teenage byplay an endearing immediacy – we hear every classroom mumble and aside – it’s never quite used cleverly enough. In fact it turns intimacy into social media storytelling. By the end of this sunlit, upbeat, Pepsi- ad time trip you’ll feel like history – and hell – is other people’s Instagram feeds.
An alternate opening; two alternate endings; eight deleted scenes. Nick Setchfield A brief shot of a plane crashing was cut after it emerged it used real footage from a 1994 US Air Force crash.
The Evelyn Dead
Release Date: OUT NOW!
2014 | 15 | Download/ view- on- demand Director: Joe Dante Cast: Anton Yelchin, Ashley Greene, Alexandra Daddario, Oliver Cooper
If you only
watch one movie about a girlfriend returning as a zombie this year… don’t make it this one.
It’s no pleasure to report that this zom- com trails in second even in such a limited field, because Joe Dante is someone your average SFX reader roots for. The guy brought us Gremlins and Piranha, and is irrepressibly enthusiastic about our genre. Sadly, Burying The Ex is not a triumphant return to form.
For starters, the basic concept feels fairly offensive, with domineering, jealous eco- fanatic Evelyn hit by a bus, then returned to bossy life. Presumably we’re meant to empathise with Anton Yelchin’s under- the- thumb horror store employee Max, but his inaction ( and willingness to overlook his partner’s flaws when she’s dressing up as a “Naughty Nurse”) screams “man- child douchebag”. Secondly, unless you find the mere thought of necrophilia screamingly funny, it’s not that amusing.
Dante also over- indulges his fanboy impulses; there’s constantly something in the background, be it a TV showing Plan 9 From Outer Space or a poster for Robot Monster, reminding you that you could be watching something else.
Ageing male geeks who daydream of ditching their “ball and chain” for a hot rock chick with implausibly niche knowledge of horror- themed 1970s breakfast cereals may find this an appealing wish- fulfilment fantasy. Anyone else should watch Life After Beth instead.
None. Ian Berriman Death Race 2000 star/ Andy Warhol associate Mary Woronov had a role as the owner of Max’s store, but it was cut.