3 Generations Blu-ray Review

• Actors: Naomi Watts, Elle Fanning, Susan Sarandon, Tate Donovan, Linda Emond
• Director: Gaby Dellal
• Disc Format: NTSC, Widescreen
• Language: English
• Region: Region A/1
• Number of discs: 1
• Rated: PG-13
• Studio: LIONSGATE
• Release Date: June 13, 2017
• Run Time: 92 minutes

         While I appreciate a film attempting to address hot button topics, this needs to be done in a way that is intelligent and thoughtful. It is not merely enough to make a movie about a transgender teenager as she navigates the tough road to becoming transsexual. Some might argue that any film with this topic is a step in the right direction, because at least these characters are being depicted onscreen, but the film also has to be good in order for people to see it. If nobody sees the film, it doesn’t much help the conversation, and I definitely would not recommend 3 Generations to anyone, in or out of the LGTBQ community. This is a poorly made film full of contrivances and unsympathetic characters, badly written and lazily directed. Worst of all, the transgender character is not even the main focus of the narrative, despite being at the center of it.

Chapter & Verse DVD Review

• Actors: Daniel Beaty, Loretta Devine, Omari Hardwick, Selenis Leyva, Marc John Jefferies
• Director: Jamal Joseph
• Format: Color, NTSC, Widescreen
• Language: English
• Region: Region 1
• Rated: R
• Studio: LIONSGATE
• DVD Release Date: June 13, 2017
• Run Time: 100 minutes

         Chapter & Verse suffers from a familiar narrative, which leads audiences down expected paths to an inevitable conclusion. The predictability of the story could easily have rendered the film irrelevant, but it somehow remains compelling thanks to a screenplay co-written by star and director, which feels poetic without being overworked. It has the raw honesty and realism that Barry Jenkins was praised for last year and the social realism that Spike Lee built his career upon, even if missing the distinct directorial style that each of these directors put in their films.

Alone in Berlin DVD Review

• Actors: Emma Thompson, Brendan Gleeson, Daniel Brühl
• Director: Vincent Perez
• Disc Format: Color, NTSC, Subtitled, Widescreen
• Language: English
• Subtitles: English, Spanish
• Region: Region 1
• Number of discs: 1
• Rated: R
• Studio: MPI HOME VIDEO
• Release Date: June 13, 2017
• Run Time: 95 minutes

         Actor-turned-director Vincent Pérez was already facing an uphill battle when he decided to make a film based on Hans Fallada’s novel about a middle-aged Berlin couple quietly resisting against the brutality of the Nazi regime. As intriguing as the concept sounds, the form of resistance taken was as unexciting as possible. There are no battles against the violence, speeches about the terror, or collaboration with enemies fighting the Nazis directly. Instead, the film centers on a silent resistance against Nazi propaganda, which means the primary action involves our protagonist writing postcards.

Bitter Harvest DVD Review

• Actors: Max Irons, Samantha Barks, Barry Pepper, Terence Stamp
• Director: George Mendeluk
• Disc Format: AC-3, Color, Dolby, NTSC, Subtitled, Widescreen
• Language: English
• Subtitles: English, Spanish
• Region: Region1
• Rated: R
• Studio: LIONSGATE
• Release Date: June 13, 2017
• Run Time: 103 minutes

         Ever since James Cameron successfully mixed a fictional love story in with true-life tragedy in Titanic, there have been countless other failed attempts to do the same. Peal Harbor copied the formula almost exactly, even including an unnecessary love triangle to take over the narrative. You might think that filmmakers would realize that this is a misstep, and almost seems to trivialize the real-life events, but Bitter Harvest compounds these mistakes by placing them in a film about one of the largest genocides in history. Rather than focusing on the massive scale of the real-world atrocities, director/co-writer George Mendeluk mistakenly spends a majority of the film narrowing the scope to the fictional experiences of a single couple.

A United Kingdom Blu-ray Review

• Actors: Jack Davenport, David Oyelowo, Tom Felton
• Disc Format: AC-3, DTS Surround Sound, NTSC, Subtitled, Widescreen
• Language: English (Dolby Surround)
• Subtitles: French, Spanish
• Dubbed: French, Spanish
• Region: Region A/1
• Number of discs: 2
• Rated: PG-13
• Studio: 20th Century Fox
• Release Date: June 6, 2017
• Run Time: 111 minutes

         Though restrained in its scenes of large emotional outbursts and rousing speeches, A United Kingdom faces the unfortunate problem of being released the same year of another subtle interracial romance based on true events. Loving was so expertly made without the need of melodrama or sentimentality that even sparsely used in A United Kingdom, these moments ring a bit contrived. Along with teary speeches and somewhat contrived feel-good moments, there is also a redundancy in Guy Hibbert’s screenplay and a surprising blandness in Amma Asante’s visual style, so that the one-note themes of A United Kingdom begin to wear thin, regardless of how convincing the chemistry is between the leads.

Operation Mekong Blu-ray Review

• Actors: Eddie Peng, Xudong Wu, Baojuo Chen
• Director: Dante Lam
• Disc Format: Color, Dolby, NTSC, Subtitled, THX, Widescreen
• Language: Mandarin Chinese (Dolby Digital 5.0), Mandarin Chinese (DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1)
• Subtitles: English
• Region: Region A/1
• Aspect Ratio: 2.35:1
• Number of discs: 2
• Rated: Not Rated
• Studio: Well Go USA
• Release Date: June 6, 2017
• Run Time: 124 minutes

         Although inspired by real-life tragic events, Operation Mekong works better as a mindless action film than it does as a respectful tribute to the lives lost. Even when the movie does give reverence to the Chinese characters engaged in the operation, it feels more like nationalist propaganda than a realistic depiction of actual people who gave their lives for justice. Director Dante Lam has had trouble with the spectacle of his films conflicting with the message in the past, and though this is not the problem with Operation Mekong, survivors of the victims may wish it were. On the other hand, those who merely want a few hours of intense procedural action will likely be pleased with the non-stop spectacle.