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Adrien Brody Archive

Backtrack, Blu-ray (2016)

by Audiophile Audition | Apr 22, 2016 | DVD & Blu-ray Video Reviews

Basically a horror film, but without the demons and gore. Well done. Backtrack, Blu-ray (2016) Cast: Adrien Brody, Sam Neill, Robin McLeavy Director: Michael Petroni Studio: Lionsgate (4/26/16) Video: 2.40:1 for 16:9 screens, 1080p HD color Audio: English DTS-HD MA 5.1, DD 5.1 Subtitles: English, Spanish Extra: “The Psychology of Backtrack” featurette Length: 89 minutes Rating: ***** This is a very well-developed and directed paranormal mystery film with a suspenseful plot twist near the end. I didn’t realize until I saw one of the Amazon reviews that the older psychiatrist (Sam Neil) for the star, Adrien Brody, was also a ghost and referred his patients to Brody. This film really hits on the “I can see ghosts” bit of Sixth Sense, and Brody does a great job of playing the nervous, gloomy and put-upon man whose young daughter had been killed a year earlier in a bicycle accident when he looked away briefly in a store window. A new young patient who doesn’t talk appears in Brody’s psychiatric office, and she appears and disappears suddenly. It turns out that all of Brody’s patients are ghosts, and all have one thing in common, which is the wreck of a train near […]

Dragon Blade, Blu-ray (2015)

by Audiophile Audition | Dec 22, 2015 | DVD & Blu-ray Video Reviews

A quite different sort of Jackie Chan movie, with amazing visuals. Dragon Blade, Blu-ray (2015) Cast: Jackie Chan, John Cusack, Adrien Brody, Sharni Vinson Director: Daniel Lee Studio: (Chinese) Grindstone/Lionsgate Premiere (12/22/15) Video: 2.40:1 for 16:9 color 1080p HD Audio: Mandarin & English, DTS-HD MA 5.1 Subtitles: English Extras: Behind the Scenes of Dragon Blade, Music Videos, Extended interviews with cast and crew, Trailer gallery Length: 103 min. Rating: **** The accuracy of the ancient history supposedly researched by the writers of this film is far from believable. One reviewer said it only looks like they watched Gladiator a couple times and then shot it. The plot is incoherent and the position of Chan, as the leader of first the Silk Road Protection Squad and then the leader of a renegade legion of Roman soldiers, is decidedly pro-Chinese nationalism. Nevertheless, the whole thing – never mind the campy scenery-chewing – comes across as a sincere attempt to show how the 36 different tribes involved can learn to treat each other wth respect. One wonders occasionally about Hu An’s (Chan) fairly constant fighting tying in with his statements about peace with no fighting. China becoming a major motion picture market has […]