The buddy-cop genre has been spun a dozen different ways from sundown (there’s even an afterlife version with Jeff Bridges and Ryan Reynolds, in the form of this summer’s forthcoming R.I.P.D.), but the paired-female version has, for a variety of reasons, never been given much of a serious Hollywood treatment, either dramatically or comedically, on the big screen (sorry, Cagney & Lacey). That changes with The Heat, a fresh, funny and indefatigably paced offering starring Sandra Bullock and Melissa McCarthy. Helmed by Bridesmaids director Paul Feig, and powered by great comedy of contrasts, the movie channels the same anarchic spirit as last year’s 21 Jump Street, delivering a wild and enjoyable ride of nicely balanced verbal sparring and physical comedy.



Sarah Ashburn (Bullock) is a hard-charging, by-the-books FBI agent with her eye on a promotion. Sent by her boss (Demian Bechir) from New York up to Boston to try to untangle a lead on a drug dealer, the difficult Ashburn immediately locks horns with Shannon Mullins (McCarthy), an uncouth local police officer whose lack of adherence to rules would seemingly mark Lorenzo Lamas or Steven Seagal as her heroes. Begrudgingly thrown together and powered by their shared fierce desire to bring down a mysterious criminal kingpin, they begin to suspect there might be a mole in the Boston Police Department or another government agency.

Screenwriter Katie Dippold (Parks & Recreation) leans readily on recognizable character types and the reliable tension between McCarthy’s boundless, foul-mouthed energy and Bullock’s initial condescension and deadpan, slow-burn persona, but she uses an audience’s familiarity with and acceptance of these tropes in smart, amusing ways. There’s definitely a bit of the same buttoned-up spirit Bullock brought to the Miss Congeniality films, but with less doted on personality flaws. Likewise, all the sputtering, go-it-alone rage of McCarthy’s character comes from a sincere place; having locked up her druggie brother Jason (Michael Rapaport) in order to protect him from both himself and others, Mullins is a pariah to her own stereotypically dysfuntional Irish family (a group that includes Jane Curtin, Bill Burr, Nate Corddry and, yes, ex-NKOTB-er Joey McIntyre — all very funny, and of an agitated piece).

Ergo, these characterizations feel more fully rounded, and the film as a whole has a savvy touch; while in some respects it’s a pin-prick satire of the puffed-up, masculinized clichés of the genre, it invests wholeheartedly in the feeling behind the behavior. Feig showcases great instincts for where and how to end scenes (the film is smartly edited, if a pinch overlong), and as with Bridesmaids, there’s also a distinctive array of worthy supporting characters — all honestly motivated, and not sacrificed at the altar of cheap, take-what-you-can, scene-to-scene laughs.

Bullock and McCarthy’s superb chemistry is The Heat‘s chief draw, however. It starts out as voluble, but as Ashburn and Mullins recognize and appreciate the occupational passion in one another, and pass through first a détente and then into friendship, it gives the movie a bit of welcome and surprising heart to match its bawdiness. (20th Century Fox, R, 117 minutes)

A return to the median for master of disaster Roland Emmerich after 2011’s period drama Anonymous, White House Down finds Channing Tatum and Jamie Foxx, a mere three months after the similarly plotted Olympus Has Fallen, battling for their lives and the lives of their countrymen while bearing witness to the destruction of the seat of government and living quarters of the President of the United States. Falling more on the side of entertaining than good — there’s a basic miscalculation to a movie that explicitly puts a gun to a child’s head and also has the commander-in-chief peddling quips about his sneakers — Emmerich’s adrenalized, well orchestrated pop fantasy is the type of exercise in audiovisual excess that heartily welcomes viewer reactions of “ridiculous” as compliments, whether intended or not. For the full, original review, from Screen Daily, click here.

World War Z is busy presently chewing up the box office, but there’s another zombie tale out there in theaters as well — one likely shot, quite literally, for the catering budget on Brad Pitt‘s film. Putting a Shaun of the Dead-like spin on one of filmmaker John Hughes’ beloved teen classics, Detention of the Dead centers on an oddball (and at-odds) collection of high school students who find themselves trapped in detention while all their classmates and teachers outside have turned into zombies. If its budget and cramped settings sometimes let it down, director Alex Craig Mann, in his feature debut, shows a nice ability to juggle character-rooted comedy and horror, in a manner that would surely make a young Sam Raimi proud.

It sounds damning with faint praise (and I suppose it somewhat is), but the easiest and most honest line on Detention of the Dead is that it’s better than it has any reasonable right or need to be, given its aims. A calling card for its maker and young cast, the movie isn’t seeking to reinvent the wheel or radically reinvent formula, and yet the extra thought and care put into it on various levels of production is evident throughout. For the full, original review, from ShockYa, click here. Detention of the Dead opens today in select cities, and in Los Angeles at the Laemmle NoHo7. Additionally, it’s already available across VOD platforms. For more information, click here to visit its website. (Gala Films, R, 87 minutes)

In the vein of Searching for Sugar Man and Anvil! The Story of Anvil, earnest and engaging nonfiction feature A Band Called Death again helps prove that all the best nonfiction music stories aren’t tied up in Behind the Music-type bitterness and acrimony, and certainly aren’t related to any level of achieved fame. A warm if slightly overlong tale that sketches an arc of both what sadly might have been and what surprisingly now is bubbling to the surface, the movie chronicles the rather incredible story of three African-American Detroit brothers who, in the 1970s shadow of Motown, formed a punk rock group that predated Bad Brains, the Sex Pistols and even the Ramones.

A Band Called Death opens with a barrage of familiar faces — Henry Rollins, Elijah Wood, Kid Rock, the Roots’ ?estlove, Alice Cooper and more — designed to give the brothers Hackney credence. Three of four sons (the oldest was not a band member) of Motor City working-class parents, Bobby, Dannis and David grew up in a household that valued the eclecticism of music as much as the rhythm; the Beatles and the Who were as welcome as Earth, Wind and Fire, and the younger three Hackney’s in quick order turned to rock ‘n’ roll. The tragic death of their father, who was killed by a drunk driver, marked a turning point for their musical experimentation, however. Older brother David christened them Death, and they channeled their grief and abiding spirituality into a litany of thrashing tracks.

David, however, was caught up in the notion that the band’s somewhat off-putting (or at least confusing) name was integral to its “concept” — so much so that he convinced his brothers to turn down a record deal from Clive Davis. Their master recordings were returned to them, but nothing ever came of those innovative “Death sessions.” A heavy drinker and smoker, David would drift apart from his brothers — who made a living with a reggae band — and eventually succumb to lung cancer. Years later, however, Death’s tunes would find their way into the hands of collectors, leading to a proper “reissue” via Drag City Records, 35 years after the material’s recording, and sparking an appreciation of their heretofore unrecognized trailblazing status.

Co-directors Mark Covino and Jeff Howlett have an obvious affection for the Hackneys, and their closeness to the family, and the mutual trust they obviously have, makes for a warm, openhearted film. They do a generally great job, too, of mixing in archival photos, performance footage and other audio snippets with a cross-section of modern-day interviews, creating a dynamic and sincere sense of the Hackney family’s love and joy — for both music and one another.

Somewhat paradoxically, the film’s energy wanes a bit once it gets into the details of Death’s rediscovery. Just when it should be really catching flight as a story of unlikely redemption, the movie becomes bogged down by a roster of obsessive collectors.　Covino and Howlett seem to feel the need to track the full story, in exacting hand-to-hand detail, of how a particular seven-inch came to be passed along to some ears that mattered. Little matter, however. A Band Called Death still delivers an uplifting tale of resilience and deep family bonds. For the full, original review, from ShockYa, click here; to view its trailer, click here. In addition to its theatrical engagements, A Band Called Death is also available on iTunes and across VOD platforms. (Drafthouse, unrated, 96 minutes)

Before reality television became a genre unto itself, before dubiously achieved demi-celebrity became an actual career goal for many, and before blowhard media personalities took as their pet lemmings a significant portion of the American electorate, there was Morton Downey, Jr., a foul-mouthed talk show host who, as the anti-Phil Donahue, blew cigarette smoke in guests’ faces and generally ranted and raved in a manner that now seems both like some overblown caricature of populist agitation and the cornerstone for a cable news empire of ever more emphatically delivered deceitful scare-mongering. In the late 1980s, his meteoric rise keyed a heated debate over raunchiness and civility in public discourse. The new documentary Evocateur: The Morton Downey, Jr. Movie, then, chronicles that clamorous time, in an engaging and entertaining fashion that also rather purposefully induces a certain queasiness.



The brainchild of MTV co-founder Bob Pittman, The Morton Downey, Jr. Show, which debuted on New Jersey-based WWOR in the fall of 1987 and went national the following year, was originally envisioned as an updated version of the same sort of confrontational style of television talk peddled in the 1960s by Joe Pyne. The late Downey, though, who grew up with divorced parents and in the shadow of his famed Irish tenor namesake father, would seem to channel his obsession for fame into playing a character whose vices and hubris would first define and then consume him in real life. Downey wasn’t merely an angry populist; his rhetoric was shot through with envy and rage. He would constantly decry the United States’ “low ebb of morality” while often indulging in a bilious, unfocused rage that made him a hip, wild man hero to disaffected teens and un(der)educated and/or bigoted suburban white males.

The show rose like a rocket, notching all the requisite national magazine covers. Presaging the breathlessly obsessive cable news network over-coverage of various sensational trials that would spread out over the next couple decades, Downey turned the lurid Tawana Bradley case — in which an African-American women alleged kidnapping and rape against a number of white attackers, including police officers — into an ongoing soap opera. Then something strange happened, something almost unthinkable in today’s Internet age; Downey’s fame imploded. After a scuffle during a taping at the Apollo Theater, and some other bad publicity (including a weird putative attack on Downey by white skinheads in an airport bathroom), The Morton Downey, Jr. Show was canceled by the summer of 1989.

The brilliance of something like The Eyes of Tammy Faye, Fenton Bailey and Randy Barbato’s fascinating, from-the-ground-up reconstruction of a similarly divisive public figure, disgraced The 700 Club co-host and religious theme park peddler Tammy Faye Bakker Messner, lies in its laying waste to motivations and views falsely ascribed to its subject. Evocateur lacks this sort of wallop. It readily identifies the daddy issues, but chooses to more or less ignore Downey’s humbled post-syndication career, framing the third act of his life by way of his protracted lung cancer battle and contrition over being such a public face for smoking. Still, if it suffers from the absence of some key figures in Downey’s life (none of his four wives appear, and only one of his four children), the movie is lithe and entertaining, as well as uncanny in summoning up a gassy, unnerving portrait of a man who birthed so much decibeled anger for money. Among the many interview subjects, a group of Downey’s old producers mention his embrace of emotional rather than any intellectual arguments, and also note the ferocity with which he would attack guests. (Even a friend says, “He could’ve been a serial killer.”)

Co-directors Seth Kramer, Daniel Miller and Jeremy Newberger use animated segments, a la The Kid Stays in the Picture, but here to showcase more literally the snarling monstrousness of Downey’s increasingly unhinged behavior. They also include — in what proves one of the film’s more inspired touches — interviews with a cross-section of hardcore fans (mostly teenagers at the time) who vied for live-taping tickets and came to love their roles as what was known as “The Beast.”

These present-day reflections cast a light on the nature of Downey’s vaguely xenophobic appeal, and speak silent volumes about those who pedal such grotesqueries today. “People want what they’re getting, or they’d be getting something else,” says Pat Buchanan at one point, with a touch of amazed admiration. He’s speaking in regards to Downey’s deft touch at playing upon the worst of human instinct and feeling, but Evocateur makes clear that although this particular three-ring circus enjoyed but a brief run, the bigtop hasn’t vacated the country. For the full, original review, from ShockYa, click here. In addition to its theatrical engagements, Evocateur is also available across VOD platforms; for more information, click here to visit its website. (Magnolia, R, 90 minutes)

Filmmakers arrive at a life behind the camera in all sorts of manners these days. But perhaps one of the best things about the rapid decline in the cost of production is that it allows relative neophytes who are perhaps experts in other fields the opportunity to shine an interesting and important light on causes and subjects in a manner that even the most dedicated and intellectually curious nonfiction filmmakers might not be able to achieve. Such is the case with Ryan McGarry, a doctor at Los Angeles County Hospital who took his camera to work during the four years of his residency. The resultant cinematic portrait of that time, Code Black — a world premiere at the Los Angeles Film Festival, where it picked up the Documentary Grand Prize — paints a dire picture of an American health care system on the precipice of outright collapse.

Turning up the knob on cinematic advocacy to 11, Code Black (the title refers to a waiting room full or beyond capacity, which is its state most of the time) is disquieting and affecting in equal measure and, owing to the roots of its production, comes more or less inoculated against spurious claims of a politicized agenda. This isn’t a film made by someone to advance a predetermined point-of-view, it’s made by (and with) the people who actually toil on the health care frontlines, and deal with a shortage of resources that impacts patient care on a daily basis.

Unfolding as it does from 2008 to 2012, McGarry’s film takes a wholly different tack than Peter Nicks’ verité-style The Waiting Room, which basically was constructed to track as a single 24-hour period at an Oakland hospital that served as the primary care facility for over 250,000 citizens. Its net gut-punch effectiveness, though, is the same. McGarry doesn’t shy away from the sometimes gruesome and/or graphic nature of the injuries that he and his colleagues face in the emergency room, and in the face of public hospital patient overflow and county budget cuts, their little victories often seem nominal and/or short-lived — a case of one step forward, one step back. Still, Code Black is a special film laced with both heartbreak and hope. It deserves a wider audience, and open ears. For the full, original review, from ShockYa, click here; for more information on the film, click here to visit its website. (C-Booth LLC, unrated, 80 minutes)

Evincing a mood and rooted sense of place more than a dynamic plot, writer-director Aaron Douglas Johnston’s My Sister’s Quinceañera digs into its creator’s familiarity with his hometown of Muscatine, Iowa, in telling a coming-of-age story of hazy ambition against the backdrop of a a young Latino girl’s 15th birthday. A North American premiere and Narrative Competition selection at the Los Angeles Film Festival comprised of a cast of non-professional actors, this lovingly constructed, work-shopped piece of cinema offers up a refracted glimpse of the fits and starts of rural dream-fires.

Dreams of busting out of two-star towns — and the familial and/or romantic friction such aspirations produce — are of course rich cinematic terrain, but My Sister’s Quinceañera largely eschews outwardly manifested conflict and instead focuses a lot of that energy inward. To this end, it helps that Johnston has an eye for detail that conveys multitudes around the story’s edges. That quality gives this poetic film much of its delicate charm. For the full, original review, from ShockYa, click here. (Double Life Productions, unrated, 72 minutes)

A movie of considerable if to-scale surprises, micro-budgeted indie From the Head invites a certain amount of snickering and lowered expectation going in, touted as it is, in punny fashion, as the directorial debut of a “veteran strip club bathroom attendant,” and set to boot in the very same arena of his experience. Yet as far as movies located almost entirely inside a bathroom go, this one is light years better than Hunter Richards’ insipid London, starring Jessica Biel, Chris Evans and Jason Statham. Written, directed by and starring George Griffith, From the Head is an intriguing pop-psychology character study — a movie of minor revelations but shrewd behavioral observations.



Unfolding over the course of one evening in 1995 New York City (though the year seemingly makes no discernible difference, except for the lack of cell phones), the movie stars Griffith as Shoes, a bathroom attendant at a fairly respectable strip club. Between handing out paper towels and having folks bringing him shots, Shoes doesn’t much have time for his yo-yo and well-worn Samuel Beckett book but there they are with him, tucked away in the corner. His chief aim and concern, of course, is prying tips out of the (frequently tipsy) patrons who wander in to take a leak. While sharing jokes, advice and a smoke with the dozens of these customers (including Matthew Lillard and Jon Polito) who cycle in and out, Shoes also pleads with the matriarch of the strippers, Ruby (Samantha Lemole, above), to stop sharing that this particular night represents his third anniversary of employment.

There are more than a few moments of armchair philosophizing herein (“Everybody hits the ‘What-am-I-doing-here?’ monologue if they stay here long enough,” Shoes tells one guy), but From the Head is basically a giant grab-bag of accumulated details and occurrences — of conversational riffs and small moments of pique, compassion or practical advice, like counseling a married guy not to try a new cologne. In many respects, the movie most impresses in its steadfast avoidance of ante-upping dramatic gambits (hey, it’s even 65 minutes before anyone barfs). Things happen, and there are telling character moments, but there isn’t any dynamic plot, per se. In general, Shoes is overwhelmingly subdued, and thus something of an interesting Rorschach for viewers, who may find different interpretations in his demeanor.

The film’s staging — its flow of customers, and general rhythm — is handled quite well. And Griffith has a great presence. His tight smile and socially appropriate, slightly askance gaze — combined with the litany of patter, tailored in smart, quick ways to how he sizes up incoming visitors — reveals that, clearly, he knows of what he writes, both anecdotally and in feeling. But there’s also a centeredness to him that would seem to translate well to other roles. Griffith doesn’t feel the need to trade in cheap demonstrativeness; his Shoes is well-worn, but honestly so. For the full, original review, from ShockYa, click here; to visit the movie’s website, click here. In addition to VOD offerings, From the Head is available on DVD on July 9. (Breaking Glass Pictures, unrated, 93 minutes)

The Industry Choice Award winner at the recent Dances With Films Festival, Home eschews pitiable characterizations of the mentally ill in favor of more full-bodied representations. A smart, engaging work from debut writer-director Jono Oliver, Home is a superbly acted indie drama that knows and shows its title can be not just a physical place but a state of settled mind. For the full, original review, from ShockYa, click here. For more on the movie, click here to visit its website. (Mountaintop Productions, unrated, 112 minutes)

Amateurishly staged and unevenly acted, microbudget indie L.A. Superheroes is an indulgent, mishmashed immigrant/fringe-dweller‘s drama in which a couple artistically inclined Los Angelenos struggle to stay afloat (and in the country). Co-directed by multi-hyphenates Yelena Popovic and Alexandros Potter, from what they claim to be a collection of true-life stories witnessed firsthand, this dramatically impotent film serves as ample further evidence that, absent a unifying aesthetic and an artistic hand on the tiller, a camera simply turned back upon “real life” does not a compelling movie make.

Helena (Popovic) is a thirtysomething model who, after her work visa expired, apparently never got around to getting her paperwork in order. She has a wildly terrible manager, Angie (Catherine Carlen), who in addition to borrowing money from her client to make her car payment, also advises her to get a forged passport so she can go to Paris and do this big gig that’ll magically solve all her problems. Helena’s acting class friend, Auto (Alexander Zisiades), is a struggling musician who gets by delivering pizzas, though that doesn’t much seem to quell the rage he has toward the Los Angeles dating scene. After Helena secures a phony birth certificate through a contact of another friend, Sunny (T.J. Castronovo), things go sideways, and she becomes convinced she’s in danger for her life.

Weirdly titled, L.A. Superheroes unfolds in a series of languorously staged vignettes surrounding the fallout of this passport dilemma, but Short Cuts this isn’t. It aims for what is ostensibly a seriocomic tone (Auto’s advice to Helena before entering a potentially dangerous situation is to take a rock and not get shot in the face), but apart from a scene in which a woman feigns an injury in Runyon Canyon to catch the eye of a potential suitor, there’s nothing particularly amusing, clever or insightful about its eye and ear for random detail, and there’s additionally no compelling forward momentum, plot-wise. Helena’s husband gets quickly shunted off to the side, robbing the movie of at least the potential for some greater interpersonal dramatic friction.

Though it does feature a bit of decent music, L.A. Superheroes is shot through with nonsense — full of other tangents that never go anywhere. In theory Helena is also a would-be actress (hence the acting class), but the script attaches no particular aspiration or energy to her plight; indeed, there’s an extended sequence where an old New York friend shows up, invites her to dinner and then harangues her, reminding her that she in fact knows the director of “the year’s biggest movie,” Scumbag Club. Oh yeah, Helena realizes with a shrug… there’s that. Then it’s never really addressed again, leaving a viewer only their own glorious imagination in daydreaming up that fictitious hit. For more information on the film, click here to visit its website. (Simeon Productions, unrated, 78 minutes)

Agreeably cast but burdened with an overly predictable narrative and junior flyweight comedic punching power, New York-set indie Hannah Has a Ho-Phase is one of those post-Bridesmaids laffers (no matter its exact date of origin) that tries to put a Title IX spin on (slight) raunchiness and sexual acting out. In the zeitgeist shadow of works with much more strongly defined voices, however, like Lena Dunham‘s HBO series Girls, this slice of mock-shock has little going for it except for that great title and a few likable performances.



While her roommate and best friend Leslie (Genevieve Hudson Price), a pole-dancing instructor who digs no-strings-attached flings, frequently keeps her up at night with her bedroom antics, 25-year-old advertising associate Hannah (Meredith Forlenza, above left) finds herself in a bit of a dry spell. She’s dating a guy, but not having sex, and so after she spots said dude at a bar making out with another girl, Hannah impulsively accepts a bet from Leslie that she can more easily bed 10 guys in six weeks than Leslie can go without sex for the same time period.

Ergo, titular sexual oat-sowing ensues. All this coincides, of course, with an assignment at work where Hannah is paired with ladies man Donny (Quincy Dunn Baker) to research a potential campaign for a branded, vanity vodka line that a rapper wishes to launch. As Hannah starts to inch closer to hitting her target number, though, she begins to wonder if developing feelings for Donny are, a) sincere, and b) requited. Freed up from base-level attraction, meanwhile, Leslie accepts a date offer from schlubby, mustachioed Seth (Mike C. Nelson), but then struggles to convince him of the genuineness of her romantic interest.

Co-directed in flatly shot fashion by Nadia Munla and Jamie Jensen, from a script written by the latter, Hannah Has a Ho-Phase (and yes, that hyphen kind of bugs me) surfs along on a somewhat saucy wave, but it lacks the relative sophistication — and certainly the Dorothy Parker-esque dialogue snap — of films like Lola Versus or L!fe Happens, to name but two other femme-centric comedies of sexual exploration, acting out and/or consequence. A bit of the frank sex talk is funny, but once Hannah enters her blue period, the film’s qualified chasteness comes through; there’s no nudity herein, making for some awkward sex scenes that run counter to the dialogue. Munla and Jensen also seem afraid to mine supporting characters for laughs; the whole idea of the rapper, and especially him wanting to name his brand “Get It,” as a sexual come-on, is amusing, but the character appears once, as a third act throw-away.

Thankfully, though, the performances are for the most part enjoyable. Forlenza — who physically favors a mash-up of Rachel Weisz and Nia Vardalos — has a certain girl-next-door coquettishness, and a nice rapport with Price. Nelson, though, rather quietly steals the show. He’s gifted with a few funny lines (as when Seth queries Leslie as to her “art stance” when they visit a museum), but also nails the probing humor and deferential physicality of a guy punching up above his number. If only the rest of Hannah had his same slyness. In addition to its theatrical engagements, Hannah Has a Ho-Phase is also available on iTunes and across VOD platforms. For more information, click here to visit its website. For the full, original review, click here. (Hourglass Entertainment/Kitty Kat Productions, R, 93 minutes)

A choppy adaptation of Max Brooks’ beloved novel of the same name, World War Z, starring Brad Pitt, aims for a putative classy, ruminative sweet spot somewhere between pandemic thrillers like Contagion and Children of Men and pulse-quickening zombie survival tales like Dawn of the Dead and 28 Days Later and its sequel. But it ignores or fudges various geopolitical realities, and in fumbling away one of the chief strengths of its source material it morphs into just another anonymous quasi-post-apocalyptic blockbuster.

A poorly reasoned first act gives way to a number of admittedly crackling, professionally mounted set pieces largely unburdened by any necessary unification, but the degree of satisfaction with World War Z for many viewers will be inversely proportional to their familiarity with the source material — or indeed, even just a desire for intelligent complexity. For the full, original review, from Screen Daily, click here. (Paramount, PG-13, 116 minutes)

The evocative title conjures up an immediate sense of intrigue, and Twenty Feet From Stardom, a new documentary about the unique lives and role of back-up singers, does not disappoint. Directed by Morgan Neville, this fascinating and eminently watchable little movie shines a deserving spotlight on those for whom singing is often chiefly about just sharing in a sense of harmonic enlightenment, not competition or means-to-an-end fame.

The subjects at the heart of Twenty Feet From Stardom are a varied bunch, but the film predominantly centers around five talented women. There’s 71-year-old Darlene Love, one of the bricks in Phil Spector‘s groundbreaking “Wall of Sound,” and a back-up singer to heavy hitters such as Frank Sinatra, Sam Cooke and Dionne Warwick; Merry Clayton, a preacher’s daughter whose voice has colored everything from Lynyrd Skynyrd‘s “Sweet Home Alabama” and Carole King’s “Way Over Wonder” to the Rolling Stones‘ “Gimme Shelter;” Lisa Fischer, who has a Grammy-winning solo album under her belt but tours with the Stones and Sting; Judith Hill, a back-up singer for Michael Jackson at the time of his death; and Tata Vega, whose turbulent career was improbably revitalized by The Color Purple.

Neville uses the interview recollections of these women as the backbone of his movie, but livens it up with a smartly curated collection of archival footage (and tunes, of course) that buoys their stories. More recognizable faces like Bruce Springsteen, Mick Jagger, Stevie Wonder, Sheryl Crow (herself a former back-up singer) and Bette Midler also pop up, sharing their thoughts both generally and specifically on back-up singing; Jagger and Clayton’s intercut reminiscences of the latter’s summoned-in-the-middle-of-the-night contributions to the unforgettable “Gimme Shelter” provide the film with an electric high point.

Like a great melody, Twenty Feet From Stardom sticks around in one’s head for a while, and stands a chance of popping up unannounced in a thought, weeks later. Its characters are lively, intelligent and articulate women who in several instances bear the marks of a system that took undue advantage of them. Perhaps this is why the mere cursory manner in which Neville touches on some of the racial and sexual components of his protagonists’ stories is by comparison so disappointing. The women here share a lot in common (backgrounds in church choirs, for instance) and yet Neville seems afraid or unable to dive past the surface of some of these similarities and examine them in relation to the music industry, and its legacy of a certain exploitation.

In short, Twenty Feet From Stardom seems largely content to trade on its anecdotal punching power. The chasm in psychology and personality between would-be lead singer and back-up singers is frequently evoked and discussed, but only up to a certain point, in a kind of thumbnail fashion. In this manner, Neville’s film leaves one wanting just a bit more. Fortunately, though, its stories are so rich in detail — and, alternately, humor, heartache and triumph — that one will leave never quite being able to listen to the FM dial in quite the same way. For the full, original review, from ShockYa, click here. (Radius-TWC, unrated, 90 minutes)

From Rod Serling’s The Twilight Zone to The Simpsons Movie and Stephen King’s Under the Dome, the notion of an area being impenetrably sealed off from contact with the outside world is a well-worn one, full of rich and easy dramatic veins through which to explore notions of human fallibility and transcendence. Unfortunately, said concept gets a tired workout in writer-director Julian Roman Pölsler’s plodding adaptation of Marlen Haushofer’s eponymous 1962 novel — a German/Austrian import so weighed down by a stereotypically angst-ridden voiceover of emotional numbness and philosophical despair that one could be forgiven for thinking Werner Herzog wrote it as a goof.

Set against a beautiful and at times stark northern Austrian mountain landscape, The Wall tells the tale of a nameless woman (Martina Gedeck) who finds herself suddenly and inexplicably cut off from all human contact when an invisible barrier surrounds the cabin where she’s vacationing. At first her only companion is a loyal dog, Lynx. Later, there’s a cow she comes across and names Bella; later still, a kitten she dubs Pearl. The only people she sees, however, exist frozen in time, outside this bubble. After only a couple rather cursory attempts at breaching the wall, the woman focuses her time on survival (changing weather continues unabated in said space) and channels her psychic energies inward; the film then cuts back and forth in time, as she records in a diary notes from her stay of several years.

Certain critics have praised The Wall as intensely cinematic, but apart from its natural scenery and superb sound design (the wall is given an electromagnetic hum) this could scarcely be further from the truth. Rather than even try to let his audience live, labor and panic alongside Gedeck’s character Pölsler instead ports over or invents large swaths of morose narration marked by maddening equivocations. A typical passage goes like this: “I sometimes think X. (pause) I don’t believe that, though — I just wish it so.”

The result is a movie that feels antsy, uncomfortable in its own skin and, somewhat paradoxically, intellectually manic — a schematic exercise in theory and philosophy, with writ-large Metaphorical Import. It takes place in the wild, but is disconnected from it. For a much more interesting portrait of the unforgiving nature of the wild, consider Herzog’s Happy People: A Year in the Taiga instead. For the full, original review, from ShockYa, click here. In Los Angeles, The Wall opens at the Laemmle Royal, the Laemmle Pasadena Playhouse 7 and the Laemmle Encino Town Center 5. (Music Box Films, unrated, 108 minutes)

The idea of an Earth-bound fistfight between a foul-mouthed God and equally lewd Satan, complete with shots to the groin, sounds anarchic and wild. And certainly the participation of a roster of comedically gifted talents inspires some level of buzzy expectation. But in a post-South Park world, lazy execution of a ribald, potentially controversial concept will not suffice — especially not when the apocalypse is being handled with much more wit, vim and verve just across the megaplex, in the form of This Is the End. Thus the judgment of hearty disappointment falls upon Rapture-Palooza, a yawning, slapdash, would-be laffer in which a twentysomething Seattle native grapples with the discomfort and awkwardness of finding herself the object of the Anti-Christ’s affection.

After several billion people are raptured up to heaven, Lindsey (Anna Kendrick) and her boyfriend Ben (John Francis Daley) find themselves left back on Earth, with all the other heathens. The young couple tries to continue to lead some semblance of a normal life, amidst the downpours of blood, pot-smoking wraiths, and cursing crows and locusts, but it’s not that easy. Ben’s sycophantic father (Rob Corddry) has gone to work for the Anti-Christ (Craig Robinson), a garrulous taskmaster born Earl Gundy but who now goes by the moniker of Beast. When he whimsically settles on Lindsey to be his new bride, threatening to kill everyone she knows unless she assents, Lindsey and Ben concoct an on-the-fly, four-part plan to foil the Beast and cage him for 1,000 years.

Written by Chris Matheson and directed by Paul Middleditch, Rapture-Palooza locates a lot of its comedy in polarity. The Beast is a filthy-mouthed asshole who sings songs about his penis and spouts coarse come-ons like, “I bet your vagina tastes like pistachio mint ice cream” (and much worse). Shy-gal narrator Lindsey, meanwhile, is removed in a what-are-you-gonna-do? sort of manner, while the perpetually frustrated Ben finds himself in the awkward position of having his manhood undercut by Satan-in-waiting. To the extent that Rapture-Palooza is appealingly cast, this tack works in fits and starts.

The problem is that the Kevin Smith-type or South Park-y, sacrilegious stuff doesn’t play, because it’s not elevated, smart and specific enough. Plus, there’s no inner logic, even given the very low ceiling of the conceit. With the collapse of civilization, the idea of Ben and Lindsey saving money to operate their own sandwich cart so they in turn can afford to buy a house seems off. Presumably there would be lots of homes newly available, yes?

The movie is basically one big extended, inch-deep riff. It establishes the Beast’s infatuation with Lindsey in short order, gives her eight hours to decide a course of action, and then has she and Ben devise and then attempt to implement said plan to take him down. Laden with voiceover, a compacted first 15 minutes sketches out some of the specifics of this particular post-apocalyptic world, but Rapture-Palooza ignores much fun that could be had with the notion of the Anti-Christ as a former politician, even in ancillary fashion. In fact, pretty much every good idea it has — the notion, for instance, that Lindsey’s mom (Ana Gasteyer) is sent back to Earth after complaining too much at the gates of Heaven — it abandons in short order (frequently in favor of some bit of borderline obscenity from Robinson), as if it’s engaged in a game of plot-point hot potato.

The film’s high point, for those who remember the fifth season “Cape Feare” episode of The Simpsons, and its glorious Sideshow Bob rake-to-the-face bit, involves a litany of repeated shootings when Lindsey and Ben’s plan goes sideways. In its sheer over-the-top absurdity, it elicits out-loud laughs. Unfortunately, it’s too little, too late for Rapture-Palooza, a movie bogged down in a tedious spin cycle of crassness. For the full, original review, from ShockYa, click here. (Lionsgate, R, 85 minutes)

A recent world premiere at the 16th annual Dances With Films, the Los Angeles-set Us offers up an unusual yet sympathetically pitched examination of mental illness through the rubric of a weird love triangle. Anchored by a superlative lead turn from Alanna Ubach, this micro-budgeted, worthwhile indie feature could, given a wide enough audience, serve as an important pivot-point for the actress, leading her into more dramatic terrain.

At first glance, Margaret (Ubach) seems like just a garden variety alcoholic — another thirtysomething wounded bird who drowns her unhappiness in booze and unfulfilling sexual encounters with seedy and abusive men. When she comes to after having blacked out in a bar, a lonely employee there, Jeff (Patrick Russell), lets her out before locking up. Later, a sympathetic social worker named Walker (Michael Navarra) happens upon Margaret on the street, and after a bit of conversation, leaves her his phone number. Once sober, Margaret relents to a proper date with him. Though cautious at first, she even begins to entertain the idea of having a real relationship.

One problem, however, lies in Margaret’s multiple personality disorder, which keeps Walker at bay and feeds an often less-than-healthy decision making process. The additional rub is that Jeff becomes a sort of guardian angel stalker — though not a very good one. Margaret finds out about Jeff’s peeping-Tom trailing of her, and invites him in for tea and conversation. Their strange and uneasy platonic bond, then, eventually intersects with Walker’s efforts to intervene in what he views as Margaret’s downward spiral into self-destruction.

In his feature debut, writer-director Sam Hancock concocts an interesting prism through which to refract a more serious mental illness; it obviously says something about both Walker and Jeff, and their co-dependence, that they’re drawn toward Margaret. The chief problem is that these supporting characters are so thinly and problematically sketched. For a supposed social worker, there’s a downright implausible lack of insight to Walker’s understanding and treatment of Margaret as he gets to know her better (“She’s moody,” he says at one point, after he should know much better). Jeff, meanwhile, is kind of a cipher — a vaguely free-form loner version of Wes Bentley’s disaffected character from American Beauty, minus any daddy issues or videocamera equipment. Despite game efforts from Navarra and Russell, these characters don’t rise to multi-dimensionality. As such, Us doesn’t feel like an equilaterally apportioned narrative but rather just a character piece with a couple wobbly wheels.

Thankfully, though, Us has Ubach. Better known for her comedic performances in movies like Legally Blonde, Meet the Fockers and Waiting…, Ubach brings a full-bodied complexity to Margaret, capturing both her vulnerability and the steely resolve and investment she has in protecting the walls she’s built up around her. She’s abetted by a script that really understands the relationship between a multiple personality disorder and sexual acting out (“That’s how people respond to me,” says Margaret at one point), as well as the character’s real angst and panic at the idea of letting go of the personalities, of letting them “die” (“They’re all I know!” she later rages).

In its atypical focus, Us does the broader issue of mental illness a great service. It showcases the impaired thinking that can lead to a variety of bad and dangerous situations. But it also examines the inwardly reflected insecurity that comes with trying to cope with such problems absent any greater support structure. When Margaret says, “You don’t want me — you want some cleaned-up, stripped-down version of me,” it’s heart-piercing in its directness, and the cold truth that informs Walker’s good-hearted desire to “fix” her. Us knows human complication, and puts a light on it. For the full, original review, from ShockYa, click here. For more information on Us, click here to visit its website. (Umbrage Entertainment, unrated, 107 minutes)

A recent world premiere at the 16th annual Dances With Films, the evocatively titled micro-budget indie film Steve Chong Finds Out That Suicide Is a Bad Idea tries to put a bearded, decidedly fraternal spin on the whole Return of the Secaucus 7 sub-genre, wherein young adults gather and grapple with changes in life and their relationships. If there’s a certain easygoing charm to the movie, there’s also a lack of forward-leaning momentum or insight to make these characters stick to the psyche.

Scripted by Owen Hornstein, from a story concocted by his other three male costars and director Charlie LaBoy, Steve Chong breezes along nicely, a kind of down-tempo riff on The Hangover, in which guys get together, imbibe alcohol and give each other some shit. (Fear not, neither tigers nor Mike Tyson make an appearance. Sadly, neither does Heather Graham.) Big-punchline jokes aren’t really on the agenda here, but rather comedy of awkwardness and humiliation rooted in grudges over an old love triangle and the like.

Unfortunately, while the title holds true in the literal sense, Steve (Stanley Wong, also an editor on the project) is mostly a cipher, and interesting details regarding the other characters remain half-sketched. Most frustratingly, though, the film doesn’t really try to tap deep into Steve’s pathological shyness, or any of the cultural considerations that may inform it. So is it a comedy, or a drama? It’s sort of both, really, but without much punch or bite in either direction. Lacking much in the way of dynamism, the movie merely bobs along — pleasantly, for the most part, but in ultimately forgettable fashion. For the full, original review, from ShockYa, click here. (Steve Chong The Movie LLC, unrated, 81 minutes)