STACK NZ May #73

DVD & BD REVIEWS

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100% pure adrenaline POINT BREAK

There goes the neighbourhood GOOSEBUMPS

Release Date: 11/05/16

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Release Date: 25/05/16

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What, they’ve remade Point Break already? Well, it has been 25 years – that’s a long time in Hollywood. So, Patrick Swayze’s Bodhi and Keanu Reeves’ Utah have been replaced with newer, hipper models in Edgar Ramirez and Aussie Home and Away escapee Luke Bracey. The story’s also been given a 21st century bump in the excitement stakes, with the action sequences amped considerably. The chilled bank-robbing surfers are now a bunch of Robin Hood-styled extreme sports athletes, pulling off such capers as nicking a fortune in cash and then letting it loose over an underprivileged Mexican

With over 60 books in R.L. Stine's mega-selling series of scary tales for kids, how does Hollywood pull off a Goosebumps movie? It takes a meta approach; casting Jack Black as the reclusive author, who keeps his creepy creations locked within their respective manuscripts in his basement. When said books are opened, a maelstrom of monsters is unleashed upon the quiet town of Madison, Delaware, and it's up to Stine's daughter (Odeya Rush) and her new neighbour (Dylan Minnette) to get the fictional creatures back between the covers. A chaotic

village, and ripping off diamonds from a skyscraper before parachuting to freedom. But with FBI guy Utah deeply embedded among them, they’re gonna go down, right? Much like a movie equivalent of your favourite energy drink, this Point Break takes Hollywood recycling TO THE EXTREME! AF

clash of Jumanji and Night at the Museum , there's simply way too much going on in this overly ambitious adventure, including Black pulling double duty as Stine and the voice of his diabolical dummy nemesis, Slappy. Goosebumps won't raise any, but kids will be sufficiently entertained. SH

Forbidden love CAROL

J. Law cleans up JOY

DVD&BD

Release Date: 04/05/16

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Release Date: 04/05/16

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Cate Banchett is exquisite in the title role of this flawless adaptation of Patricia Highsmith’s 1952 novel, while Rooney Mara is equally superb as the object of her desire, young New York shop assistant Therese. The two meet when elegant and affluent Carol buys a Christmas present for her daughter from Therese and there is a subtle but electrifying connection between the pair. Blanchett is cool and alluring as Carol, while there is an enchanting Audrey Hepburn-like quality to Mara as the inexperienced Therese whose true self is awakened. But it’s the 1950s and society wife Carol

J-Law is, appropriately, a joy in this uplifting David O. Russell dramedy that’s loosely based on real life. That would be the rise of American entrepreneur Joy Mangano, who went from inventing a mop that changed the face of, well, mopping, to running a multi-million dollar empire creating home shopping products. We meet Joy when she’s still juggling more than any woman should have to. She’s a divorced mum with two young kids, her mother, dad and grandmother all living under her roof – plus her ex, an aspiring lounge singer who’s still at the aspiring

has everything to lose, including her child, if the women’s relationship is discovered. Director Todd Haynes ( Far From Heaven ) wonderfully evokes the era with ravishing period detail and brilliantly captures the tantalising thrill – and piercing pain – of falling in love. Judy Ewens

stage. Creative since she was little, Joy works as an airline clerk, but invents things in what little spare time she has. When she comes up with the mop, Joy faces mass indifference – even her family are dismissive. But she’s one tenacious woman, determined to, er, clean up. AF

MAY 2016

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