Every New Movie Substantially Covered in July 2021 [Review List]

Stone Time Touch arrives from Indiepix on August 17th

Stone Time Touch is the latest Indiepix DVD that I checked out at the tail end of July 2021. Watching movies about the Armenian Genocide don’t always get people excited. But, I’m a documentary nerd and love checking out everything I can. You get two short films as bonus features. But, Torossian hits a spectacular narrative with this movie retellin of Arsinee Khanijan’s life.

Drunk Bus arrives on August 10th from MVD

Drunk Bus wants to be a cult indie movie so bad that it almost forgets to be a movie. It’s rare that I realize I’m not enjoying a movie 20 minutes in, but I could not bring myself back around on this one. I’m not familiar with Charlie Tahan or his past performances, but something in this movie didn’t pop for me. The Blu-ray comes with no special features.

Chariots of the Gods: 50th Anniversary Edition arrives on August 10th from MVD

Chariots of the Gods probably should have came out closer to Eternals hitting theaters. That being said, I love it when VCI takes chances on vintage curiosities that capture the public’s imagination. Chariots of the Gods has been on the AMPAS top 100 Documentary Films of All Time and I can see why. While serving much stronger than Mysteries of the Gods, this movie really pops up and asks to question our origins.

The Blu-ray release comes with the titular documentary and the Mysteries of the Gods follow-up in their entire length cut.

Lust comes to DVD on August 10th from MVD

Lust is about a crime writer who wants to recover from a fan’s attack. Now, she’s dealing with post traumatic stress disorder and believes her attacker has returned. Thrill to the usual catch-alls of this kind of movie, as they are all on display. But, thrill to the camera work of Kai Roger Melkevi. For a movie with limited sets, Melkevi makes the most out of Eskeland’s direction.

Through the Shadow comes to DVD on August 10th from MVD

Through the Shadow is a horror film out of Argentina about ghosts. Taking cues from other ghost story in history, a young nanny has to protect her kids from being possessed by supernatural spirits. Things get wonky and they don’t get to call on teens in a van to help them out. What’s weird is this feels like the third adaptation of Turn of the Screw in the last 3 years. Not sure what’s up with that.

I am Toxic comes to DVD on August 10th from MVD

I am Toxic is described as Mad Max meets The Walking Dead. That feels like a purposeful mislead. This dystopian outing is more about marauders and the people desperately trying to survive them. Our lead character wakes up and doesn’t know how he woke up in Hell. The action is interesting, but it suffers from World Cinema spectacle fatigue. Not enough budget to look cool and not enough reason to keep going serious. Still, the movie was well worth checking out.

OLDER MOVIES WE REWATCHED AGAIN!

Voyagers is now available from Lionsgate on Blu-ray

Voyagers is a movie full of hot young talent and Colin Farrell. Johnny Depp’s kid plays the lead and it’s not like she hasn’t been dealing with a lot of crap lately, now she has to outact 90% of the cast. While it’s directed by the criminally underrated Neil Burger, Voyagers doesn’t really do much with its premise. Honestly, it feels like this one should have been a TV limited series.

The Blu-ray comes with featurettes as the only special features.

Chaos Walking is now available from Lionsgate

Chaos Walking was the film that no one dared release. Then, COVID brought the plague times back to Earth and Lionsgate was like WHY NOT? The end result was a confusing movie with amazing star power that makes me wonder who Doug Liman pissed off to get treated so bad. For a major director to work for so many studios and yet get bounced back and forth like nothing, it kinda astounds me.

For Marvel comics fans, just imagine a future Earth where people can do stuff like the morlock Artie. But, there’s a budding young romance element because everything in America can only be as complex as a Young Adult novel. The Blu-ray comes with a commentary, featurettes, trailer, deleted scenes and the freedom to watch at home.

A Serbian Film is now available from Unearthed Films

A Serbian Film is one of those movies I used to love springing on unsuspecting people and now it falls flat. While the movie is still amazingly horrifying, it’s kinda hard to shock a rather juvenile audience. When we’re dealing with people that haven’t seen 5% of the AFI Top 100 and are generally oblivious to movies prior to 2010, you have to readdress things. Shock cinema doesn’t work when the average movie watcher has no comprehension of what is truly disgusting.

Somehow, I think the baby scene will speak across this audience gap. Unearthed Films continues to release the most stellar Blu-rays loaded with a ton of special features. Unearthed Films chief Stephen Biro leads up the commentary with the film’s director. Plus, you get previews, photo galleries, featurettes, trailers and a ton of extra material!

Hanger is also available from Unearthed Films

Hanger is the latest Ryan Nicholson movie I watched in the last few weeks. Nicholson has always been a blindspot for me in terms of cult cinema. Lloyd Kaufman shows up in the movie, but that’s not what I liked about it. Hell, this is the first earnest Grindhouse movie to arrive in the aftermath of Rodriguez and Tarantino trying to bring back that film trend.

I mean, who doesn’t like a movie about an abortion survivor coming back for revenge? The revenge movie premise is strong enough to carry it over so many humps. Hell, the Blu-ray comes with two discs loaded with a commentary, featurettes, trailer, more scenes and 16 hours of special features. Unearthed does it right again.

The Cool Lakes of Death is now available from Cult Epics

The Cool Lakes of Death is a movie I covered earlier in the year, but it appears to have been wiped off the face of existence by our tech upgrades. For those that dig it when we cover the foreign erotic dramas that Cult Epics releases, this is part of the larger set of Nouchka van Brakel movies. They all have been getting 4K restorations from the original 35mm film negatives. That means it looks real and doesn’t suffer from any digital noise reduction issues.

Plus, you get the original Netherlands newsreels about the production, the original poster and photo gallery and trailers. But, what about the movie? Well, it’s a loaded movie. Serving as a middle finger to the late 19th century romance novels about love having to fight against societal roles…this goes darker. Our lead heroine can’t get the love she want, because everyone around her keeps dying.

While she steadily goes mad, one has to appreciate how this movie feels a hell of a lot realer than other romantic historical pieces.

These are all of the movie reviews off my list in July 2021