BLU-RAY MOVIE REVIEWS

Director Bill Condon brings his experience adapting the Broadway smash Dreamgirls to this lavish, live-action reimagining of Disney’s 1991 Golden Globe–winning (Best Motion Picture – Comedy or Musical) animated film Beauty and the Beast. The CGI-laden visual spectacle stars the lovely Emma Watson as the titular beauty Belle who is imprisoned in a castle by an irascible prince cursed by a witch for his failure to aid her on a stormy night and forced to live life out as the Beast (Dan Stevens).

When we last saw John Wick, he’d come out of retirement to take out the Russian mobsters who were responsible for stealing his prized muscle car and killing his puppy. In this well-made sequel, we are greeted by an angry Wick who’s still on the hunt for his Mustang Mach 1, which he finds in a local chop shop. Needless to say, Wick dispenses some brutal street justice on the thugs—and he does recover his car.

For centuries, the Order of the Knights Templar has searched for the mythical Apple of Eden. They believe it contains not only the seeds of man’s first disobedience, but the key to free will itself. If they find the relic and decode its secrets, they will have the power to control freedom of thought. Only the brotherhood of the Assassins stands in their way…

In a city of human-like animals (think Zootopia), Buster Moon, an ambitious koala theater owner, has fallen on hard times. He hasn’t had a hit in ages, when he suddenly has an inspiration: We’ll pack ’em in with a singing contest! When his loopy lizard assistant mislabels the announcement flyers to offer a $100,000 prize, hundreds of hopefuls show up for the auditions.

The year is 1942, and Max (Brad Pitt) is a Canadian working with British Intelligence deep undercover in French Morocco, teamed for the first time with Marianne (Marion Cotillard), a cunning operative for the French Resistance. Together they face incredible danger and the sad realities of the life they’ve chosen, only to fall in love. Back in England, they find themselves married with a child while the war still rages, but Marianne is suddenly the target of suspicion: Could this woman who has so dutifully risked her life in service to the Allies possibly be a spy for the Germans? With his entire family at stake, Max sets out to uncover the truth, a perilous journey with some unexpected, unwelcome twists.

Writer-director Kenneth Lonergan’s Manchester by the Sea is a story of ordinary folk who are sideswiped by life. Lee is a stiff working as a janitor-handyman in Boston, his inexpressive, glum detachment occasionally interrupted by outbursts of anger or self-punishing bar fighting. After his brother, Joe, dies due to a heart condition, Lee travels back to his hometown of Manchester to break the news to Joe’s teenage son, Patrick. While awaiting the funeral—which cannot take place until the ground thaws in the spring enough to allow the grave to be dug—Lee discovers that Joe has named him as Patrick’s legal guardian.