Announcement
Collapse
No announcement yet.
DEMENTIA
Collapse
-
- Published: 05-27-2016, 08:51 AM
- 0 comments
X
Collapse
-
Dementia
Released by: Shout! Factory/IFC
Released on: May 17th, 2016.
Director: Mike Testin
Cast: Hassie Harrison, Gene Jones, Steve Agee
Year: 2015
Purchase From Amazon
The Movie:
George Lockhart (Gene Jones of THE HATEFUL EIGHT) has the same problem James Caan dealt with many a moon ago in MISERY - he's trapped in a home with the nurse from hell.
After suffering a stroke, Vietnam vet Lockhart is forced by his estranged son to get live in care while he recuperates. That "help" comes in the form of nurse Michelle (Kristina Klebe) who shows up one day at the house ostensibly on orders from the hospital to check on George's progress. While George's son Jerry (Peter Ciella) and his granddaughter Shelby (Hassie Harrison) come by the house on a daily basis to keep abreast of things, they fail to believe the older man when he starts to claim that his new nurse is abusing him when no one's around. This abuse takes the traditional form of "gaslighting" (where the abuser tries to trick the victim into believing that they are losing their mind) and horror staples like messing with the house cat and screwing around with medications. Far be it from me to spoil the twist but let's just say that George has a history relating to his combat in Vietnam. Captured and tortured by the Vietcong during the war, he exacted a terrible revenge related to someone who had betrayed him. And now a chicken has come home to roost.
IFC Midnight/Scream Factory have been pumping out these original DTV horror films at a steady clip for quite a while now and while most of them manage to avoid being outright awful, "meh" seems to be the usual order of the day. The real problem with DEMENTIA is that it's a movie that works reasonably enough when you're watching it but falls apart with any real analysis. It's got a single truck-sized plot hole that almost kills it and some unnecessary characters that just muddle up the proceedings. On top of that, the central mystery is so easy to solve that the viewer feels cheated. The acting is uneven with Jones being so good you wish he was in a better film and Ciella doing an emotionless flatline. Klebe just screams CRAZY CHICK so when she starts mumbling and playing with Barbie Dolls it's not exactly a "whoa - never saw that coming" moment.
The only thing to really recommend DEMENTIA is Jones. He's playing a really interesting and complex character - a once very bad man who in his old age is trying to change is ways. It's also nicely ambiguous. The viewer is forced into the uncomfortable position of having to understand that bad people can nevertheless sometimes suffer cruelly at the hands of other evil people. Lockhart was a brave soldier tortured brutally. He was also an alcoholic prick who beat his wife. He'll defend a child from a bully and be a loving grandfather but he'll also pull a gun on someone for absurd reasons. Watching him struggle after his stroke you feel pity but when this "dry alike" is pushed back to the dark side you realize his vicious tendencies weren't quite as dormant as you thought.
Video/Audio/Extras:
Visually, this 2.35:1 AVC encoded 1080p transfer looks fine. For a movie with a lot of dark and weirdly lit scenes clarity and detail are strong. Facial closeups are particularly strong and some tricky scenes shot in lower light never lose detail. Transfers like this are hard to write about because they are simply unremarkable in their professionalism. This one looks quite nice.
The audio, on the other hand, is a bit more problematic. The 5.1 DTS-HD Master Audio and 2.0 DTS-HD tracks suffer from some sometimes sloppy mixing that makes the occasionally overbearing musical score swamp the dialog. This is a major problem in a crucial late scene where key dialog is being delivered. I had to actually activate the subtitles. General fidelity is good but the mixing is a problem.
Extras? Aside from some trailers for other Shout!/Scream products, none. A DVD version is also included.
The Final Word:
Aside from the fine work here from Jones, this isn't a very good film. It's got a shopworn plot, crowded narrative and pedestrian presentation overall. Jones needs a better vehicle to star in next. Recommended only for a rental.
Posting comments is disabled.
Categories
Collapse
article_tags
Collapse
- album review (218)
- album reviews (274)
- arrow video (272)
- blu-ray (3225)
- blu-ray review (4162)
- comic books (1392)
- comic reviews (872)
- comics (988)
- dark horse comics (484)
- dvd and blu-ray reviews a-f (1969)
- DVD And Blu-ray Reviews G-M (1711)
- DVD And Blu-ray Reviews N-S (1757)
- DVD And Blu-ray Reviews T-Z (878)
- dvd review (2513)
- idw publishing (216)
- image comics (207)
- kino lorber (391)
- movie news (260)
- review (318)
- scream factory (279)
- severin films (300)
- shout! factory (537)
- twilight time (269)
- twilight time releasing (231)
- vinegar syndrome (497)
Latest Articles
Collapse
-
Released by: Kino Lorber
Released on: February 22nd, 2022.
Director: Gianfranco Parolini
Cast: Lee Van Cleef, Jack Palance
Year: 1976
Purchase From Amazon
God’s Gun – Movie Review:
Directed by Gianfranco Parolini in 1976, quite late in the spaghetti western boom years, God's Gun (Diamante Lobo in Italy) introduces us to a bad, bad man named Sam Clayton (Jack Palance) who, along with his gang of equally bad, bad men, start wreaking...-
Channel: Movies
04-17-2024, 12:10 PM -
-
Released by: Kino Lorber
Released on: October 8th, 2019.
Director: Mario Bava
Cast: Christopher Lee, Reg Park, Leonora Ruffo, Gaia Germani
Year: 1968
Purchase From Amazon
Hercules In The Haunted World – Movie Review:
Directed by Mario Bava in 1961 and featuring a screenplay by Bava (and Sandro Continenza, Francesco Prosperi and Duccio Tessari), Hercules In The Haunted World (also known as Hercules At The Center Of The Earth and...-
Channel: Movies
04-17-2024, 12:08 PM -
-
Released by: Cinématographe
Released on: March 26th, 2024.
Director: Jack Nicholson
Cast: Jack Nicholson, Mary Steenburgen, Christopher Lloyd, John Belushi
Year: 1978
Purchase From Amazon
Goin’ South – Movie Review:
Made at the height of his career as an actor, 1978’s ‘Goin’ South’ sees Jack Nicholson once again in the director’s chair, seven years after his directorial debut, ‘Drive, He Said,’ failed to set the...-
Channel: Movies
04-17-2024, 10:29 AM -
-
Released by: Radiance Films
Released on: April 20th, 2024.
Director: Noburo Nakamura
Cast: Miyuki Kuwano, Mikijiro Hira
Year: 1964
Purchase From Amazon
The Shape Of Night – Movie Review:
Directed by Noburo Nakamura for Shochiko in 1964, ‘The Shape Of Night’ follows a young woman named Yoshie Nomoto (Miyuki Kuwano). In the opening scene, she’s working as a streetwalker on the outskirts of town and soon enough, she’s picked...-
Channel: Movies
04-17-2024, 10:26 AM -
-
Released by: Film Masters
Released on: April 23rd, 2024.
Director: Bert I. Gordon
Cast: Richard Carlson, Juli Reding, Lugene Sanders, Susan Gordon
Year: 1963
Purchase From Amazon
Tormented – Movie Review:
The late Bert I. Gordon’s 1963 horror film, ‘Tormented,’ is an effectively spooky ghost story made with an obviously low budget but no less effective for it.
The story revolves around a professional piano player...-
Channel: Movies
04-17-2024, 10:19 AM -
-
Released by: Grindhouse Releasing
Released on: March 12th, 2024.
Director: William Grefé
Cast: William Shatner, Jennifer Bishop, Ruth Roman, Harold Sakata
Year: 1974
Purchase From Amazon
Impulse – Movie Review:
Directed by the one and only William Grefé, 1974’s Impulse is one of those rare films that allows you to witness what it would be like if a really sweaty William Shatner got mad at a lady carrying balloons. Before that...-
Channel: Movies
04-15-2024, 01:20 PM -