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This week marked the Blu-ray, DVD, and Digital release of the drama-thriller A Vigilante ($22.98; R; 91 minutes). Written and directed by Sarah Daggar-Nickson, the film first premiered at South by Southwest in 2018. Saban Films picked up the U.S. distribution rights and released the film earlier this year.

The film stars Olivia Wilde as Sadie, a woman who had barely escaped the wrath of her abusive husband (played by Morgan Spector). Unfortunately, her young son was killed during the aftermath. Since that  night, her husband has went off the grid and is on the run from the authorities.

Still grieving and broken, Sadie teaches herself boxing, martial arts, and other survival skills. She uses these new abilities to help protect other battered women and abused children.

The only Special Feature on the Blu-ray is the featurette Catharsis: Creating A Vigilante. The Blu-ray does come with a DVD and a Digital code.

Final Thoughts

Mill Creek Entertainment; Amazon

There was nothing better to do on a stormy night than to stay up late and watch a double feature that consisted of two low-budget 1990s' horror gems - Mindwarp and Brainscan!

These flicks will be arriving on a Sci-Fi Double Feature Blu-ray ($19.98) on June 4th from Mill Creek Entertainment.

Directed by Steve Barnett, Mindwarp (1992; R; 96 minutes) was the first of three movies in the early 1990s produced by Fangoria Films. Set in the year 2037, the film takes place in a world where the ozone layer has mostly been destroyed. There are highly radioactive areas called Death Zones, which are filled with mutated cannibalistic Crawlers and a few Outworlders, humans who haven't been affected by the radiation. Then there are the Dreamers, a group of humans who live in a computer controlled biosphere called the Inworld. The Dreamers have implants on the back of their necks that lets them plug into a virtual reality world where they can live out their wildest fantasies.

After rejecting the virtual reality from within her own mind, a young woman, Judy (played by Marta Martin) is kicked out of the Inworld and tossed into the Death Zones. Upon arriving she is attacked by a Crawler, but luckily for her she is rescued by an Outworlder named Stove (played by the legendary B-movie man Bruce Campbell). Sparks fly rather quickly between the two, but the romance is cut short when more Crawlers attack; which leads to Judy being kidnapped by the Seer (played by the late great horror icon Angus Scrimm) and of course Stove has to rescue her again.


Directed by John Flynn, Brainscan (1994; R; 96 minutes) centers around Michael Brower (played by Edward Furlong), a sixteen-year-old who's basically been taking care of himself ever since his mother was killed in a car accident several years prior. The accident also resulted in permanent leg damage for him. Now as a teenager, Michael has a become a big horror and video game nerd. After hearing about the new mind-bending video game Brainscan, he eagerly orders the first game disc.

While at first glance Brainscan looks like a ultra-realistic POV slasher game, Michael quickly learns the game is actually real. And it's possible Michael might have committed real-life murders.

Why doesn't Michael just quit the game?

Well, the game is controlled by a demon called The Trickster (played by T. Ryder Smith), and a player cannot quit the game. The game has to be played out to the very bloody end!

Final Thoughts

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After being a little upset at the way the fantasy drama Game of Thrones ended last Sunday, I ended up spending my Memorial Day evening watching a different (& better) dragon tale - How to Train Your Dragon: The Hidden World (PG; 104 minutes), which landed on Blu-ray and DVD last week from Universal Pictures Home Entertainment.

The Hidden World is the final chapter in the How to Train Your Dragon trilogy, which is based on the children book series of the same name by Cressida Cowell. Written and directed by Dean DeBlois, the film features the talented voice cast of Jay Baruchel, America Ferrera, Cate Blanchett, Gerard Butler, F. Murray Abraham , Kit Harington, Craig Ferguson, Kristen Wiig, Jonah Hill, and Christopher Mintz-Plasse.

Picking up one year after the second film, Hiccup, Toothless, the other dragon-riders, and their entire Viking village must go on a journey to find a new home after being threatened by the legendary dragon hunter Grimmel the Grisly and his army of minions (and a few evil dragons). At Grimmel's disposal is a female Light Fury who easily captures Toothless's heart and sets the stage for the the dragon-riders' final battle.

Bonus Features include:

• Alternate Opening with Intro by Writer/Director Dean DeBlois
• DreamWorks Shorts:
• Bilby – Directed by Liron Topaz, Pierre Perifel and JP Sans; produced by Jeff Hermann and Kelly Cooney Cilella. Threatened daily by the deadly residents and harsh environment of Australia’s Outback, a lonesome Bilby finds himself an unwitting protector, and unexpected friend, to a helpless (and quite adorable) baby bird. 
• Bird Karma – Directed by William Salazar and produced by Jeff Hermann, the beautifully artistic 2D short film Bird Karma tells a delightfully lyrical and fully unexpected tale of a long-legged bird’s journey of blissful joy, inescapable greed and the accidental discovery of the consequences when too much is not enough.
• Deleted Scenes with Intros by Writer/Director Dean DeBlois
• How to Voice Your Viking – Go behind the scenes with the cast as they record the Viking voices of HOW TO TRAIN YOUR DRAGON: THE HIDDEN WORLD. 
• Creating an Epic Dragon Tale – Discover what filmmakers learned while crafting this epic dragon trilogy.
• How I Learned from Dragons – The diverse cast of characters reveal why they think the dragon trilogy is so special. 
• Brave Wilderness Presents: Nature + Dragons = Awesome – Join Coyote Peterson, host of Brave Wilderness, as he explores what it takes to make the dragon’s characters come to life. 
• The Dragon Sheep Chronicles – Protecting sheep from the dragons of Berk is no easy task but Hiccup has a plan. 
• A Deck of Dragons – Observe four new dragons as Fishlegs unveils his original deck of dragon trading cards. 
• Growing Up with Dragons – After years of being with these characters, hear the lasting effects of the dragon trilogy from the filmmaker’s perspective.
• The Evolving Character Design of Dragons – Cast and crew reveal what it was like to evolve not only the characters of HOW TO TRAIN YOUR DRAGON: THE HIDDEN WORLD, but themselves as well. 
• Drawing Dragons – Get a glimpse of what goes in to designing a DreamWorks dragon. 
• Epic Villain – A different kind of villain, Grimmel brings great challenges to the village of Berk. Go behind the scenes as filmmakers breakdown this epic character.
•  Astrid’s Whole Dragon Trilogy in 60 Seconds – Hold on tight as Astrid sums up the whole dragon trilogy in a legendary 60 seconds. 
• Welcome to New Berk – With Hiccup as your guide, get a firsthand look at the updated Viking village of New Berk.
• Feature Commentary with Writer/Director Dean DeBlois, Producer Bradford Lewis and Head of Character Animation Simon Otto.

Final Thoughts

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Have you ever read a new book without realizing there was a lot of media buzz around it?

Well, that's the exactly what happened to me with the thriller The Lost Night by Andrea Bartz, which was published by Crown Publishers earlier this year. Originally, I had stumble upon the title in the "upcoming" books section on the Barnes & Noble website. After reading the blurb, I became interested in reading the book. It wasn't until after I finished reading it that I learned about the possible "limited series" adaptation. When I say "possible," I'm referring to little fact that there has been no new news about the rumored series since February.

The book centers around Lindsay, a journalist who's trying to unravel the mystery of why her friend Edie committed suicide in 2009. After talking to their friends, Lindsay realizes her memory of the night Edie died is mostly a blur. As she tries to put the pieces of that fatal night back together, she shockingly discovers evidence that suggests Edie was actually murdered.

Final Thoughts

Sunday Post is a weekly meme hosted by Kimberly @  Caffeinated Book Reviewer!

In the Mail

For the past week, I've been playing around on the website called Book Brush, https://bookbrush.com, which is basically a website where authors, publishers, and bloggers can create advertising and social media images.

If you follow this blog regularly, then you would already know I love to use images in my posts. I create many of the post headers myself by using different software and online programs, so naturally I was intrigued with Book Brush.

Book Brush has two different "creator" programs to use on their website - a custom image creator and a video creator. You can register for free without a credit card and create 3 images per month, but if you want additional features you'll have to sign up for the "Plus" package for $8 a month (paid yearly at $96)! There's a 30-Day Money-Back Guarantee!

Creating an image with Book Brush is fairly simple. To begin with you need to pick what image size you need. You can customize the size to whatever you want or you can use one of the "popular"sizes that can be used on Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, etc.. There are many backgrounds (over 1 million free images) and templates available to choose from. There are even a few different book templates, which you can covert a 2D cover to 3D. Additionally, there are many different fonts for adding text and a wide variety of stamps to add to your image.

To use the video creator, you'll need to have already made an image or images. Then you add video effects and change the image transparency. 


Note: Book Brush cannot be used with Microsoft Edge or Internet Explorer. It's only supported on Chrome, Firefox, & Safari.

Final Thoughts

Mill Creek Entertainment; Amazon

One of my favorite movie directors is John Carpenter, who happened to direct and co-wrote my favorite movie, Halloween. Mr. Carpenter made several "classic" horror and science fiction films during the 1980s. However, the 1990s weren't too good for the director, as almost every one of his films during this decade were complete flops; though over the the years many of them have become cult classics. His last two efforts (I'm not counting the two Masters of Horror episodes!) were 2001's Ghosts of Mars and 2010's The Ward.

Ghosts of Mars was originally planned to be the the third entry in the Snake Plissken film series with Kurt Russell returning as Snake. The title would have been Escape from Mars. After Escape From L.A. flopped, the film's title was changed to Ghosts of Mars and Snake was renamed to James 'Desolation' Williams with Ice Cube playing the character. The movie was released to Blu-ray (R; 99 minutes; $14.98) last week by Mill Creek Entertainment.

The film is set during the 22nd Century where Mars has been terraformed 84% and humans can walk around without having to wear a spacesuit. The plot involves Commander Helena Braddock (played by Pam Grier), Lieutenant Melanie Ballard (played by Natasha Henstridge), Sergeant Jericho Butler (played by Jason Statham), and a few other officers being sent on a mission to retrieve the criminal "Desolation" Williams (played by Ice Cube), who's in a prison cell located in the remote region of the planet. Unknowingly to the squad, the local mining workers had stumbled upon a Martian ancient crypt and unleashed evil spirits who have now taken over the bodies of the workers.

To escape Mars, the squat must work with Desolation, so they can find a way to stop the evil Martian spirits.

Special Features on the Blu-ray include:

• Audio Commentary with Director John Carpenter and Natasha Henstridge
• Video Diary: Red Desert Nights
• Featurette: "Scoring Ghosts of Mars"
• Special Effects (SFX) Deconstructions

Final Thoughts

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Grab a book, any book.
Turn to page 56 or 56% in your eReader.
Find any sentence, (or few, just don't spoil it).
Post it.
 Add your (url) post below in the Linky at: www.fredasvoice.com
Add the post url, not your blog url.

The big garage door rose and rose, revealing black boots, silver-gray trousers, and she thought, The Wraith, it's the Wraith!

page 156, N0S4A2 by Joe Hill

  My Thoughts

Are you deeply afraid of snakes?

Me? Not at all, in fact, I have a surprising fondness for them. Just don’t get me started on spiders—I’m decidedly less enchanted by those little eight-legged monsters. Snakes, however, hold a special place in my heart, particularly when it comes to the genre of creature features. Among these, the 1997 film Anaconda reigns supreme in my cinematic library, a nostalgic flick featuring a young Jennifer Lopez, alongside Ice Cube, Jon Voight, Owen Wilson, Jonathan Hyde, Kari Wuhrer, Vincent Castellanos, and a cameo by the ever-memorable Danny Trejo.

I still remember the thrill of skipping school just to watch Anaconda the day it landed on VHS. A true escapade for an avid young moviegoer!

As a side note to the kids out there: please don’t follow my example.

Anaconda (PG-13; 89 minutes; originally retailing for $14.98) has recently been re-released on Blu-ray and DVD by Mill Creek Entertainment. This film previously received a Blu-ray release back in 2014, which I had the pleasure of reviewing on this very blog. (Take a look at my review here!)

Sunday Post is a weekly meme hosted by Kimberly @  Caffeinated Book Reviewer!

In the Mail

$24.95; 224 pages; AMAZON

Believe it or not, 2019 marks the 100th year for Ripley's Believe It nor Not!, which was originally created by the late Robert Ripley. To celebrate this grand mark in history Ripley Publishing (a Jim Patterson Company) has recently published 100 Best BIONS (Believe It Or Not Stories), featuring the greatest Ripley's Believe It Or Not! stories from the last 100 years.

100 Best BIONS is split into five chapters: Classics, People, Animals, World, and Exhibits. The stories presented here have either appeared or been featured in other Ripley's Believe It Or Not! books, television series, cartoons, or odditoriums over the years. Each story's article is accompanied by photos (black & white and color) and/or illustrations.

Within the pages of 100 Best BIONS you'll learn about the half-man John Eck, Thomas Wedders - the man with the 7 1/2 inches long nose, the 7 longhaired musician sisters from New York, Mike the headless chicken, and many other strange facts that are almost too unbelievable to be true.

Final Thoughts

Mill Creek Entertainment; Amazon

It's time to take a trip back to 1978 (three years before I was born), the year when the psychological thriller Eyes of Laura Mars was released to theatres starring Faye Dunaway, Tommy Lee Jones,René Auberjonois, Brad Dourif, and Raul Julia!

Based on John Carpenter's eleven-page treatment, Eyes of Laura Mars was written for the screen by David Zelag Goodman and directed by Irvin Kershner. Faye Dunaway plays Laura Mars, a famous controversial fashion photographer who takes erotic photos of models in settings of graphic violence. What makes Laura Mars completely different than other photographers is that she has a psychic ability, giving her a mind's eyes (similar to looking through the lens of a camera). This is how she has been witnessing a series of brutal murders, which have inspired all of her gallery portraits.

Laura becomes a possible murder suspects after a police detective, John Neville (played by Tommy Lee Jones), discovers her portraits are very similar to real crime scene photographs. After ruling her out as a murder suspect, John begins to believe she has a sixth sense and will do anything to protect from the serial killer.

Eyes of Laura Mars (R; 104 minutes; $14.98) will be released on Blu-ray on May 14th by Mill Creek Entertainment. The only bonus extra is an Audio Commentary by Director Irvin Kershner.

Final Thoughts

Grab a book, any book.
Turn to page 56 or 56% in your eReader.
Find any sentence, (or few, just don't spoil it).
Post it.
 Add your (url) post below in the Linky at: www.fredasvoice.com
Add the post url, not your blog url.

Bing moved his hand across the pebbled leather. The polished cherry dash and the gearshift glowed.

page 56, NO24A2 by Joe Hill

  My Thoughts

Mill Creek Entertainment; Amazon

Hopefully, I'm not the only one who's tired of the countless remakes and reboots of Robin Hood! Hollywood has milked the folk hero story to death!! And many of the recent takes on the character have been horrible.

Well, it's a good thing us fans can go back and watch the better versions (movies and television series) on DVD, Blu-ray, and Digital. Mill Creek Entertainment will be releasing The Adventures of Robin Hood: The Complete Series DVD Set ($34.98; 59hrs 33mins) on May 14th; which features all 143 episodes from the classic British series on 11 discs. There are no special features or bonus extras; though it does come with a Digital code that can be redeemed and streamed on Mill Creek Entertainment's website.

The Adventure of Robin Hood aired on ITV in the UK and on CBS here in the United States from 1955 to 1959. The series started Richard Greene as Robin of Locksley, a Saxon nobleman who returns home to Nottingham from the Crusades and quickly becomes an outlaw. He teams with the other Sherwood Forest outlaws and eventually becomes their leader (a.k.a. Robin Hood) by the end of the second episode. Along with Little John (played by Archie Duncan), Friar Tuck (played by Alexander Gauge), and their merry men, Robin Hood robs from the rich and gives back to the poor, as well as outrunning the Sheriff Nottingham (played by Alan Wheatley).

Other cast members included Bernadette O'Farrell as Maid Marian in Seasons 1 & 2, Patricia Driscoll as Maid Marian in Seasons 3 & 4, and Ian Hunter as Sir Richard of the Lea.

FYI: Richard Greene reprised his role as Robin Hood for the 1960 Hammer Film Productions' feature film  Sword of Sherwood Forest. It was basically a retelling of how Robin Hood met Maid Marian. None of the other cast members from the series returned.

Final Thoughts

AMAZON

It's been a busy and stressful year for me, which means reading hasn't been my top priority. Case in point, I'd received the historical fiction novel Between Two Shores by Jocelyn Green back in late January or early February (I don't remember the exact date!), and I attempted to read it several times. However, something always comes up and I end up putting it aside in favor of another title. I eventually took the time and read the book last month.

Set in Lachine, Island of Montreal, Quebec in 1759, the novel centers around Catherine Duval, the daughter of a French father and Mohawk mother, who must come to the aid of her ex-fiance, Samuel Crane, after he is captured by her father. He claims to have information that could help stop the war and asks her to help him escape.

Final Thoughts

Sunday Post is a weekly meme hosted by Kimberly @  Caffeinated Book Reviewer!

In the Mail

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