Friday film roundup: One for Spiritual Introspection, Four for Action
It’s Friday, and time for another film roundup from Past the Popcorn:
It’s a pretty decent week for competent filmmaking, and leading the pack of new releases is a thoroughly spiritual and contemporary tale called Hidden Secrets. Released by PureFlix for a one-day opening on Monday, April 30 (no fooling!) on 200 screens, it’s a tale of confession, forgiveness, and reconciliation. Greg Wright calls it an “idealistic, gentle, somewhat cloistered, but genuinely moving little film.”
On the mainstream, adult-ish front, Jeff Walls finds the action flick The Condemned “a not-so-subtle condemnation of our modern voyeuristic society,” and enjoys it for what it is. And in that voyeuristic vein, Kathy Bledsoe finds Vacancy to be “masterful,” if nightmare-inducing, filmmaking. Meanwhile, Mike Brunk finds enough plot holes to drive a truck through in Next, though calling the film “a good option for a mindless action flick.”
If noise and violence don’t attract you, Diggers might do the trick–but don’t expect sanctity here, either, or much of a conventional story. A slice of life in a clamming community, this small (but very adult) film is what Mike Brunk calls a “recipe” with all “the right ingredients in the proper proportions.”
