New DVD Tuesday

Dinner for Schmucks (2010) - Steve Carell, Paul Rudd, Zack Galifianakis
When business man Tim (Rudd) is offered a promotion, he finds that it comes with a catch: his boss hosts a dinner once a month to which each of the company's higher-ups bring an idiot to mock. Originally disgusted by the idea, he then literally runs over Barry (Carell) whose antics change his mind. I went into "Schmucks" expecting absolutely nothing and was pleasantly surprised that it was half-way decent. Carell is really, really funny and while the movie wreaks of 1997, it's not bad.

Machete (2010) - Danny Trejo, Jessica Alba, Robert De Niro

An ex-Federale (Trejo) goes on the rampage when he discovers that his employers try to kill him. Uber-violent and blatantly ridiculous, Robert Rodriguez's style has never done it for me. No question that he's a talented guy, I'm just no into his scene. I am glad, however, to see Trejo (aka "the bad looking Mexican guy" in every single action movie ever) get a starring role. Dude deserves it.

The Last Exorcism (2010) - Patrick Fabian, Ashley Bell
A documentary crew films a priest performing an exorcism. The reviews for this have been all over the place but as a general rule, I skip out on all exorcism-related films for two reasons: 1.) they freak me out, and 2.) there's no way any of them could ever come close to topping "The Exorcist." What's the point, you know?

Case 39 (2010) - Renee Zellweger, Bradley Cooper
Having sat on the shelf for years, none of the stars of "Case 39" were that excited to see it hit US theaters late last year. Concerning a social worker (Zellweger) who takes in an abused child who turns out to have a demonic association, this did marginally well overseas but still failed to find an audience over here. I was out at "Renee Zellweger."

Catfish (2010)
The most controversial film of 2010, "Catfish" is an alleged documentary about a twenty-something New Yorker who falls into an online relationship with a woman who may or may not be an attractive girl his age. The question is, were the filmmakers really this lucky (so to speak) or did they know all along what was going on? I confess I'm interested to see and judge for myself but some of the press has been exceedingly negative.