US Blu-ray and DVD Releases: The Water Man, Batman: The Long Halloween, The House Next Door, Profile, After Life and more

• Chariots of the Gods – One of the most infamous/famous treatises on alien life is Erich von Daniken’s tome Chariots of the Gods, which posited that aliens visited earth in ancient times and were responsible for — among other things — the Egyptian pyramids, Stonehenge, and Easter Island. If you’ve ever heard the term “ancient astronauts,” it’s von Daniken who coined the phrase. The book came out in 1968, and then in 1970, a film documentary was made that even got nominated for an Academy Award. While the original film was, like, four hours long, an edited version was released, and it’s that 90 minute edit that’s rereleased on DVD this week in a new, remastered edition. Personally, I’ve always found this film really interesting; I remember watching it as a kid and being utterly fascinated by it. This DVD also includes a bonus feature film that serves as a more recent follow up to the original film, so you get a lot of bang for your buck.
• My Heart Cant Beat Unless You Tell It To – There’s no denying that My Heart Can’t Beat is a vampire film; that much is very clear. However, if you come to it expecting a traditional vampire movie, you’re going to be sorely disappointed. This is a low-budget, non-flashy family drama disguised as a vampire film, and it lacks the usual vampire trappings. In the film, Almost Famous’s Patrick Fugit plays the de facto lead of a small family unit of siblings, the youngest of whom happens to be a vampire. Unwilling to let young Thomas leave the house, older brother Dwight procures Thomas’s blood by killing homeless people and the like and draining their blood, while sister Jessie acts as Thomas’s mother and teacher. The film is less about vampirism and more about this bleak existence and how it’s tearing this family apart. I applaud the film for its new approach, but it is awfully dark and depressing, and while I’m sure it will have its fans, I can’t say the film as a whole did a lot for me.
• Little Q – I’ll admit, about 95% of the Asian films I get for review are action movies, with the other 5% usually made up of family dramas. So Little Q was a welcome diversion from the norm. This film follows a freshly trained guide dog for the blind being sent to help a celebrity chef who has recently gone blind and is extremely cranky about it. And I doń’t think I’m venturing into spoiler territory when I say that despite his reluctance to the dog, a wonderful friendship eventually forms. The film alternates between being truly warm and sweet and being a little cheesy, but for the most part it’s an enjoyable film that fans of movies like Hachi and Marley and Me will enjoy.
• Finding Your Roots: Season 7 – The popular PBS show hosted by Dr. Henry Louis Gates, Jr. returns, and as always it sees a number of popular celebrities researching their family trees and coming up with some genuinely interesting results. This season has Glenn Close, Jim Gaffigan, John Lithgow, Jane Lynch, Pharell Williams, and a ton of other famous faces, and it’s fascinating stuff. Admittedly I find genealogy very interesting, but this show also has some emotional moments and some “detective” work that’s a lot of fun to watch. This three-disc set gives you almost nine hours of content, and if you haven’t watched this show before now, definitely give it a try.
• Through The Shadow – This Brazilian supernatural drama is based on Henry James’s classic novel The Turn Of The Screw, which I’ll admit, I never knew had a ghostly element to it. Made in 2015, this latest version comes from Brazil, and sees a young teacher hired to teach two young orphans on a coffee farm. However, spiritual presences make Laura suspect that there may be forces out to harm the children or herself. Obviously, this isn’t a story I’m particularly familiar with, but I found this film to be a solid ghost story. It eschews a lot of jump scares or special effects, instead going for a more ambiguous presentation of the specters at work, It’s not a horror movie per se, rather, it’s a drama with some horror elements to it. It’s not great, it’s not bad; it lands somewhere just a touch above average territory.
• Indie/Foreign Spotlight – Wrapping up the week, we have a number of indie releases out this week, all of which happen to be foreign films. First up Stone Time Touch, one of the more artsy releases I’ve come across in recent months. Created by Armenian-Canadian experimental filmmaker Gariné Torossian, the film is part travelogue of Armenia, part art collage, part dream territory, and very little narrative story. There are some folk stories told throughout the film, but it’s not driven by a plot. The film looks dreamy and artistic, and if you like less linear filmmaking than the norm, this might be your cup of tea. Next up is the misleadingly-titled You Will Die At Twenty, which sounds like a horror movie but is actually a coming-of-age drama from Sudan. The film follows a young man who was cursed on his birth to die at age 20. Now, he’s 19, and he’s lived his life under the oppression of a family that’s mourned him more than loved him. The film explores the emotional impact as well as the freedom that comes with a sort of expectation of one’s own death, even if it might be more just superstition than anything real. The movie is interesting; I can’t say I loved it, but I did like it. It’s a touch long, but it’s well acted and presents a storyline we haven’t seen often before, so it’s worth a look if you like foreign films. Following that we have Lust, a Norwegian film about a crime writer who is brutally attacked by one of her fans, who then begins to retreat from her life and suspect that everyone is out to get her. The film blurs the lines between what is real and what is imagined, and I suspect that that’s the film’s power. It’s part revenge thriller and part surreal drama, and again, I can’t say I loved it but I didn’t dislike it either. It isn’t really my kind of movie, but it’s hard to argue that it’s well made. Next up is The Real Thing, a film from Japan based on a popular Manga. The film follows a young man who lives a life of boredom, until one day he rescues a woman who throws his life into chaos. My understanding is that the film was originally a ten-episode series, which explains it’s near-four-hour running time. I’m not sure if the show was cut down to make it into a film or if this includes the entirety of the show, but between the overly long running time, the largely unlikable characters, and the cramming of too many events into the film, it really didn’t do much for me. Fans of the original manga may have a different take on it. Finally this week, we have Nakom, which I guess isn’t officially a foreign film. It’s written and directed by Kelly Daniela Norris and T.W. Pittman, but the film is set in Ghana and features a heavy use of the local Kusaal language. The film follows a young man in medical school in the big city who is called back to his farming community when his father dies. Cue the usual big-city-versus-small-town sensibilities and the family drama that comes along with it. The film moves a little slowly for my tastes, although the performances are quite good. Might be worth a watch for fans of the genre.