New at BOP: Review: Matrix Resurrections Movie Review: Moonfall Movie Reviews: Scream The #1 Movie in America November Forecast The Many Saints of Newark October Forecast New Trivia Question All site updates Share & Save   Tweet Print this column

The landscape for independent films has changed rapidly. On one hand, the opportunity to build a theatrical release has become increasingly difficult, but on the other hand, digital release has given indies a chance to play to a broad national audience at once. Each week, new indie releases will be profiled and because they might not be playing at a theater near you, one highly recommended film available now a click or two away via VOD (whether a new or not quite new release) will be presented for viewing without leaving your computer.

VOD Pick of the Week

Dance of the Dead
It’s October, which means Halloween is just around the corner and with it comes the time for scary movies. If you prefer to have some comedy with your horror, then Dance of the Dead is the perfect trick for a Halloween treat. It’s prom night at Cosa High School, but it turns out that these high school students have more to worry about than whether their dream date will say yes or if the corsage will match the dress. They have to deal with a zombie invasion as it seems like the local power plant is causing the dead to rise from their graves.

Lindsey has embraced the high school ritual. She is part of the prom committee and is looking to make prom night the best night of her life. She has about met her wit’s end with her boyfriend Jimmy, who thinks everything is a joke, so she informs him that they are through. They are forced back together to fight the zombie horde. They are joined in their fight by members of the sci-fi club who couldn’t get dates to the dance and a militant gym teacher.

Dance of the Dead shares much in common with Shaun of the Dead by mining zombie movie tropes for comic effect. It also is obviously influenced by early Peter Jackson by using explicit and outrageous blood and gore for fun and amusement. Fun is the key word. Once the movie gets going it is pretty much a nonstop ride. While not particularly scary, Dance of the Dead belongs as a nice change of pace in your Halloween movie rotation.
Available at Amazon
Available at iTunes
Available at Vudu

New releases for October 18th

All is Lost: All is Lost joins a mini-trend of movies about individuals fighting to survive in isolation (see: Life of Pi, Gravity). Robert Redford plays a man whose small yacht is damaged somewhere in the middle of the Indian Ocean when it collides with a lost shipping crate. With the yacht disabled and becoming less and less seaworthy, he is forced to rely on his own ingenuity to stay afloat. Redford’s performance is garnering Oscar buzz. A nomination would be his first as an actor since The Sting in 1974.

Big Ass Spider!: The title is pretty self-explanatory. If you haven’t figured it out the movie is about a 10-story tall spider that rampages across Los Angeles. The city’s only hope is an exterminator (Greg Grunberg) and a security guard (Lombardo Boyar) who team on to take on the towering arachnid.
Available at Amazon
Available at Vudu

Kill Your Darlings: Daniel Radcliffe plays beat poet Allen Ginsburg in a film that focuses on his early years at Columbia University, during which time he became friends with classmate Lucien Carr and fellow writers William Burroughs and Jack Kerouac. When an admirer of Carr’s turns up dead under mysterious circumstances, the group is implicated as suspects, and the ensuing investigation has major impact on the lives of these emerging artists.