Disc of the Week (10/25/11)

As I live in the lowly state of Ohio, it normally takes quite a bit for the less-expensive independent movies to get to me. While we decide presidential elections, we apparently aren’t the first place smaller distributors look to send their films. This summer, I just happened to be lucky in that I was visiting Chicago the exact weekend the much-hyped British alien invasion film Attack the Block was hitting American theaters. As I had some time to myself, and my hotel wasn’t far from the local theater, I decided to stop by and see just what all this fuss was about. And boy oh boy was it a blast. It brilliantly takes what you love about films like this and strips away all the crap. Even the design of the aliens themselves is incredibly simple; they are simply furry masses of black and little else. While some may laugh at the apparent lack of imagination, compared to the generic tentacle-y alien that we see in every sci-fi movie these days they seem downright revelatory.

As much as I loved Attack the Block the first time around (and I loved it) only upon second viewing did I fully comprehend its genius. In many ways, it serves as a statement on our universal fear of the unknown, and that isn’t restricted to aliens from another planet. One character in particular spends his time walking around with his iPod in his ears, and thus is cut off from the world outside his own bubble. For a movie that moves so quickly, it’s amazing to think about all the ideas that it tackles head-on. Upon second viewing, it went from a really great movie to one of my favorites of the year. The first time you see it, Attack the Block is so entertaining that you may miss all it has going on upstairs. It only gets better the more you reflect on it. That this was directed by a first-timer (ex-comedian Joe Cornish) is staggering to consider.

Also out on DVD and Blu-ray this week is what might have been the best mainstream blockbuster of the summer: Captain America: The First Avenger. Coming into the year, this might have been the superhero movie in which I was least interested, but this may be the most fun I’ve had with such a film since 2008. At its best, it evokes the adventures of classic Spielberg, and a winning performance from Chris Evans also helped make it such a blast. It doesn’t try to change the cinematic world, but Captain America is old-fashioned popcorn entertainment that does just about nothing wrong.