Grand Theft Parsons (2003)

Released June 18 , 2004 in the US.

Filmed entirely in California.

Based on truths.

The story : 1973 , Joshua Tree , California.

26-year-old musician Gram Parsons has just overdosed in his room at the Joshua Tree Inn.

A woman spending time with him and freaking out that he is dead makes a frantic phone call to Gram's best friend and road manager , Phil Kaufman.

Phil instantly begins setting in motion a plan that stemmed from a pact between the two friends.

The pact is that when one of them dies , the other is to burn his friends body in the desert of Joshua Tree...

Phil cannot give up on this pact and will not.

Without telling anyone about what he is up to , Phil rents a hurse that comes along with a driver who happens to own the hurse, steals Grams body from an airport where Gram's stepfather is to pick it up and proceeds to get Grams' body out to Joshua Tree.

The pact proves to be not an easy task , causing much confusion and chaos , but Phil perserveres.

Stars Gabriel Macht , Danielle Sapia , Johnny Knoxville , Jamie McShane , Robert Alan Beuth , Marley Shelton , Christina Applegate , Scott Adsit , Sara Arrington , Mary Pat Gleason , David Caffrey , Alexa Sheehan , Wesley Mann , Jim Cody Williams , Kay E Kuter , Michael Shannon , Robert Forster

Directed by (& story co written) David Caffrey

Rated PG13

HISTORY/COMEDY/DRAMA

"Oh. Okay. It's a 200 hundred dollars worth of surprise?"

"No. No. No. It's more of a 50 dollars surprise."

Lowlifes (2024)

Made for Tubi, released on instant streaming April 11th in the US.

Filmed in Canada.

The story: Keith and Katherine have taken their teenage children Amy and Jeffery out of the city for their school break.

They are camping in their grandfather's camper...

While eating a meal cooked by Keith, two grimy men show up.

They claim they are looking for their cousin. But the family claims to have not seen him.

Finally, the two guys leave, and the family packs up, quickly getting back on the road.

On their way, they are stopped by the same two guys who now claim their pickup just stopped running.

They ask that the family take one of them just down the road to pick up another car to come and get him.

The family allows the man to go with them, but not even at the house yet, Jeffery does the guy in...

After the family rallies together to clean up the mess, they make their way to the very house they were supposed to bring that guy to.

There, the family finds two sisters and their grandfather, who are more than happy to allow the family inside their home, after the family claims they had car trouble.

But they should have never allowed them in.

Stars Matthew MacCaull, Elyse Levesque, Amanda Fix, Josh Zaharia, Todd Masters, Richard Harmon, Ben Sullivan, Brenna Llewellyn, Cassandra Sawtell, Kevin McNulty, Dayleigh Nelson, Alexander Calvert

Directed by Tesh Guttikonda & Mitch Oliver

Not Rated

MYSTERY/THRILLER/HORROR

Disconnect (2012)

Released July 5, 2013 in the US.

Filmed entirely in New York.

The story: Four groups of people that do not know each other, are all connected by one thing. The internet.

Ben is a talented smart kid who keeps to himself and doesn't exactly have any friends.

His father Rich is an attorney, who is never too far from his cell phone, which makes him even further away from his family.

While wandering around a martial arts studio, Ben has a run-in with bullies Jason and Frye.

When Frye looks on Facebook to find Ben, he learns that Ben is a 10th grader just like them and also goes to their school.

They decide to make a fake Facebook account to mess with Ben, which goes horribly wrong.

Jason's dad Mike, is a widowed ex-policeman who is struggling to raise Jason on his own.

Jason thinks his dad is too hard on him, doesn't understand him, and worst of all, doesn't care about him.

Mike works taking down people who steal others' identities through the internet.

He is currently trying to help married couple Derek and Cindy, whose marriage is suffering since the passing of their infant son.

To make matters worse for Derek and Cindy, their bank accounts were hacked into, due to Derek's online gambling problem and Cindy befriending someone on a chatroom out of loneliness.

Nina is a journalist who has recently got the bright idea to do a piece on the people who make a living on adult webcam sites.

When her piece gets picked up by CNN, trouble strikes because unknowingly at the time and without that intention, what Nina really uncovered is underage sex workers.

When the FBI gets involved, Nina is in hot water.

Attorney Ben is called in to advise Nina on what she can and cannot do to help solve the case.

Stars Jonah Bobo, Colin Ford, Aviad Bernstein, Jason Bateman, Haley Ramm, Hope Davis, Frank Grillo, Alexander Skarsgard, Paula Patton, Andrea Riseborough, Norbert Leo Butz, Max Thieriot, Michael Nyquist, Teresa Celentano, Kasi Lemmons, John Sharian, Marc Jacobs

Directed by Henry Alex Rubin

Rated R
DRAMA

Honk for Jesus. Save Your Soul (2022)

Released September 2nd in the US.

Filmed in Georgia.

The story: Pastor Lee Curtis Childs and First Lady Trinitie Childs were the proud leaders of their self-made Southern Baptist Megachurch.

Everyone loved and admired the couple and gave freely.

The Pastor and First Lady also gave so much more back.

But when Pastor Lee was involved in a scandal, everything surrounding the church changed.

They lost their congregation, which has really taken a toll on them.

Years later, after they believe everything has blown over from the public eye and they paid their dues, the couple are aiming to rebuild and reopen their church.

At the same time, they have hired a film crew to commemorate their progress, which doesn't always go as the couple planned.

But they carry on, with high hopes and expectations even though it seems they are continuously struck down at every turn.

Stars Sterling K Brown, Regina Hall, Nicole Beharie, Conphidence , Austin Crute, Devere Rogers, Robert Yatta, Greta Glenn, Andrea Laing, Selah Kimbro Jones, Crystal Alicia Garrett, Perris Drew

Directed by (& story written) Adamma Ebo

Rated R
DRAMA

Renfield (2023)

Released April 14th in the US.

Filmed entirely in Louisiana.

The story: Renfield was once a married man with a daughter who was trying to make a living selling insurance.

That is until he met the Prince of Darkness...

Dracula took a liking to Renfield right away, claiming him for his servant.

Present day, after a serious accident, Renfield has taken Dracula to an unsuspecting city, where they can fit in and find food.

But lately, Renfield is feeling like he needs to get out of his servantry.

He has been attending a self-help group at a local church and there he learns there is hope for him.

When Renfield gets the idea that he can feed the "monsters" in the lives of his fellow self-help group to his boss, he believes he has solved all problems.

But that idea backfires on him.

Renfield ends up getting involved with helping a policewoman who feels like she is a one-person police force while trying to take down a powerful local drug kingpin and his family.

Stars Nicholas Hoult, Nicolas Cage, Awkwafina, Ben Schwartz, Shohreh Aghdashloo, Camille Chen, Adrian Martinez, Brandon Scott Jones, Jenna Kanell, Danya LaBelle, Rhonda Johnson Dents, Bess Rous, Christopher Matthew Cook, Michael P Sullivan, Rosha Washington, James Moses Black

Directed by Chris McKay

Rated R
COMEDY/FANTASY/HORROR

Play Dead (2022)

Released April 7, 2023, in the US.

Filming location(s) unknown.

The story: Chloe is a young woman juggling school and payments on her family home with very little money.

Her younger brother TJ is no help.

To make matters worse, Ty gets himself into trouble, going along with his friend Ross on a robbery. 

But TJ is only the driver.

When Ross gets shot, TJ gets away. But, Ross's phone connects him to the robbery.

When TJ tells Chloe what happened and how they need to get Ross's phone, they try to get into the town morgue but are unable.

So, Chloe comes up with the crazy plan to "play dead" so she can get into the morgue.

Unfortunately, when she's finally inside, the situation is even worse than she would have guessed.

Stars Anthony Turpel, Chris Lee, Chris Butler, Sterling Beaumon, Stephanie Rojas, Bailee Madison, Jerry O Connell, Jorge Luis Pallo, Kyler ONeal, Haley Pilz, Josh Harp,  Coco Fenton, Ashad Hashine

Directed by Patrick Lussier

Not Rated

THRILLER/MYSTERY/HORROR

The Bob's Burgers Movie (2022)

Released May 27th in the US.

The story: Today is the day that Bob and Linda are to try to get another loan to help pay for their burger business.

Bob is completely worried but Louise positively encourages him that they will get the loan.

When they do not get the loan, both Bob and Linda really become worried. 

The only solution is to sell as many burgers as possible in a month to pay off the loan they already have.

But when a giant sinkhole opens up right in front of the business, selling burgers doesn't exactly become any easier.

Meanwhile, at school, Louise is called a baby for not wanting to play on the monkey bars because her hat will fall off and everyone knows she never takes off her hat.

Louise gets the idea to be recorded climbing down into the sinkhole, to show her bravery.

While in there, she finds a skeleton which becomes big news and gets the kids thinking that they can uncover who the killer is.

Stars (voices by) H John Benjamin, John Roberts, Dan Mitz, Eugene Mirman, Kristen Schaal, David Wain, Zach Galifianakis, Kevin Kline, Larry Murphy, Gary Cole, John Q Kubin, Nick Kroll 

Directed by Loren Bouchard & Bernard Derriman

Rated PG

ANIMATION/COMEDY/MYSTERY