FlickDirect Movie Reviews

Physical Media: 4K UHD, Blu-ray, DVD Reviews by Stephen Compall

Browse reviews written by Stephen Compall, including critical takes on films, home entertainment releases, and television series.

All Reviews Theatrical 4K / Blu-ray TV / Streaming

Ostensibly a programmer from faraway places, Stephen recognizes that making up your mind about movies and television is a simple matter of imposition in the form of review, and he who controls minds controls the world. No word yet on how that second part is progressing. After seeing many films, a few good, for FlickDirect, he returned to faraway places, but still checks in from time to time.

Homeland: The Complete Second Season

Sep 26, 2013

With a series so tightly wound as Homeland season 1, seemingly meant for a self-contained, miniseries-style run, there are two real dangers of extending the story. To extend past shelf life,...

Full Review | Grade: A

Battlestar Galactica: Blood & Chrome

Feb 14, 2013

Following Caprica, a beautiful if unwatched experiment in radically altering the Battlestar Galactica formula, Syfy tried to get back to the roots of the franchise's mass appeal...

Full Review | Grade: C

The Town Ultimate Collectors Edition

Mar 09, 2012

The film is full of emotional contradictions, and trades in them to keep this simple tale of "one last job" from falling into cliché in the wrong ways.

Full Review | Grade: A

J. Edgar

Feb 28, 2012

Among the most colorful moments of J. Edgar are those when J. Edgar Hoover (Leonardo DiCaprio, The Aviator, Inception) testifies in Congress. It is, more than anything, reminiscen...

Full Review | Grade: A

A Very Harold & Kumar Christmas

Feb 08, 2012

What I didn't expect of A Very Harold & Kumar 3D Christmas was to be genuinely laughing at one of the jokes early on. In a blatant display of ubiquitous timeliness, of which mos...

Full Review | Grade: C

Doctor Who Physical Media: Blu-ray Review

Doctor Who: The Complete Sixth Series

Nov 27, 2011

Heightened expectations and high risk were the rule of the previous series, series 5, of Doctor Who. The beginning of the reign of showrunner Steven Moffat (Coupling, Sherlock) promi...

Full Review | Grade: A

24: Season Eight - The Complete Final Season

Jan 10, 2011

After the astounding revival in storytelling that was 24's seventh season, the onus was on this, the eighth and final season, to avoid slipping back into the dark days of season six. I...

Full Review | Grade: B

Doctor Who: The Complete Fifth Series

Nov 21, 2010

Perhaps the most difficult question to answer about Doctor Who, despite its 31-and-counting television seasons of storytelling, is "What is Doctor Who about?" The red...

Full Review | Grade: A

Mad Max

Nov 10, 2010

You could suppose, if you so desired, that the grand construction of humanity's unique accomplishment, the abstract model of the universe, is nothing more than the same small set of ideas remixed and...

Full Review | Grade: B