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Moriarty's DVD Shelf! New Release Tuesday for June 27th!!
Hi, everyone. "Moriarty" here with some Rumblings From The Lab...
Okay, so last week’s redesign of the DVD Shelf seems to have gone over fairly well. I was happy with it, most of your feedback seemed like you were happy with it. For the moment, I’ve sidelined “Laserdisc2K6,” but it’ll be back. In the meantime, I’m still adjusting to the shift from the old DVD blog to the main site, and I’m still working on the balance of new release reviews to older titles, because I want to put up a variety of things for you guys and not just be a slave to release dates. That’s what I love so much about DVD in the first place... you don’t have to just deal with what someone else has booked to play on a local screen. You can watch anything you want any time you want, and you should take full advantage of that.
With that in mind, let’s get right to this week’s new releases.
A
This one sounds awesome. A Japanese documentary about the Aum Shinrikyo religious cult would be interesting enough, but Tatsuya Mori was given permission to follow the cult’s members in their daily life. This was done in the wake of the sarin gas attacks in Tokyo’s subways in 1995, and he managed to capture the group at a flashpoint of controversy. I haven’t read much about the film, but just that much of the premise is enough to get me interested. I’ll definitely track this one down this week.
DOCURAMA FILM FESTIVAL VOL. I
Nice little stack there, eh? Docurama, a company dedicated exclusively to the release of documentaries on DVD, is doing what they call a “film festival,” where they’re releasing or re-releasing a whole stack of stuff all at once, and there are some really strong titles in this group.
I’ve seen AGING OUT, which was a pretty powerful movie about what happens to kids who are getting ready to graduate from the foster care system into life on their own, and I’ve seen BROKEN RAINBOW, which deals with Navajo Indians being relocated from their home in Arizona. All the others, I’m just going to try blind because I trust this company and their taste. Should be an interesting stack.
ANNAPOLIS
I’m still not sold on Justin Lin, but I’ll give this one a chance. It looks fairly cookie cutter based on the trailers, but trailers can be deceptive. I’m not sure how this is different than any other movie about a young man trying to make his way through the military training system. James Franco has yet to blow me away as the lead in anything, so that’s another hurdle the film has to overcome. This one’s sitting here on the stack, so I’ll review it as soon as I’ve seen it.
BLOOD BATH
BURST CITY
DEATH TRANCE
THE FLESH & BLOOD SHOW
THE DEVIL’S SWORD
ELECTRIC DRAGON 80,000V
Here’s a whole fistful of exploitation stuff that’s hitting the shelves at the same time, and it looks like aside from the crazy trash, there’s also some stuff that genuinely delivers the goods. I love this sort of stuff, and I love finding the diamonds in the rough.
This one’s an anthology film from 1975 as the director of a horror film tells stories to his guests around a dinner table. From the director of BLOODSUCKING FREAKS, which might not be a recommendation for everyone. I love Subversive Cinema and the stuff they’ve been working on lately, and they actually got Joel Reed to sit down for an interview here, as well as a full-length commentary. For fans of crazy cult cinema, that’s a pretty big deal, and you’ll want to check it out.
Punk rock in a post-apocalyptic Tokyo. Sounds good to me.
A samurai tries to find a mystical coffin where a powerful goddess lies trapped, dormant, so he can unleash her on the world to lay waste to it. Someone else tries to stop him. Okay. Again... what’s not to like about that?
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I’m pretty sure there’s a trailer for this film on 42nd STREET FOREVER, VOL. ONE, because this sounds familiar. Either that or I saw the trailer at the Alamo Drafthouse during one of the Quentin Tarantino fests. This is an obscure title to say the least, and there’s not even a picture of the cover art for the disc online anywhere. It’s not an anthology film, but it sounds like it’s set in a similar world to BLOOD BATH.
I’m on to you, Mondo Macabro. I’m hip to your tricks, dudes.
You bought a whole library of Indonesian films from the Indonesian equivalent to Toho, whatever their big studio was. And in the case of Indonesian films, a big movie looks like an episode of DR. SHRINKER in terms of production value when we look at it now. These are movies that were made for absolutely nothing, and they’re fueled only by the sort of whacked out local mythology/action movie mix. You hooked me with the absolutely insane VIRGINS FROM HELL, the gateway drug of Indonesian exploitation cinema. And on the second disc, you included a full two hours of exploitation trailers. You’ve now released several of the movies that were on that trailer ring. You’re very sneaky... and it’s much appreciated. And to anyone wondering if this is a recommendation... just look at that cover.
That’s the worst title I’ve ever heard, but in being awful, it’s sort of brilliant. I’m just now putting this one into the DVD player, and I realized as I opened it that Discotek actually included the soundtrack as a second disc. So if this turns out to be some sort of supergenius weirdo underground thing, I can feed my iPod. Awesome. Thanks.
The movie itself puts me in mind of TETSUO: IRON MAN and ERASERHEAD in its opening moments. I’ll definitely have a review of this one up later this week. Looks crazy. Tadanobu Asano is the star, and he’s one of the great insane actors in Asian cinema right now. That alone gives this film credibility for me.
CACHE
Michael Heneke has been called “the modern Hitchcock,” but I think he’s more malicious to his audience than Hitchcock ever was. This film showed up on many ten-best lists from major critics last year.
I wasn’t one of them. I think it’s a solid film, and I think it provokes, but I also think it smirks at you as it provokes, and there’s a sense that the last thing he wants to do is actually connect any dots for you at all. It’s a fine line when you’re playing games with the viewer, and sometimes, Heneke rubs me the wrong way as a result. Having said that, CACHE does manage to generate a sort of nightmare intensity for certain passages as Daniel Auteil and Juliette Binoche try to deal with the invasion of their privacy by someone who begins taping their lives. When you watch it, make sure you pay close, close attention to the final shot. Feel free to back it up and examine it a second time. On DVD, I have a feeling people will be able to appreciate the ending in a way they couldn’t in a theater, and it may help the film in the long run.
CHUCK BERRY – HAIL! HAIL! ROCK’N’ROLL! (4-disc box set)
Can someone tell me what this is? I can’t find any good description of the extras or the reason for this to be four discs long. It’s a good documentary by Taylor Hackford, and if you’re a fan of this music, there are some awesome performances during this concert. But four discs? Man, that makes me curious. Is there that much extra footage? Are those audio discs? I’d love to know.
COLT 38 SPECIAL SQUAD
CONVOY BUSTERS
Once again, NoShame offers up a pair of new releases that proves them to be one of the coolest distributors in DVD right now.
Massimo Dallamano was a major figure in Italian cult cinema. In addition to directing several major exploitation titles, he also was the cinematographer on A FISTFUL OF DOLLARS and FOR A FEW DOLLARS MORE.
This film, available here for the first time on US home video, was the last movie that Dallamano made as a director, and it united two of the biggest stars of the day, Ivan Rassimov and Marcel Bozzuffi, in a story about how violence creates more violence in the constant struggle between cops and criminals in Italy’s underworld. There are several extras on the first disc, including an interview with the composer for the film and a separate interview with the editor.
On disc two, there’s a movie called LA BIDONATA, aka THE BIG RIP-OFF. This is an ultra-rare film that was never officially released because the producer was kidnapped before it was finished. Made in 1977, the film’s of particular interest to fans of director Luciano Ercoli, who have wanted to see this ever since it was shelved. Both films are presented in their full 2.35:1 ratio, and there are liner notes about both films. Pretty nice package overall.
Stelvio Massi makes badass movies. No two ways about it. And CONVOY BUSTERS is actually one of his better cop thrillers. NoShame’s been putting out a lot of his films, which I’ve had a great time watching, and this one’s no different. Once again, the disc is packed with extras, and it’s well worth it for fans of the genre.
COLUMBO: THE COMPLETE FIFTH SEASON
Have I mentioned yet how much I love COLUMBO, and how much fun these full-season box sets have been? Here’s another fistful of the 90-minute Columbo movies. It’s a strangely satisfying length for a detective story. Not quite real feature length, but longer than TV. There’s room for real behavior, for character work, and the guest stars make the most of it practically every time out. Peter Falk was really running at the peak of his craft during this stretch of the show’s time on television, and he just seemed to be able to find endless quirks to play, little things that made each performance as Columbo feel fresh and interesting. I point at him as one of the perfect examples of what a lead in a TV series can do when they are given the exact right kind of support.
COPS VERSUS THUGS
YAKUZA GRAVEYARD
Here’s a double-feature from director Kinji Fukasaku, best known here for BATTLE ROYALE. This guy’s a lunatic, a great and inventive visual storyteller, and it’s always nice to see more of his work released.
Fukasaku made a ton of crime films over the years, including his great epic THE YAKUZA PAPERS series, and COPS VERUS THUGS is very much a prototypical movie about cops and yakuza.
If you want to see the director at his absolute craziest, this is the one this week. Fukasaku really played with the language of his storytelling, and there’s a giddy quality to his best work that’s just infectious. You have fun watching because it looks like he was making them while running on pure id. Both of these are available on Kino Video.
EVIL
If things were fair, Magnolia would be as big as Miramax used to be, because they seem to have picked up a steady stream of quietly great films in the last year or so. They end up releasing some really solid films, but because they’re such a small distributor, a lot of people just haven’t seen the films. This is one of those titles that should have made a bigger impression than it did in theaters, especially since it was nominated for Best Foreign Language Film in 2004 at the Oscars. A boy is expelled from school for fighting, and he ends up being sent to a boarding school where he is brutally hazed and systematically broken down. It’s a harrowing ride, and the less you know before you watch it, the better. Director Mikael Hafstrom made his English-language debut after this with DERAILED, but if you want to size him up as a filmmaker, here’s the one to watch.
FAILURE TO LAUNCH
This is not a recommendation. This is a warning. On a film like this one, I’ll give it to my wife to have her watch it first. She loves these movies. If she likes one of them, I’ll give it a look. But when she hates a movie as much as she did this one, that also demands that I look to see what it is that she responded to. Here, it’s pretty obvious... this is just a comic miscalculation from frame one. It’s tired before it begins, and it never manages to figure out what to do with its large and undeniably appealing cast. Everyone’s wasted. Everyone looks miserable. I can’t say this strongly enough... this one will please no one. It’s just the absolute definition of studio product.
GWENDOLINE: UNRATED DIRECTOR’S CUT
Ahhhh, yes. I remember when this film came out. I was 15, but I knew ushers who would look the other way for me since I was in the theater every weekend. They would kid me about what they let me in to see, and they were especially vocal in busting me for going to see THE PERILS OF GWENDOLINE IN THE LAND OF YIK-YAK, as it was called. To me, a movie like this combined two of my biggest interests at the time: ‘80s adventure movies and masturbation. Needless to say, it was a video classic soon after that brief theatrical run, where people could “appreciate” the film better at home. Tawny Kitaen was smoking hot and very naked in this film, and I remember laughing like Beavis & Butt-head at the idea that this movie was directed by a guy named “Just Jaeckin.” This disc from Severin Films is more than just the European cut of the movie (ten minutes longer than what was originally released here, and most of it is indeed adult material that got cut for the R-rating), it’s also a nice package that celebrates Jaeckin as a filmmaker overall.
LEROY AND STITCH
The last LILO & STITCH sequel wasn’t bad, and families really seem to love these characters, so I’m going to at least give this one a look.
LOOK AT ALL THE LOVE WE FOUND: A TRIBUTE TO SUBLIME
This is a record of a 2005 benefit concert at the Fonda Theater, where Los Lobos, Unwritten Law, Ozomatli, Fishbone and others got together to play Sublime tracks. Evidently, this package is one CD, one DVD, and not the exact same material on both.
WE JAM ECONO: THE STORY OF THE MINUTEMEN
I haven’t seen this documentary about the Minutemen, but I love the band, and it sounds like this is a pretty dense and interesting look at them. More importantly, there’s a second disc here with three full Minutemen live shows, and I can’t wait to get my hands on it.
MASTERS OF HORROR: DEER WOMAN
MASTERS OF HORROR: SICK GIRL
Obviously I’m not going to try to make any sort of critical comment about this series, but I will point out that the next two titles in the DVD release of the series are issued today, and it’s a pretty polarizing pair of titles this week.
John Landis fans know what they’re getting with this supernatural story featuring DREAM ON’s Brian Benben as a cop investigating what sounds like an urban legend or a local superstition, and there are nods to some of Landis’s earlier work here that will make you smile.
Lucky McKee took Sean Hood’s script about a killer bug and turned it into a screwball comedy lesbian love story, and how much you enjoy his episode may be based on how willing you are to make that sort of tonal shift with him. Softcore cable star Misty Mundae plays a major role here opposite Angela Bettis, McKee’s May.
STRANGERS WITH CANDY: THE COMPLETE SERIES
Whoever said comedy is not pretty was probably talking about Amy Sedaris. Not Amy Sedaris the way she looks every day, mind you. I’m talking about what she does to herself in order to play Jerri Blank, a “user, a loser, and a boozer,’ as she puts it. She makes me queasy when she’s in character, which I think is the point. The show is like an ultra-arch afterschool special, and Steve Colbert does some really good work here. She returns to high school while 42 years old, ready for a fresh start. Only... she’s not really ready. She’s a mess, and she pretty much poisons everything she touches. If you like comedy of the uncomfortable, this one’s for you.
ULTRAVIOLENT: EXTENDED UNRATED EDITION
As I understand it, Kurt Wimmer had this film taken away from him almost completely, and what was released has little similarity to what he wrote and what he wanted to accomplish. Wimmer’s noticeably absent from all the behind-the-scenes stuff. You see him, but there’s no commentary and no interview footage. I’d love to know what he meant for this to be. As it is, the film is visually striking and severely compromised, damn near incoherent at times. Still, watching this, it makes me think that Wimmer and Milla might have been able to create something that looked almost exactly like the animated AEON FLUX if they’d been teamed on that film. Some of this action is completely impossible, but staged with real verve, and it makes me hope (just as EQULIBRIUM did) that someone gives Wimmer something big and really good to do, and soon.
WHY WE FIGHT
Here’s my review of this one from a week or so ago.
YELLOWBEARD
This movie should be funnier than it is, but having just seen it again for the first time in years, I’ll say that it’s funnier than I remember it being. Graham Chapman plays the ferocious and slightly insane pirate Yellowbeard, and he spends his entire stretch in prison planning to pick up his long-hidden treasure when he gets out. Unfortunately, everyone else wants his treasure, too, and you end up with a costume-drama version of IT’S A MAD MAD MAD MAD WORLD as a result, with a pretty dense cast of well known comic performers. Cheech and Chong, Peter Boyle, Marty Feldman, Peter Cook, Eric Idle, John Cleese, Madeline Kahn, James Mason, Kenneth Mars, Spike Milligan... it’s a pretty outrageous line-up. The film’s not bad, but it never quite become the laugh-a-minute ride it wants to be.
This, by the way, may be the single cheapest, crappiest transfer I’ve ever seen. The film looks okay, but there’s not even a menu on this disc. This is so indifferent as to be insulting, and it’s not the way any studio should treat any title they’re putting out. It just seems disrespectful to the consumer.
THE COMPLETE SHERLOCK HOLMES COLLECTION
14 films. 5 DVDs. The complete run of Basil Rathbone films about Sherlock Holmes. Pretty swanky for $90 or so. I hear these have been restored, but I haven’t seen the set for myself. These are great movies, pretty much the definitive screen treatment of the characters, and well worth picking up.
That’s it for this morning. I’ll be back later with that SUPERMAN review and more of this week’s DVD reviews. I’ll also have some set visits to report on as I finish up this overwhelming backlog of transcription. For now, though...
"Moriarty" out.
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is that just asking for it?
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I want you inside of me.
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alex gray tool oshii apple stallman
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He conducts electricity! He thinks like a lizzard! HE'S THE MAN!
This movie is absolutely awesome, it's like the Japanese neo-punk version of Jimi Hendrix, drenched in PCP. I saw this at the Rotterdam Filmfest a few years back (together with Sogo's short The Master of Shiatsu (dying to find that on dvd) and feature length film "Gojoe", where the director Ishii Sogo was present. In advance, he apologized for the loud volume. During the film, half the audience survived the sound with their fingers up their ears, the other half left the screening with blood coming out of their ears. After the show, the director apologized for the sound not being loud enough. Watch this on 5.1 and turn the volume WAY WAY WAY up, then ignore story and just absorb the utter coolness that is Asano freaking out over his guitar being turned into a jigsaw puzzle. -
To have a frigging fortune to spend on movies... How does the guy even find these movies? No one has ever heard of these. Mori, I thought you had a kid? How do you still have time to watch all these? My movie consumption went down so much after I had my kid that the last movie I saw in a theater was King Kong. Sad, I know... I can still watch a couple on disc in between all the Elmo and Baby Einstein.
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...he gets them for free as promo copies. he reviews them for magazines and for this site. the companies send them to him for that reason. at least i think that's how it works... and JuggFuckler, nice reference to wet hot american summer...
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Columbo rules! Gwendoline was the wife of Hercules (The Kevin Sorbo version!). I heard from many people that they really like Leroy & Stitch. Lucky McKee looks still like he's about to cry and Yellowbeard has been released in Germany as a Monty Python-film (which it of course not is). That's it.
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stupid comments like that make me NOT want to see a movie.
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We crave the adventures of Cassie, D.D., and Shane!
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But ironicaly enough that's EXACTLY why those genius marketing types think you WILL watch it. "Goddamn it how the hell are we going to sell this fucking FOREIGN movie? Hey, I know, what's that 'cool' movie the kids like?" This is why 3rd rate Vietnam vet bring 'em back alive flicks used to rule (financially)on VHS - tenuous links like "From a friend of a maker of a halfway decent flick about a mistreated AMERICAN soldier!" Yep, that stuff fools me every time! Clever marketing people! Now THAT'S "Evil"!
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That didn't make much sense - I mean't to say befor the Vietnam Vet flick bit that basically the stupid 'Vet' approach worked on Joe Sixpack back in the day, so they're still trying that sort of disingenuous shit these days on "Hard to market" (foreign, subtitled, indie, non-mainstream or un-popcorn) films, regardless of their worth. It's pretty fucking patronising, especially as Joe Sixpack is NOT the right demographic anyway. They probably do actually think both films are really about fighting though.
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*sorry*
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I paid money to see this piece of ..., well, you get the picture. What the hell does it mean when you recomend a film on what it could have been. Everyone involved with this film must be force to watched it over and over for a space of 24 hours. If they are not shells of people after the experience, then they had no souls to start with. Repeat after me "Utraviolet is a piece of..." you know the rest.
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Failure to Launch is retarded shit. That and the Family Stone make me wish SJP stopped working. (I'm not a weird RomCom freak, I have a g/f.)All the rest looks cool, thanks for the heads up. Also Unltraviolet is bad but at least you could see what they were *trying* to do.
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Again on my marketing rant, I just love how they put the little line on there (the Failure poster) for people who didn't 'get' the picture. They don't even believe in what they do so they second-guess it! Ultraviolet looks to be the funniest film of the year to me, if the trailer was anything to go by. Does it have anything to do with the English TV show?
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Additional Release Material: Disc 1: HAIL, HAIL ROCK 'N' ROLL - Theatrical Version -- Additional Release Material: Introduction - Taylor Hackford - Director -- Trailers - Theatrical Trailer --- Disc 2: Additional Release Material: Featurettes - "The Reluctant Movie Star" -- Outtakes - 54 minutes of rehearsal footage --- Disc 3: WITNESSES TO HISTORY #1 Additional Release Material: Featurettes - "Chuckisms"; "The Burnt Scrapbook" --- Disc 4: WITNESSES TO HISTORY #2
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I immediately thought of the fantastic Jack Davenport mini-series! However, it's based on a 'comic strip' (as Vern would say). You can see flashes of briliance in it but it's such a mess. Think Aeon Flux with vampires, but what you get is all style and no plot or character. Shame really.
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Never been much for the Rathbone/Bruce series of Holmes films. Iconic as they made the roles for silver screen audiences, it's a rather large sidestep from Conan Doyle's literary creations. If these films are "definitive", it's because they are so well-known, not because they particularly resemble the Holmes and Watson of the books (Watson is not the comic relief), or their late Victorian world (Holmes vs. the Nazis?). Heck, out of all the Rathbone films, only one is actually based on a Doyle story, and only two are set in the right time period. If you include the small screen, the Granada series starring JEREMY BRETT gets my vote for the "definitive screen treatment". His performance of Holmes is brilliant, and much closer to Doyle's prose. In addition, they filmed virtually the entire canon (with great production values -- wonderful music, cinematography, etc.!) before Brett passed away. If you have a DVD player that can play R2 DVDs, you can get the COMPLETE Brett series from Amazon.co.uk right now for under $100 American dollars -- which is not a bad price for 16 DVDs and more than 39 hours of film! (Yes, there are R1 DVDs of the complete series, but they aren't packaged together, they aren't remastered -- R2 quality is significantly improved -- and they're much more expensive.) The old BBC series starring PETER CUSHING (Grand Moff Tarkin as Holmes!) is also quite good, and the surviving episodes are also available in R2 at Amazon.co.uk for a very reasonable price. Like Brett, Cushing was a Holmes scholar, and quite faithful to the Doyle (some may even prefer his more collected, by-the-book approach to Brett's creative intensity). And track down the Cushing telefilm "The Masks of Death", if you can find it, for a terrific Holmes yarn set at the end of his career (it was one of Cushing's last films), with World War I on the horizon. Not based directly on Doyle, but shades of "His Last Bow". Finally, the rest of the "Murder Rooms" series has just been released Stateside (the pilot was released as "Dr. Bell and Mr. Doyle"), starring IAN RICHARDSON, and telling the "true" story of young Conan Doyle at medical school and his mentor who would become the model for Holmes. It's a terrific series that Holmes/Mystery fans will not want to miss! Oh, one more thing ... "A Study In Terror", the '60s Holmes vs. Jack the Ripper film starring JOHN NEVILLE, is juvenile but fun, with a great turn by British character actor Robert Morley as Sherlock's older brother Mycroft. The DVD is only available outside R1, but it's worth tracking down. It beats the pants off the slicker but soulless -- and hilariously off-canon -- Christopher Plummer film "Murder By Decree" (Holmes wearing his deerstalker to the opera? To a funeral??) And I now see I've neglected to mention Hammer's "Hound of the Baskervilles", starring Cushing and Christopher Lee. Lots of liberties with the stories, but a fun ride nonetheless. It's Cushing's first turn as Holmes, the first Holmes adventure filmed in color, and the DVD has a bonus of Lee reading the first and last chapters of the book, as well as a wonderful documentary interview in which Lee reminisces about Cushing. (Lee himself played Holmes a few times, but the films aren't quite up to snuff, with Lee's voice dubbed by another actor!) Well ... I think that's about it! Go get buying! :-)
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And Dark Trance sounds like how a "Happy Finish" feels. Damn.
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...Kitaen, what the HELL happened?!"
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Talk about a shelf of shit.
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There's a hidden message in that photo. Is the center man the new Opie? I wonder?
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You mentioned Alex Grey and Tool, that got me interested? New Tool video maybe? That's all I gotta say. Well, except for "Yellowbeard" is bad, oh no, holy shit. Good thing I may get it for $5.00 it's a funny movie, you have to like absurd stuff. I love absurd movies.
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You can sum it up in one word shameful. What a horrible film.
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I rented this as a kid on VideoDisc! Yup, RCA VideoDisc. It was a bit "racy" for my 7 year old mind, as I recall, but it entertained the hell out me. Lots of laughs. I'll be picking this up, but not for my 6 year old to watch. You bet it's a double standard!
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Just kidding. And that Gwendoline title looks exciting, but it ain't on Netflix just yet. Curse you, Mori!
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Hence the delayed review. The boy over at CHUD certainly ripped it a new one. Oh well, at least we still have PIRATES OF THE CARIBBEAN to look forward to.
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Forget about the basil rathbone Sherlock. Jeremy Brett is easily the definitive Sherlock holmes. In all honesty his performance as Holmes is the finest acting I've seen on television. Seek out the Granada versions.
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Smoke another one, Columbo!
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Very disappointing. I have a soft spot for Equilibrium. Im glad to hear ultraviolet was not all Wimers fault. Maybe there is hope after all. The movie really was a mess. Terrble with very subpar effects.
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Clear my schedule for the week!
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But that deer wasn't no woman!
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(check his post, Blacklodgebob!) My wallet feels very sick, having bought ALL the region 1 Brett Holmes stuff. I live in region 4, and they were released in a weird order and way too expensive, so I thought I was onto a bargain with the region 1 stuff (English DVDs are so expensive, I generally just buy region 1 which also has 'extra' extras in many cases)! Oh well, the play's the thing, but I would have liked it in better quality, whatever the price.
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Why are they featured so huge on the cover, lol
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But, 'Razzle Dazzle' Basil would've been definitive had his films been set in the proper time period and based on actual stories. As it is, only a couple of the SH films are cool, although Watson is a fat, blubbering buffoon. I'll go rewatch 'Seven Percent Solution' and 'The Private Life of Sherlock Holmes' instead.
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Maybe they're afraid no Latinos will buy the DVD if it's not advertised as a C&C flick.
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...You're mad! Mad, I say! You neglected mentioning the greatest film in the history of cinema arriving on DVD the 27th! I am, of course, referring to the epic 1987 tale of good versus evil starring Canadian muscle-metal rocker, Jon-Mikl Thor -- Rock 'n' Roll Nightmare! For shame, sir! For shame!
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"I'm pretty sure I'm Chinese, dude"
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That's some mixed bag you got there i don't know if i could be arsed watching most of them especially shit like that Milah Yobitch crapfest Ultraviolent or whatever or Columbo!? it's on Tv every other day and i turn it over and what the Fuck is John Landis doing? Deer Woman!? LMAOff!
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Without the work of Sogo Ishii there would be no Takashi Miike or Shinya Tsukamoto. That becomes quite clear in the opening minutes of BURST CITY. The hyper-kinetic beginning of the film with its lightning fast editing and violent images together with the use of music were obvious influences on Miike's DEAD OR ALIVE and BLUES HARP as well as a number of other films. And the camera-work, use of black and white photography and cyberpunk imagery were later recycled in Tsukamoto's TETSUO films as well as his most recent effort, SNAKE OF JUNE. BURST CITY is essentially a feature length punk rock music clip. The film is set in a kind of post-apocalyptic Japan where everyone is a punk, a freak or a brutal cop. There are non-stop riots in the streets, non-stop punk concerts, non-stop gang warfare, non-stop police brutality and non-stop car chases. This film is one hell of a wild ride and it left me feeling spun. The soundtrack is made up entirely of awesome Japanese punk rock and fits the images perfectly. It is powerful, frenetic, feral, rabid cinema that feels like a transmission from the gutter of the future.
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Oh and don't watch Cache/Hidden it's pretentious French arse of the highest order where an interesting premise is shafted by irrelevant shots and characters who deliberately talk rubbish to annoy/confuse the viewer by the admission of the director himself!
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if you want to see Haneke's masterpiece grab THE SEVENTH CONTINENT instead. He was still an Austrian director and not a French one back then.
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Granted, its not that great, and it boils down to some pretty cliched shit in the last twenty minutes. But it has Anthony Head dammit, who I would watch in anything, including gay porn if it came down to it.
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If someone can actually find it for under a hundred dollars I'd love to see that.
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Boy, I'll bet all 6 of you who bought XM to hear them are really happy about that! Fuck the Prime Directive! Hi Sulu!
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Yeah, it is worth noting for sure, that the r1 dvds of the Jeremy Brett series are not of the highest quality. There's a lot of annoying audio warbling, and some blemishes or something on the film some time. I dont have r2 capability, so that's what I'm stuck with. Still worth it though. Do they ever still show it on PBS?
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And have not regretted a moment I've had it. Absolutely wonderful. I will now have to get the R2 Brett Discs, cos the R1 DVDs blow. Artifacting, haze, that weird motion-blur in some pans...very poor transfers.
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When I bought it at Amazon.co.uk in late April, the price was
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I guess you didn't see the James Dean movie he starred in, then.
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the first movie is a GEM compared to the recent mediocre direct to dvd sequels.
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An awesome movie with great extras about an amazing band.
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That was sweet. Better than 90% of the articles on this site. In fact, it would be nice to have that as an article so it would be indexed. Love to see some space available on the site for people to just go off on their favorite category. Regarding the Granada series, I agree Brett was arguably the definitive Holmes to date. I'd like to also point out that Burke and Hardwicke were equally good. In fact, given the poor treatment Wason has received onscreen, I'd say the series is almost more remarkable for their performances than for Brett's.
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Kudos to your, sir... my roommate brought Rock N Roll Nightmare home the other night, and we laughed our asses off. How 'bout that bass player's "British" accent?
So, it turns out Thor's gonna be rawking at a bar near my house in August. I will be front and center. Thanks for mentioning it... -
...is that by using that particular title, it soils the reputation of the great Joe Ahearne series of almost the same name. That series was a masterpiece...*X-Files* meets vampire hunters (Code V alert!). I guess Ahearne has the solice of being a successful *Doctor Who* episode director now. I'd really like to see a continuation of that series considering how many loose ends were left at the ending. Hell, I'd even take an American reimagining series on cable tv over the *Blade* tv series.
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Do you too feel that SR was a wasted opportunity at relaunching the franchise with a proper reboot that didn't alienate the fanbase? What'cha think about Spacey's Hackman impersonation? Or can its pretty special effects trump the story deficiencies as if Lucas made it himself? And if so, do you feel that not even the worst writer in the history of *Smallville* could have turned in such a terrible screenplay made far worse by the absence of the actual *Smallville* cast? We're curious to know your thoughts.
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.... you watch some amount of shite.
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Did it have many loose ends? I thought if anything it went too quickly from zero to conclusion in what 8 episodes? At the time I thought it was pretty cool and complex, I heard later that they were pretty much making it up and writing it as they went along. Still a very cool series though. Reboot it in America but get Jack Davenport back for it. How's that for an idea!?!
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Have you even seen the fucking movie?
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The WITNESS TO HISTORY docs are the most enticing thing about this release: Interviews with Roy Orbison, Jerry Lee Lewis, Carl Perkins, etc. documenting the birth of rock. Should be amazing, considering Orbison and Perkins aren't taking requests for interviews anymore.
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Which movie in particular are you asking about?
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How crass of me to omit mention of Burke and Hardwicke! You are absolutely right. Their Watsons are superb in their own right. A lousy Watson can tank a Holmes film for me almost as much as a bad Holmes. A brief survey of the Watsons in the other productions I recommended: Andr
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I could agree to that. But Davenport would have to anunciate more. His accent isn't the best to understand when he mumbles. Granted, it might have been an audio mixing issue for the televised episodes. I haven't seen it on DVD so that might have fixed said issue(s). I've noticed that *Doctor Who* has used similar frantic yet somber music as Ultraviolet in "Father's Day" and other episodes.
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By which I assume you mean Superman Returns.
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I can't believe you've never heard of Sogo Ishii, and that you don't realize that he directed BURST CITY, too. He was a teen prodigy whose first film was basically a remake of an 8mm high school project that attracted sold-out crowds in huge cinemas in Tokyo.
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...now let me go find my balls
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Fuck Basil Rathbone. Jeremy Brett is THE MAN.
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Why do I need to see the film to label it a POS? Did any of us have to see *Catwoman* to know it was a POS? How about *Elektra*? If the script sucks...which it does...the film sucks. Search your feelings, you know it to be true.
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This used to be shown on the USA channel on a fantastic show called NightFlight. The film is LONG. Filmed around 68 in Wembley stadium, these rockers were prematurely finding themselves on the backburner of fame. Think of it. Today, U2 has had a career of roughly 25 years and although they are (arguably) not entirely passe' - to others anyway -they are far from completely discarded. With the hippie revolution in full swing, aging rockabilly artists like Little Richard and Jerry Lee Louis were certainly not the in-fashion. The result is amazing. The performances have the quality of Jerry Swaggert after being caught with the hooker. If I remember right...Little Richard is kinda sweaty and scary, trying to look something like Hendrix while banging the piano and hollering in trademark fashion. Jerry Lee Lewis....similarly creepy. Big fat teddy boys roam the crowd. Still....its fascinating to watch. The absolute highlight is Bo Diddley, giving the most rockin' out amazing performance I've ever seen. Truly a must see for this alone!!!! I can't wait to rent it for the first time. Saw it last in the early 80's.
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he wasn't even sure until very recently they'd even LET him review the movie. This, the man who pretty much destroyed J.J.'s draft (and I know you like parts of it, Mori, so don't say I'm misrepresenting you), so you could be sure that WB might have been a little reluctant. Mori usually waits--for good movies and bad--until pretty much before the movie is widely released for the most part (POTC 2 notwithstanding). So stop goddamn asking. And where's that Tawny Kitaen movie on Netflix already?!
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It appeared in the last 24 hours. Tawny Kitaen spankfest in T-minus 72 hours.
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I always dug that old Yellowbeard poster, the film's an enjoyable enough slice of cheese too, though more a film of moments than anything else.
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You don't know that the script sucks. You haven't seen the film. And no, I don't know that Elektra or Catwoman are bad films. From the reviews and trailers, they look bad, but not having seen them, I have no opinion of them. And notice that you don't have me obsessively stalking talkbacks badmouthing them (this isn't even a SR talkback, is it?). I'll leave that to people who *have* seen the movie.
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Well, call me crazy, but I don't have to experience a legal injection from a death penalty sentence to know that it ends up in death for the recipient. That's your logic applied to the real world. Nor do I want to test food from a restaurant after it receives a bad review in the local newspaper. So let us again go over a checklist that illustrates why the screenplay sucks. #1. Lex Luthor is not the modern take on the character. He's out to remake Cobra Island out of Kryptonite. That's stupid. #2. Superman goes on a 5 year mission to discover the obvious that Krypton resembles Alderaan and Gallifrey instead of taking his deceased father's word from the original movies that his home planet is dead. This also happens after telling the President of the United States (in the prior film that this movie is supposedly a sequel to) that he wouldn't go away again. That equals stupid. #3. Superman is a deadbeat dad. Stupid. #4. Lois hooks up with a guy right after Superman takes off and leads him to believe he is the father of her child. Lois = a ho. Stupid. #5. The screenplay sets out to be a continuation of the Donner films - aged as they are - instead of a proper reboot like what was applied to the Batman franchise. That equals mass idiocy. So there are 5 legitimate criticisms with the screenplay even before getting to the external issues such as the cast being inferior to a TELEVISION SHOW'S cast. The other gripe is that by Superman having a kid in this film, it ruins the chance of seeing the storyline of Batman fathering a child with Talia Al Ghul appearing in the future Batman films.
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Not analagous at all. And If you read a bad review of a restaurant, that means that the reviewer didn't like the restaurant. (I guess you choose to ignore that others may like the restaurant?? In this case, the majority of reviews are still positive) You still don't have an opinion of the restaurant since you haven't experienced it yourself. You don't know how the food tastes, you can only imagine what it might taste like through others' descriptions. So you still don't know that the screenplay sucks. I guess this couts as calling you crazy? Although the obsessive off-topic postings (about a movie I assume you won't even go see?) gave that away long ago.
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Truly, a standout film - and certainly one of the most important films on display in this, M's present shelf-o-DVDs. I can see why people are initially put off by this movie - about 15 minutes into it the gently flowing plotline starts to resemble the very definition of a serious cinematic mindfuck. But the technical prowess of Haneke is impossible to ignore, and for me the result is a movie both terrifying and enveloping, but also pretty to look at. Ergo the Hitchcock comparison often invoked. So, okay, you're probably not going to figure out everything at once - or maybe as someone previously had mentioned - you're not supposed to. But what in the world is wrong with that? This one is all about mood, and based on that standard of values the end result is more than satisfactory. That said, the fact that there IS a "last scene" seems to reveal that it's not all fluff and that we're not being screwed completely. Hey - do yourselves a favor and rent the damn thing and decide for yourselves if you haven't already. To be honest, I'm a bit embarassed that M gave it such a light dusting amid such a stack of stinkers as is currently on display.
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2 weeks. How many "re-designs" and "re-imaginings" has Moriarty had over the years with his columns? It's basically all cover-up for the fact that he is lazy, lazy, lazy and can't deliver on his promises. Face it Moriarty, you don't have the time and/or dedication to actually review as much as you say you will.
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http://lordoftherings.net/index_400_hv_limiteddvd.html
WTF are they doing? I haven't seen a post about this anywhere, so maybe no one will notice, but I figure this is the most relevant.
Why can't they just release the "super special documentary" separate so I won't feel like a homo for even thinking about buying the movies again for a...third time. WTF.
At least put in some more deleted scenes for more extendedness and bloopers and some shit. Eff this. Release the documentary separate PJ, don't become another George Lucas.
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