Electric Shadow

FantasticFest08: Zombie Girl shambles to Slamdance 09

Zombie Girl was a fun doc I reviewed back in September when it played Fantastic Fest, the hajj of genre film enthusiasts. It's now moving on up to Slamdance 09 according to the lineup that Cinematical posted this morning. This is excellent news in light of the recent blow to female directors in the Hardwicke Whacking of 08. Let's hope Emily really represents as much the future of female directors as her own generation. Emily and her mom Megan will be at ButtNumbAThon X this weekend, I'll see about grabbing a quote from them about where the movie is otherwise. Speaking of Fantastic Fest, I have a Nacho Vigalondo interview that I need to put up in the days leading up to Friday, as (I'm assuming) Timecrimes expands to other markets.
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Region0: Red Cliff Part 1 and The "International Cut"

2008, China Region-free DVD available from Sensasian.com and YesAsia.com among others I'm not holding out any hope that the complete, two-part, and four-hour Chinese cut of John Woo's Red Cliff will hit the US in anything other than a DVD or Bluray release. As a result, I've gone ahead and imported it. I can't help but think of the parallels to the impending release of Che. IFC isn't paring Che down into one 2.5-hour condensation, but the only way we expect to see the whole experience of either movie is in one's living room. For those unfamiliar with the film and its still-hazy US release plans, the plot of the film concerns the Battle of Red Cliff, a landmark event in Chinese history that further unified regional rulers as China grew together to become the People's Republic that it is today. Woo has attempted a more historically-accurate take on the material than has been seen in more...loose adaptations that use Romance of the Three Kingdoms, a historical novel, as their blueprint rather than Chronicle of the Three Kingdoms, the historical record of events from which Romance is adapted. Part One was released in China in early July 2008 and has waged a path of destruction across Asian box offices since then, recouping over 80% of its budget so far. The movie came out just in advance of the Beijing Olympics, and I wish someone gave me a vote as to whether the US got The Mummy 3: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor or Red Cliff: Part One this past August. I'm used to waiting months (Mongol) or years (Hero) for Asian films to hit the US, but this one is getting chopped to pieces before it gets here. The nearly 2.5-hour Part One will be combined with the undetermined-length Part Two and shaved down to...2.5 hours? I know nothing's official yet, even a US distributor, but the reason no one seems to have any clue what's happening with the movie is inextricably tied to the fact it's non-English language period drama clocking at around five hours in two chunks. Even more so after seeing Part One, I can't fathom how you effectively shave almost 5 hours down to 150 minutes with this material. The cast is Lord of the Rings large in terms of focal characters, so you'd have to chop a few people completely out of the movie to really drill the running time down that much. What am I saying? I'm giving people ideas now. Terrible ideas.
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Dear Zachary on MSNBC

...or, How to Ruin an Engaging Doc with Commercials.

I didn't catch Dear Zachary at SXSW this year or anywhere else, and I wish I had. My only shot at seeing it was tonight's showing on MSNBC prior to an expected DVD release at some point. If you can put up with commercials, see it as soon as you can. I did fine for the first little bit (20-25 minutes or so), until the first commercial break, which lasted around 6 minutes. Commercials destroy momentum, and it's a great testament to Kurt Kuenne's film that even the lengthy breaks to sell the elderly hearing headsets or car insurance don't lose you.

The movie is only 95 minutes long, and I get the bricks of time in which the universe exists in the cable realm don't fit that at all, even with "limited commercial interruption." 95 minutes of movie and 25 minutes of commercials, though...is excessive, even to the most indoctrinated cable zombie. MSNBC would be wise to chop the commercials in half and plug a 15 minute newsbreak in at the end of each screening of the movie.

The movie itself, I can say without spoiling things for those who haven't seen it, is a far more scathing indictment of government and justice systems than Roman Polanski: Wanted and Desired. Dear Zachary is a movie about how miscarriage of justice by any officiated body can affect one individual directly and leave irreparable damage to the many, many people connected to them and consequently, human society as a whole. There are tons upon tons of docs and TV specials out there about the horrible things that happen to people, but Dear Zachary really feels like it happened to you or a person you know, and on top of that, it makes you appreciate what you have more than you could believe before you're on the other side of its 95 minutes (2 hours including liquor commercials).

I'm rewatching it as we speak, and at a particularly involving moment, we cut to a quick Advil commercial, and then...ShamWOW! When is the US going to get on the bandwagon with IP TV and cut this crap out? Fine, front-load me with 12 minutes of ads straight, just don't chop the content up for crying out loud!

This movie should have been on that shortlist. I assumed that was the case before, but I'm angry about it now. It is reassuring that an enormous number of people will see it by virtue of being on cable TV "for free," which will give it a bigger potential audience than anything shy of Fahrenheit 9/11 hype, which is not the case with docs in any case other than that one movie.

Austinites can see it theatrically thanks to the Austin Film Society in February, I'm told, with director Kurt Kuenne in attendance. More details as they come on that front.

Hardwicke off Twilight and why this sounds familiar

Nikki Finke has reported and many others have hopped aboard news that Twilight director Catherine Hardwicke is off the franchise. The most interesting piece of the story comes in Finke noting that Summit (who owes its newly-flush coffers to the movie that Hardwicke directed) is positioning her as "irrational" and "difficult to work with" (I'm paraphrasing the second there), similarly to how Julie Taymor was described on Across the Universe. Why does this sound like a man breaking up with a woman with no good reason other than some one else waiting in the wings? I'm not saying I know anything about the production, Catherine, or any of the people involved, but this could be the new standard of writing off female directors. Didn't we hear something similar shot around about the studio's perspective on Lexi Alexander on Punisher: War Zone? Is this the conversation that goes on when studios look to hire directors: "Jesus, Bill, we can't let a broad direct the picture, just think how irrational, difficult to work with, and out of control all those lady feelings are gonna be! Let's go get smashed, grab a couple hookers, and a brick of coke, whaddaya say?" Any outspoken "artiste" or "auteur" type is going to butt heads with a studio that has anything less than complete trust in the director in question. No one will definitively, without a shadow of doubt, convince anyone that they're right in a he-said she-said on this thing. There are so many cooks in a studio kitchen, it's a matter of who owns the IP and who makes the hiring/firing choices...they control the spin, no question. Is Summit trying to P.R.-wise wash its hands of the one undesirable regarding the first movie, its critical reception? "It isn't our fault, it's that bloody hard-headed woman!"
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Hancock Unrated changes

Thanks to a mandatory 6-hour online defensive driving course, I've taken the copious free time included in that timeframe and the poor judgment of a friend who already bought Hancock on DVD and have finished getting through it playing in a tiny window in the background while I complete the course. This was spurred by the overabundance of extra time included and a commenter on Jeff's counter-Hancock post asking about the differences: In the first ten minutes, there's a character-building scene that expands Hancock in the bar early on. Readers of the original Tonight, He Comes script will see a piece of the movie that would have been preserved here. He meets a girl, she comes back to his place, and Brodie Bruce's (from Mallrats) curiosity about "when that moment comes" when Superman and Lois Lane are intimate is explored. Both watching it and checking other sources, the only other difference I can find is the means of transportation used to get to Hancock's trailer a little over an hour in to the movie. It's an alternate shot choice that then causes a continuity error. The additional scene is definitely an improvement over the theatrical cut, but it doesn't change how far off the rails the movie goes in Half Two. If you haven't seen it, the opening add-on is nice, but doesn't make it worth your time. The performers do good work relative to what they're given to work with, as does Berg, but the plot is what it is. For those who felt this movie really subverted the superhero genre in any way, you really should read the original script. It was much more adult and less "A La-La Land Superhero Story". It doesn't ignite a revolution when there's rampant cursing and alcohol abuse in a superhero movie. If you haven't seen it, catch it on cable when drunk yourself or wait for someone who doesn't know any better to throw it on in a "hey, let's watch this" when you have an escape option if it loses you halfway in like it did myself and others.
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The Blue Hair Mafia and Oscar

I'm going to immediately be accused of ageism, that much I anticipate. The going logic that keeps coming around is that the "Geezers of Gold" that killed Brokeback Mountain a few years ago are the real swing voters of the US. This means that as go the old folks, so goes the Academy in terms of nominations, snubs, and winners in many but not all cases. Even if their "pick" as a bloc doesn't outright win, they can play the spoiler and tip things another direction. Actors are a big contingent, but how does the age split go across the board? The painful personal analogue for me is community theatre, where if the elders in power don't go for it, it ain't happening. Some of the following experiences are true, some overheard, and some are invented realistically. The hottest, most cutting edge play or musical can be available for amateur production with plenty of young actors ready to jump at the chance to play in it, but if the Blue Hair Mafia (BHM) decide they want to do Nunsense again or that Mornings At Seven hasn't bee revived eight times, that's what they want and that's what they'll have. A new David Mamet play? Who wants to hear all those dirty words?! Onstage nudity? Devilish sin, let's do Our Town instead! Wait a minute, where's our annual Tennessee Williams show? How long can we make a completely unabridged Shakespeare show's runtime? Wait just a damn minute, we can't have actors say the N word in a production of Ragtime! Imagine the protests, but honestly, where are we going to find all those black people? With this year as a case study, I've wondered if the geezers (I use the term affectionately) had/will have a hand in... ...Dear Zachary and Roman Polanski: Wanted & Desired getting shoved off the shortlist for Feature Doc because they were TV-bound (Zachary in December on MSNBC and Polanski already hit HBO), which isn't considered Old Hollywood "classy" enough I suppose... ...Stranded being ignored because it's about those horrible brown cannibals!... ...Gonzo shunned because it's assumed the subject himself would get enough of an audience on DVD... ...The Order of Myths being left off the Doc shortlist because it reminds people that old folks aren't crazy about non-whites and that the appearance of progressive ideas prevailing may be just that... ...Che gets dismissed for any consideration for the top prize amongst the scuttlebutt because 4 hours is a long time for an OAP to spend watching a movie about some pinko where no one speaks damn English...at least Lawrence of Arabia came out when they were in their 20's... ...early dismissal of Mickey Rourke's chances because The Wrestler gets too intense at one point thanks to blood... ...the possible last-minute arrival of Gran Torino and Eastwood on respective lists not necessarily for merit as much as "shut up, he's one of 'us'." I never count out an Eastwood film nor the man himself as an actor, but if the consensus among those under 70 is that there are five plus films better than Torino and it shows up on the Best Pic list... ...The Visitor shows up on the Best Pic list because as much as the oldies love Clint, they don't want "get off my lawn" to ring in their ears throughout 2009 and they don't end up liking Torino as much as they really want to... ..."it's too depressing" is code for "it reminds me of the less-Greater aspects of my Generation back when I was younger" kills Revolutionary Road... ...the counter-spoiler effect happens and The Dark Knight, WALL-E, or another film considered a dark horse shows up due to split votes for Benjamin Button, Gran Torino, or something else...and the geezers don't come to a consensus similar to the Republican Party during the primaries such that they end up with nothing they can all get behind... My personal hope is that the old folk do in fact split their preference, The Visitor squeaks through, and there are a couple big surprises on top of conventional-thinking upsets. Are the big wrong-o picks all their fault? Not necessarily, but they could be. I don't hate older people, I'm calling them like I see the situation this year and what has happened for too many years now. Jeff does enough Oscar reporting and footsoldiering for six writers, so I don't see myself writing too much about the Awardaholic Season, but we'll see.
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Grammy noms for Broadway

Gypsy, In the Heights, The Little Mermaid, South Pacific and Young Frankenstein: The Musical I can vouch for the bolded choices, and I've listened to all five. Read between the bold. I've been a bad Broadway enthusiast this year, so I should have five or six things that have better albums than Mermaid. I'll work on including that in the will-never-be-finished piece I've been working on By the numbers: 2 revivals 2 movie adaptations 1 Disney 1 Mel Brooks 1 Patti Lupone show 1 completely original show 17 is how many times iTunes says I've listened to the South Pacific album, the only recording of it I've listened to more than once or all the way through
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Butt Numb A Thon 10: 10 days out

My first Butt Numb a Thon experience was last year. My first Fantastic Fest was this year. From all indications, this year's BNAT will be the unholy combination of the two, and there are few other things that I find myself anticipating or thinking about in my idle time. I'm hoping the full-course Che is in the mix, since I know the Roadshow thing is NY/LA only (which is ridiculous).
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Hellboy 2: The Golden Army

The pedigree of Guillermo del Toro's DVDs continues unabated with this past summer's Hellboy 2. Like others including Jeff, I'm a more ravenous fan of Guillermo's "art" films from Cronos to Espinazo del Diablo to Pan's Labyrinth, but I enjoy his "studio" movies much more than their counterparts from other directors and studios. If his "art" films are filet mignon and fine wine, the studio stuff is high-end pizza and my favorite beer, and there's not a goddamn thing wrong with that. The aspect unique to Hellboy 2 as compared to the first installment and Blade II is that it's still pizza, but it's this brilliant, eclectic mix mix of ingredients that is wholly unlike what he and others have done before. Others have done "anti" superhero films that pose the question of how far is too far in the name of survival and justice and at what cost, but the components surrounding the narrative from design to plotting is more Guillermo del Arte than Guillermo del Estudio and it's a brilliant new strain of his work. I like to think of it again with the pizza analogy. Having Pineapple on a pizza is exotic to some, but de rigeur for most these days, but it's still something of an eye-opener to have goat cheese, artichokes, or sirloin involved in pie. I paid as little attention as possible to the pre-release images, releases, leaks and so on as possible because I knew I'd go see it, so a lot hit me by surprise, including the Troll Market and the Elemental sequences, and all for the better. If you're a viewer who gave subtitles a chance last year and saw Pan's Labyrinth, but also love action movies in English, Hellboy 2 delivers a brilliant bastard child of the two. Money is tight this time of the year, and especially so in the middle of an unpredictable recession. Investing in the deluxe 3-disc version of this movie is worth it for fans of the franchise, filmmaker, or action movies and special features all round. The gift version with extra goodies is excellent as well. As for what's in there and why I think it's worth the X dollars you find either version for, this isn't a case of a bunch of extras padding out the back of a box, but there's something new and worth looking at in every nook of the set. For the love of god, don't watch/listen to any of this stuff before watching the movie. Disc 1 Commentary Tracks: Director & Cast tracks I listened to the cast track first while doing some cleaning around the house and kept taking 5-10 minute "watching" breaks, getting far less laundry done than I would have otherwise. Selma Blair, Jeffrey Tambor, and Luke Goss keep it funny and informative the whole way through. Guillermo's track begins with him implying that you're about to suffer through listening to his "terrible voice" but don't let the self-effacing artiste or his humble nature put you off. Call me a freak or a sadist, but I like the idea of watching a del Toro movie and having him talking through the whole thing with me. Guillermo's signature talent on his tracks is consciousness of all the other stuff you have to pore over and not duplicating info. Easter Egg: Gag Reel On the Special Features menu, if you press Right on your remote , it'll highlight an idol on the screen and pressing Enter then treats you to outtakes. This was the last thing I watched and I recommend you do the same on your journey through the laberinto of features. Bookmark for later for sure, they're more funny in context to what you learn in other corners. A good cap to all the other stuff. Set Visits Real-time behind the scenes as they're filming certain pieces of the sequences listed. Those with no patience for the filmmaking process will not care, but for those of you who read film industry blogs and really care about the craft, it's a link to being on-set right along with everyone as the magic happens. Troll Market Tour Guillermo spends his lunch break showing you corners and features of the Troll Market you won't see no matter how many times you re-watch that sequence. If you like production design porn, go no further than this featurette. Anyone interested in practical effects will probably re-watch this more than anything else, don't let the 12 or 13 minute runtime deceive you. Epilogue An animated setup for the third movie, I should think. I hope this means the clockwork head-only helicopter Kroenen that Guillermo mentioned way back at the first screening of Hellboy in 2004 in Austin is still in the cards. I can only imagine how much more insane the third movie can be once Hobbit gives Guillermo even more "fuck you" cred than he has from Pan's. Deleted Scenes 6 or so scenes that were trimmed out or shaved down are here, with optional commentary. Nothing crazy here, so you're probably fine listening to the commentary with Guillermo the first way through, but it's only five minutes or so of footage, so it's not a gigantic investment to watch them both ways. Miscellaneous (trailers, language tracks) I laughed almost as hard at the trailer for Slap Shot 3 as I did the Can't Live Without You sequence in the actual movie. I love watching movies with the Spanish and French dub tracks. Abe Sapien, telenovela actor, is highly recommended for hispanohablantes and english speakers who've seen the movie alike. Disc 2 Hellboy: In Service of the Demon feature making-of All the above stuff is great on the standard one-disc edition, but this doc on its own is worth moving up to the 3-disc. It's two and a half hours long, which is longer than the movie itself, and every minute is worth it. Interspersed are plenty more on-set Behind the Scenes moments that really ring home how much patience and care is taken in building a film of this scope. The other thing that comes to mind is that they did all this for 85 mill, and it makes you really question what these other comic book movies are doing with all that filthy money. The Production Workshop: Professor Broom's Puppet Theatre A multi-angle view of the opening stop-motion sequence with optional del Toro chat track. Since the regular audio is no different than it is in the movie and there's no new "scenes" so to speak, just alternate views of the storyboards, solistening to it with Guillermo loses you absolutely nothing. Pre-Production Vault: Director's Notebook & Photo Gallery/Marketing Campaign They scanned in Guillermo's Hellboynomicon and also included design sketches, photos, and posters. The Notebook del Toro is the real highlight along with the Mignola sketches. There's a little for everyone in the stills here. The DVD-ROM Script is included too, for script-o-philes. Disc 3 Digital Copy of the Movie I'd never encountered one of these "Digital Copy" discs myself, and David Lynch has gone on record eviscerating the very idea of watching a movie on an iPhone/iPod/whatever, but I dig the idea. I've already bought the movie, and this makes it easier to take it on the go whether on a computer or a handheld device. I'm also a nut for gadgets that fit in the palm of your hand, so this is a nice "throw in" that they're putting on about every damn movie special edition these days. Some movies it makes no sense whatsoever to watch on a three inch screen, but I can at least see dialing up the Elemental sequence when waiting in line at the Drafthouse. --------------------------------------- I'm sure the Blu-ray release looks as gorgeous as Blu-ray always does, but I can't claim to have seen it since I'm still a standard-def guy for the foreseeable future. If you have a Blu-ray player, the choice is clear: DVD isn't as good an investment if you're buying this bad boy. Of recent releases that aren't multidisc box sets or Criterion discs, this and WALL-E (which I'm working on getting reviewed soon) are the clear standouts when it comes to where to strategically buy your deluxe DVDs this time of year for yourself and the ones you love (hopefully you fall into both categories, if not, get a therapist). You will actually get your money's worth in terms of extras in addition to an excellent movie. Even if I didn't see myself watching the movie multiple times a year, I'd pay full price for the extras alone on Hellboy 2.
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Doc Derby Thoughts: The Big 15

It's difficult for anyone outside of festival programmers and the hardest of hardcore festival-going writers to have seen all of the movies that end up on the Oscar shortlist, posted by Indiewire and everyone in creation by the time you read this. This year I've seen more of them than usual for me, a full one-third of them. I should be seeing a couple of them soon since they're still showing in town. The one movie that's missing that I presume will be everyone's "it got robbed" this year is Kurt Kuenne's Dear Zachary, which I couldn't get into at SXSW and haven't had another shot at since. I trust the buzz on it, and recommend you do the same and see it before it airs on TV (if you're near an upcoming screening). I'm not shocked that Religulous didn't make the cut in the same way I didn't expect Borat to be a Best Picture nominee. Having seen five of the fifteen on the list, I can definitively say that they're all better than Roman Polanski: Wanted and Desired, and that's not to say I am not fond of the movie. It's very interesting and engaging, but it's the kind of movie I could put on pause, leave the room for twenty minutes and return. I can't say the same about the five I've seen that are on this list. Below are the ones I've seen and then underneath is the rest of the list. "Encounters at the End of the World" Wonderful work from Herzog soon to be available on Bluray for those (unlike me) who have a big pioneer plasma set and top-notch player "In a Dream" An absolutely deserving first feature doc that I reviewed back in March at SXSW. I had a feeling that this one would sneak up behind long-held favorites like Man on Wire, Encounters, and Standard Operating Procedure "Man on Wire" No one should be surprised on this one. Lots of ads, lots of screenings, an excellent film that got pimped perfectly. "Standard Operating Procedure" Anyone wonder what Errol Morris would do if one of his (extremely deserving) films didn't get nominated? "They Killed Sister Dorothy" Another excellent SXSW flick that I can't find my writeup for, which means it's lost somewhere on my jump drive that all my backups were on. Really excellent, deserving contender with one of my favorite doc-god-voices, President Jed Bartlett-Estevez-Sheen. Enraged me almost as much as Who Killed the Electric Car? "At the Death House Door" "The Betrayal" (Nerakhoon) "Blessed Is the Match: The Life and Death of Hannah Senesh" "Fuel" "The Garden" "Glass: A Portrait of Philip in Twelve Parts" "I.O.U.S.A." "Made in America" "Pray the Devil Back to Hell" "Trouble the Water" If I were to make an educated guess of what the final 5 will look like, I'd actually posit that the five I've seen could be it. It's a good mix that I.O.U.S.A. might invade thanks to the current and worsening financial crisis. I'm not guessing it's these five just because I've seen them (no hubris here, that's a trademark of Movie City News...oh, there I go again), but it really is a pretty diverse, high quality spread honestly. I've been lucky. I should have something else on this general subject later in the week.
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Slumdog Millionaire

There are already a lot of reviews of this one out there, so I'll keep this brief. I think director Danny Boyle put it best when he introduced the film at this year's Austin Film Festival saying "I never expected to be this thrilled by a script about Who Wants to be a Millionaire." The truth is, it is and is not about that show that has long become passe in the States. What it is really designed to get at is the very real diametric difference between classes that is so invisible to people worldwide in so-called industrial nations. The movie's plot follows a nobody guy named Jamal who gets to the next to last question in the Indian Who Wants to be a Millionaire and is accused of fraud. The idea of human beings no longer being considered a commodity, or "property" is a joke. Some of the outright depraved things that happen to Jamal and those around him are just brutal on the senses, but things lighten up as you go along. I've spoken to friends (all Americans) who've seen it and their opinion of this guy's rough childhood is that "it's a bit much, you know. Hard to believe, lays it on thick, etc." with a twinge of high thread-counting, liberal elitism in their voice every time. Here's the thing: shit like this happens in India and other countries all the time. Even though it was half a century ago, my dad can tell comparable stories from his childhood in Cuba. Unlike the States, things haven't changed to a great degree in terms of human conditions since Castro took power. To some extent, what happens to Jamal in the course of the film's full-meal 120 minutes is heightened-reality, once in a century stuff, but through the new lens a lot of people have after the election of Barack Obama, it's now much less of a stretch to consider this movie about long-shot hope completely plausible. No one knew who Jamal was, and now he's the hope of a nation. Sound familiar? I fell pretty hard for the movie when I saw it in mid-October, and I've grown more fond of it since then. This is a movie people should take a gang of ten friends to, and catch Quantum of Solace a couple weeks from now when the crowds die down. This is the kind of movie people will purchase on DVD so that every once in a while they can show it to friends. One of the interesting things that came out of the post-show Q&A however many weeks ago was that originally Warner Independent Pictures (WIP) had picked it up, and then all of a sudden there was no WIP anymore. I lament the fact that this movie may have stalled on its way to release, and am very glad it's beginning to open across the coutry this week. This is Danny Boyle's best work both cinematically and socio-politically. If the "on for me, one for you" formula stays true to Boyle, we'll get one of his "Slumdog" movies and one of his genre movies one after the other for some time to come.
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Alaska: "Oops, we forgot to count 30% of our ballots"

The Anchorage daily News reports that oh, around 90,000 ballots are still not part of their final count. This means any statewide race, including indicted Senator Ted Stevens', is still up for grabs. No offense to Alaska, but does your state government not know how to count?

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Sleeping Beauty Platinum Edition

This movie has never looked this good. I didn't even watch the Blu-ray release as I am still stuck in the land of standard-def, but I'll be damned if this transfer isn't amazing. Had I not been interested in the special features, I considered the brilliant cross-platform release that is the Blu-ray (they packed the movie-only standard def DVD in as a third disc). I'm going to spend a good deal of time with the feature itself before getting to the spread of special features.

One of the greatest sequences in animated history
One of the more striking features of the restored movie is the fact it's back in its originally-intended aspect ratio of 2.55:1, first available to the public exclusively in this new home release. As soon as I saw the comparison shots, I immediately wondered just how it could be that so much of the frame had been sliced out for so long from this undeniable animated classic. The "tapestry" design of the whole film that was mandated by Walt himself and implemented by Eyvind Earle (more on him later) lends itself so perfectly to this ultra-wide ratio, I spent one time through watching the movie and the next trying to visualize what was lost in previous transfers. Below I've chopped a sample from the big fight with the Dragon (not very precisely, I apologize):

As seen in 2.35:1

As restored in full 2.55:1
The above examples contrast best when the sequence is seen in motion, but the below frame is really the true exemplification of why the wider aspect ratio is infinitely better. The sense of depth and the fundamental composition in this shot is completely betrayed by chopping the frame:

As seen in 2.35:1

As restored in full 2.55:1, to proper grand scale
This is like shaving a couple inches on the sides of a great work of portraiture because smaller frames were cheaper. Thank god this has been rectified. I never knew anything was wrong with it as a kid, but now I know I could sense those missing inches off the frame. I can only imagine how glorious this looks in 1080p, but my father-in-law assures me it "looks pretty damn amazing." The restoration of the film is covered in one of the docs on disc 2 which I'll dig into soon enough further down), but for the real nitty gritty, I'll direct you to a recently-posted Yellow Layer Failure column put together by restoration king Robert A. Harris over at The Digital Bits. As for the Movie The storytelling shows its age, especially in the wake of Enchanted, which I find even more chuckle-worthy having re-watched Sleeping Beauty. While Prince Phillip stalks behind Briar Rose/Aurora in the forest, creeping up to take her in an embrace from behind, Ashley and I had a back and forth exchange that kept escalating more and more along the lines of "don't go in there" or "he's going to get you!" as one would warn while watching a slasher movie. Just sing and play with animals and wait for a complete stranger to ambush you. Then, fight him off but then invite him over to your house that night. What could go wrong, right? The story is an artifact, but the aesthetic design holds up admirably 50 years later, especially thanks to the extensive restoration work. The dated plot mechanics and stereotypes aside, the fight with the Dragon is still one of the most compelling animated action scenes in the realm of traditional animation, and with the plethora of cheap CGI garbage churned out these days, the movie is a great family-friendly choice in a sea of talking animal crap. Beyond the Movie: Disc 1 Feature Commentary One of the last extras I looked at is in retrospect one I wish I'd looked at first: the Feature Commentary with Pixar chief John Lasseter, Leonard Maltin, and animator Andreas Deja. Any chance to listen to Lasseter talk about classic animation is a can't-miss, and his Pixar movie yack-tracks have always been good. Maltin is a guy many either love or hate, and I'm pretty ambivalent on him. If you dislike him at all, his presence here won't turn you off. As is often the case with Disney history, Maltin really knows his stuff and he doesn't overload you with unnecessary info. Back to Lasseter for a moment, because a couple places in this track reminded me of a doc I saw last year called The Pixar Story (included in next week's WALL-E deluxe set) where he served as one of the primary talking heads. Any chance you ever have to hear this guy talk about animation is an absolute privilege. I don't listen to as many comment tracks as I used to, but any of them with John are worth listening to, sometimes twice. The piece of this triumverate you may not be familiar with is Andreas Deja, who has worked for Disney as an animator since 1980's The Black Cauldron, and has been supervising animator for many of Disney's major villains since then including Gaston, Jafar, and Scar, in addition to creating Roger Rabbit. He most recently supervised animation of Queen Nerissa in last year's Enchanted, so his inclusion here is more of an insider's than you would assume just knowing he works for Disney. Very informative and quiet in places where the three guys get wrapped up (understandably so) in watching this masterpiece unfold. Music Video: Emily Osment singing Once Upon a Dream Look, I'm not the target market for this extra or a few of the others, so why did I watch it? Out of the same morbid curiosity my wife has in scrutinizing Disney DVD covers that employ radically different style than the actual movie, like the rerelease of Peter Pan. This is probably on there to support the Hannah Montana Generation of new Disneyphiles who'll learn the junk-rock version of this song because Hannah Montana's sidekick/friend is singing it. Not to get too off-topic, but if Miley Cyrus "retires" Hannah, will Osment take up the reins with the same character name/identity, or will she become "Morrigan Oregon" or "Rhoda Minnesota"? Song Selection Lets you jump to any "song" you want in this song-sparse movie. Princess Fun Facts Again, not aimed at me, this is what my wife calls "Pop-Up Video" for Disney movies. Assorted trivia and facts and so on. Grand Canyon The entire Grand Canyon suite set to a 29-minute video of the Grand Canyon. Lovely music, but I remember them showing this to us in elementary school music class and it put us all to sleep. The '58 Oscar winner for Short Subject, this may be used as background when I'm making dinner on the odd night. Lovely photography if you have a kid who's never seen the million and one docs/specials on The Canyon. The Peter Tchaikovsky Story My wife laughed at me when I put this on, but it turned out to be phenomenally entertaining. Thanks to current TV movie trends, I joked, it sounded like a Lifetime TV movie about "noted wife-abuser and philanderer Peter Tchaikovsky, that son-of-a-bitch." The first TV show broadcast in "stereophonic" sound and theatrical widescreen (it's only taken us 50 years to get aspect ratio right), it tells the story of young Tchaikovsky being haunted by melodies and being reprimanded for being an "artist" in the face of a lucrative career as a government official like his father. Plenty of 1950's TV acting is on display, which in and of itself is hilarious. Walt Disney himself introduces the piece as well as the "special preview" of Sleeping Beauty, and as much as we see movies spoiled in trailers these days, the two near-full sequences he shows are the climatic Dragon fight at the end and Sequence 8 ("Once Upon a Dream" in the forest). Alternate Languages Most people gloss over this, but I love being able to watch these Disney classics with the Spanish ad French voice tracks. Great way to start your kids early on foreign language comprehension. Disc 2: The Real Meat Games and other Kiddy Stuff Again, these were not designed for me, but I don't see how they could be entertaining to the target audience. The games themselves are better played with cards and the narrating voice is so condescending I wanted to take a sleeping pill. Picture Perfect Ahh, now this is the stuff. A comprehensive documentary of the production, history, and problems on Sleeping Beauty. Not too long, not too short, and just right. Disney's DVD production team does a masterful job of differentiating featurette content from "The Making of" and separating those out to their own little segments. Contributors range from Briar Rose herself, Mary Costa, to filmmakers and historians. Eyvind Earle: The Man and His Art This glimpse intot eh life of Earle is a fascinating eight or nine minutes with a genius. With a life history so interesting, I'm surprised no one has fashioned a capable biopic or bio-musical about this guy. A rough childhood that lead to greatness in this film. Worth re-watching it's so interesting. Sequence 8 Most would refer to this as "Once Upon a Dream" when the two leads first meet. A notoriously complex sequence that Walt demanded be more and more unique, it almost sundered the entire production, let alone the studio. Deleted Scenes/Storyboards The wisely-trimmed opening song and additional stuff with the kings. Disney really does cut the fat before they get to cooking. Three songs total and a couple of storyboards, introduced by Andreas Deja. The Storyboards are a comparison to the finished footage and worth watching. Live Action Reference They filmed live actors in costumes in front of stock sets for reference when drawing back in the days before mo-cap. Nice to see a peek into just how precisely they captured the physical nature of hair, fabric, and facial expressions. Production Galleries This is probably my favorite, sure-to-be unsung feature of this set. Through a copious amount of stills, you get to see the evolution of various character and location designs. Take my word for it and spend a few minutes with these and you'll find yourself spending the better part of a half hour or full hour poring over these. Sleeping Beauty Castle Walkthrough and Attraction This was particularly engaging for me since as a kid or an adult, I've never been to either Disney theme park in the US. Disney Imagineers walk us through the attraction that's been unviewable to the public for something like 40 years. They show us the magicians' tricks that make everything possible, and the changes that it went through until its closing. There's a not-so-hidden easter egg toward the end of the guided tour in addition to the news that the Castle Attraction is going to have a grand re-opening next year, which reminds me of Lasseter's passionate dedication to the Disney parks. Not only is his presence at Disney revitalizing their feature animation division, but their parks and DVD releases are really truly getting those Pixaresque bits of extra loving care. 4 Artists Paint 1 Tree An old Walt goodie featuring how four artists interpret one task. This should be shown in school art classes. Eyvind Earle is one of the artists. Trailers The teaser, and full trailers from 1959 are here as well as the 1995 re-release one. I realized I hadn't watched these yet, so I just popped the disc back in and...my god. The 1995 trailer is in 1.85:1. The Last Word From a guy who used to buy DVDs all the time but has been tamed from that habit by a very practical wife, this would have gone to the top of my "weekly stack" in those days. As it stands, the pedigree of recent Disney DVD releases under John Lasseter have vastly improved over the nigh-perfect ones from before his tenure. This one is a blind buy unless you hate animation, classic films, or Disney. Note that I left out "family-friendly" there. The frightening "get seduced by strangers vibe" in the forest glen makes this one difficult to recommend as totally ok for young girls...but then again I have to compare it to other "family friendly" movies out there. The Bolt trailer has a hamster talking about snapping someone's neck, for cryin' out loud. A splendid addition to anyone's collection, and I'm sure the Blu-ray is just as worth it. There is one (or five) people close to you that will enjoy this arriving in a stocking or as a present of any sort this year.
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Back and (Reasonably) Healthy

I thought I'd disappear and pop back up around election day. I worked on a piece about the transforming Texan electoral map and everything. Then I got struck down by appendicitis and am only now out of the hospital. Expect a flurry of posts this week, as I'm on a week of bed rest that will be spent entirely in catching up on backlogged pieces, writeups, and reviews. I'm also going to write a followup to a review I did earlier this year of a doc (the only one out) about President-elect Obama, so watch for that.
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Election2008: Mandate Balancing Act

Change has been a big word this year just like re-form was in O Brother Where Art Thou's election bits. The greatest concern I have going forward is that the polls will bite us in the ass and no one will show up out of complacency. The next greatest concern I have for us as a country is who all of our Democratic candidates being swept in on this mandate really are. I wonder who some of these "Democratic" candidates on down-ticket races really are, because at least in Texas, we have plenty of Republicans, Libertarians, and Ron Paul supporters who beat actual Democrats in the Democratic primaries in March. Record turnout of people unfamiliar with anyone on the ballot other than Clinton or Obama combined with Republicans voting in the Dem primary to throw things off results in some outlying weirdos popping up. Our state party is only getting warmed up for how much sheer mass they have now in terms of participants, and it will be some time before they really build out the infrastructure to support the coming return to majority the Democrats will have in Texas. In Williamson County, here in Texas, we have a re-formed Bush Republican (Gregory Windham) running as a Democrat against the incumbent 3rd Precinct County Commissioner. He said to me once that "George Bush Sr. brought me into the Republican Party, and George Bush Jr. pulled me out." He's a very forthright, aggressive kind of guy...rough around the edges. He's the old-school country-fried, homegrown, salt of the earth Dixiecrat that ruled Texas for decades. I'm not really worried about him. There are people running in East Texas (and other areas) on the Dem ticket who are avowed "Ron Paul Republicans" who are Fair Tax supporting, anarchistic-leaning Libertarians who wanted "a real shot". The worst outcome I can see aside from a complacency-induced McCain win is a bunch of weirdos who wound up the "Democratic candidate" across the country making the party and by extension, the Obama Mandate, look like the doom-bringing prophecy the right-wingers are pitching hard at this point. Assuming my fears are ill-founded (and I hope they are), the optimism I have at present for my home state is based on the Texas ballot I saw and cast last week.* The Texas ballot exclusively gives you the options of John McCain, Barack Obama, and Bob Barr. No Nader, no McKinney, none of the other parties that all show up on the Colorado ballot among others. As always you can write-in, but I don't expect to see many Dem votes bleed off there this year in Texas. There are Good Ol' Boys who won't vote for Barack Obama because he's black and they believe the socialist bullshit flying around...but they don't want to vote for John McCain either. If their "Perot vote" for Barr helps the state go to Obama, as extremely unlikely as that may be, they'll not blink and blame it on Obama's African voodoo socialist brainwashing. Mark my words, this is the year that will change people's minds about whether Democrats can win in Texas, for better or even worse. Texans are tired of inefficient leadership handing money, land, and roads to corporations... "Republicans" and Democrats alike. By 2012, the electoral map could be even more lopsided than people are predicting it'll be on 4 November, especially if Sarah Palin really guns for the top job, truly ending her career outside of Alaska. * I must note here that I cast it on a touch-screen machine, which makes the fact that I "cast a vote" tenuous at best, depending on who you are. The big 2010 ballot initiative in Texas will be mandating optical scan ballots, I bet.
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