Release of the Week Husbands (DVD only) The release of a John Cassavetes film that was previously unavailable on DVD is cause for celebration, as far as I'm concerned. The transfer is solid, the sound is sharp, and it actually has extras. Someone in the world of DVD production still loves me. The movie concerns Cassavetes, Peter Falk, and Ben Gazzara as middle aged men who bury a friend and then run headlong into a trip steeped in contemplating their futures and mortality itself. The movie is rough around the edges, meanders, and isn't generally considered a classic of any sort. None of those things change the fact that it's a damn good movie that holds up these years later. Similarly to how I felt about Judd Apatow's Funny People, the 142 minutes of Husbands is well spent contemplating human nature and the stupid, regrettable things we often do without remorse. People don't really change much once they've settled into their own idiosyncratic patterns. Film critic, author, and Elsewhere commenter Marshall Fine delivers a solid, knowledgeable Feature Commentary. He wrote a book about Cassavetes that came out three years ago, and I've been told it's well worth a read. The Story of Husbands: A Tribute to John Cassavetes [29:46] traces the origins of the film through interviews with friends and Ben Gazzara, and it doesn't waste a second of your time. I don't expect Criterion-deep extras for every movie out there, but releases like this one and Lookin' To Get Out really get it right. Give me the movie, make it look good, and put together a 20-30 minute piece about it. Discs like this one have reassured me that catalog titles are not, in fact, dead. As for the movie on its own: if you can't or don't want to deal with a two and a half hour running time, that's the beauty of freedom of choice. I'm just glad that the option is there. New to Blu Kagemusha Playtime Criterion's recent editions of both movies get the Blu-ray upgrade. I've only had a chance to look at Kagemusha thus far, and I have to say the color and picture quality are stunning; however, at this point that's as profound as saying it rains in the Pacific Northwest. A full review of Kagemusha should arrive in the next couple days, with Playtime coming some time after Amazon delivers it. Go Doug Liman, where have you gone? John August appears to have been the more favorably destined of the young bucks who made this movie. I haven't seen this disc yet, so I have no idea regarding picture quality. The Last Starfighter (Blu-ray & DVD) I didn't grow up wearing out a tape of this. In fact, I recall only having seen it two or three times my entire childhood. It came out the year after I was born, so I don't know if my generation of kids got into it nearly as much as kids four or five years our senior. By the time we were the right age and it was on tape, we were all going Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle crazy. I've seen complaints online of digital scrubbing, edge enhancement, DNR, and so on, but I didn't pick up on anything that particularly bothered me. My mantra on this stuff is "consider the source material," and I'm at a disadvantage due to the fact I never saw a print of this movie projected. I'll be damned if the Blu-ray doesn't impress anyone who's known this movie on VHS for most of its life, though. The CG shots are remarkably clear and crisp, and the live-action stuff looks up to par when compared to what a relatively recent print I saw of Flight of the Navigator looked like. There's a brand-new retrospective doc called Heroes of the Screen [HD 24:18] on here in addition to the now 10-year-old Crossing the Frontier: Making The Last Starfighter [SD 32:01]. They don't really repeat one another too much. The Feature Commentary is with Director Nick Castle and Production Designer Ron Cobb, and the Photo Gallery on the disc features (among other things) toy prototypes and muddy stills of the original ending, which was only different in that it was shot on a different set than the one they ended up using in the reshot one. New Release Tyson (Blu-ray & DVD) James Toback's revealing and surprisingly moving (for me at least) portrait of "Iron" Mike Tyson should be on minds toward the end of the year for nomination as Best Feature Documentary. I had no idea how introspective Tyson was, nor did I scratch the surface when it came to really knowing anything about who he was or has become until now. In some respects, that lack of familiarity is representative of the era of pop culture idols that includes Mike Tyson, Michael Jackson, and Michael Jordan among many others. They were commodified personas who were all plastered on every kind of merchandise in existence, from drink cups to clothing to video games. What does it say about modern culture that we are still putting the weight of the world on the shoulders of celebrities who have no interest in ruling it as much as living in peace and quiet? Extras include: a Director's Commentary from Toback; "A Day With James Toback" [HD 16:11] featuring footage from the day of the L.A. Premiere of the director primarily and eventually Tyson himself; a featurette called Iron Mike: Toback Talks Tyson [HD 11:49]which is just that; and an excerpt from an episode of "The Big Picture Show" featuring Toback [HD 13:08], which is referred to in the program itself as "The Fabulous Picture Show," for clarification. Julia (DVD only) Tilda Swinton always impresses, but hopefully she's remembered for this performance at the end of the year. Julia is a woman given to excess. She's oblivious to just how far over the edge she's gone when she gets mixed up in a situation she wouldn't have control of even if she were sober. The DVD from Magnolia carries only Deleted Scenes [26:00] in addition to the 144-minute feature. I only mention the running time as a courtesy so that viewers know precisely what kind of time investment they're looking at. The movie is well worth two and a half hours to me thanks to Swinton's performance, which the entire movie hinges on. If you aren't with it in the first 30-45 minutes, you probably don't believe in 2.5-hour movies to begin with. Surveillance (Blu-ray & DVD) I didn't really care for this movie at Fantastic Fest last year, with the exception of Bill Pullman's performance. My review last September: "Please take anything you see written about this movie that includes a comparison to Rashomon with a grain of salt. Kurosawa's movie and this movie really should not be found mentioned in the same sentence, paragraph, or article. Three different people all have somewhat varying accounts of an "incident" in this serial killer movie. The accounts are not as wildly different as using the R word would imply. Three different POVs, murder? Check and check, but that doesn't equal the dynamic of Rashomon as a whole. The visuals of the flashbacks are all consistent, it's the story people are telling that contains different information. It is patently unfair to compare this film to Rashomon, so don't. Rant ends here. "Serial murders are being committed in broad daylight and FBI agents (Pullman and Ormond) are sent to investigate after a particularly grisly encounter finds a stoner, a young girl, and a local cop telling their individual accounts of what went down. The acting was pretty solid all around really, with the exception of some bizarre stuff the local police guys say (even for backwater morons...badly written, takes you out of the film)." The Feature Commentary is with director Jennifer Lynch and actors Mac Miller and Charlie Newmark. Miller is the shitkicker boyfriend and Newmark is the cop who isn't French Stewart. Surveillance: The Watched Are Watching [15:01] is a making-of/behind the scenes featurette. There's also an HDNet "A Look At" featurette that's standard on all Magnet releases for the most part. Most interesting are two Deleted Scenes and an Alternate Ending, all of which have optional Director's Commentary. I'm glad they didn't use this ending, because it doesn't work nearly as well as the one they went with. That variant ending actually made me appreciate the movie a lot more. At the very least, this isn't a revived-franchise serial killer movie, and even though at the time I said I "forgot I'd seen it two days later," it's turned out more memorable than the Friday the 13th or My Bloody Valentine do-overs. Hannah Montana The Movie (Blu-ray & DVD) I find the very existence of this movie hilarious due to a comment Miley Cyrus made at some appearance or another where she talked about how she hoped to pick up an Academy Award nomination for Best Song. The plot involves Miley going "back home" to save something or another by "putting on a show." It's no more derivative than many classic musicals. Yes, I went there. Believe it or not, I'm given to defend the movie on philosophical grounds, because it has a "to thine own self be true" message that makes it more substantive than the vast majority of Disney Channel-birthed product of the last decade or so. I still can't get over the fact that I saw an inflatable Hannah Montana chair at Target that seemed to be marketing the idea of how fun it was to sit on her face. Don't get me started on the wigs! Extras on the DVD & Blu-ray outdo most Disney releases with a total of 7 Music Videos; Bloopers; Director's Commentary, which I might review on its own; Find Your Way Back Home, where the stars show the viewer around their own hometowns; a featurette where boy of Miley's character's dreams Jason Earles digs into why "I [He] Should Have Gone to Film School"; and finally a Digital Copy of the movie. Blu-ray exclusive extras include a "Throwdown Hoedown" Dance-Along and a featurette called The Dance Experience with the cast. The Blu-ray also includes a DVD copy of the movie with the DVD extras on it. Last House on the Left (Blu-ray & DVD) I haven't watched this one yet, but when Scott Weinberg says it's "One of the best horror remakes ever made," that's a quote worth paying attention to. The Blu-ray features the Unrated and Theatrical Cuts via seamless branching, a Digital Copy, Deleted Scenes, and a featurette called A Look Inside. The Golden Boys (DVD only) From my review a few days ago: "David Carradine, Rip Torn, and Bruce Dern are retired sea captain roommates looking for a housekeeper. I must have missed the reason why, but one of them has to marry this lady so that two of them can live for free. I replayed the opening minutes of the movie to try to figure this out and gave up. Did I mention the movie is set on Cape Cod in the days of horse-drawn carriages? It may read like a sketch slotted in the closing half hour of Saturday Night Live, but if you trust the quote on the front cover of The Golden Boys, it's apparently "a cross between Grumpy Old Men and Three Men and a Baby." It's not really either one. "The picture itself wasn't nearly as interesting or entertaining as From Zen Master to Shipmaster: The Life and Career of David Carradine [40:07], which is more a Making-of/Behind the Scenes featurette than a Carradine career tribute. The bits with David telling stories are indisputably the most tolerable parts of the whole disc. "I must note that I really do dislike slagging off the months and months of work people put into making a feature, but this is a great example of how not to write or complete a period film. The reason to touch this disc is to sift through that featurette if you have an interest in Carradine." Reissue Pete's Dragon (DVD only) This disc replaces an eight-year-old edition, retaining all but one of the original extras: a 25-minute theatrical short called Man, Monsters, and Mysteries. The upside is the short had little to do with this fondly-remembered children's classic that would likely never be made today. The video and audio transfers don't look any different from what I remember. The swirling grain all over Elliott (the dragon) makes me wish for the sacrilege of a Lowry Digital-style restoration that'd strip out the grain from him, just because I wonder what that would look like. New extras include Brazzle Dazzle Effects [25:23], which is mostly about the animation technique, spending some time with unsung Disney hero Ub Iwerks. It's also in part a "looking back" piece for the movie's star, Sean Marshall ("Pete"), who narrates. A Deleted Storyboard Sequence: "Terminus and Hoagy Hunt Elliott" [2:27] is in there too, along with three music samplings. There's an early Original Song Concept [2:35] for the song Pete sings to Elliott, Original Demo Recordings [7:07] of three songs (one of which was deleted from the film), and finally a Promotional Record of 4 "Pop" Versions of Songs [12:00] including "Candle in the Water." Carried over are a DVD game, and a couple of excerpts from shows that remind me of when The Disney Channel showed the older 1950's programs. Catalog TV The Simpsons Season 12 (DVD only) It feels odd to consider the year 2001 as having been 8 years ago. The opening episode of this season, Treehouse of Terror XI (depicted above), features the best case against The Cove I can think of: those dolphins are going to turn on us in the moment we least expect. The packaging is Comic Book Guy-themed (photos to come) and includes the Worst Episode Ever among other excellent latter-day Simpsons shows. The 4-disc set features Audio Commentary on every episode with alternating participants, Deleted Scenes (w/ optional commentary) via button-push during the episodes, and Multi-Angle Alternate Animation. Also on there is a Comic Book Guy: Best. Moments. Ever. [9:38] clip package, some clips from The Simpsons Global Fanfest [7:28] 10th anniversary event on the Fox lot back in 2000, Commercials, Original Sketches, and the option to play one episode with Hungarian, Ukranian, Portugese, or Italian audio. New Release TV Sons of Anarchy Season 1 (Blu-ray & DVD) Fox's FX cable network has consistently been putting together "grit" shows like this one, The Shield, and Rescue Me aimed squarely at the blue collar demographic. They might just rename the channel The American Badass Network. This isn't intended as a slight, but all their shows could cut promos to Kid Rock's salt of the earth anthem. What got me to sit up and pay attention to this show was the fact that it stars Ron Perlman, Charlie Hunnam (Hooligans), and the criminally under-used Katey Sagal. They're the reason I'll watch this even though I don't give a shit about the various biker reality shows across cable. There's ten hours of TV to chew through on this thing, just in time for the start of the new season. The Blu-ray is a three-disc package with 11 episodes split between the first two discs and the last 2 on the third along with the extras. Audio Commentary is present on select episodes throughout the season, and there are Making-Of, Behind the Scenes, Casting, and Production Design featurettes rounding things out along with Deleted Scenes. Dexter Season 3 (Blu-ray & DVD) You know what's weirder than a show about a serial killer that's caught on big-time? A Blu-ray disc whose special features are almost exclusively available via BD-Live. Don't get me wrong, I think it's brilliant to give purchasers of Dexter Season 3 free-to-watch access to "gateway drug" episodes of other Showtime series like United States of Tara and The Tudors and push BD-Live use and adoption. The problem is that not everyone is using a PS3 or WiFi-connected player, and let's face it, ethernet jacks in the wall aren't a standard feature of most American apartments or houses. You can't watch any of the Cast Interviews or other features without BD-Live access, which is a bit of a bummer for people without the necessary hardware or those like me who hate the horrendous load times for BD-Live content. Everybody Hates Chris (Final) Season 4 (DVD only) This is the beginning of a multi-part series of capsule reviews I write for shows that have been cancelled much to my chagrin. I really wish that we could have seen this one get Chris all the way through high school and not just leave us hanging after his 9th Grade year. For those unfamiliar, the show is based on Chris Rock's life and he narrates. They released a four-season complete series bundle this past week as well. Extras include Director Webisodes, Intro and Commentary by Exec Producer Ali LeRoi, a Gag Reel, four or five featurettes, and Deleted Scenes. Dirty Sexy Money (Final) Season 2 (DVD only) There's a little trinity of "Second and Final Season" sets from ABC including this, Eli Stone (further down), and Samatha Who (the following week). I blame the writers' strike for all three disappearing. None of them could hope to retain audiences. Dirty Sexy Money is the kind of show that some friends dubbed "HBO Lite" because it was part family dynasty drama and part dark comedy garnished with plenty of people of privilege, just without all the nudity and cursing. You would expect a show with a cast of this caliber would implode from star salaries before just tanking in the ratings, but the latter is what ended up happening here. Three featurettes, a Blooper Reel, and Deleted Scenes are included. If you got in to the first season and were among the millions who dropped off, now there's a fixed amount of the show to catch up on. Eli Stone (Final) Season 2 (DVD only) I had no idea what this show was about when it was on the air. Was it a supernatural comedy, a quirky lawyer show, a sci-fi thinker? It turns out it's about a lawyer who has an inoperable aneurysm and starts having visions. None of the ads ever told me that. It's got a good sense of humor to it and is worth watching. I didn't even know Loretta Devine and Victor Garber were in the cast. Why did no one tell me this show had musical numbers in it? I would have watched it, for cryin' out loud. Similar to DSM above, there are a couple featurettes, Bloopers, and Deleted Scenes for devoted fans. GREEK Season 3 (DVD only) This show is the focus of my rant for the week. Why is there a show in its third season on a major cable network that seems entirely designed as a National Pan-Hellenic Council recruitment ad? I never had any interest in the Greek system in college, nor do I have interest in the High School For Big Kids atmosphere invented here. This show makes it seem like there's no one in the world who could survive college without pledging a frat or sorority. Most cinematic depictions of the Greek system aren't realistic, owing mostly to Greek system graduates scattered throughout the industry. These people want to perpetuate a legend that's never been real. The hive-mind groupthink being promoted here is thoroughly disgusting. The DVD includes Commentaries, Bloopers, and a 20 Questons With the Cast of Greek featurette.

Disc of the Week The GoodTimesKid (DVD only) Azazel Jacobs' The GoodTimesKid is a minimalist film accurately described on its DVD sleeve as in the vein of films from Jim Jarmusch and Jacques Tati. In stark opposition to the other new releases of the week, GoodTimesKid offers something that one doesn't really get to see with the majority of new releases. The movie is and feels distinctively handmade. There's a URL in the credits for the lead actress' clothesmaking business. I'm reasonably certain that there isn't a single cell phone seen or heard throughout the running time. The movie is about two men named Rodolfo (director Jacobs and Gerardo Naranjo) and the woman (one-named Diaz) on the rocks with one of them. Kid's 77 minutes concern the wanderings of the three of them over the course of a single day. The youthful vigor and sense of abandon in the filmmaking and acting is extremely refreshing. Anyone accusing the filmmakers or their characters of "hipster" pretension really means to use the word "aimless." The Rodolfos and the girl all lead dirty, unkempt lives, but not as a means of expressing their style. The movie was completed in 2005 and has only now found a DVD release. The effort and boutique treatment that Benten Films has given to the DVD is equally impressive as the movie itself. Supplements include a Director's Commentary that also features both costars; Deleted Scenes; a Photo Gallery; the Original Trailer (not your standard trailer); Let's Get Started, the short that led to the making of GoodTimesKid; and The Whirled (1956-63), a short by the director's father Ken Jacobs that helped inspire the movie. There's an insert book with an essay by Glenn Kenny, and there's a cardboard slipcase that features different art than the disc case. If I didn't know better, I'd think that Criterion had started an ultra-low-budget indie label. This is not just the best disc released this week, but one of my favorite discoveries of the year so far. The GoodTimesKid is more than a breath of fresh air, it's an afternoon where you never look at your watch and throw your phone in the lake. New Releases The Class (Blu-ray & DVD) The Class is a really solid movie that won the Palme D'Or at Cannes last year and was deservingly nominated for Best Foreign Language Film at the Oscars. Those who think public education must be so much more easy-going in other countries should give this one a look in particular. Based on an autobiographical novel, it follows Mr. Marin (Francois Begaudeau), a teacher at an inner-city school in Paris trying to negotiate the challenges of his individual students and the cultural cocktail they represent. The Class does much more than work off of the existing template for inspirational teacher movies, and deserves consideration if only for that. If not for The GoodTimesKid, this would be the Disc of the week, far and away. Even those given to watching French films like this one that play almost non-existent theatrical runs missed this movie. High-profile arthouse films like this one are picking up more viewers as the expanded choice of Netflix queues take over from blockbuster-flooded local video stores. My hope is this will only get better with the proliferation of set-top VOD. Extras on both formats include a Making-Of featurette and Select Scene Commentary. The Blu-ray adds an Actors' Workshop and Actors' Self-Portraits. The Tiger's Tail (DVD only) MGM released this 2006 John Boorman film straight to DVD in the US. Aside from being an extremely insipid doppelganger story, the worst thing about it is Kim Cattrall's "Irish" accent. Since her presence is probably part of why the film got made, I tolerated it. Tail is a Prince & Pauper-styled moral drama crossed with some thriller elements and some minor comic tinges. The whole movie is saved by paying attention only to Brendan Gleeson's masterful performance and not the blunt, overly-simplistic plot. Gleeson plays Liam O'Leary, an arch-businessman made rich by the "Celtic Tiger" boom of the late 20th-Century irish economy. Liam pays very little attention to his wife Jane (Cattrall) or his son Connor (Gleeson's son Briain). I was also glad to see Ciaran Hinds in a supporting part as a priest pal of Liam's. A vengeful, separated-at-birth twin enters Liam's life in the opening minutes of the film and sends his world into upheaval, oh my stars and garters! Life lessons are learned, a twist pops up here and there, and the movie is only a great excuse to watch Brendan Gleeson act opposite one of my favorite Irish actors (Brendan Gleeson). There are no extras, just the movie. 17 Again (Blu-ray & DVD) The best explanation I have for why this movie works reasonably well is that Thomas Lennon is one of the most talented comedians living or dead, and they kept the plot relatively simple. More fleshed-out thoughts on this one after I take a look at the extras: a couple featurettes and some trivia track stuff along with BD-Live features I hope I can make work. I Love You, Man (Blu-ray & DVD) In my review back at SXSW in March, I referred to this movie as akin to a really good cheeseburger. That isn't to say it's cheesy and full of bad nutrition, but that sometimes this is just the thing that hits the spot. "Like I did, a lot of people will look at promos for I Love You, Man determined to be a neg-head on it. "Oh great, one of these," many will say. I came out thinking it's a perfect "watch anytime" kind of thing. When I'm done with the latest depressing "end of the world"-tinged doc and want to watch something that grabs me by the gut and makes me chuckle, this is it." I've found in the months since then that it's gotten me re-addicted to Baja-style fish tacos. The Blu-ray includes 3 Deleted Scenes [HD 3:48], a few Extended Scenes [HD 12:39], a so-so Gag Reel [HD 11:25], and a Making-Of [HD 17:29]. The Feature Commentary includes director John Hamburg, Paul Rudd, and Jason Segal, and it's really laid back. There's a set of Extras [22:24] which are better described as "Extra Takes" or alternate riffs from different parts of the movie dominated by Jon Favreau. Rounding things out is the movie's Red Band Trailer in HD. Paris 36 (DVD only) I almost drove to Dallas to see this at AFI Fest. I still haven't seen it, but want to very much. Alien Trespass (Blu-ray & DVD) Allegedly fun and campy. I'll catch up to it. Gigantic (DVD only) Goodman, Asner, Dano, and Deschanel (in that order)? I'll give it a look down the road. The Wild Man of the Navidad (DVD only) It kills me that I missed this one at Fantastic Fest last year. New to Blu Starman Blue Thunder St. Elmo's Fire About Last Night... Cutthroat Island TMNT Collection (3 live-action & recent CG toon) The Ninth Gate This week was good to catalog titles filling in gaps on Blu-ray, particularly with another John Carpenter movie (Starman), a couple 80's movies, and a schlocky action movie. I can't speak for any of the transfers on these, but will write something up as soon as I do. Imported TV Pulling Season 2 The second and final season of Pulling is now available. As i said when I reviewed the first season, toss all Sex & The City comparisons out the window and enjoy it on its own terms. TV New Release 90210 Season 1 Apparently, this show has done so well that they're reviving Melrose Place as well. I caught part of a single episode in which a High School was putting on a production of Spring Awakening: A New Musical. I like the score to Awakening a great deal. 90210 I don't

Release of the Week Big Trouble in Little China (Blu-ray only) This has been one of my most-anticipated high-def upgrades since I started obsessively tracking what is and is not available on Blu-ray. The 1080p resolution of the picture is the biggest "get" for fans of the movie like myself who have worn out VHS tapes of it over the years. The added clarity makes it look like a completely different movie for me and others who never saw it on the big screen. All of the extras from the most recent DVD special edition carry over, including the John Carpenter/Kurt Russell Commentary. Enjoyable for me was the Spanish Trailer, which re-titles the movie "Rescue in Chinatown," or more literally, "Rescue in the Chinese Neighborhood." Big Trouble can be found for right around $20, and is the Disc Release of the Week partly on its own merit, but mainly because it's the only true must-own of the week. titles like this one being handled correctly will be what makes Blu-ray sink or swim in the long run. New Releases The Soloist (Blu-ray & DVD) This is a much better movie than people gave it credit for during the takedown campaign that pre-dated its actual release. I don't know if it would have made the Best Picture nominee list, but it didn't deserve to be buried in April. Robert Downey Jr. and Jamie Foxx are both very solid, Foxx in particular. What really angers me most about all the damning-with-faint-praise buzz now that I've seen the movie are the slams against Foxx I read months ago. Downey puts it best in one of the featurettes when he says that when someone portrays schizophrenia and does it badly, it's just dreadful. What Jamie put together is an absolute mimicry of Nathaniel Anthony Ayers, and I mean that as the highest compliment. I would not consider this a movie I think everyone would want to go out and buy, but the movie and all the supplements deserve at least a rental. The blu-ray includes Director's Commentary with Joe Wright, some Deleted/Alternate/Extended Scenes, and various featurettes that are worth looking at (unlike many). Race to Witch Mountain (Blu-ray & DVD) Disney has wisely decided to issue their family films on Blu-ray with the DVD and a Digital Copy included, thus removing any and all inclination to "rip" video through other means. The movie itself is better than I expected, mostly thanks to Dwayne Johnson's showmanship, which makes a lot of things he's in tolerable all on his own. I never had any attachment to the original whatsoever, and it didn't knock my socks off. I can say, however, that seeing Drew "Moriarty" McWeeny as a Featured Background Artist did encourage me that he may have finally found a steady job. Extras include Bloopers and Deleted Scenes on both the DVD and Blu, with a "Which Mountain" feature exclusive to the Blu-ray that points out references to the original movie. Mutant Chronicles (Blu-ray & DVD) I wish I could say this movie has some redeeming value other than being unintentionally hilarious. Loosely-based on a role-playing game from some years ago, there's a great deal of talent on display despite a plot out of the mind of a middle-schooler and effects that are often shockingly bad. Thomas Jane is once again squandered, Ron Perlman plays a priest with a better-than-most Irish accent, Malkovich plays a guy with so few lines he must have only worked for a couple days, and Benno Furman barely gets a chance to do anything but act "sinister" and "bad-ass." As long as one goes in expecting it to be terrible, it's watchable while planning a couple accidental naps. A friend recently remarked on Twitter that you learn the most from movies that don't turn out well, and I completely agree. For every Criterion multi-disc set, I have a super-in-depth special edition of something like Mutant Chronicles. Believe it or not, for a movie this negatively-reviewed and generally dismissed, there's a metric ton of supplements included. There's a Feature Commentray with Simon Hunter & Ron Perlman, a Making-of Documentary, Deleted Scenes, Greenscreen/Storyboard Comparisons, a Promo Teaser Short Film with Director's Commentary, a Making-of for the Promo Teaser (thorough!), Cast & Crew Interviews, Storyboards, Concept Art & Visual Effects featurettes, an HDNet promo, a San Diego Comic-Con Panel Q&A, Webisodes, and the Theatrical Trailer. Most movies that do as poor of business as Mutant Chronicles hit DVD without so much as the trailer. Magnet (genre subsidiary of Magnolia) allows the curious to see how the sausage was made, which I think is utterly brilliant. Delgo (DVD only) Independently produced and released, Delgo fell victim to the mass failures of independent labels that followed the tanking worldwide economy. It was released in the middle of December 2008, which is why most people forgot it existed. I'd rather expose kids to this than all the gimmicky crap 3D CG-animated stuff out there, as there's some real effort, ingenuity, and interesting creature design at play. It's also notable in that it features Anne Bancroft's final performance. The voice cast is full of famous people, from Malcolm McDowell and Val Kilmer to Burt Reynolds and Michael Clarke Duncan to Jennifer Love-Hewitt and Freddie Prinze Jr. to Louis Gossett Jr. and...Kelly Ripa? Lots of famous people worked on the cheap, let's put it that way. The movie is not terrible by any stretch, relative to movies of its type. did it blow me away? No, not really, but it was authentically original, and that nice in CG animation. It actually reminds me of some of the less-remembered Rankin-Bass animated fantasy movies, like Flight of Dragons. The visuals really deserve a Blu-ray upgrade at some point. The check disc I received looks all right, I suppose, and the financial prospects for the movie bode not too well for sales, but this movie will look a lot better in 1080p. In terms of extras, there's a Directors' Commentary, Behind the Scenes, fully-animated and rendered Deleted Scenes [13:00], and a Sound featurette. Also included is an original animated short, Chroma Chameleon [4:48], which I'm assuming accompanied Delgo's theatrical run. The major uphill battle Delgo has on home video is the fact it doesn't have accompanying toys that kids expect to compliment their new favorite movie of the moment. I hope the filmmakers have a grassroots campaign going, because otherwise this worthwhile family-friendly title will get buried by the likes of Ice Age 3: Yawn of the Dinosaurs. New to Blu Sling Blade This is one movie that has aged really well, as has Thornton's performance as Karl. The picture on the Blu-ray is as close to the look of the print I saw back in '96 as I think I'll see again until (I'm assuming) it's re-struck as a repertory title for its 20th anniversary in 2016. The Blu-ray includes all of the following: Mr. Thornton Goes To Hollywood; Bravo Profiles: Billy Bob Thornton; A Roundtable Discussion with Billy Bob Thornton, Dwight Yoakam, Mickey Jones, and Producer David Bushell; A Conversation with Billy Bob Thornton and Robert Duvall; A Conversation with Robert Duvall (on his own); A Conversation with Billy Bob Thornton and Composer Daniel Lanois; The Return of Karl; On the Set: Billy Bob at Work, Doyle's Band: The Johnsons, Doyle Gets Pummeled; "Doyle's Dead" with Intro by Thornton; and finally a Feature Commentary with Thornton. The Waterboy It's been over ten years since this came out, and it's still on my "tune-out and veg" list of movies I'll come across on cable and just leave on for three hours on TBS. Do I endorse the horde of imitators that have flooded multiplexes since 1998? No, not at all. nor am I surprised that Touchstone included no extras here. The movie doesn't really need them. No one cares how they did Sandler's makeup, they just want to watch him tackle people. My Cousin Vinny Tomei won an Oscar for this, and the movie's good too. Haven't looked at this disc yet. New to Region 1 Ulysses (DVD only) There were crap all-region versions of this out there previously. I'm waiting for this to arrive to put it through its paces, but I'll keep beating the drum: more Kirk Douglas movies on DVD is a good thing. You Must Remember This: The Warner Bros. Story I'm going to track this one down at some point when I want to soak in studio history. The reviews are raves across the board. Reissue The Tigger Movie: 10th Anniversary Edition (DVD only) Does my credibility take a minor blow for including a Winnie The Pooh spin-off movie in a DVD roundup for a column with the word "Arthouse" in the title? Probably. Do I care? Not at all. Disney appears to have remastered this one, included a Digital Copy, and a couple Tigger-centric episodes of The New Adventures of Winnie The Pooh along with a pile of interactive extras. The whole reason I'm covering this is to emphasize what they're doing right here: bundling Digital Copy and actual added-value (more than just the movie, i.e. the TV show episodes). The "movie" (more like extended episode) is just over an hour and teaches some lessons about what family means. To my delight, this may inadvertently start a "nature versus nurture" kinship conversation in a lot of conservative households that don't know what they're getting into. I blame socialism, naturally. TV Catalog Stargate Atlantis: Fans' Choice I never got into this show, and this is the perfect gateway drug or shortcut, depending on how one reacts. Fans of the show voted for the full, feature-length version of the Pilot episode, "Rising," and the unedited Series Finale, "Enemy at the Gate" to be released on Blu-ray. They even voted on packaging design. Either I'll get sucked in and decide to catch up on the whole thing, or I'll watch the very beginning and very end. SPOILER ALERT: I watched both and skipped everything in-between, reasoning that I'd never have time to catch up on yet another show. It looks a hell of a lot better than shows like this usually do on broadcast TV. The Young Black Stallion Season 2 My wife and I have two horses. We will probably own this at some point. TV New Releases Flight of the Conchords Season 2 It would be advisable to start with the first season of this show. ------------------------------------------------- Splitting the Disc releases from VOD wasn't a big deal, but structuring the VOD Roundup has been more time-consuming than ever expected. A big one with plenty of backdated on-demand stuff is coming later this week.