Electric Shadow

Out of Print Watch: Sleeping Beauty

 


Screencap from DVD Beaver's writeup

 

This past Saturday, 30 January, Disney put Sleeping Beauty "back in the vault", so existing DVDs and Blu-rays (reviewed by me here) will disappear from shelves in the coming months. If you want an example of ultra-widescreen classic animation on Blu-ray, no better one exists than Sleeping Beauty. Amazon is currently listing the Blu-ray at $24.49, so grab it if you want it.

I should also mention that the DVD editions of The Jungle Book, its sequel, and the 101 Dalmations family of movies (animated & live-action) all went back in the vault as well.

The HD Guide's Out of Print Watch is designed to give a head's up to collectors and fans of movies that are going out of print before they're hard to find, over-priced, or both.

HD Waistcoats

Watching Atonement and Pride & Prejudice (2005) on Blu-ray last week, my thoughts turned to Jane Campion's Bright Star and how wonderful it would look in HD...but alas, it's DVD-only for now. These dual Joe Wright successes from Universal look and (especially) sound lush and crisp. Neither adds additional supplements beyond what was on the original DVDs.

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Stallone/Schwarzenegger

Cliffhanger has aged very, very well, to the point that my wife just sat down on the couch with me to watch it after watching the opening. Once it was over, she told me she digs the idea of going through the Rocky series with me. This was Friday night. On Sunday, we bought Over the Top, the arm-wrestling classic. Last Action Hero, on the other hand, may hold nostalgic value for some, but hasn't aged terribly well.

Sony's Blu-rays of each hit back on the 12th. Both films look fantastic. Cliffhanger includes all of the extras from the previous DVD SE (commentary, featurettes, deleted scenes). Both titles include the BD-Live "movieIQ" interactive trivia track. Last Action Hero features no other extras.
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Re-Scrubbed

I'd be remiss if I didn't add a brief mention of the Scrubs Season 8 Blu-ray as part of my recovery regimen last week. I had reviewed the DVD edition last fall, but at the beginning of December ABC re-issued it on Blu-ray (with a $10 rebate coupon for DVD owners). The Blu adds an extra featurette and the now-standard ABC SeasonPlay (also found on LOST) to the existing DVD extras. The biggest plus to me is the fact the whole thing fits on just two discs.

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Birth of "Seagalteur"

I almost coughed up a lung reading the cover of The Keeper, which hits you with the following like a kick to the eyes: "Steven Seagal (Driven to Kill) unleashes his wrath -- and his fists -- in this fast-paced thriller...caught in a web of deceit, racism, and murder." At the end of the second graph "...Sallinger (Seagal)'s job turns from protector to hunter as he untangles a dangerous web of lies and murder..." Where the hell did the racism go? That mystery aside, The Keeper sees the birth of a new cinematic term: The Segalteur.

A Seaglateur is one who directs multiple Steven Seagal movies in succession. I am not the expert on Seagal that we all aspire to be, so I can't say if director Keoni Waxman, also the director of The Anna Nicole Smith Story, is the first Seagalteur we've had or not. His other contribution to the ever-expanding Seagalibrary is the upcoming A Dangerous Man, which I wish had been an action sequel to A Serious Man. Seagal would have played the rabbi who kills bad guys by night and keeps kids kosher by day at schul. "Mazel tov, mothuhfuckuh!" I fell asleep multiple times during The Keeper on account of being ill, but the plot wasn't too complicated. Seagal's an LA cop whose partner turns on him and shoots up Seagal so that he starts at a major physical disadvantage, which is necessary for Seagal to be unable to waste all the bad guys in the opening minutes due to his inhuman amount of strength and agility). Seagal is forced into medical retirement from the force. While all this is happening, a rich man's daughter who has an idiot redneck boxer boyfriend is kidnapped. This creates a new job for Seagal. Seagal then hunts down the bad guys and yadda-yadda-yadda. Sites like Steven-Seagal.net were born for this movie.
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So Irreparably Lost

Wrong Turn at Tahoe joins a burgeoning special collection of direct-to-video Cuba Gooding Jr. movies (including the recent Hardwired that co-starred Val Kilmer). The movie isn't outrageously awful so much as it doesn't ever really go anywhere such that it even has the potential to take a bad turn (that's the only groan-inducing metaphor, I promise).

Contrary to Pete Hammond's box quote, Tahoe isn't ever intense or gripping, let alone really qualify as a thriller. Gooding is a henchman with a kid who works for Miguel Ferrer. Harvey Keitel plays a rival crime lord. Someone steps on someone's turf, some shit gets real, and some shit goes down, all thanks to some moron who shot their mouth off. Welcome to DTV Actionland, where every ride is the same one with a different paint job and style of clothing to fit the time period. If you rent this at your local Blockbuster that hasn't yet closed, Keitel's entrance scene is worth watching even if what comes before it gives you fits. The girl in her underwear on the cover is a red herring and a half: the movie is solely comprised of events that lead to things getting worse for unlikeable, unsympathetic people through a desaturated color filter and "extra grime" lens. Wrong Turn at Tahoe is like fast food so greasy, it makes you want to take a shower and a blood test afterward. Of course, that's exactly what some people are looking for.
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Scrubbing In

The 12th season of ER hit DVD back on 12 January, and especially when I'm sick, this is the kind of stuff I put on repeat, for better or worse. This, House MD, Scrubs, or any medical series in the book fits the bill, but ER most of all. Now that I type that, it seems rather morbid that I'm so attracted to medical dramas when ill.

Going back to 1994, I've been an unapologetic follower of the series. It's a guilty pleasure to some extent, but the acting and scripting has been consistently good throughout the show's run. Yes, it's a nighttime drama that went on and on and on, but they found ways to keep the show topical. I'm certain that, were it still on, we'd abruptly see a shift to Haitian relief efforts at present, just as season 12 followed members of the cast to Iraq and Darfur. The 6-DVD set contains unaired scenes on 16 of the season's 22 episodes. An added bonus to me is that the case only takes up the space of two standard DVD cases. Amazon has it for $31.99, or roughly $1.45 per episode.
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Out of the Woods

I don't make a habit of disappearing for the better part of a business week, but I've been pretty horrendously sick thanks to a sudden ear and respiratory infection. I'll get a couple of things up today and then get back to bed so as to sleep the rest of this away. Sleep has helped the most, but running a close second is a pair of Steven Seagal DTV movies. Life could be worse: I could be living one of those realities.
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Nerdy White Jew Plays Black Man

The most surprising thing about Seth MacFarlane's Family Guy: Something, Something, Something Dark Side is that they had such a dearth of black characters (pre-Cleveland Show) to work with that they had to use "Mort Goldman" in brownface as Lando Calrissian. For those who don't follow the show or find themselves sucked into syndicated airings periodically (like me), that makes no sense whatsoever.

Family Guy's Empire Strikes Back spoof, like the New Hope one before it, relies as much on the framework of the original films as it does in-jokes from the Family Guy universe. I found it much more digestible than most FG episodes, so I suppose the solution to stomaching MacFarlane's work is to chase or blend it with something else. The Blu-ray includes a commentary with MacFarlane, Seth Green, three producers, and the director of the 54-minute "deluxe episode". They touch on why they'll never do a spoof of the prequel trilogy and various bits that were cut or re-written. The "Fact-Ups" (pop-up trivia) are as informative as they are satirical of themselves. My favorite featurette by far was the one that covered the hand-painted cover art they did called The Dark Side of Poster Art. It's about ten minutes of graphic design geek fodder. The full table read of Something, Something, Something Dark Side is included, as are the opening minutes of the one for the next chapter.
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G-Force vs. Transformers

I did not expect to enjoy G-Force at all. That style of opening is often followed by something akin to "I'm shocked, shocked to admit right here in front of God and all the world that I loved it!", but that's not what I think of it.

Months ago, when G-Force was in first run theatrically and I was busy not supporting it by buying a ticket or going to a press screening by choice, I had a short chat with a good friend. In college, I spent most of my time working with FSU's campus movie theater. My first student manager, mentor, and friend there was Nicholas Ware, who is now a grad student in Northwest Ohio after an extended stint attempting to conquer the country of Japan. Nick and I would routinely find ourselves in the minority of a group that swelled in size and popularity such that we'd lose out trying to program midnight movies like El Topo and instead get stuck with The Neverending Story (which is in no way a Midnight Movie). I wanted to preface our chat with that bit of trivia, because as soon as I asked what he thought of G-Force, he said, "G-Force is a better action movie than Transformers 2". I jokingly opened a chat with "do you reckon G-Force is better than Transformers 2?" Below is the chat, largely unedited and messily joined together (but such is online communication). Nick: BETTER. GIANT. ROBOTS. MC: I haven't seen either movie. [this was months ago. still haven't seen TF2.] Nick: TF2 robots are just these sharp, ugly metal shapes that vaguely resemble humanoids. At least the robots in G-Force look like what they're supposed to look like! The thing that was awesome about the transformers toys is that they WORKED. They turned from robot-man into truck and back. None of the Transformers in the Transformers movies look like the would actually turn into a truck! It's just a slippery CGI fuckfest with photoshop filters. Makes my cock soft. MC: Basing all my thoughts off the trailers (since I haven't seen either), I think G-Force one-ups TF2 with a better cartoonish villain too. Nick: Well, except there's a TWIST! The real villain isn't Nighy. MC: "It's not easy, trying to take over the world" coming out of Bill Nighy's mouth made me almost choke laughing. Nick: All of it worked better, though. The characters are more believable and they're TALKING GUINEA PIGS. The humans don't have much to do, but I was surprised how much I liked (and how well rounded) the animal characters (were). I mean, I don't think G-Force is amazing. But it's a really good sort of segue kids film. The level of action gets them ready for stuff like Iron Man and other soft PG-13s. MC: Gateway Toy Movie Nick: My brother's 7-year-old will probably love it. It's tight. Every scene is needed, and works, and it all comes to a head, everything pays off. MC: I know people whose kids think it's the best movie they're ever seen Nick: There's no excess. TF2 is nothing BUT excess. It's good storytelling. MC: The host of NPR's "Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me!" said said something along the lines of "you can leave a half hour in, come back two hours later for the credits, and not miss anything. Seen CGI Joe yet? Nick: Naw. But I will. Because I'm a fucking idiot. I thought Transformers 1 was boring. However, I thought Transformers 2 was boring and racist. Which is a much larger crime. Nick: You and Devin both. MC: You should have seen the ridiculous fights people picked with him "reading in racism that wasn't there" in TF2. Nick: Isn't there? ISN'T THERE? If this had been a Disney movie, and they were animals, they would have gotten EVISCERATED for it. Those two robots are supposed to be DUMB BLACK GUYS. There is NO OTHER READING. That is THE READING. It's not a matter of reading something into it, it's a matter of READING IT. MC: I've found there's a wave of new and relatively-new web critics who are into helping studio P.R. departments defend hilariously indefensible things like this. Nick: And you know, I wouldn't have minded how racist Mudflap and Skidz were if they were FUNNY. They were SO... FUCKING... GRATING. Every attempt at humor in TF2 fell so completely flat. It's like if someone kicks you in the balls and expects it to be funny TO YOU. MC: I must have imagined all of my black friends in the office coming in and asking me how "Hollywood" thought the Step'n'fetchit Bots were ok and appropriate and hilarious. Of course, it was a bunch of white film critics on either side arguing with each other, which made the whole thing more ridiculous. Nick: They are very appropriate in Hollywood... if Hollywood is still doing minstrel shows. MC: Speaking of racism, any to be found in G-Force? Nick: The Tracy Morgan character was surprisingly "jive turkey" free. Though his (and Penelope Cruz') ethnicities are pretty clear, I don't remember any obvious cheap racial jokes MC: A kids' gerbil movie with Tracy Morgan in it avoided race humor entirely? I'm asking you to think real hard. Nick: I think he might of said stuff like crack-a-lackin' that kind of thing that's the extent of it MC: I might pay to see G-Force just to see the 3D version. Nick: I kept hoping that he'd talk about taking the Steve Buscemi gerbil out behind the plastic house and getting it pregnant. There is some anti-ferret humor, though. I really liked the angry Buscemi hamster MC: What if anything did you like about TF2? Nick: I mean, it's technically proficient, there's no doubting that, but to no end. The "old man" Decepticon farting a parachute? Devastator having testicles? I liked the voice work for the most part. Most of the Transformers have really nice, raspy voices. They SOUND like Giant Robots From Outer Space. ------------------------------------ The Blu-ray set comes with a pile of extras that are all aimed at a younger audience. A friend with kids tell me they played it through on repeat four times the first day they had it. The Blu-exclusive "enhanced commentary" includes a couple of the rodents plus Zach Galifianakis in-character. Other Blu exclusives include a featurette dedicated solely to Bruckheimer's work in CG (which someone could write a book about) and another that takes you behind-the-scenes in the 3D animation lab. The quality of modeling, rendering, and animation is really quite impressive. Extras that appear on the DVD also include the gag reel, deleted scenes, a few music videos, and some in-character featurettes for the kids. Disney was wise to start packing all their Blus with a DVD and a Digital Copy. This hit the street back in December, but I've only recently gotten to it due to the overwhelming pile of stuff I had hit at the end of the year. Never in a million years did I expect to be charmed by this.
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Playing JINGO

I didn't make up a BINGO-style scorecard, but I did have a little list of things I expected to see and hear while watching John Wayne's The Green Berets. While talking to conservative-minded friends about the movie, more than a couple have responded immediately with something along the lines of, "that one's kind of embarrassing, huh?"

The condescending manner in which Wayne's Col. Mike Kirby tries to inculcate David Janssen's reporter George Beckworth with "true" patriotism would be infuriating if it weren't hilariously shortsighted. Wayne's Vietnam "epic" is full of racism, arch-conservatism, and peppered with plenty of rah-rah sentiment about US involvement in Vietnam for good measure. The flaws don't end there: entire shots dip in and out of focus, a Georgia plantation house is used as a major set piece, and the sun sets in the east at the end. The movie is important in the realm of military movies relative to the historical record because the situation as Wayne would have it painted contrasted wildly with things that were and had been happening while they were shooting Georgia doubling for Vietnam. George Takei's performance here as the helpful native came on the heels of his saying goodbye to playing Sulu the first time. It's nice to see him doing something aside from a TV series, but this material is terribly beneath him, as it is below the great Aldo Ray. Warner's Blu-ray of The Green Berets came out back on 5 January and includes the trailer and a vintage making-of featurette in addition to the feature. The vintage featurette trumpets Wayne as if he's the man's man for the job when it comes to telling the story of Vi-et-nam. I watched it twice. The transfer is as good as the source would allow.
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Fame the Second

I sang and acted off and on growing up in suburban Dallas, and if there is a sucker audience for last year's remake of Fame, I'm elbowing for center seating about halfway back. The extreme widescreen aspect ratio (2.40:1) and earth-toned palette are additional incentive for me to give it a shot, and I'm glad I did, if only to see it fail.

The "believe in yourself" and "do what you love" themes are as needed in the lives of kids today as they ever have been. The fatal flaw of the movie is that its characters are spread too thin and the narrative is not as engaging or interesting as Glee or High School Musical are in style. I had a voucher to see this movie at no cost. The movie wasn't in first run long enough for me to use it, so I never saw the theatrical cut, just this DVD-only "Extended Dance" version that runs 16 minutes longer. The runtime (123 minutes) is closer to the 1980 original's 133 minutes. That doesn't change the fact that the movie is still kind of uninteresting for a while. Once the pace picks up it's not really half bad, but it's not all the way to half good either. The 15-minute auditioning prologue is like dead air. I don't remember a lick of it. No one in these arts fields enjoys sitting through that process in real life. This isn't stagey American Idol comedy hour stuff, so there's nothing to it aside from "these are the archetypes and stereotypes with which we will paint for two hours". The following quarter hour makes all the difference in the world when it comes to development. I have a feeling that's what the theatrical cut was most lacking overall: character investment and development. Remaking a movie that was rated R and ending up with a PG can only be chalked up to an inconsistent ratings standard board or merciless watering down. The sanitization of New York City itself since 1980 mirrors the transformation that the Fame "property" went through here. I'd wager it's as edgy as a dull butter knife as a PG, but the rating-free Extended Cut is full of plenty of suggestive material and more authentic high schooler credibility. The initial group jam session in the cafeteria was rolling along fine until some blonde girl started singing all street-style. Again, on assumption, the Extended version isn't exclusively dedicated to more dance footage. My gut is telling me the Dance branding is trying to subconsciously tie it to So You Think You Can Dance in the minds of viewers. I'm sure the target audience will take something away from this if they actually sit down to watch it. Unfortunately, the spectacular failure at the box office makes that less likely. As imperfect, manufactured, and fake as it is, Fame (2009) is better than most teen-aimed stuff. The Blu-ray hit last Tuesday (12 Jan 2009) and includes some deleted scenes, a "Fame" music video, character profiles, and a couple of featurettes: one on the dance sequences and another on the nationwide casting call to fill the mostly-unknown cast. The included Digital Copy is of the Extended Dance Cut (which I assume is superior based on first-run reviews).
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The Endurance of District 9

Whether it becomes some sort of mini-franchise from here, we'll know one way or another in time. District 9 certainly put a fair amount of fresh talent on the market, from director Neil Blomkamp to star Sharlto Copley. On top of that, it became one of the more profitable movies of last year on one of the smallest budgets (excluding Paranormal Activity as an outlier). I was going to hold off on writing about Sony's rather excellent Blu-ray of the movie, but then word seeped out that they're making the next Spider-Man movie with director Marc Webb for $80 million.

I started tapping away at this just after a brief and pointless argument with HitFix's Drew McWeeny on Twitter that began when I misquoted D9's budget as "$40 million" (it was actually closer to 30, or to have Drew tell you, exactly $30 million dollars according to "PJ"). Said argument appears to have been more about Drew getting the final word than what I was initially talking about in the first place: You could make two District 9's with an $80 million bank account. My biggest beef with the first Spider-movie was that they spent a lot of money and ended up with not-so-great effects overall (it got worse through the series). The leaping from roof to roof bit comes to mind most immediately. The approach D9 took was "what do we have to show, how do we make that happen the most effectively, and how cheap can we do it?" I'm very pleased by the idea that this approach is now appealing to studios that will hopefully greenlight more and more movies like this. When you consider that Guillermo del Toro made Hellboy 2 for $60 million and could have done yet more with another $20 mill, things are encouraging rather than pessimistic ("they're cheaping out on Spidey!"). Pouring mountains of money into Spider-Man 3 only made things worse. Splice out the Sandman stuff and you basically have the only part of the movie I cared for at all. Months ago, I stepped out of the Austin press screening and said to an esteemed acquaintance that I was most thrilled that what I'd just seen was "real Sci-Fi" done for $30 million. I spent five minutes promising and assuring him that it only cost 30. He was blown away by that number more than the movie. His initial "eh, it was pretty good, I suppose" morphed into "it was pretty good, but if it cost 30, that's going to change how the studios make these things." We're already seeing that change going rapidly into motion. My only fear is that the studios will shave things down so lean that veteran directors will just drop off the radar for years at a time. The extras on the Blu-ray don't try too hard to squeeze more minutes out of the same info as the vast majority of new releases. That isn't to say that I don't expect a second edition of this to come along at some point. Knowing Peter Jackson's outfit from the Lord of the Rings sets, they are aware that fans don't want to be bled dry and they pack in reasonable added value for people already disposed to re-buy the same movie. Blomkamp goes solo on the commentary, which is extremely fulfilling and without useless crap to fill dead air nor much dead air either. If I were to peg something for the theoretical Collector's or 5th Anniversary Edition, it'd be a group track with Blomkamp, co-writer Terri Tatchell, and star Copley. Having gone through it all now, the commentary plays best after having gone through the three-part doc, deleted scenes, and featurettes. The deleted scenes are a testament to movies truly being made in the editing, as a lot of fat got wisely trimmed off. The doc and featurettes get their business done and over with pretty expeditiously. The Blu-ray exclusives include an interactive satellite map of the staging area for the movie, which I skipped, the Sony Blu-standard movieIQ trivia/info track, and useless to me and other non-gamers (I'm retired, back off) is a God of War III demo for the Playstation 3 that keeps Sony's vertical integration standard in check. All told, this is one of the very few new releases from last year that I can actually recommend buying as not only a "vote" for the movie and what it represents creatively, but as an entertainment package. The disc hit the street nearly a month ago, but I expect we'll see another resurgence in awareness once Oscar nominations come out. I think this first "ten pictures" year in a long while could see D9 nominated for Best Picture along with Avatar and Star Trek as a Sci-Fi trifecta. Hugh Jackman declared that the musical was "back" last year, so I expect a Sci-Fi dance number this year. Break out the blue body paint, miniskirts, and most importantly, the shellfish costumes.
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Yellow on Blu

The first season set of The Simpsons to hit Blu-ray is the just-finished 20th one. Notably absent is the usual complement of easter eggs, deleted scenes, and commentaries on every episode. Collectors of previous season sets who also frequent blog comment sections have already gone beyond ballistic saying that Fox has found yet another way to screw fans of the series.

These people obviously know nothing about the enormous amount of time involved in compiling the people and content necessary to make things like the stellar 12th Season set that hit last August. The biggest positive with this extras-free set is that the whole season is housed on just two discs, so disc-swapping upwards of four times is no longer an issue. There's a teaser for the Hulu-able 20th Anniversary special as the lone extra.
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Discs of 2009: You Missed...On Disc Only

Some movies never play commercially, for whatever reason. Many of these are terrible wastes of time. Some are not. Below you get a grab bag of titles that struck me throughout last year from both groups.

Nothing But the Truth The greatest injustice of last year was this awards-caliber Rod Lurie movie going straight to DVD (no Blu-ray!) thanks to the financial failure of the Yari Film Group. Spring Breakdown A comedy written by a smart woman, go figure. The best (and only) parody of Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison (R-TX) is done here by the un-hatable Jane Lynch. What Doesn't Kill You Another Yari yarn. Not as good as NBTT, but still good. The Code The scenery gets chewed, but Banderas and Freeman contribute to a better-than-many action flick. An American Affair JFK assassination conspiracy fiction starring the wonderful Gretchen Mol as his mistress. The Tiger's Tail Brendan Gleeson is excellent here in The Irish Industrialist Prince and the Pauper. Kim Cattrall's Irish accent is absolutely atrocious. Green Street Hooligans 2 I'm laughing too hard to come up with how to describe this piece of utter tripe. Hardwired Val Kilmer. Cuba Gooding Jr. A plot from 1995. This somehow ends up pretty entertaining. The Maiden Heist Walken, Freeman, and Macy (plus Marcia Gay Harden). A heist movie with elements of the first Night at the Museum (older guys get their revenge), it's like 9 bucks at Walmart. Review on its way soon. The Marc Pease Experience Just because Cinematical's William Goss found a way to see this in one of its invisible bookings doesn't make this a non-DTV title. I think he told me it's a comedy without the "comedy" part. Discs of the Year is a look back at the year in disc releases and trends, from the best to the worst.
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Discs of 2009: You Missed...Indies


The GoodTimesKid A Disc of the Week last year, and a movie with echoes of Chaplin and Tati. Julia The most wow-worthy female performance of the year can be found here turned in by the not-even-in-the-Best-Actress-race Tilda Swinton. Medicine for Melancholy One of the most definitive movies about race intra- and inter- relations, this is one of my favorite releases of the last year and one of my favorite SXSW movies. The Exiles A fascinating artifact of handmade filmmaking, worth seeking out. The Great Buck Howard A lovely movie and performance from Malkovich. Jack Brown Genius Before Peter Jackson was the Peter Jackson... Synecdoche, New York I don't care how famous anyone in it is and I don't care who paid for the movie. Kaufmann's meta-meta-meta movie is woefully underseen. The Wackness Another early 2009 disc release from Sony that, like Synecdoche, was barely a blip on the radar of many and deserves rental or purchase. Moving Midway Special Michael Rappaport's virtuoso, finest performance. Shades of Ray You know Zachary Levi from Chuck. Splinter I'm bored by most modern horror, but not this. Thousand Years & Princess of Nebraska Wayne Wang. Microbudget. Sharp as a tack. Gigantic Adam Resurrected 42nd Street Forever: Drafthouse Alamo Drafthouse trailer rarities, get it while these last. Goodbye Solo The Limits of Control Jim Jarmusch! Isaach de Bankole! Discs of the Year is a look back at the year in disc releases and trends, from the best to the worst.
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Discs of 2009: You Missed...Documentaries

Today I'll be posting a string of lists that collect quantity more than quality in a few categories that are too often overlooked in Netflix queues and the video stores still out there. The You Missed... lists are my cheat sheets to you the renter/buyer and are a shameless callback to my days as a student film programmer. Little to no justification will follow, but I wouldn't have included these without good reason.

In a Dream An exceptional portrait of family, art, and madness that questions the nature of each. Not Quite Hollywood How to become obsessed with Aussie exploitation movies, They Killed Sister Dorothy The power of influential industrialists in Brazil outweighs everything else, including the scales of justice. The Order of Myths The old secrets of Mardi Gras culture in Mobile, Alabama are partially uncovered here. The Top Secret Trial of the 3rd Reich There was a sham trial after the events portrayed in Valkyrie. This doc contains the film taken at that trial with overdubbed translation. Dear Zachary Read nothing about it going in, watch it, and then behold the polarizing reactions of the many who've seen it. There are those who call it (alternately) the most affecting and the most manipulative documentary they've seen in some time, if ever. Hyperbole orbits this movie regularly. The Town That Was Dreams With Sharp Teeth Harlan Ellison: the only words needed to recommend this or not. American Outrage Harvard Beats Yale 29-29 Like sports documentaries more than sports? Here you go. You Must Remember This: The WB Story Great film history in a concentrated dosage. Trouble the Water Katrina. Handheld. Trumbo Dalton Trumbo: a true patriot who believed in individual rights and the Constitution. Full Battle Rattle How to Be a Man/Woman This was used as actual instruction for young adults and is absolutely hilarious. New World Order An excellent doc about conspiracy theory and, primarily, Austin native and Infowars.com founder Alex Jones. The Way We Get By Who welcomes the soldiers when they come back? This is a movie set in an airport that I like better than Up in the Air. Must Read After My Death A portrait of a family in the boomer era disintegrating, as told by the mother. You thought Revolutionary Road was hardcore? You thought wrong. The Cove It's the frontrunner to win Best Documentary Feature at the Oscars, but since it's a doc, no one (comparatively) has yet seen it. The best-known title on this list by far. Anvil! The Story of Anvil This wasn't even shortlisted by the Academy in another astounding misstep. Discs of the Year is a look back at the year in disc releases and trends, from the best to the worst.
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Disc Roundup (Movies & TV) 19 Jan 2010


Demian Bichir in his alternately chilling and thrilling portrayal of Fidel Castro in Steven Soderbergh's Che
New Release of the Week Che: The Criterion Collection (Blu-ray & DVD) Review (22 Dec 2009) Catalog DVD Release of the Week Chantal Akerman in the Seventies: Eclipse Series 19 Foreign Language Release of the Week My Fuhrer (DVD only) Catalog Blu-ray Upgrades of the Week Boogie Nights & Magnolia (Boogie has been Best Buy-exclusive since 15 Dec 2009) Specialty Release of the Week Red Cartoons: Animated Films from East Germany Catalog New to Blu-ray Smokin' Aces Catalog New to DVD Robert Altman's Streamers Kingdom of the Spiders starring William Shatner Direct to DVD/Blu-ray Smokin' Aces 2: Assassin's Ball The Keeper (DVD only) New Release (Blu-ray & DVD) Whiteout Pandorum Gamer I Can Do Bad All By Myself The Burning Plain According to Greta No Impact Man Across the Hall New Release (DVD only) Outrage Chevolution Angus, Thongs, and Perfect Snogging Blood Creek Blu-ray/DVD "Flipper" Double-dips The Bourne Identity The Bourne Supremacy The Bourne Ultimatum Downloading Nancy Goliath Onimasa The Drummer Frontrunner a l'aventure Like Stars on Earth Catalog TV Release of the Week (tie) Renegade Season 1 21 Jump Street Season 1 They tied because now there's proof they existed. TV New Release of the Week Aziz Ansari: Intimate Moments for a Sensuous Evening (Blu-ray & DVD) TV New Release (Blu-ray & DVD) Weeds Season 5 Artie Lange: Jack and Coke TV New Release (DVD only) Defying Gravity Season 1 Damages Season 2 BBC New Tricks Season 2 BBC Waking the Dead Season 4 The Game Season 2 TV Catalog (DVD only) BBC Cranford: The Collection (Cranford & Return to Cranford) BBC Return to Cranford BBC Jonathan Creek Season 4 thirtysomething Season 2 Law & Order Season 7 Dallas Season 12 Disc Roundup is posted each week and updated as reviews are posted on individual titles. Unless otherwise noted in the linked reviews, assume that screener copies of titles reviewed were provided by the respective studio.
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Blu Flippers: First Contact

I received my first Universal Blu-ray/DVD "flipper" discs for review the other day: The Bourne flicks Identity & Supremacy (hitting the street today, 19 Jan, along with Ultimatum). I hate the idea in theory thanks to an irrational anxiety about disc layer bonding. In execution, however, they work quite well and feel sturdy.

Showing them to coworkers produced exclamations of "that's awesome, I'm gonna start buying Blu-rays". I'm sure that's precisely the reaction Universal was hoping for: people start buying software before they have Blu-capable hardware. These folks like the idea of going to Blu-ray, but they don't have the home theater to back it up just yet. Consider this my eating crow (for now) on these things.
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Gervais' Side of the Truth

I very much enjoyed skimming a DVR'd version of The Ricky Gervais HBO Show/Invention of Lying Promo Show (also known as The 67th Annual Golden Globes) from the other night. Just a couple of days before, I'd watched Invention of Lying and been transported back to when writing and concept were integral parts of studio comedies. The movie is a grinner (not a laugher) until Gervais' character of Andy invents the concept of God and the afterlife. I greatly prefer the original title, The Other Side of the Truth.

The Invention of Lying hits the street today (19 Jan).
The Blu-ray is lacking a Gervais commentary, which is disappointing. It does include the original opening (The Dawn of Lying, narrated by Patrick Stewart), set in prehistoric times. On top of that are some more deleted scenes, outtakes, a making-of featurette, some video podcasts, and a 20-minute piece called Meet Karl Pilkington. It follows a friend of Gervais' flying to the US to be an extra in the (now-cut) opening. I'm assuming it's put-on at least in part. Buying it is a vote in favor of the style of screenwriting, not the movie's quality as a comedy classic (which it is not).
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