Fateful Terminus (#165)

If you've never watched Spaced, you have no idea how soothing it is to hear Julia Deakin's voice saying "Broian?" in your head no matter what role you see her perform. I love that she is the audience for Simon Pegg's trademark speech as Gary King.

iFlicks 2.0

I love this app. I've been progressively cranking terabytes of content through it to convert for iTunes and mobile device compatibility on top of metadata scraping. It's only $10 until 25 November, but worth it even at full price.

BREAKING BAD Barrel Includes All Retailer Exclusives

This is tremendously refreshing, partly as a result of the series creator shilling for his own product, but mostly because this is a truly definitive "ultimate" set. Retailer exclusives bit hits at about 5:20 mark.

Noriko (#164)

This still frame comes from the breathtaking new Criterion Blu-ray of Yasujiro Ozu's Tokyo Story, restored and remastered from a 4K film transfer. It is a noticeable upgrade as compared to the BFI's Region B Blu-ray, from which I've previously featured stills.

I finally saw a 35mm print of Tokyo Story three months ago, thanks to an Austin Film Society screening. I suggested a pair of screenings that I realize I've just missed, of A Story of Floating Weeds and its color sound remake, Floating Weeds. I hope people enjoyed them. I'm actually quite sad to have missed them, but there are worse things to have happen in life, you know?

3D, Flattening

TheWrap reports some rather damning statistics from the opening weeks of Thor 2 in the US, and it's info that studios should use to honestly consider upcoming productions:

With around 80 percent of its 3,841 screens offering the format, roughly 39 percent of Disney’s Marvel superhero sequel’s $85.7 million opening weekend grosses came from 3D. That’s still about $33 million, but a solid majority of moviegoers opted to see it in 2D rather than put on the glasses.

If it always looked great, from production (or post-conversion) to in-theatre execution, the story might have been markedly different. Hollywood cannot offer its customers the promise of an unparalleled, high-end experience and deliver less-than-adequate results. You can only rip people off for so long.

Out of Print Watch: Criterion's IL GENERALE DELLA ROVERE

The 2009 Criterion DVD is suddenly out of stock on Criterion's site, at Amazon, and Barnes & Noble ahead of the 3 December 2013 release of separate Raro Video DVD and Blu-ray editions. For true Criterion collectors, it's wise to snag this as soon as possible in the next couple days before the price skyrockets. Here's a quick look at extras that have been retained, lost, or added in the new edition as compared to the old:

Retained: Adriano Aprà & Renzo Rosselini interviews, theatrical trailer

Lost: Isabella and Ingrid Rosselini interviews, The Choice visual essay by Tag Gallagher, booklet content

Added: a three-minute interview with Aldo Strappini and 45-minute video essay Truth of Fiction

From the Criterion synopsis:

In a magnetic performance, Vittorio De Sica is Emanuele Bardone, an opportunistic rascal in wartime Genoa, conning his fellow Italians and exploiting their tragedies by promising to help find their missing loved ones in exchange for money. But when the Nazis force him to impersonate a dead partisan general in prison to extract information from fellow inmates, Bardone finds himself wrestling with his conscience for the first time. Roberto Rossellini’s gripping drama, a rare box-office breakthrough for the legendary neorealist, is further evidence of the compassionate artistry of one of cinema’s most important voices.

I Don't Know When, I Don't Like How (#160-163)

The first movie I saw in a movie theatre saw a major digital restoration…but the final product has a noticeable, major editing mistake during "Part of That World" of all things (along with a couple other places). Make sure you get a replacement disc through Disney's program that they rather quietly and begrudgingly issued. There are no copies currently available that aren't screwed up.

I went through the process today. Here's a shortcut and a quick rundown of what it was like and what to expect (get ready to be angry):

1. Start by calling: 800-723-4763 (U.S.), 888-877-2843 (Canada)
2. select these menu options in this order: 1 then 5 then 6
3. they'll get some info from the disc packaging and discs themselves from you and ask for a phone number and mailing address
4. they'll mail you two things, a "Consumer Form" and a return label
5. fill out the form when it arrives and put only the discs into something suitable for shipping (keep the case), slapping the label they provided on, and mail
6. wait 4-6 weeks (as of this writing in mid-November 2013) for your replacement discs

color looks muted here as compared to the first frame above, but that's how it's supposed to look

I was on the phone for a total of about nine minutes, with basically no wait time other than menu-hunting. They asked for an email address (which you don't have to give them), and promptly asked if they could use mine to contact me for future offers (which is why I gave them a dummy email).

The thing most people would be galled by was when at the end of the call, I was told about the upcoming Blu-ray release of Mary Poppins, which they could "take a pre-order for right here over the phone". I'm sure this is a compulsory part of the call flow forced on their phone reps, but it's disgusting to tell someone that the product they paid $25+ for retail (mine was a review copy) will be out of their hands for at least a month, and in the same breath ask them to trust you with more money for a product that could be screwed up in the same way.

Granted, mine is a review copy provided by the studio and I'm a grown man, but to think that people with kids could be without a proper corrected copy until after the holidays at this point is shameful.

I mean seriously…they've got gadgets and gizmos a-plenty. Whozits and whatsits galore.

I guess what I'm saying is…I want more (in terms of their caring about their customers).

I'll update as The Process continues. This mess aside, the disc looked and sounded really great. I hope corrected copies actually get put on store shelves at some point.

The Cure for Love (#159)

I prefer Chaplin to Lloyd and Keaton, and I think at least part of it is due to my not thinking much of the latter two's use of black people in stereotyped or buffoonish caricatures, where Chaplin never did. White people will look at me funny when I say something like that, usually responding with "not like you're black", though it turns out I am, in part. I'm also part Chinese and part Latino on top of being half-white. I don't hold the racial mores people grew up with against them, but I do award extra credit for being ahead of one's time.

Whatever Chaplin's other indiscretions or flaws were in life, at least he was beyond progressive on race, and that's something. I like very much that biographer Jeffrey Vance makes a particular point of talking about this on the Criterion commentary for City Lights. I may be teetering back toward calling it my favorite Chaplin, over Modern Times.

It's a Wonderful Lie

Variety is reporting the intent to make a sequel to It's a Wonderful Life for release in 2015, with Karolyn Grimes, the original Zuzu Bailey, attached as an angel and…this is all hooey. This script will not get made. This is a publicist-placed story that notably doesn't mention Paramount having comment at all.

The remake, derivative, and so on rights to the original film are tangled up like crazy, as rightly pointed out by Lou Lumenick in relation to the troubles faced by Broadway producers in the 1980's. Since around 2009, actress Karolyn Grimes has been trying to drum up interest and attention surrounding her association with the original movie. She has a very interesting personal story as related in that last linked story from two years ago, but nothing in that Variety "EXCLUSIVE" says anything about production actually being set in stone or that a green light has been given. According to Lumenick, he visited the location used for the movie back in 2009 and was told something about a TV series that was planned to star Grimes.

I wasn't going to post anything until I saw loads of outlets playing exactly into the purpose of the Variety story and reported this "announcement" as fact. There is no green light, and nothing "real" about this announcement other than the intent by some people to maybe make something in time for a certain release date. Producing partners like a script for a movie that they could not possibly have secured the full rights for without official comment from various other parties. Chief among the entities that would have to have something to say for this to be credible would be Paramount. Note they're nowhere to be found.

The actual movie usually drifts between $15-20 on Blu-ray. It'll probably wiggle a little cheaper as we approach Black Friday. Amazon Prime members can stream the wholly unrelated, Peter Capaldi-directed and Richard E. Grant-starring Oscar winner Franz Kafka's It's a Wonderful Life for free.

GigaOm: Movie "Ownership" is "Over"

This piece from GigaOm is the most idiotic bit of writing from the tech sector about entertainment that I've seen in some time, and that's saying something.

The Digital Entertainment Group, a trade association that tracks revenue in this space, doesn’t differentiate between movie and TV shows when talking about digital sales, but an industry insider told me that between 80 and 90 percent of all digital movie revenue comes from rentals, not sales.

None of his cited data comparisons are compared equitably. He puts gross subscription service (Netflix) revenue, which did not exist a few years ago, against physical media sales. His analysis is anything but objective, and that he doesn't qualify the insight of his "industry insider" source makes them as authoritative as an intern in a mailroom discussing an entire studio's performance.

iTunes sales data has actually shown the opposite, as has physical media purchase data. This one guy's preferences, behavior, and experiences no more dictate the market than I do as an individual. The data contradicts him regarding media ownership, and that he plays so much into what many have said studios want us to do (prefer rental to "ownership") is further evidence of how weak and utterly facile his "analysis" is here.

What would interest me is a look at the conversion of rental revenue since the late 90's from retail into SVOD rentals and RedBox (which GigaOm never mentions…too bourgeois for them?).

Steel Resolve (#158)

I re-watched Man of Steel with my wife last night. It's a movie that I tried to defend and found myself disliking more as I talked about it on The Incomparable. I should have been a bit more forthright in my stance on a few things. I've been proven quite right since we recorded in June, in that Man of Steel was literally the foundation for expanding their DC Cinematic Universe and Goyer has publicly alluded to exactly the Lex Luthor framing I guessed. I would still defend the character choices Kal-El makes, but I'm more emboldened that the destruction porn was overboard.

I've also examined the respective retailer exclusive extras available (from Target and Walmart) in the US, just as I did Star Trek Into Darkness. I'm angry again, too. "Disappointed" may be a better choice of words. Guess what I'm posting about either later tonight or in the morning...

Archival #1: MADAM SATAN (1930)

Welcome to a new regular feature dedicated to under-recognized movies that deserve more attention. Whether brought back into print by Manufacture-On-Demand (MOD) services like the Warner Archive Collection or bootstrapped and/or Kickstartered by obsessed entrepreneurial cinephiles, attention must be paid. These are the more obscure, the less-replayed, and those long absent from repertory cinema. Subsequent installments will cover everything from individual movies to TV shows, and multi-movie collections to blessed occasional Blu-rays.

l. to r. Bob (Reginald Denny), wife Angela (Kay Johnson), Bob's pal Jimmy (Roland Young)

This (unfortunately) obscure Cecil B. DeMille picture is one of my favorite discoveries from my college days. My "Dance in the Movies" professor showed it to us not just for the electricity-themed, spark-plugs-and-current song and dance number. The real fireworks are the gender politics and (dare I say it?) what we would today call cosplay. Quite notably, the three credited screenwriters are all women, and as much as feminism existed in the early 1930's, this Pre-Code, dark-musical-comedy-disaster movie was as feminist as motion pictures got. Even though the next still frame features a gun, "dark" is relative to the musical comedies of the 1930's.

the best friend, the wife, and the mistress…and a gun

Scorned wife Angela (Of Human Bondage's Kay Johnson) turns marital deception around on her philandering husband Bob (Rebecca's Reginald Denny). Demure, sweet, and unassuming otherwise, she eventually takes on a costumed persona who goes by only Madam Satan: an exotic "French" woman full of spice and sin, burning to take a naughty man back to "hell" with her.

miniature work par excelence

By design, her husband finds "Madam Satan" completely irresistible and loses interest in his brassy mistress (Animal Crackers' Lillian Roth). The husband's best friend (Philadelphia Story's Roland Young) gets tangled up in the whole affair doubly, since the climax of the movie occurs at a party he throws on a fancy-schmancy zeppelin. The poster shows parachutes and an exploding zeppelin, so I'll leave it at saying the actors all do their own stunts.

DeMille is best-known and best-remembered for large-scale epics, and the climactic party on a zeppelin here does not disappoint. Elaborate costumes, a bizarre and decadent tribute to technology in the form of dance, and the bacchanalia of the party itself is an interesting antecedent to the golden calf rave in The Ten Commandments.

I don't care how they accomplish the majority of CG shots in the modern day, but boy am I fascinated by how they pull something like this off.

Titular star Kay Johnson had a much shorter career than one would hope (she's magnificent here), but in case you weren't aware, she also happened to be the mother of the great James Cromwell. Lillian Roth underwent the early 1900's version of today's booze-fueled tabloid starlet meltdown, complete with eight marriages. She would eventually become the first celebrity to publicly associate herself with Alcoholics Anonymous, something she deserves as much credit for doing as she does getting herself clean.

Pre-Code movies in general haven't had the best of luck seeing disc or streaming release anywhere other than WB, and especially Warner Archive (who have recently restarted the magnificent Forbidden Hollywood series). There was a VHS, but I don't think Madam Satan ever hit laserdisc, let alone DVD before WAC released it at the end of this past July.

Early talkies have a charm all their own, but this one has more than the average share of surprises and delights. You can buy Madam Satan on DVD for $16.95 by clicking/tapping here or the image below, or try a 2-week free trial of the Warner Archive Instant service and watch it in SD on their site or in HD on a Roku set-top box. Their HD-supporting, AirPlay-enabled iPad app launches soon, too.

Archival is a recurring feature that shines a spotlight on more obscure catalog content, much of which has rarely (if ever) been available to own on home video. 

Return to Soderberghopolis

Criterion is not only returning Soderbergh's King of the Hill to print on home video in February 2014, but they're also including his The Underneath in the same package. I knew it was only a matter of time before we got KOTH, but I'm more grateful to see them having convinced Soderbergh to do an interview about his film that he (allegedly) dislikes the most.

Regarding The Underneath as I wrote about it in the third numbered installment of Soderberghopolis:

"I don’t see the complete clusterfuck he apparently does. I’ve had personal artistic catastrophes others have seen as successes, so I get it. I just don’t agree that it sucks. Imperfect work from a great director is better than what hacks can do on their best days with a papal blessing. I’ll concede that it isn't drenched in Soderbergh's cinematic DNA, but it couldn't have been directed by just anyone. The cinematographic flourishes and this first pass at a non-linear narrative are distinctly Soderbergh."

My "Soderberghopolis" series stalled out once I hit the point I needed to re-watch his two TV series from the early/mid-aughts. Booking time to not just scrub through (as I have with some of the movies) ground it to a halt.

It's finally restarting soon, and I may push that forward even sooner with this tremendously happy news.

I hope this means that not only we'll see the Kafka "Midnight Cut" next year, but maybe a Blu-ray of Schizopolis and at long, long last…The Limey.

I wonder if Extension765 will do a "Perennial Security" t-shirt...

Small Warrior Need Father (#157)

I finally cracked open Paramount's recent restored and remastered Blu-ray of Hondo a couple of nights ago when my wife came across it on the over-the-air MOVIES network. The SD, stretched and distorted picture on the channel was like watching a third-generation VHS copy compared to the rich, bright, crisp colors and details of the Blu-ray.

Watching the extras, my wife said "I would pay to go see this in 3D. Why didn't they remaster it in 3D?". I told her, "because, like when this movie came out, 3D is dying again."

From the Sides (#156)

I'll never stop missing Bob Peck.

Marmalade Sandwich (#155)

This is one in a series of these that you'll be flooded with from now until (and probably after) the release of the The World's End on Blu-ray. I like pointing at this bit when making "miniature Odyssey" comparisons to the World's End  narrative.

Skewing Into Massive Popularity

Thanks to my friend Ryan Gallagher for alerting me to this via Twitter. The Ultraviolet consortium, junta, cosa nostra, or whatever have conducted a survey of existing Ultraviolet users.

This has resulted in finding that those surveyed overwhelmingly love the service. This is, of course, as polled from within the very small sample within the portion of the 15% of consumers who even know it exists.

As soon as I'm able to find the time, I'll post a piece about how and why I rip my own Digital Copies from Blu-rays.

The Frame #154: 16mm Friends Forever

Not only did Edgar Wright shoot the flashback sequences featured in The World's End on 16mm celluloid, he shot the whole movie on film.  It makes a difference, and more than just matching well to the other two shot-on-film installments of the Cornetto Trilogy.

My exhaustively comprehensive review of the Blu-ray is almost finished. Three years ago, I did the same for his ultra-stacked Scott Pilgrim vs. the World. 

Giant Size #33: Cigar-Smoking Baby

Comics pro Antony Johnston returns to Giant Size and joins Drobo CEO Geoff Barrall to properly school me in the various worlds and characters of the UK's 2000AD , with a particular focus on one-man judge/jury/executioner Judge Dredd. One of my favorite bits of this episode is listening to the two of them enthuse about their childhood discoveries of various stories through 2000AD's ultra-violent (and thoroughly satirical) lens.

This week's interview with colorist extraordinaire Elizabeth Breitweiser begins at the 01:44:52 mark. Pick up Velvet  #1 (written by Ed Brubaker, penciled by Steve Epting, and colored by Elizabeth) and add it to your pull list.

1800+ weekly issues strong, 2000AD has never shied away from political subject matter and the topical since its inception in 1977. What follows is a US-focused reading list of how to get your hands on the biggest, most iconic and interesting stories we discussed in this week's show.

Judge Dredd: The Complete Case Files #02 (progs 61-115)
includes "The Cursed Earth" and "The Day the Law Died" and more
 $15 TPB or $10 Kindle Edition

Dredd goes over land from Mega City One (east coast) to Mega City Two (west coast), with a life-saving vaccine and a convict in tow.  Immediately spilling out of that, one of his biggest early nemeses arises and gives him hell.

Judge Dredd: The Complete Case Files #05 (progs 208-270)
includes "Block Mania" and "The Apocalypse War" and more
 $16 TPB or $10 Kindle Edition 

The most iconic, go-to classic Dredd story sees major, lasting implications for the planet and world of Dredd, replete with Cold War imagery.

The above three collections, for a remarkably reasonable price, collect some of the most definitive early Dredd stories. If you grab #03, you'll get the first appearances of both Judge Death and Judge Anderson, and a bunch of self-contained stories.

The US has only seen six print volumes of the "Complete Case Files" released, whereas they've released 21 of them in the UK. The good news is that they are all available in the 2000AD Newsstand app for iOS. Alternately, you could import the UK editions from Amazon UK.

Judge Dredd: The Complete Case Files #07 (progs 322-375)
"Cry of the Werewolf""The Graveyard Shift""The Haunting of Sector House 9"
£11 TPB

 Antony was very into some of these weirder, horror-tinged stories. How can you resist a story that starts with a cover showing Dredd turning into a werewolf?

Judge Dredd: The Complete Case Files #08 (progs 376-423)
"City of the Damned" 
  £11 TPB or $14 on iOS Newsstand

Time travel finds its way into Dredd stories here, where Dredd and Judge Anderson travel to the future. The story serves as a continuation of "The Judge Child", so make sure you read that one first. For the record, it precedes Chris Claremont's "Days of Future Past" by four years.

Unfortunately, many of the other characters we discussed either haven't been reprinted in the US (like Sam Slade Robo-Hunter), or they're out of print (Strontium Dog).

Rogue Trooper: Tales of Nu Earth 1 ($16)
Rogue Trooper: Tales of Nu Earth 2 ($15)

A genetically-engineered soldier on his own against an endless war, the good people at IDW recently announced a new ongoing Rogue Trooper series. These collections are similar in style to the Dredd Complete Case Files.

The Complete Nemesis the Warlock, Volume 1

Put by Kieron Gillen to Matt Fraction as something along the lines of "this is how messed up what we  grew up on is", I'm chomping at the bit to devour Kevin O'Neill art that I've never seen.

Sláine : The Horned God ($18 HC)
Sláine: Warriors Dawn ($14 TPB)
Sláine: Book of Invasions Volume 1 ($16)

Described as a Celtic Conan the Barbarian, he was controversial as an addition to what was considered a sic-fi-only publication. He's proven to stay immensely popular in retrospect. I've no context for the above collections, but they're all that's available in the US. 

The Ballad of Halo Jones ($15 TPB)

A rare female main character, Alan Moore's work here has eluded me thus far, but now I have little excuse. I'm especially ashamed to have not read this, considering how highly acclaimed it is.

 The Complete Alan Moore Future Shocks ($15 TPB)

Including Abelard Snazz and all of Moore's other short stories aside from the bigger scale of both Halo Jones and D.R. and Quinch.

The Complete D.R. and Quinch ($15 TPB) 

Dredd goes across the Cursed Earth and eventually off into space to find a prophesized savior for Mega City One. We spoil a twist about this one during the show. includes , , and  and more  or $14 on iOS Newsstandincludes and more 

Alan Moore's pair of ne'er-do-well college troublemakers is all collected in one neat little trade. 

Harry 20 on the High Rock ( $13)

A wrongly accused man ends up on an orbital prison, and he's forced to survive against the odds. 

I'm amazed I got this show recorded and this all written. I'm sick as a dog…a Strontium Dog.