Archive for the ‘DTS HD 2.0 Master Audio (English)’ Category
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Disc Reviews by John Ceballos on February 3rd, 2013
“I’ve changed a lot. I’m not the same woman.”
Early on in Luis Buñuel’s surrealist gem, a mild-mannered older gentleman named Mathieu douses a beautiful, battered woman with a bucket of water as she desperately attempts to board the train he’s riding. His fellow passengers are stunned, but also understandably intrigued. What possible sequence of events could’ve led Mathieu to this cold and cartoonish gesture? It’s an irresistible hook, and Mathieu proceeds to regale the other travelers —
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Disc Reviews by M. W. Phillips on August 29th, 2012
“We decided to tour round Serbia. We’ll go to villages. It will be interesting to see farmers’ reactions to our sexual provocations. Sexual education for Serbs. Widening the horizons. This is our guerilla mission.”
I like to think I am not a prude. My taste in film runs to the controversial, and I don’t shy away from extreme cinema. I think Salò, or the 120 Days of Sodom and Caligula are masterpieces; A Serbian Film impressed and affected me, although I have no intention of watching it again
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Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on August 2nd, 2012
“It’s one thing to see a great white shark on television or from the safe confines of a boat. It’s another experience entirely to see the animals in their natural element. There simply is not a single creature on Earth that we’re more afraid of.”
Man’s always had a rather natural, and healthy, fear of sharks, but it was perhaps the 1975 film Jaws that brought all of those primordial fears bubbling to the surface of our pop culture. Since then sharks have taken an almost mythic position in our culture
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Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on July 24th, 2012
“Satan has sent me Twins Of Evil.”
Okay, it wasn’t really Satan, at least I don’t think it was. It was the folks over at Synapse who sent me the Blu-ray release for Hammer’s Twins Of Evil, and I’m pretty glad that they did. If you’re a horror fan of any worth and are old enough, you have some wonderfully frightful memories of Hammer’s run of horror films starting in the late 1950′s. Hammer pretty much began where Universal ended their celebrated cycle of horror films. Like Universal, the cycle produced a new generation of atmospheric horror films that included the classic creatures.
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Disc Reviews by John Ceballos on June 19th, 2012
“Nikolai Petrovich Rachenko…our warrior elite…a very powerful and valuable tool…if he can be controlled.”
It’s no secret that they just don’t make action movies like they used to. (Sylvester Stallone just shot a brawny arm into the air in protest. I see you, Sly!) These days the odds of seeing a pretty boy like Matt Damon and a perennial tough guy like Bruce Willis headlining an action flick are just about even. You’re just as likely to see Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson in family fare like Journey 2: The Mysterious Island as you are in an manly romp like Fast Five. Heck, the Arnold Schwarzenegger role in the upcoming Total Recall remake is being played by…Colin Farrell.
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Disc Reviews by M. W. Phillips on May 24th, 2012
“His name is Samson. He’s big with his cat, with mama and with his stick. Black Samson… he’s mean and clean and rules the scene.”
In the 70s and 80s, filthy little theaters littered New York’s 42nd Street, sandwiched between adult bookstores, porn theaters, and peepshows. These dens of celluloid sin hosted an endless loop of “B” movies affectionately known as grindhouse films. They ran exploitation films, drive-in double features, and European softcore of every subgenre, ranging from Blaxploitation to Sexploitation, from Euro-crime to Sci-Fi and Horror. Some theaters projected these movies 24 hours a day, seven days a week
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Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on May 16th, 2012
“In the beginning there was darkness. And then bang, giving birth to an endless expanding existence of time, space, and matter. Every day new discoveries are unlocking the mysterious, the mind-blowing, the deadly secrets of a place we call The Universe.”
The History series has lasted for six seasons to date. The show uses modern space photography, computer-generated images, and demonstrations along with respected scientists to explore the various aspects of our universe.
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Disc Reviews by John Ceballos on April 2nd, 2012
They came back to tie the game five different times. They were down by two runs in the bottom of the ninth and facing a closer who had been a perfect 6 for 6 in save situations during that postseason. They were down to the last strike of their entire season two different times. I guess what I’m trying to say is, at a certain point, it became obvious — painfully obvious, if you happen to be a fan of the Texas Rangers — that there was no effing way the St. Louis Cardinals were losing Game 6 of the 2011 World Series.
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Disc Reviews by John Ceballos on March 31st, 2012
I think most of us can agree that being buried alive would be a horrible way to go. Several movies — Kill Bill: Vol. 2, The Vanishing (not the soft American remake) and, of course, Buried — have exploited that terror to varying degrees of success. Though the action in A Lonely Place to Die centers around a girl found buried in the Scottish Highlands, the camera frequently pulls way back to show us the desolate beauty (and danger) of the mountainous setting. I really wish director Julian Gilbey had kept the action on those mountains.
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Disc Reviews by Brent Lorentson on March 26th, 2012
Released back in 1982, Treasure Train tries to capture the imagination of kids as Disney had for years but with a much smaller budget. Helmed by surrealist artist and director Fernano Arrabal, he crafts a film heavy on the power of a child’s imagination and sense of adventure. To be fair I had to give this movie a second viewing not because I liked it but because it was so weird I had to make sure what I saw was real.
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Disc Reviews by M. W. Phillips on March 26th, 2012
“Ohh. Oh, Fritz? Fritz, get up for God’s sake! Get up! They’ve killed Fritz! They’ve killed Fritz! Those lousy stinking yellow fairies! Those horrible atrocity-filled vermin! Take that! Take that! They killed Fritz!!!”
Ralph Bakshi is probably best known for his x-rated animated adaptation of R. Crumb’s Fritz the Cat, the first animated film to receive an x-rating from the Motion Picture Association of America and still turn into the most successful independent animated feature of all time. When his second and also x-rated animated feature, Heavy Traffic, a blacker than coal satirical comedy
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Disc Reviews by Bob Ross on February 12th, 2012
It followed Annie Hall by two years, once again reshaping the mass market’s notion of serio-comic romance. With its bittersweet plotting and cynical one-liners, Woody Allen’s Manhattan was an even bigger commercial success than its Oscar-winning predecessor. Its current incarnation on Blu-Ray offers the best chance yet to revisit its eccentric brilliance.
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Disc Reviews by Bob Ross on February 10th, 2012
This April will mark 35 years since Woody Allen emerged as a world-class comic filmmaker. Although Annie Hall was his seventh feature (if you include the voice-over spy-spoof What’s Up, Tiger Lily?, which you certainly should), and although Allen already had a sizable group of admirers (including this longtime fan), his 1977 mainstream smash gave him commercial clout and a little something called the Best Picture Academy Award.
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Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on February 8th, 2012
“Gentlemen, I assure you she’s the perfect type for the job. She’s good at making friends with gentlemen, and we want somebody inside his house who has his confidence.”
Say what you will about Alfred Hitchcock, but one thing he never lacked was confidence. Today filmmakers and film fans alike still worship at his altar. His church was the darkened neighborhood cinema, and no one held court better than the man fans affectionately refer to as Hitch. The flicker didn’t come from candles as you might expect in such a place of worship. They emanated from the silver screen.
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Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on February 2nd, 2012
Written by Brian Ludovico
To film fans, the clause “Directed by Alfred Hitchcock” has almost become an adjective in and of itself. It has come to mean suspense created by using the viewer’s imagination and mind as a part of the film, first and foremost. These films didn’t have the freedom of CG, and consequently had to invent ways to achieve visual effects (watch the documentary on Birds or Rear Window for example). Besides the lack of freedom of creation that digital filmmaking now provides, the filmmakers had to tip toe around the Hays code
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Disc Reviews by William O'Donnell on February 1st, 2012
The title of this documentary stems from the quote “In the end, the love you take is equal to the love you make.” In this film, said “love” refers to the love and support Paul McCartney, and other major celebrities, give to New York in the immediate wake of 9/11. Starting from early rehearsals and finishing with McCartney’s closing performance at the “Concert for New York” benefit, we watch one of the most famous people on the planet demonstrate his uncanny sense of humility and humanity as he proves he is a “man of the people.”
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Disc Reviews by Michael Durr on January 30th, 2012
When I was in the fifth and sixth grade, I learned how to play a cello. Despite my attempts at learning the instrument, it was a constant struggle to be able to read sheet music and get my hands to cooperate in an appropriate manner. Personally, I think it had something to do with the fact that instrument spent half the time in the shop (school provided) rather than in my hands. Today’s review explores a similar subject, the movie: The Piano. Let’s see how well Holly Hunter does with her instrument.
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Disc Reviews by David Annandale on January 30th, 2012
Jack Lemmon is a rather meek insurance company employee who is slowly working his way up the corporate ladder by lending his apartment to married executives looking for a place to take their girlfriends. Life is rather inconvenient, as he is locked out of his home at all hours, but things become even more complicated when the big boss (Fred McMurray) takes an interest. The good news is that Lemmon gets another promotion. The bad news is that McMurray’s affair is with Shirley MacLaine, the elevator girl for whom Lemmon is carrying a torch.
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Disc Reviews by M. W. Phillips on December 22nd, 2011
“I’m just crazy about this store.”
Anyone who has worked the night crew in a grocery store, restocking shelves after the place is closed, knows how creepy it can be walking the aisles in the belly of a half-lit behemoth. Now imagine if you were being stalked while you stocked by a mutilating psychopath. This was obviously the motivation for writer/director Scott Spiegel when he created his Super-8 short film Night Crew with childhood friends Sam Raimi, Ted Raimi and Bruce Campbell.
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Disc Reviews by William O'Donnell on December 9th, 2011
A bar owner hires a hitman to assassinate his wife and her lover upon discovering their affair. What proceeds is a neo-noir packed with ample murder, betrayal and suspicions throughout.
This film is the directorial debut of Joel Cohen, thus making it the first in the line of “Coen Bros.” productions (Joel’s brother Ethan naturally contributing as co-writer and co-editor). As well, Barry Sonnenfield is the Director of Photography, which helps to explain the outstanding visual composition of this film.
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Disc Reviews by M. W. Phillips on October 31st, 2011
“In a blaze of blood, bones, and body parts, the vivacious young girl was instantly reduced to a tossed human salad… a salad that police are still trying to gather up… a salad that was once named Elizabeth.”
Ah, there is nothing that can bring an exploitation movie alive like the unhinged imagination of Frank Henenlotter.
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Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on October 27th, 2011
“The punishment’s gotta fit the crime.”
Believe all of the hype and controversy. In the language of the day The Exterminator was one bad mother. And when I say one bad mother, we’re not talking Casey Anthony. The Exterminator came at the tail end of the era of grindhouse, exploitation, and revenge films. So, how do you close out a memorable era like that?
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Disc Reviews by Michael Durr on October 14th, 2011
For those who do not know, I am not a typical sports fan. I primarily watch three sports, none of which are football. I love me some wrestling, hockey, and the legendary sport of baseball. The Phillies have been my team for over 30 years and even though they took it hard this year in the playoffs, I look forward to more baseball in the years to come. I also appreciate the history of baseball so I was certainly curious to see a couple of great Red Sox teams come to Blu-Ray in this A&E presentation.
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Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on October 12th, 2011
Stop me if you’ve heard any of this before. Peter Jackson directs a horror film that has an expedition going to Skull Island to retrieve a horrific primate. Of course, you might now be expecting a review of Jackson’s remake of King Kong. But the primate here is something called a rat monkey, and it only figures into the film’s early moments. Long before Jackson achieved household name status by taking us on a journey to Middle Earth, he was a small filmmaker with no less grand designs.
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Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on September 9th, 2011
Imagine a time when Joel and Ethan Coen weren’t household names. The two have become something of Hollywood legends with films like No Country For Old Men and the superior remake of True Grit. But every legend has to have a beginning, and the story of the Coen Brothers goes back to 1984 and a quirky little film called Blood Simple. The film had only a limited release and pulled in a mere couple of million bucks in its initial release. Even the cast with the notable exception of M Emmett Walsh was pretty much unknown at the time.
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Thank you.