Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on March 4th, 2011
In the 1930’s and 40’s MGM was trying to get in on the lucrative animation game. The field was dominated at the time by Warner Brothers with their Loony Tunes shorts, and of course, the iconic cast of animated characters coming out of the Walt Disney Studio. For years they had failed to find the right property to take advantage of the market. It wasn’t until the team of William Hanna and Joseph Barbera approached the studio with their first project that the times did change, at least a little, for the fledgling animation department at MGM. The project was far from an original one even for the time. It was a very basic cat-and-mouse adventure featuring a cat named Tom and a mouse named Jerry. There would be almost no dialog on the shorts. It certainly didn’t look like much of a hit to the studio brass, but with no better ideas on the way, they went ahead with the new shorts of Tom And Jerry. There’s a reason why the cat-and-mouse pair is such a classic. It’s because it works. If you can make your characters entertaining and endearing enough, you can have a hit. MGM finally entered the major leagues, and the team of Hanna and Barbera would become one of the most successful animation teams in history. They would go on to create such cherished characters as The Flintstones, Yogi Bear, The Jetsons, and, of course, Scooby Doo.
These were the days of the Golden Age in Hollywood. These shorts were not being produced for television, which hadn’t been invented when they began; rather, they were intended for theatergoers. In those days going to the movies was much more of an inclusive experience. You always got a cartoon short along with an adventure serial, the likes of Buck Rogers, Flash Gordon, and The Lone Ranger. These multi-chaptered serials were the forerunners to the modern television series. It kept you coming back to the movies to see what would happen next. Each chapter ended in a cliffhanger. These early serials were the inspiration for such film franchises as Star Wars and Indiana Jones. Finally you got one, sometimes two movies, all for the price of a single admission.
Posted in: Random Fun by Gino Sassani on March 2nd, 2011
We continue our celebration of the release of Bambi on Blu-ray with some art lessons. Veteran Disney Animator Andreas Deja shows you how to draw the popular Disney character. Watch it with the kids. It'll make a great art project to go along with your family sharing the movie together.
Just Bang it Here: Learn To Draw Bambi
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on March 1st, 2011
Everyone knows Charlie Chaplin. For many, he is the symbol of the silent age of film. The stiff figure in trademark hat and twirling cane comes easily to mind. But that wasn't really Charlie Chaplin. That was a character he created called The Tramp, or often The Little Tramp. So, it would seem that Chaplin spent most of his career playing The Tramp, who in turn played many different characters on the silent screen. He was known for his subversive antics and charming stare. He became the champion of the common man, all the while becoming the first elite star in Hollywood. With his troubled life and numerous sex scandals, you would expect that Chaplin would have been the subject of a bio-pic before 1991.
The script is based on two books. One of them is Chaplin's own autobiography. The other is David Robinson's book Chaplin His Life And Art. You get the idea that the material is authentic enough. It doesn't attempt to gloss over the flaws in the man's character. While it obviously spends much of the time on his films and the things that went into them, we don't get an over-stylized idea of Chaplin as anything less than what he was: a flawed human being like the rest of us.
Posted in: Random Fun by Gino Sassani on February 27th, 2011
This week we're going to be celebrating the Walt Disney release of Bambi in high defintion. The Blu-ray comes out Tuesday March 1st. Our review will be out a week later. But we don't want you to miss out on all of the fun. With the help of our friends at Disney, we're going to offer a few Bambi posts this week.
Let's start with a great deal from Disney themselves. You can go online and get a coupon for $10 off this amazing release right now. Just bang it here: Bambi Discout Coupon
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on February 23rd, 2011
"In training they give you an F. Out here you get killed."
When was the last time you saw a good train movie? There have been a few classics. Most of the best merely happened on a train with the drama having to do with what was happening on the train. I can't really remember when I saw a good train film where a train itself was the source of the tension. Yes, there have been several films where terrorists hijack a train and threaten something bad if their demands weren't met. But in Unstoppable, the threat really is just the train. There's no political agenda at all going on here. It's really quite a clever threat when you think about it. The train doesn't "want" anything. It's powered by its own laws of "nature" and can't be talked down or reasoned with in any way. There's no emotion to get in the way. It just drives forward at its own pace. It doesn't care what is in front of it or what it's left behind. It merely is. In fact, Unstoppable can be a metaphor for runaway technology, the machine that can't be stopped. What a rather nice old-school device for one of society's deepest philosophical quandaries.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on February 23rd, 2011
"When, in the course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the laws of nature and of nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation."
Of course, that declaration would be heard the world over as thirteen small British colonies began an experiment that would change the face of the world. The words came out of a Continental Congress, more specifically a committee that included Ben Franklin and John Adams. But it is neither of those men from whose pen came the liberating words of the Declaration of Independence. That honor belonged exclusively to the young wordsmith Thomas Jefferson. He would put words to the spirit of rebellion that consumed a small corner of a great continent. He would become our third president and the first to expand the country by more than double with the purchase of the Louisiana Territory from Bonaparte in France. His concept of the separation of church and state would become known as Jefferson's Wall and become one of the most abused and misunderstood rights of the Constitution. He was an inventor. He was a naturalist, cataloging hundreds of new species of plants and animals. He was a meteorologist, leaving us the first accurate records of America's climate. He would die on the Fourth of July at the 50th anniversary of his famous document.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on February 23rd, 2011
"My money is on you being brutally killed within two days, but what choice do we have?"
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on February 16th, 2011
"I've always believed that, done properly, armed robbery doesn't have to be a totally unpleasant experience."
You would think that Thelma And Louise would have been a blockbuster film. It's certainly become entrenched in our pop culture. The famous ending has been spoofed to death in other films and television shows, including the latest Star Trek, if you can believe that. You would think, but you'd be completely wrong. This was one of the movies that got a ton of critical attention and even some Academy Award attention. Ridley Scott, Geena Davis and Susan Sarandon all got nominated for statues. The film ended up only taking one for the screenplay. Silence Of The Lambs took the actress and director Oscars that year. The film only pulled in $45 million, hardly a blockbuster but more than enough to cover the $17 million budget. The truth is that 28 films finished with better numbers in 1991, but few of them still have the enduring fame that Thelma And Louise has in 2010.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on February 16th, 2011
"This despicable remake of the despicable 1978 film, I Spit On Your Grave adds yet another offense: a phony moral equivalency."
Roger Ebert is at it again. Over thirty years ago he pretty much hated the original film, but he didn't stop there. He extended his hatred to the fellow movie-goers he encountered as well. The 2010 remake appears to retain his disgust, and couldn't be prouder of the slight. Go figure.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on February 15th, 2011
"You're traveling through another dimension, a dimension not only of sight and sound but of mind; a journey into a wondrous land whose boundaries are that of imagination. That's the signpost up ahead your next stop, the Twilight Zone."
![Chaplin (15th Anniversary Edition) [Blu-ray] dvd cover art](https://upcomingdiscs.com/ecs_covers/chaplin-15th-anniversary-edition-large.jpg)
![Unstoppable [Blu-ray] dvd cover art](https://upcomingdiscs.com/ecs_covers/unstoppable-blu-ray-large.jpg)
![Thelma & Louise (20th Anniversary) [Blu-ray] dvd cover art](https://upcomingdiscs.com/ecs_covers/thelma-louise-20th-anniversary-large.jpg)
![I Spit on Your Grave [Blu-ray] dvd cover art](https://upcomingdiscs.com/ecs_covers/i-spit-on-your-grave-blu-ray-large.jpg)
![The Twilight Zone: Season 3 [Blu-ray] dvd cover art](https://upcomingdiscs.com/ecs_covers/the-twilight-zone-season-3-blu-ra-large.jpg)
