Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on October 11th, 2006
Synopsis
For those who enjoy the films of Warren Beatty, perhaps his quintessential film, the epic Reds has finally arrived on DVD. The film, which earned 12 Oscar nominations in 1981, including a remarkable four for Beatty (as Director, which he won), Actor, Writer and Producer), the film was a clear labor of love for the left-leaning political activist. Beatty plays John Reed, an American political writer who becomes more and more enamored with the ideas and concepts behind a blossoming ideological...revolution in World War I era Russia.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on October 1st, 2006
Synopsis
As one who has a brother that is (or was) a bit of a Stephen King fanatic and loves goofy King adaptations like Pet Cemetery, I’d never seen The Dead Zone, and I’m a Christopher Walken (True Romance) fan. I’m also a David Cronenberg (Dead Ringers) fan. And now that I’ve finally seen The Dead Zone, I can consider myself having a fairly complete existence now.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on September 19th, 2006
Tom Hanks is sometimes called this generation's Jimmy Stewart. In an odd sort of way, that is sort of a compliment to both men. Both are extraordinary actors who have secured a place in film history as the best of their time at playing the everyman. While such a role would doom other actors to being typecast as the all-time greatest supporting actor, both Hanks and Stewart have been able to pull off the role with amazing versatility.
Clearly, this is not the definitive set of Stewart's work as an actor. For t...at, you would have to include his roles in Alfred Hitchcock's Rear Window and one of my all time favorite films, Vertigo. Of course, Frank Capra's It's a Wonderful Life would also have to receive special treatment. The Spirit of St. Louis, which is in this set, would also be there. But what about The Philadelphia Story or Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, you might ask? Yes, those would have to be there too. We are now approaching the problem with putting together a set of Stewart's best movies. If you were to truly include his greatest films, you still might be left with a 20-disc box set. It's best to look at this release for what it is, and not try to play the “but where is...” game. That is a dead end road.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on August 15th, 2006
Synopsis
Robert Mitchum shows up twice here, as does Robert Ryan. The two clash in The Racket (1951), where Mitchum is the incorruptible cop, and Ryan is the old-school gangster whose brutally direct methods put him in conflict not only with Mitchum, but with the more sophisticated crime syndicate spreading over the land. The focus of the film is rather split between the two, but is pretty tense, and is further enlivened by a memorably sleazy turn by William Conrad as a VERY corrupt cop.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on August 1st, 2006
Synopsis
In 1930, the animation department at Warner creates three characters: the Warner Brothers and their sister, Dot. The siblings run riot, however, and are finally caught and imprisoned in the Warner water tower. Flash-forward to today, when they escape to once more wreak havoc.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on July 15th, 2006
The thing that makes the death of Bruce Lee an even larger tragedy is that he virtually set back the kung-fu/karate genre from gaining mainstream recognition by a couple of decades. Set back may not even be the proper word for it, as he would have become a larger than life action star whose dreams were bigger than most anyone had anticipated.
In the case of Enter the Dragon, the film was designed to be Lee's crossover attempt into American films, and it's one worthy of his abilities. Bruce (or in this case, Lee) lives at a temple and is invited to a private island for a martial arts tournament where a man named Han (Kien Shih, Once Upon a Time in China) runs the tournament and possibly some illegal operations. His henchman is Oharra (Chuck Norris protégé Robert Wall, Game of Death), who might have been responsible for the death of his sister. Some of the more colorful characters in the tournament are Roper (John Saxon, From Dusk Till Dawn) and Williams (Jim Kelly, Black Belt Jones), friends from America that are also looking to gain the top prize. Lee isn't there to win the tournament, but to try to expose Han's dealings.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by David Annandale on July 11th, 2006
Gregory Peck plays Francis Chisholm. After losing his parents as a young boy, and then his sweetheart (to moral turpitude, it seems), Francis enters the priesthood. His unorthodox ways make him a failure initially, but kindly bishop and mentor Edmund Gwenn sees potential in the man, and sends him off to China to be a missionary. There too, things get off to a rocky start, but a turnaround happens when he saves the son of a local mandarin. His struggles are far from over, but through it all, he remains a triumphantly decent man.And one would expect no less from Gregory Peck, now would we, in this, his screen debut. This is old-fashioned religiosity following in the vein of The Song of Bernadette and Going My Way. It certainly is easy to cynical about it, and there is more than a whiff of cultural imperialism about the affair. Even so, and in spite of the very stately pace, the film is so fundamentally sweet-natured that it is very hard not to be caught up in it.
Audio
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on July 10th, 2006
A lot has been said about Roger Ebert and Russ Meyer. Ebert has been called the most famous film critic this side of Pauline Kael (he certainly is the most informative one since I've started becoming a wee critic myself), and Meyer certainly found a niche audience directing and producing films with large-breasted women. So when Fox got the two of them together and had them come up with a script that would be a pseudo-followup to The Valley of the Dolls, one would be interested to see what became of it.
The big misconception about Beyond the Valley of the Dolls is that it's a sequel to the Sharon Tate film before it. It's actually more of an homage to the first film (as the introductory title cards discuss), and goes in a different direction, rather than extending the current storylines. Pet (Marcia McBroom, Jesus Christ Superstar), Casey (Cynthia Myers, They Shoot Horses, Don't They?) and Kelly (Dolly Read, That Tender Touch) comprise a band that comes to Los Angeles looking for stardom. They run into their fair share of unique California characters, including Emerson Thorne (Harrison Page, Lionheart), Lance Rocke (Michael Blodgett, Catalina Caper) and perhaps most uniquely, Ronnie Barzell, a.k.a. the Z Man (John La Zar, Over the Wire).
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on July 10th, 2006
Synopsis
Tony Curtis and Jack Lemmon are two down-on-their-luck jazz musicians in Prohibition-era Chicago. They witness a gangland massacre, and in order to hide from the hoodlums, dress up in drag and join an all-female jazz band that is off to play an extended gig in Florida. The vocalist of the band is none other than Marilyn Monroe, and though it is Lemmon who first casts designs for her, it is Curtis who engages in the wooing. Lemmon, meanwhile, has his hands full when billionaire Joe E. Brown f...lls head over heels for his female persona.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by David Annandale on July 7th, 2006
Tyrone Power has been plying his trade as a pirate in the waters near Jamaica. When his former captain becomes the governor of Jamaica, Power goes straight. He has his eye on Maureen O'Hara, who is engaged to a duplicitous aristocrat who is feeding information to unreformed pirate George Sanders (utterly unrecognizable in shaggy red hair and beard). There will be many complications before Power can claim the resisting O'Hara as his own.Compared to the Errol Flynn pirate movies Captain Blood and The Sea Hawk, this one is a bit light on the action, really only getting down to the buckling of swashes in the final act. The romance between Power and O'Hara is a bit difficult to take in this day and age as well, especially in the first part of the film as it dances into rape fantasy territory. But be that as it may, this is still a first-class adventure.
Audio
![Enter the Dragon [HD DVD] dvd cover art](https://upcomingdiscs.com/ecs_covers/enter-the-dragon-hd-dvd-large.jpg)
