Disc Type

Edgar Rice Burroughs was one of the most successful novelists in American literature history. His characters have become iconic and have been the source for over a hundred films. Some haven't done so well. His John Carter of Mars stories are where he began, but no one has been able to quite put the character on film yet in a way that has brought in any kind of box office numbers. In the 1970's his world at the center of the Earth brought in some nice cult favorite drive-in films, most notably starring Doug McClure. He's even written a few westerns, but without much luck. But Burroughs became the most wealthy writer of his era because of one particular character. It was Tarzan that would be adapted as far back as the silent era and remain a solid moneymaker over one hundred years later. There hasn't been a decade since his creation that the character has not been featured in a film, television series, or movie house serial. By the 1930's Burroughs was collecting $75,000 a film for the rights to use the character. That's $1.6 million in today's market. For each film. Plus royalties that amounted to a cut of the profits. He was so wealthy that when he finally sold his estate, it would become Tarzana, California, named after his famous character. There have been so many Tarzan films that it would be impossible to put them all together, and I doubt they will never all be available on home video or streaming services. But The Film Detective has brought us quite a gem from some of the deepest and most vintage Tarzan films out there. They've been restored as much as they can be and were made during the time Tarzan's creator was still alive to provide input. While it's true he was never really happy with most portrayals of the character, he lived quite comfortably off the proceeds, which included not just films, but comic strips, magazines, and merchandise, making him the first character to be so heavily marketed. You might not believe it today, but Tarzan was the Star Wars of its day, and if you are any kind of film buff at all, you're going to want to check out what this collection has to offer.

Here's what you get.

"At this point I have lost the capacity to be surprised. Is there a point where nothing can surprise us, or have we reached that point and didn't even know it?" 

For 12 years Blue Bloods has been a staple on CBS, giving Tom Selleck a chance to completely redefine his television career. The once cocky and carefree Magnum P.I. now has established himself as the wise patriarch. It's a transition that a 1970's audience would never have bought. But now he's become a new kind of airwaves icon. The show has also managed to make it through over a decade with very little change in the cast, and most of that coming from additions. In the real world the police have been villainized by some, and it's becoming an increasingly tougher job to do. For a family so steeped in law enforcement, the show was going to have to address these new realities. That happens this year, and for the first time since all of this Defund the Police stuff started happening, we get a series that gives us some honesty and truly looks at the issue from both sides without preaching or disparaging. It shows up in the stories and the increasing conflict between Frank (Selleck) and the DA's office, where his daughter Erin (Moynahan) is toying with the idea of running for the head job herself. No matter what side you might be on, I think you'll find the balance here truly refreshing. I know that I do.

"I wish I could help. But I can't"

You shouldn't need a primer on the NCIS franchise by now. Unless you've been living under a rock for the last decade or longer, you're up to speed on these guys. If not, you still could have some fun and enjoy the CBS DVD release of NCIS: L.A., but NCIS has been around for nearly 20 years, and this particular version has been around for 13 seasons now. That's a lot of characterizations under the bridge and a ton of character evolution and stories that can't help but give you maximum mileage out of the release. If you aren't up to speed, you can check out over 30 seasons of various NCIS reviews by just banging it here: NCIS Reviews. That should keep you busy long enough to get you to the point that we're here talking about Season 13. So hopefully you are up to speed, and we can get on with it. Shall we?

With the success of Yellowstone and the spin-off series 1883, I’ve been patiently waiting for a resurgence of westerns to come out. Bone Tomahawk and The Hateful Eight are pretty much the best westerns we’ve gotten in the past decade, and they both came out in 2015, so I feel we are long overdue for a great western (sorry, but The Power of the Dog didn’t impress me in the least). While I’m always hopeful a new title will impress me, unfortunately, despite the solid cast, Murder At Yellowstone City is a film that simply disappoints. Cicero (Isaiah Mustafa) is a drifter and a recently freed slave who happens to be a big fan of Shakespeare. It’s his unfortunate luck that he rides into Yellowstone City, Montana when a prospector has struck gold, and soon after the prospector finds himself on the unfortunate end of a gun. Sheriff Ambrose (Gabriel Byrne) doesn’t take long to arrest Cicero, considering he’s the new face in town and ignores the notion that just about any other person in town would have a good reason to kill the prospector. The film is definitely an ensemble piece with each of its characters having a secret. If executed properly, this could have been a fun murder mystery, but the Sheriff simply is too lazy to investigate anything, even as more dead bodies start showing up around town.

The mystery element of the film is even taken away about midway through the film as the plot goes into all too familiar territory with generic storylines that simply lead to an evitable shootout. Filling out the cast is Thomas Jane as Thaddeus Murphy, the town preacher, who has a mysterious past and is one of the only ones who believes that Cicero is innocent of being the murderer. What Jane is able to do with this character is genuinely one of the more enjoyable aspects of this film, though I wish they didn’t take this character in such an obvious direction as the film plays out. Richard Dreyfuss is Edgar Blake, the town barkeep, who is friendly with everyone, and while it is nice to see Dreyfuss on screen, well, there simply isn’t enough of him. Aimee Garcia (Lucifer) plays Isabel, one of the town’s many prostitutes who has a connection to the deceased prospector and of course wants to see vengeance. I mention that there are a lot of prostitutes in this town. Well, it just seems that all the women in the town are prostitutes with the exception of the preacher’s wife and the prospector’s wife. The town isn’t quite a boomtown, and I’ll simply blame the low budget for the mostly empty streets and lack of diversity with a background cast.