Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on August 5th, 2009
As a kid, I was a huge Lost In Space fan. We loved Dr. Smith in particular and would go around our neighborhoods moaning, “The pain, oh the pain” in some mock imitation of the deliciously bad character. I think I finally know what he was talking about. I’m a man, and so I won’t even begin to pretend that I can understand what labor pains feel like. I believe it when I’m told there’s no worse suffering in the human experience, except for one. Yes, my gentle female readers, no matter how much torture childbirth might be for you, I bet it can’t compare to the mental anguish of having to sit through Labor Pains. Since this film was written and directed by women, I suspect it just might actually be some female plot to get guys like me to appreciate true suffering.
In the first place, we have Lindsay Lohan. I mean seriously. Is there anyone out there who actually thinks she’s a gifted actress? Is she really on anyone’s dream cast? Name one good movie she’s been involved in. I hear someone in the back screaming out Mean Girls. Forget about it. She has a reputation of showing up whenever she feels like it, arguing or downright fighting with cast and crew. She’s been known to “accidentally” walk off with stuff that doesn’t belong to her, and she’s pretty much a temper tantrum throwing brat when she doesn’t get her way. I’m tired of the press hanging on each and every emotion implosion like it was actually important. Do you really care how many times she splits up and gets back together with her lesbian DJ friend? How many pictures do we need of her crying on the lady’s front porch beggin’ for another chance, only to be dropping F bombs in anger a day later? The woman’s a train wreck. Is it any surprise at all that her films are crap? I can honestly say knowing all of these gross intimate details has not improved the quality of my life. What would help my job as a reviewer is if she’d stop trying to make movies. In a nice piece of irony, a character asks Thea if she wants people to see her as a “wayward skank”. Well…Lindsay?
Posted in: Comedy, Disc Reviews, Fox, No Huddle Reviews by Gino Sassani on August 5th, 2009
Name: Miss March Measurements: 89 minutes/90 minutes (unrated version)
Birthdate: March 13, 2009 Weight: $ 4 Million at the box office
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on August 3rd, 2009
“What is Echelon? It’s NSA’s central computer. It filters all global communications. Echelon’s a juggernaut. It can access any security system on the planet… Echelon’s been compromised.”
In 1948 British author George Orwell delivered a sobering science fiction novel about a future society where the State has become a parent figure to its people. It watches over everything that you say or do like a …big brother. That term originated with the novel 1984. The work has added such words as “big brother” and “Orwellian” to our lexicon. It was intended as warning against intrusions that weren’t yet possible. Today we’ve moved beyond 1984 both in linear time and in Orwellian technology. You’re not paranoid. Someone is pretty much always watching you. From ATM’s to supermarkets, you are on camera pretty much anytime you’re out in public.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on August 3rd, 2009
It just wouldn’t be summer without The Discovery Channel’s Shark Week extravaganza. What started back in 1988 as a themed week of specials has turned into the longest running annual series of programming on cable. Every year The Discovery Channel gives up its normal collection of educational shows to concentrate on that feared predator of the deep. 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. They invade our fears, but more importantly they fascinate the heck out of us. Young or old, it doesn’t matter. Sharks are the new dinosaurs, and they aren’t going anywhere anytime soon. As Discovery plans out yet another annual invasion of these perfect killing machines, you get to have an encounter of the high definition kind. Come face to face with some of the most dangerous creatures on the planet, with a level of clarity and detail that was once reserved only for those who shared their waters.
It’s quite nice to have a collection of these shows on Blu-ray and in high definition. There are some downsides, however. The shows aren’t necessarily the best I’ve seen on the series. Most of them are pretty recent. I suspect many of the classics aren’t going to be as easily available in HD. The second problem is redundancy. I’ve always been a big critic of editing shows for home release. Here I think it might have been a good idea. Many of these shows do rather extensive recaps each time they come back from an anticipated break. Of course, here there are no breaks, so we have to watch some material several times in the same 40 minute segment. The point really gets driven home. I have to ask myself if it is really that necessary to recap so often. Are the breaks so long that we can so easily forget what we were watching? I’d suggest that Discovery give a little more credit to their viewer’s intelligence.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on August 3rd, 2009
“Corporations… They have all the money. They have all the power and they use it to make people like you go away. Right now you’re suffering under an enormous weight. We provide the Leverage.”
I remember seeing like a million ads for this show toward the end of the last football season. If memory serves it was heavily promoted during the Super Bowl. In any case, I had made a mental note to catch it, but it was still several weeks away and I ended up forgetting about it by then. Fortunately, the release of the first season on DVD has given me a second chance for a first look at this intriguing series.
Posted in: No Huddle Reviews by Michael Durr on August 3rd, 2009
This week, we are continuing to give small reviews to a range of discs from the Smithsonian Network. The next disc is entitled: The Big Blue. This documentary goes into Southeastern Australia and tells us the unique tale of the blue whale, the largest creature in the world. The whale has a heart the size of a small car and a tongue that weighs several tons but is more elusive than a cunning criminal. In the next 45 minutes, I hope to uncover a little more of those mysteries and other odd facts.
A fisherman off the southeastern coast of Australia has spotted a rare occurrence. He has seen a whale twice the size of the boat. He has seen what is known as a blue whale, the largest of the animals on the planet Earth. The spectacle is due to a yearly event called the Bonney Upwelling which is when nutrient rich cold water wells up the shelf and triggers an explosion of life from December to April.
Posted in: No Huddle Reviews by Michael Durr on August 1st, 2009
The people at Smithsonian Networks decided to send us a few documentary discs in the last week. The discs were presumably made to show off a few of their network shows on the Smithsonian HD channel which is starting to crop up on many satellite outfits including DirecTV and Dish Network. It is also listed on some of the cable companies lineup including TimeWarner and Charter Communications. The first disc is called Sky View and subtitled “Soar like an Eagle; A Unique View that will take your breath away.” Hopefully the proceedings won't be too high, I just might get airsick.
In splendid picture quality and sound, we are introduced to four different episodes in Sky View.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by David Annandale on August 1st, 2009
Running for a single season in 2008, this ABC Family production is a humorous pastiche of superheroics and Avengers-style adventure. Natalie Morales plays Wendy Watson, a struggling artist making ends meet as a temp. When she demonstrates incredible unflappability when a monster is unleashed at her current job, straight-arrow superhero the Middleman (Matt Keeslar) recruits her to join him in the fight against all sorts of bizarre menaces. A sampling of titles gives the flavour of the series: “The Boy-Band Superfan Interrogation,” “The Palindrome Reversal Palindrome,” “The Flying Fish Zombification.”
Posted in: Disc Reviews by David Annandale on August 1st, 2009
In 2007, the Pang Brothers, whose The Eye was one of the spookiest ghost stories of recent memory, made their North American debut with The Messengers, a disappointingly ordinary tale of a haunted farm. Nobody asked for a sequel, to my knowledge, but here it is, apparently closer to writer Todd Farmer's original story than the first film.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by David Annandale on July 29th, 2009
This was Lucille Ball's follow-up to I Love Lucy, and the first season is, apparently, the most highly regarded one. Here Ball is a widowed mother of two, sharing her home with best friend Vivian Vance, who is a divorced mother of one. All the other members of household are, of course, faced with the disasters triggered by Lucy. I screened this set immediately after viewing its close contemporary, Petticoat Junction, and the difference between the two was instructive. There are plenty of hoary gags and situations on The Lucy Show, but there is an enormous difference between the shows thanks to the comic genius of Lucille Ball. Her energy fills each episode, her timing is spot-on, but there is also her commitment to a type of physical comedy that to this day remains pretty much the exclusive domain of male performers. Not only does she make this style her own, she grounds it in a female reality. There is a reason she was so beloved a performer, and why her work still stands up today.
Though the image is a bit soft, with features losing definition in long shots, the picture is still looking remarkably good for television from 1962-63. The black-and-white tones are very warm, and the grain, though present, is minor. There is no edge enhancement to deal with. It is, frankly, very unlikely that these episodes have ever looked better.
![Labor Pains [Blu-ray] dvd cover art](https://upcomingdiscs.com/ecs_covers/labor-pains-blu-ray-large.jpg)
![Echelon Conspiracy [Blu-ray] dvd cover art](https://upcomingdiscs.com/ecs_covers/echelon-conspiracy-blu-ray-large.jpg)
![Shark Week: The Great Bites Collection [Blu-ray] dvd cover art](https://upcomingdiscs.com/ecs_covers/shark-week-the-great-bites-collect-large.jpg)
