Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on June 12th, 2003
20 Million Miles To Earth has always been one of my favorite films. It was from this classic monster fest that I developed my long standing respect for stop motion pioneer Ray Harryhausen. In 1998, I got to meet Ray for the first time as his assistant for a horror convention (unfortunately run by a megalomaniac). It was there that I developed enough of a relationship with him and his lovely wife Diane that I was able to interview him at the 2003 Wonderfest in Louisville. Ray’s time was extremely limited, so I ...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by David Annandale on June 12th, 2003
This is the story of Frida Kahlo, now recognized as one of Mexico’s greatest artists. Most particularly, the film is the story of her tempestuous love affair with fellow artist Diego Rivera --their loves, their clashes, their politics, their infidelities, their betrayals, and so on. So much attention is paid to this relationship that Kahlo’s art itself slips into the background, which is too bad. That said, this is a tremendously engaging film, with great performances all round.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by David Annandale on June 11th, 2003
Synopsis
Topper tells the tale of Cosmo Topper (Roland Young), a repressed, middle-aged banker,and his liberating encounter with the ghosts of Cary Grant and Constance Bennett. Grant andBennett, irresponsible socialites, die in a car accident without ever having done a good deed.They must make up for this before they can move on, and their good deed is to shake upTopper’s life. This is a gentle comedy, with fabulous character work from Young (who richlydeserved his Oscar nomination)...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by David Annandale on June 11th, 2003
Synopsis
This is essentially Twilight Zone or Outer Limits with a rock angle. There are four stories,each a mild horror tale. The format might be rather limiting, though there are some clever ideas.“Disco Inferno,” for instance, posits what hell would be like for headbangers. That’s a cutenotion, but is hard to sustain, even over 22 minutes.
Audio
No surprise that the music dominates the soundtrack, though even then it isn’t quite aspowerful as one might thi...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by David Annandale on June 11th, 2003
Melina Mercouri plays Illia, a character who makes prostitution seem like a carefree Utopia.She lives in a version of Greece where there only appear to be 5 women, and they are all ladies of the night. Into this extraordinarily male fantasy comes Jules Dassin, a deluded American idealist who wants to save Illia from herself. Naturally, he doesn’t have a hope, and Greek enthusiasm (think My Big Fat Greek Wedding on steroids) will inevitably overcome his anti-fun attitudes. Obviously, the picture has dated quite noticeably, and makes Pretty Woman look like a gritty expose.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by David Annandale on June 11th, 2003
Eric Roberts, miles away from direct-to-video action fodder, plays Nick, a man in the terminal stages of AIDS. Over the opening credits, we see his long-term relationship with Gregory Harrison rise and disintegrate, and in the present, this relationship and its fallout will have a major role to play at Nick’s party. This party, the heart of the film, is an event he throws to say goodbye to all his friends and family. The story has added poignancy since this is based on an actual event.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on June 10th, 2003
Synopsis
An all new adventure for all of your favourite characters form Disney’s Jungle Book. Back for more fun we have Mowgli, Baloo, Bagheera and Shere Khan of course, Mowgli has moved out of the jungle and into the village but, he misses his old friends. He soon finds an excuse to wander back into the jungle and quickly finds himself hunted by his old enemy Shere Khan. With all new songs and a couple of new characters the fun continues in The Jungle Book 2.
Video
The t...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on June 9th, 2003
Synopsis
The follow-up to Jackie Chan’s Project A, Dragon Mao returns to Hong Kong after defeating Pirate Lo on the high seas. Dragon is assigned to lead the local police force and finds that police corruption is running wild. Framed for a jewelry robbery he must fight for his freedom and his life against a group of spies, pirates and revolutionaries.
Audio
The audio on this disc is an average quality Dolby Digital 5.1 mix. The badly overdubbed voices (part of the appeal o...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on June 9th, 2003
On the heals of the release of Charlie Angels: Full Throttle we have a collection of the five best episodes from season one of the original television show. The five episodes are as follows:
Posted in: Disc Reviews by David Annandale on June 6th, 2003
The topic for this documentary are the Shakers, more properly the “United Society of Believers in Christ’s Second Appearing.” The Shakers weren’t around that long: they were celibate, which meant no offspring. However, as the film explores, that didn’t stop them from having a profound impact on American life (they were, for instance, feminist and anti-slavery well ahead of the game).
Audio
A mono soundtrack. Though it might have been nice to hear the Shaker songs in stereo, the sound is still very clean, and without distortion.
![It's My Party [Special Edition] dvd cover art](https://upcomingdiscs.com/ecs_covers/its-my-party-special-edition-large.jpg)
