DVD

Devil’s Advocate

Posted in Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on February 13th, 2002

“Can you summon your talent at will?” This is a question from Satan himself in the The Devil’s Advocate. For Al Pacino I would say the answer is a resounding yes. Pacino has been making us offers we just couldn’t refuse for 30 years. Just a list of his exceptional films would require more space than I have here. You’ll find this film to be one of his more underrated gems.

Synopsis

Kevin Lomax (Reeves) is a hot young lawyer with an uncanny ability to pick a winning jury; in fact he’s never lost.
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Bad News Bears go to Japan

Posted in Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on February 13th, 2002

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Intro

It’s official. The franchise has been run into the ground. They’ve made a baseball movie with virtually no baseball and the little bit that you do see has no tension or comedy.

Synopsis

The Bears head to Japan at the urging of a scam artist (Tony Curtis) hoping to make big bucks in endorsement deals. Along the way they discover that love of the game is more important than competition. And in his last gasp at stardom, Jackie Earle Haley falls in love with a Japanese girl, walk…
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Sexy Beast

Posted in Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on February 9th, 2002

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Intro

I have been hearing about this film for quite some time now… and now that I have had the pleasure of viewing it, I can honestly say it is a great film. If you like British style films (Lock Stock, Snatch, Gangster No. 1)… you will thoroughly enjoy Sexy Beast.

Synopsis

“Jonathan Glazer, the award-winning director of advertisements and music videos, presents his feature film debut with this lushly photographed, expertly written, and brilliantly performed convention-defying …
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Bad News Bears

Posted in Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on February 9th, 2002

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Intro

In this world of political correctness it’s a breath of fresh air to revisit this classic film from 1976. Sadly, it’s been given a completely lackluster DVD release.

Synopsis

A washed up former minor league baseball player (Walter Matthau) is given the task of taking a hapless group of kids and turning them into a team. With the help of his secret pitching weapon (Tatum O’Neal) they take a run at the pennant.

Audio

Presented in Dolby Digital 5.1 and Mono. Gi…
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Matrix

Posted in Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on February 7th, 2002

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What is the Matrix? That’s the question everyone’s looking to answer in this sci-fi spectacular from Wachowski brothers. One thing it was — groundbreaking both in the spectacular special effects that we’ve since taken for granted even in tv commercials and in actual ground (the tons of concrete) broken in the film itself.

Synopsis

Computer hacker extraordinaire Neo (Reeves) has this gut feeling that life isn’t all that it seems to be. Turns out he’s right in a big way. A group of revolutionaries l…
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American Rhapsody

Posted in Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on February 3rd, 2002

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Intro

Based on a true story, unfortunately, the story is just average and the DVD release is on the same par.

Synopsis

American Rhapsody tells the story of a Hungarian families (Nastassja Kinski, Tony Goldwyn) escape from their country during Communist rule. Because of the danger they must leave their baby behind and circumstances prevent her from coming to America for another six years. Once she becomes a teenager (Scarlett Johansson), the young girl knows something is missing from h…
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Grateful Dawg

Posted in Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on February 2nd, 2002

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Intro

A labour of love…the director (Gillian Grisman) has taken home movie and live performance footage to create a compelling documentary about the friendship between her father (David Grisman) and the late Jerry Garcia.

Jerry Garcia best known as the lead guitarist of the Grateful Dead and the lesser known, at least in my musical knowledge, mandolin maestro David Grisman could easily have been separated at birth. The “twin” musicians have a sound all there own and even if the music isn’t to your…
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Thumbelina

Posted in Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on February 2nd, 2002

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Intro

From the washed out video to the sappy Barry Manilow songs the best that can be said about this disc is it might be a good babysitter for a 3 year old.

Synopsis

The story is derived from the classic Hans Christian Andersen fairytale Thumbelina. After Thumbelina falls in love with a fairy prince she is kidnapped by a family of show toads, and upon her escape goes from one adventure to the next in trying to find her true love.

Audio

The audio is presented in Dol…
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Gladiator

Posted in Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on February 2nd, 2002

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“Imagine where you will be and it will be so”. That was how Maximus comforted his troops before battle. If you imagine yourself in Rome during the days of the Gladiator then Ridley Scott makes it very easy to do. Russell Crowe plays the role of a lifetime as Maximus. I have often heard film lovers state that they don?t make classics anymore. Whether Gladiator is the exception that proves the rule or proof against the rule is uncertain. What is sure is that Gladiator will become a true classic.
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Blind Date

Posted in Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on January 30th, 2002

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Written By Kelly Stifora

Intro

Kim Basinger and Dan Larroquette upstage Bruce Willis in his tepid debut as a leading man. Don’t let the fact that Blake Edwards directed blind you: this is a dud.

Synopsis

Walter (Willis) gets set up on a blind date with Nadia (Basinger) for an incredibly important business dinner at which his boss is expecting him to make a good impression on a prospective client. After being explicitly told not to let Nadia imbibe, Walter heads straight out to get a bottle of champagne and sta…
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Sandlot

Posted in Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on January 30th, 2002

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Written By Kelly Stifora

Intro

Arliss Howard narrates this piece of child-oriented Americana (in the vein of Stand By Me and The Wonder Years) about a group of 1962 youngsters, their obsession with baseball, and the gigantic dog that lives over the left field fence.

Synopsis

Scotty Smalls (Tom Guiry) is the new kid in town. Regarded as a geek by the boys who hang out at the local sand lot playing scratch baseball for his inability to throw or catch, Scotty wants nothing more than for his inattentive step dad (…
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Venomous

Posted in Disc Reviews by David Annandale on January 29th, 2002

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Fred Olen Ray, director of B-movies beyond counting, strikes again, with a DVD release some steps up from what many movies of this type receive.

Synopsis

In 1991, Iraqi agents blow up a secret US government lab, releasing genetically modified rattlesnakes (don’t ask). Over the years, these snakes breed, and in the present, minor earthquakes drive them to the surface, and they infect whoever they bite with a virulently fatal virus. Treat Williams is the small town doctor who must save the day, while…
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When Strangers Appear

Posted in Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on January 29th, 2002

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Intro

This is the new film from writer/director Scott Reynolds, who brought us The Ugly, a stylishly weird psycho-thriller from a few years back.

Synopsis

Radha Mitchell runs a diner and a motel by herself in a middle-of-nowhere little town. One morning, she opens her diner and strange young man comes in. He’s been stabbed in the gut, and he needs her help. He’s terrified of a group of surfers who arrive shortly after him. He says they’re after him. Should Mitchell believe him?

I…
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How to Get Ahead in Advertising

Posted in Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on January 27th, 2002

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posted by Marc Atonna

Everything must either be high in something or low in something else. You have to love a film where a priest defends, “the tit was spread with peanut butter!”

Synopsis

Dennis Bagley is a hard, calculating advertising executive who was happy in every way he could conceive. Upon worrying about an overdue campaign for a boil ointment, he sprouts a boil himself. Not a problem, you’d think; that is, until the boil starts speaking. Dennis seems batty to all who hear the random boil comments or feel h…
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Ghost World

Posted in Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on January 27th, 2002

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Written By Kelly Stifora

Intro

Director Terry Zwigoff follows up his acclaimed documentary on R. Crumb with an adaptation of the cult underground comic by Crumb-inspired artist/writer Daniel Clowes, who collaborated closely with Zwigoff on the film.

Synopsis

Enid (Thora Birch) and Rebecca (Scarlett Johansson) are two caustic high school graduates too intent on annoying the hapless souls in their neighborhood to realize their dream of having their own place. As Rebecca drifts toward a responsible life and Enid …
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Die Hard

Posted in Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on January 26th, 2002

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Say the name Bruce Willis and what is the first thing that comes to mind? Lately Willis has excelled in roles that have redefined him as an actor. Of course, I’m talking about films like “The Sixth Sense”. But when I hear Bruce Willis I think of John McClane. Die Hard was the film where Willis “made his bones” in Hollywood and revolutionized the action film forever.

Synopsis

John McClane just can’t catch a break. It seems his wife has moved from their home in New York City, where John’s a cop, to L.A.
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Shrek

Posted in Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on January 25th, 2002

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Intro

The makers of this DVD have thought of just about everything to deliver a film that has as many layers as an onion and can be enjoyed by both children and adults alike. A parent is able to let their child watch their own full-frame version of the film on one disc while they watch the widescreen version on another. Thereby preventing the young one from continually asking, “Daddy, why do you keep laughing when they say Farquaad?”

Synopsis

The classic fairytale spun on its head. …
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Vampire in Brooklyn

Posted in Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on January 25th, 2002

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Intro

Before Wes Craven’s career was revived by Scream, and before Eddie Murphy’s was by The Nutty Professor, the two of them made this.

Synopsis

Eddie Murphy is Maximillian, the last vampire, and he has come to Brooklyn looking for the one woman in the world who, if she becomes his mate, will save his race. That woman turns out to be Angela Bassett. Along the way, various denizens of Brooklyn run afoul of the supernatural creature.

This rather unusual collaboration doesn’t exact…
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Baby’s Day Out

Posted in Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on January 23rd, 2002

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Intro

Think of this John Hughes script as the logical conclusion to the Home Alone phenomenon.

Synopsis

Baby Bink lives in pampered luxury, cared for by his nanny while his two twitty parents carry on with their twitty upper class lives. Three bumbling crooks kidnap Baby Bink and take him downtown. It’s not long, however, before he escapes, and blithely crawls around the city. Our crooks chase after him and into one catastrophe after another.

Audio

The music is good,…
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Baise-Moi

Posted in Disc Reviews by David Annandale on January 22nd, 2002

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In 1993, Virginie Despentes burst onto the French literary scene with Baise-Moi (“F**k Me”), a snarling novel who’s unblinking, deadpan, yet philosophically pointed excess places it in the tradition of Sade. In 2000, Despentes and Coralie Trinh Thi co-directed and scripted this adaptation, which has already forced the French government to re-evaluate its ratings rules.

Synopsis

Nadine (Karen Bach) is a prostitute. Manu (Raffaela Anderson) has done porn films, and has just been raped (in a t…
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Don’t Say a Word

Posted in Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on January 22nd, 2002

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Intro

I was quite interested in viewing this film, and I must say, it did not disappoint. Don’t Say a Word is a very suspenseful film with great acting and an interesting storyline.

Synopsis

“When the daughter of a prominent New York psychiatrist (Douglas) is kidnapped, his only hope for her safe return is to pry a 6-digit number from the memory of a troubled teenage girl – and time is running out!”

Audio

This film sounded great on DVD… in both DTS and Dolby Digital…
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Boycott

Posted in Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on January 22nd, 2002

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Intro

Now this is a pretty rare achievement: a film that has an educational goal, but reaches that goal while being exciting cinema. And once the film has you wanting to know more, the DVD obliges.

Synopsis

We are in Montgomery, Alabama, in 1955. Rosa Parks has just been arrested for refusing to give up her bus seat to a white passenger. This incident sparks the civil rights movement, and a young pastor named Martin Luther King, Jr. is about to begin his rise to prominence. The respons…
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Adventures of Huck Finn

Posted in Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on January 20th, 2002

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Intro

This release has added interest now for the later careers of its director and star: Stephen Sommers is now best known for his Mummy films, and Elijah Wood is currently sporting a British accent as Frodo Baggins.

Synopsis

Based on Mark Twain’s The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, the original American picaresque, the film follows Huck Finn, fleeing his terrifying father, and Jim, an escaped slave, as they travel down the Mississippi in search of freedom, encountering no end of colo…
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Tron

Posted in Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on January 15th, 2002

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Intro

I got quite a kick out of this film. It is great to see the creative minds of 20 years ago try to put a spin of the world of computers. I had forgotten the basis for this film, and watching it 20 years after it was released was really fun.

Synopsis

“When Flynn (Jeff Bridges) hacks the mainframe of his ex-employer to prove his work was stolen by another executive, he finds himself on a much bigger adventure. Beamed inside by a power-hungry Master Control Program, he joins comput…
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My Bodyguard

Posted in Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on January 14th, 2002

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Intro

Fox’s recent set of Family Features includes a couple of films aimed at older viewers, and are that rare thing: the smart teen comedy. This is one (the other is Breaking Away).

Synopsis

Chris Makepeace plays Clifford, the new kid in school. The son of a hotel manager, he’s a fairly laid-back sort, dealing without blinking with his flamboyant grandmother (Ruth Gordon of Harold and Maude) and the various characters at the hotel. School becomes a trial, however, when he runs afoul o…
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