Posted in Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on May 5th, 2004
As a music lover, the phrase, “written by Paul McCartney” almost always signifies excellence in the performance to come. For a movie lover, this is not necessarily the case. Sure, A Hard Day’s Night is a great film, Help! is better than average, and Yellow Submarine is a fun departure from mainstream animation. Heck, even […]
Posted in Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on May 2nd, 2004
Quite possibly my favorite part of this job is checking the post on the day that my new box of DVD screeners are scheduled to come in. Sometimes, I know what is coming to me, and the new box means that it is time to get down to business. Other times, however, there is a […]
Posted in Disc Reviews by David Annandale on April 27th, 2004
Synopsis King Xerxes of Persia marches on Greece with his vast army. Greece’s city states are asquabbling, disunited bunch, but Athens and Sparta lead the way to co-operate against thecommon enemy. King Leonidas of Sparta (Richard Egan) must hold the pass of Thermopylae,but Spartan politics mean he has but 300 men to stand against […]
Posted in Disc Reviews by David Annandale on April 25th, 2004
Synopsis Mandy Moore plays Anna Foster, daughter of President Mark Harmon. She is extremelyfrustrated with the fact that her social life is consistently ruined by the vast phalanx of SecretService personnel that shadow her every move. Harmon promises to ease up on her while theyvisit Prague, but he breaks his promise, and she flees, […]
Posted in Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on April 15th, 2004
It appears that Fox is having a hard time keeping a good thing going when it comes to the Marilyn Monroe Diamond Collection. The Volume One boxed set included five discs, Volume Two included four discs, and the group of films that are generally being referred to as Volume Three don’t come in a box […]
Posted in Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on April 10th, 2004
I hate Carly Simon. However, I feel that as I am supposed to be an impartial reviewer, so I should get that out of the way right here at the start. I have never liked her, though I am not really sure why. Maybe it is her freakishly large mouth. Maybe it’s that fact that […]
Posted in Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on April 1st, 2004
Oh, where to begin? I guess I should start with the directors. That’s right, DIRECTORS. Plural. There are three of them. Apparently, the first two didn’t suck enough, so they had to bring in a third to fill out the talentless triumvirate. Any film directed by three people who are not related should make moviegoers […]
Posted in Disc Reviews by David Annandale on March 30th, 2004
Synopsis Having exhausted just about every other romantic combination involving the ever-popularcast, the writers finally settled down to make a wedding actually happen. The preparations forthe wedding and all the associated complications form the backbone of the season, while variousother subplots (Rachel’s hunky new assistant, roommate musical chairs, etc) weave in and out.We are […]
Posted in Disc Reviews by David Annandale on March 30th, 2004
Synopsis Susan Ward, presumably cast because she’s a dead ringer for Denise Richards, is a sad littlerich girl at one of those beachfront high schools populated, to judge from the evidence on hand,by porn stars. In between slow-motion beach volleyball games, her life seems to be falling apart.Her mother died years go in the […]
Posted in Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on March 9th, 2004
I’ve found a new crime genre: New Orleans noir. I’ve seen a few of these in the past month. The films seem to be about the flawed people of Louisiana (the Pelican State, by the way) and center around steamy murders and love affairs. All made with a certain bayou charm. Tempted is another movie […]
Posted in Disc Reviews by David Annandale on March 6th, 2004
Synopsis M-3D purports to be a parody of MTV, which is hardly likely, given that the film, inits original form, was made in 1976. Actually Lollipop Girls in Hard Candy, this is apainful slog combining aphrodisiac lollipops with extra footage involving ancient Greek soldiersdoing sad Three Stooges routines. No, it makes no sense. No, […]
Posted in Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on March 1st, 2004
Film Sin suffers from a severe case of identity crisis. The film opens with a wide western vista and a lone grave in the wilderness. The music is soft and the atmosphere Unforgivenesque. The peace is rudely crashed with a quick cut to an urban techno-dance club. Ving Rhames plays a one-armed vigilante, but if […]
Posted in Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on February 27th, 2004
If you’re passing through the video store and see a movie on a shelf that looks like the cover of Motley Crue’s album “Too Fast for Love”…you’ll be disappointed…or relieved (depending on how you feel about the Crue). The movie is James Cox’s Wonderland. Wonderland is a film about the porn star John C. Holmes […]
Posted in Disc Reviews by David Annandale on February 22nd, 2004
Synopsis Meg Ryan plays Manhattan English teacher Frankie Avery. When parts of a dismemberedyoung woman are found in her back garden, Ryan is questioned by Detective Mark Ruffalo.Ruffalo asks Ryan out, and before long they’re at it hot and heavy. But the day of the murder,Ryan was in the same bar as the victim, […]
Posted in Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on February 22nd, 2004
In 1967, a top secret document was commissioned by the government, tracing the United States’ history with the Vietnam war. This history went as far back as the 1940’s. The result was a 7,000 page document. In 1971, a defense department official and former Rand corporation employee, Daniel Ellsberg, secretly photocopied these “Pentagon Papers” and […]
Posted in Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on February 22nd, 2004
What happens when a maladroit lackey, an entrepreneur and his wife, a polymath, a store clerk from Kansas, a motion picture starlet, and a ship captain get stranded on a desert island? The next edition of Survivor, right. Okay…I didn’t fool you. It’s Gilligan’s Island. And the first season is on DVD, all 36 episodes […]
Posted in Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on February 20th, 2004
MGM keeps rolling out the Best Picture award winners. A few weeks ago it was Mutiny on the Bounty, this time it’s The Great Ziegfeld . I think Ziegfeld belongs in the category of those Best Picture winners that aren’t necessarily the best films for that year (Driving Miss Daisy?? C’mon). I actually prefer Frank […]
Posted in Disc Reviews by David Annandale on February 18th, 2004
Synopsis Our story begins in 1939, just before the outbreak of WWII. The Minivers (Greer Garsonand Walter Pidgeon) enjoy an idyllic existence in a charming town where the biggest controversyis over whether the station master Henry Travers should be entering his rose against localaristocrat Dame May Witty’s in the flower competition. But then the […]
Posted in Disc Reviews by David Annandale on February 16th, 2004
Synopsis Efficiency expert Clifton Webb is the pater familias of 12 children. He runs his family ratherlike an industry, and is simultaneously loving, stern, eccentric, pompous and goofy. He moves hisbrood from Rhode Island to New Jersey, and we follow the family as they adapt to their newsurroundings, and the new surroundings adapt to […]
Posted in Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on February 13th, 2004
The show that just won’t die returns for it’s sixth season on DVD… and proves why it still belongs in every sitcom fan’s home collection. Let’s be honest, if you’ve never seen this show before, you are not going to start with Season Six. People who are interested in Season Six are here because they […]
Posted in Disc Reviews by David Annandale on February 10th, 2004
Synopsis When the kind but dull Rhys Ifans proposes to girlfriend Shirley Henderson on a Sally Jesse-style TV show, she turns him down. He is hurt, but still hopeful. Unfortunately, this show wasseen by Henderson’s first boyfriend: small-time crook Robert Carlyle. A flame reignites inCarlyle’s heart, and he comes to town with all the […]
Posted in Disc Reviews by David Annandale on February 3rd, 2004
Synopsis Liam Neeson is a doctor who stumbles upon Jodie Foster, who has lived in the wildernesswithout ever coming into contact with the rest of the world. She speaks her own language, and isa society of one. Neeson wants to preserve Foster’s existence, but psychologist NatashaRichardson wants to study Foster, and believes that the […]
Posted in Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on January 30th, 2004
This is a great idea for a children’s video. Our Friend Martin is an animated film that follows the Dickens Christmas Carol format to tell the story of the life of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. When two boys (an underachieving African-American and his slacker white counterpart) visit the birthplace of Dr. King on a […]
Posted in Disc Reviews by David Annandale on January 24th, 2004
Synopsis An arrogant, misanthropic Charlton Heston leads a trio of astronauts who left Earth in 1972for a trip they expected to last some 900 years. 2000 years later, they crash-land on what theysuppose to be another planet. They encounter mute, primitive humans, but then are set upon bycivilized apes. Heston is the only survivor, […]
Posted in Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on January 13th, 2004
If you are a fan of space flight, this DVD is your holy grail. While the Spacecraft Films series of releases is full of high-quality products covering the history of space flight, Apollo 11 – Men on the Moon pushes their usual high standards to the outer reaches. The few frustrations that I had with […]
