Posted in: Brain Blasters, News and Opinions by David Annandale on January 26th, 2007
Bela Lugosi has certainly had his share of collections and box sets hitting the stands, but now, belatedly, Boris Karloff has some sets of his own, and we’re not talking cheap public domain films from late in his career.
Universal, where Karloff became a star with Frankenstein, has released, as part of their Franchise Collection, The Boris Karloff Collection. There are five films here: Night Key (1937), Tower of London (1939), The Climax (1944), The Strange Door (1951) and...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on January 25th, 2007
The Rock � sorry, Dwayne Johnson � sure has come a long way from his melodramatic days as a WWE superstar. His first major film role, as the Scorpion King in 2001�s The Mummy Returns was more about his physical presence than any acting ability. Two years later, he proved he could handle action comedy with The Rundown. Now, with Gridiron Giants, Johnson has added the drama notch to his genre belt.
The film, based on a true story and following a 1993 TV documentary of the same name, tells...
Posted in: Dare to Play the Game, News and Opinions by Michael Durr on January 24th, 2007
Halo 3 Beta, Wii at a Loss, and a Link to the Past - Welcome to the mortgage that’s been refinanced too much and drowning fast known as Dare to Play the Game.
Welcome to another edition of Dare to Play the Game. I’m your host that is having a rough week, but the looks on the horizon are quite good and I might come out of my current situation alive. Thank goodness I have my job to fall back on and thanks to my friends too for they provide me an outlet to let go my mental ...
Posted in: News and Opinions by Archive Authors on January 24th, 2007
This CNET article wishfully prophecies that HD-DVD will surrender mid-year. This prognosis is based on the the fact that there's a 5:1 ratio of Blu-Ray to HD-DVD players in households - driven mainly by the PS3. Of course, the verdict is still out on whether the PS3 will ever get traction in the marketplace, so take that with a grain of salt.
Personally, I'm going to skip the next-gen physical media ratrace entirely and skip right to HD downloads via A...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on January 23rd, 2007
It�s hard to believe, but after six years and three movies, this fourth film proves the Scary Movie franchise is still good for a cheap laugh.
For those of you that have lived under a rock and aren�t familiar with the Scary Movie series, I will enlighten you. Some of the horror movies coming out these days are just begging to be parodied, and the comic brains of the Wayans brothers did so in 2000 with first instalment simply titled Scary Movie. This movie poked fun of then-recent movie...
![Scary Movie 4 [HD DVD] dvd cover art](https://upcomingdiscs.com/ecs_covers/scary-movie-4-hd-dvd-large.jpg)
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on January 23rd, 2007
Wow. It�s already been over a year since hearing the endless �I can�t quit you� pander that many labeled Brokeback Mountain with. Sitting down to see this one for the 3rd time, I feared that the initial power the film had over me would be diminished. Such isn�t the case here as Brokeback Mountain is still the same excellent film it was over a year ago.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on January 21st, 2007
Back in late 2006 there was a minor to-do about a film depicting the last days of Jesus, except that Jesus was played by a black man. Written and directed by Jean-Claude La Marre, Color of the Cross tries to do what it can to tell the tale of this black Jesus, or be-jeezus if you will.
The film, like others covering the last two days of his life, follows Jesus as he performs the Last Supper, gets betrayed by Judas and the other stuff. While in town, many Jews are trying to celebrate Passover without being abused or persecuted by the Romans, so they celebrate in secret.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on January 21st, 2007
For all the talk about a film being "just as relevant now as when it was released", Oh! What a Lovely War seems to fit that bill more than a lot of movies I've seen recently. From a screenplay by Len Deighton and directed by a first-time director (but longtime actor) in Richard Attenborough (Jurassic Park), the film may be a daunting endeavor for some to see, probably because it's a film that's two and a half hours long and contains a lot of songs.
It also contains a lot of dialogue, and both the songs and dialogue were from the period.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on January 20th, 2007
Con movies are nothing new to Hollywood. Each has that character who thinks they�re on top of the world behind this bullet proof armor only to eventually realize that they�ve either been played or been watched the entire time. I suppose what makes con films work on the level they do is that these characters (admit it!) are all committing acts we�d love to even THINK about committing. The only problem is that we�re not even that badass of a person to even attempt it. Having never seen this film, I figured I�d get a fairly entertaining film with decent acting and an interesting enough plot. Boy was I mistaken about this one. Oscar awarded 1973 film The Sting has easily become my favorite con film.
![The Sting [HD DVD] dvd cover art](https://upcomingdiscs.com/ecs_covers/the-sting-hd-dvd-large.jpg)
Posted in: Brain Blasters, News and Opinions by David Annandale on January 20th, 2007
The next time someone talks about The Sixth Sense having an original twist ending, sit them down and force them to watch Carnival of Souls (1962).
Spoiler warning. If you haven’t seen either of these films, or generally have no idea what I’m talking about, stop reading now. Go away. Come back next week. You don’t want to be hear. God knows, I might spoil the twist in The Crying Game while I’m at it.
Your humble correspondent waits one for one more paragraph in case some unfort...
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