Savant's new reviews today are
The Night of the Iguana Warners
The Roman Spring of Mrs. Stone Warners and
71 Fragments of a Chronology of Chance Kino Video
Saturday greetings. An alert for Science Fiction fans: Go outside and play if the weather's good, but when you get back check out the Savant review for Creation of the Humanoids. I barely remembered the film from a viewing on a neighbor's color TV (two colors, orange-brown and dull green) in about 1965. On this new disc it turns out to be a unique experience -- stultifyingly static -- but unique!
I've got to hand it to Warners' ... their Tennesee Williams boxed set proved to be a fascinating bunch of titles, several of which I've seen before but became much more interesting after learning their back stories from the DVD extras. I was probably too hard on some of the musicals in another box set, which probably hasn't endeared me to the Judy Garland crowd. Feel free to point out my errors if you see I'm completely snafu on any of these pictures.
And Warners have more interesting announcements for July. We'll be getting a restored 70mm transfer of John Frankenheimer's Grand Prix, which has some potentially interesting extras. And there'll be a couple of boxloads of prime old action dramas: The Film Noir Classics Vol 3 box will include Border Incident, His Kind of Woman, Lady in the Lake, On Dangerous Ground and The Racket, whle the Warner Bros. Pictures Tough Guys Collection will carry Bullets or Ballots, City for Conquest, Each Dawn I Die, 'G' Men, San Quentin and A Slight Case of Murder. Almost all will have commentaries, and I've heard about a couple of titles that will have major restorations. One title has material dropped after its original release and not seen in sixty years! (Don't ask, as I've been told not to say any more about this ... the detailed scoops are apparently reserved for more dramatic announcement opportunities.)
For Stanley Kubrick fans, I've amended the review of, believe it or not, Dark Sky's Frankenstein Meets the Space Monster with a friendly letter from a filmmaker who relates the true nature of the working relationship between Kubrick and FMTSM director Robert Gaffey. Small world! Thanks for reading, Glenn Erickson
Posted by DVD Savant at April 28, 2006 10:01 AM