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Film Fest 4
List Price: Unknown [Buy now and save at Amazon]
The Movie:
This is the 4th offering in the Film Festival series, and again, like the Circuit Music Series, it offers quite a lot of value to the viewer at an impressively low price. Structured like a magazine, Film Festival takes us in-depth to some of the world's biggest and most important film festivals.
One cool feature out of many is that this series actually offers an outlet for short films that may not have otherwise found an audience. On this edition, we get 4 films - some that are short and some that are moderate in length. The 4 are: Call Me Fishmael(3 minutes); Enchanted(9 minutes), Protest(3.5 Minutes) and Jorge(29 Minutes). All of these films offer audio commentaries from crew members; for instance, "Enchanted" offers audio commentary from the director and producer.
More "magazine"-ish are the live interviews, which are quite entertaining. Actress Heather Graham and the cast of "Commited" chat around the table about the film, and it's refreshing to just hear actors relaxed and offering comments rather than the usual publicity/promotional documentaries that offer interviews on some DVDs. Also interviewed are Brenda Blethyn, Dave Foley and the group of Nick Nolte, Nathan Lane, Emily Watson and director Alan Rudolph.
Also included are "Coming Soon" and "Featured" sections; the featured section offers featurettes of Sundance and Hawaii film fests, and the coming soon area features looks at "Mariposa", "Human Traffic" and "Six Days In Roswell".
The only thing that I didn't really care for is that there is advertisements before some of the featurettes start. Although since the retail price of this DVD is kept so low they likely need the ads, the Circuit series has been able to go without the ads on recent issues. Still, for a DVD that offers you 130 minutes of solid content and definitely not just thrown-together material for $14.95, I still have to recommend it.
The DVD
VIDEO/AUDIO: The picture and sound quality for Film Fest 4 varies throughout due to the material. Some of the interview segments and clips look slightly soft and hazy, while others look sharp and detailed. Colors are similarly varied throughout the programs, but in general, the picture quality is pleasing and enjoyable. Many of these features are presented in Dolby 2.0, and for the material that the disc offers, the sound gets the job done. All presentations sound clean and clear, and interviews are easily understood.
MENUS:: The menus that Film Fest offers are quite well done. The main menus offer different interview clips that can be played as well as some light animation in the backgrounds. I had one time where the disc went back to the main menu and lost the ability to select any options, but that only happened once.
EXTRAS:: Again, Film Fest offers a wide variety of extra features, and many of the featurettes/films have alternate audio tracks as well as notes and information. There's definitely a lot to look through and more than just the films and interviews themselves. There is also some DVD-Rom content such as web-links.
Final Thoughts: Again, I have to give praise whenever someone can offer this much quality content for only $14.95. The interviews are especially entertaining and it's another well-done effort in the series. Recommended. Although it remains a little difficult to find these discs, you can subscribe to the series by visiting filmfestdvd.com or buy this issue at Amazon.com
This is the 4th offering in the Film Festival series, and again, like the Circuit Music Series, it offers quite a lot of value to the viewer at an impressively low price. Structured like a magazine, Film Festival takes us in-depth to some of the world's biggest and most important film festivals.
One cool feature out of many is that this series actually offers an outlet for short films that may not have otherwise found an audience. On this edition, we get 4 films - some that are short and some that are moderate in length. The 4 are: Call Me Fishmael(3 minutes); Enchanted(9 minutes), Protest(3.5 Minutes) and Jorge(29 Minutes). All of these films offer audio commentaries from crew members; for instance, "Enchanted" offers audio commentary from the director and producer.
More "magazine"-ish are the live interviews, which are quite entertaining. Actress Heather Graham and the cast of "Commited" chat around the table about the film, and it's refreshing to just hear actors relaxed and offering comments rather than the usual publicity/promotional documentaries that offer interviews on some DVDs. Also interviewed are Brenda Blethyn, Dave Foley and the group of Nick Nolte, Nathan Lane, Emily Watson and director Alan Rudolph.
Also included are "Coming Soon" and "Featured" sections; the featured section offers featurettes of Sundance and Hawaii film fests, and the coming soon area features looks at "Mariposa", "Human Traffic" and "Six Days In Roswell".
The only thing that I didn't really care for is that there is advertisements before some of the featurettes start. Although since the retail price of this DVD is kept so low they likely need the ads, the Circuit series has been able to go without the ads on recent issues. Still, for a DVD that offers you 130 minutes of solid content and definitely not just thrown-together material for $14.95, I still have to recommend it.
The DVD
VIDEO/AUDIO: The picture and sound quality for Film Fest 4 varies throughout due to the material. Some of the interview segments and clips look slightly soft and hazy, while others look sharp and detailed. Colors are similarly varied throughout the programs, but in general, the picture quality is pleasing and enjoyable. Many of these features are presented in Dolby 2.0, and for the material that the disc offers, the sound gets the job done. All presentations sound clean and clear, and interviews are easily understood.
MENUS:: The menus that Film Fest offers are quite well done. The main menus offer different interview clips that can be played as well as some light animation in the backgrounds. I had one time where the disc went back to the main menu and lost the ability to select any options, but that only happened once.
EXTRAS:: Again, Film Fest offers a wide variety of extra features, and many of the featurettes/films have alternate audio tracks as well as notes and information. There's definitely a lot to look through and more than just the films and interviews themselves. There is also some DVD-Rom content such as web-links.
Final Thoughts: Again, I have to give praise whenever someone can offer this much quality content for only $14.95. The interviews are especially entertaining and it's another well-done effort in the series. Recommended. Although it remains a little difficult to find these discs, you can subscribe to the series by visiting filmfestdvd.com or buy this issue at Amazon.com
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