DVD Talk Ultra HD Reviews https://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/list/DVD Video DVD Talk DVD Review RSS Feed en-us Drive (1997) - 4K Ultra HD Blu-ray Ultra HD https://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/review/75383 Thu, 29 Sep 2022 15:30:22 UTC Recommended

The Movie:


Not to be confused with the Nicholas Winding Refn movie of the same name from 2011, 1997's Drive, directed by Steve Wang, introduces us to Toby Wong (Mark Dacascos), a martial arts expert who has been technologically enhanced to make him the ultimate ass kicker. We see this first hand when he takes down some bad guys in the opening scene. From here, he winds up at a dive bar in Los Angeles where he meets aspiring musician Malik Brody (Kadeem Hardison), just as some more bad guys show up only to once again get slaughtered by Wong.


In quick need of an escape route, Wong winds up taking Malik hostage to a certain extent, forcing him to drive him out of the city in his car to escape from those chasing him down. It's here that Wong explains to Brody his situation. As the bad guys, led by Vic Madison (John Pyper-Ferguson) working for the mysterious Mr. Lau (Jam...Read the entire review

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The Lost City [4K UHD] Ultra HD https://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/review/75347 Fri, 19 Aug 2022 15:49:52 UTC Rent It

The Movie:

I recently became a member of a new club, one that sends you member updates, a magazine, has a powerful voting bloc and mentions other members' ages as if they were part of a school graduating class. It's not SAG, it's the AARP, though Sandra Bullock (58) is apparently a member of both, and good on her for doing so! That she still has the capability to act in the romantic action/comedy genre is a testament to her talents, even as she co-stars with someone more than 15 years her junior in The Lost City.

Aaron and Adam Nee co-wrote and co-directed the film, which has Bullock cast as romance writer Loretta Sage. She is successful but the tragic death of her husband as left her creativity sputtering, and finishing a novel focused on Dash, a charming, Fabio-type (Tatum, Magic Mike XXL). She does publicity ...Read the entire review

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The Killing (4KUHD) Ultra HD https://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/review/75330 Tue, 09 Aug 2022 16:08:26 UTC Highly Recommended

The Movie:

Written and directed by Stanley Kubrick in 1956 and based on the novel 'Clean Break' by Lionel White, The Killing introduces us to a man named Johnny Clay (Sterling Hayden) who has just recently been freed from a half-decade stint in the slammer. Proving you can't teach an old dog new tricks, he almost immediately sets out to put together a small crew of five men to help him execute a heist at the Lansdowne Racetrack. The plan is to split the estimated two million dollar payday and split it evenly between each member. Each man has his own motivations for wanting in on this, and in Johnny's case, it's to run off to Boston with the love of his life, Fay (Coleen Gray). She doesn't feel she's pretty enough or smart enough to be with anyone else, and she waited for him while he was in prison. Marvin Unger (Jay C. Flippen) is doing it out simple loyalty to Johnny. A cop name...Read the entire review

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The Northman [4K UHD] Ultra HD https://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/review/75297 Wed, 29 Jun 2022 17:46:23 UTC Highly Recommended

The Movie:

Thanks (or damn) the pandemic for hampering it, but Robert Eggers has made three films in seven years, with The Northman being the third following The Witch and The Lighthouse. Each have been full of sometimes stark, captivating imagery, and The Northman takes that rep and builds onto it.

Eggers co-wrote The Northman with Icelandic author Sjon (Dancer in the Dark), and the story is kind of simple in retrospect. Amleth is a son to King Aurvandil (Ethan Hawke, Boyhood) and Queen Gudrun (Nicole Kidman, The Killing of a Sacred Deer). Amleth witnesses his father's murder at the hands of his bastard Uncle...Read the entire review

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Infinite Ultra HD https://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/review/75260 Tue, 31 May 2022 16:11:34 UTC Rent It

Infinite:

I was all prepared to enjoy Antoine Fuqua's 2021 effort Infinite starring Mark Wahlberg and Chiwetel Ejiofor, a glossy, metaphysical action flick. But after about 20 minutes it became clear why this didn't get a theatrical release, and it wasn't just the pandemic. (Although that played a part; in the before times this would have spent a week or three in theaters before limping home.) No, what makes Infinite not much more than a decent Rent It option on a Friday night when you Just. Can\'t. is the fact that it actually takes itself seriously.

After a voice-over set-up we're thrown into a pretty great high-speed car chase in Mexico with a dude cauterizing a leg wound with the cigarette lighter (fact check - cars don\'t have those anymore) before employing some intense offensive driving skills that include using controlled acceleration to launch bricks like from...Read the entire review

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Wild Things (Limited Edition 4K) Ultra HD https://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/review/75258 Fri, 27 May 2022 23:14:56 UTC Recommended

The Movie:

I guess I either never understood or got behind the long-term sustaining fascination with Wild Things. It made a modest amount of money theatrically, spawned several straight to video sequels, most everyone involved seemed to be strangely entertained by the schlock involved, and when I saw it back in the day, I guess I didn't really get it? It was one thing to be sensationalist, and the film sure was that, but past being a garden variety soap opera running 110 minutes, I remain unsure what all the fuss was about.

Stephen Peters wrote the film that John McNaughton (Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer) directed. Set in the fictitious Blue Bay, Florida, Sam Lombardo (Matt Dillon, Crash) is a popular figure at the local high school, a mix of passio...Read the entire review

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The Green Knight Ultra HD https://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/review/75038 Thu, 04 Nov 2021 18:04:30 UTC DVD Talk Collector Series

The Movie:


The folly of man lies in its egotistical illusion that it can cheat death and nature through self-appointed aggrandizement. No matter how great a king becomes, he will eventually share the soil with a lowly pauper, the greenery of mother earth absorbing their bodies in equal measure. Writer-director David Lowery\'s (Pete\'s Dragon, A Ghost Story) haunting and hypnotizing masterwork, half Arthurian mythology and half contemplative medieval horror, sends its brave knight Sir Gawain (Dev Patel) through a journey that begins with faux chivalry and meticulously breaks him down to the vulnerable core of any human being who eventually comes face-to-face with the inevitability of nature and the finality of their time in it.


Lowery based his film on an actual Arthurian legend, a morality tale of heroism that sees our knight setting on a journey to meet the titular character, wh...Read the entire review

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Halloween (1978) 4K Ultra HD https://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/review/75037 Wed, 03 Nov 2021 16:29:45 UTC DVD Talk Collector Series

The Movie:

With the recent Halloween Kills, Michael Myers and his whiteface Captain Kirk mask is still going strong as an enduring slasher franchise after four decades. Ironically, John Carpenter\'s 1978 horror masterpiece, perhaps the finest distillation of the genre\'s id, was the one story that derived its strength from never continuing on from its haunting and perfect ending.

Carpenter\'s Michael Myers is pure, unmotivated, non-sensical, unstoppable evil. The reason for what was first conceived as a low-budget exploitation flick called The Babysitter Murders lingering as the pure distillation of terror to this day lies in Carpenter stripping as much reason and humanity from his iconic killer as possible, making him represent the random and sudden specter of death when we least expect it, and when we\'re at our most comfortable and sheltered.

The universality of this fear that\'...Read the entire review

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Mortal Kombat Legends: Battle of the Realms Ultra HD https://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/review/75024 Wed, 27 Oct 2021 16:05:38 UTC Recommended

Mortal Kombat Legends: Battle of the Realms:

I like to approach a review as if I were writing it for someone who had no knowledge of the subject. A review for a newbie, doing a blind-buy, if you will, which in this case is not a problem, as that newbie is me! This 4k UHD animated feature is part of a remarkably robust film-franchise based on a video game, and may or may not have been released to coincide with the 2021 live action movie. Providing 80 minutes of gory action and drama, and looking pretty great, it presents a fun way to spend an evening, for fans and newbies alike.

You don\'t need to have deep, or any, knowledge of the Mortal Kombat franchise to take something from this movie, a direct sequel to the previous animated movie Mortal Kombat Legends: Scorpion\'s Revenge, and for what it\'s worth, you get enough backstory in the dialog to smooth over any bumps. There are severa...Read the entire review

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My Fair Lady (4K UHD + Digital) Ultra HD https://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/review/74812 Tue, 08 Jun 2021 19:27:57 UTC DVD Talk Collector Series

The Movie:

My Fair Lady:

I had never seen My Fair Lady before but it seems like I've seen it in a lot of other movies and not realized it; someone from the lower class is brought in to take on the behavior and mannerisms of the upper class? I mean hell, Trading Places even did that! But there's a certain charm that inhabits My Fair Lady by almost everyone involved, and I can understand that charm.

In this case, the lower class person is Eliza Doolittle (Audrey Hepburn, Breakfast at Tiffany's), full of moxie and a Cockney accent. Professor Higgins (Rex Harrison, Cleopatra) brings her into his home, gives her Dad a stipend and provides her with class and culture that turns her into a prospective princess. She finds that the grass is n...Read the entire review

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The Ten Commandments (4K UHD + Blu-ray + Digital) Ultra HD https://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/review/74764 Thu, 29 Apr 2021 14:28:15 UTC Highly Recommended

The Ten Commandments:

The Ten Commandments is touted on the slipcover as "the greatest epic of all time." This may be a retroactive judgement, or director Cecil B. DeMille may have been self-glossing in 1956 when the picture originally came out. Whatever the case, at almost four-hours in length, the cinematic story of Moses is certainly great, and epic, and timeless as well. This new 4k Ultra-HD 3-disc set from Paramount Movies is timeless too, presenting the movie likely better than it has ever looked and with a commentary track plus a couple additional extras.

The story of Moses is well-known for many, but certainly not all. A legendary prophet of Judaism and many other Abrahamic religions, said to have lived somewhere in the neighborhood (taking an average of estimates) of 1400 years BCE, Moses survived the killing of male Israelite children by the Egyptian Pharaoh when his infan...Read the entire review

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Love and Monsters (UHD + Blu-ray + Digital) Ultra HD https://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/review/74633 Thu, 07 Jan 2021 18:07:37 UTC Recommended

The Movie:

Directed by Michael Matthews, who co-wrote the screenplay with Brian Duffield, 2020's Love And Monstersis set in a future where the Earth was ravaged by an apocalypse that has destroyed the vast majority of the planet's human population. Making matters worse, the after effects have caused insects and amphibians alike to mutate into massive monsters, the kind that are only too happy to munch away on any surviving humans that they should be so lucky as to come across.

When the President is obliterated by a random moth monster, hordes of people decide to relocate and live underground. One such survivor is Joel (Dylan O'Brien), who lives in an underground bunker with a bunch of others, all of whom have found true love... except for him. He works as the cook and everyone just kind of ignores him, he doesn't stand out much at all and just sort of exists in the background....Read the entire review

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Collateral (4K UHD + Blu-ray + Digital) Ultra HD https://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/review/74606 Thu, 17 Dec 2020 14:49:41 UTC Recommended

The Show:

I've said it before and will say it again now; this experience of Hollywood studios putting their catalog on 4K allows me to experience films again much in the same way I did when the catalog trickled out to Blu-ray, or going from VHS to DVD. Hopefully, these things become less and less because at some point they're going to start cheating viewers from original creative intent. Thankfully we're not there at this point yet, so in the meantime, bring on the retrospective appreciations!

Pretty basic setup here; Jamie Foxx (Any Given Sunday) is Max, a cab driver working the graveyard shift in Los Angeles. He picks up Vincent (Tom Cruise, American Made) on a fare, and he knows nothing about him, and we know barely more than he does. Vincent gives Max enou...Read the entire review

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Beverly Hills Cop (4K UHD + Blu-ray + Digital) Ultra HD https://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/review/74601 Wed, 16 Dec 2020 16:51:34 UTC Recommended

The Movie:

It's nice to see a film at various points within your life and have an evolving point of view with each viewing. Far be it for me to imbue something so profound with Beverly Hills Cop, but I remember renting this from my video store when I was 13 and two things happened while watching it: first, I laughed so hard I was crying because Eddie Murphy's performance was hilarious, hands down. Second was the language in the film took me back a step or two. It's not like I was puritanical or anything, but it was surprising to see how many profanities were used. I had seen Murphy's films before and even for this, it was a surprise. As I've seen it through the years though, while I've still relished the scenes Murphy is in, it's the impact his presence had on other characters (among other things) that have made it fun viewing.

Written by Daniel Petrie Jr. (Read the entire review

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Ghost In The Shell Ultra HD https://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/review/74501 Fri, 11 Sep 2020 21:19:12 UTC Highly Recommended

The Movie:

One of those rare anime features that even people not into anime know about, Ghost In The Shell is widely considered one of the best of its kind, and for a very good reason. A remarkably high concept Blade Runner inspired slice of cyberpunk sci-fi, it's exciting, tense, stylish and even pretty thought provoking.

Set in the (not so distant anymore!) future of 2029, the film takes place in a world that has established massive worldwide information networks and where cyborgs are almost completely indistinguishable from humans. Wreaking havoc on this network is a sort of cyber-terrorist who is known only as The Puppet Master. His trick? To install, through the network, false memories into people who are then coerced into acting on his behalf. The Puppet Master exists entirely in the network at first, but soon makes it clear that he wants a body of his own.

...Read the entire review

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Braveheart (4K UHD + Blu-ray + Digital / Steelbook) Ultra HD https://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/review/74428 Mon, 20 Jul 2020 14:31:31 UTC Highly Recommended

The Movie:

I am probably mistaken on my memories of Braveheart when it came out (we are talking about a quarter century back and all!), but my impression of it before it came out was that Mel Gibson had done all the Lethal Weapon movies and had done a couple of dramas here and there, but nothing on the breadth of this, where he was starring AND directing. And even after it was winning all the awards under the sun it was hard to believe for me. Then I saw it and wow, guess I was wrong!

Gibson took the script of Randall Wallace (We Were Soldiers) and transformed himself into William Wallace, a Scotsman in the 13th century who helped push for independence for Scotland against the English armies and King Edward I. As a boy...Read the entire review

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Hustlers 4K Ultra HD https://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/review/74130 Wed, 18 Dec 2019 16:33:52 UTC Highly Recommended

The Movie:

I recently watched The Kitchen, a movie I had no knowledge about, which included some above the title leading actresses who turn in decent performances in an underachieving movie. Well now I've seen Hustlers, a movie I had no knowledge about, which included a couple of above the title leading actresses who turn in excellent performances in a movie that lives up to and exceeds its potential..

Lorene Scafaria (Seeking a Friend for the End of the World) adapted the Jessica Pressler story from New York Magazine which she directed as well. It looks at Destiny (Constance Wu, Crazy Rich Asians) and her just starting out in a New York strip club. She strikes up a friendship with Ramona (Jennifer...Read the entire review

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The Wizard of Oz Ultra HD https://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/review/74085 Tue, 19 Nov 2019 18:28:15 UTC Recommended

What more can be said about one of the most iconic movies of all time, an evergreen title on home video since 1981 (the very first from MGM's video label, and also in their first wave of DVD titles before their classic library was lost to Warner) and a yearly TV tradition before that? Released in 1939, one of the biggest years for movies, it's based on a story written in 1900 by L. Frank Baum- which spawned an entire series of stories some of which were done as movies in the silent era. This is the version most know and love however, with Judy Garland as Dorothy- a simple Kansas farm girl who dreams of a better place "somewhere over the rainbow". A tornado hits her home sending it flying with her in it, crashing down in the land of Oz- killing the Wicked Witch of the East in the process and making her an instant hero. There are both good and bad witches throughout Oz, Glinda (Billie Burke) being one...Read the entire review

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Pet Sematary Ultra HD https://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/review/73908 Tue, 16 Jul 2019 19:28:41 UTC Rent It

The Movie:

Generally I gristle at the thought of remakes, reboots or reimaginings, though I'm willing to hear them out, as in the case of Pet Sematary. This new adaptation is the third such cinematic effort following the first one in 1989 (which I think I saw in the theater?) and a sequel in 1992. And because everything is redone in some fashion or another, Stephen King's novel gets a 2019 makeover.

This version is adapted by Matt Greenberg (Seventh Son), and directed by Kevin Kolsch and Dennis Widmyer (Starry Eyes). The modern version of Doctor Louis Creed is played by Jason Clarke (First Man) while Amy...Read the entire review

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Glass (4K) Ultra HD https://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/review/73816 Tue, 28 May 2019 21:46:35 UTC Recommended

There are some who say M. Night Shymalan's formula has gotten old, but with a few exceptions his movies continue to hook me. However, Glass didn't exactly blow me away, despite thinking that Unbreakable was brilliant and its follow-up Split was pretty intense. I'll just start out by saying that I won't be able to avoid including spoilers for those two movies so if you haven't seen them you may want to stop reading- I also advise anyone to see those before watching this one, as it doesn't stand very well on its own and might leave you more confused not knowing what these characters did previously or why you should care about them.

<...Read the entire review

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The Witch Ultra HD https://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/review/73797 Fri, 19 Apr 2019 18:05:25 UTC Highly Recommended

The Movie:

I remember The Witch less for its cinematic merits and more the fact of where I saw it (an Alamo Drafthouse) and what happened during the film (I loudly told talkers to shut the fuck up during the movie). This isn't to say that The Witch was forgettable or doesn't hold up, more that you control the vibe, and you can do what you can to control the tribe. It worked, btw.

Robert Eggers wrote and directed his feature debut, which examines a mid-17th century family's relocation to the New England forests. William (Ralph Ineson, Ready Player One) is the patriarch next to his wife Katherine (Kate Dickie, The Last Jedi), though their oldest daughter Thomasin (Anya Taylor-Joy, Read the entire review

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RALPH BREAKS THE INTERNET Ultra HD https://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/review/73674 Mon, 25 Feb 2019 17:12:59 UTC Highly Recommended

In 10 Words or Less

Ralph, Vanellope and their video-game pals go online

The Movie

When last we saw Wreck-It Ralph (John C. Reilly) and his pal Vanellope (Sarah Silverman), they were happily ensconced in their respective arcade video games, having reac...Read the entire review

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The Movie:

Lots has been written in the quarter century since Steven Spielberg's Schindler's List came out that I'm not sure what else I could contribute; it was easily Spielberg's most personal film and one that served as either a small reinvention in terms of style and storytelling, it served as a mainstream vehicle for Liam Neeson (Darkman) and Ralph Fiennes (Quiz Show) but more than those pieces of trivia, it served for a lot of people as an embracing of the severity of the Nazis treatment of Jews before and during World War II on a scale that had not been seen before. This was America's most popular/successful director handling a film about the Holocaust, presented in black and white and running more than three hours. A lot of new societal ground was being b...Read the entire review

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Halloween 4K Ultra HD https://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/review/73352 Tue, 02 Oct 2018 14:39:23 UTC Recommended

It's been a while since Halloween fans really had something to look forward to. It's been twenty years since Halloween H20, sixteen since Halloween: Resurrection, eleven since Rob Zombie's take, and four years since the entirety of the franchise found its way to Blu-ray. You'd think that'd be the end of it, but thanks to the horror genre slaying at the box office again, we're finally getting a new movie. Not just any movie, mind you, but a direct follow-up to John Carpenter's unbeatable classic. It brings Jamie Lee Curtis back to the fold, ignores the sequels, and its trailers have left people chomping at the bit for the return of Michael Myers. It was a no brainer for Lionsgate to capitalize with a 4K UHD release, and it's a welcome upgrade in some respects.

If you've never seen Halloween, you should consider rectifying that as soon as possible. Some minor continuity errors and a few moments of...Read the entire review

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