DVD Talk DVD Reviews https://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/list/DVD Video DVD Talk DVD Review RSS Feed en-us The Power of the Dog (Criterion Collection) (Blu-ray) Blu-ray https://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/review/75464 Wed, 18 Jan 2023 19:36:03 UTC Rent It

THE FILM:

New Zealand filmmaker Jane Campion's latest, The Power of the Dog, earned a host of rave reviews upon its Netflix premiere in late 2021. It is certainly the kind of slow, pretentious, perfunctorily showy film critics wank over, but audiences were much less impressed, dogging it in online reviews. I land somewhere in the middle. Based on Thomas Savage's 1967 novel of the same name, The Power of the Dog stars Benedict Cumberbatch and Jesse Plemons as wealthy ranch-owning brothers Phil and George Burbank in 1920s Montana. Phil is cold and cruel to everyone except his men; while George is kind and friendly, earning the affections of Rose Gordon (Kirsten Dunst), who runs a restaurant with her son Peter (Kodi Smit-McPhee). Shot on location in New Zealand and sporting gorgeous cinematography by Ari Wegner, the film is certainly handsome. The acting and prod...Read the entire review

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Malcolm X (Criterion Collection) (Blu-ray) Blu-ray https://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/review/75463 Wed, 18 Jan 2023 19:16:37 UTC DVD Talk Collector Series

THE FILM:

In celebration of the film's 30th birthday, the Criterion Collection releases Spike Lee's seminal biographical drama Malcolm X in a definitive edition that collectors will certainly appreciate adding to their film libraries. With a screenplay written by Lee and Arnold Perl that is based on Malcolm X's 1965 autobiography, the film offers a career-best performance from Denzel Washington and a powerful exploration of the American activist's life and beliefs. Lee's epic tracks its subject's life from childhood through his assassination in 1965, diving deep into the events that formed Malcolm X and depicting these civil rights-era conflicts with grace and attention to detail. At 201 minutes, Malcolm X is a lengthy sit, but Lee and company created a film that not only offers important discourse but is consistently, dramatically entertaining.

Washington ...Read the entire review

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Eve's Bayou (The Criterion Collection) (Blu-ray) Blu-ray https://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/review/75456 Mon, 12 Dec 2022 18:48:15 UTC Highly Recommended

Eve's Bayou:

Oktay Ege Kozak

The Movie:

Early on in Eve's Bayou, the impressionable and innocent ten-year-old Eve (Jurnee Smollett) witnesses his highly respected doctor father Louis (Samuel L. Jackson) clearly having sex with a woman who's not Eve's mother. After the shock of her discovery wears off, Eve tells her early teens sister Cisely (Meagan Good) about what she saw. Cicely, afraid that the happy family front that this affluent family projects to their New Orleans community and convinced that no matter what Louis does, he still loves their mother, tells Eve that Louis and the other woman were just drunk and having harmless fun.

Writer/director Kasi Lemmons goes as far as recreating the event from Cicely's perspective showing just that, innocent fun, and Eve also becomes part of this newly minted false memory. The...Read the entire review

]]> Drive My Car: Criterion Collection (Blu-ray) Blu-ray https://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/review/75453 Wed, 07 Dec 2022 17:28:01 UTC Highly Recommended

The Movie:

Drive My Car was 2021's little art film that could. It has the pedigree of a Haruki Murakami short story as source material, which is certainly nothing to sniff at, but it's no guarantee of international success either (anyone remember 2010's Norwegian Wood?). Plus, a three-hour runtime is an automatic dealbreaker for many viewers (which, pardon the cliché, is ludicrous in the binge era of media consumption). Yet, Ryusuke Hamaguchi's beautiful film managed to net a decent box office and score four Oscar nominations, winning Best International Feature. I have watched Drive My Car a few times in theaters prior to popping in Criterion's Blu-ray release, and I'm now convince...Read the entire review

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Frownland (The Criterion Collection) (Blu-ray) Blu-ray https://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/review/75443 Tue, 29 Nov 2022 18:33:53 UTC Recommended

Frownland:

After enjoying Ronald Bronstein's powerful performance in Daddy Longlegs I felt almost duty-bound to check out his directorial debut Frownland (2007). While the latter movie shares much in common with the former, Frownland is to be approached with extreme caution. It's a plot-less trip into hellish despair. If that, and an intimate portrait of low-rent New York City, sounds like a great way to spend 106 minutes, then The Criterion Collection has your ticket.

Frownland has roots in the indie film-making scene of New York, from the '80s on up. Bronstein crafts a movie that appears so off-the-cuff, one imagines that any old person might just accidentally have made it. We get the chance to peer in on the life (if you can call it that) of Keith, as assayed by Dore Mann. Keith has something like a j...Read the entire review

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The Infernal Affairs Trilogy (Blu-ray) Blu-ray https://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/review/75445 Mon, 28 Nov 2022 23:38:29 UTC Highly Recommended

The Movies:


There was a period of time where the Infernal Affairs Trilogy, debuting on domestic Blu-ray from The Criterion Collection, was reasonably well known thanks to the fact that it was the inspiration for Martin Scorcesse's The Departed. For those not in the know, Scorcese's critically acclaimed film is a remake of these three pictures that came out of Hong Kong a few years before. If Scorcese's movie gets a few interested film buffs to check out the trilogy, so much the better as they really are excellent films.


Here's a look at how the movies play out.


Infernal Affairs:


When the first movie begins, Chan Wing Yan (Tony Leung) and Lau Kin Ming (Andy Lau) are training to become police officers. Chan Wing Yan is kicked out of the academy so that he can be used as an undercover operative and before you know it, he's working as a mol...Read the entire review

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Daddy Longlegs (The Criterion Collection) (Blu-ray) Blu-ray https://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/review/75434 Fri, 11 Nov 2022 17:44:54 UTC Highly Recommended

Daddy Longlegs:

The Safdie brothers' (Uncut Gems) first jointly directed full-length picture, Daddy Longlegs (2009) seems designed to create intense anxiety in parents and those without kids alike. Semi-autobiographical elements ferry this mostly naturalistic, feckless drama through its uncomfortable paces, creating a lasting, troubling, heart-felt imprint.

Things start oddly as Lenny (Ronald Bronstein) appears to have some difficulty ordering a hot-dog at a New York deli. He wants a foot-long, which they don't have, so he settles for two regular dogs; communicating his choice of toppings seems cumbersome too. After dropping his dogs on the grass in the park, he lies down laughing. Who is this moron? He sure doesn't seem to fit into the world, it would seem by intent. Stakes are raised uncomfortably high only when he...Read the entire review

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Arsenic and Old Lace - Criterion Collection (Blu-ray) Blu-ray https://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/review/75428 Mon, 07 Nov 2022 23:18:02 UTC Recommended


(Too) loosely adapted from the 1941 hit play by Joseph Kesserling, Frank Capra's movie version of Arsenic and Old Lace, filmed later in 1941 but contractually not released until September 1944, is fondly regarded by critics and audiences. It even ranked #30 on the American Film Institute's list of "100 Years...100 Laughs," but the movie is almost a complete bust. Frenetic instead of funny, it offers a small handful of amusing performances, but Cary Grant is downright awful in the lead, and the adaptation is wrongheaded in myriad ways, at times perversely so. Its mostly positive reputation seems to at least partly stem from the reputations of Capra, the cast, and the fact that Kesserling's play is still among the most popular among community theater groups and high schools, and probably therefore more frequently seen by audiences normally averse to old black-and-white Hollywood movies.

...Read the entire review

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Cure - Criterion Collection (Blu-ray) Blu-ray https://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/review/75427 Fri, 04 Nov 2022 22:20:31 UTC Highly Recommended

The Movie:

Written and directed by Kiyoshi Kurosawa, 1997\'s Cure is set in the director\'s native Japan and is centered around a detective with the local police department named Kenichi Takabe (Kōji Yakusho). His job is stressful and his home life less than ideal, as his wife (Anna Nakagawa) has some mental health issues.

When a string of murders occurs, each of the victims with a giant letter \"X\" carved into their neck, he\'s tasked with trying to find and apprehend the killer. If that weren\'t enough for him to deal with, the killer seems to be a different person each time, with the presumed murderers caught shortly after each killing, right near the location of each respective murder, each one confessing to the killing but without an obvious motive of explanation. To get to the bottom of this, Takabe teams up with Sakuma (Tsuyoshi Ujiki), a psychologist, and they soo...Read the entire review

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La Llorona - Criterion Collection (Blu-ray) Blu-ray https://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/review/75426 Thu, 03 Nov 2022 19:11:48 UTC Recommended

The Movie:


Directed by Jayro Bustamante, who co-wrote with Lisandro Sanchez, 2019's La Llorona introduces us to General Enrique Monteverde (Julio Díaz). Early in the film, he is on trial, accused of masterminding the genocide of the Mayan natives of Guatemala during his stint as the country's president in the early eighties. Monteverde is, at this point in his life, an old man and he is not in the best of health. He shares a home with Carmen (Margarita Kenefic), his wife, their daughter Natalia (Sabrina De La Hoz) and their granddaughter Sara (Ayla-Elea Hurtado). A maid named Valeriana (María Telón) lives on set as well, as do a few other servants. The Monteverde does not want for money, they live a very comfortable life, at least in terms of material possessions and wealth.


As the start date of the trial looms heavy over Enrique's head, he starts hearing the sou...Read the entire review

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Lost Highway - Criterion Collection 4K Ultra HD Blu-ray (Blu-ray) Blu-ray https://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/review/75420 Fri, 28 Oct 2022 17:17:50 UTC Highly Recommended

The Movie:


A decidedly bizarre mix of horror, noir and surrealism, David Lynch's 1997 picture Lost Highway begins with the story of a man named Fred (Bill Pullman) and his wife Renee (Patricia Arquette). He's a saxophone player in an avant-garde jazz band. They share a nice house together in Hollywood. Things seem okay on the surface but Fred has strange nightmares and doesn't seem to quite trust Renee, even when he's having sex with her. Their life gets rocked a bit when, one morning, she finds an envelope outside containing a video tape. They put it into their VCR and realize that it's footage someone shot of the exterior of their home. They're weirded out, but don't panic. When a second tape is delivered and shows not just the exterior but the interior too, as well as footage of them sleeping, they call the cops who can find no evidence of anyone trying to break in.

Read the entire review

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Martin Scorsese\'s World Cinema Project No. 4 (The Criterion Collection) (Blu-ray) Blu-ray https://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/review/75416 Thu, 27 Oct 2022 17:20:10 UTC DVD Talk Collector Series


Unlike 99% of reviews of DVDs and Blu-ray discs I write here, Martin Scorsese's World Cinema Project No. 4 is a boxed set most of us will approach with virtually no frame of reference. The six feature films in the set emanate from Angola (though made with French money and shot in Congo), Argentina, Iran, Hungary, India, and Cameroon. I've seen other Indian and Iranian films, but am hardly an expert of those country's cinemas, and never before experienced movies from the other four that I can remember. I'm also unfamiliar with the filmmakers behind them save Hungary's Andre DeToth, who eventually had an extensive career in Hollywood.

On the other hand, all but one of the films offer stories with universal themes of family relationships, love relationships, and most deal with issues of economic class and people in positions of power exploiting the nearly powerless. And even if one goes i...Read the entire review

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Exotica / Calendar (Criterion Collection) (Blu-ray) Blu-ray https://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/review/75403 Tue, 11 Oct 2022 18:06:24 UTC DVD Talk Collector Series


Atom Egoyan's Exotica (1994) is a puzzle film of sorts, in some respects similar to Paul Thomas Anderson's later film Magnolia (1999). Both pictures introduce a gaggle of people midstream in their lives. They mostly appear disconnected from one another, and initially it's unclear what we in the audience are supposed to make of them. How these disparate characters eventually converge is part of what makes both films interesting, but that's not really what either is about. Nevertheless, it's best to approach these films cold, with no knowledge of what their stories are about ahead of time. You definitely don't, for instance, want to visit Wikipedia's entry on Exotica beforehand. While its plot synopsis is undeniably accurate, it's from the post-viewing perspective that gives absolutely everything away.

Exotica received rave reviews and did good (arthous...Read the entire review

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Le Corbeau (Blu-ray) Blu-ray https://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/review/75391 Tue, 04 Oct 2022 15:29:42 UTC Highly Recommended

The Movie:


Directed by Henri-Georges Clouzot in 1943 from a script that the director co-wrote with Louis Chavance, Le Corbeau (or The Raven in English), was quite controversial upon its release in France but has since been properly recognized as the excellent piece of challenging filmmaking that it is.


The story takes place in a French town dubbed "anywhere" in the movie. Hhere, someone identifying themselves only as 'Le Corbeau' is sending scathing letters to Doctor Remy Germain (Pierre Fresnay) of carrying out a clandestine affair with a woman named Laura Vorzet (Micheline Francey), the beautiful, and much younger, wife of one Doctor Michel Vorzet (Pierre Larquey), an aging psychiatrist. On top of that, the writer also accuses Germain of discretely conducting abortions, an act which is very much agains the law. From here, the letters spread, the writer send...Read the entire review

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Sound of Metal (Blu-ray) Blu-ray https://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/review/75390 Tue, 04 Oct 2022 15:29:01 UTC Highly Recommended

The Movie:

When word of Sound of Metal first came out I was a little skeptical of the film, not for what it was about but it was in that vein of films designed to win a bunch of awards, led by its charismatic, capable star from Rogue One in Riz Ahmed. But the old guy who likes heavy metal was more inclined to give Sound of Metal a try and brother, I'm glad I did.

Darius Marder had previously written The Place Beyond the Pines but Sound was his directing debut, co-writing the script with Pines director Derek Cianfrance (Blue Valentine). Sound gives us Ahmed as Ruben, a drummer in a heavy metal band who travels with singer Lou (Olivia Cooke, Read the entire review

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Devil in a Blue Dress: Criterion Collection (Blu-ray) Blu-ray https://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/review/75371 Tue, 20 Sep 2022 17:09:01 UTC Highly Recommended

The Movie:

In a Q&A featurette on Criterion's new Blu-ray release of Devil in a Blue Dress, screenwriter-director Carl Franklin answers an audience question about the possibility of other films featuring the lead character of Ezekiel "Easy" Rawlins. He says that all of novelist Walter Mosley's Rawlins books had been optioned at the time the film was made with an eye toward building a Denzel Washington-fronted franchise, but a regime change at TriStar Pictures killed that idea quick. Presumably, a lack of studio support is part of why the film underperformed at the box office back in 1995 as well.

It's a rotten shame, because Devil in a Blue Dress is a hardboiled treat with Washington in lean and mean fighting form, supported by a ridicul...Read the entire review

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Buck and the Preacher (The Criterion Collection) (Blu-ray) Blu-ray https://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/review/75367 Tue, 13 Sep 2022 17:30:58 UTC Recommended


Teaming Sidney Poitier and Harry Belafonte for a Western focusing on the still largely-untold story of former black slaves in the American West sounds irresistible and seemingly unmissable. Unfortunately, Buck and the Preacher (1972), co-executive produced by the actors and directed by Poitier, isn't very good.

Working from this premise, it would seem the filmmakers could have gone in one of two directions: a classical Western that just happened to star African-American actors, or a more probing, enlightening and historically accurate film about freed slaves and their struggles in the American west. Instead, the undernourished, almost sketchy script by Ernest Kinoy, primarily a television scribe of the Paddy Chayefsky/Rod Serling generation, tries to have it both ways, failing to satisfy on either count. Poitier, who took over the direction (his debut as such) after firing Joseph Sarge...Read the entire review

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Hotel du Nord: Criterion Collection (Blu-ray) Blu-ray https://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/review/75364 Wed, 07 Sep 2022 16:17:22 UTC Highly Recommended

The Movie:

Marcel Carné, the French director known for the "poetic realism" of films like Children of Paradise, is considered a foundational filmmaker in his homeland -- and a relative "deep cut" in the States. His 1938 film Hôtel du Nord is just now seeing its first U.S. disc release, courtesy of The Criterion Collection (DVD Talk reviewed a Region 2 DVD version back in 2006).

Unlike the bookending Carné films, Port of Shadows (1938) and Le Jour Se Lève (1939) -- both of which Criterion previously released on DVD --, Hôtel du Nord was not w...Read the entire review

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Raging Bull (Criterion Collection) (Blu-ray) Blu-ray https://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/review/75350 Tue, 23 Aug 2022 16:01:44 UTC DVD Talk Collector Series

THE FILM:

Positively electrifying if occasionally exhausting, Martin Scorsese's Raging Bull is based on American boxer Jake LaMotta's memoir and features a career-defining performance from Robert De Niro as the deeply flawed athlete. There is plenty of drama surrounding "the Bronx Bull," and Paul Schrader was called on to revise Mardik Martin's original screenplay after United Artists balked. Scorsese was initially reluctant to make the film, but related to LaMotta's troubles after struggling with drug addiction and being encouraged by De Niro and others to kick his cocaine habit. Before shooting began, Scorsese and De Niro made further revisions to the script, but remain uncredited due to writer's guild guidelines. Then unknown actor Joe Pesci was cast as Jake's brother Joey LaMotta, and Pesci suggested Cathy Moriarty to play Jake's second wife Vickie. The film may b...Read the entire review

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Okja: Criterion Collection (Blu-ray) Blu-ray https://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/review/75349 Mon, 22 Aug 2022 15:00:32 UTC Recommended

The Movie:

Bong Joon-Ho's Okja could almost pass for a children's film for a long chunk of its runtime. There's a forty-minute section of the film in which tween Mija (An Seo Hyun) hangs out with her giant superpig pal Okja in the enveloping forest near her family's humble mountaintop farm. Thanks to seamlessly rendered digital effects, Okja looks like a living, breathing giant creature that also has the sweetness of a family pet. This section of the film is not without drama -- Okja saves Mija from falling off a cliff at one point -- but it has an idyllic quality that feels almost like a fairy tale.

Well, let's not forget that director Bong is the same filmmaker who wrought the dark comic violence of Read the entire review

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Shaft (1971) (Criterion Collection) (Blu-ray) Blu-ray https://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/review/75340 Wed, 17 Aug 2022 15:05:34 UTC DVD Talk Collector Series

THE FILM:

Gordon Parks' 1971 crime thriller Shaft really hooks you from its opening credits; as leather coat-clad Richard Roundtree struts to the sounds of Isaac Hayes, dodging traffic and shooting the shit with street vendors, you cannot help but smile. Who is this cool man? He is the black private dick that's a sex machine to all the chicks; he is Shaft. After decades of treating black characters like caricatures, the movie industry began to change. Shaft began what film critics would label "Blaxploitation cinema;" a nod to the violent and sex-heavy films popular in 1960s midnight screenings. Some black organizations were critical of Shaft and the films it inspired, branding it exploitative in glorifying violence and gangsterism. Others celebrated the film for its minority characters who felt like actual people instead of sanitized, offensive stereoty...Read the entire review

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Summertime: Criterion Collection (Blu-ray) Blu-ray https://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/review/75319 Fri, 29 Jul 2022 23:39:52 UTC Recommended

The Movie:

Director David Lean has been quoted as saying that the 1955 romance Summertime is his favorite film that he made. While watching the film for this review, I had one roommate walk through the room and comment that David Lean is the most boring filmmaker he has encountered. Meanwhile, another roommate -- a fan of Lean's -- sat with me and got gradually antsier as the film went on, announcing at the end that Summertime might be the worst film from a major filmmaker he had ever seen.

I mention this up top just because context in filmgoing is important. My personal enjoyment of Summertime was hit-and-miss -- I certainly am nowhere near as enthusiastic as Lean about this film -- but maybe this particular viewing influenced my r...Read the entire review

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Rouge: Criterion Collection (Blu-ray) Blu-ray https://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/review/75309 Wed, 20 Jul 2022 20:35:00 UTC Highly Recommended

The Movie:

Originally released in 1987, Rouge is the third film from Hong Kong filmmaker Stanley Kwan (Center Stage). It's a love story that is swooningly romantic at first blush but Rouge leaves a decidedly unsentimental aftertaste.

Anita Mui stars as Fleur, a 1930's courtesan with a quiet grace and elegance that catches the eye of middle-class playboy Chan Chen-Peng (Leslie Cheung). Their romance is sensually wrought in teasing close-ups and fluid tracking shots. Chen-Peng (often referred to as "Twelfth Master" due to his family rank) is bold with Fleur but her experience gives her the subtle upper hand. This dynamic is perfectly captured in a moment where Twelfth Master br...Read the entire review

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Walker: Criterion Collection (Blu-ray) Blu-ray https://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/review/75294 Tue, 28 Jun 2022 22:55:30 UTC Recommended

The Movie:

Walker (1987) is the last film to date that director Alex Cox has made with a major Hollywood studio, and one suspects that neither party is all that torn up about it. Cox, who made his name with Repo Man and Sid & Nancy, is the kind of unrepentant rebel whose point-of-view makes for wild and challenging films but not often a lot of money. (Of his lesser-known independent productions, I recommend the Beckettian travelogue Three Businessmen.)

One wonders what exactly Universal Pictures thought it was getting when it greenlit Walker, ...Read the entire review

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The Worst Person in the World (The Criterion Collection) (Blu-ray) Blu-ray https://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/review/75290 Fri, 24 Jun 2022 15:57:15 UTC Recommended

The Movie:

One could see The Worst Person in the World be something that American comedienne Jenny Slate headline (and for a minute, that's what I thought it was!), because it's a film that seems to reach broadly in some of the things in it that it's lead does. And as a continuing part of Criterion's pivot to contemporary films, having a chance to see this Norwegian gem proved to be an interesting proposition.

Joachim Trier co-wrote and directed the film, the final part of his "Oslo Trilogy" which included Reprise and Oslo, August 31. The worst person in this world is Julie (Renate Reinsve), a young Oslo woman whose careers and relationships are shown through the years. Whether it's the writer Axsel (Anders Danielsen Lie, 22 July) or the modest Eivind (...Read the entire review

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The Tales of Hoffman (Criterion) (Blu-ray) Blu-ray https://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/review/75289 Wed, 22 Jun 2022 16:45:52 UTC DVD Talk Collector Series


It came as a bit of a shock to learn that Orson Welles detested the movies of Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger (as told to Henry Jaglom in My Lunches with Orson). You'd think if any American filmmaker would appreciate the artistry of this producer-writer-director powerhouse duo, it would be Welles. Why he disliked their work so much I cannot say, but I have a hunch Welles' distaste might have stemmed from the team's "composed" films: The Red Shoes (1948), The Tales of Hoffman (1951), and Oh…Rosalinda!! (1955).

During the 1940s and ‘50s, a handful of very talented filmmakers tried fusing the classical arts with cinema. Walt Disney famously attempted a merging of classical music and animation with Fantasia (1940), while Gene Kelly merged classical dance in films like Vincente Minnelli's An American in Paris (1951) and especially the Kell...Read the entire review

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Round Midnight: Criterion Collection (Blu-ray) Blu-ray https://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/review/75287 Mon, 20 Jun 2022 22:50:29 UTC Highly Recommended

The Movie:

Bertrand Tavernier's 1986 film 'Round Midnight is one of the best movies set in the world of jazz music. Legendary tenor saxophonist Dexter Gordon plays a fictional amalgam of Lester Young and Bud Powell, in a loosely told story inspired by the journals of illustrator Francis Paudras. Paudras was a Parisian jazz fanatic who helped keep pianist Bud Powell afloat in the late '50s, financially and spiritually.

Dexter Gordon so fully embodies his character, called Dale Turner in the film, that numerous reviews over the years assume that Gordon's Oscar-nominated performance here is just the jazzman playing himself in a 1950s context. As the interviews on the Blu-ray make abundantly clear, Gordon does a seamless job of embodying the physicality ...Read the entire review

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Pink Flamingos (The Criterion Collection) (Blu-ray) Blu-ray https://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/review/75285 Mon, 20 Jun 2022 22:50:15 UTC Highly Recommended

The Movie:

Probably John Waters' most notorious film, 1972's Pink Flamingos stars Divine as herself, hiding out under the pseudonym of Babs Johnson with her egg obsessed mother Edie (Edith Massey), her son Crackers (Danny Mills), and her friend Cotton (Mary Vivian Pearce). Divine has been dubbed the filthiest person alive, and it is a title she wears with pride as she and her 'family' live their life in a trailer in a remote part of Maryland.


When Connie (Mink Stole) and Raymond (David Lochary) Marble hear of Divine's title they set out to prove that they are, in fact, far filthier than she could ever hope to be. They send a woman named Cookie (Cookie Mueller) to infiltrate the Divine camp by sleeping with Crackers (and his chicken in a scene that has to be seen to be believed… unless you're a member of PETA) who returns to them with information on where Divine is hi...Read the entire review

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Miracle in Milan: Criterion Collection (Blu-ray) Blu-ray https://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/review/75278 Fri, 17 Jun 2022 19:21:23 UTC Highly Recommended

The Movie:

The comic fantasy Miracle in Milan (Miracolo a Milano) debuted in 1951, between director Vittorio De Sica and writer Cesare Zavattini's best-known films, Bicycle Thieves and Umberto D.. Miracle's subject matter and characters fit in with those acclaimed examples of Italian neorealism, but its tone is several dozen shades lighter.

Miracle in Milan is not the kind of film you'd expect when you hear it is set in a shantytown and peopled with many non-professional poor actors. It's part fairy tale-style fantasy and part Preston St...Read the entire review

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Mississippi Masala (The Criterion Collection) (Blu-ray) Blu-ray https://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/review/75272 Mon, 13 Jun 2022 17:14:48 UTC Rent It

The Movie:


Mira Nair's awkwardly structured by charming interracial romance Mississippi Masala once again emphasizes a fact that's blatantly obvious about America more than any other country: It's a melting pot full of various cultures, races, and faiths blending together, trying, and sometimes struggling, to find common ground when it comes to peace, understanding, and especially love.


Through the impeccable Chemistry between stars Sarita Choudry and Denzel Washington, it tells the romance between an Indian immigrant from Uganda named Mina and an African-American carpet cleaner named Demetrius. The two share a delightful meet-cute when Mina crashes into Demetrius' truck and a simple but passionate romance ensues.


The most captivating moments in Nair's film come during moments that have nothing to do with the plot or narrative conflict. It's the quiet moments between t...Read the entire review

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Chan Is Missing (The Criterion Collection) (Blu-ray) Blu-ray https://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/review/75273 Fri, 10 Jun 2022 21:40:38 UTC Highly Recommended

The Movie:


As an Immigrant to the USA, I can sympathize with the inner conflict that almost all immigrants have when it comes to living in the unique cultural melting pot that is this country. How much do we assimilate to American culture and leave our past identity behind? How many of us are immigrants, and how much is a citizen? And what does the concept of American culture mean anyway, when the point of the country is that it's made up of various different cultures and races that (hopefully) believe in an ideology of democracy and personal freedom?


The two protagonists of Wayne Wang's ultra low budget DIY 1982 noir/drama Chan is Missing, the comical uncle-nephew duo Jo (Wood Moy) and Steve (Marc Hayashi), meditate on these questions as they go on a wild goose chase across San Francisco's Chinatown, looking for their friend Chan who suddenly disappeared with the money meant for...Read the entire review

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Double Indemnity (The Criterion Collection) (Blu-ray) Blu-ray https://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/review/75267 Tue, 07 Jun 2022 19:27:03 UTC DVD Talk Collector Series

The Movie:

Having never consciously entered watching noir films before, this seemed like a good time as any to get into the one that so many deem the one that started the genre, the one that showed the way for scores of films since. And with Double Indemnity, Raymond Chandler's (Strangers on a Train) adaptation of James Cain's novel, directed by Billy Wilder (The Apartment), it's an interesting film to consume.

Walter (Fred MacMurray, Caine Mutiny) is an insurance salesman who meets Phyllis (Barbara Stanwyck, Ball of Fire), who he becomes enamored with. Phyllis gets a life insurance policy for her husband and convinces him to sign it, and eve...Read the entire review

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Miller's Crossing (Criterion Collection) (Blu-ray) Blu-ray https://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/review/75250 Tue, 24 May 2022 16:51:13 UTC Highly Recommended

THE FILM:

While I still call Blood Simple, Fargo and True Grit my favorite films by brothers Joel and Ethan Coen, Miller's Crossing is nipping at their tails. This excellent noir features an A-list cast in Gabriel Byrne, Marcia Gay Harden, John Turturro, J.E. Freeman and Albert Finney, and feels like a tribute to both the classic Warner Brothers gangster films of the 1930s and noir fiction from writers like James Ellroy and Raymond Chandler. Set during Prohibition in the 1920s, Miller's Crossing sees Tom Reagan (Byrne) serving as the close confidant to Irish gangster Leo O'Bannon (Finney), who denies his rival, Italian mobster Johnny Caspar (Jon Polito), the right to...Read the entire review

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Mr. Klein (The Criterion Collection) (Blu-ray) Blu-ray https://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/review/75246 Mon, 23 May 2022 20:26:41 UTC Recommended

The Movie:

Joseph Losey's Mr. Klein, from 1976, is a unique World War II film that focuses on those involved in a different aspect of the war.


Set in the Paris of 1942, Robert Klein (Alain Delon) is an art dealer who doesn't really have a problem with the way that the Germans, currently occupying France, are running things. He is not affected by their politics, and chooses not to care. In fact, things are going well for Klein. He seems to have it all: a slick apartment, a beautiful mistress and a well established art dealing business.


When the French government decides to turn on its Jewish population, many of the Jewish citizens quickly find themselves strapped for cash and needing to get out of the country. This puts Klein in the unique situation of being able to purchase their artwork at cut throat prices, knowing that they'll take whatever he offers them,...Read the entire review

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Love Jones: Criterion Collection (Blu-ray) Blu-ray https://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/review/75245 Thu, 19 May 2022 20:50:34 UTC Highly Recommended

The Movie:

The 1997 romance Love Jones occupies a unique cultural space, especially for African-American viewers. Far from a box office success upon release, it nonetheless has lived on as a perennial classic, with an accompanying soundtrack album that is as beloved as the film. At the time it hit theaters, Love Jones stood out as a '90s Black film that wasn't about crime or violence, and didn't prominently feature somebody tragically dying. (Hell, even the '90s stoner classic Friday has a bizarre amount of dramatic violence for a mostly breezy comedy.) A portrait of middle-class bohemia on the south side of Chicago, Love Jones has a shaggy hang-out vibe that is enticing eno...Read the entire review

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