VIDEO BLOG #99: “My Football Stunt” ““
This week, J.D. flashes back to an encounter with the football team, and we go behind-the-scenes of this sequence from episode 7×06, “My #1 Doctor”.
Download Scrubs Video Blog #99:
Large (560 x 420 – QuickTime – 38.49 MB)
Small (320 x 240 – QuickTime – 17.04 MB)
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Instead of manning-up and actually going the emotionally hard route of being outrightly rejected by publishers, I’m rejecting them first and allowing you to give my entire book a preview, let you read the whole thing or, if you like, download the whole damn thing at no cost. Download and read my first book “Thank You, Goodnight” for FREE.
How much is that franchise in the window?
I rode the Polar Express last night. While the obvious assumption here is that I dropped a fistful of acid and took a ride akin to experiencing the full color oddity that was Robert Zemeckis’ 2004 nascent, in some mindless circles, classic.
The experience itself could best be described as a mind scrambler for my four and almost-two year old. They had read the book enough times to associate the physical reality of the decked out, velvety train car with that of the book. I can’t imagine the conceit that led these kids to believe that what they were seeing and hearing was real could have been any worse than leading them to believe that Santa Claus is real (I apologize to my children publicly right now when they’re old enough to employ Google-Fu on their own) but there was something about the construction of the experience that I not only found intriguing but fairly shameless.
If I had any gumption or was paid any kind of money to actually put an effort to researching things for my column I would find out what division of Warner Bros. is responsible for the licensing/franchising of the POLAR EXPRESS “experience” but a cursory search of a real train ride near you that harnesses the story’s saccharine mythos yields this badly designed website in New Hampshire for the ride of a lifetime which ultimately led me to the official site for the POLAR EXPRESS train ride experience.
Taken from the website, the company leading the way for little boys and girls (and the parents, like me, who brought along a little Bailey’s) says:
Rail Events, Inc. has signed a license agreement with Warner Bros. Entertainment Inc. to license and help coordinate train ride events around the country based on the hit movie and award-winning book The Polar Expressâ„¢ written by Chris Van Allsburg.
Further, “Families are sure to enjoy their trip to the North Pole, complete with cocoa and cookies served on board the train, followed by a reading of The Polar Expressâ„¢ (ed. note – Love the TM usage) by Chris Van Allsburg.
Upon arrival at the North Pole, Santa will greet the children and each child will receive their own jingle bell, just like in the story. There will be caroling on board the train as your trip returns to the depot. This is a holiday ride the entire family will enjoy.” By all means, see if a train is departing soon from a depot near you.
Now, I would never begrudge anyone to make a dollar; I would support any half-baked idea to create a buck. (All hail and praise the assholes who plopped down any money for those Billy Bass animatronic plasticine fishes.) However, what I think irks me slightly is the co-optioning of the book as a means to extend a revenue stream a little further into the pockets of parents and rubes who don’t know better.
Por ejemplo, after you’re sold with a nauseating Josh Grobin, slo-mo trailer, resplendent with all the trickey that makes mothers weep at Hallmark commercials or that one coffee commercial where that douche Peter, with his perfect coif, comes home Christmas morning and brews up some Folgers, there’s a kind of sleaziness to the idea that there’s this ride you can pay money for that’s been endorsed by the suits at Warner Bros. and/or by some marketer.
I paid the price of admission and I have no problems with it. My kids loved it, they were happy, my wife was happy that they were happy and daddy was happy because of the fine people who make after dinner liqueurs; in some way I feel vindicated in sullying the experience by spiking my hot chocolate, and the hot chocolates of some fellow parents, with something taboo I shouldn’t have brought aboard. By the end of the night my kids had believed that Santa, indeed, visited the train car in which we chugged along for our hour and a half ride and were genuinely amazed by the uniqueness of the experience.
I think I’m going back again next year if it means I can spend a day or two extra with my family by ourselves.
At the end of my day I hate to be a part of some ancillary revenue stream of a movie studio that thinks nothing of pimping its properties out under the guise of it bringing families close together. Please. Warners would sooner enjoy my family being driven to divorce if it meant it could make a few more shareholders happy. I’m simply a cynical person when it comes to shameless marketing and plugging and the incessant push to consume the brand even further (Buy the book! Buy the movie! Buy a shirt or hat to commemorate the experience!) and I was honestly shocked as we drove away from the train station and didn’t see one mark on the jingle ball that every kid was given that would somehow let anyone who looked at know that this is was an Officially Branded Polar Express Jingle Ball. I guess that was the cynic in me.
I’m just happy my kids don’t yet know when they’re the unwitting audience of a Warner Brothers sales pitch.
Now, on to much more funny news: Pixar most definitely cribbed its plot for its newest film, WALL-E, from 1986’s SHORT CIRCUIT. After I made the accusation there was a curious letter that I received which I just had to share with the rest of the world that just sort of solidified the fact that I hope Fisher Stevens gets himself a good lawyer; it could be payday city.
“Chris,
So, as has been my Friday routine for many years now, I read your article while sitting at my desk & drinking my coffee…during which time, I probably should be working. More often than not, I’ll completely agree with your prognoses (on a side note, the notion that prognoses is the plural of prognosis, just seem grammatically incorrect… shouldn’t it be prognosises or prognosi?). Anyway, back to my point.
I was a little disappointed of your scathing review of Wall-E.
Although, I completely agree that it holds a not so subtle resemblance to Short Circuit, don’t consider this just another blatant rip-off from an industry who’s seemingly incapable of coming up with an original idea…look at is an homage to one of the late, great, bad, cheesy 80’s movies. Even though it starred Steve Gutenberg, Short Circuit gave every teenaged boy the opportunity so confirm that, yes indeed Ally Sheedy was hot and gave one last chance to see her before she disappeared into obscurity. If Wall-E can flash everybody in their 30’s to a simpler time when, unlike Paris Hilton & Britney Spears, pop culture icons had enough sense to keeps their drug abuse and sexual deviance behind closed doors, isn’t that a good thing?
All that said, I’m holding out hope that Wall-E is a box office blockbuster…’cause that can only encourage studios to rip-off…I mean, homages to more of the really bad 80’s movies, that although they had almost no artistic merit or any other redeeming qualities, were wildly entertaining. It’ll only be a matter of time before we see feature length, animated versions of Remo Williams, Tremors or Weekend at Bernie’s…and wouldn’t that make the world a better place?
Keep up the good work.”
The only portion of that letter I take umbrage with is the very resolute fact that if any red-blooded American tried to steal the story of Fred Ward’s greatest cinematic achievement there would be blood flowing in the street; it would be anarchy.
WALK HARD: THE DEWEY COX STORY (2007)
Director: Jake Kasdan
Cast: Jenna Fischer, John C. Reilly, Kristen Wiig, Tim Meadows, Angela Little Mackenzie, Matt Besser, David Krumholtz
Release: December 20, 2007
Synopsis: America loves Cox! But behind the music is the up-and-down-and-up-again story of a musician whose songs would change a nation. On his rock “˜n roll spiral, Cox sleeps with 411 women, marries three times, has 22 kids and 14 stepkids, stars in his own 70s TV show, collects friends ranging from Elvis to the Beatles to a chimp, and gets addicted to — and then kicks — every drug known to man… but despite it all, Cox grows into a national icon and eventually earns the love of a good woman — longtime backup singer Darlene (Jenna Fischer).
View Trailer:
* Large (QuickTime)
Prognosis: Negative. No.
Here’s the problem I have with this movie: there seems to be confusion on the part of either the filmmakers or the marketers. With only the trailer to go off of I can’t be sure whether this biopic that is a goof on biopics is going to be Zucker-like in nature or played for straight laughs. As it stands there seems like to be a lot of reaching going on in order to be funny or to essentially scream, “See what we’ve distilled from every single story about musicians”¦and how we’ve funnily poked fun of them!” I hate it when people want to club you over the head to make a point and that seems exactly like what’s happening here right from the beginning.
The 6 year old Dewey grabbing a guitar and with a faux voice singing the blues I think is supposed to make fun of the stories of musicians who say they’ve had it in them since they were little but even after we roll on this obvious gag the older Dewey making ladies strip their clothes, the priest who decries it and gets sucker punched for it, the guy puking from being overcome and the wife who plays the part of the Doubting Thomas (a common theme in the stories of people trying to make it big) is just grating for its obviousness.
They’re looking to lampoon these films but with Reilly’s character tongue flicking ice cream, his creation of a character that is oblivious and obnoxious, his protestation to his wife about walking hard (Ooh, his theme!) and his eventual demand to keep his monkey versus his kids just isn’t funny. I think it might play well to young men in their teens and twenties but they’re not useful for others, like me, who might want to have the comedy thrown at us in more subtle ways.
I mean, one of the best parts of this trailer is not Paul Rudd’s pathetic display of a character that just panders, but it’s Jack White’s appearance and talk about being able to chop a man in half with his hands that is amusing as all hell. He manages to be the greatest reason why this trailer just seems to be sticking its tongue in its cheek so much, being so ironic and making sure to wink at us as it does so, that it loses its ability to simply be funny.
The quicker we get to the end I think there is some redemption to be made of this movie. The aging Cox and his run ins with Patrick Duffy, his eventual Disco phase, the sad pitchman moment he has to go through, all these things add up to something for me that gives me a moment of pause. Yes, there could be all the aforementioned obviousness but if it can be smarter than that, if it can be more than just one of those SCARY MOVIE or NOT ANOTHER TEEN MOVIE flicks, if it can be more intelligent with its satire, there could be more hits than there could be misses; a mark of a great screwball comedy.
Our holiday contest-a-palooza continues as, in conjunction with Hasbro, we’re giving away a pair of SPIDER-MAN 3 ULTIMATE Web BLASTERS to 2 lucky winners.
Contest ends at midnight EST on Thursday, December 13th.
No member of Quick Stop Entertainment or their immediate families may enter.
No Purchase necessary to win.
Must be 18 years of age or older to enter.
All submitted entries must be received by 11:59pm EST on Thursday, December 13th.
The winner must allow 4-6 weeks after notification of win to receive the product.
The web. It’s a big place, full of plenty of distractions ““ some funny, some informative, some ludicrous, some disturbing, some inane, some profound. Each and every weekday, we present links to a few of our favorite finds”¦
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Have a THINGAMABOB? Send it in!
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Some people hang the holly, others decorate the tree, and a few even terrorize the neighborhood with off-key caroling.
Not us.
Here at Quick Stop Entertainment, we’re celebrating the holiday season by giving a little something back to you, our readers (you know who you are).
Every weekday leading up to the holiday break, we’ve got uber-exclusive gifts provided by a whole range of artists, actors, comedians, and studios. One a day, straight from them to you (and you can check out last year’s fun here).
Ain’t that cool?
Today, we’ve got an exclusive piece from Jonathan Katz.
Besides his stand-up career, Katz was the star of Comedy Central’s award-winning Dr. Katz: Professional Therapist (the complete box set of which is currently available on DVD) and is a regular contributor to The Next Big Thing radio show on NPR. His first album, Caffeinated, is also available, and he has a regular podcast at www.WKATZ.com. You can visit him on the Web via his official site, www.jonathankatz.com.
Download Jonathan Katz’s Holiday Havoc 2007 Piece:
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Check out the rest of this year’s “Holiday Havoc” HERE
Our holiday contest-a-palooza continues as, in conjunction with Sony Home Video, we’re giving away a five (5) copies of the Steven Seagal actioner URBAN JUSTICE on DVD.
Contest ends at midnight EST on Wednesday, December 12th.
No member of Quick Stop Entertainment or their immediate families may enter.
No Purchase necessary to win.
Must be 18 years of age or older to enter.
All submitted entries must be received by 11:59pm EST on Wednesday, December 12th.
The winner must allow 4-6 weeks after notification of win to receive the product.
The web. It’s a big place, full of plenty of distractions ““ some funny, some informative, some ludicrous, some disturbing, some inane, some profound. Each and every weekday, we present links to a few of our favorite finds”¦
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Have a THINGAMABOB? Send it in!
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Some people hang the holly, others decorate the tree, and a few even terrorize the neighborhood with off-key caroling.
Not us.
Here at Quick Stop Entertainment, we’re celebrating the holiday season by giving a little something back to you, our readers (you know who you are).
Every weekday leading up to the holiday break, we’ve got uber-exclusive gifts provided by a whole range of artists, actors, comedians, and studios. One a day, straight from them to you (and you can check out last year’s fun here).
Ain’t that cool?
Today, we’ve got a special gift from actor/writer/comedian Rick Moranis. Unless you’ve been living in a cave, you’ll know Rick from SCTV (where he co-created the legendary MacKenzie Brothers with Dave Thomas), Ghostbusters, Honey I Shrunk The Kids, and many more flicks through the years (including a guilty fave of mine, My Blue Heaven).
Rick has provided us with an exclusive track from his album (yes, album!) The Agoraphobic Cowboy.
Before you go thinking it’s some comedy album ““ it’s not. Yes, many of the songs are funny and the wordplay definitely comes from a brilliant comic mind, but it’s more in the vein of Randy Newman or Harry Nilsson ““ and trust me, that’s strong praise. With a country flair and a solid backing band, Moranis has recorded an album that never becomes kitsch or a novelty, but stands on its own two feet as a legitimately enjoyable listen. For more information, check out his official website at www.RickMoranis.com.
Download Rick Moranis’ “Nine More Gallons“:
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Check out the rest of this year’s “Holiday Havoc” HERE
For those who find journeying to our message boards to comment on our articles, interviews, features, columns, and more simply too much work, we’ve opened up comments on all of our stories (including our archives).
You’ll find the comment form at the bottom of every story… Have at it!
…But fucking behave or we’ll squash you like bugs.
-Ken Plume
Editor-in-Chief /Poobah
Everyone – good guys and bad guys alike – need their posse. They need a cadre of dudes around them to protect and guide, otherwise they end up like Britney. And nobody wants that.
In the original trilogy (and you know which trilogy I’m talking about without my having to say it, so don’t act so puzzled), Emperor Palpatine has these cool, deadly looking red robed guards. Now, it has to be a bit of a bummer being this guy’s guard, since he could clearly kick your ass with his little finger, but at least you get to wear the cool red robe.
In later films, which are actually earlier stories, Palpatine was just a lowly Senator. His guards were the guards of all the Senate as well, appropriately called Senate Guards (rather than Royal Guards). They dressed in blue robes with a slightly different helmet. When Sidious rose to power, becoming Emperor, he gradually phased them out with the red version, and renamed the group.
If you have any questions or comments, just drop me a line at mwc@mwctoys.com. On to the review!
Royal Guard mini-busts from Gentle Giant
Gentle Giant produced a whopping 10,000 of the guards, but split it up into red ones and blue ones. The red, classic look is the majority of the run, with the blue version put in as a chase. I’m not sure of the actual numbers, but it looks like there was a blue for every two or three red, similar to what we’ve seen with some of the early Clonetrooper color variations.
Packaging – ***
These come in the usual, bland, black packaging that we’ve seen dictated out of Lucasfilm for awhile now. On the upside though, they have windows to see the contents, and those nifty GG baseball card style Certificates of Authenticity. On an interesting side note, they used the exact same base foam shell for both busts, even though only the red has the removable weapon.
Sculpting – ***1/2
While neither of these are extremly complex, it’s not really the fault of Gentle Giant. On certain characters in the past, I’ve complained about GG’s lack of texturing, but here it makes complete sense. These costumes always appear very smooth, very clean, and very ominous. The outfit itself lacks detail by design, so complaining about the smooth robes and helmet would be a tad disengenious.
Other key aspects are right on target, like the scale of the helmeted heads to the body, arms and hands, and the stoic poses. Put a couple of the red guys behind your Emperor bust, and a couple of the blue behind the Palpatine bust, and you’ll have an excellent display.
It’s worth noting here that the weapon on the Senate Guard is part of the permenant sculpt and is not removable. However, the majority of the weapon and left hand on the Royal Guard comes as a separate attachment, held tightly in place with magnets. It stays in plce quite well, and is much easier to get lined up and attached than some of the other recent busts.
Paint – ***1/2
Like the sculpt, the paint is going to be pretty basic on these. Lots of red or blue, a little black, and a dash here or there of some other color with the weapons perhaps.
The paint work is extremely clean, and to make up for the lack of detail, they used a nice high gloss finish on the helmets, and a matte finish on the robes. This does an excellent job of setting the two apart, and adding visual pop to the otherwise consistent color.
Design – ***1/2
While neither of these busts is in a particularly dynamic pose, that fits the characters perfectly. Like the guard at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier or Buckingham Palace, these guys were stoic bordering on statue. They made for nice set dressing, and added a bit of ‘royal’ to the look of the Senate (and later to the Emperor), but they weren’t men of action in the films. Creating a bust like this, where only the upper body is visible, in some sort of extreme action pose wouldn’t have fit the character well. Also, since the main display option is as a guard(s) to a Palpatine mini-bust in one form or another, an action pose would have made that impossible.
Value – red **1/2; blue **
The busts will run you the usual $45 each or so, except if you’re trying to get a Blue version. Since these were the smaller run, retailers had little choice but to either charge more, or set up package deals where you purchase two reds and you can also buy a blue at the normal cost.
Things to Watch Out For –
Not much. While the weapon on the Royal Guard is held very tightly by the magnets, I still wouldn’t carry him around or handle him without one hand keeping it savely in place.
Overall – ***1/2
Gentle Giant’s track record with the monsters and masked characters in their Star Wars mini-bust line has been extremely good, certainly better than the overall quality of the human likenesses. These two continue that tradition, and will make an excellent addition to your collection. However, if you don’t already have the Emperor or Senator Palpaltine mini-busts, you will most likely be less inclined to take the plunge on buying one or more Guards.
Where to Buy –
There are plenty of great online options:
– the best deal around is at Urban-Collector, at least if you’re looking for both red and blue. You can buy them as a pair for $89. And if you’re just looking for the red, he’s just $37!
– Andrew’s Toyz has a slightly higher price than some on just the red – $45 – but you can get a good price on the blue if you buy him as part of a set of three, two reds and one blue, for $135.
– Amazing Toyz has a great price on the red at $40, or you can get the red AND blue together as a set for $120.
– CornerStoreComics has just the red for $42, or the red AND a blue for $120 as a set.
– Dark Shadow Collectibles is all out of the blue but has the red for $42.00
– Alter Ego has just the red version, available for $42.50
Related Liniks –
Other reviews include the Jawas,
Dengar,
Zuckuss, Chewbacca and Darth Maul, Jedi Luke, Qui-Gon Jinn, Palpatine and Skiff Lando
Our holiday contest-a-palooza continues as, in conjunction with Fox Home Video, we’re giving away a copy of the new direct-to-DVD, brand-spankin’ new FUTURAMA movie, BENDER’S BIG SCORE.
Contest ends at midnight EST on Tuesday, December 11th.
No member of Quick Stop Entertainment or their immediate families may enter.
No Purchase necessary to win.
Must be 18 years of age or older to enter.
All submitted entries must be received by 11:59pm EST on Tuesday, December 11th.
The winner must allow 4-6 weeks after notification of win to receive the product.
The web. It’s a big place, full of plenty of distractions ““ some funny, some informative, some ludicrous, some disturbing, some inane, some profound. Each and every weekday, we present links to a few of our favorite finds”¦
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Have a THINGAMABOB? Send it in!
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It’s that time of year again, when sites the web-over compile helpful holiday shopping lists to guide you into the deepest, darkest pits of retail with a map that will hopefully get you out alive. Here now, without further ado, is the 2007 Quick Stop Holiday Shopping Guide (and if you see anything you like, support Quick Stop by clicking through the links and order from that fine online emporium, Amazon.com)…
If you’ve never heard of the UK quiz program QI, you’re missing out on one of the funniest “educational” shows ever devised (the devisee being creator/producer John Lloyd, formerly of Blackadder, Not The Nine O’Clock News, and Spitting Image). The key to QI (which stands for “Quite Interesting”) is the central tenet of its philosophy – it’s not always being correct that counts, but interesting (and funny). The interesting nature of a given piece of information spurs conversation and debate, eventually leading round to the learning said informational nugget. Did you know that the Earth has more than one moon, for example? Or that otters kill crocodiles? Airing on BBC2 (and currently in its 4th season), it’s hosted by Stephen Fry and features a rotating panel of four comedians (one of which is mainstay Alan Davies) – and it’s one of the most hilarious shows I’ve ever seen… Honestly, you’ll laugh as much as you learn, and I still hold out hope a network in the US is smart enough to pick the show up uncut (Hello, Comedy Central! Hello, Discovery Channel! Hello, PBS! Somebody!). Until then, you can grab a copy of both the first (A Quite Interesting Game) and second interactive QI DVD games – the newly-released sequel, Strictly Come Duncing – (Warner Home Video, DVD-£18.99 each), and a 2-disc, feature-laden DVD set of the first season (2 Entertain, Not Rated, DVD-£19.99)… all three of which are available only for Region 2, so make sure you have a Region Free player. For those in the US, the very first QI Book of General Ignorance (Faber & Faber, $19.95 SRP) is finally available for those in North America, and it’s a brilliant tome which collects much of the interesting information featured in the first four seasons into one handy volume. For those in the UK (and bright, industrious Americans who know how to use the internet, HINT HINT), the QI Book Of Animal Ignorance (Faber & Faber, £12.99) and the inaugural QI Annual (Faber & Faber, £12.99) are available and make the perfect holiday gift. By all means, learn what all the hubbub is about (and stop by the official QI site at www.QI.com).
I’m not quite sure what all the hubub was about regarding the star of Pixar’s latest cartoon opus, Ratatouille (Walt Disney, Rated G, DVD-$29.99 SRP). Some seemed to think that it was a massive risk to do a story about a rat who has aspirations to be a master chef, and that somehow the sight of this loveably designed (some would say Muppety) rat – Remy – in a kitchen environment would be a turn-off to audiences. Those people are fools. Director Brad Bird took Jan Pinkava’s unique idea and crafted an exciting, beautiful, and funny flick that proudly upholds Pixar’s winning streak. Bonus features include a brand new short (Remy & Emile in Your Friend The Rat), deleted scenes, a behind-the-scenes featurette, and the theatrical short Lifted. Sadly, there’s no audio commentary.
If you’re still in the mood for more Pixar this holiday season, then you’ll probably want to pick up the Pixar Short Films Collection (Walt Disney, Not Rated, DVD-$29.99 SRP). As its title clearly indicates, it’s a collection of all the shorts that Pixar has produced to date – The Adventures of Andre & Wally B, Luxo Jr., Red’s Dream, Tin Toy, Knick Knack, Geri’s Game, For The Birds, Mike’s New Car, Boundin’, Jack-Jack Attack, One Man Band, Mater And The Ghostlight, and Lifted – plus audio commentaries, a featurette on the history of Pixar’s shorts program, and more.
Put all the visions of the horrible live action version of Alvin & The Chipmunks by picking up some classic Chipmunk tunes courtesy of a newly remastered and expanded edition of Alvin & The Chipmunks: Greatest Hits – Still Squeaky After All These Years (Capitol, $14.98 SRP). And – since this is the holiday season – there’s a brand new edition of Christmas With The Chipmunks (Capitol, $13.98 SRP) to pick up at the same time.
Another holiday perennial – Vince Guaraldi’s jazzy soundtrack to A Charlie Brown Christmas (Fantasy, $14.98 SRP) – has been remastered. Slowly but surely, everything that’s been recorded will be remastered – mark my words. In addition to the album’s original dozen tracks, this re-release features an additional quartet of alternate takes.
While J.K. Rowling may have finished her massive epic of Potter & pals, those seeking to get their Harry fix with some choice collectibles will want to browse – and probably drop most of their paycheck – at the Noble Collection website. As the official prop replica purveyors of the Harry Potter film franchise, they’ve got a ton of materials that will help you get your geek on – including wand reproductions ($35.00-$45.00 each), a Gringott’s Bank coin set ($29.50), a Gryffindor house scarf ($65.00), Hermione’s Time Turner ($49.00)… Really, they’ve got just about everything you could possibly want – either for yourself or as a fantastic gift for the Potterphile in your life. For the younger kids, there’s an illuminating version of Harry’s wand ($39.50). Heck, they even have a reproduction of Harry’s glasses ($55.00), if you want to build your own high quality ensemble for next Halloween!
Last year, there was a chance that the Mouse House’s beloved line of collector-friendly Walt Disney Treasures DVD releases were going to be discontinued… despite the fact that they had begun releasing The Chronological Donald (Duck, of course) as part of the series, and had only gotten two of the four volumes out the door. After a fan outcry, Disney has decided there’s life in the line yet, and this holiday season brings a trio of new releases – The Chronological Donald: Volume 3, Disneyland: Secrets, Stories, & Magic, and The Adventures Of Oswald The Lucky Rabbit (Walt Disney, Not Rated, DVD-$32.99 SRP each). Leonard Maltin returns as compere, and each volume sports the usual complement of featurettes.
Over the years, Canada has gifted the world with many a comedy legend ““ most of them, in fact, were in the much-beloved SCTV. Thanks to SCTV and the aggravation of fulfilling Canada’s Canadian content rules, Dave Thomas and Rick Moranis created the uber-Canadian McKenzie Brothers, Bob & Doug ““ fans of back bacon, bear claws, toques, and beer. They were also the hosts of the improvised “Great White North” segments that became a cultural phenomenon in the US ““ and also in the Canadian homeland they lampooned. Airing on the CBC, Bob & Doug McKenzie’s Two-Four Anniversary (Universal, Not Rated, DVD-CDN$28.99 SRP) celebrates those loveable pair of hosers with a celebrity studded retrospective, which also features brand new segments with Bob & Doug. The DVD features classic SCTV bits, songs, additional interviews, commercials, a Q&A, and even comes bundled with a bottle opener. Beauty, eh?
Give the gift of Disney comics this year with a pair of brilliant collections starring my favorite fictional character. Uncle Scrooge Adventures: The Barks/Rosa Collection – Volume 1 (Gemstone, $8.50 SRP) features Carl Barks’s classic tale “Land Of The Pygmy Indians” and Don Rosa’s modern sequel, “War Of The Wendigo”. This is the first in a series of Barks/Rosa volumes, with hopefully many more to come. For modern Scrooge fans, Gemstone is also collecting the DuckTales comic done by the short-lived in-house Disney Comics in the early 90’s, beginning with Marv Wolfman’s “Scrooge’s Quest” (Gemstone, $15.99 SRP).
If you’ve ever had the desire to live a Wodehousian existence and be as coddled and pampered as Bertie Wooster – or you just feel like being awakened in the morning by the mellifluous tones of Stephen Fry – then you’ll want to make sure the new Voco Alarm Clock (£39.95 each), which features 150 different wake up messages recorded by Mr. Fry in his finest Jeevesian delivery. The clock is available in both a “Good Morning, Sir” and “Good Morning, Madam” version, and is an incredibly fantastic idea for an alarm clock.
It seems like every few years, a new version of Blade Runner makes its way out of whatever subterranean holding facility these things are held in. For the holidays, though, it seems Warners and director Ridley Scott are endeavoring to get all definitive on us by releasing a 5-disc Ultimate Blade Runner set (Warner Bros., Not Rated, DVD-$78.92 SRP). Not only does it contain all of the previously released versions (including the theatrical cut), but there’s a newly prepared director’s cut – and even the original workprint. Thee are plenty of bonus features to keep you occupied, and the briefcase also comes packed with a few nerd trinkets – a lenticular motion film clip, an origami unicorn, a miniature replica spinner car, collector’s photographs, and a letter from Scott.
Fans will have already picked up the Wal-Mart exclusive 2-disc edition of Edgar Wright & Simon Pegg’s Hot Fuzz, but you’ll probably want to donate that extra copy to a lucky friend and snag the 3-disc collector’s edition (Universal, Rated, R, DVD-$34.98 SRP) for yourself. The first two discs are identical to the Wal-Mart edition, but disc 3 is loaded with even more featurettes, behind-the-scenes materials, Wright’s first cop movie, outtakes, commentaries… Just an almost literal ton of goodies.
Chances are, to most Americans, the names David Mitchell & Robert Webb mean very little… unless, of course, they have a friend, relation, or acquaintance by that name. I speak, however, of a pair of brilliant comedians by the sobriquet Mitchell & Webb who currently ply their trade in the sceptred isle of England. A cursory glance at the offerings on YouTube will bring you up to speed on Messrs. Mitchell & Webb – who, since their Cambridge Footlights days, have written and starred in Edinburgh Fringe productions, radio (That Mitchell & Webb Sound), a live tour, and a trio of sketch shows (Bruiser, The Mitchell & Webb Situation, and That Mitchell & Webb Look – the latter two of which are currently available on DVD). They’re also the stars of the Britcom Peep Show (about to begin its 5th season), the feature film Magicians, and were cast as PC (Mitchell) & Mac (Webb) in the British versions of the popular Macintosh ads. The DVD for That Mitchell & Webb Look (Contender Home Entertainment, £19.99 SRP) features a behind-the-scenes featurette and deleted scenes, while The Mitchell & Webb Situation (Eureka Entertainment, DVD-£7.99 SRP) features an audio commentary, outtakes, and an interview with the guys.
And on the topic of Peep Show, if you’re a fan of The Office – or just offbeat British comedy in general (you know, the smart people) – you’ll probably dig Peep Show (BBC, Not Rated, DVD-£44.99 SRP). Gosh, how do I describe such a unique premise… In the show, you see the lives of roommates Jeremy & Mark through their eyes – and inner monologues. Jeremy is a wannabe pop star, Mark is an obsessive loser, and their thoughts and actions are truly hilarious. Think of it as a small-screen take on Being John Malkovich, without all the arty pretension. The 4-disc Region 2 set features all 4 current seasons, with bonus features including audio commentaries, featurettes, bonus scenes, and more.
Far a more surreal holiday viewing experience, I recommend Black Books, which stars Dylan Moran as customer-hating bookshop owner Bernard Black – a man fond of drink, swearing, antipathy, anger, but definitely not customers. Imagine if Basil Fawlty’s antisocial tendencies were given full reign and a bottle of vodka. Paired with Black is new-hire Manny (Bill Bailey), a good-natured man clearly out of his element and clearly the target for Bernard’s goading, which is only mitigated somewhat by the presence of daffy friend Fran (Tamsin Greig). Crikey, how I love this series – which is also, shock!, available in a box set that collects the first three series, with commentaries, outtakes, and more (BBC, Not Rated, DVD-$59.98).
For years, the Bloom County holiday special Opus N’ Bill: A Wish For Wings That Work (Universal, Not Rated, DVD-$14.98 SRP) – the animated adaptation of Berke Breathed’s first children’s book – was a bit of an albatross. A one-off run and 15 years of being little more than a rarity with only a half-hearted VHS release, it’s gotten a remastering for DVD just in time for the holidays, and I urge you to pick it up.
Last year, Master Replicas inaugurated their line of Muppet photo puppet replicas with everyone’s favorite amphibian, Kermit The Frog. This year, you can pick up the manic drummer of The Electric Mayhem, Animal (Master Replicas, $399.00 SRP). Standing an impressive 38″, Animal is fully poseable – including his mouth and eyelids (which means you can capture the wildly fluctuating emotion puppeteered by Frank Oz). If you don’t feel like just sitting him on a shelf or hanging him upside down, he comes with a display stand. You might want to get him as soon as possible, as he’s strictly limited to only 1,500 pieces.
I was worried that last year’s gloriously uncut complete first season of Saturday Night Live was a fluke and that somehow it would live on as a tease for future seasons never to come, but my fears were, thankfully, proven unfounded as SNL: The Complete Second Season (Universal, Not Rated, DVD-$69.98 SRP) hits shelves in time to garner a place under many a Christmas Tree. Every episode from the season that the show established itself as a cultural powerhouse is uncut with all of the original music, and the set even contains the mythically disastrous Mardi Gras special, not seen since its original airing.
If that isn’t enough SNL for you, then there’s always the 10-disc Best Of Saturday Night Live (Lionsgate, Not Rated, DVD-$49.98 SRP) – containing the Best Of discs featuring Steve Martin, Chris Farley, Christopher Walken, Dan Aykroyd, Phil Hartman, John Belushi, Will Ferrell, Mike Myers, Tom Hanks, and Adam Sandler.
I’ve been outspoken before about how cruddy I think Michael Bay’s designs for his big screen Transformers are – they’re a visual mess of metal shards and no character. Hasbro must have recognized this, too, because the toys try desperately to streamline it all into something approaching the streamlined, iconic look that made the original toys so popular. Nowhere is that more evident than in the massive, 15″ Ultimate Bumblebee (Hasbro, $99.99 SRP). I’m a sucker for Transformers – and toys that light up and talk – and this one has it all. Ignore the film and pick up the toy.
And while you’re at it – and since the movie version of Megatron was such a non-starter – why not give Bumblebee a real enemy to fight with the massive transformable Darth Vader (Hasbro, $44.99 SRP) – whose robotic Dark Lord of the Sith form transforms into the Death Star. This one also lights up and features classic Vader lines.
For many cinemaniacs, the new Stanley Kubrick: Director’s Series box set (Warner Bros., Rated G/R/NR, DVD-$79.98 SRP) marks the third time we’ll be buying the same set of flicks on DVD. What makes it all worth it is that those flicks – 2001, A Clockwork Orange, The Shining, Full Metal Jacket, and Eyes Wide Shut – have been completely remastered and loaded with tons of new bonus content, including audio commentaries, documentaries, featurettes, conceptual artwork, interviews, trailers, and more. This set also contains the previously unreleased in America unrated version of Eyes Wide Shut. Also included in the set is the feature-length documentary Stanley Kubrick: A Life In Pictures. All in all, this is a must-have collection… Even if it does mean we’re upgrading for the third time. These, thankfully, are about as definitive as we can hope for at this point… And the commentary on Full Metal Jacket with R. Lee Ermey alone is worth the price of admission.
After stumbling in the second season of its relaunch, the third season of Doctor Who (BBC Not Rated, DVD-$99.98 SRP) benefited immensely from the introduction of a brand new companion, Martha Jones, and a big bad that allowed for a much spiffier finale than last year’s awkward Dalek vs. Cyberman whizaroo. The 6-disc set features all 13 episodes, plus audio commentaries, video diaries, featurettes, outtakes, and more.
History nuts – and those fascinated with World War II in particular – will have a field day getting lost in the 10-disc The History Channel Ultimate Collections: World War II (History Channel, Not Rated, DVD-$59.95 SRP). Packed with 7 documentaries and four bonus featurettes, it’s an incredible gift. You might want to supplement it with a trio of BBC releases – Gladiators of World War II (BBC, Not Rated, DVD-$19.98 SRP), Secrets Of World War II (BBC, Not Rated, DVD-$34.98 SRP), and Heroes of World War II/Weapons Of World War II (BBC, Not Rated, DVD-$19.98 SRP), from the same people that produced the incredible documentary series The Century Of Warfare.
We’ve already seen a complete edition previously, but a remastered set of the Britcom classic The Young Ones is welcome – particularly when The Young Ones: Extra Stoopid Edition (BBC, Not Rated, DVD-$59.98 SRP) contains new bonus materials, including audio commentaries, a spotlight on the guest stars, a making-of featurette, and a featurette on Britain’s alternative comedy scene of the early 1980’s.
If your holiday viewing plans skew prehistoric, then the Ultimate Dinosaur Collection (BBC, Not Rated, DVD-$39.98 SRP) might be just the thing, as it collects the three hugely popular Walking With… documentaries – Walking With Dinosaurs, Walking With Beasts, & Walking With Monsters – along with a 30-minute making-of documentary in one easy-to-gift package.
If you were still pining for the bizarre visual musicality of Tenacious D, look no further than the kiwi duo of Jemaine Clement and Bret McKenzie – aka Flight Of The Conchords (HBO, Not Rated, DVD-$29.98 SRP). The first season set features all 12 episodes of New Zealand’s 4th Most Popular Folk Parody Duo’s adventures in America.
There’s nothing like extracting nuts with everyone’s favorite infant with matricidal tendencies, Stewie Griffen. The Family Guy nutcracker (Kurt S. Adler, $24.44 SRP) is a heavy-duty nutcracker, and features Stewie dressed in his finest holiday Lederhosen.
Not wearing nearly as many clothes, though, is the nearly-nude, singing & dancing Macho Man Homer (Russ Berrie & Company, $29.99 SRP). Watch this plush Simpson gyrate to that Village People classic, right in your own home! Can you believe it? We live in amazing times.
If, perchance, a dancing Homer doesn’t satiate your geeky holiday wishes, then surely a remote-controlled R2-D2 (Hasbro, $137.99 SRP). Standing over a foot tall and fully mobile, RC R2 flashes lights, “talks” and can be coaxed to play Princess Leia’s message. You can program a path for him to follow, and there’s even a drink holder.
The collected stories of Cicely, Alaska’s goofy residents have been packaged together in Northern Exposure: The Complete Series (Universal, Not Rated, DVD-$199.99 SRP). Bundled in a faux-fur saddle bag, all 6 seasons are spread across 26 discs (gone are the awkward flipper discs of the original individual releases), with bonus materials including deleted and extended scenes from every season.
After individual releases of the first two seasons, Comedy Central has decided to show faith in one other their finest shows – and reward the fans – with a box set collecting all six seasons of Dr. Katz: Professional Therapist (Paramount, Not Rated, DVD-$139.99 SRP). The 13-disc contains all of the bonus features of the previous releases, plus newly-produced “lost” episodes (featuring Dave Attell, Whoopi Goldberg, and Conan O’Brien), a live version of the show, “Short Attention Span Theater” shorts, a 28-page booklet detailing the life of Dr. Katz, and more. Can someone please tell me why this show isn’t still on the air?
Beatles fans have cause to celebrate this season, as their second feature film gets a fully-remastered, feature-laden release. Help! (Rhino, Not Rated, DVD-$29.98 SRP). The 2-disc special edition contains a 30-minute making-of documentary, a missing scene, cast & crew reminiscences, theatrical trailers, radio spots, and a featurette on the restoration.
Speaking of Beatles, Paul McCartney has released a comprehensive set of his prodigious music video output, The McCartney Years (Rhino, Not Rated, DVD-$34.99 SRP). Not only do I finally get to throw away my tape with “Pipes of Peace”, but there’s also plenty of rare interviews, the documentary/performance Creating Chaos At Abbey Road, his 1991 Unplugged episode, the 1976 Rockshow concert, his headlining gig at Glastonbury 2004, and more.
Granted, the films of the late Ingmar Bergman wouldn’t immediately come to mind as being bright and cheerful holiday fare, but their stark, Nordic cinematography is definitely evocative of winter. There is no denying, regardless, that he’s made his fair share of contributions to cinema, and a quartet of those landmark films are featured in the Ingmar Bergman: Four Masterworks collection (Criterion, Not Rated, DVD-$99.95 SRP). Criterion has been systematically going back and revisiting their most popular titles with brand new high definition transfers, and that’s what you’ll find in this set, with Smiles Of A Summer Night, The Seventh Seal, Wild Strawberries, and The Virgin Spring. Bonus features include audio commentaries, documentaries, interviews, trailers, galleries, and more.
A brand new addition to the Criterion collection is Terrence Malick’s lush period piece Days Of Heaven (Criterion, Rated PG, $39.95 SRP), starring Richard Gere as a Chicago steelworker who flees to Texas after accidentally killing his supervisor to start his life anew, with his girlfriend and little sister in tow, as a fieldworker on the land of a wealthy farmer (Sam Shepard). Featuring a high-definition transfer, bonus materials include an audio commentary, interviews, and more.
Ready-made for geek gift-giving, the limited edition Music Of Star Wars: The 30th Anniversary Edition (Sony Legacy, $89.98 SRP) – packaged in a deluxe, hardcover box – contains the previously-available remastered versions of the original trilogy’s soundtrack albums. In addition to the 6 discs of music, there’s a bonus 7th disc which is essentially a hodgepodge of cues from across all 6 films. If you know someone who doesn’t have these albums yet, now the time to snatch ’em.
Get your holiday kicks with the first volume of the inaugural season of Route 66 (Infinity Entertainment, Not Rated, DVD-$99.98 SRP), sporting the first 15 cool cat, wanderlust episodes. Produced in the wake of the Kerouac fascination with hitting the road, Route 66 focused on the cross-country adventures of Tod and Buz… And featured one of TV’s most memorable theme tunes.
Reformed wild and crazy guy Steve Martin has committed to paper a wonderful first volume of his autobiography. Born Standing Up (Scribner, $25.00 SRP) is a candid tale of a young man who came at comedy from a right angle, upsetting the buttoned-up preconceptions of what stand-up had been and becoming the first rock star comedian during his meteoric rise in the 70’s.
f you’ve avoided immersing yourself in the oddball world of Matt Lucas & David Walliams, then you can rectify your oversight with Little Britain: The Complete Collection (BBC, Not Rated, DVD-$99.98 SRP). The 8-disc set features all 3 seasons, plus audio commentaries, interviews, featurettes, specials, Comic Relief sketches, and more.
When the boss writes a book, you’d better believe I’d have to at least mention it in the holiday guide. Lucky for me and my conscience, I actually dug the contents of My Boring-Ass Life: The Uncomfortably Candid Diary Of Kevin Smith (Titan Books, $14.95). The book collects over a year-and-a-half’s worth of Smith’s blog postings at SilentBobSpeaks.com, including some exclusive entries. Why not get a signed copy over at Jay & Silent Bob’s Secret Stash?
For far, far too long, comic books have been a bleak, barren territory for kids. The subject matter appropriate for “all ages” has largely vacated the “Big Two” publishers DC and Marvel, residing solely at Gemstone and their Disney comics renaissance. One of the few creators who know what an all ages book can be – in terms of excitement, character, and storytelling – is Jeff Smith. Few people expected him to follow up his landmark independent epic Bone with a gig at DC, but that’s exactly what he did with a new – and wonderfully refreshing in its old school flavor – take on Captain Marvel in the 4 issue mini-series Shazam!: The Monster Society Of Evil, which has been collected in hardcover (DC Comics, $29.99 SRP) and makes the perfect gift for young and old alike.
Fans of Jeff Smith’s Bone, though, will want to get their grubby, Rat Creature-like mitts on the new Fone Bone plush toy (Cartoon Books, $12.95 SRP). It stands over a foot tall, is cute as all heck, and makes the perfect stocking stuffer (next to a set of the colored editions of the Bone library, from Graphix) for both big kids and small.
If I were to name a definitive Spider-Man artist – or, at least, my personal choice – the honor would have to go to the legendary John Romita. After he inherited the art chores on Amazing Spider-Man from co-creator Steve Ditko, he drew the Spider-Man that entered into the pop culture lexicon in the late-60’s-early 70’s. Twomorrows has produced a beautiful tribute to the man in the form of John Romita: … And All That Jazz! (Twomorrows, $44.95 SRP), featuring an in-depth, career-comprehensive interview accompanied by dozens of pieces of Jazzy John’s art. If you can swing it, the hardcover edition is the way to go, as it features a supplemental section of additional artwork in full color.
In the age of super-articulated, exquisitely sculpted action figures, it’s a gloriously garish blast from the past flipping through Mego 8″ Super-Heroes: World’s Greatest Toys! (Twomorrows, $49.95 SRP). Author Benjamin Holcomb has written the definitive guide to these beloved 70’s pop culture relics, filled with dozens of photos and every bit of info and trivia you could possibly want, including looks at unproduced figures and rarities.
Where Scrubs fails in trying to merge medicine and absurdity, the UK’s Green Wing (Channel 4, DVD-£59.99 SRP) succeeds in spades. It’s fast, funny, and has one of those ensemble casts – led by Black Books alum Tamsin Greig – that you’ll not soon forget. The 8-disc collector’s edition features both series, plus the Green Wing special. Bonus materials include audio commentaries, deleted scenes, featurettes, and more.
With the sole CD release long out of print and the original albums even longer so, I’m delighted to finally have a 3-CD set of the music from Jim Henson’s Fraggle Rock, Fraggle Rockin’ (Koch, $23.98 SRP). The set essentially collects the CD release and two of the original albums, making for 53 tracks of Fraggle fun. I hold out hope that this is only the first volume, with more to come.
The Beatles and The Rolling Stones before them have gotten their definitive, first-person histories, and now Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers have Runnin’ Down A Dream (Chronicle Books, $39.95 SRP) – a lavish, in-depth story of the band’s over 30 year history, as told by the band themselves. It’s every bit as fascinating as the massive tomes of those other groups.
I’m not impressed with it in motion, but the design artwork featured in The Art Of Beowulf (Chronicle Books, $40.00 SRP) is impressive when taken on its own merit, which you can do with this impressive Art Of book from Chronicle. But really, when isn’t an Art Of book from Chronicle not impressive?
Speaking of which, Chronicle’s Art Of Bee Movie (Chronicle Books, $40.00 SRP) is also out now, and if you got a kick out of Jerry Seinfeld’s exploration of bee culture, this is the companion book for you – and would you guess it’s also chock full of artwork? Wouldja? And it’s co-written by Seinfeld and my good buddy Jerry Beck. He’s a busy guy, that Jerry Beck.
While American audiences will only know him largely from the U.S. version of the gameshow Distraction on Comedy Central, Jimmy Carr is actually one of the preeminent stand-ups currently plying the funny trade today. If you don’t believe me, pick up his third stand-up DVD, Jimmy Carr: Comedian (Channel 4, DVD-£19.99 SRP). It’s only available in Region 2, but it’s worth the effort to pick it up if you live in the States… And pick up his other two while you’re at it. The DVD is loaded with bonus features, including a DVD-only sketch show.
Kudos to Fox for dusting off the library and presenting a fully remastered presentation of the films of John Ford with the Ford At Fox Collection. Two absolute must-haves are The Essential John Ford (Fox, Not Rated, DVD-$49.98 SRP) and John Ford’s American Comedies (Fox, Not Rated, DVD-$49.98 SRP). The Essential collection is just that – featuring Drums Along The Mohawk, The Grapes Of Wrath, How Green Was My Valley, My Darling Clementine, Frontier Marshall, and the feature-length documentary Becoming John Ford, in addition to audio commentaries, featurettes, and more. The American Comedies set contains Up The River, Doctor Bull, Judge Priest, Steamboat ‘Round The Bend, When Willie Comes Marching Home, and What Price Glory.
Easily the funniest – and heaviest – recommendation this holiday season is the first in what I hope is an ongoing series spotlighting Mad Magazine‘s greatest artists, The Completely Mad Don Martin (Running Press, $150.00 SRP). This two volume, high quality hardcover set features every single Don Martin illustration that ever graced Mad – and trust me, that is *a lot* – plus original letters, notes, and sketches, plus an introduction from Gary Larson and a special note from Jim Davis. This is truly an mind-bogglingly incredible set that I could not stop from exploring cover to cover.
Last year saw the release of the first of 4 archival hardcover volumes collecting Neil Gaiman’s incredible comic opus, Sandman. This year brings volume 2 of The Absolute Sandman (DC Comics, $99.00 SRP), featuring issues 21-39, fully recolored, plus never-before-reprinted stories and the original script and pencils to Sandman #23. These editions are simply stunning, and are the best conceivable presentation for this material. It’s also very, very heavy.
Nobody does nature specials better than the BBC, and two of their landmark series have been bundled in one easy-to-snag set. The Blue Planet/Planet Earth Collection (BBC, Not Rated, DVD-$119.98 SRP) contains both previously available sets, loaded with bonus features galore in addition to the stunning visuals in the programs themselves.
After teasing fans with the incredibly awesome first volume of classic (and actually entertainingly educational) Sesame Street, I worried that the grand experiment would only yield that single volume. Thankfully, my fears are allayed with the release of Sesame Street Old School: Volume 2 (Genius, Not Rated, DVD-$39.95 SRP), which features episodes and segments from the years 1974-1979. All of the classic bits and characters are there and as fun as I remember them being, and it’s a much needed alternative to the pathetic, boring ghost the show has become. The 3-disc set also features the original pilot episode that aired only once in Philadelphia prior to the launch of the show in 1969. Waiter! Volume 3, please!
Long absent from the numerous reissues of Apocalypse Now, one of the most revelatory documentaries ever made about the production of a feature film finally sees the light of day in the standalone release of Hearts Of Darkness: A Filmmaker’s Apocalypse (Paramount, Not Rated, DVD-$24.99 SRP). Directed by Francis Ford Coppola’s wife Eleanor, it’s a remarkable portrait of an out of control creative process deep in the jungles of the Philippines. The disc also contains a new documentary, Coda, which picks up the filmmaker’s journey as Francis produces his newest film, Youth Without Youth.
Rudolph, Frosty, And Captain Kangaroo (Santa Monica Press, $24.95 SRP) is the biography of one Hecky Krasnow, the producer of perennial holiday favorites including “Rudolph The Red-Nosed Reindeer,” “Frosty The Snowman,” “I’m Getting’ Nuttin’ For Christmas,” “I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus,” “Suzy Snowflake,” “Peter Cottontail,” as well as “Davy Crockett,” “The Captain Kangaroo March,” and more. Full of anecdotes and trivia, it’s a fun little tome to read through by the fire.
Christmas just isn’t Christmas without Stan, Kyle, Kenny, & Cartman, and that means that the compilation release Christmas Time In South Park (Paramount, Not Rated, DVD-$19.99 SRP) is a welcome addition to the holiday viewing schedule – perfect for following up A Charlie Brown Christmas. This disc has all 7 South Park Christmas episodes to date.
Always on the lookout for ways to introduce my nephew to the world of comic book superheroes, there’s something loveably wrong yet endearing about the animatronic Sing-a-Long Spider-Man (Hasbro, $29.99 SRP). With a child-friendly design, a repertoire of 3 songs (“Spider-Man & Friends Theme”, “Heads, Shoulders, Webs, & Knees”, and “If You’re Happy And You Know It”), and a microphone for the kids to join in on the fun, it’s the perfect gift for the under-5’s on your holiday list.
When a comedian decides – at the age of 32 – to write his autobiography, it’s understandable to be a bit wary. But when that comedian is Russell Brand – and the tome deals in large part with his years of heroin and sex addiction – my curiosity is piqued. The book itself – whimsically titled My Booky Wook (Hodder & Stoughton, $18.99 SRP) – is an engaging, witty, and brutally candid bio, and increases my respect of Mr. Brand even beyond the already high level attained by his wonderfully odd, affected comedy style.
You know it’s not just another Spongebob release when the special guest star is David Bowie. The Thin White Duke plays the Lord Royal Highness in Spongebob Squarepants: Atlantis Squarepants (Paramount, Not Rated, DVD-$16.99 SRP). In addition to the 2-part special, the disc also features an additional 6 episodes, an inside look at the Spongebob animation studios, and a making-of featurette on the “Atlantis” ep.
If you want to load up on the Nickelodeon releases this holiday season, there’s Go Diego Go!: Safari Rescue, Dora The Explorer: Dora Saves The Mermaids, The Naked Brothers Band: Battle Of The Bands (Paramount, Not Rated, DVD-$16.99 SRP each), and Avatar: Book 2 (Paramount, Not Rated, DVD-$64.99 SRP).
There have been numerous releases of the flick in the past (almost as many as Goldfinger), but I think we’ve gotten pretty much definitive with the Close Encounters Of The Third Kind: 30th Anniversary Ultimate Edition (Sony, Rated PG, DVD-$39.95 SRP). The 3-disc set features all 3 versions of the film – the theatrical cut, the special edition cut, and the director’s cut – plus a 30th anniversary retrospective documentary, a making-of documentary, the 1977 “Watch The Skies” featurette, a collectible booklet, and a poster detailing the differences between all the versions.
Where George Lucas went overboard on his revisionist special editions, the high definition remaster of the original Star Trek gets it mostly right by sticking to the axiom that less is more. All of the special effects have been redone and the entire series has been remastered in high definition, which – while not replacing the classic versions – certainly provides a different viewing experience that’s largely worthwhile. By all means, check out the combo edition of the first season (Paramount, Not Rated, DVD-$194.99 SRP) which contains both standard DVDs and HD-DVDs, plus bonus retrospective featurettes. My only real criticism is they used wretched flipper discs. Here’s hoping they abandon that presentation method before season 2 hits.
Fans of Huckleberry, Fred, Scooby, Jonny, Elroy, Birdman, Yogi, and Tom & Jerry will be absolutely giddy about the new Hanna-Barbera Treasury (Insight Editions, $45.00 SRP). Written by animation historian Jerry Beck, it’s a must-have collection of rare artwork and collectible/ephemera reproductions from across the breadth of the animation house’s storied career.
And Jerry Beck’s been quite busy, as he’s also penned a retrospective of Nickelodeon’s animated history – Not Just Cartoons: Nicktoons! (Melcher Media, $40.00 SRP). Loaded to the rafters with artwork both rare and conceptual, it’s an excellent overview of a remarkable amount of cartoons over the years. Oh, and it also has a nifty slime cover.
Of course, Star Wars fans will want a deluxe memorabilia book of their own this holiday season, and those wishes are granted with The Star Wars Vault (Harper Entertainment, $85.00 SRP). In addition to reproductions of rare ephemera from over the 30-year history of the franchise, the massive hardcover tome – co-written and compiled by Lucasfilm ubergeek Stephen Sansweet – also contains a pair of audio CDs jam-packed with rarities.
A verbal comedian par excellence on Brit shows like Whose Line Is It Anyway?, Have I Got News For You, Room 101, and Just A Minute, Paul Merton is also a tremendous fan of silent comedy. He’s poured that fascination into a comprehensive look at the evolution and stars of that early cinematic form in the tome Silent Comedy (Random House, £25.00 SRP), and it’s the perfect gift for aficionados of chaps like Chaplin, Keaton, Lloyd, Laurel, & Hardy.
Try as might, I can’t help but saying, “Thanks for the memories…” in regards to the 4-disc Bob Hope: The Ultimate Collection (R2, Not Rated, DVD-$29.99 SRP), which collects copious clips and bloopers from Hope’s 50-year television career. Those specials include regular comedy outings, as well as his numerous shows for the troops. The set also includes comedy shorts from the 1930’s, interviews, and more.
Also getting an uber-collection for the holidays is the King of Late Night, Johnny Carson. The 12-disc Heeere’s Johnny – The Definitive DVD Collection from The Tonight Show starring Johnny Carson (R2, $99.99 SRP) contains all of the previously released Carson collections in one handy volume, easy for gift-giving.
Every new set seems like a gift, so be sure to celebrate the season with the purchase of The Mystery Science Theater 3000 Collection: Volume 12 (Rhino, Not Rated, DVD-$59.95 SRP). This time around, we get The Rebel Set, Secret Agent Super Dragon, The Starfighters, and Parts: The Clonus Horror – plus original theatrical trailers, the MST3K jukebox, interviews, and MST3K Hour Jack Perkins wraparounds.
Perfect for your holiday decorating needs, McFarlane Toys has released the first wave of How The Grinch Stole Christmas toys (McFarlane Toys, $12.99 SRP each) based on Chuck Jones’s animated adaptation of the Dr. Seuss classic. The sculpting work is spot on – particularly when you put the dioramas together and create the aforementioned perfect holiday decoration. The initial wave features “All I Need Is A Reindeer“, “Two Sizes Too Small“, “Cindy Lou Who“, “You’re A Mean One, Mr. Grinch“, and the deluxe diorama “The Grinch & Max On Mt. Crumpit” (McFarlane Toys, $23.99 SRP).
The POV: 20th Anniversary Collection (Docurama, Not Rated, DVD-$249.95 SRP) is an incredible compilation of 15 top-notch documentaries, all in one easy to snag package. The documentaries included in the set are American Tongues, Best Boy, The Chances Of The World Changing, Dark Circle, Farmingville, Leona’s Sister Gerri, Licensed To Kill, Maya Lin: A Strong Clear Vision, Of Civil Wrongs And Rights: The Fred Korematsu Story, Passin’ It On, Regret To Inform, Silverlake Life: The View From Here, Tongues Untied, Taking On The Kennedys, and Well-Founded Fear.
If the cold is getting you down and you desire a little sunshine, why not head down to Florida and hang with Crockett & Tubbs as they infiltrate the seedy, steamy, and well-soundtracked drug underworld of Miami with the complete set of Miami Vice (Universal, Not Rated, DVD-$199.98 SRP). The 27-disc set features all 111 episodes in one faux albino alligator-skinned box. All the original music, and the stylish wardrobe of Don Johnson – if that doesn’t say “Christmas” to you, I don’t know what does.
Rightly considered one of the finest documentaries ever produced, D.A. Pennbaker’s portrait of Bob Dylan’s landmark 1965 tour, Don’t Look Back (Docurama, Not Rated, DVD-$49.95 SRP), has gotten a deluxe remastering and special edition treatment. In addition to restored picture and sound, the 2-disc collector’s set features audio commentaries, additional audio tracks, an alternate version of the “Subterranean Homesick Blues” cue card sequence, a second documentary utilizing unused footage, trailers, and a reproduction of the original photo-filled 168-page companion book. A definite must-have all around.
The third movie was a disappointment, but I’m a big enough sucker for “Art Of” books that I still got a kick out of all the development artwork jam-packed into Shrek: The Art Of The Quest (Insight Editions, $45.00 SRP). Not only are there scores of artwork on display, but also interactive collectibles inserted throughout the book, including diaries and coasters.
Erik the Viking (MGM, Not Rated, DVD-$19.98 SRP) is one of the “lost” post-Python films, overlooked by many in favor of more well known efforts from the likes of Cleese (A Fish Called Wanda) and Gilliam (Brazil). Still, I find writer/director Terry Jones’s tale of a Viking with a conscience (Tim Robbins) to be an enjoyably fun flick, with many of the whimsical and visual qualities that have marked much of Jones’s style. Unfortunately, the original cut of the film was somewhat rushed, and Jones has never been happy with the theatrical version – which means, in this modern DVD age, he’s been given the chance to go back and tweak it for a new 2-disc special edition… well, actually, his son Bill Jones has done the tweaking, producing the “Director’s Son’s Cut” of Erik the Viking. The new special edition features both cuts of the film, audio commentary with Terry Jones, and interview with Terry and his son Bill, a making-of featurette, extended cast interviews, and a photo gallery.
While collections have been available in the past, Fantagraphics has pulled out all the stops with their chronological collection of E.C. Segar’s Popeye (Fantagraphics, $29.95 SRP). Also known as Thimble Theater, Volume 2: “Well Blow Me Down” continues where the essential first volume left off. As lovingly constructed as Fantagraphics equally must-have Complete Peanuts, the second volume covers 1930-1932, featuring dailies as well as color Sundays.
And that’s not the only comic strip collection available this holiday season! I have immense respect for any cartoonist who can make a career out of single panel gags – particularly if they’re consistently funny. Long before Gary Larson made The Far Side into a prime example of this in the 80’s, Hank Ketcham’s Dennis The Menace was king of the single panels on the daily comics page. Not content with just their amazing Complete Peanuts and Popeye lines, Fantagraphics has also been releasing Hank Ketcham’s Complete Dennis The Menace (Fantagraphics, $24.95 SRP), the fourth volume of which is now available, covering the period from 1957 to 1958.
This holiday season, I intend to spend those cold winter nights holed up with hot chocolate, Little Debbie Christmas Trees, and – Would you believe? – the complete 5 season Get Smart box set (Time Life, Not Rated, DVD-$199). Long a fan desire, never did I think that not only would we get completely uncut, stunningly remastered episodes that make the series look sparkling fresh, but that the entire run would be released in a special box set absolutely loaded with bonus features. In an age when studios release bare bones season sets only to screw over fans be releasing comprehensive, feature-laden sets at the very end (Hello, Fox!), this comprehensive bonus-filled bonanza is a true delight. Those bonus features include audio commentaries (with the likes of Mel Brooks, Buck Henry, James Caan, Barbara Feldon, Bernie Koppell, Don Rickles, and more), interviews, bloopers, featurettes, Emmy footage, rare commercials, and much more – literally hours of material. Packaged in a box comprised of multiple doors (ending with the phone booth), the set is currently an exclusive available only at TimeLife.com.
Ah, but there’s more classic TV in ridiculously large sets to be had! Packaged in a stylish briefcase, you can also own the complete 4 season run – 105 episodes over 41 discs, plus new interviews, featurettes, home movie footage from the set, and much more – of The Man From U.N.C.L.E. (Time Life, Not Rated, DVD-$249.99). Nothing beats kicking back and watching the superspy adventures of Robert Vaughn as the lavishly named (by Ian Fleming, no less!) Napoleon Solo with a mug of cocoa in hand. Nothing, I tell you. Nothing. The set is also a Time Life exclusive.
To get another iconic 60’s spy show, though, you’ll have to go a bit farther afield. To Australia, in fact. While the US has gotten scattershot releases of I Spy – starring Robert Culp and Bill Cosby as espionage agents Alexander Scott and Kelly Robinson. They’ve released the first 2 seasons, completely remastered and unedited (Umbrella, Not Rated, DVD-AU$79.99 SRP each). If that weren’t enough, Umbrella has also picked up the ball unceremoniously dropped by Rhino in the States and have released the complete third season of My Favorite Martian (Umbrella, Not Rated, DVD-AU$69.99 SRP). Not only does the 6-disc set feature all 32 episodes, but it’s also loaded with bonus materials – including the original pilot, behind-the-scenes home movies, interviews, and audio commentary, and more. Umbrella is definitely a company to watch (and import from!).
Resurrected from the abyss of Fox’s ignorance, Futurama makes the same Lazarus-like return of Family Guy before it with a brand new feature-length direct-to-DVD movie, Bender’s Big Score (Fox, Not Rated, DVD-$29.99 SRP), which finds the crew of Planet Express in a time-spanning adventure to stop Bender’s grand larceny through history. Everyone – actors, writers, producers, animation team – are back where they belong, and it’s like they never left. Bonus features include an audio commentary, a live comic book reading by the cast, a full-length episode of Everybody Loves Hypnotoad, deleted scenes, a math lecture, 3D models, the first draft of the script, the Comic-Con promo, a message from Al Gore (with commentary), and more. More direct-to-DVD flicks are on the way, and we can only hope the show finds its way back to the airwaves proper.
If your little ones are a mite too young for Brain Age but you want to start them down the path of getting a little bit of recreational learning into their noggins, then there’s a pair of Scholastic releases you’ll probably want to make sure Santa places under the Christmas tree for them – I Spy Funhouse and Animal Genius (Scholastic, $29.99 SRP each). The former is full of illusions and brain teasers, and the latter builds up your animal IQ.
Paul McCartney’s latest album, Memory Almost Full (Hear Music, $19.98 SRP) – formerly a Starbucks exclusive – has hit traditional retail outlets with a deluxe 2-disc edition, featuring not only the album proper with 3 additional tracks, but also a bonus DVD with a pair of music videos and 7 live performances recorded in London.
Those in search of a truly jazzy holiday will want to plug in to the 5-disc John Coltrane: Interplay box set (Prestige Records, $59.98 SRP). It’s over 7 hours of the pure Coltrane from his 1956-1958 period. The set also contains a photo and essay packed booklet, as well.
Of their output over the years, the only U2 album I love from start to finish is 1987’s The Joshua Tree (Universal, $29.98 SRP). Imagine my delight, then, that it’s been fully remastered and re-released as a 2-disc deluxe edition, with 14 bonus tracks to boot. The hardcover pack also includes a 36-page booklet full of photos, an essay, and lyrics.
-Ken Plume
Well, the holidays have officially hit, and there’s a crapton of stuff available for your shopping dollar. Today we’re taking the first of what will be many looks at what will be (and ultimately WON’T be) worth your holiday cheer this year, for both big kids and little kids alike.
Up first, by Crom, are the adventures of everyone’s favorite Barbarian, CONAN. In what is ultimately a GOD OF WAR rip of”¦er”¦”homage”, CONAN has you slicing and dicing your way through stages filled with mythical enemies, soldier, and of course, saving bare chested wenches.
When I say this game is like GOD OF WAR, I mean it basically IS GOD OF WAR. You have your combo-heavy attacks, the screen-prompted button mashing, your different colored orbs to gain health, stats and power, and your gruesome graphics. Here however, gruesome graphics also mean UGLY, not just bloody. CONAN is not a pretty game. While the cut scenes do the job well, they’re not rendered in the best way, and everything doesn’t quite look “next-gen”. Still, they are detailed enough to see the carnage you’ll inflict on your foes, so that’s good for something, right?
And what carnage it will be. CONAN rips through guys like tissue paper, cleaving limb from body. He can pick up just about any weapon lying on the ground, and depending on its size and variety, his combos adjust accordingly. If it’s a two handed broadsword, he’ll swing it like Babe Ruth and swat off your head. Dual-wield two swords and away goes the enemies arms. Carry a shield for protection, and you just might find that it’s good at lopping off some poor sap’s head in a clinch. CONAN practically drowns in the visceral eviscerations, as he drowns his wounds in mead.
Sadly, all that killing can become repetitive, and while CONAN has a good deal of combos to break up the monotony, some just aren’t as effective as one would hope. While the end result is the same (that is, a dead bad guy) from battling it out with a strong or regular attack, the strong ones usually leave you wide open for return attacks”¦attacks that become pounded upon you with little reprieve. Once an animation starts with you backpedaling from an attack, another enemy strikes you, sending it all starting over again and you cursing your controller.
Of course, this is actually slightly realistic (I mean, what group of thugs would TAKE YTURNS attacking a single guy?) but it certainly does make things a bit tiresome for a game. Thankfully, moves can be upgraded, and once mastered, can gain you even more stats upgrades and further help you conquer all lands. It’s simplistic, but despite it’s shortcomings, is actually fun. It’s as close to a next-gen GOD OF WAR that we’ll get for a while, and taken as such, you pretty much get what you come for: a carnage filled button mashing mess of guts and boobs. Ain’t nothing wrong with that in my book.
One Gamer’s Opinion:
If it’s blood you want, then brother, you’ll get it by the gallons in SOF:P. Every shot is meant to kill, and more so it seems, as literally FOUNTAINS of crimson spray from every enemy tagged. As a mercenary for hire, you stumble onto a plot that double crosses you on your first mission out, and the remainder of the game is”¦of course, getting payback.
Payback meaning severing limbs from armies of dudes. With bullets. I never knew you could shoot a man’s head, arms and legs off with pistol shots, but there it is in black, white and red. As a first person shooter, the action is passable, but obviously the gore is there to satisfy the baser needs of gamers. Those with a love of plasma, apparently.
Apart from the KILL BILL style sprays, there isn’t much to write home about in SOF:P. The story is ho-hum, the controls are basic, and the multiplayer has been done to death. It’s not a particularly bad game, it’s just not a particularly compelling one. It’s nice to be able to customize your weapons from the start of each mission, but it seems like everything you need is unlocked from the start”¦no upgrades to play towards. Plus, the enemy AI is AMAZING dull. They’ll run headlong into your weapons fire, losing life and limb quickly in the process.
As a shooter, it’s as basic as one gets: A by-the-numbers shooter with nothing more to add than gallons of gore. Sure, it’s a change from HALO or CALL OF DUTY 4, but better time could be spent.
One Gamer’s Opinion:
Speaking of CALL OF DUTY 4, it’s finally here, and for once, they’ve left the fields of WWII behind for more topical locales. Namely, the Middle East and points near. This is modern warfare, and with it comes modern weapons, modern sensibilities, modern themes, and of course, modern changes to multiplayer.
I’ve spoken about the perk system before in a previous column when I played the beta, and thankfully, not much has changed. You still gain skill points based on kills and those points can level you up and gain you perks to out fit your avatar. However, the matchmaking system does need a bit of work. In one match, I was paired with two guys at level 3, one guy at 15, me just starting at 1, and three guys in the twenty-fives or higher. That hardly seems fair. Still, it’s a more fun, more solid style of run-and-gun gameplay than HALOs, so I didn’t mind too much.
As for the single player, the graphics and sound are once again top-notch, with practically Hollywood style presentation. You really seem to care about these soldiers and everyone feels like a team unit”¦a lofty claim for an FPS. Every nerve wracking fire fight, every advance and retreat, every shining moment and crushing defeat is gloriously brought to life. If there’s only one complaint it’s that there’s no cover system, a feature that should be standard with any FPS released on the next gen platforms. You’ll often find yourself wishing for blind fire or a way to chuck a grenade over a toppled table as you repeatedly step out of the safety of your device only to be ripped to shreds in a cross fire.
If there’s two complaints, it’s that it’s too short. The main story mode can be beaten in about 5 hours, but thankfully, there’s that awesome multiplayer I’ve mentioned. For wartime simulators and First Person Shooters, of which there is a glut of this Holiday season, this is the cream of the crop.
One Gamer’s Opinion:
Enough with the killing, bloodletting and shooting. How about some lighter-fare. Y’know, for kids? DEWY’S ADVENTURE is one such title aimed at the younger set that I personally was looking forward to. An adventure specifically designed for the Wii, you guide a dewdrop named Dewy on a quest through his world to rid his fellow droplets of the “black rain” that has captured all the other creatures of some brightly colored fruity little forest.
The idea started promising enough. Dewy would slide along the levels as you tilted and shook the wii-mote and change form based on the temperature drop or increase, as dictated by the player. Raise the temperature, and the dewdrop Dewy turns into a gas cloud, stunning foes with lightning shots. Drop the temp, and he freezes into and ice block, spinning and shattering foes as he goes. This sound great, and a lot of fun”¦that is, until you actually play it.
Sadly, DEWY’S ADVENTURE suffers from the “too damn cute for it’s own good” syndrome. The story, which started out sounding harmless, is delivered in sparsely animated cut scenes with dialogue and voice acting that make me want to punch myself in the face. “Oh noes, the fowest is in twouble”.
Then, there’s the gameplay itself. While it does take some skill to maneuver Dewy through each level, he just doesn’t control as fluidly as a guy who’s mostly fluid should. His jumps falter a bit, and he’s hard to control in the air whilst tilting the land. See, the wii-mote acts as the stage itself. You tilt the controller to tilt the level, getting Dewy to slide around as needed. It’s kind of a digital version of LABYRINTH, where you guide the ball through the maze? However, instead of drop holes, you get annoying enemies, attacks that don’t deal enough damage, and a jump that invariably won’t send you high enough, or has you careening over the edge of a cliff each time.
I had such high hopes for DEWY’S ADVENTURE, and, while the gameplay isn’t all-bad, it’s just not very good. The controls aren’t tight enough and it just seems “broken”. That coupled with the “let’s talk down to children” storyline and vocals just soured me on the whole situation. For a game that was “built specifically for the motion sensing capabilities of the Wii”, more time should have been spent perfecting those controls.
One Gamer’s Opinion:
The licensing machine is in full effect in the younger-geared Spider title FRIEND OR FOE. Set in the movie universe (sort of) Spidey must team up with his greatest enemies to stop a new threat. Never mind the fact that half of them “˜died” in the films, only to be back here, with no explanations, here they are, fighting along side the wall crawler.
So Doc Ock, Green Goblin, New Goblin and Venom are back from the dead. As well as Sandman, Rhino, Scorpion and heroes Black Cat, Silver Sable, Prowler, Iron Fist”¦goodness, 14 other character team up with ol’ webhead to battle symbiotic goo similar to Venom’s as it spreads across the globe. As you defeat the mind-altered baddies, they join your team to stop this unknown threat, giving the player a partner for each level, and offering drop-in drop-out co-op play. Attacks are basic and upgradable, but unfortunately, there’s not much reason too.
See, all the enemies are variations on the same theme. You’ve got your drones, out in two hits. You’ve got the stronger drones”¦they take three. Then there’re the random big enemies, who have a specific weak point. Through each level there are variations on how they look, but they all behave (and are defeated) the same way. Wail on the attack button, repeat. And since it’s a kid’s game, the lack of challenge doesn’t end there. You never die. Sure, your character might fall off a cliff, or his health diminish, but he respawns right back where he was”¦over and over again.
The game is as basic as one gets. Basic combat, basic controls”¦the idea of teaming up with Spidey’s greatest foes is a unique one, but sadly the action just won’t support it. There’s no need to upgrade your moves since the enemies never really change, and the level design has you just running around and mashing buttons over and over to the same ends. It’s just too bland to bear the Spider-man name.
One Gamer’s Opinion:
There’s more to come”¦ but this ends the column for the day. See you next time.
Ratings From Greatest to Least:
Kick Ass, Right On, Okay, Eh, and Stinker (aka CRAPTACULAR)
One of this column’s frequent subjects, Neil Gaiman, and Roger Avary, best known as the co-writer of the 1994 film Pulp Fiction gave collaborated on the screenplay for the new Beowulf movie, directed by Robert Zemeckis. IDW has been publishing a four-issue comics adaptation of the movie. Zemeckis’s Beowulf is a sort-of-animated movie, employing the “performance-capture” he previously used for his 2004 Christmas-themed film The Polar Express (see “Comics in Context” #66: “A Christmas Potpourri”).
Their Beowulf movie is based on the epic poem of the same name which was written by an unknown author between the seventh and tenth centuries A. D. in Anglo-Saxon, also known as Old English. Hence Beowulf is one of the earliest known works in the history of the English language. The title character is the first great hero of the adventure genre that critic Northrop Frye calls “romance” in the English language. Beowulf therefore is our language’s first great example of the kind of character whom I call a “megahero,” who can justly be regarded as a forebear of the superheroes of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. Indeed, Beowulf’s ability to hold his own in hand-to-hand combat with Grendel, a monster who is described as larger than human. may even suggest he possesses superhuman strength, as Samson and Hercules did.
Therefore, for many reasons, the Beowulf movie is a proper subject for this column.
Certainly Beowulf is a considerable advance over The Polar Express in utilizing performance capture technology to translate the performances of real actors into the actions and facial expressions of persuasively realistic computer-generated characters onscreen. Whether or not this technology will continue to advance, and Beowulf will one day look comparatively primitive, remains to be seen. Watching the film I was usually impressed by its mimicking of reality, although there were still many times throughout the film when the characters looked to me too much like waxen figures, breaking the illusion.
In retrospect, perhaps the technology’s limitations were most exposed by the notorious depiction of Grendel’s mother as a nude version of Angelina Jolie, the actress on whose performance the character was based. (Hereafter I shall refer to the movie’s Ma Grendel as Grendelina Jolie. Readers with time to spare are encouraged to write her a theme song to the tune of Frank Loesser’s song “Thumbelina” from the 1952 movie musical Hans Christian Andersen.) I didn’t find the sight of Grendelina as erotic as it should have been, and I believe that the difference is that the sight of actual flesh can be considerably more sensual than Zemeckis’s cinematic wax.
Although there are film critics who argue that a movie must diverge from a literary work that it adapts, I suspect that the general public assumes that a
movie adaptation is faithful to the original book. Moreover, a movie adaptation may displace the original work in the public imagination: I expect that more people know MGM’s Wizard of Oz than L. Frank Baum’s book.
Neil Gaiman confronted these problems in discussing an “educational pack” for the Beowulf movie in the Tuesday, November 6, 2007 entry in his blog: “Incidentally, I think the educational pack done for Beowulf is simply wrong. Part of the point of the Beowulf movie that Roger and I wrote is the places it diverges from the story of Beowulf, and the ways it explores the relationship between a person and a story about a person. I don’t think they should be putting the stuff we made up on material intended for schools — it seems like a way of justifiably irritating teachers, who have enough to put up with when they try to teach Beowulf without us making their lives harder. It would have been much more interesting to have put up either the original, or one that talked about the differences — I’d absolutely encourage high schoolers to see our version and talk about what changed and why.”
I didn’t encounter the original Beowulf until I was in college, and it is a subject that has occupied scholars who are long past their student days. One of my regular strategies in writing “Comics in Context” is to compare an adaptation to the original work to discover what has been changed, what hs been gained, and what has been lost. In the case of Beowulf, I turned to poet Seamus Heaney’s recent verse translation of the original Old English poem, which, surprisingly, became a best seller in 2000. I obtained a copy of the 2002 Norton Critical Edition of Heaney’s Beowulf: A Verse Translation, which includes numerous critical and historical essays, including J. R. R. Tolkien’s celebrated “Beowulf: The Monsters and the Critics.”
The poem begins by speaking of the Danes, “and the kings who ruled them had courage and greatness” (Heaney translation, line 2; Norton edition, p. 3). Among those kings was Shield Sheafson, whom the poet describes thus: That was one good king” (Heaney line 11, p. 3).
Shield had a son, Beow, who was “a comfort sent by God to that nation” (Heaney lines 13-14, p. 3). The poet praises Beow for his “prudent” course of action:
“giving freely while his father lives
so that afterward in age when fighting starts
steadfast companions will stand by him
and hold the line. Behavior that’s admired
is the path to power among people everywhere.” (Heaney lines 21-25, p. 3)
Thus in the first page of the translation, the Beowulf poet establishes some of the work’s major themes. One of them is to describe and commend the behavior of the “good king,” the good leader of men, and, perhaps, the good man in general. The poet points out that “behavior that’s admired” wins the loyalty of others.
Moreover, whereas the Beowulf legend has its roots in pre-Christian culture, the poem Beowulf, as it has come down to us, was written from a Christian perspective. A benevolent God, “the Lord of life, the glorious Almighty” (Heaney lines 16-17, p. 3), watches over the human race, and sent Beow into the world to be a “leader” to the Danes.
Beow was the grandfather of Hrothgar, the king who commanded the construction of Heorot,
“a great mead-hall
meant to be a wonder of the world forever;
it would be his throne-room and there he would dispense
his God-given goods to young and old–
but not the common land or people’s lives.” (Heaney lines 69-73, pgs. 405)
I assume that in choosing the phrase he did, Heaney sought to link Heorot with the legendary Seven Wonders of the World, of which the Great Pyramid of Giza is the sole survivor. So Heorot is presented as a great monument of civilization. Presumably it is also a triumph of art, as a work of architecture.
Moreover, Heorot is Hrothgar’s “throne-room”; it symbolizes Hrothgar’s government, as, say, the White House does the American presidency. Hrothgar is a good king. Rather than hoarding his wealth (like the dragon later in the epic), Hrothgar would “dispense his God-given goods to young and old.” A Norton edition footnote points out that Hrothgar could not “dispose of land used in common” or “unlawfully kill his subjects” (Norton p. 5): again, Hrothgar is a good king. Moreover, he is a king who follows God’s will: his goods are “God-given,” and in distributing them to his people, he performs the Christian act of charity. Hrothgar is “the wise king” (Heaney, line 1400, p. 38).
Hrothgar intends Heorot to be “a wonder of the world forever” (Heaney line 70. p. 5). But here, at the outset of the work, the Beowulf poet introduces another of his major themes: that no one and nothing lasts forever in this mortal world.
“The hall towered,
its gables wide and high and awaiting
a barbarous burning. That doom abided,
bit in time it would come: the killer instinct
unleashed among in-laws, the blood-lust rampant.” (Heaney lines 81-85, p. 5).
A footnote (Norton p. 5) explains that Heorot is doomed one day to be burned as a result of a feud between the Danes and the Heatho-Bards. Neither man nor his works are immortal in this world. The foretold destruction of Heorot may parallel Ragnarok, the twilight of the gods, with the destruction of Valhalla, or the Christian concept of the Apocalypse, the end of the world.
Heorot will eventually meet its end as a result of “barbarous” action, resulting from “the blood-lust rampant.” The nature of the good king and the true hero seems to be important to the Beowulf poet because he is well aware of the evil of which humanity is capable. Through their good and wise reigns as rulers, Hrothgar and later Beowulf triumph over the dark side of humanity. Their reigns represent the victory of civilization–and Christian virtue–over barbarism and “blood-lust.” But that triumph, too, will not last forever. Hence Heorot is also like King Arthur’s Camelot, a mythic high point of Western civilization that was doomed to fall.
That barbarism and blood-lust is incarnated in the monstrous figure of Grendel, “a powerful demon, a prowler through the dark” (Heaney line 86, p. 5). That description links Grendel to both the Jungian shadow and the Christian concept of hell.
In the movie it seems that Grendel has super-sensitive hearing, so that even though he dwells miles away from Heorot, he can hear the noise from the partying in the mead-hall. The sound infuriates Grendel, as if he were the stereotypical cranky old man insisting that the kids next door turn their stereo down.
Perhaps, too, he is like Dr. Seuss’s Grinch, living on his mountaintop, angered by the sound of the Whos down in Whoville celebrating Christmas. (Wait a minute: “Grinch” and “Grendel” start with the same letters. You don’t suppose that Dr. Seuss [aka Theodor Seuss Geisel] was inspired by Beowulf in creating the Grinch? A quick Google search demonstrates that the idea has occurred to other people as well: see Robert L. Schichler, “Understanding the Outsider: Grendel, Geisel, and the Grinch,” Popular Culture Review 11.1 [Feb. 2000], 99-105. and here)
But there’s more to Grendel’s motivation than overly sensitive ears.
“It harrowed him
to hear the din of the loud banquet
every day in the hall, the harp being struck
and the clear song of a skilled poet
telling with mastery of man’s beginnings,
how the Almighty had made the earth
a gleaming plain girdled with waters;
in His splendor He set the sun and the moon
to be earth’s lamplight, lanterns for men. . .
. . .and quickened life
in every other thing that moved.” (Heaney, lines 87-98, p. 5)
The banquet represents civilization and community as well as happiness, all of which the monstrous outsider Grendel opposes. But notice that Grendel also hates the music of the harp and the “song of a skilled poet,” who is not unlike the author of Beowulf itself. In other words, Grendel is opposed to one of civilization’s achievements, the arts. Further, the poet’s song recounts how the benevolent God, who conforms to the Christian image of the deity, created the earth, at least in large part as a home for humankind. Like the devil, Grendel is opposed to God. We can also see that Grendel opposes creation in any form, whether it is the idea of God creating the world, or humanity’s artistic creation. The song is also about how God “quickened life in every other thing that moved.” Ultimately, Grendel is opposed to life other than his own: Grendel is the bringer of death.
Whatever the non-Christian origins of the Beowulf myth, the Beowulf poet certainly roots Grendel firmly in the Christian mythos. Grendel is described as “a fiend out of hell” (Heaney, line 100, p. 5) who once dwelled among “the banished monsters” who are the descendants of Cain, the Biblical first murderer. Thus the poet links Grendel with both Cain and Satan. (Lines 1265-1266, on page 34, clearly establish Grendel as Cain’s descendant.)
Grendel invades Heorot, killing Hrothgar’s people, not just once, but over and over, for a dozen years. The poet depicts Grendel not just as a killer but as a usurper.
“So Grendel ruled in defiance of right
one against all, until the greatest house
in the world stood empty, a deserted wallstead.” (Heaney, lines 144-146, p. 6)
Not only is Grendel the enemy of civilization, but he also represents a nightmarish vision of the bad king or leader. The poet condemns Grendel for his refusal to negotiate with his adversaries or pay reparations to the families of his victims!
“Sad lays were sung about. . .
the vicious raids and ravages of Grendel,
his long and unrelenting feud,
nothing but war; how he would never
parley or make peace with any Dane
nor stop his death-dealing nor pay the death-price,
No counselor could ever expect
fair reparation from those rabid hands.” (Heaney, lines 151-158, p. 7)
Hearing of what Grendel had done, Beowulf, “like the leader he was” (Heaney, line 206, p. 8), gathers together men in his country of Geatland and sets sail to go to Hrothgar’s aid. Beowulf seeks glory, which is a virtue in the world of this poem, but he is also extending help to people in distress, a Christian virtue. As we shall see, Beowulf is the poet’s foremost example of the good man, the good leader, and, eventually, the good king. Upon landing, Beowulf and his men “thanked God for that easy crossing on a calm sea” (Heaney, lines 227-228, pgs. 8-9), demonstrating their allegiance to a deity whom the poet surely intends to be the Christian God, even if the poem is set in a time before Christianity came to Denmark.
Then they are confronted by Hrothgar’s watchman, who “challenged them in formal terms” (Heaney, lines 235-6, p. 9). The formal language of the watchman’s speech and Beowulf’s response demonstrates that they are highly civilized men, more comparable to Arthurian knights than to barbarian warriors. Even before Beowulf speaks, the watchman recognizes that “he is truly noble” (Heaney, line 250, p. 9).
Impressed by Beowulf’s heroism, the watchman escorts him to Heorot, which seems nothing like the gray, dark, depressingly primitive structure in Zemeckis’s movie.
“. . .till the timbered hall
rose before them, radiant with gold.
Nobody on earth knew of another
building like it. Majesty lodged there,
its light shone over many lands.” (Heaney, lines 307-311, p. 10)
Why, it seems like an earthly heaven, even despite Grendel’s assaults. Whereas Grendel embodies darkness, Heorot shines with golden light. Moreover, it seems that the civilization that Heorot represents inspires the people of many lands. Again I am reminded of King Arthur’s Camelot.
Beowulf undergoes another challenge in formal language from another Campbellian threshold guardian, Wulfgar, and responds eloquently. Then Hrothgar welcomes Beowulf, recognizing him as an emissary of God:
“Now Holy God
has, in His goodness, guided him here
to the West-Danes, to defend us from Grendel.” (Heaney, lines 381-383, p. 12)
Beowulf asks Hrothgar for “the privilege of purifying Heorot” (Heaney, line 431, p. 13); the choice of words conveys a religious subtext. Indeed, Beowulf acknowledges his belief in God: “And the Geat placed complete trust in his strength of limb and the Lord’s favor” (Heaney, lines 669-670, p. 19).
By the way, in Heaney’s version, Beowulf removes his armor and says he will not use weapons against Grendel (who turns out to be magically invulnerable to them, anyway), but there is no indication that Beowulf is actually naked during the battle with Grendel, as he is in the movie, wherein Beowulf’s nudity seems, shall we say, ostentatiously odd.
Beowulf wrenches off Grendel’s arm. fatally wounding the monster, who retreats to his lair to die. Soon afterwards, a singing storyteller delivers a recitation about another legendary hero, Sigemond, the slayer of a dragon, to whom Beowulf is compared. (Beowulf will also slay a dragon later in the epic.) The recitation ends with what may seem an inexplicable reference to another monarch: “But evil entered into Heremod” (Heaney, line 914, p. 24).
But since the Beowulf poet is out to describe the “good king” and the great hero, it makes sense that he invokes not only another great hero of the past, Sigemund, who parallels Beowulf, but also Beowulf’s opposite, the evil Heremod, an example of a bad king.
Hrothgar makes it clear that the Christian God worked through Beowulf to rid them of Grendel:
“First and foremost, let the Almighty Father
be thanked for this sight. I suffered a long
harrowing by Grendel. But the Heavenly Shepherd
can work his wonders always and everywhere.” (Heaney, lines 927-930, p. 25)
“But now a man,
with the Lord’s assistance, has accomplished something
none of us could manage before now. . . .(Heaney, lines 938-940, p. 25).
The word “harrowing” reminds me of Christ’s “Harrowing of Hell.” Hrothgar also reminds me of the mythic Fisher-King, the wounded monarch who is figuratively impotent, and whose realm declines into a wasteland. Beowulf is the younger, more virile hero who saves the kingdom. Hrothgar adopts Beowulf as a son, making him heir to the restored kingdom.
Indeed, later, the poet describes how Beowulf behaved as a Christian hero in defeating Grendel:
“The monster wrenched and wrestled with him,
but Beowulf was mindful of his mighty strength,
the wondrous gifts God had showered on him:
he relied for help on the Lord of All.
on His care and favor. So he overcame the foe. . . .” (Heaney, lines 1269-1273, p. 35)
Beowulf is rather like the Biblical Samson, combining his great strength with his faith in God.
In a seeming digression, “the king’s poet”–notice how frequently poets and storytellers turn up in Beowulf–tells the story of “the gallant Finn slain in his home” (Heaney, lines 1147-1148, p. 31). Amidst the celebration of Beowulf’s victory this comes a memento mori, a reminder that even heroes can eventually fall victim to the violence of the world.
And the Beowulf poet considers his title character a true hero. He tells us, simply, “that good man, Beowulf the Geat, sat between the brothers,” Hrothgar’s sons (Heaney, lines 1189-1190, p. 33).
Yet the poet even restates his theme of inevitable mortality by putting it in the mouth of his victorious young hero. Before setting out on the trail of Grendel’s mother, Beowulf observes that “For every one of us, living in this world means waiting for our end. Let whoever can win glory before death.” (Heaney, lines 1386-1388, p. 37).
According to the poem Ma Grendel may be a “monstrous hell-bride” (Heaney, line 1259, p. 34), but she also “as far as anyone ever can discern looks like a woman” whereas Grendel was “warped in the shape of a man” (Heaney, lines 1350-1352, p. 36), so Zemeckis is justified in making Grendel’s mother look like Angelina Jolie rather than a repellent monster.
Again, in the poem Beowulf fulfills the role of the Christian hero in defeating and beheading Grendel’s mother: “holy God decided the victory” (Heaney, lines 1553-1554, p. 41).
During the celebration of Beowulf’s triumph over Grendel’s mother, Hrothgar returns to the subject of the evil king Heremod, who “killed his own comrades, a pariah king who cut himself off from his own kind” (Heaney, lines 1714-1715, p. 45). Hrothgar argues that a leader who loses sight of his own mortality will be corrupted by power:
“He [God] permits him to lord it in many lands
until the man in his unthinkingness
forgets that it will ever end for him. . . .
The whole world
conforms to his will, he is kept from the world
until an element of overweening
enters him and takes hold. . . .” (Heaney, lines 1732-1734, 1739-1741, p. 45)
Hrothgar them warns Beowulf:
“Choose, dear Beowulf, the better part,
eternal rewards. Do not give way to pride.
For a brief while your strength is in bloom
but it fades quickly. . . .
. . . and death will arrive,
dear warrior, to sweep you away.” (Heaney, lines 1759-1762, 1767-1768, p. 46)
The corruption of power and of heroes is a theme of Zemeckis’s Beowulf, but in the poem Beowulf never succumbs to this temptation. Soon after Hrothgar’s speech comes another reference to a bad monarch who did, Queen Modthyth, and who provides yet another contrast with the incorruptible leaders Hrothgar and Beowulf.
Beowulf eventually becomes king of his homeland Geatland (whereas in the movie he becomes king of Denmark): “He was a good king” (Heaney, line 2390, p. 60).
But outside Beowulf’s realm violence and evil still ravage the world: “Pillage and slaughter have emptied the earth of entire peoples” (Heaney, lines 2265-2266, p. 58). Not even Beowulf’s counterpart to Heorot (and Camelot) is permanent. A dragon, another monster that embodies the world’s violence, devastates Geatland, and even incinerates Beowulf’s own home, “the best of buildings” (Heaney, line 2326, p. 59).
Moreover, Beowulf recognizes that even his long, heroic life has come to its end, and that he will not survive his combat with the dragon: “He was sad at heart, unsettled yet ready, sensing his death” (Heaney, lines 2419-2420, p. 61). He cannot escape the inevitability of old age and death.
Indeed, the aged Beowulf, like Hrothgar before him, has, to an extent, become the impotent king: look what happens in the battle with the dragon to that obvious phallic symbol, his sword:
“The glittering sword
infallible before that day,
failed when he unsheathed it, as it never should have,
For the son of Ecgtheow [meaning Beowulf], it was no easy thing
to have to give ground like that and go
unwillingly to inhabit another home
in a place beyond [meaning heaven]; so every man must yield
the leasehold of his days.” (Heaney, lines 2584-2591, p. 65)
As the battle continues, Beowulf’s “ancient iron-gray sword” even “snapped” in two (Heaney, lines 2680-2681, p. 67).
Out of pride, Beowulf insisted on battling the dragon alone. The troops who accompanied him fled the scene of the battle out of cowardice. The sole exception was a young warrior named Wiglaf, who goes to Beowulf’s aid, and who clearly is intended by the poet to be Beowulf’s spiritual heir, a hero of the next generation. Working together as “partners in nobility” (Heaney, line 2707, p. 68), Wiglaf and Beowulf succeed in killing the dragon.
Mortally wounded in his combat with the dragon, the dying Beowulf reflects on his life:
“I took what came,
cared for and stood by things in my keeping,
never fomented quarrels, never
swore to a lie. All this consoles me,
doomed as I am and sickening for death;
because of my right ways, the Ruler of mankind
need never blame me when the breath leaves my body
for murder of kinsmen.” (Heaney, lines 2736-2743, p. 68)
In a mark of honor, Wiglaf and others burn Beowulf’s body on what the poet calls simply “the good man’s pyre” (Heaney, line 3113, p. 77). In Beowulf‘s final lines, the poet sums up,
“They said that of all the kings upon earth
he was the man most gracious and fair-minded,
kindest to his people and keenest to win fame.” (Heaney, lines 3180-3182, p. 78)
So, yes, indeed, the Zemeckis-Avary-Gaiman Beowulf certainly “diverges from the story of Beowulf,” the original poem. (And here I issue a spoiler warning for those who have not yet seen the movie.) Rather than depicting a proto-Christian hero, the movie indicates that the rise of Christianity put an end to the age of heroes. Although the movie’s Beowulf grows older, the film fails to convey the sense that age has weakened him, that his death in combat with the dragon is inevitable, or that his tragedy is that of all humanity: the inevitability of old age and death.
Moreover, the Beowulf poet is clearly intent both on creating images of the ideal hero, leader and ruler and on urging his readers to aspire to the high standards that his ideal leaders set. But the Beowulf movie refuses to believe in the poet’s “good kings,” instead depicting both Hrothgar and Beowulf as deeply, morally flawed men. The Hrothgar of the movie is a drunken boor, who can barely manage to keep his clothing on during the celebration at the film’s start, and whose young wife shrinks from his touch. The Beowulf poet tells us that his title character “never swore to a lie,” yet the triumphs of the Beowulf of the movie in slaying monsters are marred by the fact that he is a liar. The movie’s Beowulf claims to have slain Grendelina, whereas he instead became her lover and let her live, thereby not just compromising with evil but becoming its enabler. He follows a pattern set by Hrothgar, who has likewise concealed his own tryst with Grendelina, which spawned the monstrous Grendel, a living representation of the consequences of his liaison with evil. Similarly, the dragon proves to be the son of Beowulf and Grendelina, representing his own dark side, unleashed to wreak destruction. In the movie Beowulf perishes not so much due to the inevitability of human mortality but because he cannot destroy the evil he has created without destroying himself. And is there any hope for the future? At the film’s end, Wiglaf, who is not depicted as a young man, is left staring at Grendelina, leaving the audience to wonder of he will continue the cycle by becoming her lover and fathering yet another monster.
Neil Gaiman says that the Beowulf movie “explores the relationship between a person and a story about a person.” But why should the movie’s deeply pessimistic and cynical depiction of Beowulf be more credible than the original poet’s portrayal of Beowulf as a truly good and noble man? Over a millennium ago the Beowulf poet could extol the human potential for moral greatness. The Beowulf movie dismisses the possibility. This is not progress.
Besides, the original Beowulf is a fictional character as depicted in the epic poem. It is that poem that defines Beowulf’s character. The Beowulf of the Zemeckis movie may have the same name and perform many of the same actions, but he does not have the same personality, and certainly not the same moral code, as the Beowulf of the poem. To put it another way, the Beowulf of the movie has a different characterization than the Beowulf of the poem. Or to put it bluntly, the movie’s Beowulf is not the same person as the poem’s Beowulf.
You cannot faithfully adapt or interpret a work if you turn the central character into a different person. However interesting the Zemeckis movie may be, it might as well be called something like Fred the Dragon-Slayer; it’s not about the Beowulf readers have known for centuries.
–Copyright 2007 Peter Sanderson
Our holiday contest-a-palooza continues as, in conjunction with NBC.com, we’re giving away prizes from the stars of the online animated comedy shorts PALE FORCE – Conan O’Brien and Jim Gaffigan. What are we giving away? How about:
1 Conan O’Brien 10th Anniversary DVD
1 Conan O’Brien Tshirt
1 Jim Gaffigan CD: Beyond the Pale
Contest ends at midnight EST on Monday, December 10th.
No member of Quick Stop Entertainment or their immediate families may enter.
No Purchase necessary to win.
Must be 18 years of age or older to enter.
All submitted entries must be received by 11:59pm EST on Monday, December 10th.
The winner must allow 4-6 weeks after notification of win to receive the product.
The web. It’s a big place, full of plenty of distractions ““ some funny, some informative, some ludicrous, some disturbing, some inane, some profound. Each and every weekday, we present links to a few of our favorite finds”¦
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SModcast is the meandering palaver of a pair of dudes whose voices are so dull, they don’t deserve to be on the radio (and, hence, aren’t). Kevin Smith and Scott Mosier are SModcast.
The best thing about SModcast? It don’t cost nothing.
SModcast 39: Of Berries And Twigs –
In which our heroes engage in a frank discussion of inebriation, find out what happens when the Italian Harold decides Maude is a bit too old, and touch on the horrors of Alzheimer’s, how to spend your last 48 hours, the passing of Evel, the vindictiveness of jellyfish, and a future after the unkindest cut of all.
[CONTENT WARNING] SModcast features harsh language and even harsher notions of propriety. Listener discretion is advised.
DOWNLOAD: (right click to save)
SModcast 39 (MP3 format) – 48.79 MB
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CLICK HERE FOR THE SMODCAST ARCHIVES
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The web. It’s a big place, full of plenty of distractions ““ some funny, some informative, some ludicrous, some disturbing, some inane, some profound. Each and every weekday, we present links to a few of our favorite finds”¦
————————————————
Have a THINGAMABOB? Send it in!
##
The weekend’s here. You’ve just been paid, and it’s burning a hole in your pocket. What’s a pop culture geek to do? In hopes of steering you in the right direction to blow some of that hard-earned cash, it’s time for the Quick Stop Weekend Shopping Guide – your spotlight on the things you didn’t even know you wanted…
After the his first lackluster big screen outing 10 years ago, I was curious to see if lessons were learned with the second Mr. Bean feature, Mr. Bean’s Holiday (Universal, Rated G, DVD-$29.98 SRP). I’m happy to report that lessons were learned, and this flick captures nicely the naïve destructiveness of Rowan Atkinson’s beloved comedy creation, as Bean wins an all-expense-paid vacation to the French Riviera. Bonus materials include deleted scenes and a trio of featurettes.
It’s bittersweet success that Waitress (Fox, Rated PG-13, DVD-$29.99 SRP) is such an enjoyable comedy, as it marks the final film of writer/director Adrienne Shelly, who was murdered shortly before its release. Starring Keri Russell as a small town waitress with big dreams and a talent for stellar pie-making who hatches a plan to win a contest and use the funds to leave her dead-end existence, it’s well worth a spin. Bonus features include an audio commentary, featurettes, and a tribute to Shelly.
If you’re still having withdrawal pangs from the sidelining of Real Time due to the writer’s strike, get your fix of the man himself with the DVD release of Bill Maher’s latest comedy special, Bill Maher: The Decider (HBO, Not Rated, DVD-$19.98 SRP). Can you guess who bears the brunt of the jokes this go round? The disc also includes a bonus featurette, “Bill Maher Finds A Purpose In Life”.
Ignore the over-the-top fawning of host James Lipton, and you get a decent interview with the enigmatic Johnny Depp in his Inside The Actors Studio (Shout! Factory, Not Rated, DVD-$14.99 SRP) spotlight. The disc features additional footage not seen in the original airing, as well as a flashback featurette with Lipton.
With the success of the SNL digital shorts, it was inevitable that Andy Samberg would follow in the footsteps of Chris Kattan and Jimmy Fallon with a starring vehicle of his own, Hot Rod (Paramount, Rated PG-13, DVD-$29.99 SRP), as stuntman Rod Kimble – a man with a dream. Bonus features include an audio commentary, deleted/extended scenes, outtakes, a behind-the-scenes featurette, the theatrical trailer, and more.
Producer Garry Marshall’s accountant must be ecstatic, because third season sets of the legendary writer/director/producer’s TV legacy – Happy Days, Laverne & Shirley, & Mork & Mindy (Paramount, Not Rated, DVD-$38.99 SRP each) – have arrived. Each 4-disc set features the complete seasons, but there are still, sadly, no bonus features to be found. Not even that highly sought-after Anson Williams commentary.
For a very brief run in 1991, NBC combined two of their Nintendo animated series into a single half-hour time slot – Captain N And The New Super Mario World (Shout! Factory, Not Rated, DVD-$29.99 SRP). Shout! has collected all 10 episodes of this brief experiment into a 2-disc set, which also features storyboards of the open titles.
In the second half of Entourage‘s 3rd season (HBO, Not Rated, DVD-$39.98 SRP), the narrative cracks have begun to show, and the emasculation of a fired Ari Gold does nothing but make me feel like someone punctured the bubble that’s kept the rather thin-broth of this sometimes too-insider-for-it’s-own-good show afloat. Bonus features include a behind-the-scenes featurette, a trio of audio commentaries, and a Museum of Television & Radio panel.
The hyperkinetic style of Teen Titans is thrown into overdrive in the fourth season (Warner Bros., Not Rated, DVD-$19.98 SRP). It would have to be, in a season which culminates in a 3-episode arc titled “The End”.
If you’d like to see a career self-destruct in real time, grab some Twizzlers and a soda and watch Lindsey Lohan flail about in the bizarre, sadistic flick I Know Who Killed Me (Sony, Rated R, DVD-$26.96 SRP), as a stripper who is abducted by a sadistic killer, only to have me lose interest after 15 minutes. Bonus features include an alternate opening, and alternate ending, an extended strip dance, and a blooper reel.
So there you have it… my humble suggestions for what to watch, listen to, play with, or waste money on this coming weekend. See ya next week…
-Ken Plume
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Instead of manning-up and actually going the emotionally hard route of being outrightly rejected by publishers, I’m rejecting them first and allowing you to give my entire book a preview, let you read the whole thing or, if you like, download the whole damn thing at no cost. Download and read my first book “Thank You, Goodnight” for FREE.
I do realize that the there will always be big, bloated movies that will always haunt my local cineplex.
After seeing the haul that BEOWULF, the movie where this is the penultimate example of a book being better than the film based on it, took last week it was hard not to believe that there is nothing that Hollywood can’t turn into a bona fide hit at the box office.
The problem, though, is that its second week drop of over 40%, its cumulative total around 56 million at this point, means that it has a long road to hoe to get it into the black beyond its predicted budget of around 150 million. Yes, you’ve got those IMAX screenings and all those other kitschy 3-D offerings, to say nothing of international box office, DVD, blah, blah, blah but it doesn’t take away from the obvious point that there is a steep climb ahead for this investment to pay off. I can’t say I’m surprised by the drop when you see that this is Zemeckis second dip into the well of “motion capture” (he gets a little testy when you mention the words animation for reasons I can’t understand) and it has the same bizarre look that THE POLAR EXPRESS had when you compare the two; the same vacant look in the characters’ eyes, the less than fluid movement of the people in the frame and the people’s mouth movements border on dubbed kung-fu imports all contribute as to why this is movie that is good but not earth shattering as some would have you believe.
The point here isn’t to point a finger at a movie that did solid box office but when you hear about the comparisons of other movies of its kind, the one I heard a few times being A SCANNER DARKLY, there is something I hope to try and figure out about what the difference is between movies of this variety.
I know that what DARKLY did was use rotoscoping, digitally capturing the movements beforehand and then doing everything else in post, its Wikipedia entry even mentioning the word “animate” (Gasp!), but the one glaring difference I didn’t know before investigating these productions was that DARKLY cost around 6 to 8 million to produce compared to the 150 million that BEOWULF took to get it to the big screen.
Now, these are apple and orange comparisons although I think Variety would like to have a few words about what constitutes animation. However, and I would posit, if you’re talking about the budgets of movies of similar films and want to have a discussion of economies of scale what on earth was Zemeckis doing that would explain the gap in this creative endeavor? THE POLAR EXPRESS was an OK movie, it wasn’t superb, but with a production budget that went upwards of about 170 million wouldn’t it be safe to assume that there have been more than 20 million dollars of savings that could have been made to BEOWULF to try and get this number down but, even excluding that, there is something about the process of marketing this film that couldn’t bring people to the trough. True, it was number one last week and I am sure there are people who still believe that the opening weekend is the end-all-be-all benchmark but in an age of strikes and shareholders who are demanding more value from their corporate overlords there is just the sense I have about the What If’s that come along with thinking about how many variations of how many different stories could have been had for the same amount of money.
SCANNER DARKLY didn’t blow the air up anyone’s skirts, yes, but when you talk to those filmmakers who have the penny pincher mentality of being able to make more with less there is something inherently timely about the argument for films that bloat to this size and have nothing more to show for it than a few choice pull quotes and the promise that the 32% drop POLAR experienced in the second week (its third release saw a surge in positive gains, it was Thanksgiving weekend) will most likely ensure a downward trend from here on out. That is, unless, Zemeckis animates a Santa cap on old Ray Winstone…which I don’t think is likely to happen.
It would be nice if people could learn from past experiences but it looks like the more things change, there are those who want to keep it the same. But it’s not Zemeckis’ fault, either, if any of you think I’m pointing a finger. Again, this is the movie…business. He was slick and smart enough to convince someone to pour money into this movie and if there are any kudos he deserves it is for having a great business acumen, convincing those with a checkbook that this was going to be a lock.
Now, if anyone out there wants to listen to me I have a brilliant idea of converting some works of Proust into an animated (I have no problems with the word) adventure filled with violence, guns and butt secks. Who cares if this strays from the text, it certainly didn’t stop Bob.
From the I Love Boobs file: A special thanks has to go out to MAS for their help in getting some of these interviews up on the site. Lord knows I need it and their donations of time and effort is always appreciated.
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Director: Matt Reeves
Cast: Mike Vogel, Michael Stahl-David
Release: January 18, 2008
Synopsis: Secrecy surrounds this monster movie from producer J.J. Abrams (LOST). A mysterious creature attacks New York City, sending the metropolis into chaos.
View Trailer:
* Large (QuickTime)
Prognosis: Negative. Nope, I just don’t see what the fuss is about, this modern day BLAIR WITCH PROJECT. The hype doesn’t equate to anything I can see in this trailer.
Usually, pre-movie release hype centers around a script or a director or even controversy that revolves around a movie’s production yet here, when all anyone had to go off of was a blurry picture of the poster for the film and the doubt whether the flick was going to be called MONSTROUS or the now titled CLOVERFIELD. I am constantly amazed by how much ink some people are willing to spill on nothing more than some clever marketing.
As it stands, this looks like a mesh between GODZILLA and any number of fauxmentaries, the quite unbelievable drama has the sheen of a YouTube lonelygirl15 stench on it, that pass as entertainment. Simply put, if you’re going to lie to me at least grant me the chance to make it feel like you’re not blatantly trying to suspend my disbelief.
For starters, the card that reads that there was a “found camera” that captured everything we’re about to see is just a modern hack tool that would’ve been novel a decade ago; thanks for trying, though, as this just starts me thinking like everything from this point has been purposely rigged to make it feel real. Thanks for spoiling my interest.
The perfectly framed shot of the Statue of Liberty’s head bouncing down the street, I will admit, is pretty keen but the “Oh my God!”s just make me laugh more than anything else because”¦it is all false even in the movie magic sense.
Hey, a perfectly lit video message for anyone who might stumble upon his camcorder later! What a nice companion piece to go with all this other really good video footage of this attack on New York.
“Whatever it is…it’s winning”
From here, I take it, we’re supposed to be assaulted with disjointed shakey-cam footage to increase the tension of what we’re seeing but because we’re already aware, or should be aware, that this is a mix of what we’re supposed to believe is real it just feels needlessly hysterical and over the top. The pixilation of the American soldier’s face is a goofy ass accent that shouldn’t have been done because what comes out of his mouth only does a disservice to the film’s chance of eliciting genuine “oohs” rather than laughing at what they’re doing.
See, what I hope is being understood is that this movie could be very interesting. The dozen or so troops opening fire in a walking line towards the unseen beast that is attacking New York, should I even mention what happened to GODZILLA when its marketing did all it could to not show you the lizard, is a cool shot. That part is actually interesting but the extended scene of these goofballs screaming their heads off in an obvious soundstage that looks like a quickie mart just takes back any goodwill I’m giving it.
Same thing goes for the helicopter shot; it’s intense as fuck but when you have the lead actor saying this is a record so people know what happened I can’t help but think that when I try to record anything so people can know what happened at a birthday or a holiday event my camcorder usually craps out after an hour. Unless this guy is weighed down with a Chewbacca like battery belt any explanation of how he can get all this done will just feel well”¦false.
Director: Michel Gondry
Cast: Mos Def, Jack Black, Danny Glover
Release: January 25th, 2008
Synopsis: Jerry (Jack Black) is a junkyard worker who attempts to sabotage a power plant he suspects of causing his headaches. But he inadvertently causes his brain to become magnetized, leading to the unintentional destruction of all the movies in his friend’s (Mos Def) store. In order to keep the store’s one loyal customer, an elderly lady with a tenuous grasp on reality, the pair re-create a long line of films including The Lion King, Rush Hour, Ghostbusters, When We Were Kings, Back to the Future, Driving Miss Daisy, and Robocop , putting themselves and their townspeople into it. They become the biggest stars in their neighborhood.
View Trailer:
* Large (QuickTime)
Prognosis: Negative. Sometimes it just pays to be ignorant.
It wasn’t until I was through the mid point of this trailer when I realized it was Michel Gondry who directed this film. I hadn’t ever heard of the film, I didn’t keep up with the production of the film and it wasn’t until later in the trailer when I read Michel’s name did I put it all together.
It didn’t take away from the oddness that is his style and, in fact, I was perplexed by what this movie was supposed to be about up until that point.
I was mesmerized by the premise, mostly. The trailer opens up, innocuously enough, with people coming in to a video store asking about their seemingly erased tapes. I thought it was a unique way to introduce a movie with its insistence on having an extended moment where you have what is a bit of strangeness from the perspective of trying to determine where we are and what time it is. Gondry has a way of pushing that 4th wall ever so slightly and he gets kudos from me for the small, yet effective, visual trick of bending the screen with static.
Where this trailer eventually goes, with the GHOSTBUSTERS soundtrack beneath it, is a wondrous take-off as Jack Black for once throttles it back a smidge and actually engages me as a viewer. The lo-fi reenactment of the actual GHOSTBUSTERS film, in an effort to somehow salvage his VHS video operation, is equally catchy. I would have no idea that Mos Def had it in him to play such a straight man but that’s the brilliance of Gondry, to take conventional actors and mold them into something more than what we’re used to.
The second half of the trailer is equally strange but it’s engaging. The recreation of modern films could seem like a one trick gimmick but there’s something more at play if you’re paying hard enough attention.
There is a sense that this is a film built on how other films can filter their way through reinterpretation. It’s the modern equivalent of a modern cover song; you have what was there before and, if you’re honest and faithful to the source material, there could be something that wasn’t immediately there before you heard it. There’s something new and fresh about the perspective it has and the trailer here expresses some of that between-the-lines love for film. I’m not quite sure the remake of DRIVING MISS DAISY does a lot for my confidence in the success of the film, it gets too “Jack Black-y” for my taste, but hopefully it’s just one moment in a slew of other films they recreate.
Some of what could immediately be taken for a gimmick surely could be there within the final cut. But, what’s clear by the end of this trailer is that if there is a fair amount of thoughtfulness put into the idea then there could be another reason to just enjoy what Gondry does best.
If I have any issue at all with this trailer it is that I’m just not sure if this is a movie I feel I need to see immediately; my final impression is tinged with the idea that you have these schlubs who have a old and busted video store, create mini movies to stay alive, Jack Black does his shtick, Mos Def looks like the weigh holding everything down and they all rise to prominence within the community.
I think the biggest sum of all these parts is: so what? There’s nothing compelling about this trailer and that’s the most disappointing part about this preview.
Director(s): Chris Weitz, Bob Shaye
Cast: Nicole Kidman, Dakota Blue Richards, Sam Elliott, Eva Green, Daniel Craig
Release: December 7th, 2007
Synopsis: Based on author Philip Pullman’s bestselling and award-winning novel, The Golden Compass tells the first story in Pullman’s His Dark Materials trilogy. The Golden Compass is an exciting fantasy adventure, set in an alternative world where people’s souls manifest themselves as animals, talking bears fight wars, and Gyptians and witches co-exist.
View Trailer:
* Large (YouTube)
Prognosis: Positive. This could possibly be the best return to greatness I have ever seen for a trailer.
Based on this shitageous trailer for the film eons ago when it did nothing for me and only served to aggravate my sense that this was going to be nothing more than a lighter version of the CHRONICLES OF NARNIA and that I should just find another indie to indulge myself in because of the bloated nature of this awful looking film, this trailer came out and has changed my attitude 100%.
Just because it’s going to be an epic it doesn’t mean you have to market it as so.
Someone got this through their fat skull and realized that trailers were meant to lie to people and, even if your film is six and a half hours you have two minutes and twenty nine seconds to sex it up a bit. The first trailer, which you can see any number of places, is OK. It’s nothing great; it certainly didn’t excite me enough to even talk about. The reason why it lacks in ways too numerous to list is exactly because there are too many things to list. The trailer challenges you to keep a running tab on all the things that are going on.
Now, I don’t purport to be an expert on the source material. I know a lot of geeks and nerds get their wide panties in a bunch when adaptations stray from the literary text from which they originated. What these dweebs don’t realize is that it is called the movie business for a reason. There are just some elements that have to go by the wayside and some that have to be included. THE LORD OF THE RINGS trilogy excelled simply because of its faithful adaptation, and the company behind the franchise is smart, wickedly smart, for stamping that message within seconds of this television spot. This does a few things but it does one thing in particular that’s important to keep in mind: establishes credibility.
Once it does this it is the reeling in of all the sleepy elements that made the first trailer so unwieldy. You had so much territory to cover, so much of it went to making it seem like they were saying “Look how careful we’re being with this story too!” when it did nothing for illiterate wags like me who could not have cared less about the source material but needed a brain dead reason to spend the money to see the movie. I wasn’t given it with the theatrical trailer but I’ll be damned if the 33 seconds this spot spans doesn’t make me yearn with abject glee.
The way it works so well, then, is after its explanation that this company did the deed with the RINGS trilogy and will do it again with this one we’re launched into a screamingly fast rock track that gets right to the quick.
It’s my base need to be thrilled and excited that genuinely pays off. You’ve got some babushka bobbing bearded dudes with long swords ready to slice and dice, you’ve got Nicole Kidman doing what she really can only do well, look hot and not saying much, toss in some polar bears that are losing their shit right in the middle of a square (who cares about the reasons why this is even happening), toss in a brunette who is doing some of her own battling in the middle of a dark wasteland, also looking hot and not saying anything, get excited by some animals going to town on one another as they try and kill one another and top it off with Daniel Craig dueling it out with the butt of a rifle.
I am happy I am an illiterate slob with regard to knowing what’s happening here because I have no clue how this all fits together. I am sure the book is a wonderful piece of literature that kids everywhere appreciated with regard to pointing fingers at organized religion.
I also have no reason why I am especially giddy by a polar bear swatting some canine but if this is an allegory of what people are feeling about predatory, pedophile priests then I am so in.
This is, head and shoulders, the exact M.O. that should be employed when trying to sell another epic to a public that has been sold on multiple variants of the RINGS trilogy ever since it was shown that it can be successful; there needs to be a reason to go and spend the money.
11/30/07
Sick of those never-ending Thanksgiving leftovers? If so, here’s a potential cure: Halloween leftovers! That’s right, a whole bunch of great (and not-so-great) monster and horror films were dug up by the studios this year for the spooky holiday, and if you missed “˜em in October, it’s not too late to catch up now”¦ hell, they’ll make great Christmas gifts!
This year was particularly great for old school horror and monster fans, as MGM Home Entertainment, and their new distributor, 20th Century Fox, decided to resurrect the popular “Midnite Movies” line, dipping into the musty vaults of both companies for this year’s offerings of cinema macabre.
Among the most welcome of this year’s “Midnite Movies” releases is director Michael Reeves’ final film, WITCHFINDER GENERAL (1968). Previously only available in edited form as THE CONQUEROR WORM, with the home video addition of cheesy synth music replacing Paul Ferris’ lush symphonic score; this new edition finally restores the film to the filmmakers’ original intentions.
Vincent Price plays Matthew Hopkins, who travels the English countryside, selling his services as a “witchfinder.” For a fee, he puts accused witches to sadistic “˜tests,” to determine whether they are truly in thrall to Satan. But, inevitably, he picks on the wrong victims, and finds an angry young soldier (Ian Ogilvy) on his trail.
The last film of cult director Michael Reeves, who died of a drug overdose shortly after completing the movie, WITCHFINDER GENERAL has become something of a holy grail for horror film buffs. Now that it is available in its original form, fans can determine for themselves whether it lives up to its vaunted reputation. It’s a good film, no question, with one of Vincent Price’s most layered, serious performances ever. The whole cast is solid, the production values are strong, and the climax is startling even today.
MGM has given this classic horror film a fine treatment with this new release. The gorgeous transfer is presented in 1.85:1 anamorphic widescreen. The soundtrack is in its original mono. Unlike most of the newer “Midnite Movies” titles, WITCHFINDER includes a couple of welcome bonus features: an audio commentary by actor Ian Ogilvy and co-producer Philip Waddilove, and an informative, well-produced retrospective documentary. My only complaint is that it would have been nice to have the U.S. opening titles (as THE CONQUERER WORM) with Price’s reading of the Poe poem as another extra.
Recommended.
For fans of giant monsters and rampaging behemoths, there’s the destructive double bill of YONGARY, MONSTER OF THE DEEP/ KONGA (1967/1961).
YONGARY was Korea’s first entry in the Asian giant monster genre, and it’s pretty awful, although MGM’s newly restored DVD helps it quite a bit. The plot is simple: a giant saurian emerges from the ground and rampages through the Korean country-and-city-side until it is defeated by a noble scientist. With the obligatory obnoxious kid in short pants and scenes of model airplanes being batted from their strings by the guy in the monster suit, the film satisfies all the requirements of the kaiju genre. It’s all just a bit ineptly done, unfortunately.
Never previously available in the U.S. in widescreen (the film was bought by AIP television in the Sixties and released to syndication only in a 16mm, horrifically cropped, full-frame version. MGM’s new, restored DVD is in 2.35 anamorphic widescreen, and looks terrific, with a sharp picture, solid colors, and virtually no visible print damage. There are no extras provided, unfortunately.
KONGA was an American-International release directed by John Lemont and produced by Herman Cohen. Michael Gough (HORRORS OF THE BLACK MUSEUM, Alfred in the first four BATMAN films) plays Doctor Charles Decker, an arrogant botanist and college professor whose experiments turn a small chimp named Konga into a rampaging giant gorilla.
It takes a while to get there, though, and the audience has to sit through more than an hour of Gough being a complete prick to everyone around him and a few Rue Morgue-styled murders before Konga shoots up to King Kong-like proportions and begins the obligatory rampage. Fortunately, Gough’s Decker is an utter bastard, so fun to watch that it keeps your attention until the monkey business begins. Plus, there’s a buxom blonde co-ed, a goofy gorilla suit and some truly ridiculous pseudo-science to keep you entertained ““ just don’t ask how the chimp switches species to become a gorilla. No one knows.
This “Midnite Movies” presentation is a direct port of the previously released Sony/MGM disc with a crystal clear full-screen (1.33:1) transfer. The picture quality is so sharp that it actually betrays the movie’s special effects work, making the process shots and the Barbie dolls that Konga carries around way too obvious. The sound is a clear mono, with only minimal background noise. The otherwise bare-bones disc even includes trailers for several unrelated Sony DVD releases from a few years ago, when Sony handled MGM’s distribution.
Arguably the best of the rampaging reptile subgenre, 1980’s ALLIGATOR comes to DVD in a surprisingly nice edition from Lion’s Gate.
A little girl’s pet baby alligator is flushed down the toilet by her asshole dad. Twelve years later, the reptile has grown to tremendous size, having fed on the carcasses of illegally dumped test animals, and begins preying on errant sewer workers. Detective David Madison (the great Robert Forster, JACKIE BROWN) is assigned to investigate, and with the help of a cute herpetologist (Robin Riker), he tries to convince the authorities that they have a monster carnivore on their hands.
When screenwriter John Sayles struck out on his own as a highbrow independent filmmaker, the world of schlock cinema lost a great asset. Sayles’ B movie scripts (PIRANHA, THE HOWLING, BATTLE BEYOND THE STARS) always showed rare intelligence and wit, and his sly screenplay for ALLIGATOR is no exception. His story suffers a bit at the workmanlike hands of director Lewis Teague (CUJO), but it’s still one of the best examples of its particular genre.
The best thing about the film though, is the beastie itself. Brought to life with both real alligators on detailed miniature sets, and utterly convincing animatronics, the toothsome terror is a formidable ““ and tangible ““ menace. Compare the reptile in this film to the CGI critters in recent killer lizard flicks, and tell me which one is more frightening.
Lion’s Gate graciously gives this long awaited genre gem a restored & remastered 1.78:1 anamorphic widescreen transfer, and it’s the best the movie has ever looked on home video. Sharp, detailed, with solid blacks and vivid colors, the seventeen-year-old, low budget film looks brand new. Surprisingly, LG has also sprung for a couple of bonus features, including and audio commentary by director Teague and an on-screen interview with screenwriter Sayles. There are also trailers for a handful of other LG titles.
Recommended.
This Fall, MGM revisited Dan O’Bannon’s 1984 zombie classic with a new “Collector’s Edition” of THE RETURN OF THE LIVING DEAD.
Taking place over the course of one evening in Louisville, Kentucky, RETURN tells the twisted tale of two employees at a medical supply warehouse who inadvertently release a toxic gas into the atmosphere. This gas, created by the Army, reanimates the dead, and turns them into fast-moving, intelligent ghouls that crave human brains. Did I mention that this warehouse was next door to a graveyard? Or that a group of teenage punks are partying among the tombstones?
One of the true horror classics of the Eighties, RETURN deftly mixes horror and humor with a steadily rising tide of hysteria that leads to an inevitable, and utterly nihilistic climax. A talented cast of veteran character actors (Clu Gulager, James Karen, Don Calfa), young faces (Thom Matthews, Beverly Randolph) and scream queens (Linnea Quigley, Jewel Shepherd), remarkable zombie make-up and practical effects, and a witty, intelligent screenplay combine, under O’Bannon’s deft direction, to make a damn near perfect fright film.
Sporting a new transfer and a bunch of newly created bonus features, this new “Collector’s Edition” trumps the version released a few years ago, but it does not include quite everything from that edition. If you have the old one, you may want to hang on to it, too. First off, the movie is given a new 1.85:1 anamorphic widescreen transfer, culled from a flawless source. Colors are bright and solid, details are sharp and well defined, and there are no noticeable artifacts or print damage. It looks gorgeous. The Dolby stereo sound is strong, with the film’s punk rock score coming through loud and clear”¦ along with all the screams and zombie moans. There are two commentary tracks provided. First is an informative commentary by director Dan O’Bannon and production designer William Stout, ported over from the previous edition. New to this disc is a second commentary track by most of the film’s cast, joined once again by Stout. This track is a lot of fun, and well-worth listening to. MGM has also included a couple of silly gimmicks: “zombie subtitles” and an Easter Egg “zombie thoughts” track. I appreciate the effort, but both are really lame.
MGM has also produced two new featurettes for this edition: “The Dead Have Risen,” a making-of documentary with most of the cast and crew represented, and “The Decade of Darkness,” a retrospective of 80’s horror films, filled with clips and interviews with filmmakers like John Landis, Joe Dante and Stuart Gordon. A third featurette, “Designing the Dead,” is retained from the previous release, and includes interviews with O’Bannon and Stout. Also retained from the original DVD are a couple of trailers. Missing from this edition is the full-frame version of the film (no great loss), some TV spots and some beautiful concept art by Stout.
If you’re a fan of this film ““ and if you’re not, you should be ““ this new Collector’s Edition is a no-brainer (if you’ll pardon the expression). Even if you have the previous DVD release, it’s definitely worth buying again. This is one of the few double dips I don’t resent, as it really is an improvement over the old version.
Highly recommended.
Another 80’s horror classic was just reissued as part of Starz Entertainment’s “Anchor Bay Collection,” in the form of Clive Barker’s original HELLRAISER (1987).
Barker’s feature directing debut is the twisted and disturbing tale of a couple (Andrew Robinson of STAR TREK: DS9, and Clare Higgins) who move into an old house and discover the undead form of the husband’s brother (who was also the wife’s lover) in the attic. His earthly body having been taken by bizarre, sadistic demons known as Cenobites, he forces his former mistress to bring him his human sacrifices so he can recreate his body…
A disturbingly graphic and highly effective horror film, the original HELLRAISER stands as one of the best true horror films of the Eighties. With a palpable sense of dread and depravity, the film still has the power to shock and horrify.
Starz gives the movie a fantastic new1.85:1 anamorphic widescreen transfer and a Dolby 5.1 surround mix. The disc is loaded with extras ““ some from previous editions of the film on DVD, some new ““ including five featurettes, an audio commentary by Barker, TV spots, trailers, several still galleries and the first and final drafts of the screenplay on DVD-ROM. I haven’t seen the previous DVD releases of this film. But I doubt they looked this good. If you’re a fan, you might consider upgrading to this edition for the excellent transfer and new featurettes.
HELLRAISER is an important and still-effective horror classic that has been given a very solid release by Starz/Anchor Bay. Recommended.
Remembered ““ and sometimes reviled ““ as the cheapest producer in Hollywood, the legendary “Jungle Sam” Katzman is celebrated in Columbia’s new ICONS OF HORROR COLLECTION: SAM KATZMAN boxed set. This collection includes four of the genre films that he produced for Columbia Pictures, among them the most ridiculous giant monster flick of the Fifties and a genuine low-budget lycanthropic gem.
THE GIANT CLAW (1957) features probably the most absurd giant monster of all time in the form of a gangly, apparently molting marionette representing an “antimatter bird” from another dimension. Aside from that, though, it’s not a terrible slice of 50’s sci-fi, with a fairly imaginative script, and a good cast featuring Jeff Morrow (THIS ISLAND EARTH), the lovely Mara Corday (TARANTULA) and solid direction by veteran Fred F. Sears (EARTH VS. THE FLYING SAUCERS). Shame about the puppet, though.
Scripted by Curt Siodmak (THE WOLF MAN, DONOVAN’S BRAIN), 1955’s CREATURE WITH THE ATOM BRAIN stars Richard Denning (CREATURE FROM THE BLACK LAGOON) as a police scientist embroiled in a plot involving gangsters, Nazi scientists and reanimated atomic zombies. Decent direction by Edward L. Cahn (IT! THE TERROR FROM BEYOND SPACE) and a cast full of familiar serial vets make for a fast-paced 69 minutes of vintage schlock.
Cahn also helmed ZOMBIES OF MORA TAU (1957), a sluggish tale of sunken treasure and its undead protectors somewhere on the African coast. The best part of this interminable potboiler is the presence of sexy Allison Hayes (the 50-FOOT WOMAN herself) as a spoiled bitch-turned-zombie.
The best film in the set, though, is Fred F. Sears’ THE WEREWOLF (1956), a sci-fi take on lycanthropy, featuring hapless Steven Ritch as the victim of a couple of mad scientists. Never before available on home video, this briskly paced, well-acted chiller benefits from lots of authentic snowy mountain locations and is a great atomic age twist on an old theme.
Columbia presents CLAW, ZOMBIES and WEREWOLF in beautiful new B&W transfers, correctly framed at 1:85:1 and anamorphically enhanced. ATOM BRAIN is presented full-frame. Columbia has also included the second chapter of the Katzman-produced movie serial MYSTERIOUS ISLAND (1951), which purports to be based on the Jules Verne novel, but is instead a ludicrous mishmash of cliffhanger cliches. There’s also a Mr. Magoo cartoon, a somewhat tedious comedy short, MIDNIGHT BLUNDERS, and trailers for all four features, as well as for other vintage Columbia genre titles.
A fantastic package, affordably priced, and highly recommended.
Probably the most memorable horror franchise of the Fifties is collected in Fox’s new THE FLY COLLECTION box set, featuring all three of the films in the series, including one that has never been available on home video before.
THE FLY trilogy chronicles the efforts of the scientifically-minded Delambres family, and their obsession with creating a working matter transportation device (like STAR TREK’s “transporters.”).
In the big-budget, Technicolor, Cinemascope opus, THE FLY (1958), David Hedison (THE LOST WORLD, LICENCE TO KILL) is Andre Delambres, handsome young scientist who builds a pair of teleportation chambers. After a successful test with an animal, Andre decides to try the device himself, unaware that a fly is in the transmitting chamber with him. In the test, body parts are switched, and Andre emerges with a giant fly head and limb. Keeping it a secret from his wife (Patricia Owens) and brother Francois (Vincent Price, WITCHFINDER GENERAL), Andre attempts to reverse his condition ““ but he needs to find that fly!
THE RETURN OF THE FLY (1959) takes place 15 years later, when Andre’s son, Phillipe (Brett Halsey, ROY COLT & WINCHESTER JACK) attempts his father’s experiment, with similar results ““ and an even bigger fly head! Vincent Price returns as Francois, with a larger role, as Phillipe’s reluctant assistant.
CURSE OF THE FLY (1965) is the final, belated entry in the trilogy, with Brian Donlevy as the latest teleportation-obsessed scion of the Delambres family. There are no giant fly heads in this one, but that’s not to say that the guy’s finally got that damned machine to work ““ on the contrary. In this particularly grim and downbeat entry, we have a whole slew of deformed, inhuman matter transporter mutations.
All three films are presented on their own discs in 2.35:1 anamorphic widescreen transfers. The first two films look significantly better than in their previous DVD release a few years ago. THE FLY has been given a 4.0 Dolby Surround mix, while the other two are in mono only. The extra features have been placed on a fourth disc, which includes trailers and still galleries for the three films, the Vincent Price A&E BIOGRAPHY episode from 1997, a new featurette on the series, and trailers for a bunch of other Fox horror films ““ most of which are currently available as part of the “Midnite Movies” line.
Overall, it’s a great package and presentation of three classic, vintage sci-fi/horrors, and is highly recommended.
CAPSULE REVIEWS
PLANET OF DINOSAURS (1978). Uber-low budget sci-fi schlock saved solely by some stunning stop-motion animated prehistoric beasts, PLANET chronicles the adventures of a group of spaceship crash survivors on an uncharted world populated by, well, dinosaurs. The acting is terrible, with the biggest name in the cast being James Whitworth (THE HILLS HAVE EYES), and the story is paper-thin. But the stop-motion effects are great, and many of the people who worked on them went on to much bigger films.
Retromedia’s 30th Anniversary Edition (although it says “20th” on my DVD cover) presents the film in 1.85:1 anamorphic widescreen, sourced from both 16mm and 35mm elements. Some parts of the film show serious damage, while the rest looks great. There’s a commentary track with director James Shea and effects artists Doug Beswick and Steve Czerkas, as well as a couple of vintage TV spots and two silent stop-motion shorts by KING KONG’s effects genius, Willlis O’Brien.
Recommended for fans of Ray Harryhausen-styled effects and dinosaur buffs.
28 WEEKS LATER (2007). A superior follow-up to the pseudo-zombie hit of a few years ago, 28 DAYS LATER, this sequel ramps up the action a bit, with a plot reminiscent of George A. Romero’s THE CRAZIES. Six months after the Rage virus turned the population of England into mindless killers, the U.S. military has moved into London to clean up the starved corpses and begin repopulating the city with citizens who were abroad when the virus hit. Sure enough, it isn’t long before another outbreak occurs, and the film follows a small group of survivors as they try to escape both the Rage-infected and the American soldiers.
The Fox DVD presents the film in a nice, sharp, 1.85:1 anamorphic transfer and51. Dolby Surround sound. There’s a commentary track by director Juan Carlos Fresnadillo, a few “Making Of” featurettes, several deleted scenes, a semi-animated presentation of a 28 DAYS LATER graphic novel, and trailers or other Fox DVD titles. I liked this one a bit better than the original, but I really think these guys should be paying Romero royalties.
PLANET TERROR (2007). Director Robert Rodriguez’ half of the GRINDHOUSE double feature is a loud, violent, and cheerfully incoherent zombie pulse-pounder, filled with gruesome gore effects, over-the-top action scenes, and a game cast comprised of such familiar faces as Rose McGowan, Freddy Rodriguez, Michael Biehn, Michael Parks, Bruce Willis, Josh Brolin, Jeff Fahey and pretty much all of the director’s pals and family.
Genius Products/Dimension’s 2-platter DVD presents an extended and unrated cut of the film in an anamorphic widescreen transfer that preserves all the digitally-added scratches, specks, splices and artificial print damage of the theatrical presentation. It looks like shit ““ but that’s part of the gag. The first disc also includes a Dolby 5.1 audio mix, a commentary track by Rodriguez, an “audience reaction” track, a poster gallery, and the MACHETE bogus trailer. Disc 2 holds four “Making Of” featurettes, including an installment of Rodriguez’ patented “10-Minute Film School.”
I liked it better than a lot of reviewers, and really enjoyed the ride. The DVD is pretty solid, and should hold over fans until the Weinsteins get around to releasing the whole GRINDHOUSE double bill together.
FRANKENSTEIN (1973). In the Seventies, Dan Curtis was TV’s king of gothic horror. His daytime soap opera, DARK SHADOWS, ruled the ratings with its witch’s brew of vampires, werewolves and heaving breasts, while his production company churned out movies of the week based on DRACULA and DR. JECKYLL & MISTER HYDE. Somewhere in there, he cranked out this two-part, shot on videotape, mostly-faithful adaptation of Mary Shelly’s novel, with Robert Foxworth (PROPHECY) as the mad doctor and Bo Svenson (WALKING TALL PART 2) as his creation.
Dark Sky’s disc features a full-frame transfer that looks about as good as possible for a shot-on-70’s-video production to look. There’s some video noise and color bleeding, but it’s quite watchable. The disc also includes the original network TV promos and bumpers. Fans of Curtis’ DARK SHADOWS or aficionados of Shelly’s novel will want to check this out.
THE AMICUS COLLECTION. Dark Sky Films repackages three previously-released fright films from England’s Amicus Studios ““ ASYLUM (1972), AND NOW THE SCREAMING STARTS (1973) and THE BEAST MUST DIE (1974) in one, convenient box set. (I reviewed ASYLUM and BEAST in this column when the discs were first released.) ASYLUM is a creepy horror anthology with five fiendish stories by famed author Robert Bloch, AND NOW”¦ is a stylish, if slightly hokey, gothic thriller starring handsome Ian Ogilvy and the lovely Stephanie Beachum, and BEAST is an odd combination of murder mystery, blaxploitation actioner and horror flick, full of high-camp fun. All three films feature horror icon Peter Cushing (CURSE OF FRANKENSTEIN, STAR WARS), along with a plethora of outstanding British film and stage veterans. Each film is presented in anamorphic widescreen and there are some appropriate and enjoyable extras. Great spooky fun, and if you don’t already have any of the individual discs, this box is well-worth getting.
COMING SOON: Plenty of TV on DVD releases, including: WANTED: DEAD OR ALIVE SEASON 3, TWIN PEAKS GOLD BOX COLLECTION, CHARLES IN CHARGE SEASON 2, MAGNUM P.I. SEASON 7, MIAMI VICE: THE COMPLETE SERIES, NORTHERN EXPOSURE: THE COMPLETE SERIES, THE ADDAMS FAMILY: THE COMPLETE SERIES as well as a handful of animation discs like MEET THE ROBINSONS, SHREK THE THIRD, THE PIXAR SHORT FILMS COLLECTION and A WISH FOR WINGS THAT WORK. And after that”¦ we’ll be back to the best B-movies and exploitation cinema on digital disc!
For older Late Show columns (adding up to well over 200 reviews!), visit the recently revamped DVD Late Show website and archive. For additional pop culture musings, occasional DVD previews and lots of shameless self-promotion, you might try checking out my blog.
Comments, DVD questions, review requests and offers of money can be sent to: dvdlateshow@atomicpulp.com
As adults collecting toys, we really have it made. We can eat our cake and have it too – we’re reliving the joy of our childhoods through our collecting habits of our old age. But there are lots of children out there who don’t have the kind of childhood we had – or the kind of childhood we wish we’d had. These children are less fortunate than we were, or at least most certainly less fortunate than we are now.
In 1947, a woman named Diane Hicks had made a Raggedy Ann doll as a craft project, and decided that it should go to a less fortunate child at Christmas time. She asked her husband, Bill Hendricks, a major in the Marine Corp Reserves in Los Angeles, to find an agency that could deliver this toy appropriately. When he found that none existed, she suggested that he start one. That first year, he collected and distributed 5000 toys to needy children. And thus was born Toys for Tots.
The program was so successful that in 1948, the Marine Corp adopted it and turned it nationwide. It’s been delivering on it’s goal to bring the joy of Christmas to America’s needy children ever since.
During the 2006 Toys for Tots Campaign, local Toys for Tots Coordinators distributed 19.2 million toys to 7.6 million needy children.Concurrently, local campaigns were conducted in 558 communities covering all 50 states, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico, and the Virgin Islands – the most extensive coverage ever.
Over the 59 years of the U.S. Marine Corps Reserve Toys for Tots Program, Marines have distributed more than 370 million toys to more than 173 million needy children. This charitable endeavor has made U.S. Marines the unchallenged leaders in looking after needy children at Christmas. Over its 16 year life span, the Marine Toys for Tots Foundation has supplemented local toy collections with more than 70.2 million toys valued at more than $387 million; plus has provided promotion and support materials valued at over $4.7 million. I’m proud to say that I’ve helped in those numbers for the past decade, and I’d like you to consider giving back some of your love of toys to children that might not ever realize just how wonderful it can be.
So here’s your call to arms. You collect toys because of the love you developed for those silly playthings of your youth. By giving new, unopened toys to your local Toys for Tots campaigns, you can give other children the chance to develop that same bond, to have that special friend in Pooh or Tigger, or to learn just how much fun they can have with a couple G.I. Joes and an empty lot.
When you see those toys on clearance, think about it. Is it really all that much to spend a little on bringing the joy to a child on Christmas morning? I’d think most of us would agree that helping kids is the greatest work we can do.
To get further information on the program, and contact information for local coordinators, check the official web site at www.toysfortots.org. There will be drop off bins at many of your local stores, including Toys R Us again this year. Do what you can, even if it’s only a little – every bit helps.
And now back to your regularly scheduled programming!
The web. It’s a big place, full of plenty of distractions ““ some funny, some informative, some ludicrous, some disturbing, some inane, some profound. Each and every weekday, we present links to a few of our favorite finds”¦
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Have a THINGAMABOB? Send it in!
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