DVD Talk Forum - Last DVD you watched?

Quote:

Originally Posted by Spottedfeather (Post 10352857)

For the first time in probably more than a year, I watch the first Superman movie with Christopher Reeve. I had forgotten how good it was. It's an almost perfect example of how good a comic movie can be when the director, cast, and crew know what they're doing. You hear me, Brett Ratner ?

Brett stopped listening to anyone besides his accountant a long time ago. :rolleyes:

From the past three or four weeks (I can't keep track anymore):

Sergei Eisenstein's BATTLESHIP POTEMKIN (1925) - killer montage sequences (the Odessa Steps massacre = WOW!) and well staged set-pieces compensate for the lack of characterization and the fact it's Soviet era propaganda. Great score too (I was on pins and needles during the final sequence).
Victor Fleming's THE WIZARD OF OZ (1939) - saw it for the first time, then watched it two more times (days apart). My initial nitpicks, like Margaret Hamilton, eventually melted and I just got sucked-in by Judy Garland's charm (her vulnerability and still-palpable innocence totally sells the flick's fantasy angst) and the catchiness of (most of its) tunes; 'We're Off To See The Wizard' is now part of my MP3 heavy rotation. Hate the Munchkins though (and their sped-up voices) and Bert Lahr's Cowardly Lion gets on my nerves after a while.
Yasujiro Ozu's RECORD OF A TENEMENT GENTLEMAN (1947) - other than a preachy speech toward the end (which is redeemed somewhat by a memorable series of final shots in a park) this melodramatic post-WWII comedy from Ozu is both hilarious (Chôko Iida's "mean" facial gestures) and heartbreaking. Worth seeing just to watch/listen as Chishû Ryû get down and funky with a mean rendition of a then-popular song.
Yasujiro Ozu's A HEN IN THE WIND (1948) - while socially accurate for its time/place and an important step in Ozu finding his style (he never ventured into this type of movie again) it's hard for Western viewers to identify with a movie that finds its pathos in an abusive husband coming to terms with what he's done to his wife without apologizing or admitting any wrong doing.
EASTER PARADE (1948) - after "Wizard of Oz" I had to sample more Garland ("Oz" was the first Garland movie I've ever seen) and this one did the trick. Besides Garland (who looks/sings just dandy) Astaire, Ann Miller and even a young Peter Lawford (looking like Treat Williams did in the 80's and 90's) are on top form in a light story that jumps from one killer Irving Berlin musical number to another. Love how the movie closes the show with the title track (the best tune) and sends the viewing audience high as a kite.
Alfred Hitchcock's NORTH BY NORTHWEST (1959) - saw this for the first time, then watched it again after that with the Ernest Lehman commentary track (nice man but he leaves way too many dead spots). What else can I do but join the chorus: this is the mother of all Hitchcock flicks. Grant is effortlessly cool even when he's over his head; James Mason was born to play suave villains (that voice!) and, even though at first I resented Eva Marie Saint for not being Grace Kelly, eventually I was won over by her performance. Martin Landau is cool but creepy-looking as a too-attached-to-the-boss henchman. Colorful set-pieces (that plane chase blew my mind!) and a light 'Bond' air keep this thing moving and never boring. Blu-ray transfer is superb but a few better (less general) extras would have been nice. Loved it.
Alan Resnais' LAST YEAR AT MARIENBAD (1961) - found the whole love triangle aspect of "Marienbad" rather romantic and even touching despite the distance the filmmakers put between us, the characters and this... time and place they seem to be stuck in. Even though it's technique ahead of heart (B&W photography looks fine but I've seen sharper/better B&W transfers on Blu) the actors sell their minimalist roles with gusto.
Joseph L. Mankiewicz' CLEOPATRA (1963) - Rex Harrison is the man (though Liz and Burton are OK in their more prominent roles); long after his Julius Ceasar is gone Harrison's presence still looms large. Roddy McDowall starts all meek and fey in the background, but by the movie's end you totally buy him as an a**hole Caesar Augustus Octavian. Production is mammoth and threatens to veer into camp at every turn (Cleo's entrance to Rome left me with my mouth hanging) but Mankiewicz's script and direction gives these stock archtypes hints of humanity underneath their funny clothes. The DVD looks OK but it's almost ten years old; where's the BD Fox?
Michelangelo Antonioni's RED DESERT (1964) - took two viewings (the first left me so puzzled and confused I didn't know if I liked the movie or not) for me to 'get' "Red Desert." While not as open to interpretation as I was led to believe (the commentary pretty much lays it as is) this is still a gorgeous and meditative look at modernism's toll on a person ill-prepared to handle it. Richard Harris' performance is hurt by his Italian voice-over guy (too distracting) but Vitti's performance and Antonioni's techniques (painting stuff for it to look a certain way on-camera) trump the movie's flaws without completely eliminating them. An acquired taste.
THE MERCENARIES, aka Dark of the Sun (1967) - Rod Taylor is great (Jim Brown not so much) as a mercenary trying to smuggle diamonds and human survivors out of war-torn Congo region. Taylor's final showdown with Peter Carsten is so OTT and intense you feel every bounce of rough terrain and bloody punch as the two duke it out to the death. A 60's B-movie mini-masterpiece, warts and all.
Frank Zappa's 200 MOTELS (1971) - unless you're into Zappa you ain't going to get much out of this. I didn't.
SUPERBEAST (1972) - TV-movie-of-the-week production values, silly make-up (the beasts of the title look like Ferrigno's "Incredible Hulk" creature in mid-transformation... remember that episode?) plus shamelessly ripping off both "Dr. Moreau" and "The Most Dangerous Game" all sink this Philippines-shot movie into the realms for laughable cheese.
TRUCK TURNER (1974) - after "Black Dynamite" it's impossible to look objectively as blaxploitation movies. That said, this one stars Isaac Hayes (his first role), has some fine actors (Yaphet Kotto, Uhura from "Star Trek") slumming for paychecks and a couple of bloody shootouts to go along with the Hayes-composed "Shaft" soundalike soundtrack. Nothing wrong with "Truck" but nothing worth remembering either.
Larry Cohen's THE PRIVATE FILES OF J. EDGAR HOOVER (1977) - other than Broderick Crawfor'd committed performance as America's top cop this is a sillier-by-the-minute conspiracy movie that will have political junkies (like mua) laughing hysterically at every attempt by Cohen to rewrite history. Production values/photography look cheap and not even worthy of comparison to those 70's 'JFK Assasination' flicks.
DEFIANCE (1980) - Jan Michael Vincent has on-screen charisma that carries him through a preachy PG "Warriors" wannabe exploitation flick (one in which he's always vulnerable and never a Bronson-style vigilante), an early attempt by then-rookie producer Jerry Bruckheimer to wane on his formulaic techniques. Great late 70's/early 80's gritty NYC location photography and some good actors (Danny Aiello, etc.) aside, not much to see here.
WITHOUT WARNING (1980) - "Predator" before "Predator" (with Kevin Peter Hall also playing a really tall alien creature) but at 1/100th the budget and with Martin Landau/Jack Palance throwing nuisance out the window and ready to chew scenery... if there were any to chew. Cheesy fun.
Alan Resnais' MON ONCLE D'AMERIQUE (1980) - philosophical and deep without feeling preachy despite having an on-camera narrator talking about heavy psychological stuff, the excellent trio of lead performers (Gérard Depardieu, Nicole Garcia and Roger Pierre) and Resnais' flights of cinematic fancy (those rat scenes!) keep "Mon Oncle d'Amérique" grounded, romantic and never less than compelling.
LIFEFORCE (1985) - between the glorious intro/closing credits featuring a kick-ass Henry Mancini score lays the most incomprehensible, non-sensical and sexy (two words: Mathilda May) vampires-from-outer-space-attack-London sci-fi movie ever made.
MST3K KTMA-06: Gamera Vs. Gaos (1988/1967) and MST3K KTMA-07: Gamera Vs. Zigra (1989/1971) - despite being knee-deep in 'Gamera' nonsense these two episodes are where the show begins to really emerge with its voice and the tone it's been know for since. Servo gets his 'Mighty Voice' (which would stay the same until Weinstein's departure from the show at the end of Season 1), Joel and his bot companion(s) begin talking back to the offending movie with firm rebukes (instead of the polite observations from earlier episodes), the mad scientists appear, and the host segments start being funny. Plus, since riffing is so infrequent compared to national "MST3K," the movies themselves determine whether an episode is tolerable or not. Gaos makes a fun villain to hate in his appearance, and the "Zigra" movie is just wacky as all heck. The use of the 'Crow gets frozen' stock footage has got to stop though, please! :(
MST3K KTMA-08: Gamera Vs. Guiron (1989/1971) - the last Gamera movie of the KTMA era (hooray!) and perhaps the worst-dubbed movie I have ever seen. You know a dub is bad when it makes you miss the professionalism of a Sandy Frank Production. Gore and violence in this flick is flipping eye-opening; Guiron beheading a lackey monster on-camera and showing the head bouncing around with its eyes blinking was just too much. Riffing picks up though (or maybe just feels that way since Crow is back) so it's all good.
MST3K KTMA-09: Phase IV (1989/1974) - above-average-but-flawed 70's disaster movie (directed with lots of studio interference by king of title sequences Saul Bass) about ants forming the ability to think, and a crazy human scientist (Nigel Davenport, who looks like Paul Krugman!) that sets out to stop them. Despite Servo's angry rants that they're 'just ants!' the impressive micro-photography of ants causing mayhem and some superb-for-its-time-and-budget miniature effects keep one's attention firmly on the flick and not the (mostly lame) jokes J&TB's make. The rare "MST3K" experiment where the movie towers over the show's premise and makes the viewer feel that it's better than the show it's appearing on.
MST3K KTMA-10: Cosmic Princess (1989/1982) - bad riffing (way too many 'Dairy Queen' jokes) and two average-at-best episodes of "Space: 1999" masquarading as a made-for-TV 1982 movie (the bad 80's video credit give it away immediately) make this a tough slug of an early MST3K experiment to sit through. BTW, this the FOURTH Martin Landau movie on this list (after "North by Northwest," "Cleopatra" and "Without Warning")... HEEEELP! :p Catherine Schell is hot as Maya though, and hammy "Battlefield Earth" lookalike Mentor (Brian Blessed) is fun for the few minutes he's allowed to go wild at the start of the "movie."
MAD DOG TIME (1996) - Gene Siskel named this the worst movie of 1996 (I actually remember seeing that particular episode) but it's not that terrible. It's no good either as a truckload of talented thespians (Dreyfuss, Goldblum, Barkin, Byrne, MacLachlan, Pollard, Hines, Diane Lane, etc.) and celebrities (Billy Idol) are given too much freedom to be weird for the sake of being weird by writer/director/co-star Larry Bishop. Neat production design (30's era nightclub and such) but nothing worth losing sleep over not seeing.
CLEOPATRA: THE FILM THAT CHANGED HOLLYWOOD (2000) - two-hour made-for-AMC documentary (back when that channel actually gave a damn about good movies) that covers pretty much the whole sordid behind-the-scenes (and in front as well) affair about the making of this infamous flick. Since he recently passed away it was nice to see/hear Tom Makiewicz (son of director Joseph and screenwriter of "Superman: The Movie," "Live and Let Die," etc.) talking about his memories of working by his father's side as the old man was being consumed emotionally and physically by the heavy toll of the "Cleopatra" machine. R.I.P. Tom! :(