Coraline: 2-Disc Collector’s Edition (Blu-Ray)
UNIVERSAL
MOVIE B-
SPECIAL FEATURES A-
DVD GEEK FACTOR 8
(OUT OF 10)
While the plot didn’t leave me enraptured, I must give major props
to the look of the film. Director Henry Selick did an incredible job
with the stop-motion animation. The movements are fluid and less
herky-jerky than past stop-motion efforts.
The story, about a young girl discovering an alternate universe in
her house, has its moments, but isn’t as consistently entertaining as
Selick’s A Nightmare Before Christmas. Available in a 2-disc
Blu-Ray package (that includes a standard DVD) and a standard-DVD
version, both come with 3-D capability. This looked shockingly good on
my home system.
SPECIAL FEATURES: Commentaries, a making-of documentary and a
surprising amount of deleted stuff. Animators worked a lot on footage
that got left on the cutting-room floor.
Battlestar Galactica: Season 4.5 (Blu-Ray and Standard)
UNIVERSAL STUDIOS
SHOW A-
SPECIAL FEATURES A-
DVD GEEK FACTOR 8.5
(OUT OF 10)
Latecomers to this series (like me) should find it relatively easy
to jump right into the final season of the show. I had only seen
sporadic snippets before, but found the show involving from the very
first scene, during which the crew of Galactica finds itself on a
decimated Earth.
Things have changed a lot since the Galactica days of Dirk Benedict
and Richard Hatch (who makes an effective appearance during this
season), stars of the original show. Mary McDonnell plays an ill and
depressed president, despondent because she has led the survivors of a
Cylon war to a desolate, post-nuclear-war Earth. Edward James Olmos is
badass as an admiral on the brink of a breakdown, dealing with decaying
morale on his ship.
I am by no means an expert on this series. I’ve only seen the last
season, and I haven’t quite figured everything out yet. Still, I can
see that this show is put together well, and if I can come along this
late and be entertained, that says a lot. I’m definitely going back and
starting from the beginning—and the complete series will be
available in one package (on both Blu-Ray and standard DVD) on July 28,
as will this final season.
SPECIAL FEATURES: More than 10 hours of bonus stuff,
including deleted scenes, a doc on the end of the series, a six-part
retrospective and more.
12 Monkeys (Blu-Ray)
UNIVERSAL
MOVIE A
SPECIAL FEATURES A-
DVD GEEK FACTOR 9
(OUT OF 10)
This was perhaps director Terry Gilliam’s most commercial effort
before his films became a little too self-indulgent. He got Bruce
Willis, who delivered one of his most sensitive and well-rounded
performances as a time-traveler trying to gather clues about a virus
that wiped out most of the human race. He also got Brad Pitt, who
garnered an Oscar nomination and a Golden Globe for his portrayal of a
mentally disturbed revolutionary.
Blu-Ray allows you to revisit and see Gilliam’s masterstroke in
pristine glory. The movie has a slight resemblance to his Brazil in the future-world scenes. Gilliam likens the look of his future world
to the inside of a smoker’s infected lung. I’d say that’s accurate.
SPECIAL FEATURES: You get the stuff from prior standard-DVD
editions, including Gilliam’s great commentary and a lengthy
documentary on the film. The doc is especially good when it captures
Gilliam, delighted, after a preview screening, only to later find out
that the seemingly friendly people didn’t like his movie. If they
release this again on Blu-Ray in the future, there’d better be new
stuff.
Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon/Curse of the Golden Flower/House
of Flying Daggers (Blu-Ray)
SONY
MOVIES CROUCHING (A), GOLDEN FLOWER (B), FLYING DAGGERS
(B+)
SPECIAL FEATURES CROUCHING (B), GOLDEN FLOWER (C), FLYING DAGGERS
(C-)
DVD GEEK FACTOR 7.5
(OUT OF 10)
This is a good-news, bad-news, sort-of-good-news scenario. The good
news is that Ang Lee’s beautiful martial-arts epic, Crouching Tiger,
Hidden Dragon, finally comes to Blu-Ray. The bad news is that you
have to buy it in a combo package with House of Flying Daggers and Curse of the Golden Flower. Then it becomes good news when
you consider the other two movies are decent, and you can get the
package for cheap. (Amazon.com was
offering it for $39.99 when I checked.)
Over the years, I’ve heard people complaining about Crouching
Tiger, and how it started that whole trend of martial-arts fighters
flying around during battles. I’m not a purist, so I had no problem
with a floating Chow Yun-Fat. Still, if flying martial-arts dudes is a
pet peeve, you can aim the blame at Ang Lee.
The treetop fight remains one of the more amazing cinematic feats of
the last 10 years.
SPECIAL FEATURES: The Crouching disc is pretty good,
with a Lee commentary and some decent production footage. The other two
films offer minimal features.
This article appears in Jul 23-29, 2009.