It was meant to be Ingmar Berman’s last film (although he ended up making another), his final statement about life, the theater, and the place of humanity in a possibly Godless universe. It’s unquestionably his most magical, one of his least grim, and in my opinion, one of his best. He also made two versions [...]
Filed under: Blu-ray Review | Leave a Comment »
After his two great action comedies (Yojimbo and Sanjuro) and before his last black and white historical epic (Red Beard), Akira Kurosawa made one of the best crime thrillers of the 1960’s. Now Criterion brings a high-definition copy into your home. Toshiro Mifune (who else?) stars as a successful businessman who thinks he’s off the [...]
Filed under: Blu-ray Review | Leave a Comment »
Full disclosure: I’m reviewing a Blu-ray set that I don’t even have. Kino accidentally sent me the DVD set rather than the Blu-ray. In fairness, this may be my fault. When I emailed a request for a review copy, I neglected to specify what format. Luckily, the content of the two sets are identical, so [...]
Filed under: Blu-ray Review, Comedy, Silent Films | Leave a Comment »
I’d be hard-pressed to think of another film that’s anything like Jean Cocteau’s post-war fantasy. It’s a fairytale, told with a charming and often naïve innocence, and contains absolutely no objectionable-for-children content. But its slow pace and quiet magic never panders to unsophisticated viewers. About 30 years ago I saw a very young audience sit [...]
Filed under: Blu-ray Review | 3 Comments »
“Raymond Shaw is the kindest, bravest, warmest, most wonderful human being I’ve ever known in my life.” All the men who served under him in Korea say so. Which is odd because the guy is a cold, self-righteous jerk. Maybe it has something to do with the way they seem to be on autopilot when [...]
Filed under: Blu-ray Review | Leave a Comment »
I’m not sure if Some Like It Hot really is, as the American Film Institute declared in 2000, the best American film comedy of all time. It certainly belongs in the top 10. There are comedies with a higher laugh-to-minute ratio, and others that have more to say about the human condition. But if I [...]
Filed under: Blu-ray Review, Comedy | 3 Comments »
When I think of the 1970s as a golden age of Hollywood-financed serious cinema, the first image to come into my mind is a lonely Robert De Niro walking the dark, mean streets of New York, slowly turning into a psychopath. Three young geniuses–writer Paul Schrader, director Martin Scorsese, and actor Robert De Niro–came together [...]
Filed under: Blu-ray Review, Home Theater | 4 Comments »
Back in the days before DVDs, if you loved films and wanted to enjoy them in your own home, the Criterion Collection was king. Their Laserdiscs were the first to have careful, state-of-the-art transfers, the first to letterbox widescreen films, and the first to come in supplement-filled special editions. They also, to my knowledge, invented [...]
Filed under: Home Theater, Restorations | Leave a Comment »
To my mind, no Hollywood features show off the virtues of Blu-ray better than the large format road-show spectaculars of the 1950s and ’60s. Indeed, 2001: A Space Odyssey was the first Blu-ray disc I bought. I’ve been delighted to see Sparticus, Patton, How the West was Won, and The Ten Commandments turn up on [...]
Filed under: Home Theater | Leave a Comment »
When you first insert this disc, it takes a few seconds to load (as all Blu-rays do), then it goes directly to the opening menu–no ads, no trailers. I wish all major studio Blu-rays were like that. Now, on with my review: I enjoy a strange relationship with the biggest commercial hit of the 1950s. [...]
Filed under: Blu-ray Review | 6 Comments »
