Orson Welles’ TOUCH OF EVIL DVD Special Edition slated for October release
July 8th, 2008 by Scott Marks
Here’s something you won’t find on any DVD - Whit Masterson’s BADGE OF EVIL
Emulsion Compulsion’s favorite movie of all time is set to receive a (semi) deluxe, 50th Anniversary DVD reissue
The reason I qualify ‘deluxe’ with a parenthetical ’semi’ is because the set fails to include the outstanding 1999 documentary Reconstructing Evil. A couple of sites erroneously listed it as an extra included in the 2000 DVD edition. I double checked and aside from the trailer and a copy of Welles’ 58-page memo (both included in the new set) there is nothing in the way of extras. In its place there are two new documentaries, Bringing Evil to Life and Evil Lost & Found.
Continue reading Orson Welles’ TOUCH OF EVIL DVD Special Edition slated for October release
Tags: Amazon, Anniversary, Charlton Heston, dvd, F.X. Feeny, James Naremore, Janet Leigh, Jonathan Rosenbaum, Orson Welles, Photos, Restoration, Rick Schmidlin, Special Edition, TOUCH OF EVIL, VideoFiled Under News
3 new Walt Disney Treasures DVD collections slated for release
February 21st, 2008 by Scott Marks
Destino (2003)
The Disney Vault is once again ajar. Walt Disney Home Entertainment announced the new lineup for their highly coveted Walt Disney Treasures collection. The year’s releases include Chronological Donald, Vol. 4, Dr. Syn, Alias the Scarecrow and Destino.
The latest Donald Duck anthology will showcase the tail end of the irascible Mr. Duck’s career. The 31 cartoons in the set were produced between 1951 and 1961 and include all of Don’s CinemaScope shorts presented in their original widescreen aspect ratio for the first time on video.
Later period Donald, particularly when teamed with chipmunks or nephews, is not exactly the duck that laid the golden egg. A complete list of titles has yet to be issued, but for sentimental reasons, I sure hope they include Donald in Mathmagic Land and Donald and the Wheel. My first and only viewing of these shorts was at the Roosevelt Theater in downtown Chicago. I was six at the time and am still curious to understand why my parents made be don a sport coat and tie to see a couple of cartoons.
Dr. Syn, Alias the Scarecrow first aired as three separate episodes on Disney’s weekly TV show under the title The Scarecrow of Romney Marsh, was later edited for theatrical releases in England and the U.S. This DVD set includes all three of the original TV episodes plus the theatrical version of the film that was released in England. Never had any interest in Dr. Syn. With the exception of 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, live-action Disney, particularly the stuff produced for TV, is anathema.
There’s gold to be mined in the Destino set. It all began in 1946 as a collaboration between Uncle Walt and famed surrealist painter Salvador Dali and was originally intended as a newfashioned experimental work to be included in a compilation film. Disney and Dali met in 1945 at a dinner party hosted by Jack Warner. At the time, Dali was working on the dream sequence from Alfred Hitchcock’s Spellbound. The two artists expressed mutual admiration and it wasn’t long before they came up with the project.
Fifteen seconds of footage was produced before the short was abandoned due to financial constraints. Walt’s nephew Roy E. Disney rediscovered the project while making Fantasia/2000 and this meeting of legends finally saw the light of day in 2003.
It’s a stunning 7 minute short, easily the best work of animation the studio has attached its name to this decade. Destino played the festival circuit and was eventually picked up by Landmark Theaters and shown as a short subject before The Triplets of Belleville. Their press release described the film as “set to a Spanish song, devoid of dialogue and without a linear story line. It follows a dark-eyed ballerina on a journey among strange objects through a desert landscape in a dreamlike atmosphere. It is a love story as only Dali could envision it, complete with images of ballerinas, baseball players, melting clocks, tuxedo-clad eyeballs, ants that turn into bicyclists, and two giant heads carried on the backs of the Fates (represented as giant turtles.)”
How does a 7 minute cartoon justify a 2 DVD tin? Also included is an all-new feature-length documentary that examines the surprising partnership between Dali and Disney plus two new featurettes; “The Disney That Almost Was,” an examination of the studio’s unfinished projects; and “Encounters with Walt,” which addresses the surprisingly diverse group of celebrities and artists who were attracted to Walt Disney’s early work.
All three collections are due to hit store shelves on November 11.
Tags: Chronological Donald, Collectors Tins, DESTINO, Donald Duck, DR. SYN, dvd, Salvador Dali, Vol. 4, Walt Disney, Walt Disney TreasuresFiled Under News
JUNEBUG / Phil Morrison (2005)
February 18th, 2008 by Scott Marks
JUNEBUG (2005)
Directed by Phil Morrison
Written by Angus Maclachlan
Starring: Embeth Davidtz, Allessandro Nivola, Amy Adams and Ben McKenzie
Running time: 107 mins.
Aspect Ratio: 1.85:1
Rating: 
“Junebug” starts on stock footage of North Carolinians yelling in the mountains. Screaming is the ideal forward to a film that examines both the abyss between North and South and the inner-workings of an uncommunicative family that reunites for one week.
Estranged son and brother George (Allessandro Nivola) is persuaded by Madeleine (the wonderful Embeth Davidtz), his older, British-born wife of six months, to make a side trip so that she may meet her in-laws. They’ll be in the Carolinas anyway while Madeleine courts backwoods painter David Wark (Frank Hoyt Taylor). She believes Wark’s “outsider” art will lure wealthy collectors to her Chicago gallery.
Their arrival finds a sulking mother (Celia Weston), reticent father (Scott Wilson) and Johnny (Ben McKenzie), George’s brooding, underachieving younger brother. Their floating-on-eggshells reserve prompts cauterized silence during several early scenes. Not since Ingmar Bergman in the sixties has a movie theater been so quiet.
Johnny’s very pregnant wife Ashley (newcomer Amy Adams in a remarkable performance) is everything but mute: guileless, eager to please and, in spite of nonstop talking jags, unable to make a point. Perhaps this is why she is the only member of the family to embrace sophisticated, but shallow Madeline. (Could she intuitively sense a fellow toenail biter?) Ms. Adams star-making performance brings life and dimension to a poster child for insignificance.
Never having seen an episode of “The O.C.,” I can’t imagine it calls for much acting. “Junebug” does, and McKenzie’s transition from small screen stud to indie ensemble player comes as a pleasant surprise. Unable to grasp the pulled-tab concept of a video cassette, Johnny fails to record a show he knows would thrill Ashley. This fleeting thought of his wife, the single moment in the story where he acts selflessly, shines through McKenzie’s depiction of Johnny’s inability to express his love via VHS.
Director Phil Morrison depicts Ashley’s sexual desperation in a manner I don’t recall ever seeing. Hopelessly in love with Johnny, yet terrified by his emotional retreat, she masturbates to a snapshot of the couple in happier times. Reality became Ashley’s fantasy soon after high school ended and married life began. This moment of painfully honest tenderness may cause even hardcore voyeurs to respectfully avert their gaze.
Madeleine’s relationship with Wark examines the age old question of separating the artist from their art. Wark is a mumbling crackpot well schooled in religious diatribes (with a minor in antisemitism) who finds his “voice” on canvas. His rustic battle collages are reminiscent of childhood Colorform’s sets, only these come equipped with anatomically incorrect renditions of Gen. Lee and boast good ol’ boy titles like “Ni–er Uprising.” With prosperity just out of reach, is Madeline’s personal integrity worth compromising for gallery gold?
Between Madeleine’s professional conundrum and a familial snub she must reconcile dwells still another timeworn plot gap in a film that refuses to simply document or, even worse, shrug off cliches. “Junebug” confronts and dissects them head on. Sometimes there’s an art to redirecting the obvious.
Tags: dvd, Film, Film Review, JUNEBUG, Movie, Movie Review, ReviewTHE EDUKATORS / Hans Weingartner (2005)
February 15th, 2008 by Scott Marks
THE EDUKATORS (2005)
Directed by Hans Weingartner
Written by Katrina Held & Hans Weingartner
Starring: Daniel Bruhl, Julia Jentsch, Stipe Erceg and Burghart Klaussner
Running Time: 126 min.
Aspect Ratio: 1.85:1
Rating: 
After the last presidential election I began wondering what kind of ex-hippie would pluck the daisy from their rifle and vote Bush in. Twice no less! It took some time, but Hans Weingartner’s second feature eventually got around to examining a German love child gone terribly wrong.
The first hour of “The Edukators” in which a trio of budding anarchists key cars, protest sweat shops, spout current events, smoke, screw and attempt to bring about “poetic resistance” by breaking into the homes of vacationing capitalists, covers no new ground.
Daniel Bruhl, who garnered attention in “Goodbye, Lenin!” stars as Jan, the angry, young and already disillusioned group leader. He fears that today’s young radicals find the hippies a tough act to follow and don’t bother trying. His co-conspirator Peter (Stipe Erceg) seems equally content stealing Rolex watches as he does engaging in political uprising. Peter is involved with Jule (Julia Jentsch), a struggling waitress who moves in with the boys and is immediately drawn to their mysterious brand of anarchy.
Their handle is “The Edukators” and their goal is to, what else, edukate the masses. Working off an address list of local yacht club ambassadors they plan to change the system from within mansions. Their distinguishing characteristics: rearranging personal belongings and a cautionary note that threatens, “Your days of plenty are numbered.” These are the most victim-friendly terrorists one is every likely to meet.
The ideas of defining self by assuming the lives of others and home invasion as an anti-capitalist statement are better dealt with in Kim Ki-Duk’s “3 Iron.” Weingartner should have nailed these malcontents in the first ten minutes and cut to them scrambling for a kidnap plan the moment homeowner Hardenberg (Burghart Klaussner) makes an unexpected return. Only then does their youthful folly, and the film’s ultimate purpose, become blindingly apparent as their catch turns out to be a fifty-year-old former SDS radical-turned-Republican millionaire.
While laying low in a mountain getaway, the old school activist befriends the group, becoming their instant guru. In a well-calculated rush of nostalgia, Hardenberg drops the ultra-radical concept of “free love.” While Peter was on vacation, Jan and Jule began a clandestine relationship that the savvy capitalist catches wind of. Watching Scout Master Hardenberg’s fleeting return to rebellious idealism as he works the kids is time well spent. The “knock-your-socks-off” ending hyped in the promotional material arrived three minutes too late for my taste and could easily have been excised.
Note to cinematographers Matthias Schellenberg andDaniela Knapp: Get some shocks and struts on that shopping cart you use for a camera dolly. Your fuzzy digital visuals are made even worse by the director’s insistence on wall-to-wall, hand held camerawork. 35mm film stock may be cost prohibitive, but a tripod? Luster quickly fades when a tool of visual punctuation and/or expression becomes the sole mode of presentation.
Tags: dvd, Film, Film Review, Movie, Movie Review, Review, SDS, THE EDUKATORSTHUMBSUCKER / Mike Mills (2005)
February 6th, 2008 by Scott Marks
THUMBSUCKER
Written and Directed by Mike Mills
Based on the novel by Walter Kirn
Starring: Lou Pucci, Tilda Swinton, Vincent D’Onofrio and Keanu Reeves.
Running Time: 96 mins.
Aspect Ratio: 
Rating:
It’s official: Hollywood is experiencing their worst summer since 1983. According to the Hollywood Reporter, after four years of continuous upgrowth ticket sales are down a formidable 13% from last year’s record-breaking season.
Only three films, all conveniently aimed at fourteen-year-old boys, lived up to greedy box office expectations: “Revenge of the Sith,” “War of the Worlds” and “Batman Begins.” “Wedding Crashers” brought unexpected financial relief, though the mind boggles over America’s willingness to buy into the tabloid-peddled “Mr. and Mrs. Smith.”
The tide of hype ran high for “Kingdom of Heaven,” “The Island,” and “Stealth,” but combined they barely topped the $100 million mark. (”Kingdom of Heaven” will definitely lose something on DVD, but it’s well worth a rental.) Audiences venture into “art” films only when they are guaranteed safe passage, in other words none of that foreign stuff with the fancy talking written on the bottom. Proof positive: Only two Indie films, the cuddly basic cable documentary “March of the Penguins” and “Crash,” a film that boldly declares racism a bad thing, managed to successfully break out of the art house circuit.
High ticket prices, DVD sales and the prevalence of home exhibition should absorb some of the blame. Many are quick to finger on-screen commercials for part of the slump. One mental patient actually attempted to sue a theater chain for projecting commercials. Stop whining! Just so the trailers, give or take a few extraneous ads, hit the screen promptly at seven who cares what’s shown during intermission? Generally nothing cures bad box office quicker than good pictures, but contrary to popular belief, 2005 has been a damn fine year for movies, particularly those not playing at a theater near you. Between Memorial Day and Labor day, the fifteen weeks that comprise
Hollywood’s braindead summer season, megaplexes do not need to drape garlic bunting across their box office windows to ward off true film lovers. Did anyone in their right mind truly expect to find entertainment value let alone cinematic enlightenment in “Dukes of Hazard,” “Monster-In-Law” or “Constantine?” Continue reading THUMBSUCKER / Mike Mills (2005)
RED EYE / Wes Craven (2005)
February 2nd, 2008 by Scott Marks
RED EYE (2005)
Directed by Wes Craven
Written by Carl Ellsworth
Starring: Rachel McAdams, Cillian Murphy, Brian Cox and Jayma Mays.
Running Time: A merciful 85 mins.
Aspect Ratio: 
Rating:
Urbandictionary.com lists three distinct definitions for “red eye”:
1. A late night airline flight.
2. A type of whiskey consumed in the old west.
3. Your a**hole
All three definitions apply in varying degree to Wes Craven’s Airport ‘05.
Rachel McAdams, looking barely old enough to get a room let alone manage a hotel, plays Lisa, an unduly efficient innkeeper returning to Miami on the red eye from her grandmother’s funeral. An unexpected layover gives her time to meet and greet Jackson “Don’t Call Me Jack D.” Rippner. (Do you smell that? It’s a first-time screenwriter inventing funny names!) Cillian Murphy’s Jackson is arrestingly charming, especially if you’re turned on by a guy who looks slightly less menacing than Peter Lorre (circa “M”) shooting morphine outside an elementary school.
The two have a drink in the airport lounge, a plot point that will come in handy by reel two. Just about everything that happens in reel one perfunctorily comes back into play. So much for the element of surprise. One can award only so much blame to duffer Carl Ellsworth’s script. Craven has signed over twenty features, most in the teen horror genre, and should have learned something about structure by now. But, with all his commercial success why stop to contemplate nuance?
Once the captain turns off the seat-belt sign Jackson gets down to business: Lisa’s dad will die unless she can instruct her assistant (comic relief Jayma Mays) to downgrade the lodgings of a high-profile politician (Jack Scalia) and his family from their customary rooms to the Certain Death Suite.
Craven consistently frames his stars in one choking anamorphic close-up after another. The production notes crow that the ersatz aircraft was built on hydraulics that shook it from side to side in order to simulate turbulence. Filmed at such close range you can barely notice the seatbacks let alone the set. Why not just save a few bucks and jiggle the camera?
After enduring five of Craven’s pre-Freddie Krueger epics I took an oath to swear off his patented brand of schlock. Together, The Last House on the Left, The Hills Have Eyes, Summer of Fear, Deadly Blessing and Swamp Thing comprise a blank calling card. With Nightmare on Elm St. 3 I broke the vow. I’m a sucker for 3-D, but even that failed to impress. My fondness for Drew Barrymore eventually brought me back, but forty-five minutes of Scream found me racing for the door.
In the seventies, horror was defined by David Cronenberg, George Romero, Larry Cohen, Dario Argento, Joe Dante and John Carpenter. Wes Craven’s witless, TV-paced track record became an assurance of pressurized dung. Twenty-five years later finds pale Asian girls with dirty black hair covering their faces and Rob Zombie leading the chills in horror movies. At least give him credit for one thing: Craven is still in there swinging. Now if only someone would point him in the general direction of the mound.
Tags: Cillian Murphy, Cillian_Murphy, dvd, Film, Film Review, Movie, Movie Review, Rachel McAdams, RED EYE, Review, Wes Cravenkeep looking »
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