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The Grandmaster
BD - Directed by acclaimed
filmmaker Wong Kar Wai, The Grandmaster is an epic action
feature inspired by the life and times of the legendary Kung FU
master, Ip Man who mentored Bruce Lee. The story spans the
tumultuous Republican era that followed the fall of China's last
dynasty, a time of chaos, division and war that was also the
golden age of Chinese martial arts. Filmed in a range of
stunning locations that include the snow-swept landscapes of
Northeast China and the subtropical South, The Grandmaster
features virtuoso performances by some of the greatest stars of
contemporary Asian cinema, including Tony Leung and Ziyi Zhang.
Blu-ray Release date: March
11th, 2014
Persona
BD - Heavily artistically
infused this chamber piece from Bergman lauded numerous
international awards for both the film and the performances.
It's beautiful imagery captured by Sven Nykvist's magnificent
cinematography, its high level of pretension and its inability
to be comprehensible have given it a unique place in cinema
history. "Persona" can causes a myriad of personal
reactions. Perhaps its greatest triumph is forcing the viewer to
allow "it" to penetrate... to open yourself to its deeply felt
expressions and perhaps have it touch upon your own. "Persona"
is rife with universal emotions; pain, love, desire, regret,
longing. This is a film that can be viewed multiple times
garnering more from each visit ... or less, depending on how you
allow it to brush your subconscious... that part of you filled
with emotions which you rarely, if ever, openly discuss.
Blu-ray Release date: March 25th,
2014
The Agony and the Ecstasy
BD - Adapted by Philip Dunne
from the novel by Irving Stone, The Agony and the Ecstasy is the
story of the 16th century war of wills between Renaissance
artist Michelangelo (Charlton Heston) and "warrior pope" Julius
II (Rex Harrison). Commissioned to paint a religious fresco on
the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel, the independent-minded
Michelangelo balks at the assignment. He is virtually
strongarmed into accepting the job by Pope Julius, who wants to
leave something for future generations to remember him by.
Director Carol Reed deftly juggles screen time between the
Pope's activities on the battlefield and Michelangelo's slow,
arduous completion of his monumental task. The film also
gingerly approaches the subject of Michelangelo's sexual
orientation vis-a-vis his relationship with the Contessina de
Medici (Diane Cilento). Blu-ray
Release date: March 4th, 2014
The Great Beauty
BD - For decades, journalist
Jep Gambardella has charmed and seduced his way through the
glittering nightlife of Rome. Since the legendary success of his
only novel, he has been a permanent fixture in the city’s
literary and elite social circles. But on his sixty-fifth
birthday, Jep unexpectedly finds himself taking stock of his
life, turning his cutting wit on himself and his contemporaries,
and looking past the lavish nightclubs, parties, and cafés to
find Rome itself, in all its monumental glory: a timeless
landscape of absurd, exquisite beauty. Featuring sensuous
cinematography, a lush score, and an award-winning central
performance by the great Toni Servillo, this transporting
experience by the brilliant Italian director Paolo Sorrentino is
a breathtaking Felliniesque tale of decadence and lost love.
Blu-ray Release date: March 25th,
2014
Fellini's Roma
BD - As Fellini himself
travels with his crew to document the ring-road circling Rome,
with all the natural diversions that might inherently divert a
traditional film shoot, we move into episodes that chart the
wartime difficulties of Roman life across those fleeting times
that chronicle love and life within the modern-day Rome-time,
themselves pitted against the archaelogical vestiges of the
great city, - and the Catholic church rears its dominance, and
we come into a midpoint that positions itself, indeed, between
the memory-cinema of
Satyricon and
Amarcord.
Blu-ray Release Date: February
24th, 2014
Frightmare
BD - Just released from an
insane asylum, an elderly British couple (Davies and Keith)
retire to a remote farmhouse, where Keith immediately resumes
her cannibalistic activities, while Davies covers up for her. In
addition to knocking off the psychiatrist sent to check up on
them, Keith even enlists her adult daughter (Butcher) in the
service of her perversion. Easily the best of notorious British
gore director Walker's efforts (and that's including the
sadistic House of
Whipcord, 1974), this
film is stylishly directed and contains several good
performances, most notably that of Keith.
Blu-ray Release date: March 18th,
2014
Mysterious Skin
BD - At the age of eight,
Kansas youngsters Neil and Brian played on the same little
league baseball team. Now, ten years later, the two boys
couldn't be more different. Neil is a charismatic but
emotionally aloof male hustler while Brian is a nervous
introvert obsessed with the idea that he has been abducted by a
UFO. When the boys parallel lives inevitably intersect, the pair
unearth dark, repressed secrets on a harrowing and unforgettable
journey of self discovery. Blu-ray
Release date: March 18th, 2014
12 Years a Slave
BD - The film 12 Years a
Slave, British director Steve McQueen’s antebellum Southern
drama, sets a new standard in realistically depicting American
slavery. With slavery at the heart of the paradox – the United
States’ existence was founded on the principle of liberty – a
mainstream film that depicts that bleak part of history is
exceptional. For that reason alone, 12 Years A Slave is
probably the film event of the year, but worthiness in itself
can be deadly – even if it does win Academy Awards. Fortunately,
12 Years a Slave is also exceptional as a film. Far from
the push-button catharsis offered by most Hollywood redemption
tales, the work is sober and deliberate, a mix of visceral
intensity and artful design. Blu-ray
Release date: March 4th, 2014
The Blue Max
BD - Directed by John
Guillermin and starring George Peppard, James Mason, and Ursula
Andress, The Blue Max (1966) is based on Jack D. Hunter’s
perennial best-seller about an ambitious young German soldier (Peppard)
who, from the muck of the World War I trenches, becomes
determined to join the aristocratic ranks of his country’s
heroic fliers. The film details his journey as he moves up the
ladder and into the skies, providing along the way some of the
most thrilling sequences of aerial combat ever committed to the
screen. Featuring music by Jerry Goldsmith (available on this
Twilight Time release as an isolated track) that has taken its
place as one of the greatest film scores of all time.
Blu-ray Release date: February,
2014
Beyond Outrage
BD - A manipulative police
crackdown on organized crime has ignited a tricky power struggle
in the yakuza underworld. As the police force prepares a
full-scale crackdown, anti-gang detective Kataoka wants to start
a war between crime families for their mutual destruction. His
war incendiary device is the rumored dead boss Otomo (Kitano)
who seeks to retire from a life of crime, but can't help but get
drawn back into the battle. Blu-ray
Release date: March 11th, 2014
Boiler Room
BD - In this drama that
explores greed and corruption in American business, Giovanni
Ribisi plays Seth Davis, an intelligent and ambitious college
dropout who runs a casino in his apartment. Eager to show his
father that he can succeed, Seth lands a job with a small stock
brokerage firm. He is given a space in the company's "boiler
room," where he makes cold calls to prospective clients. As it
turns out, Seth has a genuine talent for cold calling, which
gains him the approval of his superiors, the admiration of his
father, and the attentions of one of his co-workers, Abby
Hilliard (Nia Long). However, the higher up the ladder Seth
rises, the deeper he sinks into a quagmire of dirty dealings,
until he's breaking the law in order to keep his bosses happy
and his paychecks coming. Blu-ray
Release date: March 4th, 2014
Hatari!
BD - Hatari! is
Swahili for "danger"--and also the word for action, adventure
and broad comedy in this two-fisted Howard Hawks effort. John
Wayne stars as the head of a daring Tanganyka-based group which
captures wild animals on behalf of the world's zoos. Hardy
Kruger, Gérard Blain and Red Buttons are members of Wayne's
men-only contingent, all of whom are reduced to jello when the
curvaceous Elsa Martinelli enters the scene. In tried and true
Howard Hawks fashion, Martinelli quickly becomes "one of the
guys," though Wayne apparently can't say two words to her
without sparking an argument. The second half of this amazingly
long (159 minute) film concerns the care and maintenance of a
baby elephant; the barely credible finale is devoted to a comic
pachyderm stampede down an urban African street, ending
literally at the foot of Martinelli's bed. The other scene worth
mentioning involves comedy-relief Red Buttons' efforts to create
a fireworks-powered animal trap. Not to be taken seriously for a
minute, Hatari is attractively packaged and neatly tied up with
a danceable-pranceable theme song by Henry Mancini.
Blu-ray Release date: March 11th,
2014
Gunfight at the O.K. Corral
BD - Of the many filmed
versions of the October 26, 1881, O.K. Corral shootout in
Tombstone, Arizona, Gunfight at the O.K. Corral was one of the
most elaborate and star-studded. Burt Lancaster plays Wyatt
Earp, the renowned lawman, while Kirk Douglas is consumptive
gambler (and gunfighter) Doc Holliday -- the two meet in
difficult circumstances, as Earp discovers that Holiday, for
whom he initially feels little but loathing, is being held on a
trumped up murder charge and being set up for a lynching, and
intercedes on his behalf. The action shifts to Dodge City,
Kansas, where Earp is marshal and Holiday, hardly grateful for
the good turn, shows up right in the middle of all kinds of
trouble, this time mostly on Earp's side of the ledger. And,
finally, the two turn up in Tombstone, Arizona, where Wyatt's
brother Virgil is city marshal, and where Wyatt finally gets to
confront the Clanton/McLowery outlaw gang (led by Lyle Bettger
as Ike Clanton). Since the time-span of the actual gunfight was
at most 90 seconds, the bulk of the film concerns the tensions
across many months leading up to the famous battle.
Blu-ray Release date: March 11th,
2014
Thunderbolt and Lightfoot
BD - Thunderbolt and
Lightfoot (1974) marked the directing debut of screenwriter
Michael Cimino (The
Deer Hunter,
Heaven’s Gate), working
under the meticulous guidance of star/producer Clint Eastwood.
Eastwood plays a typically laconic loner, a big-time thief in
hiding who hooks up with a goofy young drifter (Jeff Bridges,
giving an Oscar®-nominated performance). First attempting to
escape from a couple of vengeful former partners (George
Kennedy, Geoffrey Lewis), then joining forces with them to pull
off a risky robbery, Eastwood and Bridges give us an ultimately
touching portrait of masculine friendship. Superbly photographed
in Montana’s Big Sky country by Frank Stanley, and featuring a
score by Eastwood regular Dee Barton.
Blu-ray Release date: February, 2014
William Powell at Warner Bros.
- When William Powell signed with Warner Bros., he did more than
find a new studio home for his urbane sophistication – it was
there he solidified himself as a leading man. Culled from the
nine 1931-34 films Powell made at Warner, these four films
variously draw on the star's renowned romantic, comic and
sleuthing talents. The Road to Singapore (1931): The roving eye
of boozing playboy Powell settles on a blonde (Doris Kenyon)
disenchanted with her neglectful husband (Louis Calhern). High
Pressure (1931): Powell's roguish wit is in high gear as he
plays a garrulous promoter selling investors on a scheme to make
ersatz rubber. Private Detective 62 (1933): Private eye Powell
falls for the socialite (Margaret Lindsay) he's supposed to
frame. The Key (1934): In volatile 1920 Dublin, British officer
Powell sacrifices his freedom for the woman he loves (Edna Best)
and her political-captive husband (Colin Clive.) DVD Release
Date: September 10th, 2013
Frankenstein: The True Story
- Scripted by Christopher Isherwood and Don Bachardy, this is
not exactly a faithful rendering of Mary Shelley's novel,
although it deserves full marks for using the magnificent Arctic
ending so long ignored by the cinema. Difficult to assess
properly, since the feature is a boil-down from the 200-minute
version shown on American TV (editor's note: the DVD versions
feature the complete miniseries), although a misogynistic
reading is clearly intended (with the two brides, Frankenstein's
and the monster's, emerging as more treacherously villainous
than either of their mates). For a while it comes on like bad
Hammer, until the arrival of the monster - a handsome lad, but
the process is reverting - perks things up considerably.
Particularly memorable is a scene where the monster's demurely
virginal Bride sings 'I Love Little Pussy, Her Coat Is So
Warm', before gleefully attempting to strangle a sleepy
Persian and lasciviously licking a drop of mauve blood from her
scratched arm; and a glorious moment of delirium when the
monster disrupts a society ball to collect his bride, ripping
off her pearl choker to reveal the stitched neck, then annexing
her head as his property. Whiting is a weak Frankenstein, but
more than made up for by Sarrazin (the monster), Seymour (his
bride), Richardson (the hermit) and Mason (first cousin to Fu
Manchu as Polidori). DVD Release Date: March 10th, 2014
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