Blu-ray Consumer Guide: May 2013, A Memorial Day Gift To You From Some Came Running

How did this forty-disc monster CG happen, you may wonder? (Then again, you may not wonder, in which case just skip ahead to the capsules.) Well, it’s like this: whilst working on the De Niro book I would take breaks from the intensive De Niro watching by popping in a Blu-ray to “relax,” and mostly they would be things that I’d had in the “staging area” for the Consumer Guide anyway. Once the De Niro book was done, and I’d done another round of revisions on The Novel That I Delusionally Expect Will Catupult Me Out Of This Particular [redacted] Business, I had been hoping to get a few weeks work on another actually remunerative project, but that DIDN’T HAPPEN. Also My Lovely Wife has had to work late a lot. What’s a fella to do? Go to rep theaters? Interact with OTHER PEOPLE? Hell no.

Equipment: Playstation 3 for domestic discs, OPPO BDP 83 for import discs, Panasonic Viera TCP50S30 plasma display, Pioneer Elite VSX-817 AV amplifier/receiver. 

3:10 To Yuma (Criterion)

Commended by Andrew Sarris for his “stylistic conviction in an intellectual vacuum,” Delmer Daves does in fact offer stronger, better stuff than that, according to his post-Andrew champions. Dave Kehr has written compellingly on his frequently dismissed melodramas, Susan Slade and Parrish, particularly (“Call it Camp…”—Sarris) and in the booklet essays for this and the also-superb Jubal, Kent Jones makes the case that Daves was the master of a rare and particular kind of Western, one in which the depiction of goodness was paramount (“or call it Corn,” Sarris continued). Jones is compelling and well-informed, and his descriptions of Daves’ technical innovations in shooting his uniquely American landscapes adds persuasive ballast to his case for the director as a major one. But  here it’s really the seeing that’s believing. The simple-as-death storyline (adapted from an Elmore Leonard tale) gets a beautifully measured treatment here; this is a far, far more substantial film than its lazy movie-guide categorizations as a “solid B Western” or whatever give it credit for, and the transfer of the black-and-white film is gorgeous. Outtakes include still shots from an excised Felicia Farr nude scene. OK, that’s not actually true. Extras are sparse but as I said the Jones essay is an education. And I can’t emphasize enough that the movie is beautiful, beautiful, beautiful, on pretty much every conceivable level. —A

Bakumatsu Taiyo Den (Eureka!/Masters of Cinema region B U.K. import)

This 1957 picture ranked fifth in a 1999 poll of greatest Japanese films conducted by the nearly hundred-year-old magazine Kinema Jumpo. It’s relatively obscure in the west; the reasons for the high esteem there and the scarcity of its reputation here are probably not unrelated; it’s a very culturally specific film, an allegorical farce in which the dwindling of  the shogunate in the mid-to-late 19^th century reflects upon the Japan of the time the film was released. The opening montage, as it happens, has a lot in common with that of the veddy British On Approval, reviewed below; taking the viewer by the hand and saying this story is about “then,” but it’s also about now. So what is it about, anyway? It takes its time with that; the ostensible plot hook, in which a broke brothel patron starts doing odd jobs around the joint because he can’t pay his bill, doesn’t really kick in until about 45 minutes into the nearly two-hour film, directed by  Yuzo Kawashima and co-written with his then protégé, the soon-to-be-great Shohei Imamura. The movie is diverting for its picaresque humor, social observations, and overall frankness (never not funny: when a bunch of the film’s male characters gang up for a group piss); sometimes it comes off like a Moliere farce with a change of venue. The disc boasts an excellent transfer of a recent digital restoration; extras are confined to the disc package booklet, which has some essays. I’d tend to recommend this most highly to viewers already very conversant with Japanese film looking to catch up on what had been a hard-to-find canon classic. —A

Band of Outsiders (Criterion)

How audience friendly was this Godard film considered to be back in 1964? Please note the Columbia Pictures logo between the “Visa de controle Ministériel No. 28712” card and the opening title montage. Yep, with its tack-piano theme, jokey credits, quirky tendresse, and more, this really is the sort of film that represents to perpetually disillusioned one-time Godard fans of a certain age what “earlier, funnier films” meant to the aliens chastising Sandy Bates in Stardust Memories. To such an extent that one almost is tempted to trash it, the better to extol the virtues of Ici et aeilleurs. OK, not really. Much. It’s wonderful, the race through the Louvre and the much-bruited Madison bit are as great as everyone says they are, and in all this is Godard’s most Queneau-esque film, not just with respect to Gallic “charm” and all that, but also in terms of a structural self-consciousness that’s designed to enhance genuine feeling rather than preclude it. In short, a Great Film. This Blu-ray is a lovely upgrade of what had been an already excellent package, the wintry black-and-white rendered in exceptional crispness and detail. Even the booklet essay by Joshua Clover, quite possibly my least favorite writer of all time (because I’m sure you were wondering)  is better than all right. —A+

Black Sabbath (Arrow region B U.K. import)

I think this anthology picture may be Mario Bava’s best film, by virtue not only of its consistency but its variability. Alternatively dead serious and irrepressibly playful, every shot a wonder and certain images so hauntingly terrifying and sad as to be unforgettable, it’s a concise feast of very particular cinematic inspiration. I speak of course of the Italian language version of the 1963 film, entitled I tre volti di paura (The Three Faces of Fear), which retains the original order of the three tales and has a final shot featuring “host” Boris Karloff that’s an utter delight. That version is the highlight of this three-disc (one Blu-ray, two standard def) edition of the film from Arrow. There’s also the English-language American International cut, which gives us Karloff’s own voice, which is nice. The most salient extra on the Blu-ray is a very good half-hour video with split-screen explanations of the aural and visual differences between the two versions. The picture quality of my favored version, from red telephone to sickly green vampire family to grimacing jewelry-wearing corpse, is so staggeringly great it brought tears to my eyes, almost. A definitive edition and an intense pleasure. Wowsers. Co-starring Jean-Pierre Leaud’s mom, by the way.  —A+

Cloak and Dagger (Olive)

I raised my eyebrows in an approving way when I saw the logo of The Film Foundation on the back cover of this edition of the 1946 Fritz Lang thriller. The restoration presented here looks pretty grand. A little damage in the form of scratches and such is visible here and there, but overall this has really superb picture quality with excellent contrast and detail. It’s a damn fine film, too, boasting a solid Gary Cooper performance (whether you buy him as a nuclear physicist really doesn’t matter after about six minutes or so) and some very nice bits, including a a scene in which attracted-to-each-other-awkwardly roommates have to contend with a hungry cat, and a killing-in-self-defense scene that’s a definite precursor to the nasty kitchen-murder sequence in Hitchcock’s Torn Curtain. Check it out. —A 

Crimewave (Shout! Factory)

As the saying goes, films don’t get too  much more maudit than this 1985 item. Director Sam Raimi’s second proper feature, and the first that he and his associates (Bruce Campbell, Rob Tapert, et. al.) made for/with THE MAN,  was a behind-the-scenes tragedy/farce from the get-go, from imposed leading man to unforeseen union overages to clueless execs doing recuts that mutilated a plethora of elaborate and possibly beautiful master shots and more. Surely an object lesson not just for Raimi and company but for co-writers Joel and Ethan Coen, who here dub a correctional facility “Hudsucker State Penitentiary” and make a blink-and-you-miss it cameo appearance (Frances MacDormand plays a nun, too). So how’s the movie? Sometimes quite entertaining, always exuberant, a bit of a mess, and an unexpected stylistic link between Raimi, the Coens, and honestly, Zucker-Abrahams-Zucker. Like the Coens’ subsequent Raising Arizona, it’s a real cartoon movie, although at this point Raimi has a slight edge in chops. Still, never such innocence again and all that. And I bet Tarantino was a big fan, for reasons you’ll get if you watch it yourself. The picture quality is very good and will likely satisfy the recollections of the five people who actually got to see this in its abortive theatrical “release.” The extras are nicely explanatory overall but the jewel is of course the Bruce Campbell commentary, because production train wreck tales are way more interesting than success stories and because it’s the irrepressible Campbell telling them. Speaking of Reed Birney, who got the lead role that Raimi wanted for him, Bruce notes, “Reed’s pretty cute in this. I wonder why he didn’t work much after this. I guess it’s because we destroyed his career.” He also refers to Louise Lasser as “a piece of work.” Great stuff. —A

Day of the Falcon (Image)

Every now and then I hear of a direct-to-DVD (more or less) release of a film of the sort maybe that they don’t make anymore, and I kinda get my Sentimental Old Man hopes up, like somehow I’m gonna be gifted with a latter-day Khartoum or something that will help me to banish dull care or something. This is particularly weird because I don’t even like the actual Khartoum all that much.  Anyway, I thought maybe this produced-by-some-obscenely-rich-Middle-Eastern-dude item, directed by Jean-Jacques Annaud, might do some kind of trick in this realm, but alas, no. It opens in “The Yellow Belt, somewhere in Arabia.” And boy, that belt sure is yellow! The noble heads of warring factions come to an uneasy truce involving one of the scions of a warlord living under the safekeeping of the former rival, or something, setting the stage for an epic (not quite) series of conflicts once the land of the Yellow Belt is discovered to be oil rich. The disc looks very good, but the  visual splendor does not ameliorate a cliché-collection storyline and script, po-faced direction that takes every cliché dead seriously, phoned-in performances, and….well, the battle scenes take forever to get started, and aren’t so hot once they do. I’m sticking with Khartoum. —C+

The Devil And Miss Jones (Olive)

Ah, Olive Films. Its Blu-rays of old Republic Westerns (right, as opposed to the up-to-the-minute Republic Westerns) kept me sane when I took breaks from grappling with The De Niro Perplex and other inerleckshul challenges. And its off-kilter but hardly random selection of other vintage Hollywood fare consistently uncovers gems of substantial cinephilic pertinence. This 1941 Norman Krasna-scripted, Sam Wood-directed comedy is an excellent case in point, a swell vehicle for the great Jean Arthur and an amusingly agitationist pro-labor parable to boot, with Charles Coburn as a magnate who conceives the concept for the later television series Undercover Boss, as it were. A crackerjack picture with a standout sequence set in Coney Island, and a very interesting just-pre-World-War-II time capsule (although there’s not a single allusion to the troubles in Europe at the time). All this and production design by  William Cameron Menzies. (Cogent, but a little on the subdued side for him, although the Coney Island police station did give this viewer an eerie little pre-echo of Invaders From Mars.) The Blu-ray is crisp looking,  but a little lowish in the contrast department, which I sometimes find to be the case with Olive. Hardly a cardinal sin and in any event and the movie is well worth your time. —B+

Diary of a Chambermaid (Olive)

Hollywood-studio bound Jean Renoir is frustrating in a lot of ways, I noted as I began watching this, struck by the stage sets, and the sometimes-Mickey-Mousing musical score. This ain’t no Toni, in other words. However. Once you’re accustomed to the climate, the salient features of which include Paulette Goddard’s incarnation as a blonde, the movie builds up a nicely sly and sardonic head of steam. And of course this 1946 gloss on Mirbeau is an excellent double feature with Buñuel’s 1964 treatment of the same material, starring a Jeanne Moreau who’s permitted to keep her natural hair color. The cursory treatment Renoir accords this picture in My Life and My Films tends to confirm my suspicions that this was more a passion project for Burgess Meredith (co-star, co-screenwriter, co-producer, and Goddard’s husband at the time) than the director himself. In any event, the disc looks good, there’s a slight uptick in contrast relative to The Devil and Miss Jones, and ostensibly minor Renoir is still Renoir. —A-

From Beyond (Scream Factory)

Barbara Crampton’s metamorphosis from bespectacled researcher to  leather corseted dom is possibly the greatest sexy librarian switch in cinema history. And the Stuart-Gordon-directed 1986 followup to the immortal Re-Animator doesn’t disappoint in its other particulars either. The disc is first rate: Good detail, great psychedelic colors. Gordon’s brio and the overall inspiration of the rest of the crew bring this latter-day exploitation goodie way above generic Italian-studio Charles Band-dom. (Longtime Fangoria and/or Video Watchdog subscribers know too well what I mean.)  Filmmaking lesson: various gradations of psychedelic pink lighting definitely give your rubberized creature effects a more convincing feel. Good explosions and fire, always a sign of a well-done transfer. Inspirational Commentary Bit: “From Beyond has a machine!” —A

Frontier Horizon (Olive)

The good news is that this 1939 B oater, the eighth and last Three Mesquiteers picture to star John Wayne, is the best-looking of all such Blu-rays I’ve looked at thus far (I haven’t yet  gotten to Santa Fe Stampede and Red River Range). It’s one of the more unstuck-in-time Mesquiteers adventures, with an engaging land-grab storyline and tight narrative margins and brisk action; a real tonic. Also the film debut of Jennifer Jones, here billed by her real name Phyllis Isley, and looking and acting very fresh, innocent as she is of the knowledge that David O. Selznick would soon come along and CRUSH HER SPIRIT.—B+

The Fury (Twilight Time)

This, as it happens, is one of my favorite Brian De Palma movies, largely because it’s just the director going virtuosically nuts on a B-movie “Don’t fuck with Kirk Douglas” scenario. For the first quarter or so I was having a wonderful time with the high-def version. The beach scene with William Finley, and its bizarre depth-of-field show-offery, looked amazing. And I noticed that Hillary Thompson, the girl Amy Irving gives the nosebleed to, was a dead ringer for Sasha Grey, who was not even a concept in 1978. This is what movie watching’s all about. However. Once the night scenes started, the picture got pretty wonky: a good deal of speckling akin to what one sees in the Italian transfers of some Dario Argento pictures. It’s particularly evident in a scene after Douglas puts Irving on the bus: the over-graininess doesn’t get as bad as that of the misfire French Connection Blu-ray of a while back, but it’s close. Off-the-record consultations with technically trusted sources suggests the problem arises from an anomaly of an outmoded storage medium for digital transfers. It certainly didn’t kill the movie but it took me out of it for a bit, and it’s a poor comparison with the wonders inherent in the daylight scenes. A shame, and a problem I hope can be corrected at some point in time. —C

The Grandmaster (Mei Ah mixed region Hong Kong import)

If you wanna see the latest from Wong Kar-Wai before Harvey Weinstein regales the U.S. with his shorter-by-fifteen-minutes cut, this  pricey import would seem to be the way to go, and it’s a beauty. An evocative and sometimes elliptical biography of martial arts legend Ip Man (in case you were wondering, that’s the guy’s actual NAME, not like a superhero title or anything) it begins with a rain-soaked fight sequence that’s both quintessential and unlike anything the director’s done before. The colors are quietly ravishing, the performers profoundly enigmatic, and on the whole it’s more assured and cohesive than My Blueberry Nights, which I’ve actually gotten fonder of in recent years. On this disc, movie itself is region-free, and has English subs; special features are region-locked, and have none. They look pretty EPK-generic, as far as I can tell.  Your call. —A-

The Grapes of Death (Kino Lorber)

That’s a goofy title (and the French original, Les raisins de la mort, isn’t much better) for a genuinely remarkable horror movie, one of the most desolate films ever made, its often goofy special effects notwithstanding. There’s something about zombie-like pestilence occurring in the bucolic French countryside (Michael Haneke exploited it for rather similar effect, in fact, for his more arthouse-respectable [and also excellent] Hour of the Wolf) that just gets to you. Director Jean Rollin’s determined simplicity alternates with genuine (blank verse0 poetry, and the atmosphere of dread and despair is simply remarkable. Brigitte Lahaie-aiie-aiie-aiie is great as a not-what-she-seems character and her “behold my infection-free naked body” bit is a rather hilarious bit of exploitation deadpan in an otherwise mordant vision. The disc looks spectacular, very true to its source. Which source contains the aforementioned cheesy special effects, but what are you going to do. —A-

The Grifters (Miramax/Echo Bridge)

Ah, Echo Bridge, perpetrators of that wretched Blu-ray of Dead Man back in 2011. How I dread the idea of spending money on your product. So I think what happened is that I picked up this (admittedly cheap retail price point) disc in a trade in, because my curiosity got the better of me and also because damnit this is a pretty great picture that belongs in one’s library and it has a Donald E. Westlake script and naked Annette Bening and so there. Still, once it was home I didn’t look forward to checking it out. It’s not bad. The opening credits are in 1.66, which piqued my interest for a minute, but once they were through the picture reverted to a plasma-screen-filling 1.77 (not even 1.85, those motherfuckers). The picture’s solid, a little soft at times (like during Bening’s nude scene, imagine that) but it doesn’t have any jump-out-at-you pixilation screw-ups as Dead Man did. Not terrible, but also nothing special. I’d recommend you shoplift it but what kind of person would that make me?—B- 

The Hobbit (Warner)

I don’t have full-time access to a 3D display, so I acquired the flat Blu-ray of this, a movie I’d probably like a lot more if I smoked pot, because I was curious about how a more conventional version would look—I saw it on the big screen in 3D and at the controversial 48 fps projection speed and was mixed but sometimes very impressed. The “regular” version on Blu-ray is more…mixed. The textures of the visuals offers more disctrete distinction between the live-action and animated components within a given frame that I was comfortable with; the images rarely, if ever, merged into a coherent and satisfying whole. Again, this might not have been a problem had I been watching stoned. But I think the thing is, this movie actually needs  3D, if not necessarily 3D in 48fps. Having figures inhabit different planes just makes the multi-platform effects more digestible, as it were. Whenever I get a display upgrade (and it’ll probably be a while), I’ll give the 3D version a look and report back. —B

The Hudsucker Proxy (Warner Archive)

Almost ten years after their pal Sam Raimi got majorly burned on Crimewave, the Coen Brothers got a big budget and no studio interference on their own arguably final Full Cartoon movie, their first effort to really take a bath at the box office, as it happened. Like all Coen pictures, it’s since acquired a cult, but not nearly the one that The Big Lebowski entertains. And so, its Blu-ray gets a bare-bones Warner Archive release. Not that you go to Coen Brothers movies on video for the DVD extras anyway. This movie looks very nice; the disc nails the movie’s highly burnished look, which we come to understand as but one function of its Dada-by-way-of-Preston-Sturges snideness. By this time the Coens’ chops had come to match the ambition of their crazy gags (if you watch Raising Arizona today, while it’s still delightful, you might be shocked at how ragged some of it looks), and with more money to throw at production design and such, they really went to town. It’s kind of astonishing that the movie even exists. And yes, I think Jennifer Jason Leigh’s performance works. —A-

The Jazz Singer (Warner)

One rather wishes that Michael Curtiz rather than Alan Crosland had directed this 1927, um, breakthrough film, but what are you going to do. It would have still retained its problem-picture status. What this Blu-ray really demonstrates is how great a result is yielded via application of expensive up-to-the-minute technology. I’m admittedly speculating here; I don’t have the details of how this transfer was made but it simply has to be a meticulous frame-by-frame scanning of good or eminently restorable materials. Look at the whites of Warner Oland’s eyes when he pops them out in indignation that Jakie is late to sing at temple. It’s incredible in a movie that’s almost ninety years old. As good as the older movies Olive puts on Blu-ray can look, their transfers are done by more conventional means, and it shows. The rest of this package runs along the same lines as the 2007 standard-def release, with multiple eye-popping hours of vintage musical entertainment, while the commentary track on the movie itself from  Ron Hutchison and Vince Giordano is one of the best of its kind. Just amazing. —A+

Knightriders (Arrow Region B U.K. import)

I cannot tell a lie: until this Arrow release came under my transom, I’d actually never seen this crucial George A. Romero film. I regret I didn’t sooner; it’s a pretty spectacular film. And it’s really not nearly as goofy as its conceit of stunt cyclists enacting Arthurian myth in the modern world might strike you, in large part due to Ed Harris’ superb lead performance and to the workmanlike, thorough way that Romero and his company enacts said conceit. Expansive, emotional, but never sentimental, it’s a quintessential Romero treatment on the wages of integrity. The transfer looks terrific, and the extras, including a commentary and a contemporary interview with Harris, are also excellent. Shout! Factory has this slated for a domestic release in July but I’m not sure if the company will best this particular product.—A+

Leave Her To Heaven (Twilight Time)

There has not been an extant Technicolor source for this glorious Technicolor film since maybe before you and I were even born, which is a shame and maybe even a crime. So as much restoration as it gets, we shall never be able to behold the full glory of John Stahl’s mesmerizing 1945 plunge into murderous neo-noir amour fou, starring Gene Tierney at her most hypnotically ga-ga gorgeous. But this Blu-ray boasts a beautiful picture for all that, so much more than passable that I wonder whether viewers of the real Technicolor were struck by Stendhal syndrome en masse. Essential. —A+

Looney Tunes Mouse Chronicles (Warner)

What a sort of random idea: a two-Blu-ray anthology of  Looney Tunes mice-themed cartoons, billed as “The Chuck Jones Collection.” The adventures of Abbott-and-Costello-esque Hubie and Bertie are featured, as well as a bunch of shorts featuring neurotically gabby Sniffles. While I grant that a little Sniffles goes a long way, I also insist that in small doses he (she? it?) can be kind of winsomely delightful. Aw, fuck it, I’m a complete sucker for Looney Tunes on Blu-ray in any permutation, so maybe take my grade with a grain of salt. But know also that the collection includes “Trap Happy Porky,” which has that drunk-mice singing “On Moonlight Bay” and one of them hiccupping “You’re flat” at the end, still one of the most reliably hilarious gags in all of cinema, for my money.—A

 Major Dundee (Twilight Time)

The heroic-not-quite restoration of a too-much-messed-with Sam Peckinpah coulda-been-a-masterpiece looked great in the standard-def package released in 2006; this version looks better still. Even the 1965 Columbia opening logo has this particularity of grain that provides a Proustian rush of movie-palace power. The reconstruction of Peckinpah’s vision is a movie one wished one could have seen in precisely that context, because it would have blown minds; it begins by coloring very deftly within the lines of the standard Cavalry Western and grows progressively wilder and stranger while never betraying its prime directive, so to speak. It’s also one of the most emotionally stirring pictures of its kind. Cinephiles who are unconvinced by claims for Peckinpah’s genius will at least have to credit him for a very particular singularity of vision after seeing this. And in this format you need make no excuses for the presentation.—A+

Monsieur Verdoux (Criterion)

Speaking of strange, Charles Chaplin’s 1947 black comedy, based on an idea of Orson Welles’, is one of the filmmaker’s odder creations, the character a very upfront mix of self-love and self, if not loathing, then some degree of disapproval. Verdoux is Barbe-bleu as bourgeois fallen on hard times, as it were, his endeavors in murder slapstick cookies dipped in arsenic and his exercises in restraint and/or compassion sentimentally self-aggrandizing. Fascinating, to say the least. This is a good-looking but not extraordinary rendering of the film—there’s apparently only so much that can be done with the material available from the licensing agent. Nevertheless, a necessary entry in the Cinema of Extraordinary Personality. And it’s pretty funny, at least in parts, particularly those parts in which Chaplin jousts with Martha Raye.—A

On Approval (Inception)

No, I had never heard of it before either. Dave Kehr had, of course Dave Kehr had, and it was his review of it in the Sunday New York Times that convinced me to check it out. I’m very happy I did. The 1944 take-everyone’s-mind-off the war comedy (set in the Victorian era, it has a present-to-past prologue that pokes gentle fun at the torn-from-the-distressing-headlines pictures of its day) is pretty much a fat-free puff pastry of droll dialogue exchanges in a Wildean mode, to wit, “You have a sweet voice, Helen.” “Thank you, George.” “But you seldom sing. That is a great accomplishment.” Reproduced in stellar, high-contrast black and white, and supplemented by a dry but informative commentary from scholar Jeffrey Vance. Aside from featuring a rare film performance by British comedy queen Beatrice Lillie, the wonderful movie happens to have been adapted, directed by, and starring Clive Brook,whom you may remember as “Doc” Harvey from Sternberg’s Shanghai Express. I had no idea he had it in him. —A 

Pals of the Saddle (Olive)

Another Mesquiteers title. No windowboxed opening this time. A clear crisp  image, not quite as crisp as that of Frontier Horizon. I like it better than Frontier Horizon though because it features kinds creepy quasi ventriloquist Max Terhune as “Lullabye” Joslin, whom I find a more compelling (not to say Lynchian) character than Raymond Hatton’s Rusty Joslin. Terhune’s character also indulges in some merciless mocking of sap Tucson, played by Ray “Crash” Corrigan. It’s also one of the Mesquiteer’s present-day-set adventures, and it involves a woman of initially ambiguous allegiances and the smuggling of something that’s not quite uranium but is definitely meant to be. Hence, the movie is Notorious avant la lettre, and hence cinematically important. Look, my point is that if you don’t get your hands on every Three Mesquiteers western you can, you’re a bad American. I don’t know how else to put it. —B

Panic In The Streets (Fox)

Essentially a high-def clone of  the Elia Kazan box set edition (note the menu, which is designed in the style of the box set), but a really good looking version of a masterful movie. As Kazan himself understood, this 1950 thriller was much more than a genre exercise, but it works on that level just fine. It’s thrilling filmmaking right from the get-go, with Kazan deploying genuine locations and idiosyncratic performers (Zero Mostel has a major role in one of his scarce films from this period before the blacklist kept him out of movies for pretty much a decade) with remarkable energy and invention. The contrast is just as I like it, the detail looks just fine to me. A couple of  newer extras are added (docs on costars Jack Palance and Richard Widmark), but the commentary from  Alain Silver and James Ursini remains the crucial one.—A    

The Telephone Book (Vinegar Syndrome)

This Blu-ray from a relatively new concern that seems commendably concerned with unearthing and preserving unusual grindhouse and quasi-underground fare does a nice job with this curio, written and directed by Nelson Lyon, whose unfortunate subsequent claim to fame would be accompanying John Belushi through a good portion of the Hollywood drug binge that killed the performer. This not-quite-tale of a girl Candide’s search for the world’s greatest obscene phone caller (no, really) boasts lovely vintage NYC locations rendered in yummy black and white and features, not necessarily in this order, Roger C. Carmel yelling “Fuck,” William Hickey contemplating a giant erection, and Jill Clayburgh loading a gun while wearing a sleep mask. Producer Merv Bloch provides a lively and sometimes sadly nostalgic commentary. Utterly intriguing but not for everyone. —B+

Tess (BFI Region B U.K. import)

One of Polanski’s greatest films, it’s rarely acknowledged as such for reasons I’m not sure I ought to speculate on. So I won’t, and instead will hope that this beautiful albeit extras-short Blu-ray from a restored source will help find it a newish and appreciative audience. Yes, the British countryside of Hardy, not to mention of Turner and Constable,  is  evoked via the ravishing cinematography (Ghislain Cloquet took over for Geoffrey Unsworth after the latter died some weeks into shooting) but the effects are not “merely” picturesque; the beautiful golden glow  that illuminates “Sir John D’Urbeville” throws that character’s strong ignobility into sharp relief, and throughout, natural glory is undercut by human stupidity and/or cruelty. The director is at his most expansive and his most crushing, simultaneously. —A

That Cold Day In The Park (Olive)

Pre-M*A*S*H Altman, but the purposeful murk of the imagery, and  the focus fakeouts throughout,  presage McCabe and Mrs. Miller and Images and Three Women more than they do the subsequent film that would make him famous. The movie got slagged as a squalid but conventional psych thriller at the time but seen today its particular tetchiness is really auteur-distinctive, if you ask me. The drab of the supposedly swank apartment inhabited by the Sandy Dennis character speaks volumes. The Olive disc seems to have been transferred from not pristine materials, but the Blu-ray renders what is likely a pretty accurate account of cinematographer Laszlo Kovacs’ long-lens impressionism. Fun fact: after retiring from acting male lead Michael Burns became an academic historian and has written more than one book on the Dreyfus case. — B+

Tristana (Cohen)

Goddamn there are a lot of trailers before the beginning of this movie. And that’s my only complaint. This high-def version of what I still consider Buñuel’s masterpiece of masterpieces looks amazing right from the beginning, as it casts a seemingly simple but ultimately devastating spell. Kent Jones fortifies his reputation as The World’s Most Enviable Film Critic by hosting a commentary track with Catherine Deneuve herself, and he keeps it relaxed and gets great stuff.  The included alternate ending is interesting. The actual ending is…well, unbelievable. Get this. Inspirational Commentary Bit: “He was really happy to be back in Spain, to be back working in Spain.”  —A+

 

Ultimate Gangsters Collection: Classics (Warner)

Good idea, putting these things on Blu-ray. The individual discs reproduce the extras, “Warner Night At The Movies” cartoons and shorts and all, of the standard def editions. And we approve. As for the high-def picture quality, the films are, in backward chronological order: White Heat, which looks very nice; there's some crackle on the audio of the 1949 film, and one insert shot in the opening train robbery sequence kind of stands out like a sore thumb, but otherwise solid, terrific. The longest movie of the bunch, almost two hours, because it’s kind of surprisingly plotty. Never lags a minute though. 1936’s The Petrified Forest screened in a restored version recently, and I presume that’s what’s on this Blu-ray, because the picture is easily the sharpest and most consistent in the set (not that the others are considerably behind, mind you). I mean, you can see stray hairs pop off both Bette Davis and Leslie Howard’s heads in medium closeup when they’re facing each other. Also the painted desert backdrops of the set are more evident. Terrific film, a bit on the talky side, but great performances (it made Bogart a star, but Howard really sells his slightly ridiculous role; the guy was some actor) and interesting action…and the two African-American characters are not broad stereotypes or even really stereotypes at all, a near-impossiblity for a Hollywood picture of this time, I used to think. The Public Enemy looks spectacular, sometimes grain heavy but what of it. Little Caesar  displays a  little softness in the shallow focus shots but it’s likely endemic to the material and it’s neither displeasing nor “bad.” A wonderful thing in all respects. —A+

  Universal Soldier: Day Of Reckoning (Sony)

A lot of The Kids have been raving about this one (and I gotta say that getting behind Peter Hyams’ son could be Vulgar Auteurism at its most innovative), so I thought I’d check it out, despite the fact that I turned off the similarly-praised The Raid after about twenty minutes cause the thing looked as if it had been developed in a mud bath. The first twenty minutes of this were really disgusting (slaughter of lead character’s family in graphic detail, including much-teased adorable-little-girl death), and looked pretty damn good. Eventually I thought I discerned a pulpier, freaked-out extrapolation of The Bourne Legacy and/or Unknown, with some intriguing Fire Walk With Me "touches."Eventually I had to own up to the fact that I was being way too optimistic and that the movie really wasn’t about much more than a guy who comes out of a coma to discover that he has a British accent. This does have more nudity than an average Bourne knockoff, plus the lead actress is a pretty credible Stoya lookalike. (Don’t hassle me for knowing too much about porn stars, she was on the cover of the goddamn Village Voice.) The action stuff is pretty credibly bone-crunching, I admit. The commentary is the usual “we had a great second unit” stuff. Verdict: not as essential as you may have been led to believe. —B-

The Vampire Lovers (Scream Factory)

No real complaints from me on this one. Yeah, maybe the materials weren’t pristine/super-restored, but they look decent. If there’s ever a Blu-ray of Fearless Vampire Killers, I’ll expect it to look better. But, no disrespect to Roy Ward Baker intended, the way this looks is both objectively good, and also entirely appropriate to the movie’s aesthetic pay grade. Inspirational dialogue: “German’s so difficult.” Among the extras: ten minutes of pasty but nicely dressed white males trying to come up with more erudite ways to exclaim “Boobies,” (because there sure are a lot of them in the movie, and most of the guys saw the movie when they were at an impressionable age). On the other hand, while the very sensible and nice and still lovely second female lead Madeline Smith gives an interview my wife characterizes as “darling!” Commentary features very sedate-sounding Ingrid Pitt,  delightfully named screenwriter Tudor Gates,  and the great Baker in a dry but informative interview format. (All three are now deceased, which is lamentable but inevitable.) —A

Van Gogh (Gaumont Region B French import)

Gaumont’s been putting out the Pialat catalog in new high-def editions and while I am sufficiently pleased by my current Eureka!/Masters of Cinema standard-def editions of the films and I figure eventually the company or some like concern will step up to the plate with versions featuring English-language extras, in a couple of cases I have not been able to resist. This 1991 picture is one. (It’s not among the MOC titles, is one reason.) This is a magnificent film, an artist’s portrait of an artist that concentrates on interstices, pauses, and work, work, work rather than the usual romanticized “artiste” stuff. It’s kind of the ultimate act of respect to its subject and likely a kind of self-portrait of its director. It looks sweet throughout, though there are hints of noise in some of the darker scenes near the end (for instance, Jacques Dutronc’s Van Gogh with a prostitute in the Moulin Rouge back room). I hold out hope for cheaper, more English-comprehensive editions (you’ve got subtitles on the feature but not on any of the extras) but I’m still glad to own this. —A

The Verdict (Fox)

The long-awaited (by me and Jeffrey Wells and probably some other people too) Blu-ray of the 1982 movie looks pretty splendid: a good library copy of a movie that belongs in your library. Watching it this time around I noticed for the first time that the relationship between Paul Newman’s Frank Garvin and Jack Warden’s Mickey Morrisey rather neatly reverses the dynamic between the Jimmy Stewart and Arthur O’Connell characters in Preminger’s Anatomy of a Murder. Director Sidney Lumet often complained that critics didn’t really appreciate the depth of cinematic craft he brought to his deceptively straightforward storytelling; this movie is a master class in it. As Phillip Lopate put it in a recent Cineaste review of the Blu-ray of Lumet’s film of A Long Day’s Journey Into Night (which I haven’t gotten around to looking at yet), “If Lumet refuses to disguise the theatricality of the source material, he brings an impressive array of cinematic techniques to its moment-by-moment realization.” Where, say,  Preminger moved the camera, Lumet likes to place it in a comprehensive overview position and keep it there for a good long time (see the pretrial conference with Newman, James Mason, and Milo O’Shea), but he then places his emphases via judicious cutting to ground-level medium shots as the scene builds in verbal and strategic complexity. In other words, he is rather like a theater director in that his moves service the script, and this script, by David Mamet from  a novel by Barry Reed, is a very strong one. One of the best by the director, the screenwriter, and the star. —A+

Viva Zapata! (Fox)

I haven’t kept up on the critical reputation of this 1952 picture, and I haven’t watched it in quite some time,  and I have to say I was not that thrilled by it (and I recall not having been too thrilled by it first time around, which must have been when I was in my twenties). It looks beautiful; Joseph MacDonald’s lensing of various parts of the North American west standing in for Mexico is inspired. But I  found it dramatically stilted (John Steinbeck’s script wears its earnest didacticism on its sleeve) and kind of a waste of Brando, who is very conscientiously consistent in his portrayal of the plaster-saint version of the title character. This movie immediately precedes another Kazan non-favorite of mine, Man on a Tightrope. Maybe the guy was having personal problems in the mid-50s, I dunno. The disc is a solid presentation to be sure.—B

Wake In Fright (Alamo Drafthouse)

This highly disquieting 1971 thriller directed in Australia by Canadian-born Ted Kotcheff could just as well be titled Alcohol Is A Hell Of A Drug. A dissatisfied outback schoolteacher en route to Sydney makes a stop in the so-called “Yabba” that, after a few beers and a few more after that, submerges him in what we’ll call a distinctly unwholesome culture. Definitely a movie you ought to show anyone who thinks the “Wolfpack” ethos endorsed by those idiotic Hangover movies is something, you know, real. Also, you'll never see Donald Pleasance the same way again, even if you already do know Cul-de-sac. Long considered lost, Wake was revived on the rep circuit recently and the Blu-ray from relatively a new distrib outfit (an offshoot of the legendary Texas movie venue) is highly admirable: a great transfer that really puts across that baking-heat yellow light that seems endemic to Australia and certain Australian films, and good extras. If you can stand the (multiply disclaimered) kangaroo hunt that’s the movie’s horror centerpiece you’re golden. If not, well, you’ve been warned here. —A

War of the Wildcats (Olive)

Lest anyone accuse me of being completely in the tank for any Republic western, I cite this 1943 relative dud, which is kinda dull although arguably as semi-interestingly weird as one would expect any movie that casts Albert Dekker and John Wayne as romantic rivals to be.  Originally titled In Old Oklahoma, it features Dekker and Wayne as two different types of oil men, one the rapacious land-grabbing type, the other the hard-working man of the people. Guess who’s which. Martha Scott plays the object of their affections, a former school teacher turned early 20^th-century chick lit purveyor. Nothing against Scott, but Claire Trevor might have put more oomph in the role. Also featuring Sidney Blackmer as Theodore Roosevelt. Seriously, it’s not as good as I’m making it sound. And the disc presentation itself is quite mixed, what with the frequent speckling of the source material. For Republic junkies only.—C

Zeta One (Kino Lorber)

This 1969 secret agent/sci-fi pastiche looks pretty good. GREAT colors. (Note the orange kitchen. If you watch it. Which I'm not recommending.) Whiter than white whites. Too bad it’s one of the worst movies I’ve ever seen. INSIPID direction, coy dialogue, flat delivery. Nice 60s art direction…I think my parents had those white swivel chairs. The first scene goes on forever and nothing happens. It’s like The Room of James Bond parodies, honest. But I watched it all the way through! And the the image quality does hold up but man, does this movie ever answer the question “How bad can it be?” And the answer is: in the final shots, the At the end the hero is surrounded by six naked and/or semi-clad women and he looks absolutely bored to death…and you completely understand how he feels. Brilliant. —C+

Zombie Flesh Eaters (Arrow Region B U.K. import)

This 1979, um, classic, looks pretty amazing, and you’ll know a little about why from the interview I conducted with supervisor James White, here. The clarity and detail is such I was able to cogently identify (for my own self) the hallmarks of  The Lucio Fulci “Look:” Shallow focus, almost exclusively long lenses, not ostentatiously lit, lotta “natural” light. And you know, maybe it’s my grindhouse taste talking, but I think it’s a pretty good horror movie. And now one word never associated with prior video versions can be applied to it: beautiful. Nifty extras, too, including three different discrete title sequences, ‘cause that how international distribution of Italian exploitation cinema used to roll. —A+

Comments

[Titch]

The greatest, most eclectic guide available! Terrific reading. I'm going to have to buy Knightriders now.

[Petey]

"this really is the sort of film that represents to perpetually disillusioned one-time Godard fans of a certain age what “earlier, funnier films” meant to the aliens chastising Sandy Bates in Stardust Memories"

Plus one for Glenn.

And I can now imagine remembering that exact scene in Soigne ta droite...

-----

"the Coen Brothers got a big budget and no studio interference on their own arguably final Full Cartoon movie"

Joel Silver buying a papal indulgence to get into heaven.

I love the color scheme in that movie. All the colors are desaturated until the hula hoops run off the line.

[lipranzer]

CLOAK AND DAGGER doesn't seem to get brought up a lot when it comes to discussing Lang's American films (or maybe I just travel in the wrong circles), but I think it's a damn good film. Like you, I had no trouble accepting Cooper as a scientist, and the film effortlessly flows from spy drama to romance and back again. I've read Lang had a different ending in mind that was cut out of the film (or not filmed; I forget which), and it does admittedly end a little abruptly, but I like it quite a bit.

As it happens, I recently watched THE DEVIL AND MISS JONES for the first time (along with two other releases from Olive Films; CHAMPION, for the first time, and THE DARK MIRROR, for the second time). I'm a huge fan of Coburn and Arthur (one of the few actors who could say "Golly" on screen and make it seem genuine, rather than an affectation. And oh, that voice!), but except for the films he did for Hitchcock, where he was adequate for the occasion, I've never much liked Robert Cummings, and I find him bland as usual here. And while Coburn took to the role and makes the transition smoothly from Scrooge-like boss to being more generous and open-hearted, Arthur doesn't have as much to do (though she is wonderful in the scene when she realizes she does love Cummings).

I don't love THE VERDICT like other Lumet and Paul Newman fans do (I still think the actual verdict is more believable in the novel because there, the testimony of Lindsay Crouse's nurse character isn't suppressed), but it's way more subtle than critics of Lumet give him credit for, as well as, as you point out, more cinematic as well.

[lazarus]

Cloak And Dagger isn't exactly crap, but it's definitely near the bottom of Lang's sound filmography, and I've seen almost all of them. Coming right between Scarlet Street and Secret Beyond The Door doesn't help, either. Cooper is still a stiff, and to suggest that he's believable as a nuclear physicist, any more than he was as a professor in Ball Of Fire, is a joke. The guy only works when he's used as a symbol of raw masculinity, and i don't care for him in those instances, either. It's a shame Lang, von Sternberg, Hawks, etc. couldn't find a better actor for their respective works. Also, I'd rather have a Blu-ray of the underrated Hangmen Also Die.

Nice to see the love for The Hudsucker Proxy, though. Personally I prefer it to Raising Arizona and Fargo, though I'm obviously in the minority on that one.

[Ed Hulse]

Who knew, when we worked together lo those many years ago, that you would ever so warmly embrace (as in, come around to my way of thinking with regard to) Republic's Three Mesquiteers Westerns? I mean, when we were periodically screening rare 16mm prints from my collection it didn't really surprise me that you took so readily to the then-seldom-seen CHANDU THE MAGICIAN or Bob Hope's CAT AND THE CANARY; those were, after all, major-studio offerings with considerable cachet in film-buff circles. Had I any inkling that you could have been persuaded to sit through Wayne Mesquiteers oaters....

Thirty years ago SADDLE's director, George Sherman, was in NYC on business. One of our mutual friends, indie producer Sam Sherman (no relation), invited George to a proposed get-together of fans of Republic's B-Westerns. Stunned but flattered that baby-boomer buffs were familiar with his oeuvre, the director agreed to attend. But when told that we planned to screen PALS OF THE SADDLE in his honor, George asked with no little trepidation, "For God's sake, why?" Nonetheless, he enjoyed seeing the movie again and afterward regaled us with behind-the-scenes anecdotes -- like, for example, that Wayne took more interest in scripts than other Republic stars, and that Ray Corrigan habitually kept his head down during filming of "running inserts" lest his ill-fitting hat blow off and therefore necessitate a retake the SADDLE unit could ill afford on its ten-day shooting schedule.

[Griff]

Nice, true words about 3:10 TO YUMA. Whenever anyone ignorantly dismisses this major work as a "B Western," I groan.

The Olive encoding of THAT COLD DAY IN THE PARK remarkably evokes the look of the 1969 Commonwealth United theatrical release prints.

[Shane]

Gosh, Zombie Flesh Eaters, Knight Riders and From Beyond! It's like my teenage years just got blurayed.

[george]

"The picture quality of my favored version, from red telephone to sickly green vampire family to grimacing jewelry-wearing corpse, is so staggeringly great it brought tears to my eyes, almost."

I know what you mean. I can't think of anyone who used color better than Bava. Just watched "Planet of the Vampires" and was dazzled by the colors.

[george]

"Like all Coen pictures, it’s since acquired a cult, but not nearly the one that The Big Lebowski entertains."

Lebowski seems to be the favorite movie of males in their late 20s and early 30s -- it's up there with "The Hangover" as a movie they can quote verbatim every line -- but it's not one of my favorite Coen Bros. movies. I much prefer "Hudsucker Proxy."

[Oliver_C]

I'm 42 and I like 'Hudsucker', just not as much as 'Lebowski' or 'Miller's Crossing'.

[MDL]

Thanks for this consumer guide. My local library has a DVD of ON APPROVAL. It's a terrific comedy that almost no one has heard of. Glad it's on Blu- ray now.

[andy]

I caught Bakumatsu Taiyo Den a year or two ago and was at first a bit disappointed--it is clear that a Western viewer is not getting the whole of the intent--but it ended up soaking in, with the amiably shrugging tone and free-wheeling scope of the characters reminding me rather of Altman. And it makes sense that Imamura had a hand in it, for sure (and not that I'm urging a viewing, but what better recommendation is there than that?).

[DUH]

Disappointed to hear about _The Fury_ Blu. I thought I remembered you mentioning something positive about it before. Is it actually worse than the DVD?

[Glenn Kenny]

@ DUH: No, it's not worse than the DVD. About 65 or 70 percent of it looks great. The night scenes are disappointing and display artifacts that are kind of distracting. What should be a home run is something less than.

@ Ed Hulse: Yes, I did have a bit of a snobbery issue with B Westerns back in the days of screenings at the Gramercy outpost of The Ranch, which I miss greatly. I was also more immediately interested in the obvious Psychotronic stuff than real Americana. Happily my horizons have broadened and I have to credit you and Sam S. for having put the bug in my ear, so to speak, to begin with.

[Jason LaRiviere]

Glenn, what's your beef against Joshua Clover?

[Kurzleg]

I'm 42 and I like 'Hudsucker', just not as much as 'Lebowski' or 'Miller's Crossing'.

Posted by: Oliver_C | May 26, 2013 at 04:33 PM

I'm just a bit older, and I love the latter two. "Hudsucker" never did it for me mostly because I found JJL's performance distracting (not sure it's smart to disagree with Glenn on this point, but...). Haven't seen it in quite some time, though, and with Durning and Newman in the cast it's worth another look.

[James Keepnews]

Rather surprised you've only just gotten 'round to it but, now, maybe GAR's DAWN follow-up is a _little_ sentimental -- Donald Rubenstein's "finished" song, e.g.? The (dear G-d) "Pippin" character? I also want those 60 seconds of my life back from the good Friar's, um, pizza scene, sentiment notwithstanding. Beyond that, it is quite the heartfelt anomaly in Jorge's oeuvre, even allowing for your outliers like THERE'S ALWAYS VANILLA and JACK'S WIFE (the latter absolutely one of my all-time favorite Romeros). Easily one of his best ensembles -- sure, Ed, but also Mr. Savini, Ms. Tallman, the INCREDIBLE Brother Blue, &c., &c. (though too bad John Amplas was a block of wood in everything except MARTIN) -- and you get the sense he would've made many more such films had he Cassavettes' money-backers and/or wasn't so good at scaring the crap outta ya. Cold comfort indeed that he got pretty bad at the latter in ensuing decades.

[george]

I haven't seen Lebowski since it came out in '98, but I plan to revisit it soon. I've heard it gets better with repeat viewings.

[george]

"Yes, I did have a bit of a snobbery issue with B Westerns back in the days ..."

YouTube is a great source for B movies, westerns and other genres. I've been watching the B's produced by Pine-Thomas for Paramount in the early '40s, usually starring Richard Arlen and/or Chester Morris. Nothing great here, just snappy, fast-paced entertainment. Always good to see people like William Demerest, Elisha Cook Jr. and Dwight Frye in supporting roles.

And I wonder why Jean Parker, the frequent leading lady in these films, never became a major star. She seemed to have everything going for her. Maybe she needed a better agent!

[rob humanick]

And here I might be the only one who loves Universal Soldier 4 and loathes The Raid. That thing was just inert, and yeah, shitty-looking.

[Petey]

"How did this forty-disc monster CG happen, you may wonder?"

Like the legend of the phoenix
Our ends were beginning
What keeps the planet spinning
The force from the beginning

"I had been hoping to get a few weeks work on another actually remunerative project, but that DIDN’T HAPPEN."

Y'know, you COULD, theoretically, put up Amazon affiliate links to the blu's you review like a normal blog would, and thus probably earn enough for a nice dinner out via your much appreciated Memorial Day Gift...

[Jonah]

Glenn, you probably won't read this b/c it's an older post, but:

You mention "one insert shot in the opening train robbery sequence kind of stands out like a sore thumb." This is evident in all editions of the film I've seen (35mm, 16mm, DVD). What it is, is a shot that was zoomed into using an optical printer, to get a closer view than Walsh and his cameraman had obtained on location. The graininess comes from the enlarged image, and of course from the added print generation (for those few frames). Warner Bros was doing a lot with zooms in the late 1940s, albeit largely in the controlled environment of the optical printer. No restoration effort could (or should) scrub off this record of a particular craft practice.

Nowadays, directors like Fincher shoot at a deliberately larger-than-needed resolution so that they can "choose the shot" in post by similarly enlarging a portion of the frame, with no notable loss of image quality. In the analog era, one could only do this sparingly, and only when necessary.