Only Lovers Left Alive DVD Review

    

Director: Jim Jarmusch

Format: Multiple Formats, AC-3, Closed-captioned, Color, Dolby, Subtitled, Widescreen, NTSC

Language: English

Subtitles: English, French

Aspect Ratio: 1.85:1

Number of discs: 1

Rated: R (Restricted)

Studio: Sony Pictures Home Entertainment

DVD Release Date: August 19, 2014

Run Time: 123 minutes

 

 

        Jim Jarmusch’s Only Lovers Left Alive is the ultimate hipster vampire film, with pretentious exclusivity in musical preferences taking up more of the film’s running time than anything vampire related. This is perhaps the only vampire film I can think of without a single onscreen vampire bite, and the film’s only death occurring in-between scenes shown. Blood is a source of sustenance, but also becomes another area of exclusivity, with only a strong connection providing the type of choice. Taking the sustenance straight from the source is for the less refined vampires.

 

High School Confidential Blu-ray Review

     Actors: Michael Landon, Russ Tamblyn, Jackie Coogan

Director: Jack Arnold

Format: Multiple Formats, Blu-ray, Widescreen

Language: English

Aspect Ratio: 2.35:1

Number of discs: 1

Rated: NR (Not Rated)

Studio: Olive Films

Release Date: August 26, 2014

Run Time: 85 minutes

 

 

        This anti-drug juvenile delinquency film may not be as widely known as Reefer Madness (1936), but it may be worse in its attempt to be hip in its message. High School Confidential (1958) stars Russ Tamblyn three years before West Side Story, and is apparently based on the undercover police work done by Texas Joe Foster. Just like the main character is a cop pretending to be the school’s coolest new kid, the film quickly begins to feel like an imitator. Clearly a propaganda film meant to appeal to younger audience because of the current slang utilized in the dialogue, High School Confidential now stands as an embarrassingly hilarious reminder of the past.

 

Favorites of the Moon Blu-ray Review

 
 
 

     Actors: Mathieu Amalric, Katja Rupe

Director: Otar Iosseliani

Format: Multiple Formats, Blu-ray, Subtitled, Widescreen

Language: French

Subtitles: English

Aspect Ratio: 1.77:1

Number of discs: 1

Rated: Unrated

Studio: Entertainment One

Release Date: August 12, 2014

Run Time: 105 minutes

 

        Favorites of the Moon was one of the films screened at this year’s City of Lights City of Angels Film Festival, a French film fest based out of Hollywood. The new print of this classic film has been digitally remastered for this Blu-ray release of Otar Iosseliani’s surreal absurdist comedy, and it looks great despite being a film best reserved for open-minded viewers. The ensemble intersecting storylines touch upon issues of class, though without ever feeling weighed down by heavy political agendas.

 

Boredom DVD Review

     Director: Albert Nerenberg

Format: Multiple Formats, Color, NTSC, Widescreen

Language: English

Number of discs: 1

Rated: NR 

Studio: Entertainment One

DVD Release Date: August 12, 2014

Run Time: 61 minutes

 

 

        Although there are more than a few interesting facts about boredom in modern society within Albert Nerenberg’s documentary, it also means enduring a great deal of the director’s personal sense of humor. Narrated by the director, he claims that the entire idea for a film for boredom was a result of the filmmaker losing his smart phone and having nothing to do while riding the train. While these deadpan jokes can be amusing at first, they grow tiring over the course of the 61-minute run time.

 

The Amazing Spider-Man 2 Blu-ray Review

     Actors: Andrew Garfield, Emma Stone, Jamie Foxx, Dane DeHaan, Colm Feore

Director: Marc Webb

Writers: Alex Kurtzman, Roberto Orci, Jeff Pinkner, James Vanderbilt

Producers: Avi Arad, Matt Tolmach

Format: Multiple Formats, Blu-ray, Ultraviolet, Box set, Subtitled

Language: English

Aspect Ratio: 1.85:1

Rated: PG-13

Studio: Sony

Release Date: August 19, 2014

 

        I wasn’t overwhelmed by any of The Amazing Spider-Man, though it was a solidly entertaining reintroduction to the popular superhero. Perhaps it was the familiar origins story, the onslaught of similar comic book films, or the fact that the previous Spider-Man series had concluded less than a decade earlier. Whatever the reason, I went into The Amazing Spider-Man 2 with very low expectations and found myself pleasantly surprised. While it is an uneven film in terms of storytelling, dragging in large areas of the film despite having attempted to do too much in terms of plot and quantity of characters, there are moments within the film that rival anything from the first installment in the re-franchise.

 

Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down! Dual-Format Review

    Actors: Victoria Abril, Antonio Banderas, Loles León

Director: Pedro Almodóvar

Format: Multiple Formats, Blu-ray, Color, Surround Sound, Widescreen

Language: Spanish

Subtitles: English

Aspect Ratio: 1.85:1

Number of discs: 3

Rated: NC-17

Studio: Criterion Collection (Direct)

Release Date: August 19, 2014

Run Time: 101 minutes

        How much I enjoy Pedro Almodóvar’s Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down! (Átame!) depends upon on how much I try and intellectualize it. If I take the characters and the screenplay too seriously, I find myself annoyed at their illogical decisions and the gaps in narrative within the story. There is a lot which doesn’t make a whole lot of sense, but instead conveys an almost intentional artifice in the film’s events. It would feel entirely existent within a fantasy world if it weren’t for the moments of brutal violence that drive the narrative back into reality. They become so much a part of the film’s design that the anticlimactic happy ending is another jolting reminder that we are watching a film. From the film’s opening sequences and the story behind the film’s conception, this seems to be Almodóvar’s intention.