»
S
I
D
E
B
A
R
«


Victor/Victoria
May 26th, 2012

The third Blake Edwards movie returned to DVD courtesy of the Warner Archive is Victor/Victoria. (I covered the other two, S.O.B. and Skin Deep, last month.) It’s also the best of the three, with its bizarre plot — a soprano who can’t get work pretends to be a female impersonator in 1930s Paris — allowing [...]

The Awakening
May 24th, 2012

Perhaps inspired by the late-70s exhibit of artifacts from Tutankhamun’s tomb, there seems to have been an early-80s trend for Egyptian-set movies. The Awakening (1980), a new release from Warner Archive, is an example of the type, where a standard thriller is enlivened through gorgeous scenery of the country. It’s based on a novel by [...]

Hunger Games Comes to DVD August 18
May 23rd, 2012

Lionsgate has announced that The Hunger Games will be available on home video on August 18. I haven’t read the books, by Suzanne Collins, or seen the movie, but I still want to root for it to do big business, because it makes it very obvious how much a lie the idea that “women can’t [...]

Jewel Robbery Coming From Relaunched Forbidden Hollywood Line
May 23rd, 2012

“Forbidden Hollywood” is such a fun title, suggesting all kinds of naughtiness in film. Most recently, it was used for a three-volume line of TCM Archives DVD collections with some of the best pre-Code movies out there, including the one that sums it all up for me, Baby Face starring Barbara Stanwyck. Now comes news [...]

Hot Topic Contest Offers Trip to Comic-Con to Big Bang Theory T-Shirt Buyers
May 22nd, 2012

How weird the world is now, where a geek TV show is one of the most successful on television, let alone having a spin-off tie-in t-shirt line at a hip clothing store. To promote the selection of Big Bang Theory tees they have available, Hot Topic is running a contest where HT+1 members (their frequent [...]

Avengers DVD Dates Announced
May 21st, 2012

The Avengers Ready to watch Disney’s Avengers movie over and over again? (It quit being just Marvel’s when it took in over a billion dollars.) DVD dates have been announced. The Avengers will be available in Blu-ray/DVD combo pack, Blu-ray 3-D/ Blu-ray/ DVD/ digital copy deluxe edition, and (I’m assuming) single-disc DVD on September 25, [...]

WBShop Lists Over 200 Blu-rays Under $10
May 21st, 2012

Through Wednesday, the Warner online store at WBShop.com will be holding a Blu-ray sale with over 200 Blu-rays priced under $10. If you buy 3 or more, shipping (contiguous 48 states only) is free. Readers of this site may particularly be interested in the following comic-related titles: Batman Begins, $7.99 The Dark Knight, $7.99 Catwoman, [...]

Spider-Man Trilogy Re-Released on Blu-ray Next Month
May 20th, 2012

The three Spider-Man movies will be re-released on Blu-ray with new “collectible” slipcovers (“O-ring packaging” in industry lingo) on June 12. All three include an offer for a free movie ticket (up to $10 value) for The Amazing Spider-Man, out July 3, as well as an UltraViolet digital copy. Other than that, the bonus features [...]

John Carter Blu-ray, DVD Announced
May 20th, 2012

Disney has announced that John Carter will be coming to DVD and Blu-ray on June 5. It will be interesting to see if, as many are predicting, the over-two-hour movie finds more of its audience on home video. It’s possible that this could become a perennial favorite, especially since science fiction fans who’ve seen it [...]

New Year’s Eve
May 16th, 2012

It was kind of weird watching a movie with such a specific timeframe on a spring Sunday afternoon, given how much it fetishizes the magic of the titular holiday. The earlier Valentine’s Day had more universal appeal, since that holiday is more anticipated by more people. Everyone wants to be in love then, while most [...]

More Thoughts on the Avengers Movie, Particularly Money
May 14th, 2012

The Avengers continues setting box-office records. Last weekend, its second in U.S. release, it brought in over $100 million, which set a second-weekend record and took it to one billion dollars overall. It’s now the 11th biggest moneymaker ever, and it’s still climbing. But there’s more to life than money. Tom Spurgeon reminds us that [...]

Dark Shadows
May 11th, 2012

Dark Shadows is certainly a Tim Burton movie. It’s very deliberately paced, with more emphasis placed on the setting and props than on keeping incidents happening at a rapid clip. It’s as though a joke became a movie. “A ghost, a witch, and a vampire walk into a soap opera…” I also felt as though [...]

The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel
May 9th, 2012

From the time I heard about The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel, I knew it would be comfortable and well-done, but I didn’t know how enjoyable and thought-provoking it would be. “Comfortable” comes from the premise. A group of British retirees can no longer afford to live in their homeland, so they all wind up in [...]

Avengers Movie Sets Box-Office Records
May 6th, 2012

As I think we all expected, Marvel’s The Avengers did very well this weekend, with an estimated $200.3 million in ticket sales. It’s been out overseas for 12 days now, bringing it to a total of $641.8 million so far. Disney’s press release points out these record-setting markers: Highest-grossing domestic debut of all time (beating [...]

Fairly Legal TV Show Tackles Comic Creator Rights
May 5th, 2012

The USA Network series Fairly Legal stars Sarah Shahi as a legal mediator. In the latest episode, “Ripple of Hope“, her assistant Leo (Baron Vaughn) has a friend Ashley (Laci J. Mailey) who created “XX Chromo”, a “girl superhero” whose first issue “sold 36,000 copies in a week”. Unfortunately, Ashley did it work for hire [...]

A Month of Media: April Movies and DVDs
Apr 30th, 2012

It was a very light month, between travel and catching up on TV shows and just not having a lot of time to watch movies. I suspect May will be better. I know I’m going to see The Avengers, and I probably will try for The Pirates as well. Movies The Kiss (1929) — The [...]

Why DVD Bonus Features Are Going to Get Worse
Apr 26th, 2012

Mark Evanier sheds some uncomfortable light on what it’s like to be asked to be part of a DVD bonus feature. Too often, valuable sources like him are asked (even expected) to participate without compensation, regardless of the effect on their schedule. Many times, they aren’t even given a copy of the resulting DVD. More [...]

Cartoon College Shows Life at Center for Cartoon Studies
Apr 25th, 2012

Cartoon College is a new documentary about The Center for Cartoon Studies. That school, founded in 2005 in White River Junction, Vermont, accepts 20 students a year to work towards a Master of Fine Arts degree focused on the comic medium. The film’s directors, Josh Melrod and Tara Wray, shot from 2007-2010, exploring “what it [...]

Skin Deep
Apr 22nd, 2012

Along with S.O.B. and Victor/Victoria, a third Blake Edwards comedy has returned to DVD courtesy of the Warner Archive: Skin Deep (1989). This one, I admit, I knew nothing about, other than that it starred John Ritter and a lot of random women. Ritter (in his bearded phase) is an alcoholic writer and womanizer who, [...]

Blake Edwards’ S.O.B.
Apr 21st, 2012

Blake Edwards’ infamous S.O.B. (1981) has returned to DVD courtesy of Warner Archive. Edwards’ wife Julie Andrews plays a character loosely reminiscent of her real-life self, an actress best known for her family-friendly saccharine musicals. Richard Mulligan is her husband, Felix Farmer, a producer who’s just made his first flop. (Reportedly, the story was inspired [...]

»  Substance: WordPress   »  Style: Ahren Ahimsa
Copyright 2009-2012 Johanna Draper Carlson