The New DVD and Blu Thread

[Ben]

No, Eric...they don't get around to singing any of those songs. Fair enough that you didn't like the film; I have a friend whom I thought would love it and he thought it was weird, but you then don't have to go on to paint those that did like it in unflattering colors. Point made, moving on (though I will say that Kylie - gay following and all - was in there as an Australian icon, not for any other reason, and who else could really play a tiny fairy professing the benefits of absinthe? She's absolutely tiny in real life and perfect for that cameo. And, no, I'm otherwise not the biggest Kylie fan in the world!)...

Not sure what Eric's going on about with Nine, but I really enjoyed that too, more than Chicago. And, oddly enough, I didn't get much out of the other film musicals mentioned (Phantom, Rent, DreamGirls especially), despite their "real musical" status and even though I'm a big fan of other "real musicals", especially the classics, like Singin' In The Rain. Oh, hang on...that was a jukebox musical too, featuring a whole slew of classic songs shoehorned into the plot. I guess Hollywood's been doing that since the talkies began!

[droosan]

Today I got the Toy Story: Ultimate Toy Box (10-disc Blu+DVD+DC boxed set), and the Cars Toon: Mater's Tall Tales Blu-ray.

And, spent as much on those two titles as for the six I'd bought last week.

But it was worth it .. since it still worked out cheaper than buying each Toy Story Blu-ray individually.

[GeorgeC]

Got Nightmare on Elm Street (the original on BD) just before Halloween and Yogi Bear: The Complete Series today.

Wal-Mart had a bunch of stuff for $20 in animation and it seemed like a good way to spend a $20 rebate card I recently got from Staples.

Plenty of copies of the Toy Story BD Toy Box. Just don't know that I really like the series enough to get 10 discs. It's around $70 (on sale) everywhere this week.

The Mater's Tales BD was tempting but I passed on it for the time being. Not a huge fans of Cars. I think I'd be getting it for Larry the Cable Guy.

[Dan]

Yesterday:
- Seven Samurai (Blu Ray upgrade)
- The Black Orpheus (Blu Ray upgrade)
- House (1977) (Blu Ray)
- The First Films of Akira Kurosawa

Today:
- Toy Story 3 (Blu Ray/DVD Combo)
- Cars Toons: Mater's Tall Tales (Blu Ray/DVD Combo)
- Kill Bill Vol. 1 and 2 (Blu Ray upgrades)
- Beastie Boys Video Anthology

[Dan]

Today:

More from the Criterion Collection sale going on at Barnes and Noble

- Crumb (Blu Ray)
- In the Realm of the Senses (Blu Ray)
- The King of Kings
- The Lady Eve
- Jules and Jim
- Carnival of Souls
- Louie Bluie
- Empire of Passion
- Oshima's Outlaw Sixties (Five films by Nagisa Oshima)

[Whippet Angel]

Yick. I have NO desire to see In the Realm of the Senses in high def.

[GeorgeC]

The Complete (restored) Metropolis on Blu ray and DVD is being released on November 23rd... under 16 days and counting!

[Dan]

Yick. I have NO desire to see In the Realm of the Senses in high def.

I'm weary about pulling the trigger and getting Antichrist on Blu Ray. That one and Salo are, at present, the two films in the entire Criterion Collection I'm not sure I really wanna get.

Any way, the self-bankruptcy continues.

Blu Ray
- Breathless
- Vivre sa vie
- The Magician
- Paths of Glory
- The Darjeeling Limited

DVD
- The Importance of Being Earnest (1952)
- Man Bites Dog
- Band of Outsiders
- Night and Fog
- Masculin, féminin
- Made in USA
- 2 or 3 Things I Know About Her

[Ben]

I'm loving the B&N CC sale, but as I told Rand in an email recently, I'm just spending way too much at the moment. I'm very tempted by a handful of titles there in that sale but will settle on just a couple for now and see how the bank balance is looking in July, when hopefully they'll have another sale.

[droosan]

Over the weekend, I got on a 'war documentary' kick .. and picked up:

The Color of War (13 hours of full-color WWII footage!)

World War I in Color (5 hours of 'colorized' WWI footage)

I also re-watched the excellent Channel Four series The First World War, which I already had on DVD.

[GeorgeC]

Nah,

World War II was the last good war, Droo... and the first one shot in color, too!


But seriously, I've only bought a handful of documentaries over the years. They're just not films I think I'll watch again for the most part. Probably the only ones I'd get at the moment would be the two seasons of Dogfights that were made for History Channel. I like reading about air combat and that show was definitely made for someone like me.

Can't wait to see the upcoming air war series about World War II. Should be interesting. I still get uncomfortable tingles seeing B-17's cut in half by flak and German fighters. What a horrible way to die!



As for tomorrow, I didn't think anything was coming out that I would pick up, but I was wrong! The DC Showcase DVD/Blu ray releases are tomorrow. That's the disc that has all the DC Showcase shorts collected from previous releases plus the brand new Superman/Captain Marvel short that depicts their first meeting and a battle against Black Adam. I'm expecting this to be better than the last few films have been...

... Either DC/WB Home Video needs to slow down the rate at which these films come out, or they need to hire new producers and storywriters and people who can pick better things to adapt! I'm disappointed that older stories have been overlooked in favor of the crap that's been pumped out since the 1990s. A GOOD JLA/JSA team-up in the traditional multi-Earth mode would have been nice, or a good Flash or Green Lantern story adaptation. Batman and Superman have been used to death, and the good stories with those characters (pre-1986) haven't even been adapted! Aside from Gotham Knights and The New Frontier, I really can't think of much beyond the shorts that has been good in the series.

The releases are still better than what Marvel is doing with their characters but the quality has slipped from the best animated TV series of the past that featured Batman, Superman, and the Justice League.

[Ben]

Let's keep this to the The New DVD and Blu Thread, shall we?

Warners' DC Universe animated titles have more than enough coverage in other threads!

[EricJ]

Let's keep this to the The New DVD and Blu Thread, shall we?
Warners' DC Universe animated titles have more than enough coverage in other threads!

(We've been posting a.....lot of questions/warnings/group-disclaimers about George's posting creativity in the last week or two, haven't we, Ben?
I mean, not pointing any fingers of I-told-you-so, mind, just can't help noticing...)

And as for new DVD's, I can only sit here and drool enviously at posters buying out the Criterion collection--
In my little free-lance job, I'm strapped enough for Christmas, and consider myself living in dangerous luxury if I can get Chitty/Bang, Santa Claus:TM, and Fantasia/s on Blu and the long-awaited Pirates of Penzance DVD and RIghtStuf's Dirty Pair:Complete TV Series in the space of two months.

[Ben]

To be honest, there's a lot in the Criterion Collection that just doesn't warrant the overly inflated pricing, or for that matter, to actually be included in the collection itself. True that it started as the benchmark for special editions in the LaserDisc days, but as the spine numbers started to hit the hundreds, it became clear that the CC was more about preserving obscure titles rather than always being about presenting the best versions of the all-time worthy titles.

And some of their editions haven't been the "best" available for some titles, especially as other studios jumped on the bonus bandwagon and started coming out with stunning editions of their own...something only accelerated with the move to DVD. I'm NOT knocking the CC by any means, but I also don't feel the need to collect every title just because it's made the list; a list more about what films they can present as opposed to being something truly "definitive" or prestigious as to omit some titles they license.

So, fair play to those who like to collect each CC title, but for me the defining factor on any disc purchase is: do I like the movie? Is the presentation good? Are the supplements worthwhile? The CC does not fulfill those criteria in each and every case, so just like any other distributor I only pick up the titles I'm interested in. That said, since they turned Blu, there's a lot that I do find myself interested in!

I'm definitely going to go a bit more mad in July, but for now I went ahead and selected The Red Shoes and Black Narcissus BDs from the B&N sale.

Now those - for me - look like they fill all the requirements!

[EricJ]

There's no one "forcing" you to buy any disk, and curiosity can buy you a Netflix subscription--

I've had the bad luck not to buy any Criterion Blu's yet (although 7S and Charade look awfully tempting, and Modern Times isn't out yet), but fact is, A Man's Shelf Is His Castle, and I'm under no obligation to buy any Criterion except that which I like...
Think I've only actually bought three or four Criterions on DVD for permanent-shelf viewing, and as for Blu, let me know when they get around to The Magic Flute or whether they put the WC Fields Bank Dick and Shorts on one disk.