Blu-rays of the Week
Alice Through the Looking Glass
(Disney)
This belated sequel to the 2010 Tim Burton-directed smash can’t hold a
candle to the original, mainly because director James Bobin substitutes his arbitrary
garish bombast for Burton’s extravagant controlled whimsy. The gang’s all here—Mia
Wasikowska, Anne Hathaway, Sasha Baron Cohen, Helena Bonham Carter and a
delightfully dizzy Johnny Depp—yet the overall effect is that of so much visual
oppressiveness smothering the further fantastical adventures of Lewis Carroll’s
heroine. The Blu-ray visuals are eye-popping; extras include featurettes, audio
commentary, deleted scenes and a Pink music video.
The Executioner
(Criterion)
In Luis Garcia Berlanga’s sardonic 1963 classic, an undertaker falls for and
marries the daughter of an executioner; he soon takes over his retired
father-in-law’s job, which he doesn’t really want to do. Made during the height
of Franco’s fascist regime in Spain, Berlanga’s blackly comic drama remains a
potent brew of critical satire that holds up as well as Carlos Saura’s
masterpieces like 1966’s The Hunt and
1970’s The Garden of Earthly Delights.
The B&W images look lovely on Blu; extras include a Pedro Almodovar
appreciation, new program about Berlanga, and a 2009 Spanish TV program
featuring archival Berlanga footage.
The Hills Have Eyes
Dark Water
(Arrow)
Despite its crudeness, Wes Craven’s The
Hills Have Eyes (1977) is the scariest movie he ever made: its
straightforwardness, coupled with a realistically creepy vibe, combine to tighten
the screws more tautly until the horrific finale. Hideo Nakata’s Dark Water (2002), a finely-wrought thriller
about a mother trying to protect her young daughter from malevolent spirits, is
far better than the 2005 American remake starring Jennifer Connelly. Both films
have nicely-detailed and grainy transfers; extras include interviews and
featurettes, and Hills has three
audio commentaries.
Santana IV—Live at the House of Blues, Las Vegas
(Eagle Rock)
Iggy Pop teamed up with Queens of the Stone Age’s Josh Homme for his latest
album Post Pop Depression, putting
more muscle into his music than anything in years, as this Royal Albert Hall show
from London in June shows: highlights are sizzling versions of “Lust for Life”
and “China Girl.” Carlos Santana reformed the seminal lineup of his namesake
band for an album and tour last year, and this Las Vegas concert brought some
of his famed alumni back into the fold: singer-keyboardist Gregg Rolie and
guitarist Neal Schon add oomph to new tunes and Santana classics like “Black Magic
Woman” and “Evil Ways.” Both sets, which include two CDs with all the live songs,
also have first-rate hi-def video and audio. Santana IV extras are band interviews.
Lights Out
(Warner Bros)
The sinister spirit haunting their mother forces a young boy and his
stepsister to try and stop a likely fatal outcome in David F. Sandberg’s tidy
80-minute horror flick that has a few good, and a few cheap, thrills—even more
if you’re particularly susceptible to reacting to every little scare tactic in
today’s schlocky horror flicks. Teresa Palmer (stepsister), Gabriel Bateman (youngster)
and Maria Bello (mother) give persuasive performances that help sell this to
more skeptical viewers, like me. The movie looks splendidly dark on Blu; extras
are several deleted scenes, which include an idiotic ending smartly excised
from the finished product.
Gas-s-s-s
(Olive Films)
These 1970 “youth” films, despite many missed chances, have scattered
moments of insight into the then-generation gap. The bumpy Fauss has Robert Redford as a charming but rascally race car driver
who thinks nothing of using his friend Fauss (Robert J. Pollard)—especially
when gorgeous Lauren Hutton falls for the latter. Gas-s-s-s is a cardboard Roger Corman flick whose sci-fi premise
(everyone over 25 has died in a gas leak) can’t hide a basic lack of coherence
or comprehension, and which wastes then-promising performers like Cindy
Williams and Talia Shire. The hi-def transfers are solid.
Peter Gabriel—Growing Up Live
(Eagle Rock)
Originally released in 2003, Growing
Up Live is a valuable document of Peter Gabriel’s remarkable Up tour, his first in 10 years: now on
Blu-ray, the brilliance of Gabriel’s artistry—both visual and musical—can be
seen and heard anew, with highlights of this May 2003 Milan performance “Sky
Blue” and “Mercy Street.” In addition to the hi-def video and audio upgrade,
also included on this multi-disc set are a DVD of Still Growing Up Live, a more intimate 2004 concert; backstage
documentary Still Growing Up Unwrapped; studio
footage of Gabriel and his band; and two performances on Jools Holland’s show.
(Olive Signature)
John Ford’s 1952 drama is one of his most old-fashioned, with John Wayne as
an American boxer who returns to his Irish homeland and falls in love with
spunky lass Maureen O’Hara: amusing and romantic but sappy and silly, it’s pretty
shocking that Ford won his fourth Best Director Oscar for this. (Winton C. Hoch’s
stunning color photography, however, definitely deserved its Oscar.) Olive’s
Signature series not only includes a sparkling hi-def transfer that shows off the
film’s gorgeous Irish locations, but also includes an audio commentary and
featurettes about Ford, O’Hara and the Republic Pictures company.
Short Cuts
(Criterion)
Robert Altman’s sprawling 1993 drama about the interactions among dozens of
Los Angelenos before an earthquake pretends to be a Raymond Carver adaptation,
but Altman’s jaded cynicism is light years removed from Carver’s jaded humanity.
There are things that work, namely the acting of Julianne Moore and Jennifer
Jason Leigh, but it is ultimately an Altman failure that rarely comes to grips
with what it explores. Still, Criterion’s two-disc set, featuring a spectacular
new hi-def transfer—but drops the book of Carver short stories that were part
of the original DVD release—has voluminous extras: deleted scenes; Tim Robbins
and Altman conversation; Carver audio interview; To Write and Keep Kind, a 1992 PBS Carver documentary; and Luck, Trust & Ketchup: Robert Altman in
Carver Country, a full-length making-of documentary.
George Gershwin—An American in Paris/Concerto in F
(Harmonia Mundi)
The Harmonie Ensemble/New York offers lively performances of several Gershwin
favorites: the sprightly Of Thee I Sing
Overture and 3 Preludes, fizzy An American in Paris and percolating
Concerto in F, a towering piano and orchestra work heard far less often than Rhapsody in Blue. Pianist Lincoln
Mayorga plays the challenging solo part in the concerto with exceptional ease;
leading the ensemble is Steven Richman, who puts himself and his crack band in
the front rank of current Gershwin interpreters.
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