April '26 Digital Week I

In-Theater Releases of the Week 

Forbidden Fruits 

(IFC)

In this bumpy but often stylish ride, a secret witch coven among employees at a flashy clothing store in a Dallas mall is filled with bitchy adrenaline that helps it overcome the more risible moments of ruthlessness. Director Meredith Alloway (who also cowrote the script with Lily Houghton based on the latter’s play) has gleeful fun showing the switching allegiances among these young women, and if the showdown on the mall escalator is too excessively bloody, there’s much fun to be had in the performances by Lola Tung, Victoria Pedretti, Alexandra Shipp, Emma Chamberlain and—in the film’s standout portrayal—Lili Reinhart.

Kontinental ’25 

(1-2 Special)

Romanian auteur Radu Jude is definitely an acquired taste: his deadpan absurdism has taken on many obvious but necessary targets from hypocrisy to consumerism to the weight of history, and his new film, which centers on Orsolya, a bailiff who’s wracked with guilt after the homeless man she evicts from an empty building in Transylvania commits suicide, continues that trend. Jude’s dark sense of humor shines best on the insanity of modern life as his heroine (played with mordant humor by Eszter Tompa) interacts with an array of freakish but recognizable characters. 

Our Hero, Balthazar 

(Picturehouse)

For his directorial debut, Oscar Boyson (who cowrote the script with Ricky Camilleri) has chosen a difficult if timely subject: how young people deal with a world in which school shootings are not only normal but normalized by classroom drills and social media disinformation. When Balthazar thinks an online acquaintance is planning to shoot up a school, he travels from Manhattan to Texas to confront Solomon—they become friends, against the odds, but they also discover some uneasy truths about themselves. There are some good, perceptive moments but also a certain glibness in how Boyson treats such a serious subject. Still, the acting by Jaeden Martell as Balthazar and Asa Butterfield as Solomon helps smooths over the bumpier roads Boyson travels.

Streaming Release of the Week

The Mortuary Assistant 

(Shudder)

Another movie based on a video game, this at least has a properly creepy premise: mortuary assistant Rebecca finds herself involved in a weird supernatural world that finds her navigating traumatic situations that may or may not be dreams, while her boss Raymond seems to know more about it all than he should. Willa Holland’s committed performance as Rebecca makes the crazier aspects of Jeremiah Kipp’s film more palatable, if not more believable, while Paul Sparks has little to do as Raymond. 

Blu-ray Release of the Week 

Greenland 2—Migration 

(Lionsgate)

As unnecessary sequels to lumbering disaster epics go, this one fills the bill decently by not getting overly bogged down in anything more than getting the lead family—stars Gerard Butler (dad), Morena Baccarin (mom) and Roman Griffin Davis (teenage son)—to somewhere safe in a little over 90 minutes. There are a few over-the-top set pieces, such as climbing rickety ladders over the dried-up English Channel that precipitates many deaths, but for the most part, director Ric Roman Waugh keeps his focus on the family with the result that there’s more heart here than in the previous spectacle. There’s a good Blu-ray transfer; extras include featurettes and interviews. 

New Year’s Concert with the Vienna Philharmonic 

(Sony Classical)

For its annual New Year’s concert, the Vienna Philharmonic plays its usual repertoire of classical baubles, polkas and other dance pieces that gets the Vienna audience in a festive mood; led by conductor Yannick Nézet-Séguin, the memorable performance includes a work by Black American composer Florence Price—her Rainbow Waltz—for the first time, and it fits snugly among the Strauss family standards that are the orchestra’s bread and butter. The hi-def video and audio are first-rate; extras include complete ballets performed with two of the evening’s pieces along with an entertaining featurette that combines art and music, The Magic of Art—250 Years of the Albertina Collection.

November '25 Digital Week II

Streaming Releases of the Week 

Heaven 

(Lightyear)

With the untimely death of Diane Keaton, there was discussion about her legendary screen career, from her indelible collaborations with Woody Allen to her powerful performances in Reds and Shoot the Moon, among others. But Keaton was also an idiosyncratic filmmaker, and her first feature—this weirdly beguiling 1987 documentary—showed off her singular style in ways that were both affecting and head-shaking. This 75-minute exploration rounds up interview snippets with people who discuss their idea of an afterlife alongside dozens of carefully chosen clips from a wide array of movies including Metropolis and A Matter of Life and Death to create something uniquely, lightheartedly Keatonesque.

Sex Diva 

(Breaking Glass Pictures)

Writer-director Giulia Louise Steigerwalt smartly chronicles the fascinating career of Italian pornographer Riccardo Schicchi, who broke through in the ‘90s, helping to create celebrities of some of his female adult-film performers, including his wife Éva Henger and international superstars like Moana Pozzi, who died tragically of cancer at age 33. Steigerwalt’s film is amusing and dramatic, tongue-in-cheek and tragic, and has superb acting throughout, led by Pietro Castellito (Riccardo), Tesa Litvan (Éva) and Denise Capezza (Moana), with—as the calming influence of the Schicchi empire, Debora Attanasio—the magnificent Barbara Ronchi the emotional anchor of the story.

4K/UHD Releases of the Week 

Def Leppard—Diamond Star Heroes: Live From Sheffield 

(Mercury)

For a triumphant return to its hometown of Sheffield in northern England in 2023, Def Leppard played the local soccer stadium for a 90-minute concert before tens of thousands of loyal fans that mixed the group’s biggest hits with a few deeper cuts; highlights are the early tracks “Bringing on the Heartbreak” and “Switch 625.” Singer Joe Elliott can still hit most of the high notes, impressive at his age (63 in ’23), and the band is tight and focused. A bonus concert, at a Sheffield club a few nights earlier, is a 65-minute trek through some of the same hits and a couple different true-fan faves like “Let It Go” and “Wasted.” The UHD video and surround sound are first-rate.

Him 

(Universal)

In this crudely if occasionally effective horror flick, college football player Cameron Cade—after being attacked by an unknown assailant after a game—goes to train privately before the pro combine with veteran NFL QB Isaiah White, whose unconventional methods result in sex, murder and a ridiculously risible final blood-letting. Tyriq Withers is a persuasive, even sympathetic Cam, while Marlon Wayans brings gravitas to the young quarterback’s mentor. For 95 minutes, co-writer/director Justin Tipping hammers everything home so literally that it turns what could have been an enjoyably guilty pleasure into a visually striking mess. It does look terrific on UHD; extras include an alternate ending, deleted scene, and featurettes.

Blu-ray Releases of the Week 

Burden of Dreams 

(Criterion)

Les Blank and Maureen Gosling’s perceptive 1982 documentary about the stupendous (and often stupid) lengths that director Werner Herzog went to making his rain forest epic Fitzcarraldo is far more focused than Herzog’s feature, another of the German filmmaker’s adventurous but stillborn studies of madness. A precursor to the making-of featurettes that populate so many home media releases, Blank and Lassiter’s chronicle catches many interesting filmmaking moments—and Herzog, always a charming figure, has himself made far more memorable documentaries than features. The film looks striking on Blu; extras comprise Blank’s, Gosling’s and Herzog’s insightful commentary, Blank’s amusing short Werner Herzog Eats His Shoe (1980), deleted scenes and an archival Herzog interview. 

Pavarotti—The Lost Concert 

(Mercury/Universal)

In 1995, the great Italian tenor Luciano Pavarotti gave a concert in Llangollen, a small town in Wales, 40 years after he won a vocal competition there, to keep a promise he made to return one day: the entire 75-minute concert, where he sang his greatest classical hits in front of tens of thousands, was recorded for posterity. His delight is evident from the start, and he’s in fine form throughout. The video looks decent and the sound is good; lone extra is a 52-minute documentary that follows Pavarotti on his journey to the concert, although some of it repeats performances we see in the actual show.

Rick and Morty—Complete 8th Season 

(Warner Bros)

The latest bonkers season begins with Morty and his sister Summer escaping the matrix into which their mad-scientist granddad Rick sent them after they took his phone charger—and that’s just the beginning of a series of dementedly witty episodes that features clones of the main characters that go off on further adventures. The superb voice cast and the offhandedly clever animation provide special comic (and cosmic) dimension to these eight episodes; lone extra is an inside the season featurette with creator Dan Harmon and others.

CD Releases of the Week

Leoš Janáček—The Makropulos Affair/The Diary of the One Who Disappeared 

(Somm)

Australian conductor Charles Mackerras (1925-2010) was an authority on the music of the Czech master Leoš Janáček (1854-1928), recording all of his major operas, especially in an unparalleled cycle for Decca Records back in the 1970s. One of Janáček’s towering masterpieces, The Makropulos Affair (better known as The Makropulos Case in America) had its London premiere in 1964 at the Sadler’s Wells Theatre, under Mackerras’ meticulous direction, with Marie Collier an unforgettable-sounding heroine. Also on this two-disc set is a fine performance (from the BBC Studios in 1956) of the composer’s yearning song cycle The Diary of One Who Disappeared, sung in an English translation by tenor Richard Lewis and contralto Maureen Forrester, with Ernest Lush on piano.

Kurt Weill/Alan Jay Lerner—Love Life 

(Capriccio)

This delectable 1948 time-traveling musical was the only collaboration of two musical geniuses: Kurt Weill and Alan Jay Lerner. The amazing thing is that the finished work is so cohesive and flows so entertainingly, considering the outsized talents (and, no doubt, egos) of both men. This excellent recording of a recent production of Opera North—located in Leeds, England—features wonderful singing, especially by the leads, Quirijin de Long and Stephanie Carley, along with the large supporting cast and chorus; while the orchestra, under conductor James Holmes, sounds wonderful throughout. Too bad this is an audio recording—a video of this staging would be unbeatable.

March '22 Digital Week II

Streaming/In-Theater Releases of the Week 

Lover, Beloved 

(SXSW Festival, sxsw.com)

In concert, Suzanne Vega tells amusingly deadpan tales as illuminating as the direct, durable songs she sings in her personable, conversational voice. Those tough-as-nails songs, often written from the point of view of a detached narrator, make her the ideal interpreter of the life of Southern author Carson McCullers, who wrote such classics as The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter, The Member of the Wedding and Reflections in a Golden Eye. But Vega’s McCullers solo show, filmed by director Michael Tully, is an awkward hybrid (part concert, part one-woman performance piece, part musical) that doesn’t always coalesce into a uniform and satisfying whole. 

Vega plays McCullers with an acceptable southern drawl, speaking the renowned writer’s words while singing several songs that have music by Vega and Duncan Sheik and Vega’s own occasionally biting lyrics. The best moments, such as atmospheric blues or torch songs like “Song of Annemarie” and “Harper Lee,” give a clear snapshot of McCullers’ complicated relationships. Then there are songs like “Me of We,” which do neither McCullers nor Vega no favors.

Fear 

(Film Movement)

Bulgarian director Ivaylo Hristov’s black comedy that doubles as a cautionary tale about hypocrisy, xenophobia, and cultural misunderstandings follows Svetia (the memorably dour Svetlana Yanchevaa), a widow in an isolated village, who runs into Bamba (a deadpan Michael Fleming), an African émigré trying to get to Germany. After initial distrust—and a town full of scared citizens—the pair becomes inseparable, to everyone else’s chagrin. Hristov’s sharp sense of the absurd lets him not belabor his obvious points about narrowmindedness and racism, and there’s genuine feeling throughout, culminating in a final shot—which provides this strikingly-shot B&W film with its only spot of color—that will reverberate in the viewer’s memory. 

Great Freedom 

(MUBI)

The shameful treatment of homosexuality in Germany—under the guise of Paragraph 175, which made it punishable by imprisonment—is the subject of Austrian director Sebastian Meise’s sensitive drama, which follows Hans, in and out of jail for years due to the simple fact that he’s gay, and his at first tentative then tender relationship with a fellow prisoner. Franz Rogowski—an actor I’ve never found adequate in anything else he’s been in—gives a sympathetic performance as Hans, and Meise displays, with tact and a lack of cheap sentiment, how humanity cannot be snuffed out even in the inhumane circumstances his protagonist finds himself in.

I’ve Heard the Mermaids Singing 

(Kino Lorber)

Canadian director Patricia Rozema’s 1987 debut feature is the lightweight, alternately enervating and charming comedy about Polly, an aimless young woman who latches onto her new boss Gabrielle, an elegant gallery owner, discovering new things about herself along the way. Sheila McCarthy makes a winning heroine, Quebecois actress Paule Baillargeon is perfectly cast as the brooding boss, and if Rozema doesn’t trust her material enough to keep focused—the literal flights of fancy and narrative tangents are more cutesy than necessary—Rozema would find her own voice in her next film, the criminally unseen White Room. 

4K/UHD Release of the Week 

The Matrix—Resurrections 

(Warner Bros)

In this belated sequel, Neo (Keanu Reeves) and Trinity (Carrie-Anne Moss) make a return trip to an ever more dangerous alternate reality, as director Lana Wachowski goes for broke and creates a string of staggering visual set pieces that may not make much sense but provide the kind of satisfying head trip that fans will enjoy. And Wachowski succeeds—to an extent: Reeves and Moss make an endearing pair, while the visual effects and stunts dazzle, but, at nearly 2-1/2 hours, it goes on forever. The 4K/UHD transfer looks stunning; the extras (on the accompanying Blu-ray disc) comprise more than two hours’ worth of interviews and on-set featurettes.

Blu-ray Releases of the Week

Adoption 

(Criterion Collection) 

In Márta Mészáros’ insightful and mature drama, middle-aged woman Kata, who has always wanted children, insinuates herself close to Anna, a teenage ward of the state who wants to be emancipated so she can marry her boyfriend. With powerhouse performances by the two leads—the great Katalin Berek as Kata and Gyöngyvér Vigh as Anna—Mészáros’ potent chronicle of how women must deal with smothering forces from both within and without remains pertinent today, even without all the Communist-era baggage. The tightly-focused B&W images (photographed by the great Lajos Koltai) are rendered beautifully on Blu-ray; extras include a 2019 Mészáros interview, video essay about her work, Mészáros’ 1964 short, Low-Ball, and a 1979 documentary, Márta Mészáros: Portrait of the Hungarian Filmmaker.

Hester Street 

(Cohen Film Collection)

This clichéd 1975 melodrama somehow gained Carol Kane a best actress Oscar nomination as a newly-arrived Jewish immigrant in 1896 Manhattan whose husband, already assimilated, has little patience for what he sees as her glaring inadequacies. Admittedly, Joan Micklin Silver’s mostly amateurish, threadbare film does depict—in evocative black and white—the thriving Eastern European culture of the Lower East Side (including a lot of authentic Yiddish dialogue), but the characters populating her story are less than compelling. The film looks authentically grainy on Blu-ray; extras include two new interviews with the director, her audio commentary, archival cast/crew interviews and the original opening sequence with commentary by Daniel Kremer, author of a book on Silver.

Vienna Philharmonic—New Year’s Concert 2022 

(Sony Classical)

This festive annual New Year’s concert, performed by the Vienna Philharmonic, is a tradition in Vienna, and that means lots of Strauss music (not Richard, unfortunately): delightful Strauss dances, polkas, overtures and waltzes, including the grandest of them all, the “Blue Danube.” Daniel Barenboim conducts adroitly, the orchestra sounds terrific, and the masked audience looks enthralled. There’s first-rate hi-def video and audio; extras are more Strauss music accompanying ballet dancers and the world-famous horses of Vienna’s Spanish riding school.

March '20 Digital Week I

Blu-rays of the Week 

Dark Waters 

(Universal)

In this throwback to muckraking films like Silkwood and Erin Brockovich, Mark Ruffalo plays a corporate lawyer who finds himself on the wrong side of his bosses and Dupont when he brings lawsuits against the company for poisoning the water in rural West Virginia. Todd Haynes might not seem like the obvious director for such a straightforward drama, but he guides the plot capably and gets strong performances out of Ruffalo and the supporting cast: Anne Hathaway, Tim Robbins, Bill Pullman, Bill Camp and several of the actual people who were affected by Dupont’s negligence. The film looks fine in hi-def; extras comprise three making-of featurettes.

From the House of the Dead 

(Bel Air Classiques)

Czech composer Leos Janáček died in 1928 before the premiere of his last opera, a haunting adaptation of Dostoyevsky’s novel about a Siberian prison camp. But despite the perfect marriage of Janáček’s startling music and Dostoyevsky’s taut drama, director Frank Castorf decided he can be trusted more than those two geniuses, opting for all the wrong things: pointless video screen action (obtrusive cameramen and -women are seen too often onstage), a garish parade of painted flesh, and a sense that the prisoners are interchangeable. It all lessens the dramatic impact as well as Janáček’s carefully constructed musical cues. The orchestra, conductor Simone Young, chorus and performers do their best to bring across Janáček’s musical vision. There are first-rate hi-def video and audio.

J.S. Bach—The Well-Tempered Clavier, Book II 

(Naxos)

Last month I mentioned how astonishing it was that András Schiff performed Bach’s entire Well-Tempered Klavier, Book I, at the 2017 BBC Proms completely from memory. Now there’s Schiff’s playing Bach’s Well-Tempered Clavier, Book II, at the 2018 BBC Proms, and—if it’s even possible—it’s even more incredible that, once again, Schiff plays the entire 140-minute work from memory. Bach’s preludes and variations are enough to tax any pianist, but Schiff plays one of our greatest composers’ greatest works with artistry and graceful calm. Hi-def video and audio are excellent.

A Little Romance 

(Warner Archive)

George Roy Hill’s cutesy 1979 romance introduced Diane Lane to the world, and that’s the most enduring quality of this alternately charming and enervating film about the budding relationship between a French boy and American girl in Paris. Lane’s natural charisma is already obvious, but her costar, Thelonious Bernard, is less impressive (he would quit movies and go on to become a dentist); Laurence Olivier, as a French rascal who helps the young couple, chews the scenery delectably, and Sally Kellerman is an amusing mess as Lane’s mom. George Delerue’s old-fashioned (and baroque-sounding) score won an Oscar, while the locations—Paris, Verona and Venice—are unbeatable. The film looks good if unspectacular in hi-def.

Queen & Slim 

(Universal)

In the fraught atmosphere of tRump’s America, director Melina Matsoukas and writer Lena Waithe enter the fray with their provocative exploration of the aftermath of an all-too-real situation: a black couple—on a first date yet—accidentally kill a cop who pulls them over on a Cleveland street. They go on the lam before being tracked down and sacrificed to the gods of police brutality and white privilege. Like Bonnie and Clyde and Thelma and Louise before it, the film makes for a messy metaphor, but it’s a riveting drama about two innocent people who become martyrs, with superb performances by Jodie Turner-Smith (Queen) and Daniel Kaluuya (Slim). The film looks splendid on Blu; extras include Matsoukas and Waithe’s commentary and making-of featurettes.

CD of the Week

David Lang—The Loser 

(Canteloupe)

In this inspired monodrama based on a novel by Thomas Bernhard, Rod Gilfry narrates the story of two performers who feel inadequate once they realize the immense artistry of their fellow classmate: Canadian pianist Glenn Gould (who calls one of them the title moniker). Gilfry finds the nuances of emotion and intellect in his characterization, and Lang’s music—for piano and small ensemble—moves along with a sturdy forward momentum in this shockingly direct commentary about the vagaries of art, life and death.

March '19 Digital Week II

Blu-rays of the Week 

Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald 

(Warner Bros)

This sequel to J.K. Rowling’s first post-Harry Potter story (and maiden attempt at a screenplay) once again tracks a wizard, Newt Scamander (Eddie Redmayne), a none-too-subtle version of an adult Harry Potter, and his attempts to return dark wizard Gellert Grindelwald (Johnny Depp) to captivity after he escapes. Alongside Redmayne and Depp, the cast—including Katharine Waterston, Jude Law, Zoë Kravitz and Carmen Ejogo—does battle with and against eye-popping effects and cleverly designed monsters. Two-plus hours of such exploits becomes wearying, but—as usual when it comes to Rowling’s imaginative worlds—your mileage may vary. The film looks splendid on Blu-ray; extras include on-set and “Unlocking Scene Secrets” featurettes and deleted scenes.

Fear the Walking Dead—Complete 4th Season 

(Lionsgate)

The fourth season of this spin-off of/prequel to The Walking Dead is highlighted by the first crossover episode of the two series, and the 16-episode season consists of two eight-episode segments. As usual, it’s crammed with accomplished writing, directing and acting, but I can’t help but feel that such efficient storytelling obscures the fact that there’s little purpose or point to the whole enterprise. But that seems a minority opinion.  It does look fantastic in hi-def; extras comprise four audio commentaries.

The Indomitable Bow—Mstislav Rostropovich 

(Naxos)

Russian cellist and conductor Mstislav Rostropovich not only collaborated with the greatest 20th century composers—Prokofiev, Britten, Shostakovich, Dutilleux, Lutaslowski and Penderecki, for starters—but also performed many masterworks for the cello from Bach on; and that’s only part of his long but fascinating story. Bruno Monsaingeon’s illuminating documentary portrait shows an artist and human-rights advocate fearlessly speaking out during the Cold War, as Rostropovich and his soprano wife Galina Vishnevskaya fell afoul of Soviet policies antithetical to art and humanity. Clips of him performing and speaking are complemented by interviews with colleagues and family members. The film looks fine on Blu; extras comprise his performances of Bach, Tchaikovsky and Beethoven and interviews with the children of dissident writer Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn and Rostropovich about their relationship. 

Kalifornia 

(Shout Select)

In Dominic Sena’s nervy 1995 drama—among a group of mid-90s “youthful killer” movies including Fresh Bait, Natural Born Killers and True Romance—Brad Pitt and Juliette Lewis are a charismatic murderer and his compliant girlfriend on a road trip with unsuspecting couple David Duchovny and Michelle Forbes. Despite manipulative touches, this is an effective and disturbing study, with top-notch performances all around—and whatever happened to Forbes? There’s a finely-detailed hi-def transfer and both the director’s and original theatrical cut are included; extras are a new Sena interview, archival featurette and cast interviews.

Krypton—Complete 1st Season 

(Warner Bros)

(Warner Bros. Home Entertainment provided me with a free copy of the Blu-ray I reviewed in this blog post. The opinions I share are my own.)

In the first season of this sci-fi fantasy series that creates an alternative Superman origin story, an earthling from the future, Adam Strange, arrives on the title planet to convince Seg-El, Superman’s future grandfather, that his eponymous home planet needs to be saved from destruction. Despite the intriguing premise, the series takes itself a little too seriously, and it doesn’t really go anywhere unfamiliar or riveting over its 10 episodes. There’s a stellar hi-def transfer; extras are the 2017 Comic-Con Panel, two featurettes, a gag reel and deleted scenes.

The Vanishing 

(Lionsgate)

This relentlessly downbeat, exceedingly violent drama shows what happens on an isolated island when three lighthouse keepers discover a cache of gold along with a body after a boat washes ashore. Based on a tantalizing true-life tale, this prime piece of speculative fiction was directed with supreme control by Kristoffer Nyholm and exceptionally well-acted by Peter Mullan, Gerard Butler and Connor Swindells. There’s an excellent hi-def transfer; the lone extra is a making-of featurette.

CDs of the Week

Bartók—Complete String Quartets 

(Chandos) 

Bartók—Piano Concertos; String Quartet; Concerto for Orchestra; Music for Strings, Concerto for Orchestra 

(Orfeo)

The great Hungarian composer Béla Bartók (1881-1945) wrote gloriously original music in all genres, from chamber and orchestral to choral and opera. These two-disc sets bring together defining performances of some of his masterpieces. The Arcadia Quartet, with the daunting task of playing all six of his expressive, explosive string quartets, makes its own mark in this mysteriously elusive but exciting music. 

The Orfeo disc compiles performances over several decades of some of Bartók’s most important works, including pianist György Sándor as the brilliant soloist in a 1955 recording of the Piano Concerto No. 2 and Sándor Végh leading the Camerata Academia des Mozrteum Salzburg in a stunning 1995 reading of the masterly Music for Strings, Percussion and Celesta (whose third movement is familiar to anyone who’s seen The Shining).

May '18 Digital Week III

Blu-rays of the Week 

Unforgotten—Complete 2nd Season 

(PBS Masterpiece)

In the second season of this compulsively watchable PBS Masterpiece series, investigators Cassie Stuart and Sunny Khan once again focus on an initially baffling cold case: the remains of a body found crammed in a suitcase, the deceased killed 27 years before, and (again) no shortage of suspects. The twists and turns of the investigation are compelling throughout all five hours, thanks to smart writing and finely-shaded performances by Sanjeev Bhaskar and especially Nicola Walker as the detectives. It all looks supremely good on Blu.

Bruckner/Messiaen 

(LSO)

The London Symphony Orchestra and music director Sir Simon Rattle tackle a pair of uncompromising works in this excellent 2016 performance: the imposing, epic Romanticism of Anton Bruckner’s hour-long Symphony No. 8, and the subtle shadings of Olivier Messiaen’s 25-minute Coleurs de la Cite Celeste/Colors of the Celestial City. The playing, of course, is stupendous, particularly by pianist Pierre-Laurent Aimard as the exceptional soloist in the Messiaen work; hi-def video and audio are both fine.

Two Thousand Maniacs 

(Arrow)

In what was his finest moment of gory exploitation, Herschell Gordon Lewis directed this ridiculously silly 1964 splatter flick about clueless Northerners who stumble upon murderous Southerners and find themselves victims in a re-litigation of the Civil War. It’s nuttily entertaining in its way (and based on the musical Brigadoon, of all things); an extra Lewis feature, Moonshine Mountain—also 1964—is less interesting foolishness. The films look decent in hi-def; extras include Lewis’s intros to both films and Maniacs commentary, video essays, interviews and an appreciation. 

DVD of the Week

Marx Reloaded 

(Icarus)

Jason Barker’s breezy 52-minute documentary, from 2011, filters the devastating effects of the then-recent financial collapse through a Karl Marx lens, offering the failures of capitalism as proof that it’s time to take a fresh look at Marx and see how relevant his ideas are in an era of even greater financial inequality. Barker interviews several philosophers, including the famous Slovenian Slavoj Žižek, and includes a dated parody of The Matrix in its occasionally amusing animated segments. The lone extra, Marx for Beginners, is a diverting six-minute 1978 short.

CD/DVD of the Week 

Messiaen—Catalogue d’Oiseaux/Catalogue of Birds 

(Pentatone)

Olivier Messiaen’s compositions are drenched in birdsong, from his chamber and orchestral works to even his masterpiece, his lone opera Saint Francois d’Assise. But it’s his massive, multi-part Catalogue of Birds—seven books of thirteen pieces, each based on a bird from a specific region of France, and composed in 1956 to 1958—that’s the apotheosis of these works. And who better than fellow French pianist Pierre-Laurent Aimard to do justice to this often treacherously demanding music, especially the 30-minute centerpiece, The Reed Warbler. On three CDs, Aimard purposefully traverses some of Messiaen’s greatest solo piano music; on DVD, the pianist introduces each of the pieces, along with discussing Messiaen’s technique and legacy.

April '18 Digital Week II

Blu-rays of the Week 

The Color of Pomegranates 

(Criterion)

Armenian director Sergei Parajanov’s 1969 masterpiece—a riotous blend of color, music, sound, poetry and religious imagery—is an impressionistic biography of the 18th century Armenian troubadour Sayat-Nova; but even if the mainly abstract tableaux make his film difficult to “get,” the director’s stunning visual and aural artistry is always in evidence. Criterion’s restored hi-def transfer has given this hard-to-see classic its best “look” on video, while several extras give context to Parajanov’s singular cinema: critic Tony Rayns’ commentary; video essay on the film's symbols and references; scholar James Steffen interview; Sergei Parajanov: The Rebel, a 2003 documentary; The Life of Sayat-Nova, a 1977 documentary; and a 1969 documentary, The Color of Armenian Land.

The Royal Funeral of Louis XIV/Les Funérailles Royales de Louis XIV 

(Harmonia Mundi)

This dazzling recreation of the musical pageant that followed the 1715 death of the French monarch is set in the gorgeous chapel at the palace of Versailles, where the Sun King lived and reigned, and features a procession of funereal music by many French court composers. The setting is truly spectacular, the music is equally magnificent, and the performances by the ensemble Pygmalion, choir and soloists are also first-rate; the only quibble is that, at 100 minutes, it all starts to overstay its musical welcome.

Seijun Suzuki—The Early Years, Vol. 2 

(Arrow)

The renowned Japanese cult director made a voluminous number of films in his lengthy career, so it’s problematic to place him in any kind of box other than this second boxed set of five of his earliest efforts. Although all over the stylistic and narrative map, they’re linked as studies of low-lifes and other shady characters, all shot in an exuberant manner. Of the five, the most interesting are The Sleeping Beast Within and Smashing the O-Line (both 1960), each featuring actor Hiroyuki Nagato in vastly different roles: but all are definitely worth a look. Hi-def transfers are first-rate; extras comprise an O-Line commentary by critic Jasper Sharp and critic Tony Rayns interview.

Shakespeare Wallah 

(Cohen Film Collection)

One of the earliest Merchant-Ivory productions, this 1965 comic drama follows a British classical theater troupe on tour through India and the romantic and other entanglements that ensue throughout. The movie suffers from obvious writing (by Ruth Prawer Jhabvala), stilted directing (by James Ivory) and wooden acting in several key roles: its saving grace is its depiction of mutual condescension between colonizer and colonized. On Blu-ray, the restored B&W film looks superb; extras include interviews with Ivory, Merchant, and actors Shashi Kapoor and Felicity Kendal.

Sleeping Dogs 

(Arrow)

Roger Donaldson’s 1977 drama helped put the New Zealand film industry on the map, and its resonant depiction of a democratic nation overtaken by martial law feels all too relevant. A then-unknown Sam Neill is fierce and vivid as an everyman caught up in an anarchic political climate, and Warren Oates provides down-and-dirty support as an American army man trying to restore order. The hi-def transfer is good and grainy; extras a commentary by Donaldson, Neill and actor-writer Ian Mune; The Making of Sleeping Dogs (2004), a 65-minute retrospective documentary on the film's production; and The Making of Sleeping Dogs (1977), an archival on-set featurette.

DVD of the Week

Killing for Love 

(Sundance Selects)

The sensational murder trial of young American woman Elizabeth and German boyfriend Jens—both given life sentences for killing her parents—is recounted in Marcus Vetter and Karin Steinberger’s engrossing and unsettling documentary. Centered around an interview with Jens, currently in prison and recanting his confession, the film is a disturbing dive into the intricacies and unfairness of our justice system. Imogen Poots and Daniel Bruhl provide the voiceovers for both protagonists. 

March '18 Digital Week IV

Blu-rays of the Week

Beyond a Reasonable Doubt 

While the City Sleeps 

(Warner Archive)

This pair of films noir by German director Fritz Lang dates from 1956; these were the last pictures that the creator of classics M and Metropolis would make in Hollywood. Reasonable Doubt uses capital punishment for a twisty melodrama starring Dana Andrews and Joan Fontaine, while City Sleeps (also with Andrews, alongside George Sanders and Vincent Price) darkly explores the case of the “lipstick killer,” who murders young women. Both films are watchable if unexciting; the appropriately moody widescreen B&W compositions are enhanced by flawless hi-def transfers.

Copland Conducts Copland 

(Naxos)

This 1976 L.A. concert teams 75-year-old composer Aaron Copland conducting his own works, played with verve by the Los Angeles Philharmonic: it’s a greatest hits collection of sorts, starting with Fanfare for the Common Man and including El Salon Mexico, The Tender Land suite and an excerpt from his ballet Rodeo. But the highlight is a swinging version of Copland’s charming Clarinet Concerto, played by none other than 67-year-old Benny Goodman, who commissioned the work from Copland in 1947. Video and audio are adequate if unexceptional; no extras, although Copland briefly describes each piece before it’s played.

Dolores 

(PBS)

In the grand tradition of social activists like Cesar Chavez—whom she married—is Dolores Huerta, who remains mostly unknown despite her vast importance in the historic farm workers’ union movement she and Chavez led. Peter Bratt’s expansive documentary portrait, built around an interview with the now 87-year-old—and still vigorous—Huerta, intimately explores her long career championing workers’ and women’s rights, with personal encomiums by Hillary Clinton, Gloria Steinem and many others. The film looks excellent in hi-def.

The Passion of Joan of Arc 

(Criterion)

One of the towering silent-era masterpieces, Danish director Carl Theodor Dreyer’s 1928 drama recreates the trial and death of Joan of Arc with an intimacy and intensity that’s nothing short of riveting. Add to that Renee Falconetti’s miraculous performance as Joan; her mesmerizing face, held in relentless close-ups by Dreyer, show both the agony and the ecstasy of Joan’s martyrdom, culminating in her burning at the stake. The hi-def transfer is exceptionally good; Criterion’s extras include an alternate version of the film, three separate musical scores, audio commentary, interviews, and a video essay.

Sacha Guitry—Four Films 1936-1938 

(Arrow Academy)

A true bon vivant, French triple-threat Sacha Guitry made witty, talky films with his inimitably—and at times annoyingly—gregarious personality at their center, and this boxed set collects four features he churned out in a space of two years: The New Testament, My Father Was Right, Let’s Make a Dream and Let’s Go Up the Champs Elysses. Bright and clever, these films go down easily, despite staginess and the occasional overbearing sequence. All four films look lovely in hi-def; extras include scholar Ginette Vincendeau’s intros and commentaries; video essays; sound tests; and a 60-page book.

Stopping Traffic 

(Gravitas Ventures)

Activist Sadhvi Siddhali Shree urgently tackles the sadly relevant topic of sex trafficking in her trenchant documentary, which travels the world for its eye-opening glimpse, landing not only in places we aren’t surprised by (i.e., Mexico, Iraq, the Philippines) but also various U.S. locations. It’s unapologetically blunt in its depiction of sex trafficking’s horrors, and is tough to watch at times: but a necessary polemic. The film looks fine on Blu-ray.

DVD of the Week

Rowan & Martin’s Laugh-In—Complete 3rd Season 

(Time-Life)

This latest Laugh-In release brings together episodes from the 1969-70 season of the classic comedy-variety show hosted by Dick Rowan and Dan Martin, perfect ringmasters for a crazed stew of corny jokes, goofy skits, musical interludes and political satire, starring a motley crew of regulars (Ruth Buzzi, Goldie Hawn, Arte Johnson, Lily Tomlin, Jo Ann Worley) and guest stars (Johnny Carson, Ringo Starr, The Monkees, Diana Ross, Zsa Zsa Gabor). Along with the 26 full episodes, bonus features comprise a Lily Tomlin interview and a tribute to the series’ creator George Shlatter.