December '22 Digital Week II

In-Theater/Streaming Releases of the Week 

Broker 

(Neon)

Japanese director Hirokazu Kore-eda’s films chronicles the lives of outsiders, those people on the margins who create their own family dynamic, however tenuous. His latest hard-edged drama, and his first shot in South Korea, follows a pair who steal babies from drop boxes, sell them for adoption and eliminate the security camera footage of the thefts; they are soon join by a young woman who wants to meet the family that has adopted the baby she reluctantly left behind, while a couple of detectives are on thir tail. Kore-eda is honest and sympathetic to all of his flawed but humane characters, and if Broker falls short of his best films—Like Father Like Son, Shoplifters, After Life—it nevertheless is propelled by his precise observational insights.

Blanquita 

(Outsider Pictures)

Fernando Guzzoni’s downbeat but powerful drama introduces Blanca, an 18-year-old single mother who accuses a noted politician of  rape and imprisonment; this accusation soon provokes people on both sides—those who are supposed to be her advocates as well as those pushing back against her accusation—to question her story. Guzzoni navigates this prickly subject matter with a keen eye, never tipping the balance into exploitation, and the film’s searing indictment of a society that doesn’t (or won’t) protect its children is made more immediate by Laura López’s fearless portrayal of Blanca.

The Treasure of His Youth 

(Little Bear Films) 

The career of the legendary Italian photographer Paulo Di Paolo is recounted by director Bruce Weber in this beguiling documentary that showcases many of his classic images alongside often charming tales of how he started in the business—he’s 94 when Weber starts shooting. Most touchingly, Di Paolo discusses his close relationships with some of his most famous subjects, like actress Anna Magnani along with director Pier Paolo Pasolini, the latter of whom was viciously murdered in 1975 in Rome. Di Paolo’s eyes still well with tears upon discussing Pasolini.

4K Releases of the Week

Elf 

(Warner Bros)

Will Farrell was never more in his element as Buddy, who was raised by the elves in Santa’s workshop until he discovers that his real father is a rich executive in Manhattan in Jon Favreau’s cute 2003 holiday perennial. Although it goes on a little long, Farrell has moments of supremely silly strangeness, while he’s matched scene for scene by Zooey Deschanel as Jovie, the Gimbel’s employee who falls for his innocence; she’s never been better than she is here. The film looks quite good in UHD; extras include Favreau’s and Farrell’s commentaries, deleted/alternate scenes, a 90-minute on-set doc hosted by Farrell, and other featurettes.

Smile 

(Universal)

Laura Hasn’t Slept, a creepy 2020 short by writer-director Parker Finn was expanded into this crude feature about a psychiatrist haunted by a malevolent entity that is causing its victims to commit suicide. The concision of the original short gives way to a flabbiness that wallows in jump scares—how many wine glasses does the heroine have to keep dropping on the floor?—and contrived situations than even The White Lotus would consider too much. Still, there’s a lively performance by Sosie Bacon (daughter of Kevin Bacon and Kyra Sedgwick) in the lead, which makes the repetition more palatable. Extras include Laura Hasn’t Slept with Finn intro, Finn commentary, deleted scenes, and a making-of and making the score featurettes. 

Blu-ray Releases of the Week

Michael Haneke—Trilogy 

(Criterion Collection)

Austrian enfant terrible Michael Haneke has made a career out of cleverly devised cinematic provocations, and it his first three films—The Seventh Continent (1989), Benny’s Video (1992) and 71 Fragments of a Chronology of Chance (1994)—are the most original and memorable of the formal experiments and unsettling narratives he has spent more than three decades creating. The horrors of isolation have never been so savagely dramatized, and the films’ powerful moments outweigh the more obvious ones. The hi-def transfers in this set are immaculate; extras comprise 2005 interviews with Haneke about each film; interviews with Benny’s Video actor Arno Frisch and film historian William Howarth; Benny’s Video deleted scenes; and a 2013 documentary Michael H., Profession: Director. 

The Ambush 

(Well Go USA) 

Director Pierre Morel has already shown, in Taken and The Gunman, a talent for ratcheting up tension, which he does in this potent recreation of a real-life firefight during the Yemen War between United Arab Emirates soldiers and the rebels who have pinned them down in a valley. Although the claustrophobic life-and-death situations might become repetitive in lesser hands, Morel is able to keep things moving, which accentuates the drama’s ferocity. There’s a superior hi-def transfer.

Attack of the 50-Foot Woman 

(Warner Archive)

Nowhere near the top of the list of ’50s sci-fi thrillers, this 1958 B movie about a woman who grows to enormous proportions after an encounter with a giant alien has a cheesy charm that’s undermined by its cheap-looking effects and less than impressive performances. Director Nathan Hertz has a minimal amount of talent, but there’s a campy “so bad it’s good” feel that makes it all watchable—like a 66-minute car crash of sorts. The Blu-ray transfer looks terrific; lone extra is a commentary by actress Yvette Vickers and film historian Tom Weaver.

The Ballad of the Sad Café 

(Cohen Film Collection)

Edward Albee’s play of a Carson McCullers novella about a domineering woman running the lone café in a small Southern town was turned into a stagey, not entirely convincing film by novice director Simon Callow in 1983, starring Vanessa Redgrave in a physically imposing but emotionally distant lead performance. While Keith Carradine, Austin Pendleton and Rod Steiger give colorful portrayals as the various men in her life, director Callow never finds the proper handle on material that needs a more subtle guiding hand. The hi-def transfer is very good; lone extra is a commentary by critic Peter Tonguette.

Medusa 

(Music Box Films)

In Anita Rocha da Silveira’s toughminded satire, Mari and a group of likeminded evangelical young women prowl the streets physically abusing those they deem to be too sinful, even while remaining blissfully (or willfully) unaware that they are helping to promote a fascistic, misogynist regime. The problem is that, after setting up this unsettling glimpse of an hypocritical society—with parallels to what is really happening in her native Brazil and elsewhere—da Silveira concentrates on eye-popping colors and stylish visuals, which becomes grating after two hours. But, in lead actress Mari Oliveria, the director has a remarkably vital collaborator. The film looks stunning on Blu; extras include a director Q&A, video essay, deleted scenes and interviews.

Ticket to Paradise 

(Universal)

Pairing George Clooney and Julia Roberts in a rom-com would have seemed a no-brainer 20 years ago; putting them together now—as the divorced parents of a daughter who surprises them by announcing that she’s getting married to a local guy she met while vacationing in the tropics—seems kind of desperate, as through most of Ol Parker’s movie they basically insult each other while trying to sabotage the wedding. There are a few laughs along the way, as the pair does have chemistry together, but movie has the feel of an extended gag reel (there is one actually shown over the credits). There’s a nice-looking Blu-ray transfer; extras are on-set featurettes and interviews.

CD Release of the Week

Martinů Operas

(Capriccio)

Czechoslovakia’s Bohuslav Martinů (1890-1959), one of the most underrated 20th century composers, had an estimable musical career that ran the stylistic gamut from solo piano and chamber music to orchestral and stage works. This superb disc collects two of his wonderful one-act operas, the early Larmes de couteau (Knife Tears, 1928) and the masterly—and perfectly titled—Comedy on the Bridge (1935, revised 1951). There’s no shortage of frothy but arresting music on display, performed with the necessary lightness of touch by the Stuttgart State Orchestra and vocal soloists under the direction of conductor Cornelius Meister.

December '22 Digital Week I

4K/UHD Releases of the Week 

National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation 

(Warner Bros)

Despite its pedigree—a screenplay by John Hughes and a cast of reliable comic actors—this 1989 sequel to Vacation and European Vacation is as bumpy a ride as the first two entries, with similar ratios of satisfying to cheap laughs as the Griswolds attempt to have a happy holiday gathering despite seemingly everything going wrong. Chevy Chase does his usual sometimes funny, sometimes not shtick, and there are good moments from Beverly D’Angelo, Brian Doyle Murray, Julia Louis-Dreyfus, E.G. Marshall, Doris Roberts, Diane Ladd and the otherwise forgotten Nicolette Scorsese. The 4K image look solid; lone extra is a commentary by D’Angelo, director Jeremiah S. Chechik, Randy Quaid, Johnny Galecki, Miriam Flynn, and producer Matty Simmons.

Westworld—Complete 4th Season 

(Warner Bros)

Fans of Westworld think the series went off the rails during its fourth season, and to an extent, they’re right—jumping forward several years (twice!) and setting much of the plot in a recognizable Manhattan (with the High Line in evidence) is a detour from previous seasons. On the other hand, since it has always taken sharp narrative curves, season four could be considered par for the course. The always humanizing presence of both Thandiwe Newton and Evan Rachel Wood keep things grounded, along with the dazzling-looking settings, which mesmerize even more in 4K. All eight episodes are included on both three UHD discs and three Blu-rays; hours of extras comprise making-of featurettes and interviews.

In-Theater/Streaming Release of the Week 

In the Court of the Crimson King—King Crimson at 50 

(DGM)

For a half century, guitarist Robert Fripp has created his own niche in rock music annals with prog giant King Crimson, which has gone through many iterations over the decades; yet, no matter who else is in the group, Fripp is the constant, focused on the music even at the expense of his relationship with other members. Toby Amies’ candid documentary tactfully explores that delicate balance, as we hear from Fripp and current and former band members like Ian MacDonald (who died earlier this year), Adrian Belew, Bob Bruford and Tony Levin to present a compelling warts-and-all look at the creative process, with great musical moments both onstage and in rehearsal.

Blu-ray Releases of the Week

Christmas Eve 

(Naxos)

Although this opera by Russian composer Nicolai Rimsky-Korsakov isn’t among his most well-known, Germany’s Frankfurt Opera has given it a high-wire production by director Christof Loy, which was filmed last winter. The fantastical plot is business as usual for Rimsky, whose music often sounds ravishing, especially when sung by Julia Muzychenko as the heroine Oksana. Conductor Sebastian Weigle leads the orchestra and chorus in a focused and sumptuous performance. As always, there’s excellent hi-def video and audio.

Christmas Concerts 

(SWR Classic)

These two holiday concerts by the SWR Vocal Ensemble, “Silent Night” and “Christmas Carols,” were respectively recorded in 2017 and 2018 at the properly solemn confines of the Gaisburg Church in Stuttgart, Germany. Led by conductor Marcus Creed, the vocal ensemble—with its soloists often splendidly taking the lead—beautifully sings such perennials as “The Holly and the Ivy” and “Hark! The Herald Angels Sing” along with other seasonal music by such composers as Britten, Howells, Vaughan Williams, Holst, Mahler and Schumann. The Blu-ray video and audio look and sound sumptuous.

The Night of the Iguana 

(Warner Archive)

In John Huston’s spirited 1964 adaptation of a rambunctious Tennessee Williams play, Richard Burton chews the scenery as T. Lawrence Shannon, a former priest turned tourist guide leading a group to Puerto Vallarta; he’s being harangued by stern Judith Fellowes (Oscar-nominated Grayson Hall), who believes he’s trying to seduce her 16-year-old niece, Charlotte Goodall (a very Lolita-like Sue Lyon). Along for the ride are a gleefully effervescent Ava Gardner as Maxine Faulk, an old friend who might become a new flame, and a properly dowdy Deborah Kerr as spinster Hannah Jelkes. The hi-def transfer makes Huston’s B&W images really pop; extras are on-set and retrospective featurettes.

Star Trek Discovery—Complete 4th Season 

(CBS/Paramount)

In the fourth season of the latest Star Trek spinoff series, USS Discovery captain Michael Burnham heads the crew that tries, in a post-cataclysm environment, to help rebuild the United Federation of Planets. These 13 episodes provide enough of the familiar space drama to satiate even the most finicky Trekkie, while the performances of Sonequa Martin-Green as Burnham and Anthony Rapp as scientist Paul Stamets can be recommended to all viewers. There’s a very good hi-def transfer; extras include on-set featurettes, deleted scenes, audio commentary and gag reel.

DVD Releases of the Week

Blonde—The Marilyn Stories 

(Film Chest)

With the release of Andrew Dominik’s Blonde, in which Ana de Armas makes a heartbreaking Marilyn, Monroe is once again getting media attention, hence this three-disc set that brings together documentary and fictional accounts of her life, career and untimely death. Of the features centering each disc—2001’s biopic Blonde with Poppy Montgomery, 1991’s Marilyn and Me with Susan Griffiths and 1976’s Goodbye Norma Jean with Misty Rowe—the most interesting is the latter, exploitative but anchored by Rowe’s quite sympathetic portrayal. Extras are a 1986 documentary; Marilyn’s first TV appearance, on The Jack Benny Show in 1953; and a short doc, 1967’s The Legend of Marilyn Monroe, narrated by John Huston, who directed Marilyn at the beginning and end of her career, in both The Asphalt Jungle and The Misfits; but beware, the video quality is pitched somewhere between VHS and DVD.

Amazing Grace—Country Stars Sing Songs of Faith and Hope 

(Time/Life)

Time-Life’s latest massive boxed set is this behemoth, which is made up of 10 discs of  more than 150 performances of spirituals and other gospel songs by some of country music’s biggest stars, from George Jones and Loretta Lynn to Dolly Parton and Reba McEntire. Among the classic tunes they perform are “Amazing Grace,” sung by both Jones and by Josh Turner; “Coat of Many Colors,” sung by Parton; and “How Great Thou Art” by McEntire. In addition to the memorable live performances, many enticing extras include two DVDs of Opry Gospel Classics, including rare archival performances by Johnny Cash, Barbara Mandrell, Charley Pride, Porter Wagoner, and more; interviews with the likes of Vince Gill, the Oak Ridge Boys and Statler Brothers; bonus performances; and a 36-page collector’s booklet.

CD Release of the Week

Aram Khachaturian—

Piano Concerto/Concerto-Rhapsody/Masquerade 

(BIS)

Known for his engaging ballets Spartacus and Gayane (the latter featured so prominently in Kubrick’s classic 2001), Russian composer Aram Khachaturian (1903-78) was an endless reservoir of glorious tunes, so it shouldn’t surprise anybody that this disc of his piano music, especially the D-flat major Piano Concerto and Concerto-Rhapsody for Piano and Orchestra, is crammed with one exquisite melody after another. On the two orchestral works, conductor Andrew Litton leads the BBC National Orchestra of Wales in lovely accompaniment to the excellent soloist Iyad Sughayer, who shows in the solo Masquerade Suite that he can easily alternate between delicacy and bombast whenever it’s needed. 

October '22 Digital Week III

In Theater/Streaming Releases of the Week 

Call Jane 

(Roadside Attractions)

Director Phyllis Nagy and writers Hayley Schore & Roshan Sethi delve into the pre-“Roe vs. Wade” era as a network of women steer those in need toward relatively safe abortions. Elizabeth Banks is sympathetic as Joy, a stay-at-home ’60s Chicago wife whose difficult pregnancy forces her to turn in desperation to a group of “Janes,” led by no-nonsense Virginia (a forceful Sigourney Weaver). Joy soon becomes a “Jane” herself, hiding it from her teenage daughter and lawyer husband as long as she can. Nagy effectively guides this social awakening story that’s also a document of a terrible era in our recent history, highlighted by powerful moments in the room where the procedures take place.

For Ever Mozart 

(Cohen Film Collection)

Jean-Luc Godard remained a provocateur throughout his nearly 70-year directing career (he died last month at age 91), and this muddled but striking 1996 film—screening at Manhattan’s Quad Cinema on October 26—shows him at his most provocative. Exploring, through the disastrous Bosnian conflict, what art can, or can’t, do in response to the modern world’s atrocities, Godard gets on his soapbox to bemoan how the West ignores the tragedies happening under our noses by continuing to make—and watch (gasp!)—movies. He then halfheartedly introduces a rehearsal of a Mozart piano concerto in order to work in the title, but Gordard did this sort of thing far better and more poetically with Beethoven quartets in 1983’s First Name: Carmen.

Grand Jeté 

(Altered Innocence)

Isabelle Stever’s incest drama approaches the subject clinically, with mostly dire results that reduce what could have been a penetrating psychological study to the physical. Mother Nadja (played with astonishing nakedness—in both senses—by a remarkable Sarah Nevada Grether) is a dance teacher whose body is wracked by years of grueling practice, while her estranged teenage son, Mario (played stolidly by Emil von Schönfels), is similarly obsessed with his own body. Their sexual relationship, once it begins, quickly becomes enervating, as Stever never deals with the possible moral or emotional consequences. That Nadja’s own mother raised Mario so she could concentrate on her career is brought up, but as presented by Stever, little in the film rings true, especially when Nadja finds herself pregnant. It’s admittedly audacious on a primitive level, with precisely intimate cinematography by Constantin Campean, but almost completely lacks basic insights into these people’s behavior.

Looking for Home 

(First Run Features)

Alan Govenar’s fitfully satisfying documentary is a glimpse at people in all walks of life and what the term “home” means to them—whether or not they are at home at the time of the interview. Govenar talks to random people on the streets of New York as well as in far-flung places like Dallas, Paris (France) and Buenos Aires (to a young woman we first meet visiting Times Square). Interesting ideas are introduced and pithy observations are made—by both subjects and director—but March 2020’s COVID lockdown intrudes on the exploration: while moving back and forth between pre- and post-pandemic timeframes, Govenar seems to lose focus and his film blurs the concept it intends to elucidate. 

Voodoo Macbeth 

(Lightyear)

The fascinating true story of how actress Rose McClendon (Inger Tudo) shepherded a Black-cast version of Shakespeare’s Macbeth to the Depression-era New York stage through producer John Houseman and 20-year-old wunderkind director Orson Welles (Jewell Wilson Bridges, in his film debut), who gets the idea for a “Voodoo Macbeth,” set on a Caribbean island—it could either be a masterstroke or a laughing stock. A conglomerate of 10 directors, 8 writers and 3 producers as part of the USC Originals project shepherds this dramatization effectively if unsurprisingly: it’s a credible reenactment with fine performances but nowhere near as earthshattering as what Welles and company created onstage (sadly, McClendon never played her dream role of Lady Macbeth, dying of pneumonia soon after the production opened).

Blu-ray Releases of the Week

Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde 

(Warner Archive)

Frederic March won the best actor Oscar for his intense performance as the good doctor/bad monster in Rouben Mamoulian’s nervy 1931 adaptation of the classic Robert Louis Stevenson story (which, in keeping with Stevenson’s Scottish background, pronounces the deadly Jekyll’s name as JEE-kul, foreign to American ears). If Mamoulian uses the skillful makeup artist Wally Westmore to show the doctor’s transformations, it’s March’s ferocity and the sympathetic portrayal by Miriam Hopkins of the club singer Ivy that’s the dramatic drawing card. The B&W film looks splendid in hi-def; extras are two commentaries, a Bugs Bunny Jekyll and Hyde cartoon and a 1950 radio adaptation.

Easter Sunday 

(Universal)

Standup Jo Koy’s debut starring vehicle goes about as exactly as anyone would predict—it’s a sentimental comedy, centered around Easter Sunday, where everyone in Koy’s Filipino-American family deals with resentments, recriminations and reconciliations throughout a fraught holiday weekend.  Koy isn’t much of an actor, but when he takes the mike (so to speak) and does standup—as in the amusing church scene—it doesn’t matter. There’s a fun supporting cast that includes old hands like Lou Diamond Phillips and Tia Carrere, but Elena Juatco as Koy’s sister makes the most of her too-few moments. There’s a good hi-def transfer; extras include a gag reel, deleted scenes, making-of featurettes and commentary by Koy and director Jay Chandrasekhar.

Monsieur Hire 

(Cohen Film Collection)

Another elegant, tense character study by French director Patrice Leconte, this 1989 chamber drama, based on a story by the great Belgian writer Georges Simenon, follows a loner who spies on his attractive female neighbor, only later to find himself a suspect in the murder of another young woman. With Leconte’s stylish direction and sublime acting by Michel Blanc and Sandrine Bonnaire, you nearly forget that this minutely detailed film is just a 79-minute shaggy-dog story that hinges on an implausible plot point. Here's hoping that we also get re-releases of Leconte’s dazzling followup features, The Hairdresser’s Husband and The Perfume of Yvonne. The hi-def transfer looks immaculate; extras are new interviews with Leconte and Bonnaire and an audio commentary.

DVD Release of the Week 

The Time Traveler’s Wife—The Complete Series 

(Warner Bros)

Unlike the 2009 film adaptation of Audrey Niffenegger’s novel about an inadvertent time traveler’s relationship with his wife—whom he keeps meeting during different stages of her life, starting when she’s a young girl—which was turned into a tragic romance starring the delectable Rachel McAdams and charismatic Eric Bana, this six-hour mini-series is a far more self-important slog, with nudity and profanity thrown in, as if the creators knew this was stretching a slender concept fairly thin. Theo James and Rose Leslie are good as the traveler and his wife, but the nonsensical conceit doesn’t help, especially when dragged out to interminable length—and the chemistry of McAdams and Bana is sorely missing. Extras include several featurettes.

CD Releases of the Week

Hilary Hahn—Eclipse 

(Deutsche Grammophon)

American violinist Hilary Hahn’s latest recording includes her usual scintillating performances of two classic violin works—Antonin Dvořák’s eloquent Violin Concerto and Pablo de Sarasate’s rollicking Carmen Fantasy—but the main reason to listen to her new CD is her extraordinary playing on a work that doesn’t get recorded that often: Argentine master Alberto Ginastera’s Violin Concerto. In her program note, Hahn describes her “obsession” with the Ginastera piece, and it’s easy to see why: while technically demanding (something that Hahn dispatches effortlessly), the concerto is also weirdly mesmerizing from beginning to end. Listening to these pieces makes it obvious that Hahn marches in musical lockstep with the Frankfurt Radio Symphony and conductor Andres Orozco-Estrada.

Ralph Vaughan Williams—Symphonies Nos. 6 and 8 

(Hyperion)

British master Ralph Vaughan Williams (1872-1958) composed a towering cycle of nine symphonies that rivals that of Beethoven in its impressive and wide-ranging musicality, and the two great symphonies so splendidly played here by the BBC Symphony Orchestra under conductor Martyn Brabbins are filled with fire and fury. Vaughan-Williams’ sixth symphony, premiered in 1948, is a mournful postwar statement that despairs for a world shattered by the just-ended conflict, while his penultimate eighth—premiered in 1956—is the work of a still curious elder statesman, filled with variety and vigorousness. Rounding out this fine recording are short pieces sung by the excellent BBC Symphony Chorus.

October '22 Digital Week II

In-Theater/Streaming Releases of the Week 

Hail Mary 

(Cohen Film Collection/Quad Cinema)

Jean-Luc Godard’s second film from 1985—the other, Detective, is a tongue-in-cheek tribute to the film noirs he grew up watching—is among the just-deceased master director’s most remarkable creations. Banned and picketed when it was first released by those who believed it sacrilegious, the film is a typically Godardian exploration of a young virgin mother, and shows how faith, beauty and art have been co-opted by the chaotic everyday existence of modern life. Hail Mary is preceded by the short The Book of Mary, an equally stunning study of a young girl by Godard’s frequent collaborator—and life partner—Anne-Marie Mieville. This is the penultimate of four weekly screenings at Manhattan's Quad Cinema of Godard classics in memory of the great director, who died last month at age 91.

My Old School 

(Magnolia Pictures)

It’s not often you can say that truth is really stranger than fiction than in this diverting documentary about Brandon Lee, whose time at a Glasgow High School in the 1990s is dissected by many classmates (including the film’s director, Jono McLeod), and includes no less than actor Alan Cumming, who lipsynchs Brandon’s responses in a recorded interview. Just what Brandon did I won’t divulge, but the reveal is surprising enough that McLeod’s trickery—Cumming’s deadpan appearance and the animated sequences a la Daria—at times makes this intriguing character study less than the sum of its illuminating parts.

Three Tall Women 

(CBC Gem/Stratfest@Home)

In Edward Albee’s last great play (which I saw at its 1994 New York premiere), that remarkable actress Martha Henry gives a colossal performance in the central role of A, a 92-year-old looking back on her life—and, amazingly, she gave her brilliant portrayal just weeks before she died, a year ago, at age 83. Albee’s wit has rarely been so razor-sharp, and his verbal infelicities are kept to a minimum, which was not the case for many of his other post-Virginia Woolf dramas. Director Diana LeBlanc’s Stratford Festival revival also has superior acting by Lucy Peacock (as B) and Mamie Zwettler (as C), but this is a powerfully emotional memorial to one of Canada’s grand dames of the theater.

Blu-ray Releases of the Week

Beast 

(Universal)

Jaws transplanted to the African bush, Baltasar Kormákur’s thin but tense feature clocks in at an economical 90 minutes, and the first 30 are actually a fairly clever setup for the ensuing hour of monstrous lion attacks on Idris Elba and his daughters, which unfortunately become increasingly repetitive as we go along. Still, the CGI that transforms stunt doubles into marauding big cats is impressively done, as Elba proves his bona fides as an action hero. The hi-def transfer looks terrific; extras include a deleted scene and on-set featurettes.

Going Places 

(Cohen Film Collection)

French director Bertrand Blier would win 1978’s Best Foreign Film Oscar for Get Out Your Handkerchiefs, an aimless, coarse satire about a frigid wife who can’t respond sexually to either her husband or the stud he brings on board yet a callow teenager does the trick. But Blier made his initial splash with this 1974 comic drama, a similarly dishonest film about a pair of aimless drifters who physically and emotionally demean every woman they come across. Despite winning performances by Gerard Depardieu and Patrick Dewaere as the men and a redoubtable trio of actresses—Bridgette Fossey, Jeanne Moreau and the spectacular Miou-Miou—as their marks, Blier’s first attempt to shock middle-class audiences out of their complacency—which he would try to do to diminishing returns throughout his career—mostly falters. There’s a fine hi-def transfer; the lone extra is an engagingly informative commentary by film professor Richard Pena.

Mack & Rita 

(Lionsgate)

Diane Keaton is her delightfully daffy self in Katie Aselton’s middling take on Big or 13 Going on 30, as a young woman turns 70 after undergoing a past-life regression. There’s not much to writers Madeline Walter and Paul Welsh’s conceit, but Keaton—who not only looks smashing in her uniquely inspired Annie Hall-ish outfits but displays her still potent comic chops—is assisted by an able group of performers from Wendy Malick, Lois Smith and Loretta Devine to Elizabeth Lail, who’s likeable and winning as Keaton’s younger self to make this enjoyable. The film looks good on Blu; extras are two on-set featurettes that pointedly don’t feature Keaton.

Mark of the Vampire 

(Warner Archive)

In this terse 1935 vampire flick, director Tod Browning supplies humor and thrills in equal measure, including a terrific fade-out joke featuring Bela Lugosi, and there’s an eerie atmosphere that’s nicely balanced by a light-heartedness that fits the material. In addition to Lugosi, there are nicely observed portrayals by the likes of Lionel Barrymore. The excellent hi-def transfer accentuates the moody B&W imagery captured by cinematographer James Wong Howe; extras include an audio commentary as well as a vintage cartoon and short.

DVD Releases of the Week

Ed Sullivan’s Rock and Roll Classics 

(Time-Life)

This worthwhile 10-disc set, although only skimming the surface of the riches residing in The Ed Sullivan Show’s vaults, demonstrates how valuable Ed’s Sunday night variety show was as a showcase for the best and most popular pop/rock/soul/R&B artists of the ’50s, ’60s and early ’70s. The discs are broken down by theme: the British Invasion, Psychedelic Rock, etc., but they’re just an excuse to include performance clips—most live stage appearances but some primitive versions of what were later called music videos—by everyone from the Beatles to the Beach Boys, the Temptations to the Supremes, Vanilla Fudge to Steppenwolf, and the Rolling Stones to Herman’s Hermits. The video and audio quality isn’t great, but these clips are mainly for historical purposes anyway. Only eight discs feature Sullivan Show music clips; the ninth disc features The All Star Comedy Special, with dozens of Sullivan’s comedian guests, and the tenth comprises two episodes from the series The History of Rock’n’Roll. Interview extras include the Lovin Spoonful’s John Sebastian, the Mamas and the Papas’ Michelle Phillips and the Byrds’ Roger McGuinn. 

Melrose Place—The Complete Series 

(CBS/Paramount)

This evening soap opera about young people living in a West Hollywood apartment complex—executive-produced by Aaron Spelling (who did the same for Beverly Hills 90210 and Charmed in the final decade of a legendary career stretching back to the ’60s)—became a hit during its initial run from 1992-99 and either jumpstarted (or reignited) the careers of such performers as Courtney Thorne-Smith, Josie Bissett and Heather Locklear. If you’ve always wanted it, this gargantuan boxed set collects every single episode (226 in total) from all seven seasons on 54 discs, along with many extras including featurettes and audio commentaries by series creator Darren Star.

CD Releases of the Week 

Michael Tippett—The Midsummer Marriage 

(BBC) 

English composer Michael Tippett (1905-98) composed several operas over a long and eclectic career but never equaled by the musical and dramatic invention of this, his first opera (although the harsh spareness of his second, the tragic King Priam, comes close). First premiered at Covent Garden in 1955, Tippett’s mystical romance—kind of an abstract Midsummer Night’s Dream—has a surfeit of psychological acuity rare in an operatic work despite Tippett’s own convoluted libretto, but it’s the musical aspect that puts this into rarefied air. This new recording, recorded last year in London’s Royal Festival Hall, is adroitly conducted by Edward Gardner, gorgeously played by the London Philharmonic Orchestra, and splendidly sung by the London Philharmonic and English National Opera choruses as well as the soloists led by the inimitable leads Robert Murray and Rachel Nicholls.

Ellen Taafe Zwilich—Cello Concerto & Other Works 

(Delos)

Ellen Taafe Zwilich writes music of bountiful imagination, and this disc of several orchestral works cements her reputation as among our very best contemporary composers. The newest work on this excellent recording, Zwilich’s 2020 cello concerto, was premiered during lockdown and is a remarkably vital achievement, buoyed by brilliant soloist Zuill Bailey. The other pieces are equally vigorous, highlighted by the delightful Peanuts Gallery (1996), a subtly colored workout for pianist Elizabeth Dorman and the Santa Rosa Symphony (led by conductor Francesco Lecce-Chong) in six tongue-in-cheek movements mirroring Charles Schultz’s beloved characters: Schroeder, Linus, Snoopy, Charlie Brown, Lucy, Peppermint Patty and Marcie. 

September '22 Digital Week II

Blu-ray Releases of the Week 

Le Corbeau 

(Criterion)

In Henri-Georges Clouzot’s classic 1943 anti-Nazi fable (the English title is “The Raven”), a small French town is ripped apart by anonymous letters accusing people of various sins (some real, some not) until the entire populace is caught up in a toxic stew of mistrust and informing on one another. Banned in Vichy France, the film is still potent today (and has unsurprising parallels to current events) and remains a visceral and vividly realized drama that is gripping to the end reveal. Criterion’s usual splendid release includes a beautiful hi-def transfer, an interview with master director and film historian Bertrand Tavernier, and a 1975 French film history documentary featuring Clouzot. 

Abe Lincoln in Illinois 

(Warner Archive)

Although it’s dated quite badly, John Cromwell’s 1940 drama features a superb Raymond Massey portrayal of Honest Abe in the years before he became president: meeting (and losing) the love of his life, becoming a lawyer, entering politics, marrying Mary Todd and—at the end—winning the 1860 election. Massey has the folksy homeliness that Lincoln had by all accounts; his presence helps steady the bumpy ride in Grover Jones’ adaptation of Robert E. Sherwood’s play. The B&W film looks stunning on Blu; lone extra is a 1940 radio adaptation also starring Massey.

The Amusement Park 

(Shudder/RLJE Films) 

George Romero was known for his zombie trilogy (Night of the Living Dead, Dawn of the Dead, Day of the Dead), but his scariest movie might have been one no one knows about: this 55-minute, surreal feature made in 1973, but barely seen after a 1975 festival premiere, concerning the legitimate fears of elder abuse. Memorable visual imagery accompanies this honest and heartfelt plea for tolerance and fair treatment, made on the lowest of low budgets. It’s been lovingly restored in hi-def, and there’s a fine array of contextualizing extras, including an audio commentary, interviews and featurettes.

4K/UHD Release of the Week

Poltergeist 

(Warner Bros)

“They’re here” is all you need to hear to know what’s coming—this scary, funny and supremely entertaining 1982 thriller about paranormal forces hounding an innocent family in its home in the depths of American suburbia was primarily directed by Tobe Hooper, although the unceasing rumors that producer-writer Steven Spielberg actually helmed some sequernces sure seems possible considering how much of this looks and feels like a Spielberg film. The acting is superb throughout, with JoBeth Williams giving a standout performance as the harried mother, but Craig T. Nelson as the father and Zelda Rubenstein as the ghost whisperer are also good. The film looks spectacularly good in UHD, especially in its dazzling light-dark imagery; extras on the accompanying Blu-ray are a vintage making-of featurette and two-part featurette about paranormal investigators.

In-Theater/Streaming Releases of the Week 

Riotsville, USA 

(Magnolia) 

In the 1960s, the political and law enforcement establishment, spooked by the civil unrest growing throughout the U.S., actually set up fake towns that were named Riotsville that were used to help prepare the military and police for the next uprising in the inner cities. Director Sierra Pettengill’s powerful documentary cannily utilizes archival footage—yes, the military brass filmed everything—to create a potent counter-narrative to what occurred during that volatile era in order to demonstrate the beginnings of the militarization of the police that has since become ubiquitous in cities across the country.

Unidentified 

(Film Movement)

Romanian director Bogdan George Apetri, who resides in New York City, returns with his second provocative drama in a matter of weeks, following his disturbing Miracle: this film, set in the same small Romanian town (where Apetri incidentally grew up), follows an unorthodox detective looking into a case that’s not his. Apetri adroitly provides bits of pertinent information as the story moves along, until finally we realize just what the obsessed detective is doing. It’s admittedly engrossing, but the antihero (played by Liam Neesonesque actor Bogdan Farcas) is so vile that it’s difficult to stay with him for two hours.

Secret Defense 

Up, Down, Fragile 

(Cohen Film Collection)

I’ve never been a Jacques Rivette fan, but he did hit his stride in the ’90s, starting with 1991’s magnificent, four-hour La belle noiseuse and the longer but intimate two-part 1993 study of Joan of Arc, Joan the Maid. Two of his other ’90s features, Up, Down, Fragile and Secret Defense, are playing at Quad Cinema in Manhattan on September 21 and 28, respectively, as part of a month-long Rivette retrospective. Up, Down, Fragile is a sweetly entertaining look at a trio of women navigating romance and friendship in Paris; the tense Secret Defense stars a formidable Sandrine Bonnaire as a scientist searching for the facts behind her father’s death—both films are too long, as most Rivette films are, but they at least aren’t dull exercises filled with amateurish performances, which these features are happily devoid of.

DVD Release of the Week

Magnum P.I.—Complete 4th Season 

(CBS/Paramount)

For the 20 episodes that make up the latest season of yet another beloved TV series reboot, the breezy chemistry of actors Jay Hernandez and Perdita Weeks, who are playing investigators Thomas Magnum and Juliet Higgins, makes these familiar stories of murder, blackmail and other crime cases set in always picturesque Hawaii watchable. Extras on this five-disc set include the ubiquitous gag reel as well as deleted scenes from six of the episodes.

CD Release of the Week 

William Walton—The Complete Façades 

(Naxos)

Before becoming one of the grand old men of 20th-century British music, William Walton (1902-83) was a young enfant terrible, and his effortlessly witty and jazzy Façade, set to verses by his friend Edith Sitwell filled with delightful wordplay, disturbed polite London society after its 1923 premiere. In this recording of not only the original work but also Walton’s follow-up (A Further Entertainment) and additional numbers that were for various reasons dropped, JoAnn Falletta leads musicians from the Virginia Arts Festival Chamber orchestra in a peerless performance that’s light on its feet, perfectly capturing Walton and Sitwell’s unique collaboration that puts equal emphasis on his music and her words. Hila Plitmann, Fred Child and Kevin Deas make for a compelling trio of narrators.