Here are our latest reviews of films on DVD.
Reviews of Classic Films
Another Life
Mathieu Li-Goyette @ Panorama-cinéma [French]
The Birdcage
Easy Rider
- Excerpt: he problem with taking a purely skeptical view of Easy Rider — which is easy to do, once you start picking at the picture’s scabs — is that so much of the movie that still has a pulse, still vibrates with such manic energy that you can shut out the rest and understand why it got everyone’s hair up back in ’69.
The Exorcist (Director’s Cut)
The Gold Diggers
Donald Levit @ ReelTalk Movie Reviews
Lawrence of Arabia
Jonathan Richards @ www.jonrichardsplace.com
- Excerpt: It is safe to say that there has never been a more electrifying career launch in movie history than Peter O’Toole’s in Lawrence of Arabia.
Murder, My Sweet
Kristen Lopez @ Journeys in Classic Film
- Excerpt: It doesn’t boast the star power of The Big Sleep, but it doesn’t need that with a story and acting as good as it gives.
Oldboy (2003)
Daniel Lackey @ The Nightmare Gallery
Somebody Up There Likes Me
Kristen Lopez @ Journeys in Classic Film
- Excerpt: http://journeysinclassicfilm.com/2014/08/19/somebody-up-there-likes-me-1956/
Y Tu Mamá También
Mario Alegre @ Primer Hora [Spanish]
Jason Bailey @ Flavorwire
- Excerpt: The further we get from ‘Y Tu Mamá,’ the more it feels like a standalone work, a nakedly personal film from a director whose films lean more toward universal experience and spectacle.
Recent Home Video Releases
All That Jazz
Mario Alegre @ Primer Hora [Spanish]
Tony Dayoub @ Cinema Viewfinder
- Excerpt: ALL THAT JAZZ’s Oscar-winning editing, by Alan Heim, brilliantly uses repetition and rhythm to elicit emotions in the same way a dancer like Fosse would.
Baby Blues
Peter Nellhaus @ Coffee Coffee and more Coffee
Ghost Bird
Peter Nellhaus @ Coffee Coffee and more Coffee
Go For Sisters
Locke
Tony Dayoub @ Cinema Viewfinder
- Excerpt: While the story itself doesn’t entirely justify the tedium that occasionally arises from Knight’s exercise, it does present Hardy an opportunity to impress us once again.
Love Streams
Manakamana | Blu-ray Review
Jordan M. Smith @ IONCINEMA.com
- Excerpt: In theory, the film sounds like a heady slog of documentary slow cinema, but the resulting two hour feature is a charming bit of ethnographic observation that challenges us to consider the implications of technology on traditional cultures and religious rituals.
On the Beach
Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down!
Mario Alegre @ Primer Hora [Spanish]
Tony Dayoub @ Cinema Viewfinder
- Excerpt: Imagine a telenovela, the ubiquitous melodramas of Spanish-language TV, bathed in lurid splashes of color (thanks to cinematographer José Luis Alcaine) and a Herrmann-esque suspense score (by Ennio Morricone). You’ll still only get a hint of why Almodóvar is often held up as the Spanish Hitchcock.
Jamie S. Rich @ Criterion Confessions
Triad
Peter Nellhaus @ Coffee Coffee and more Coffee
Other Reviews from 2012 and earlier
Arrowsmith
Stacia Kissick Jones @ She Blogged By Night
Bandido
Dennis Schwartz @ Dennis Schwartz Movie Reviews
Blessed Event
Dennis Schwartz @ Dennis Schwartz Movie Reviews
Conquest of Space
Roderick Heath @ This Island Rod
- Excerpt: SEE! the amazing trek of the heroes to collect rock samples! THRILL! as these pioneers of the stars collect…more rock samples!
The Full Monty
Howard the Duck
- Excerpt: If you try to summarize the events of Howard the Duck — and after a couple of stabs at this futile enterprise, I’m electing not to — you just sound like a crazy person, because if Howard the Duck has one outstanding characteristic, it is not the neon ‘80s aesthetic or the corresponding crimped and teased hairdos or the utter creepiness of the titular duck himself. It is the film’s total lack of any logic.
I’ve Always Loved You
- Excerpt: It’s a story of high drama, one that should be as fevered and intense as the music it revolves around, but like its uptight conductor, I’ve Always Loved You has a little too much starch in its collar. Borzage’s realization of the story is too consistent in tempo.
Madhouse
Outpost in Malaya
Dennis Schwartz @ Dennis Schwartz Movie Reviews
Riff-Raff/Raining Stones
Kristen Lopez @ Awards Circuit
The Wizard of Gore
James Jay Edwards @ FilmFracture
- Excerpt: Cinema Fearité Presents ‘The Wizard of Gore’ – A Splattery Flick From The Godfather Of Gore, Herschell Gordon Lewis
