Hey folks, Harry here with the very first article written in the history of Ain't It Cool News from my Desk! I am so jazzed, that after 11 years, I finally have a Desk. You may be shocked to know that essentially - for the past 12 years, I've been writing from atop a wooden TV tray, a bedside nightstand or a dining room table. (of course that all symbolizes my battle with obesity) Ahem. Well now I have a gorgeous 1930's Walnut & Oak carved desk that is just a joy to write from. So much so, I want to do more writing. It feels like what I should be doing at this desk. Anyways - enough of that and on to this week's DVD COLUMN - which has some pretty fun stuff. As always the titles and the images are linked to Amazon where you can learn more on the respective title - or if you wish, you could purchase them - where a small percentage of your purchase goes to support this column and its relentless enthusiasm for the home video universe. Here ya go, I hope you enjoy...

Tuesday, July 22nd, 2008

SPACED: THE COMPLETE SERIES

It’s pretty much the greatest fucking thing ever. If you only know Edgar Wright and Simon Pegg from HOT FUZZ & SHAUN OF THE DEAD… well… You re in for a treat. Now – if you’ve already got that amazing UK SPACED box set and an all region player… and you’ve already seen my amazing appearance on that documentary about modern appreciation of SPACED – then you’re probably scratching your ass and fingering your nostrils wondering why you should bother with this set. Wouldn’t it just be a double dip for you? Well, yes… and no. You see – this set is even better than what the UK got. (Sorry Brits, but tis true.) In addition to everything on that set – there’s all new commentaries recorded with crazy guests that espouse from whence their passion for this show came from. Folks like Kevin Smith, Quentin Tarantino, Matt Stone, Diablo Cody, Bill Hader and the great fucking PATTON OSWALT – and you really should hear his commentary work on here! For all you geeks about to attend SPACED-NUMB-A-THON – this is the perfect keepsake to get signed at the event – and it will be available for sale there as well!

THE MUMMY (Blu Ray)

The very first foreign set visit I ever did was to the set of THE MUMMY – back in 1998. Oddly enough, I wasn’t a fan of the film. I liked aspects – but really wanted the tone to be straighter – for the film to actually have atmosphere – and for there to actually be tension and something to be creeped out about. Basically, I didn’t get Stephen Sommers. Since writing that review, I have come to enjoy THE MUMMY for what it is. A lite fantasy adventure comedy with a passing glance at horror. Do I wish it was something more? Absolutely – but I enjoyed ILM’s work along with the make-up work that was done. And everything about the Mummy’s story and romance, I like. And I really adore Rachel Weisz and most of Brendan Frasier… but the comic sidekick stuff wears a bit thin for me. That said, it is carmel coated eye fluff that I set the tone for the next one, which I actually preferred. The Blu Ray is gorgeous – filled with extras and a neat look at this third Mummy coming very soon. Because I’m a Universal Monster movie maven – it’s there on the shelf next to all the classics, oddly – it’ll never get played as much as those.

THE MUMMY RETURNS (Blu Ray)

THE MUMMY RETURNS unlocked my appreciation for the 2lbs of sugar coated Frosted Flake monster flicks of Stephen Sommers. In this film, I could suddenly see that thus far in Stephen’s career he’s made enormous budgeted Doug McClure Edgar Rice Burroughs adventure films – only campier and far more lushly produced. About the time the greater glory of Pygmy Mummies arrive on the scene and you have a flying AirShip right out of some frenzied AIP Vincent Price fantasy… well… I couldn’t have been more delighted… Except for the apocalyptically awful and painfully embarrassing vfx on the Scorpion King at the end. WHAT THE FUCK? Seriously – one of the worst visuals ever conceived in the history of ILM. I know a lot of people that shit on the little kid, but I loved this character. I love that he is smart, brave and filled with nerve. He isn’t played like some wimpy screaming ninny. He feels like an Encyclopedia Brown or Hardy Boys character. A kid empowerment character if I’ve ever seen one. – That said – this brings me to a whole other subject. You know – The Classic Universal Horror films were huge hits for kids back in the day. From little tykes to teenagers and on up. Universal was the Anti-Disney – and kids ate up these monsters. There were rules. Ways to kill the monsters… Little monster poems to learn, weapons that would take them out – and heroes and grown up characters to aspire to be. And if a kid came across a monster – sometimes they wound up dead. Because they didn’t know these rules. But mainly – they were adult starring endeavors. They were played straight, but just didn’t splash blood all over the place. Didn’t gore it up. And these early films essentially founded UNIVERSAL STUDIOS. With the MUMMY series they went kiddish. It’ll be interesting to see what happens with THE WOLF MAN when they head far more adult. That said, I’m anxious to see what a new director has done to the Mummy series.

ROBOT CHICKEN: STAR WARS

FUCKING AWESOME STUFF! This is fan-fucking-tastic – and worth every penny for its precious 23 minutes of stop-motion goodness. You know you want it. I just wish it was in BluRay.

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While it isn’t a hair on the ass of THE STING or even last week’s fantastic THE BANK JOB – I’m still a sucker for pretty much all movies that deal with cheating casinos out of great deals of money – and that this is a true story is all the better. Nice cast does fine work, but frankly the execution is all a bit ho-hum. However, they do kinda make counting cards make sense, and I’ve never been able to make sense of it before. Of course if I were to try to apply this to some form of gambling… I’d lose every possession I have… and I really like my Tiki Room thing I bought at Disneyland.

VAMPYR – Criterion Collection

If you wish to see the exact opposite approach to the supernatural from Sommers – look no further than this exquisite offering from Criterion. Carl Theodor Dreyer’s VAMPYR! If you don’t know Dreyer’s work – if I may – Seek out THE PASSION OF JOAN OF ARC and DAY OF WRATH! PASSION OF JOAN OF ARC is literally one of the single most brilliant movies ever made. Seriously. It will humble you. That said – VAMPYR is also brilliant work by this brilliant director. This is literally one of the greatest vampire stories ever crafted for film. It is a dream and a nightmare with imagery unlike anything you’ve ever seen. Criterion has done an amazing job with this two disc set and if you love the CARMILLA legend, you’ll go nuts for this rendition!

KISS OF THE SPIDER WOMAN

Great film, but I have a great story about the artwork you see above. My freshman year in College – I was flirting with this older gal – she was 5 years my senior – and I was just 18. She offered to invite me over to her place for the “best hotdogs I’d ever eat.” Well, though my hot dog was wanting to be consumed, my stomach was intrigued. Her place was a scant few blocks from campus and hanging upon her wall in the living room was this poster. Things progressed, she put a blindfold on me – and I let the fun commence, but the entire fuckign time – I couldn’t stop thinking about what sort of woman has a KISS OF THE SPIDER WOMAN poster on her wall. That said – it was pretty awesome sex in my first college affair. That said – at the time I saw the poster, I hadn’t actually seen the film. Since then I discovered what an amazing film this was. Completely worth of its Oscar attention and very erotic. It’s nice to have this in my collection!

Earth: The Biography (Blu Ray)

God Bless the BBC… they bring us SPACED and EARTH on the same Tuesday! And this one is in BluRay – and sweet Jesus does it take advantage. The only thing they get wrong is the whole interior of the Earth part – which is obviously one of those crackpot theories…. We all know there’s a lost world with Dinosaurs and giant geodes in there… either that or it’s just solid black gold, Texas tea, OIL it is! All kidding aside, this BBC documentary is very much an exploration of how the history of Earth’s climate has created the Earth as we know it today. It’s 230 minutes of brilliance. And there’s imagery that will blow your mind.

HIGH AND LOW – Criterion Collection

Here’s Film Noir / Detective fiction done… Akira Kurosawa style. This is an adaptation (kinda) of McBain’s fantastic KING’S RANSOM novel with Toshiro Mifune as our lead character. If you only know Kurosawa’s SAMURAI stories – then you’re in for quite a treat – he was equally astonishingly amazing at work like this! And Mifune in a McBain story is just a treat, the likes of which is very hard to communicate. As usual – Criterion knocks it out of the park – with documentarys, archival interviews, essays and much more!

THE PERFECT STORM (Blu Ray)

A landmark film in terms of visual effects and an ok film, otherwise. Without the programming work that went into making the truly awesome ocean nightmare of the film – the far superior MASTER & COMMANDER’s effects might not have been as solid. That said – I really love the visual effects and on BluRay I have to admit – I drooled at the natural systems recreated with pixels here. And the cast here was just fantastic – remember it was more than just Clooney and Wahlberg, but John C Reilly, Diane Lane, William Fichtner, John Hawkes, Karen Allen, Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio and Michael Ironside. And they all did a very nice job. I still enjoy this film.

I KNOW WHAT YOU DID LAST SUMMER (Blu Ray)

Remember when this was the best horror had to offer in the dark days of the late 90s? That said, I so preferred this to the sickeningly self-aware SCREAM series. It’s still fun – I like that its basically just the old man with the hook campfire story. Besides – I still remember staring the entire movie at Jennifer Love Hewitt’s chest, which by the way stretches her shirt material so lovely in Blu Ray!

BLUES IN THE NIGHT

Long before Elia Kazan became an amazing director to either stand and applaud or sit and look satisfied for condemning someone whose shoes you’ve never had to walk in… He was an actor in films like this and CITY FOR CONQUEST – now Elia isn’t the star, but it is a very interesting experience to see one of the best actors’ directors actually act. He’s not bad. This is a very early Jazzy Film Noir from Anatole Litvak, who went on to direct one of the greatest Noirs in SORRY WRONG NUMBER (brilliant fucking movie) – This was one of his highlights before joining Capra’s Propaganda Unit during WWII. Alongside Elia Kazan – you’ll find folks like Lloyd Nolan, Jack Carson and Wallace Ford (love that guy) – What I really love here is all the Johnny Mercer tunes performed by Priscilla Lane and William Gillespie. The music is a true jewel – but when added to the early-proto-noir story – well it comes out smiling!

BIRD (2 Disc Special Edition)

Here we have in many ways, what I consider to be Clint Eastwood’s most heartfelt directorial effort. BIRD. Clint is an exceptionally passionate aficionado of Jazz and in particular the brilliant talent of Charlie Parker – and I remember marveling at Forest Whitaker’s performance as Charlie. When Forrest won his Academy Award, at last, it was this and GHOST DOG that I was cheering for – hoping that people would rediscover both of those works – cuz.. well Forrest was now an Academy Award winning actor! Picking this up for a mere $11 is a deal! Clint has done a great job with this Special Edition.

MASTERS OF HORROR: Season Two Box Set

Honestly, I’m not a huge fan of this series. Watching some of my favorite directors be given solid scripts with micro-budgets and nationalized casting decisions… well it makes for films that just are not masters of horror. That said, it’s pretty much the only game in town for anthology horror – and in this case – HOLY SHIT – WHAT AWESOME PACKAGING! I might need to pick one of these up – cuz that skull… that’s an accurate representation of Moriarty’s skull’s interior! You see – he really doesn’t have a brain, but a multi-dvd player in his skull. If you look carefully through Drew’s comb-over – you’ll see the slot that you insert new discs into. For real – when you see Drew and Comic Con – check it out – just mess with his hair and put in TWINS – funniest thing ever is to see him talking back and forth as Schwarzeneggar and DeVito. Seriously.

HELP ME EROS

I literally know nothing about this title other than the cover. Which is obviously genius. And the tagline, “Sink Into A World Of Erotic And Psychedelic Pleasures….” Man, do they know me, they even put an ellipse in there just for me. So I’d feel all cozy.

Daft Punk’s ELECTROMA

Experimental & Awesome. Imagine a feature length Daft Punk music video – devoid of dialogue, filled with not their album music, but rather what I would call their sonics – where everyone, everywhere is robotic. The imagery evokes Kubrick and is an experiential piece. Not directly plot orientated – but the sort of thing to put on and FEEL. There is a strong possibility that if you’re not into challenging art cinema that you’ll hate this violently. However, if a Kubrickian Robotic Silent Dialogue-less Experience sounds like something you’d be into… man, you’ll be into this. As Bruce Lee said, “Don’t Think, Feeeeeel” - Personally I found it be a revelation. But then my consciousness has been expanded by the Krell Device.

That’s all for this week – next week we’ll be looking at: Scorsese’s SHINE A LIGHT, DARK CITY (BluRay), THE HUNT FOR RED OCTOBER (BluRay), HAROLD & KUMAR ESCAPE FROM GUANTANAMO BAY, CAFÉ METROPOLE, GIRLS DORMITORY, JOHNNY APOLLO, DAYTIME WIFE, LUCK OF THE IRISH, I’LL NEVER FORGET YOU, THAT WONDERFUL URGE, LOVE IS NEWS, THIS ABOVE ALL, SECOND HONEYMOON, FREAKAZOID 1st Season, LOST BOYS: THE TRIBE, DOOMSDAY, THE LOST BOYS (BluRay), TOP GUN (BluRay), PATRIOT GAMES (Blu Ray), CLEAR AND PRESENT DANGER (BluRay), TINY TOON ADVENTURES, SUM OF ALL FEARS (BluRay), NEVER BACK DOWN, TAI CHI MASTER, WAR GAMES, INGLORIOUS BASTARDS, DEVIL HUNTER, CANNIBAL TERROR, OUTFOXED: RUPERT MURDOCH’S WAR ON JOURNALISM, DADDY DARLING, HAIR EXTENSIONS and much more!