Dracula Vs. Frankenstein

Ken Begg

Rating: 9 Beans

irector Al Adamson, recently found murdered and buried in his basement, is well known to connoisseurs of 1970s Bad Movies. As was typical for Adamson, known for constantly reworking his movies to turn them into 'new' films, this flick went through a number of evolutions.

First it was meant as a sequal to Adamson's Satan's Sadists. Then a mad scientist subplot was added, including the humiliating casting of horror genre vets J. Carrol Naish and Lon Chaney Jr., who in better days had co-starred in Universal's House of Frankenstein. Finally, Naish's Mad Scientist character, Dr. Durea, was belatedly changed to become the (yet another) last descendant of Dr. Frankenstein.

This is revealed by none other than Count Dracula. It turns out that Durea/Frankenstein's work, dealing with killing young women to create some kind of blood serum (this is all EXTREMELY hard to follow), when perfected will allow Dracula to live in sunlight, and then he could conquer the world or something. As a bonus, Dracula has found the comatose body of the Frankenstein Monster. After Frankenstein zaps life back into it, the Monster (wearing what is absolutely the all-time worst Frankenstein Monster make-up ever) is used to wreak revenge on those who betrayed Frankenstein and put him into a wheelchair (including Famous Monsters of Filmland chief Forrest J. Ackerman!).

Meanwhile, Judith Fontaine comes looking for her sister, a victim of Frankenstein's. This involves her in the local hippie/beach scene, from which Frankenstein and his mad henchman Groton (Chaney) cull their victims. Ultimately, most everyone major is killed except Judith, who stumbles around in horror, no doubt ancitipating her next starring role in an Al Adamson flick (since she's played by the then Ms. Adamson, Regina Carrol).

Highlights includes 'actor' Zandor Vorkov (!) as Dracula. Imagine a thin Frank Zappa, complete with beard. Dracula here boasts horrible white shiny make-up on his face, although his hands and arms are quite tan. Also, his voice is processed through an echo chamber (!), for 'spooky' effect, although none of the film's characters ever mention this (!!); the LSD 'freak-out' scene when humiliated featured player Russ Tamblyn (!) slips Judith some acid; Dracula's goofy deathray ring, and the fact that whenever he uses it, the film freeze frames so that they can animate in cartoon raybeams; the 'groovy' hippie fashions, even worse than usual here; the equally bad '70s music, horribly contrasted with stolen themes from the classic Universal monster movies; the lab equipment provided by Ken Strickfaden, who created it for the original Boris Karloff Frankenstein movie; the Dragnet-styled tough cop; the 'dwarf falling down a ladder and landing unconvincingly on the axe' scene; the scene where Frankenstein falls victim to the guillotine from his none-too-scary haunted house exhibit; and the final, poorly lit and barely visible title bout, basically a rip-off (literally!) of the 'Black Knight' scene from Monty Python and the Holy Grail.

About Ken Begg

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HD DVD review

MAIDEN PUBLISHED Nov 7, 2006
AND

Yunda Eddie Feng

In the following honky-tonk consideration, John J. Puccio and Yunda Eddie Feng wrote up their opinions of the film, and in addition John wrote up the video, audio, extras, and concluding remarks.


The Veil According to John:

The 1950s were a time of swop, and not a little trepidation, for the big industry. Television was the enemy, keeping people in their homes, and Hollywood was doing caboodle it could to come-on viewers back into theaters. It was the discretion of widescreen color, Cinerama, CinemaScope, 3-D, stereo sound, and the sumptuous extravaganza. It was the era of "Ben Hur," "The Ten Commandments," "El Cid," and their casts of thousands. And at the close of the decade, released in 1960, came the best and most intelligent of the blockbusters, Stanley Kubrick's "Spartacus." It is relevant fitments that one of the finest of its strain should be among the first of its kind to make it to HD-DVD. Although no tranquil theater can fully replicate the prominent movie-telly experience, "Spartacus" on HD-DVD, fully restored (if not fully cleaned up), is as striking today as till doomsday. It is a fog fully worthy of its ranking as a super spectacular.

The character of Spartacus, played by Kirk Douglas, is, of conduct, based on the real historical figure, an escaped gladiator-burn the midnight oil who led an army of comrade slaves in nauseate against the legions of the Roman Republic in the initially century, B.C. The movie is notable not only for its expected sword play and scenery, but for the true inscrutability of its characters, their relationships, and their political intrigues. It is a story of both inward and outward conflicts, banal neighbourhood for director Kubrick and screenwriter Dalton Trumbo. In reckoning to Douglas, other stars of the film include Jean Simmons as Varinia, the slave with whom Spartacus falls in love, Sir Laurence Olivier as Crassus, a scheming Roman general, Charles Laughton as Gracchus, a scheming Roman senator, Peter Ustinov as Batiatus, an crawling slave trader, and Tony Curtis as Antoninus, a body servant to Crassus and singer of songs. In age before CGI graphics, it features a multitude of extras making up the grind army and the legions of Rome. It's quite a wonder to remark.

The Fog According to Eddie:

When I first watched the film on disc, I skipped over the unexceptional movie just to watch the furore where the slaves be elevated in unison, all shouting, "I'm Spartacus!" I'm telling you, regardless of the decipherability of the on-screen action, the emotions stirred by the scene overwhelmed me. My eyes misted over, mirroring heroine Kirk Douglas's resistance to what was happening.
I first truism "Spartacus" when I was about six or seven. One evening, my dad, my mom, and I sat down to watch "Spartacus." I didn't remember much of the film, evidently, but I got the feeling that my dad was really impressed with it.
When I first got "Spartacus" in the mail, I gave my dad a clanging to tell him connected with it. He was happy, of course, and he told me that my grandfather had captivated him to see the flicks overdue when he was a teenager. I estimate watching "Spartacus" with me was my father's way of headway of passing down some sort of cinematic legacy to me. I propose to watch it with my dad again some later. I also script on watching "Spartacus" with my children. In a means, this film is the ultimate offspring pellicle. Spartacus fights not only in return freedom but also for dignity, family, circle, and author-son relations. The film is a pathetic face but not in the Robin Williams schmaltz sense. Measure, here is a flick based on ideals, convictions, and moral vigor that enthralls finished with sheer wrest of understanding.
Back in the day, Kirk Douglas eagerly sought the baptize role in "Ben-Hur." Director William Wyler chose Charlton Heston instead, oblation the function of Messala to Douglas. Miffed, the hotheaded Douglas decided to make his own Roman epic. He secured the rights to "Spartacus," a novel written by Howard Fast, and hired Dalton Trumbo to write the screenplay. Now, Trumbo was on the blacklist as only of the "Hollywood Ten," so he had been writing screenplays with pseudonyms. (The Hollywood blacklist move to anomalies such as French writer Pierre Boulle winning the Oscar for "adapting" his own novel concerning "Span on the River Kwai," notwithstanding the fact that he didn't cancel the screenplay and didn't speak a word of English!) At any kind, Douglas worked as the managerial creator of the film, and he determined to go ahead and openly credit Trumbo for writing the screenplay. I remember once reading a magazine article near the making of "Spartacus" where Douglas discussed Trumbo's contributions to the film. Douglas said that one time, Trumbo walked up to him looking at him weirdly and softly said, "Hold responsible you." Retelling has been lenient to Mr. Douglas–he is credited with breaking the blacklist.
In the videotape, Douglas stars as Spartacus, a Thracian bondsman sold to Batiatus (a gay Peter Ustinov), a gladiator trainer. Eventually, Spartacus leads a hack revolt that threatens to crumple the Roman system. Sir Laurence Olivier stars as Crassus, the ambitious Roman senator who seeks to become dictator of Rome. Crassus actually believes in the greatness of Rome as an unreal, and he sets out to quash Spartacus's contumacy. What makes this film so endlessly fascinating is that the "bad guys" fight for their beliefs as much as the "good guys" do. To get a perception of how good the script is, there is a scene near the end of the glaze where Crassus talks fro representation up lists of Rome's enemies, a cleverly distant-handed method of referring to the blacklist.
Jean Simmons plays Varinia, Spartacus's love interest, Tony Curtis plays Antoninus, a "singer of songs," and the sly Charles Laughton plays Gracchus, Crassus's primary contender in the Roman Senate. Laughton and Ustinov would've stolen the movie had it not been in the service of the power of Douglas and Olivier's acting. The "corpulence" talk between the two "big" actors is a marvel of screenwriting.
Some time ago, I wrote here how powerful it was to regard realistic airplanes and ships recreate the mug on Pearl Harbor in the blur "Tora! Tora! Tora!" A similar effect takes set out here, where a truthful cast of thousands was employed for the massive conflict scenes. There are matte shots, of speed, but still, for the most vicinage, the people that you discover on screen were actually physically there as opposed to the computer-generated "cast" of thousands we detect in latest-light of day epics.
Much brou-haha has been made apropos the fact that Stanley Kubrick directed "Spartacus." Some think that the film fits neatly into Kubrick's oeuvre, how he not under any condition made the done movie twice. Others think that it was a shame how their beloved director was shoehorned into the project as a gun-for-hire after the original boss left due to creative differences with Kirk Douglas. You homelessness to know what I think? Except for "Paths of Glory" and "Dr. Strangelove," Kubrick was overrated. By the skin of one's teeth because Kubrick's films are difficult to empathize with does not inevitably enterprising him a genius. Myself, I don't think that Kubrick directed "Spartacus" at all. He was just there to set up a few shots and to keep the Director's Guild from fining the production for violation of guild rules about actors/producers who seize pilot from directors. Every minute of the film feels like it was directed by Kirk Douglas.

Camila Guzmán Urzúa returns to the place where she was raised, Havana, in this memories yon a revolution gone wrong. Via interviews with her long-lost school chums and ’80s artists and activists, she paints a tantalizing depict of a debark on the brink of a utopia that turned manifest to be an impossible oath. Although the film fails to reveal anything new about the country’s current crisis or the Cuban diaspora, it’s a bittersweet charge to what could have been.

Anticipating the save of Redone Line´s live-action membrane version of J.R.R. Tolkien´s classic invention trilogy, "The Lord of the Rings," Warner Bros. issued the 1978 Ralph Bakshi animated idea on DVD. Whether the pep will prosper any better on disc than it did in theaters is anybody´s guess.

John Ronald Reuel Tolkien, a professor of Anglo-Saxon and English language and literature at Leeds and Oxford Universities, began work on "The Rings" shortly after the finish of "The Hobbit" in 1937, but because of the intervening war and his teaching duties, the trilogy wouldn´t see print until 1954-55. The books, which number "The Sorority of the Rings," "The Two Towers," and "The Return of the Ruler," got mixed reviews at the time of their publication and picked up a small but unswerving following. It wasn´t until their paperback hand-out in the sixties that they in the end took off, anon becoming the finery-loved flight of fancy books since Dorothy left for Oz.

It was not surprising, then, that quite a few people wanted to film the books, including Stanley Kubrick, but the monumental area of the project was daunting. The price of actors, scenery, costumes, props, and special effects would deliver been more than the combined expense as regards "Ben-Hur," "Cleopatra," and the "Ten Commandments" put together. Today, of speed, most of the expenses are absorbed by computers, with digital graphics able to bear evenly matched or more intelligent results at often much lower cost. Then Saul Zaentz stepped in. His Fantasy Records had struck gold with bands like Creedence Clearwater in the sixties, and turning to take he and his unripe company, Fantasy Films, had had the charitable fortune to bring forth an Oscar winner in "One Flew Over the Cuckoo´s Nest" in 1975. Zaentz bought the film rights from the Tolkien estate.

But how to film the books was even then a question. Without the benefit of computer graphics at the time, the only realizable answer appeared to be dynamism. That was Zaentz´s first mistake. In taking an epic like "Lord of the Rings" that appealed largely to teens and adults and turning it into a cartoon seemed to trivialize it. Animated features may partake of unexceptionally been popular with children and adults, but they were at the time (and to a less extent in any case are) considered kids´ fare. Many of the "Rings" host of loyal fans were turned off by the idea previous they had even seen the fancy. The instant miscalculation Zaentz made was hiring Ralph Bakshi to direct. Bakshi was, certainly, an inspired animator, but his previous efforts had made him something of a severe boy of cartooning: "Fritz the Cat" (1972) and "Heavy Traffic" (1973) both got X ratings, and "Wizards" (1977) was a gloomy apocalyptic affair. Regardless, Bakshi persuaded Zaentz to try an experimental style of fervour for party of the film that sometimes traced real humanitarian forms onto the movies, much like the cock's-crow rotoscoping done by pioneer animators in the days of silent films. It meant that live actors had to perform scenes and then enjoy their outlines and features copied in drawings. The result is deviant to contemplate, and it prompted critics to query why the filmmakers hadn´t merely second-hand tangible actors in the maiden place. Finally, there is the matter of the ending. Nowhere (that anybody could find) in the advertising repayment for the film did it mention that "The Lord of Rings" was really only the first half of the calculate of the three books. It ends right at the midpoint, simply after the battle of Helm´s Occult, and presumably there was to be a continuation. But audiences were so unresponsive about the in the beginning installment that raising the greenbacks for a second dominating theatrical release was never attempted. As contrasted with, an inferior TV print run, "The Reappear of the King," in due course turned up to total the story. (That title, by the in the capacity of, is also available on DVD from Warners, as is "The Hobbit.") All of this was quite depressing to Tolkien fans.

The exploits of the Hobbit orchestra in Mean-Globe was undoubtedly influenced by Tolkien´s love of mythology, ancient English legends, and Wagner´s opera cycle, "The Ring of the Nibelungen." The author claimed he intended no allegorical connotations in his books, his Do battle of the Ring having nothing to do with World War II, his Sauron bearing no relation to Hitler, his Mordor not at all a representation of Nazi Germany. Call it synchrony. But he couldn´t deny the wizard Gandalf´s enthusiasm in the Merlin of Arthur lore or Gollum´s model in Wagner´s Alberich. In any case, he created an inspired journey of heroes and monsters, set in a just the same from time to time long ago and a land far, without a doubt away. That George Lucas and his escort Joseph Campbell would unite to produce their similarly motivated "Star Wars" sagas seemed almost authoritative.

In spite of the uninitiated, "The Baron God of the Rings" follows the exploits of a party of adventurers in a time and place called Middle-Earth, as they attempt to requital a rickety and all-powerful Gird to the land in which it was forged and dispose of it there. In a prologue, the narrator tells us that an bad Dark Lord named Sauron from day one forged nine rings of power over the extent of men, seven more for the minimize lords, and three allowing for regarding the Elf kings. Then he crafted identical master Mechanics gland to rule them all. But Sauron was not able to keep survive of the One Ring, and to come long it fell into the hands of others and was eventually lost exchange for thousands of years. In time it was recovered by a person named Gollum, but the Ring, which gave its bearer the force of invisibility, corrupted anyone who utilized it, and soon Gollum lost it, too. At last the Ring was found by a Hobbit named Bilbo Baggins. More years went by earlier a wizard, Gandalf, made Bilbo give up the Affiliation to his nephew, uninitiated Frodo Baggins, who would stipulate to give back it to Sauron´s land of Mordor and bewilder it into Mt. Doom, the one place where it could be destroyed forever.

There is, ascetically, something irrepressibly charming about Burt Reynolds. The man who exudes, and for a formulation personifies, sex has a subtle, wild charm that enraptures the spirit of women and the resentment of men with an oft-cast glance. Rhythmical when he´s a rascally, irredeemable, drunken blackguard like his character in "The Longest Yard" he is accomplished to convince the audience to descent for him. Of line it helps that his antagonists have even less common value than he does. And that, basically, is the point of the undiminished movie.

Burt Reynolds plays Paul Crewe, a washed-up quarterback who spends his days boozing and watching television with his kept woman. He´s unstable and violent, having nothing in life to lose. He lost everything in a points-shaving scandal while playing virtuoso football and did it without bad conscience. After beating his girlfriend, Crewe goes on a wild chase with police, culminating with a barroom brawl with the authorities.

Sentenced to a Florida prison, Crewe is given an propose to help school the reformatory semi-pro football team in swop for favors from the warden and the guards. Being a nihilist, Crewe turns them down. He´s abused by the guards, ostracized by his fellow prisoners, and usually treated with no respect. But Crewe comes to an understanding of his position and takes the chance to etiquette a football team of prisoners to be of assistance as a tune-up for the team of guards and, secretly, a whole-and-only unexpected for the inmates to hit a guard without repercussion.

"The Longest Yard" is an gripping monster because, by and monstrous, it suffers no "good guys." While Reynold´s Crewe is charming, if not affable, but the truth remains that he is an abusive nihilist. As much as I insufficiency to close to Jim Hampton´s Caretaker, I certain that he´s been imprisoned for a purpose. The guards, supposed to last as a bastion of neatness, be responsible for acts under the control of the guise of their tax that are as bad as anything done by the prisoners in the real world. We end up rooting representing the gang of prisoners simply because they adhere to a code of ethics. The dynamic is rather akin to that of Red and Andy to Captain Hadly and Warden Norton in "The Shawshank Redemption."

Themes and characters aside, is "The Longest Yard" any good? Yes… with a caveat. The movie is steeped in 70s style and it takes its time to regulate up the recital. My generation has become acclimate to comedy being a string of undivided-liners with a loosely coherent collude to hang its hat on. That, or a sickly-harmonious romantic comedy that tries, but hardly ever succeeds, to be farcical. It almost seems equivalent to "The Longest Yard" was a story before it was a comedy. The whodunit is solid and the major players are well defined.

The problem comes from a lot of the slight characters. The rest of the collaborate is a loosely defined mob who serves as setup to save a single joke and then forgotten. The film plays up monsters in the manner of Richard Kiel, Jaws of James Bond superiority, but only uses them as far as something a deft, almost throwaway gag. There´s a karate expert on the field who is reputed to be the most fatal man alive… yet we never regain the chance to see him do his make a pig. Fortunately the anchors of the team of guards are deep-felt, villainous characters including one of the meanest men to for ever play football, Shaft Nitschke. As a dream of-beforehand Packer fan I´ve got a noteworthy advance in my concern suitable Nitschke, and he does an altogether incredible job playing a dirty football player in this integument. Additionally Ed Lauter´s Captain Knauer is sadistically, deviously luscious.

Nevertheless the comedy is good, this is in the long run a movie here football and it force live or go to the happy hunting-grounds by those merits. Fortunately the ways on the battleground really does look like semi-pro football from the 70s. It´s a little slushy but the take advantage of looks convincing. The problem with it lies in the incident that they don´t disbosom oneself the story of the game, pretty they tell snippets of the story, and as a herself who finds the ebbs and flows of the fake important, it´s maddening. You are forced, as a viewer, to close in the time gaps with your insight and while most people won´t have any complication doing that, it did flutter me.

All-inclusive I base "The Longest Yard" an enjoyable movie. It´s got some extremely different characters and elicits a true-blue sense of pathos when they are woe on the entrants of play or when a trouper loses his life. Sundry scenes had me on the lip of my seat hoping what I was expecting, wouldn´t because I had developed feelings for Paul, Caretaker, and the lot. That´s the highest extol anyone can give a movie that´s, "principled a comedy." The forthcoming remake will probably capture the humor of the primeval, but to indeed succeed it needs to find the original´s hub.

More like his Hong Kong efforts than his prior American films,
John Woo's

Face/Off

contains the usual insane levels of
gunfire and melodrama. Like all of Woo's films, they are
simultaneously ultra-violent and anti-violent. He shows what really
happens when violence occurs, not what movies generally do. And
like all his other films, the violence — effective and well
choreographed in its own right — becomes a distraction from the
plot. The violence numbs the mind as much as the plot engages it.
It's exciting, non-stop entertainment, sure, but with it comes a
price. Foremost on my
mind is, does Woo's anti-violence message really work? I really
don't think so. What is shocking and upsetting today is glorified
and cherished tomorrow. The sorrowful effects of violence seen in

Face/Off

and Woo's other work, are not sufficiently
discernible from the purposeless sad melodrama in inferior films with
less to say.

Lest I emphasize this point too much, I must stop myself and state
that

Face/Off

is actually a very fine film. It's violence
may not do what Woo wanted it to, but those in the audience with the
stomachs to handle it should find it tense and exciting. But the real
reason to see the film is for its story, and the two greatly successful
and charismatic leads that pull it off. John Travolta plays the
goodguy. Nicolas Cage plays the badguy. Each are after the other.
The catch is that, through plot developments I will not explain
(suffice it to say they pull this unlikely scenario off in a
reasonably believable fashion), they swap faces and identities. The
goodguy ends up being the one in jail, and the badguy hoops it up
living the goodguy's life, both at home and in the office. The irony
is that Travolta and Cage each play both characters — keeping this
in mind, many scenes take on a deeper level of meaning. And it is
pleasantly surprising how much intelligence there is stemming off from
this essentially ludicrous premise.

The stars have a blast with their roles, and it is they who make the
film as enjoyable as it is. It is Woo's best American work and
possibly his best ever. I like the film, despite acquiring a nagging
emotional distaste for its heavy-handed violence shortly afterward.
I'm sure this was an intended reaction, but is it a desirable one?
Whatever the answer,

Face/Off

is definitely not for everyone.

THE BULKHEAD

Synopsis:

The Wall is a re-telling of the events of the Vietnam War through the lives of three soldiers who never made it home. "The Wall" is the memorial to all those fallen men and women who gave their lives in service of this country during the Vietnam War. Broken into seamless vignettes the titles are:

The Pencil Holder


The Badge

And

The Player

In the first installment,

The Pencil Holder

, an Army brat is desperately trying to gain his father's approval and attention however, the matters of war press heavily on his father's mind. To make life in 1969 Saigon bearable, the young son spends most of his time collecting military patches from wounded enlisted men. The price is usually his father's 12-year old Scotch and a handful of dad's Cuban cigars. All goes well until one day he encounters a particularly badly wounded soldier who mistakes him for his son. With a grip of iron, he holds fast to the boy all through his transport to the M.A.S.H. unit's O.R. Unable to break free, he begins to feed into the soldier's hallucination, thus easing his mental pain and preparing him for the death that is soon to come. Alerted to his son's presence in the O.R. Colonel Holst (Edward James Olmos) rushes to retrieve his son and learns a great deal about taking time out to smell the flowers before they fade and die.

The Badge

, tells the story of a family of military men who have always worn a Sheriff's badge into battle and have always come home. From the first World's War to the Vietnam War, this family has sent her men out with this badge of good luck and safe keeping if you will. The youngest member of the family (Savion Glover) is about to enter the conflict that is raging in Southeast Asia. His grandmother (Ruby Dee) emboldens his spirit by passing down the one link for all her family's military dedication and resolve. Their contribution to the saving of this country. The Badge. Shot down in enemy territory, this young soldier must rely on his skills, training and the promised power of the badge to see him safely home. Through a series of retrospective glances he introduces us to the rich patriotic history he has inherited and it serves as fuel to keep him pushing on in the face of almost certain death. War however is cruel, heartless and certainly deadly for all involved in one-way or another and, this story brings all those elements to bear in its heart-wrenching climax.

The Player

Rear Echelon soldiers. Supply men with cushy jobs waiting out their tour by selling women, drugs, alcohol and transfers to combat wearing soldiers. A squad leader, Valenzuela (Michael Delorenzo) is looking to secure a safe transfer to a non-combat position for a member of his squad whose tour is almost up. The military grapevine points him in the direction of "Bishop" (Frank Whaley). He'll sell just about anything he can get his hands on and everything he can get others to boost for him. When Valenzuela approaches him for the transfer, Bishop offers goods he has no way of providing. However, when Valenzuela sits in with the band on guitar, Bishops' dreams all come true. Always wanting to play the guitar, he has never been able to master the elements needed to become the virtuoso that Valenzuela obviously is. To feed his personal craving for the experience of listening to him play, Bishop moves Heaven and Earth to procure the transfer for Valenzuela's comrade-in-arms. When the deal is set, it becomes painfully clear to Valenzuela the type of person that he is dealing with. Parasitic is probably too good a term but it fits very nicely for the moment. Money in hand, Valenzuela goes to the "club" to garner his man's release/transfer and zones into guitar Heaven, taking all the listeners blissfully with him. War however, is never a place where you can let your guard down. That proves to be a valuable but expensive lesson for all involved in what might be

"The Player's"

and listeners last concert offering.

Audio/Video:

The feature is presented in a 2 channel stereo platform that adequately portrays the soundstage as presented. A 5.1 platform would have been far more desirable given the amount of pyrotechnic involvement found throughout the whole of the picture. Having said that, I found the aural experience less than thrilling and only adequate in its presentation. The video for the disc is that of a first generation cable rendering. The colors are less than rich and the overall sense of the film is one that is drab and bland. Perhaps this was the director's intent in creating this military allegory however, as there is no commentary track, we'll never know one way or the other. It is presented in full frame as opposed to widescreen and does much like the audio, an adequate job in presenting the film's visual offerings. There was a fair amount of pixellation, scratches and flecking throughout the film as well as the color issues already mentioned. It's really a shame that more attention to detail wasn't put into presenting this film. HBO has consistently produced top-notch DVD titles most notably, From The Earth to The Moon and The Sopranos 1st Season. If this is what we can expect from Showtime entertainment in the way of Digital offerings, we re going to be severely cheated in the way of quality presentations.

Extras:

The extras consist of roughly 5-minute interviews with the principal cast members regarding their segments of the film. They are nice additives but entirely too short. The film's trailer is also included as well as filmographies for the major players in each segment-Edward James Olmos, Ruby Dee, Savion Glover, Frank Whaley and Michael Delorenzo.

Overall:

I come from a family with a rich military history and have chosen as my field of employment, the Department of Veterans Affairs. Needless to say, this film struck a cord with me and I am in awe of the storylines presented herein. 58,183 Americans gave the ultimate in sacrifice for this country and these three stories of that courage and self-sacrifice are presented in a most heart-tugging and emotional way. Aside from the production and transfer errors in the audio and video portions of the disc, this is definitely a film that needs to be seen. If you have never come in contact with a veteran or understand the gripping reality that war can bring about, I urge you to see Saving Private Ryan, Platoon and The Wall. It doesn't get more real than this. The Wall is a testament to the lives of all those fallen and those who returned. It's definitely highly recommended!

"

A fitting tribute to Thompson's extraordinary talent

Theatrical review

By

Christopher Long

First published Jul 6, 2008

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"We were somewhere around Barstow on the edge of the desert when the drugs began to take discourse on." As an opening line of a book, it´s not quite in a league with "I am a diseased control? I am a bitter man" or "A screaming comes across the sky," but Hunter Thompson kicks off his first-rate "Quiver and Detestation in Las Vegas" by hammering down and not easing up on the pedal until he collapses from see-through exhaustion. He lived his sparkle in much the verbatim at the same time trend.

"Shrink from and Repugnance in Las Vegas" was the second in a series of three groundbreaking books by Thompson in the late 60s and early 70s that shattered any remaining notions of detachment in reporting, creating a new style he dubbed "gonzo journalism" where fiction blurs with fact, and the writer is as much a part of the alibi as the story itself. His first book, "Hell´s Angels" (1966) was a report of Thompson´s year spent "embedded" with the infamous biker ally and chronicled his journey from acceptance to eventual rejection by their outlandish and often grotesque sub-taste. It was a hit (though not big ample instead of Thompson´s taste) that rocketed the young author to instant stardom.

"Vegas" was the consequence of Thompson´s failed ascription to cover a motor sluice in Infraction City; his semi-delusional 60 page submission was rejected by an angry "Sports Illustrated" editor, only to fit a creative published in two parts in "Rolling Stone," a magazine Thompson would fit in frequently for more than the years to the delight and exasperation of Jann Wenner and others on crew. The story quickly veers away from coverage of the race to a report of the sedative-fueled adventures of Thompson and his consociate Oscar Zeta Acosta, though in the book they were re-dubbed Raoul Duke and Dr. Gonzo. Subtitled "A Savage Passage into the Understanding of the American Flight of fancy," it is a certain of a handful of books which captures a zeitgeist (there is no such thing as _the_ zeitgeist) of the 60s so poignantly it still resonates for a reader like me who wasn´t even born then.

His third book "Fear and Abhorrence: On the Campaign Haul ´72" witnessed the gonzo journalist´s assault on the Washington press corps. He immersed himself fully in the George McGovern campaign, becoming a argumentative advocate to save his candidate and a vicious and vindictive critic of McGovern´s opponents repayment for the Representative nomination.

Alex Gibney´s green documentary "Gonzo: The Life and Work of Dr. Nimrod S. Thompson" spends a appropriate trade of time covering this period in Thompson´s dazzle. While Thompson made no pretense of being an objective journalist, he certainly knew how to play with the expectations of fairness. In one report for "Rolling Stone," he wrote that Popular candidate Ed Muskie was rumored to be under the treatment of a Brazilian doctor who administered the hallucinogenic drug Ibogaine to the feisty politician. "Rolling Stone" allegedly published the claim because it was so scatological nobody would take it seriously, but it was soon picked up by the mainstream compress (every bit as naive then as today) and Muskie´s competition suffered because of it. In a talk show trim off, Thompson jokes that he on no account claimed Muskie was on Ibogaine, at most that there was a rumor in Wisconsin that he was on the cure-all. Of course, a grinning Thompson adds, "I´m the bromide that started the rumor."

Raoul Duke became much more than an outlandish personage in a book; he became both a pen name and a persona repayment for the reputation journalist, and eventually a caricature whose shadow all but swallowed up the actual Hunter Thompson. "Gonzo" kicks displeasing with another marvelous clip from the game show "To Tell the Truth" in which celebrity panelists interrogate three contestants to determine which one is the legal deal. The newscaster asks, "Resolve the authentic Huntswoman Thompson will stand up?" It´s a challenge that structures the entire pic.

But "Gonzo" doesn´t extraordinarily triumph as a "rude journey to the heart" of Dr. Hunter S. Thompson. We don´t gain a whole ration of insight into his personality, but that´s not really Gibney´s point (or at least I don´t reflect on it is.) Thompson´s singularity blended with his fictional persona to the with respect to make an effort to that the two were indistinguishable. Truthfully, you could argue that Thompson not only became the caricature Raoul Duke, but that he in point of fact became the parody of the ridicule as represented by the character Duke in Garry Trudeau´s "Doonesbury," a portrayal that Thompson allegedly despised. Attempting to detach fiction from truth is not only ludicrous in this case; it´s utterly pointless. Peel away Raoul Duke and you´re progressive with a drug-addicted, red-eye-addled, gun-toting narcissist, albeit a definitely charismatic one. Degrade the legend, and you jeopardy destroying the subject entirely.

Gibney thus has to negotiate a treacherous scheme. It´s easy to romanticize a larger-than-duration personality like Dr. Huntress S. Thompson, gonzo journalist, and it makes championing compelling viewing. After all, Dr. Huntress S. Thompson, gonzo journalist, was not bang on a shape to be emulated as many wanna-be gonzos have attempted to do over the years. Thompson´s first-wife Sondi Wright, the most provocative of all the people interviewed in the film, throws some cold bear scrutiny on the party. She talks of Thompson´s now infamous suicide, a picture to the stop which he had talked concerning for years. To some it was a spectacular fashion for a story to go inaccurate on supreme, but Sondi notes that Thompson was a long advancing from the top and believes his suicide was a cowardly act.

The documentary features a mistress of ceremonies of other interviews with politicians as disparate as Jimmy Carter and Pat Buchanan (oddly, everyone of the more eloquent speakers here) and, of orbit, Thompson´s illustrator/collaborator Ralph Steadman. Johnny Depp reads excerpts from Thompson´s work. Motionlessly, it´s the archival footage of Thompson that provides the most attraction here. No, it doesn´t help us get reversed his head, but who the misery would inadequacy to be there: it´s bat motherland, after all. As a substitute for, the footage provides evidence both of the talent and of the wasted opportunity, the creation of a legend and the consumption of a man by that legend. As Thompson himself observes, "I´ve happen to an appendage."

It is true that Thompson´s jog after "Campaign Hang back ´72" failed to twin up to his previous work, but sometimes this point is overstated. Many authors strike gold initially and then struggle to abide by the bar raised so high. Drugs and John Barleycorn may have cost Thompson and his readers sober more smart writing, but the the score is that few 20th century American writers have leftist behind a body of work as impressive and idiosyncratic as Thompson´s, warts and all. "Gonzo" is a relevant fitments tribute to his gorgeous talent. Call it an 8/10 on the DVDTown scale.

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‘Infernal Affairs’, the 2002 Hong Kong misdeed thriller that pitched a Triad mole in the police also pressurize against an undercover cop in the mass, finds its thought in ‘The Departed’. We’ve moved to Irish Boston, where precipitate rookie Billy Costigan (Leonardo DiCaprio) is conspicuously turfed out of the force as a garb for his covet-in relation to ascription, while aspiring hood Colin Sullivan (Matt Damon) signs up for the Solemn Police Academy and fast promoting. Their respective controls are the long arm of the law Captain Queenan (Martin Sheen) and capo Frank Costello (Jack Nicholson).

William Monahan’s screenplay retains the basic architecture, and several bits of business, from the original, pepping it up with snappy macho banter, including some of the most gloriously expressive swearing this side of David Mamet; senior officers Alec Baldwin and Mark Wahlberg spark free each other close to an obscene double act. But it’s somewhat distended; it’s two decades since Scorsese made a highlight less than two hours hanker, and he shows no sign of tract-tightening. The simple, mathematical tragedy of ‘Infernal Affairs’ is mussed by extra layers of hierarchy on both sides and a frustratingly done with-seasoned climax.

The casting, though, is altogether a coup. There’s unmoving something boyish about both Damon and DiCaprio, and both do best as characters who play make-believe but deck out lost in the game (see ‘The Talented Mr Ripley’ and ‘Catch Me If You Can’). Here they approach their impostors from personal ends of the spectrum: DiCaprio’s Costigan starts out an agitated loner and gets more pantihose wound, while Damon makes Sullivan arrogant, relaxed, one of the guys. Concerning a truly laidback about, though, look no further than Nicholson. ‘I don’t wanna be a artifact of my envi-o-ment, I want my envi-o-ment to be a merchandise of me,’ his vernissage voice-atop of drawls – and boy, does he contrive it. He’s every inch the hefty cat in his dotage, pulling rat-faces and pratfalls in a block, grandstanding in a porn theatre. The man’s a movie play and it’s a ridiculously enjoyable spectacle, but it feels more like Jack holding court on Oscar sundown than a crime lord forth his agitate.

You wonder if ‘The Departed’ may possess been more fun to make than to watch; at any pace, its pleasures lie in the style it permits us membership of the team – not that homophobic ribaldry and gags with severed hands are everyone’s idea of fun. There’s a advice of self-motley on Scorsese’s part, a suspicion that he’s appealing to sometime successes. But few directors can compose a movie with the power, indulgence and brass that Scorsese brings to each rule the roost and scene, and ‘The Departed’ is more fun, and certainly more weird, than his last not many films. Probe it due to the fact that more than invest in-slapping entertainment, however, and you weight start to smell a rat.

Madame Rose (Bette Midler) is the stage mother from Tophet. She pushes her two daughters June (Jennifer Rae Beck) and Louise (Cynthia Gibb) into showbiz, but concentrates her ambitions on June. When Rose meets Herbie Sommers (Peter Riegert), he becomes their agent and the statute is successful. But when June leaves, Rose turns her ambitions to Louise, who morphs into the renowned stripper Gypsy Rose Lee. Success on her daughter, in what way, is not enough for Rose, who really wants to limelight herself.