It is important to know humanity’s history, and although the Soviet Union has not been a force for nearly 20 years, the stories that individuals have about the former behemoth are legion. Laszlo (Kovacs) and Vilmos (Zsigmond) are able to provide their story, one that parallels that of countless other individuals under the Soviet regime. While the United States put forth its own propaganda as part of the Cold War,…
I believe the most interesting thing about war is how different battles and events are construed by other cultures. While the Battle of Britain was an important battle no matter where one sat in World War II, I feel that it is much more important in the eyes of individuals that were directly impacted. This documentary does well in describing the importance of the battle to American viewers, while keeping…
A Town Like Alice was originally a book by Nevil Shute (On The Beach). VCI’s version of the film is the stellar 1956 release, and the company has provided viewers with an incredibly clean and sharp print. The film is particularly interesting as it provides viewers with a sense of an independent woman’s life during World War II. Recently moved to Australia, Jean Paget is provided a chance to move…
Metal Shifters is an incredible film. The plotline is something that has not been done before – a mysterious satellite starts to impact the city of Redeemer, Idaho. What seemed to be nothing more than a bit of scrap starts to take over various living creatures and turns them into metal. This becomes a problem when the satellite gains some form of sentience. Whether the city is able to…
This is an incredibly rare recording. This version of the Jazz Singer features Jerry Lewis, and the recording is taken directly from the legend’s video vault. One has to remember that this recording was done in 1959, which precludes the existence of home-based VHS recorders. The fact that this recording still exists is particularly impressive, as a number of the television stations that received these performances recorded over these…
Many online retailers have Bizarre Foods Collection 5 Part 2 available for under $20. With ten hours of footage present, this makes the cost per hour at about $2. This should make Bizarre Foods Collection 5 Part 2 a must buy for any fan of Andrew Zimmern. Continue to check out Bizarre Foods; the current season has Zimmern focusing on all the crazy foods that have made the United States…
Weeds – the Showtime comic/drama about a widowed suburban mom who turns to drug dealing to make money – has always been a victim of its own success. The first couple of seasons were remarkably fresh, with quirky supporting characters and even quirkier plot points then it ran into a wall trying to one-up the original premise. Drug dealing led to smuggling and then marrying a corrupt Mexican mayor/cartel leader,…
I Melt With You is an interesting take on the party film. While a number of these titles would just focus on the debauchery present between the main characters, I Melt With You showcases the cathartic side of these type of social meetings. Jeremy Piven, Christian McKay, and Thomas Jane unite in what seems like a normal group tying one on. By the end of the weekend, they are able…
Considering all of the music bio pics that have been made over the past few years there has surprisingly never been one based (yet) on Queen, one of the most outrageous stadium-filling rock bands of the 70’s and 80’s (and that’s saying a lot when you consider how outrageous those decades were for rock bands). Until that inevitable film is made, this music documentary on the British band serves as…
Dragon Age is one of the world’s largest RPG franchises, so it makes a lot of sense that there would be efforts to immortalize the game on celluloid. Dragon Age: Redemption is a title that draws considerably from the game’s mythos, but from traditional fantasy and tales of yore. Felicia Day (from The Guild) is the focal point of Redemption, an episodic tale that is presented in a serial format.…
Justin Timberlake looks to make eir triumphant return to the silver screen with In Time, and shares equal time with Amanda Siefried. The film focuses on a future in which no one is forced to get old; they can pay to stick around the world. The movie focuses on Timberlake’s character coming upon a surplus of time, even as eir mother has passed on. A chase sweeps up all the…
It has been a while since we last reviewed a wrestling release. What better product could we receive to mark the re-opening of the wrestling reviews section? TNA (Impact Wrestling) puts on one of their historically best PPVs, and the 2011 edition of the show is no different. The show united some of wrestling’s biggest stars (Kurt Angle, Rob Van Dam, Sting, and Hulk Hogan) with those talents that will…
The sharpness of Drive’s print, even on the DVD format, showcases the amount of care that Sony has taken in transferring this onto a home video format. For viewers that wish to get more information about Drive, the included featurettes showcase the intense cars that are used (Under the Hood), the difficulty in the different stunts (Driver and Irene), and an in-depth look at Drive’s producer (Nicolas Winding Refn). Drive…
The amount of care that MGM put into this version of Sid & Nancy makes it into one of the best Collector’s Editions / reissues that we have reviewed for NeuFutur. The grim, gritty feeling of the movie is restored to its original film quality, while the soundtrack feels much more visceral and in your face than it did on either VHS or DVD formats of the film. For individuals…
The love story is one of the oldest stories that we have archived. It plays to the most common emotions that individuals have, and in cinema, it is an easy film to make. However, this does not mean that love films are always good. The Chateau Meroux is good, and will have viewers eagerly anticipating what happens to Marla Sokoloff’s main character. This character is given a vineyard by eir…
The Western as a genre has never recovered from the precipitous decline experienced by the seventies and eighties. I believe that most of the viewing audience has been burnt by films in the genre, which tend to be rote recreations of better titles. Blackthorn, starring Sam Shepard, Stephen Rea, and Eduardo Noreiga, is one of the films that looks to restore the Western to its former glory. The title focuses…
kimi ni todoke – From Me to You- Volume 1 (Box Set) / 2012 NIS America / http://www.nisamerica.com / http://store.nisamerica.com kimi ni todoke is a show that can be enjoyed by any age and familiarity with anime. The show tells of Sawako’s life, eir hard times at high school, and how eir classmates can be mean. As Sawako continues eir path through high school, eir feelings begin to grow more…
There is so much to learn about The Doors. The band hit a wall with the death of Jim Morrison, and the different interviews between Ray Manzarek, John Densmore and Robbie Krieger show that. However, the process that the band entered into when they were recording L.A. Woman was nothing different than the norm. One gets into the mind of each of The Doors as they laid some of the…
I must admit that before receiving The Moment of Truth (Il momento della verita), I was not too familiar with the works of Francesco Rosi (Hands Over the City, Christ Stopped at Eboli). The Moment of Truth is Rosi’s 1965 film, and it focuses on the trials and tribulations of an up and coming bullfighters. This is a story of an underdog that ultimate receives fame and riches, all while…
The whole-hog restoration and placement of older films onto the Blu-Ray format is great. It allows different resources to be tapped, while giving viewers a take on the film that is utterly and completely new. Synapse Films has released this 1989 Scott Spiegel title, with luminaries such as Quentin Tarantino and Lawrence Bender tapped to provide this vision. A cast of stars (Bruce Campbell, Renee Estevez, and Sam Raimi) all…