MCN DVD Reviews: October 20, 2009

..MCN Weekend

Cheri

Stephen Frears and Christopher Hampton’s adaptation of Colette’s Chéri and The Last of Chéri is a deliciously mounted period piece, which, I hope, is taken seriously in Oscar’s design categories. In it, Michelle Pfeiffer delivers one of her strongest performances as a woman of a certain age, Lea de Lonval, who’s engaged in mutually self-destructive relationship with the much-younger son of old friend and fellow courtesan, Madame Peloux (Kathy Bates).

Set at the height of Belle Epoque France, Peloux has asked Lea to introduce her 19-year-old son, Cheri (Rupert Friend), to the mysteries of the boudoir, and, six years later, neither person get the other out of their system. Cheri, who looks like one of the foppish Parisian blood-suckers in Interview With the Vampire, is a momma’s boy who marries for money, but can’t get it up – or keep it up – for his teenage bride. That probably has as much to do with his wife's lack of worldliness and wit, when compared to the more experienced Lea. Lest one think Pfeiffer was made up with a trowel and chisel to mask Lea’s post-menopausal wrinkles, it’s important to know that the blond beauty looks every bit the age of the character when she rinses off her cosmetic mask. And, yet, Lea could still put most of today’s cougar’s to shame … facelifts, tummy tuck, boob jobs and all.

Frears’ pacing is controlled and deliberate, as befits the film’s literary origins and daily life of such ladies of leisure. Anyone with a hankering for such period fair likely will fall in love with Cheri, which arrives with informative and entertaining making-of featurettes and alternate scenes. Others simply won’t. – Gary Dretzka

Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Live

For some folks, myself included, the only Hall of Fame worthy of its name is in Cooperstown, N.Y., and it honors the legends and minutiae of baseball. Most of the others are, at best, museums … at worst, tourist traps. Cleveland’s Rock and Roll Hall of Fame exists as both a museum and tourist trap, albeit a pleasant one for Baby Boomers to visit and remember better days.

The problem comes when the governing bodies begin anointing the chosen few legends for induction. As hard as they try, the journalists and veterans-committee members who vote on the Baseball Hall of Fame rarely get it right, anymore, so how could anyone expect music-industry geeks to find a more reliable formula? Indeed, the institution itself is a bit of a misnomer, as it honors artists who’ve excelled in everything but rock music -- strictly speaking, anyway – as well as business executives, producers and deejays whose unethical practices (payola, price gouging, extortion, I could go on) are minimized, not to offend their sponsors.

Nonetheless, Cleveland needs the tourist dollars and we Boomers demand our nostalgia fix. The rock hall’s selection committee had things easy for most of its first 10 to 15 years. A blind monkey could lob darts at wall lined with Rolling Stone magazines and hit a reasonable number of justifiable candidates. Just as Rolling Stone has become as culturally relevant as Teen Beat, however, the monkeys at the wheel have been required to make accommodations to the whims of popular taste, political correctness, sponsors, genre purists and pop oligarch Jann Wenner.

Guitar ace Jeff Beck joined the growing legion of musicians honored more than once – most athletes, so honored, are allowed to wear only one hat -- while Run-DMC and Bobby Womack belong in some other building, altogether. This list of dubious winners is only slightly shorter than the one containing the names of snubbed musicians, including pre-punkers Iggy Pop (and/or the Stooges) and MC5; crowd pleasers the Doobie Brothers, Steve Miller and Mitch Ryder; Alice Cooper, without whom KISS and Marilyn Manson may never have put on makeup; glam pioneers T. Rex; non-“chicks” Joan Jett and Pat Benatar; groupies the Plaster Casters; singers and songwriters Tom Waits, Neil Diamond and Burt Bacharach; bluesmen Ben E., Freddie and Albert King; prog-rockers Yes, Genesis and the Moody Blues; super-sidemen Ry Cooder, Billy Preston, Bruce Langhorne and Nicky Hopkins; and “influences” Cab Calloway, Spike Jones, Screamin’ Jay Hawkins and Johnny Burnette and the Rock 'n Roll Trio.

That rant notwithstanding, Time Life’s nine-disc Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Live is mostly about the music being honored -- induction speeches are included, as well – and it’s a lot of fun to hear and see being made. The set includes a full day’s worth of classic rock performances – representing 125 groups and artists -- and over nine hours of bonus backstage and rehearsal and material. The mix-and-match material is especially entertaining. For example, there’s Bruce Springsteen collaborating with Axl Rose, Bono and Mick Jagger, among others; Jagger and Tina Turner heating up "Honky Tonk Woman"; a Cream reunion and Yardbirds mini-reunion; John Lee Hooker teaming up with Bonnie Raitt; and Santana and Peter Green reprising their versions of “Black Magic Woman.” Dozens of other inducted and snubbed artists also do song shortened to accommodate TV commercials. The sound and production values are excellent. (Not all video stores are able to sell or rent Time Life products, so check out the Internet to find the best bargains.)

And speaking of unusual match-ups, there’s Willie Nelson and Wynton Marsalis Play the Music of Ray Charles. Country music and jazz meet in the service of a testimonial to the late, great Charles, who knew few, if any musical boundaries. The concert was recorded earlier this year at New York’s Lincoln Center, with Norah Jones sitting in on several of the songs.- Gary Dretzka

The William Castle Film Collection

Marvel Animation: 6 Film Set

Blood: The Last Vampire
Zombies of the Stratosphere

On a timeline of horror movies, William Castle’s oeuvre would show up well after the release of Universal’s monster classics – and all subsequent re-cycling of the iconic creatures – but well before slasher and torture flicks will come to define to the genre. The imaginatively conceived and expertly marketed thrillers included in this collection – 13 Frightened Girls, 13 Ghosts, Homicidal, Strait-Jacket, The Old Dark House, Mr. Sardonicus, The Tingler, Zotz! – began arriving concurrently with the Hammer Studio adaptations of Frankenstein and Dracula, the avalanche of drive-in-ready titles from Roger Corman and AIP, and mutant-monster tales from Japan.

It was a heady time for the genre, if not always the cinematic medium as an art form. The movies were scary, within the limits of the Production Code, but still conducive to necking sessions in the backseat and balcony. Castle’s genius involved creating marketing gimmicks that literally dared teenagers to enter the theater. Like Hitchcock, he would appear in trailers to explain just how much more scary his next movie would be than the one audiences had just paid to see.

He also would hire fake nurses and doctors to man theaters, in case of fright-induced heart attacks; insert “fright breaks” before scary parts; add vibrating devices to seats to initiate panic attacks; introduce such non-technologies as Percepto and Illusion-O; create special “shock sections,” where seatbelts were added to chairs; and add messages, instructing people when to scream. It was a blast. Besides re-mastered editions of his Columbia hits, the set adds the recent feature-length documentary, Spine Tingler! The William Castle Story.

Compare any of Castle’s films to such straight-to-video splatter fare as Wrong Turn 3: Left for Dead and it’s easy to see why annoying adults keep pointing to the “good ol’ days,” when everything was better, including splatter pictures. It isn’t that these franchise extenders are any less scary or intrinsically cheesier than their predecessors. Instead, while such offbeat thrillers as The Tingler and 13 Ghosts are recalled with fondness a half-century after they were releases 90 percent of today’s domestically made horror flicks will be forgotten in two weeks. For what it’s worth, though, “WT3” once again is graced by an appearance bymutant-hillbilly-cannibal Three Finger, who savors the taste of wayward students as much as he does prison escapees. The extras include, Wrong Turn 3 in 3 Fingers ... I Mean, Parts and deleted scenes.

The most recent wave of monsters-vs.-superheroes epics has come at us both in mega-budget-feature form and far less expensive animated, straight-to-video movies. Diehards will seek out anything that carries the Marvel brand, I suspect, while action fans will stick to the big-screen extravaganzas. The titles, which have already been released independently, are Ultimate Avengers: The Movie, Ultimate Avengers 2: Rise of the Panther, The Invincible Iron Man, Doctor Strange: The Sorcerer Supreme, The Next Avengers: Heroes of Tomorrow and Hulk Vs. The Hulk Vs disc is the single-disc edition, with fewer extras.

Blood: The Last Vampire, adapted from a hit anime series, introduced us to Saya, a half-human, half-vampire samurai “who preys on those who feast on human blood.” The sword-wielding warrior’s mission takes her to an American military base, where a truly evil vampire is wreaking havoc. The Blu-ray extras include a making-of featurette, a stunt documentary and storyboard gallery.

This week’s trophy for Best DVD Title goes to Zombies of the Stratosphere. Made in 1952, the cheesy sci-fi flick was among Republic Studios’ collection of Saturday-matinee serials. (The movie’s distributor is the aptly named, Cheezy Flicks). The most remarkable thing Stratosphere has going for it is Leonard Nimoy’s sci-fi introduction as a Martian trying to nuke the Earth out of the solar system. As such, this is a must for any collector of pre-Star Trek relics and trivia. – Gary Dretzka

It's Garry Shandling's Show: The Complete Series
Vega$: The First Season, Vol. 1
Will Ferrell: You're Welcome, America. A Final Night with George W. Bush
Chop Socky Chooks, Vol. 1
The Marvelous Misadventures of Flapjack, Vol. 1

At a time when programming on premium-cable networks was almost exclusively limited to movies, comedy specials and boxing, veteran comedy writers Garry Shandling and Alan Zweibel foresaw a day when HBO and Showtime would compete on equal footing with the then-dominant broadcast networks.

Before he become a Tonight Show regular, Shandling had parleyed his neurotic persona into a success as a sitcom writer and standup comedian. Zweibel had served as a writer and bit performer on more than a hundred episodes of Saturday Night Live. Together, they would exploit the freedoms accorded cable programmers to attract hip, young adults who were being bored to tears by middle-brow network fare. On Showtime’s It’s Garry Shandling’s Show, the comic essentially played himself, dealing with minor crises and everyday affairs.

Occasionally, he would break the “fourth wall” to speak directly to the audience. As such, the show paid direct homage to The George Burns and Gracie Allen Show, while also anticipating Seinfeld, in that it was about nothing and everything simultaneously Among the celebrities who made guest appearances, playing themselves, were Tom Petty, Rob Reiner, Vanna White, Red Buttons, Dan Aykroyd, Martin Mull, Gilda Radner, Carl Reiner, Chevy Chase, Red Buttons, Jeff Goldblum, Don Cornelius, The Turtles and Los Angeles Mayor Tom Bradley. The generous Time Life set adds featurettes with cast, crew and writers; episode outtakes, original promos and commentaries. And, yes, the show’s still very funny.

Back in 1978, Las Vegas still served as a giant piggy bank for Midwestern mobsters and the Chamber of Commerce has yet to pitch the city as a family destination or the world capital of bachelorette parties. Cirque du Soleil had yet to be invented and Sinatra was still the hottest ticket on the Strip. Aaron Spelling sensed this Las Vegas would provide a perfect setting for yet another one of his fantasy crime shows. Vega$ starred handsome action star, Robert Urich, in the role of a Vietnam vet turned PI, Dan Tanna, named in honor of a Los Angeles restaurateur. Unlike NBC’s recent Las Vegas, which was more about bouncing boobs and male bimbos than anything else, Vega$ was about car chases, gun fights and damsels in distress. Tanna was a P.I. built from the same mold as Tom Selleck’s Magnum. Among Urich’s sidekicks were Greg Morris, as a LVPD cop, and Tony Curtis, as a resort owner. Sadly, only half of Season One is available on the long-awaited DVD set.

Will Ferrell’s takedown of the Bush administration, several months after the inauguration of Barack Obama, was a curious bird. He used George Bush’s own words and policies to skewer the former president. He also sounded very much like the man who may turn out to be our least articulate and most ineffective chief executive. Considering that Bush had, unlike his vile vice president, put himself out to pasture, many of Ferrell’s barbs seemed strangely out of date and redundant. By the end, after all, Bush had largely become a parody of his former self, a man who couldn’t wait to leave Washington in his rear-view mirror. Still, hard-core Bush haters will like most of You’re Welcome America. There are several backstage and making-of featurettes, as well as spoofs on Bush.

Cartoon Network has sent out first-season collections of its The Marvelous Misadventures of Flapjack and Chop Socky Chooks. The former is set in the sea village of Stormalong, home to a kid named Flapjack, an old pirate called Captain K'nuckles and a wise-cracking whale, Bubbie. Four making-of features have been added. Chop Socky has lots of bizarro characters in the service of action, comedy and adventure.

Greg Giraldo may be best known as the celebrity roaster most likely to be zinged for being the real unknown comic. Midlife Vices demonstrates Giraldo has a distinct voice of his own and a wide spectrum of interests. The extras include a pilot for an adult-oriented show. In other TV-to-DVD news: the third season of 30 Rock, with commentary, deleted scenes, Muppets interviews, a table read, photo gallery and other making-of material.

Bones: Season Four” represents the surprisingly successful Fox show, starring David Boreanaz, Emily Deschanel, T.J. Thyne and Eric Millegan.

Among the episodes included in The Mary Tyler Moore Show: The Complete Fifth Season are “Will Mary Richards Go to Jail?,” “Lou and That Woman," “Not a Christmas Story” and “Ted Baxter's Famous Broadcasters' School.”

Top Chef: New York: The Complete Season 5 opens with the introduction of Toby Young as new judge, along with Padma Lakshmi, Tom Colicchio and Gail Simmons. The extras include a cookbook, Stew Room footage, interviews, cooking demonstrations and a PC-game demo.

The L Word: The Complete Final Season is curious in that the season’s central mystery is never really solved. This leads one to believe that a movie or TV reunion special might be required to tie up loose ends.– Gary Dretzka