Aisle Seat Presidents Day Edition

By Andy Dursin
www.andyfilm.com
dursin.blogspot.com

The empty void of the month of February has been brightened up by a succession of hot new video releases, from Criterion's outstanding new box-set of "The Last Emperor" to superb new editions of comedy classics "Groundhog Day" and "Tootsie." Without further ado here's the latest round-up of new and upcoming DVD and Blu-Ray discs for your viewing enjoyment...

30 DAYS OF NIGHT: Blu Ray & DVD (**1/2, 106 mins., 2007, R; Sony): Atmospheric but obvious vampire yarn, an adaptation of a Dark Horse graphic novel centering around a small Alaskan town attacked by vampires after the sun sets for the last time in a month.

Josh Hartnett is the town sheriff who takes on the ugly undead after their cargo ship arrives shortly before the town is enshrouded in darkness; Melissa George his estranged wife, who misses her plane out of town and tries to find a way with Hartnett to stay alive during one bloody onslaught after another.

Steve Niles, Stuart Beattie and Brian Nelson's script is ultimately too familiar for the movie to really be effective, but credit should go to director David Slade for playing up the atmosphere and crafting vampires that are anything but the sexy, seductive beings we typically get in genre films. These bloodsuckers are nasty in appearance and personality, making their menace at least physically threatening, while Hartnett and George both put in reasonably convincing performances. In the end "30 Days of Night" will likely prove to be overly predictable and cliched for seasoned genre fans, but those searching for any watchable horror outing with a bit of visual flair could do far worse, especially in lieu of the "Saw" movies and similar knockoffs typically infiltrating theaters and video store shelves.

Sony's Blu Ray disc is a keeper, with a beautiful AVC encoded transfer and Dolby TrueHD audio track making for a spectacular technical presentation. Solid extras abound as well including a commentary, eight featurettes, and a Blu-Ray exclusive comparison with the graphic novel.

Murray plays a TV weatherman who becomes bound in time to relive Groundhog Day over and over and over again, with his producer Andie MacDowell and cameraman Chris Elliott attempting each time to understand just what's ticking off the irascible tube personality. Soon Murray's Phil Connors goes from frustration to acquiring God-like powers by living the day through repetition and bewildering the small-town residents with his vast knowledge of every individual's life.

Director Harold Ramis, reteaming with his "Ghostbusters" co-star, keeps the action moving, mixing laughs and sentiment perfectly, and constantly putting spins on the ingenious Danny Rubin premise. It's an undeniably entertaining brew that represents some of the best work of its cast and crew, with a great Murray performance and a catchy George Fenton score adding to the fun.

Columbia's new 15th Anniversary Special Edition release (has it been 15 years?) offers inviting supplemental features, including never-before-screened deleted sequences and a new documentary on the production, as well as a recent Ramis interview and the commentary from the prior DVD release. The 16:9 (1.85) transfer and 5.1 Dolby Digital soundtrack are both excellent, and a Blu- Ray version is supposedly in the works, though without any release date.

Winning performances from Murray, Lange, Charles Durning, Teri Garr and an unbilled Bill Murray (as Hoffman's roommate) are complimented by a superb script (credited to Larry Gelbart and Murray Schisgal, with an unbilled assist from Elaine May), fine cinematography by Owen Roizman, and a pleasant Dave Grusin score. The film may be dated in some respects -- and certainly seems to have ushered in the era of cinematic montages, as accompanied by Stephen Bishop's classic soft-rock ballad "It Might Be You"-- but "Tootsie" remains one of the ë80s top comedies for its warm and believable characterizations.

Sony's 25th Anniversary DVD includes the documentary "A Better Man," offering new interviews with Pollack and Hoffman, as well as a generous mix of older interviews and Hoffman's original screen test. Deleted scenes are also on-hand, though regrettably Sony didn't import Pollack's director commentary from the Criterion laserdisc (as well as a deleted, improvised scene between Hoffman's female persona and Gene Shalit). The 16:9 (2.35) transfer and 5.1 Dolby Digital soundtrack are both top-notch.

Even if it glosses over some of the more heinous crimes of Communist China, Bernardo Bertolucci's THE LAST EMPEROR (***1/2, 165 and 218 mins., 2007, PG-13; Criterion) is still a sweeping, captivating epic that chronicles the life and times of Emperor Pu Yi, the last reigning ruler of China from age three in 1908 through decades of cultural and social unrest and his country's eventual evolution.

Vittorio Storaro's cinematography is outstanding, capturing images never before caught on- screen, while Bertolucci's direction takes us through the life of Yi in a manner that manages to be sympathetic and sad, epic in scope but personal in nature. "The Last Emperor" swept through the Oscars in 1988, earning nods for Storaro and Best Picture, even if many viewers have forgotten about the picture since its original release.

Criterion's four-disc Special Edition of "The Last Emperor" is a marvel for a number of reasons. First, the new digital transfer is immaculate, as close to HD as one could anticipate from a standard-definition release (here's hoping Criterion hits the high-definition arena soon!), while the 2.0 Dolby Surround stereo is satisfying enough. Secondly, the release preserves both versions of the picture, and it's important to note that the 165-minute theatrical release is basically Bertolucci's preferred Director's Cut, not the expanded version. Bertolucci has said he was under contract to make a longer version of the movie for international television exhibition, but while many viewers prefer that 218-minute edit for its more developed narrative, the director believes it's overlong and detracts from the central power of the piece.

Either way you go, though, both versions of the movie are preserved here, with ample supplements that put the icing on the cake. Commentary from Bertolucci, producer Jeremy Thomas, writer Mark Peploe and composer Ryuichi Sakamoto (who composed the odd, albeit Oscar-winning, score with David Byrne and Cong Su) is offered during the theatrical version, with extensive extras on discs three and four highlighted by an hour-long documentary about the director; video images shot by Bertolucci on-location in China; a 45-minute documentary featuring Storaro; a 50-minute examination of the production; a 66-minute BBC documentary on the film; a 30-minute interview with Bertolucci from 1989; a recent interview with David Byrne; and an interview with cultural historian Ian Baruma about the filming.

Extensive liner notes round out a marvelous DVD package that'll undoubtedly rank as one of the new year's finest disc presentations.

GONE BABY GONE: Blu Ray & DVD (***1/2, 114 mins., 2007, R; Buena Vista): Dennis Lehane's bestselling novel became a taut, tense film under the guidance of director Ben Affleck, impressively making his feature debut behind the lens.

Casey Affleck (Ben's younger brother) stars as a private detective looking for a young girl who's just disappeared from her Boston-area home; Michelle Monaghan is his girlfriend (and associate), Ed Harris and Morgan Freeman the cops all hired by the girl's aunt and uncle to find her, but the situation isn't entirely what it seems in this twisty thriller, adapted by Affleck and co-writer Aaron Stockard for the screen. This is a well-performed (Amy Ryan is likewise sensational as the girl's troubled mother) and enthralling piece that deserved a better fate at the box-office but ought to find ample viewers on DVD and Blu-Ray.

Buena Vista's DVD looks perfectly acceptable in its 16:9 (1.85) transfer with 5.1 Dolby Digital audio, but the presentation is trumped by the Blu-Ray's superlative 1080p AVC-encoded transfer with uncompressed PCM sound. Extras include an extended ending and deleted scenes, two Making Of featurettes, and commentary from Affleck and Stockard. Highly recommended!

BEOWULF: Director's Cut (**, 114 mins., PG-13; Paramount): Robert Zemeckis' sojourn into the realm of computer-generated features continues with this mediocre, action-oriented take on the Old English poem, scripted by Neil Gaiman and Roger Avary and offering visuals that occasionally seem more akin to an Xbox 360 game than mind-blowing 3-D animation.

Granted, some of the background and creature rendering is impressive, but just like Zemeckis' last "film" -- "The Polar Express" -- the film strikes out when it comes to its human characterizations, with vanilla facial expressions and movement, making one wonder what the filmmaker is trying to achieve here. How does a computerized Angelina Jolie supply any benefits over the real thing? Ditto for Anthony Hopkins and some of the other actors whose likenesses are animated here (other stars, meanwhile, look little like their real-life counterparts, including top-billed Ray Winstone and Crispin Glover, trying to pull an Andy Serkis here in his "performance" as Grendel). The script, meanwhile, doesn't help matters either, with leaden dialogue that's often unintentionally amusing as well.

Paramount's DVD looks mightily impressive, at least, with its deleted scenes, multiple featurettes, and two additional minutes of footage rounding out the package. The 16:9 (2.35) transfer is exceptional and the Dolby Digital 5.1 sound likewise spectacular; our HD-DVD review will follow shortly.

JUSTICE LEAGUE: THE NEW FRONTIER (75 mins., 2008, PG-13; Warner): Darwyn Cooke's acclaimed graphic novel -- focusing on the origins of the Justice League during the early 1960s -- makes for a decent, if decidedly uneven, made-for-video work from Warner Bros. Animation. Stan Berkowitz's script and David Bullock's direction aim for a less frenetic pace than recent DC direct-to-video efforts, and the overall artistic design does a competent job capturing the nuances of Cooke's work. Regrettably, the narrative has a hard time holding up in the confines of its 75-minute running time, the movie doing a fine job establishing the characters and setting in its first half, but turning routine and dull in its final third. Regardless, DC fans will still enjoy the action and unique setting of "The New Frontier," with Warner's double-disc DVD set packed with extras, including a comprehensive documentary, two different commentaries (one with Cooke), two other featurettes and three additional JLA episodes on the second platter. Visually the 16:9 (1.85) transfer and 5.1 Dolby Digital soundtrack are each outstanding, with both Blu-Ray and HD-DVD releases to follow.