The best part of Transformers 3 are the special effects and the scope of the danger we piddly ass humans are in. The building falling over, the scale of the destruction, the bad guys, and the detail of the transforming, it’s all more more more. Bigger and more, these are the signs of a block buster summer flick, not a thinking quiet masterpiece. Keep that in mind as you watch the low brow chuckles and mostly naked ass we are subjected to in the first minute of the movie. Men..blah

I do long for the good old days when Witwicky was new to the alien robot world and we hadn’t yet been innodanted with very boring, very unfunny ‘side kicks’. What the hell is wrong with these writers and director? What exactly seems funny about exploiting folks with accents or hinting at horrible racial stereotypes? Are they so rich and above us all that they forget to not be so rude to the world? That’s the worst thing going in all the Tranformer movies, the very very very bad taste tucked into every nook and cranny. Other than that I always find a good time lurking between the eye-rolls and sighs.

There was only a little visit with the comic stylings of Witwicky’s parents, which is kind of unfortunate. I like them even if they are a bit much sometimes. Dempsy makes a good snively rich guy who may or may not be in cahoots with the overlord metal factions. He’s making eyes for the woman in our heroe’s life, which makes him even less charming. I did like the young lady who played opposite LaBeouf, or whatever his name is. I am too lazy right now to look up their names, but you know who I’m talking about. She’s pretty tough and brave and her acting out classes our bumbling leading man by about 165%. The voices of the transformers are all pretty good, except the really super annoying “funny” ones. I say “funny” in quotation marks because they are not funny, just in case you weren’t sure where I was going with that.

For this installment Witwicky has a new girlfriend, of course, has no job, is on the outs with the government, and is mostly dispensible to the real story. The alien robots have more secrets. The bad guy robots are looking for something, while the good guy robots are becoming a nusance to mankind. When the evil robots actually come around and start blowing shit up, including lots of innocent by standers I perked up. I mean, these movies generally don’t have much in the way of collateral damage when it comes to human life, so this time it takes a darker turn. When it comes to alien invasions I’m all over any movie that goes down that path. For Tranformers 3 they do a pretty good job of giving the vibe of our whole planet being in jeapardy. What would it be like to have the human race enslaved by an alien neighbor? It actually got me to feel more supportive of the fighting folks, the soldiers who keep coming back for each movie, for nutsy ex-FBI guy, and even Witwicky and his girlfriend. They are what stands between our freedom and being the under appreciated work force for an alien race who want their world to be rebuilt brick by brick, or whatever their world is built with. I had to root for the flimsy humans, it only seemed right.

Overall I really had a good time, minus the few eye rolls and brief wishes that they would just let the franchise go away. The specticle of the special effects is enough to get my approval. To hear Bumble Bee piece together phrases to get his point across, I love that. Was that a sentence? Whatever. If you want a brainiac movie do I need to tell you not to watch this or any of the Transformers flicks? If so, maybe brianiac movies aren’t up your alley.


Features: 9/10

• Above & Beyond: Exploring Dark Of The Moon – A five part documentary that is almost as long as the film itself (1hour 50 minutes). This covers all aspects of the production and is as awesome as it sounds. Michael Bay also goes into great detail on the process of shooting in 3D so if you are interested in the latest technology this is for you.
• Uncharted Territory: NASA’s Future Then & Now – A 30 minute featurette that examines NASA’s space program. Lots of great footage of the international space station and interviews on where the space program will go next.
• Deconstructing Chicago: Multi Angle Sequences – Multiangle sequences from most of the major action scenes in the movie. You can even watch them with commentary by Michael Bay and a bunch of special effects wizards. This feature clocks in at around 40 minutes and usually I skip multi angle stuff but this time I didn’t.
• The Art Of Cybertron – Still galleries of all the robots used in the film. This is split into the following sections: Autobots, Decepticons, Enviroments, Weapons & Gear and Ships.
• The Dark Of The Moon Archive – A bunch of short featurettes that cover everything from sound editing to a look at the wing suits used in the iconic action scene.
• The Matrix Of Marketing – The teaser trailer, theatrical trailer, and all the films posters and merchandise are here for your viewing pleasure.
• 2D Blu-Ray – The standard 2D version of the movie in 1080P on Blu-Ray.
• DVD Version – A DVD copy for the kids bedroom, you know this one will keep them quiet for a while.
• UV Digital Copy – One of those new Ultraviolet digital copies that people seem to like these days.

Cover Art and Menus: 5/10
There is a giant robot on the cover, as would be expected. I don’t mind it, but it’s not very exciting. I wouldn’t have this as a poster, it’s just not interesting enough to look at everyday. I do like the Transformers logo, that would have been a nice bold look for the front of the box and I would have it in my house. The menus are tricked out with all the charm of a space ship control panel.





Audio & Video: 9/10 (By Ascully)
The transfer here is stellar. Bay shot the movie partially on film and partially digital but you won’t be able to see which is which as they did an awesome job of blending the two mediums. The picture is rich colorful and has the blackest blacks this side of the moon. In fact only an idiot would complain about this transfer it is indeed one of the finest in 2011.

I saw the 3D version theatrically and the Blu-Ray actually looks better than I remember in 3D. There is no sign of cross talk or fidelity loss here. It’s just an awesome looking sharp 1080P Blu-Ray 3D transfer that should be at the top of your demo pile.

As you might expect with a disc supervised by Michael Bay himself the audio is also out of this world. Encoded in a Dolby True-HD 7-1 mix this is possibly the best surround mix not just of this year but perhaps of all time. From the opening Paramount Logo with the famous metallic transformers sound effect that whooshes through all your speakers you can clearly tell a lot of care was taken here. If you thought the other two movies were great on Blu-Ray this release will convince you otherwise as it’s light years ahead in terms of audio and visuals. Give this disc a spin you will not be dissapointed. Well unless you hate Transformers movies!!!!!


Value: 9/10 (By Ascully)
We reviewed the 2D version of the Blu-Ray when it came out and my complaint was no extras and no 3D version of the movie. Well all is good with this new release as it literally changes everything including the final score. Paramount have packed enough special features onto the disc that even Optimus Prime would not have room in his trailer for them all. The 3D version of the movie is, of course, how it should be seen. If you held out for this version you will not be dissapointed.  If you bought the bare bones disc from a few months ago you can use the $10 coupon to get a discount on the new one :)

Overall Score 9/10

This time around, Po is struggling with finding his identity, as he discovers that his father, a goose, is not his real father, and that he was adopted.  Po of course is shocked (even though the whole goose/panda thing is obvious to just about everyone else).  Thus begins his journey, while at the same time he and the Five are sent on a mission by Master Schifu to find and destroy a weapon created by the evil Lord Shen (a peacock), played by Gary Oldman.  The new weapon is supposedly more powerful than even Kung Fu, and it threatens the whole existence of the art form, and the entire land of China.

On their journey, Po has flashes of memories of his childhood, and the memories are somehow tied to Lord Shen and his evil plan.  When they finally meet, Lord Shen knows all about Po and his fate, as the two are truly tied together.

Kung Fu Panda 2 is really a good movie.  It definitely focuses more on the story, and has a much more emotional feel than the original movie, which appeals more to adults than kids, while at the same time there is enough humor and action to keep the kids entertained.  I enjoyed the second movie, even though it took a little while to get going.  The voice acting was excellent (again), and the overall style of the movie was again excellent.  You kind of just have to wonder how many of these Kung Fu Panda movies we are going to get?  If they continue like this one, I am okay with the continuation.


Features: 9/10

• Kung Fu Panda : Secrets Of The Masters (New Film) - This is a 23 minute long short feature that focuses on some new characters in the movie: Croc, Storming Ox, and Thundering Rhino, who Po obviously looks up to, and are integral to the story.
• The Animators Corner - Focusing on the process of making the movie, this picture-in-picture feature goes in depth on the movie and how the animators brought it to life.  This is a nice extra, and worth the watch.
• Animation Inspiration - This section focuses on actual locations in China that the Director and animators used as inspiration for the locations created in the movie.  It is a pretty facinating thing to see the comparison here.
• Trivia Track - This is a pop up type of trivia that discusses various aspects of the movie.  It is interesting, if not a bit distracting.
• Kickin It With The Cast - This short focuses on the voice actors as they work on the movie.  It clocks in at about 13 minutes.
• Deleted Scenes - There are a few scenes that were left out of the movie that are showcased here.
• Panda Stories - This is a cool little 8 minute section on the plight of the endangered panda bear.  This is a nice little feature to show kids.
• Kung Fu Shuffle Game - There are two interactive games included on the Blu-ray, and they are defiintely for kids only.
• Ni Hao Learn to Speak Chinese - This is an interactive bit designed to promote and show how to speak basic Madarin Chinese.
• Kung Fu Panda : Legends of Awesomeness - This is a 24 minute short feature which is part of the new Nickelodeon Kung Fu Panda cartoon series.  It is a full episode.
• Filmmakers Commentary - Director Jennifer Yuh features on the commentary that goes in depth on a great deal of the movie and it’s development.  There is involvement with the production designer Raymond Zibach and head animator Rodolphe Guenoden, as they discuss the movie process.
• & More - 
• DVD & Digital Copy - We get both the DVD and the digital version of the movie, which is standard at this point, but appreciated as always.

Cover Art and Menus: 8/10
Stylized and bright, the cover and menus for Kung Fu Panda 2 are a continuation of the first, with Po and the gang looking menacing and ready for any fight.  Just like the movie, the cover and menus are the perfect fit for this movie, and add a lot to the presentation as a whole.





Audio & Video: 10/10
It does not get any better than this.  The 1080p MVC encode at 2.35:1 is fantastic, with insane clarity and color.  The action sequences are spectacular, and there are no issues with black levels or ghosting whatsoever.  The audio is also spectacular, with a peppy Dolby TrueHD setup that is constantly at work with ambient sounds coming from all directions, mixed with solid music and insane bass and action sequences.  This is truly an amazing presentation.

Value: 8/10
I am a big fan of the Kung Fu Panda series, and this second movie was better than the first.  It really is a strong release.  The Blu-ray release is spectacular, with a nice mix of extras.  This far exceeded my expectations, and the emotional driven story is a nice addition to the humor of the first movie.  If you enjoyed the first movie, you will really enjoy this second movie, and let’s be honest – how often can you say the sequel is better than the original?

Overall Score 8.5/10

The obvious thing to say has been said about this movie already, so I won’t say it.

What I really enjoyed about Cowboys and Aliens was that it took me to that time and place almost completely. I love period piece flicks going to other times in history and how every writer has a slightly different way to tell the tales of the times. This is a gritty, dirty time period, lots of dust and grime, and yet in this movie things are a tiny bit on the Hollywood warehouse of Western props side of the dirt road. I can accept that since there are lots of dirty faces, muddy dresses, and a fair share of grunting that makes me think living then was really hard work.

We’ve got a story that’s pretty solid. A man wakes up in a desert not sure who he is with a strange bracelet on his arm. We learn quickly that he’s not to be messed with after he kicks some desert ass right away and heads to the nearest dusty town. One woman knows about his past, maybe, maybe not. I’m not sure about that particular part of the story. I mean, she’s cool and mysterious and intriguing, but the way it plays out in the beginning doesn’t pan out as we get to know her. She’s a good character and I wish they had made her more interesting and less of a question mark early on in the movie.

We find out that a bully dude runs this town. A cattleman by the name of Indiana Solo Jones. He’s got a snotty spoiled grown son who terrorizes the town. There is a sherrif who tries to keep the peace with his big moustache, and the obligatory “Doc” who happens to be the saloon owner and is also Sam Rockwell. With this cast of characters it’s easy to see why I do lean more toward liking this movie.

The music is a bit heavy handed at times, but overall does a find job of keeping me in the old western vibe. The introduction of the aliens with their other worldly sounds and subtle music works alright, but I’ll get to the weakest part of the whole thing in a minute, and yes it has to do with the alien part of the story. OK, I’ll tell you now what problems I had with the movie. Hmmm how do I break this to you without sounding picky or unappreciative of the clash of genres? The clash of genres is awesome, in theory, but I felt that there was a big disconnect between the amazing world of the old west and their encounters with other worldly beings. I have no idea what it would be like, true, however, the visual telling of the whole story has such a jarring contrast between the cowboys and the aliens that it took me out of the movie every once in a while. I would liked for them to resist the temptation of going full Alien during the scenes in their lair. That being said, I like each element seperately. The blending of the two felt like there could have been more connective tissue, but hey, it’s a new world to explore.

It’s a good time. That’s how I see this whole adventure. The guts of making a modern big effects flick with the old school boots and hats and more dust then you can choke on is a great idea. Opps, that’s the boring thing that has been said about this movie…well, I said it. Enjoy Cowboys and Aliens for what it is and you will have a great movie watcher experience like me.


Features: 7/10

• Conversations With John Favreau – A series of interesting interviews with members of the cast, the highlight here though is a 15 minute conversation with non other than Steven Spielberg, Ron Howard and Brian Grazier.
• The Making Of Cowboys & Aliens 5 Part Documentary – This is billed as a 5 part documentary but comes off as a 5 part EPK featurette, its certainly not up to the standard of the superb Iron-Man features you see on those discs.
• Feature Commentary With John Favreau – A full length commentary with Mr Favreau, I love any commentary with a enthusiastic director and this guy certainly is that.
• Second Screen – Universals Second Screen feature that lets you use an Ipad to experience concept art and the like during the movie.
• U Control - A PIP feature that spans 12 of the movies chapters, lots of interviews and behind the scenes footage here if you are a big Cowboys & Aliens fan.

Cover Art and Menus: 7/10
For some strange reason I kind of like this cover art. It reminds me of old Western novels, as I’m sure they intended. I like the whole idea of aliens and cowboys, so it would make a fun poster to hang in our movie room. (Hint hint hint Ascully…) The menu has live clips from the movie, and a lovely typo you can find for yourself. Hilarious.





Audio & Video: 8/10
While the movie was not an outstanding success in the theaters, the quality of the Blu-Ray transfer is leaps and bounds ahead of the 1800′s setting.  This transfer conveys the grit and grime of the setting perfectly with a crisp picture that looks way nicer than the period it’s set in. Cinematographer Matthew Libertique provides a lush sun drenched pallette and some extreme close ups of most of the actors. The only problem I have is some of the darker scenes (the riverboat notably) are slightly tweaked in post to make it darker and scarier, the transfer also crushes the black slightly making it hard to see the detail in the set.

The first thing I noticed about the DTS-HD Master audio track is how clear the dialog is. We have had some Blu-Rays recently with mussy dialog that bleeds into the rest of the ambient sound. Cowboys & Aliens does not suffer from this with a clear classy audio track that really delivers, when the action kicks up the music and alien sound effects sound great with some nice separation and surround sound effects. This is a very cool showcase soundtrack that can be used to show off your system, shame the film isn’t quite up to those lofty standards.


Value: 5/10
Big action, good extras, a fun night at home at the movies, what is it worth? I say it makes a good deal around $15. If you see it for that you are getting a fair price for what you have on offer. I would watch this movie a few more times, show it to my mom, and my nephew, so it’s going to be worth the cash. It’s not tempting at the $20 mark, so watch for the best deal you can find.

Overall Score 7/10

A weakling wants to be a soldier. A scientist wants to make a new breed of super soldier. Hitler has an evil henchman who crossed paths with the scientist…..get the picture? It’s a good story for me. I know the skinny guy turned into a muscle man is weighing in on the annoying side, particularly when it obviously makes him more attractive and more of a romantic interest..blech….however, I still like it. The performance by the Human Torch is quite good. He’s subtle and yet does that “Captain America” thing now and then that makes it just right. I can’t help it if I sound a little gushy about this movie, I really had a great time and that just kind of makes me smushy. If a movie is fun, exhilerating, and has that quality that’s hard to describe, well, that’s what makes me love movies so much.

It’s not perfect or anything…no no. There are some moments of eye rolling here and there, but not much. The performances are awesome, every single one, so that’s the best part of the whole thing. The things that I didn’t really connect with were the gang of soldiers Captain America rounded up to be his team of butt kickers. I wanted more of a build up for them, but that would have added about a half hour to the whole thing, and that might not make everyone happy. I would love it, the longer the better if you ask me.

The bad guy…oh the glorious Red Skull bad guy. He’s Mr. Smith and a Elf and this twisted injected dude with a red burned or peeled or scalded head of some kind and it’s mesmerizing. Hugo is sometimes hit and miss for me, but this time around I couldn’t take my eyes off him. The idea of a Hitler henchman who breaks free and thinks Hitler isn’t enough of a bad dude and that he needs to really be the jerk of the world..well, that’s kinda cool and extra evil.

The CGI is an obvious thing to talk about in this movie, so I might not do it. Well, just this small note, making the Human Torch into a weakling with a big head wasn’t as bad as I thought it was gonna be, so that saved the whole movie and in the end it’s one of my favorite action flicks of the year. Go Captain America!! Is there a Captain France, or Captain England, or Spain, or Russia, or Italy, or Nigeria? Hmmm something to think about.

Features: 7/10

• Marvel One Shot: A Funny Thing Happened On The Way To Thors Hammer – If you have seen Thor (we have not) you might get a kick out of this 5 minute short.
• The Assembly Begins – A short look at The Avengers movie that all of Marvels movies have been leading up to.
• 6 Featurettes – A bunch of nice featurettes that cover every aspect of the making of Captain America.
• Deleted Scenes – A few deleted scenes, the commentary that accompanies them is quite uninspiring.
• Director, DP & Editor Commentary – A full commentary that again is quite uninspired, it’s almost as if they are more interested in watching the movie than talking (perhaps that’s a good thing?)
• 3D Version Of The Movie, Digital Copy & DVD – This limited edition 3 disc set comes with the 3D movie the standard Blu-Ray and a DVD and Digital Copy.

Cover Art and Menus: 9/10
The cover is OK. I wouldn’t have it as a poster. The menu is pretty cool, very designed and made to match the theme of the movie. I like it, but it’s not really necessary. I would rather have them know a couple bucks off the price of these discs instead of jazzing them up so much. I mean, the movie is the thing, not the packaging.





Audio & Video: 8/10 (By Ascully)
Cap blasts his way onto Blu-Ray with a 1080P transfer that will satisfy. The image is subdued by design with a muted 1940′s look (was it really as muted in the 40′s as cinema leads us to believe?). The movie has a ton of low light sequences that would ordinarily make lesser transfers break down but here shadow detail is great and you will never be looking for the brightness button.

The DTS HD MA 7.1 track has an issue with how dynamic it actually is. The difference between loud and quiet is so vast that some of the dialog can be lost in the mix. This was true with the theatrical release as well so it’s not a fault of the disc more of the person who mixed the audio. It’s a shame really as when the action gets loud this soundtrack is really up there with the years best.

Overall I have a new favorite Marvel superhero movie with Captain America, I love the vibe of the whole story and the time period is a cherry on top for me. Really looking forward to seeing the Avengers Assemble in 2012 now, make sure you stick around after the credits of the movie for a sneak peek.


Value: 7/10
Get it if you will watch it over and over. I think you can find it for around 20 bucks. I normally would bark about that, but if you can really give the family or you and some friends a great fun night at the movies in your own little cozy hole in the world, well it’s worth it on this one. I would recommend adding another one to the night, League of Extraordinary Gentlemen. Yes, I know I have talked about it a lot, but seriously, it’s awesome and cool and fits in with the old timey stuff mixed with modern technology….trust me on this.

Overall Score 7.5/10

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Has there every been a time in your life when you thought the whole world was out there to explore with wide eyes and a zest that’s indescribable? That’s the vibe of this movie. Youthful excitement and fear and determination all wrapped up in a story that takes us from family traumas to secret creatures, cover ups and a hint of a message about how to be a good human being. I can handle all of that. I actually got that tingle in my gut and heart palpatations throughout the movie. I was so excited for these kids and so sucked into their ordeal I would have been on the edge of my seat if I hadn’t been so comfortably reclined.

Every performance is just right. There might be the occasional lack of confidence or wooden delivery of a line or two, but so what. These are kids under some pretty intense pressure, a big story to tell, lots of thrills and spills to deal with so the charm of it all is enough to keep me from being too picky.

If there was a way to measure fun I would like to see how my brain was coming along during this movie. I was smiling, afraid for the characters, invested in the outcome of every single being, crying when needed, laughing, and the smile on my face was shining all the time just from pure joy. The spirit of this story did lift me up, even with the harder bits to digest now and then (see the movie and you’ll know what that means).  I have said this before about some other movie, but if you are a jaded grown up with no sense of humor or adventure you will grumble at a few things, but COME ON, get over it and have a good time for goodness sake!!!

If I were to make a day of watching this kind of movie I would start with Close Encounters of the 3rd Kind, followed by ET, The Goonies, and finish with Super 8. What a day that would be!! Get me some popcorn and Kleenex, it’s gonna be a bumpy ride!


Features: 9/10

• Deconstructing The Train Crash – An interactive look at the train crash sequence.
• 8 Featurettes – Some very well produced featurettes that feature JJ Abrams and Steven Spielberg. My favorite is a retrospective of the Super 8 format.
• 14 Deleted Scenes – Lots of deleted scenes in full HD.
• Director Commentary – J.J Abrams talks you through the movie and has some interesting insight into his life as a young filmmaker.
• DVD & Digital Copy  - Lots of ways to view the movie, make sure you don’t watch it on your phone the first time though :)

Cover Art and Menus: 8/10
I do not like slip covers. This time they did a nice job. It’s graphic and bold and it applies in a kind of sweet way to the movie. I would have the slip cover design as a poster because it’s so colorful. It’s red and yellow in the style of super 8 Kodak film boxes. The menu is really cool, even if I don’t see the point.





Audio & Video: 9/10
Super 8 is quite a dark movie visually and this transfer by our friends at Paramount really delivers where others might fail with this kind of material. Set in the late 70′s the film stock used here is quite grainy and makes the time period more believable. The Blu-Ray preserves the grain and gives the whole movie a wonderful filmic quality that is missing from a lot of today’s movies.

Black levels are simply perfect and throughout a lot of the scenes set at night everything holds up with no crush or noise in the video. Skin tones are also natural if a little on the warm side, but again this is a creative choice not a technical problem.

Audio is delivered using the Dolby True-HD 7.1 codec and sounds incredible. From the train scenes on-wards you realize you are in for a treat. In fact I would go as far to say the train sequence alone is one of the best showcases for HD audio to date. The sound engineer on this sequence needs to be nominated for an Oscar as it really is that good. Listen out for the subtle hint of something otherworldly as the train screams by you are literally introduced the films protagonist and you don’t even know it.

Super 8 is a superb film and a great love letter to the adventure films of the 1980′s. I would recommend it to anyone. As usual with most PG-13 movies these days there is exactly one swear word so put your hands over the kids ears during that and you will be ok :)


Value: 4/10
Value is a funny thing. This movie is really good, really fun, and I will be watching it again for sure. The extras are excellent. I can’t say enough good things about it, however, it’s not worth almost 30 bucks. If they drop this gem down to maybe $17.00 I can get behind it as a purchase. Otherwise it’s a perfect rental and a whole evening of action fun. Add some Goonies and Close Encounters and it will be the perfect movie home date.

Overall Score 8/10

The best part of Transformers 3 are the special effects and the scope of the danger we piddly ass humans are in. The building falling over, the scale of the destruction, the bad guys, and the detail of the transforming, it’s all more more more. Bigger and more, these are the signs of a block buster summer flick, not a thinking quiet masterpiece. Keep that in mind as you watch the low brow chuckles and mostly naked ass we are subjected to in the first minute of the movie. Men..blah

I do long for the good old days when Witwicky was new to the alien robot world and we hadn’t yet been innodanted with very boring, very unfunny ‘side kicks’. What the hell is wrong with these writers and director? What exactly seems funny about exploiting folks with accents or hinting at horrible racial stereotypes? Are they so rich and above us all that they forget to not be so rude to the world? That’s the worst thing going in all the Tranformer movies, the very very very bad taste tucked into every nook and cranny. Other than that I always find a good time lurking between the eye-rolls and sighs.

There was only a little visit with the comic stylings of Witwicky’s parents, which is kind of unfortunate. I like them even if they are a bit much sometimes. Dempsy makes a good snively rich guy who may or may not be in cahoots with the overlord metal factions. He’s making eyes for the woman in our heroe’s life, which makes him even less charming. I did like the young lady who played opposite LaBeouf, or whatever his name is. I am too lazy right now to look up their names, but you know who I’m talking about. She’s pretty tough and brave and her acting out classes our bumbling leading man by about 165%. The voices of the transformers are all pretty good, except the really super annoying “funny” ones. I say “funny” in quotation marks because they are not funny, just in case you weren’t sure where I was going with that.

For this installment Witwicky has a new girlfriend, of course, has no job, is on the outs with the government, and is mostly dispensible to the real story. The alien robots have more secrets. The bad guy robots are looking for something, while the good guy robots are becoming a nusance to mankind. When the evil robots actually come around and start blowing shit up, including lots of innocent by standers I perked up. I mean, these movies generally don’t have much in the way of collateral damage when it comes to human life, so this time it takes a darker turn. When it comes to alien invasions I’m all over any movie that goes down that path. For Tranformers 3 they do a pretty good job of giving the vibe of our whole planet being in jeapardy. What would it be like to have the human race enslaved by an alien neighbor? It actually got me to feel more supportive of the fighting folks, the soldiers who keep coming back for each movie, for nutsy ex-FBI guy, and even Witwicky and his girlfriend. They are what stands between our freedom and being the under appreciated work force for an alien race who want their world to be rebuilt brick by brick, or whatever their world is built with. I had to root for the flimsy humans, it only seemed right.

Overall I really had a good time, minus the few eye rolls and brief wishes that they would just let the franchise go away. The specticle of the special effects is enough to get my approval. To hear Bumble Bee piece together phrases to get his point across, I love that. Was that a sentence? Whatever. If you want a brainiac movie do I need to tell you not to watch this or any of the Transformers flicks? If so, maybe brianiac movies aren’t up your alley.


Features: 2/10

• DVD Version Of The Movie – No extras on this Blu-Ray, obviously a super duper special edition is in the works. You do however get a DVD copy of the movie to tide you over.

Cover Art and Menus: 3/10
There is a giant robot on the cover, as would be expected. I don’t mind it, but it’s not very exciting. I wouldn’t have this as a poster, it’s just not interesting enough to look at everyday. I do like the Transformers logo, that would have been a nice bold look for the front of the box and I would have it in my house. The menus are tricked out with all the charm of a space ship control panel.





Audio & Video: 9/10 (By Ascully)
Paramount obviously have a special edition of Dark Of The Moon in the works as this bare bones release contains nothing but the movie and only the 2D version. That said, the transfer here is stellar. Bay shot the movie partially on film and partially digital but you won’t be able to see which is which as they did an awesome job of blending the two mediums. The picture is rich colorful and has the blackest blacks this side of the moon. Infact only an idiot would complain about this transfer it is indeed one of the finest in 2011.

As you might expect with a disc supervised by Michael Bay himself the audio is also out of this world. Encoded in a Dolby True-HD 7-1 mix this is possibly the best surround mix not just of this year but perhaps of all time. From the opening Paramount Logo with the famous metallic transformers sound effect that whooshes through all your speakers you can clearly tell a lot of care was taken here. If you thought the other two movies were great on Blu-Ray this release will convince you otherwise as it’s light years ahead in terms of audio and visuals. Give this disc a spin you will not be dissapointed. Well unless you hate Transformers movies!!!!!


Value: 6/10 (By Ascully)
Included in the package is a coupon for $10 off the special edition 3D Blu-Ray when it is released (which hopefully includes all the extras) which is a bit disturbing to me as it’s like saying sorry you bought this inferior version here is our apology up front. That being said if you just want the movie and do not care about 3D this is a fantastic looking and sounding disc to add to your Transformers collection. It can be found for about $17 at time of writing which is fair for a brand new release. I am sure Cidtalk will disagree with me though :)

Overall Score 7/10

The menu features the main characters shaking their booty to the infamous “Move It, Move It” song done by Reel 2 Real.  It is better than a static menu, but beware, the song will ear worm you within seconds, and you will sing it for days.  (I found myself singing it while walking into court just the other day, and I hope and pray the judge did not hear it, because then she would be singing it also, and probably blame me.)

Features: 9/10
The Madagascar disc is chock full of features.  You have the classic Dreamworks Jukebox, which seems to be included on all of their DVD releases, and features numerous songs from the Dreamworks animated catalog.  There is also a decent commentary, a nice piece on the cast of the movie, as well as several smaller features that really were pretty good overall.  There is also a demo game for an Activision Air Penguin game.  The Penguins of Madagascar disk is also full of extras, which include a few (not so good) DVD games, and Alex’s Dance Off, which shows you how to dance like Alex does.  Again, pretty decent stuff, and things that kids will really get into.

Finally, I have to add that there are a few short extra “easter eggs” hidden on the Penguins disk.  They show a few funny little penguin shorts.  I won’t give away the tricks, but check the internet if you are really interested and can’t find them on your own (hint – they are all accessible from the main menu. Full list of extras below.

• DWA Jukebox
  
• Filmmaker Commentary
  
• It’s A Family Affair The Cast Of Escape to Africa
  
• The Making Of Escape To Africa
  
• Crash Landing
  
• African Adventure
  
• Jambo Jambo Swahili Speak
  
• Test Flight Of Air Penguin Game
  
• Madagascar Escape 2 Africa Activision Game Trailer
  
• Four Music Videos
  
• Popcorn Panic & Gone In A Flash
  
• The Bronx Zoo Madagascar
  
• Alex’s Dance Off
  
• The Heart Of A Lion
  
• DVD Rom Games
  
• Easter Eggs
  

The Movie: 8/10
Madagascar – Escape 2 Africa starts off with a scene involving Alex the lion as a cub, in Africa with his father (voiced by the late Bernie Mac).  It shows how Alex ended up traveling to New York before he became a featured zoo attraction.  We then are switched to the current view of Alex, with his friends Marty the Zebra (Chris Rock), Gloria the Hippo (Jada Pinkett Smith), and Melman the hypochondriac giraffe (David Schwimmer).  The crew is getting ready to pick up where the original Madagascar movie left off, as they are boarding the repaired airplane that the lemurs had been living in.  As the plane gets ready to take off to go back to New York, Julian the Lemur King (Sasha Baron-Cohen) decides he will accompany the group of New York animals on their trip.  The penguins launch the plane, and the new adventure begins.

But instead of making it all of the way to America, the plane runs out of gas, plummets, and lands somewhere in Africa.  It just so happens that the spot that they land is exactly where Alex grew up, and his lion pride is still there, as are his parents.  Alex is forced to prove himself to the pride by challenging another lion to a fight, but seeing as how Alex is a dancer, and not a fighter (zoo life is a cake ride apparently) he ends up getting banished from the pride as he tries to have a dance-off with another lion instead of actually fighting him.

Ther rest of the crew is forced to deal with the dangers of wild living, and adjusting to their new life, as the penguins (still by far the funniest part of the movie) attempt to fix the badly damaged airplane with the help of some rather sophisticated monkeys (the penguins have no opposite thumbs, and are left to deal with the monkey workforce as if they were a union).  When the water dries up, the entire group of animals become desperate, and as Alex tries to win over his father and join back up with the pride, things get out of hand to the point where the penguins end up rescuing the whole crew, and eventually the water hole.

Madagascar 2 is a great little animated movie.  I was a little bit shocked to see that it had a PG rating, and a few of the words were a bit over the top for my 3 year old.  That being said, he really enjoyed the movie, and while it definitely is for kids, this is another of those animated movies that has enough going on that it can get a bit hard to follow for the young ones.  It was sophisticated enough for adults to enjoy also, and the voice acting was again really great.  I had a blast watching it, and I could watch the penguins all day long.

The Penguins of Madagascar disk features two of the new animated TV series that will appear on Nickelodeon in March 2009.  these are about 30 minutes each, and feature the lovable penguins as they take on various missions while at the zoo.  The animation is just as good as the feature length movie, and the penguins doing anything is always hysterical.  The first short features the animals at the zoo who have become addicted to popcorn that has been handed to them by zoo patrons.  When Alice the evil zookeeper bans feeding the animals popcorn, the penguins take it upon themselves to get their hands on the tasty treat.  It ends up being a competition to see who can get the popcorn first – the penguins or King Julien, who is now living at the zoo with Mort and Maurice.

The second short feature the penguin crew investigating the disappearance of Maurice, who is fed up with King Julien’s antics.  King Julien things that Maurice has disappeared magically into a small box, that turns out to be a digital camera with Maurice’s photo on the display.  Our heroic ice loving birds swing into a full investigation to find Maurice.  Again, both of these shorts are excellent, and I can’t wait for the television show to debut.





Audio & Video: 9/10
Another brilliant animated movie – I am shocked.  All of these releases these days are spot on.  They look amazing even in standard DVD.  I now I will sound old, but kids these days do not have any idea how good they have it.  Both DVD’s are presented in wide screen format, and they look absolutely amazing.

Audio was again excellent, and the music to dialogue mix was perfect.  both disks are presented in 5.1 Dolby Digital Surround Sound.


Value: 8/10
How can you go wrong with a double dose of penguins?   The Madagascar 2 movie is a keeper, and the Penguins disk is a nice addition, and has me excited for the Nickelodeon series that is coming out in March of this year.  My boy loved both disks, and I am sure we will watch them again, and again, and again . . .

Overall Score 8/10

The menu is the same: a yellow background with the same shots of the kids as the cover, with more doodles.  It is a bit too obvious that they are trying to market this as a Napoleon Dynamite type of movie, but I just don’t see it.


Features: 4/10

• Pop Quiz: Cast Interviews – The pop quiz is a short feature with the cast about how their school was chosen, and how they were selected to be in the film itself.  This was an interesting look at how these 5 were selected out of apparently 150 kids who were interested in being in the documentary.  Apparently 15 kids were actually filmed, but these 5 were chosen to be in the final film.  This feature was relatively short at about 4 minutes in length.
• Hannah Blogs -Hannah is the “rebel” of the group, and a burgeoning filmmaker, and it seems as if director Nannete Burnstein almost favors Hannah in the movie.  Hannah’s blogs are short video essays that were given during the making of the film.  She covers a wide variety of issues, and many would not fit with the movie itself.  While Hannah is probably the most dramatic of the cast, she seems a bit all over the place, and I am not so sure that her label of “rebel” is all that appropriate.
• Character Trailers -There are 5 trailers that were created to promote the film, each focusing on a separate cast member.  These are pretty forgettable, and seem to further try to stereotype each of the cast into their narrow label.
• Deleted Scenes – The deleted scenes that are included cover a range of topics, but are appropriately left out of the final film.  One of the better scenes focuses on Hannah talking on the phone to her father about the possibility of gettingexpelled from school, and how that will effect her life.  It is a serious moment, but it just adds to the fact that while the movie portrays Hannah as a rebel, she seems to fit the role of drama queen instead.

The Movie: 6/10
American Teen is supposed to be a documentary about 5 high school kids who each nicely fit into some of the stereotypes that we all think of when we look at high school kids.  There are several problems with this approach, including the fact that not all kids fall into these neatly labeled groups.  We are supposed to have jocks, prom queens, geeks, heart-throbs, and rebels at every school in the United States apparently.  While this may in fact occur sometimes, not everyone falls squarely into those categories, and this documentary does its best to pigeonhole these 5 kids into those roles, regardless of what they might actually be.

I also question just how much of the movie is “reality.”  I know, I may be a bit cynical after having been subjected to the modern “reality” shows of late, with their manufactured drama and all, but a lot of this movie feels a bit unrealistic to me, and perhaps embellished.  Having said that, American Teen is a tight package, if not somewhat jaded view of life as a teenager in a Midwestern town.

American Teen follows 5 teenagers as they wind their way through life at a Warsaw, Indiana high school.  As stated, each is set up to fall into a category that seemingly is ripped directly from the Breakfast Club.

Colin Clemens is the jock of the school, with supposedly the entire schools reputation riding on his ability to carry the basketball team to glory.  Having gone to college in Indiana, I can attest to the fact that the entire town was probably riding on the team doing well, as basketball is a religion to these people.  Colin is also trying to find a way to make his dreams of playing basketball in college a reality, as money is tight, and he needs to find a scholarship to allow him to further his education.

Geoff Haase neatly portrays the geek.  Geoff is in band and seemingly has no skills with the ladies, even though his one goal in life is to have a girlfriend.  We are shown that Geoff loves video games, and has bad acne, as if to cement his role as the nerd.  Geoff is shown awkwardly approaching girls, until he finally finds a female who he starts a relationship with, only to have the camera show us that she (almost blatantly) is scheming to be with someone else.  In one of the more questionable scenes, his girlfriend literally arranges a meeting with another guy while with Geoff, and then not only does she meet up with the guy to swim at a pool, but she immediately embraces the new “friend.”

Hannah Bailey is the so called rebel, who seems a bit wild and free, as if she could care less what anyone thinks of her, which is exactly the opposite of what she demonstrates on film.  Hannah proceeds to be dumped by two boys in the film, and with both she is so devastated that she almost ceases to cope.  When dumped by the “love of her life” she misses school for weeks, stating that she just can’t deal with people looking at her and talking behind her back.  Then she falls in love with Mitch, a jock type basketball player who is presented as the “heart throb” of the movie.  At this point we get a little bit of a Pretty in Pinkclique crossover story, where it (shockingly) ends up that the relationship just won’t work.  Mitch, who generally seems like a nice guy, falls for Hannah and is supposedly able to be himself, before the “popular” group seems to force him to move on.  Hannah is devastated when Mitch breaks up with her via text message.  Tackiness aside, Hannah again is heartbroken.

Last but definitely not least is Megan Krizmanich, who is stuck in the prom queen role, which she seemingly embraces.  Megan is rich, decent looking, and according to the other students, the queen of the school.  (I don’t think she even won prom queen, even though the box art calls her one.)  Megan is really more of an immature, dare I say, bitch.  She controls those around her, gets jealous when other girls get close to her best male friend, even though she is supposedly repulsed at the idea of going out with him, and she does her best to belittle those who don’t agree with her.  At one point she mass e-mails a topless photo of one of her friends to the entire school, before calling the girl on the phone to call her a slut.  At another point Megan spray paints the word “fag” on the window of a guys house who voted against her prom idea.  Megan’s main issue in the movie is getting admitted to Notre Dame, where almost her entire family has gone to college.  Seemingly forgetting about the whole “legacy” admissions, the film makes it out like Megan would never get in, and when she finally does, life is good.  (Notre Dame must be so proud!)

American Teen is a decent documentary about teen life, but to me it was a bit forced and a bit overdone.  I know there are different groups in high school, but not everyone needs to be pigeonholed.  I am not a fan of shows like the Hills, or many of the so-called MTV reality shows, but to me this is much of the same.  It was an interesting look at high school days, but I just didn’t really connect with any of the characters like I should have.





Audio & Video: 6/10
The standard DVD was decent looking and had okay audio.  It was presented in wide screen, and had 5.1 Surround Sound, but I really didn’t notice either the sound or the video all that much.  That is not to say that either was bad, but to me they didn’t leave an impression.  Obviously this was a documentary, and not a big screen epic film, so I didn’t expect either to be mind blowing, and they were not.


Value: 5/10
This is a rental if anything.  I would not watch American Teen again.  It just did not really do that much for me.  Perhaps if I was a teenager, things would be different, but I am not.  This is simply a view into the lives of 5 struggling teenagers, and for me I would rather watch struggling teenagers in a hysterical story (Breakfast Club) than view this again.

Overall Score 5/10

Review Covers DVD & Blu-Ray Versions

Cover Art and Menus: 8/10
As the semi-official reviewer on Ascully.com of all things kid worthy, I feel that I have a duty to put on my, as Ascully would say, “10 year-old kid hat” when reviewing these movies.  The cover for Kung Fu Panda is of course the main characters from the movie, in Kung Fu pose, ready for action.  What is not to like about that?  As with all of these animated films, there really is no reason not to be bold and straightforward with the cover, and Dreamworks lays it out like it should be.  The colors and high definition animation are on full display.

The menus are no less colorful, but take a slightly different route.  They are presented in the two-dimensional style that often is displayed in the movie during memory sequences.  It is really well done in the movie, and looks great on the menu as well.

When both are examined with my kid hat on, the cover and the menus are “awesome.”


Features: 7/10

• Commentary – There is a decent commentary track with Directors John Stevenson and Mark Osborne included.  As with all of the animated movies, I find the commentary a little bit long in the tooth, but they do a decent job.
• Dragon Warrior Training Academy – This is a set of 5 interactive games, focused on each of the Furious Five.  I am not sold on the inclusion of ANY extra game like this, but unlike most, these seemed very difficult for a change.  I still say stay away from all of these so-called “games” on movie releases, but at least these were a challenge.
• Alton Brown at Mr. Ping’s Noodle House – This extra is basically a “how to” for making the Delicious noodles that are made famous in the movie by Po’s father, Mr. Ping.  Informative, and short at under 5 minutes.
• How to use Chopsticks – Pretty self explanatory, as a young Chinese girl demonstrates the do’s and dont’s of how to use the two sticks without embarrassing yourself.
• Help Save the Wild Pandas – Jack Black takes a few minutes to talk about the wild pandas, and what people can do to help preserve the animals by protecting their native habitat.  This was only two minutes long, and I found it interesting.  My son was very concerned about the animals, and wanted to learn more.

Also included with the first disc were short features that covered meeting the cast, a technical discussion about how the animation was done, and a bit about the sound design.  All were very informative, if not a bit dry.  There was also a music video for a cover of the classic “Kung Fu Fighting,” with Cee-Lo Green.  I am ashamed to admit that I didn’t know who Cee-Lo was, but apparently he has performed with Gnarls Barkley, which is encouraging.  There is also the obligatory Jukebox included, which seems to be on every Dreamworks animated DVD release.  It includes parts of various songs from all of the classic Dreamworks releases, like Shrek and Madagascar.  Finally, there are various DVD-Rom extras included on the main DVD.

The Furious Five DVD also has various extras included.  They seem to be more focused on activities, but they are plentiful.

• Learn To Draw – This was by far my favorite extra in the bunch.  This is an 8 minute class on how to draw the various characters, line by line.
• Dumpling Shuffle – Another “not so fun” DVD game, which is a digital version of hide the shell card game.
• Pandemonium Activity Kit – This is the DVD-Rom part of the extras, that includes some printable images, a pretty nifty sound machine, where you can adjust and change the sound effects on some of the scenes of the movie, and a few demo games from Activision, a respectable videogame maker.
• Learn the Panda Dance – This is a video in which you are shown how to do a dance based on the moves of the Furious Five.  I have to say I did not actually attempt to do the Panda Dance, as Ascully probably would have had to drive over and rescue me or call an ambulance.

There are also other extras that included a way to find out your Chinese zodiac sign, a piece on the actual Kung Fu styles that are represented in the movie, and a feature that will decide just what type of Kung Fu master style you would be based on answers that you give to some personality questions.

As I stated, the extras are extensive, but short on depth.  This is a quantity of quality issue, but I can see many kids getting into some of the activities.  It sure beats getting nothing.





The Movie: 8/10
Kung Fu Panda is an excellent animated release, and joins the excellent collection that Dreamworks has been giving us in the last 10 years or so.  The story is great, and the acting and animation really bring this movie to life.  I truly think that animated films are seeing a true renaissance with the visuals reaching new levels, and the story lines being so richly fleshed out.  Dreamworks has a solid line-up, as does that other studio Pixar.  The movies themselves are so well done that while my child can enjoy a purely fantastical cartoon, I as an adult get to enjoy the releases just as much.  Kung Fu Panda is absolutely no exception.

Po is artfully played by Jack Black, who really just seems to play himself most of the time, but due to the fact that his personality is larger than life, it works in an animated arena.  The gags and themes that sometimes make watching Jack Black in other films seem old are perfect for this animated, bumbling, overweight panda bear.  Po is a true fan of the art of kung Fu, and he idolizes the local 5 masters.  The 3 masters are all animals also, each with a unique style representing actual Kung Fu techniques.  There is Monkey (voiced by Jackie Chan), Tigress (Angelina Jolie), Crane (David Cross), Viper (Lucy Liu), and Mantis (Seth Rogen).  Each has been trained by the Kung Fu Master Schifu (voiced by Dustin Hoffman).

When Po, who works at his father’s noodle shop, tries to attend a local appearance by the Furious Five, as they are known), he stumbles into the arena in an odd manner, and somehow is named by Master Oogway (Randall Duk Kim) as Dragon Warrior.  This of course infuriates the Furious Five, who put on the demonstration in anticipation of Oogway naming one of them as the fabled Dragon Warrior, who would protect the village.  Everyone, including Master Schifu feels that somehow Oogway has made a mistake, and when Schifu is forced to train Po, who is more concerned with eating than training, Schifu tries to make life for Po so difficult that he will quit.  Po, after some soul searching, decides that he will not quit, no matter what is thrown at him, and he searches to find his inner warrior, in order to protect the village from the feares snow leopard Tai Lung (Ian McShane).  Tai Lung was once a student of Schifu, but has turned his back on the master and is locked up for trying to control the whole village.  After Tai Lung escapes, Po and the Furious Five are forced to try to stop the onslaught that approaches  in the form of the dreaded snow leopard.

The animation style and the story are well done, and the pacing of the movie is really pretty good.  While I would have liked to see more about the Furious Five, which would include perhaps a bit more screen time and story for each character, the main driving force is Jack Black.  Black, as Po is really fun to watch, and he brings a modern twist to the rotund panda that is really fun to watch.  I thought he was perfect for the character, or really the character was perfectly put together for him.


Secrets of the Furious Five
Well, the second DVD in this two-disc release is the Secrets of the Furious Five.  At just about 30 minutes long, this is (like Shrek the Halls) an interesting release for a full DVD.  I am not sure why this was not included as an extra with the film release, but I don’t make those decisions, I just review the movies.  Secrets involves Po being tasked with training some young Kung Fu enthusiasts who are more concerned with “kicking butt” than learning about the secrets of the masters.  Po details the rise of each of the Furious Five, which includes the important virtues that each had to learn in order to unlock their full potential as a Kung Fu legend.  The short is very well done, and fun to watch, but again, why not just an extra on the DVD release?





Audio & Video: 10/10
The video on Kung Fu Panda, as well as the Secrets of the Furious Five is amazing.  Dreamworks again has really done an amazing job with the standard DVD release, and I can’t imagine just how good this would look on Blu-Ray.  The setting in ancient China provides the opportunity to use rich colors, and lots of vibrant reds and yellows, which just pop on the screen and add a real flavor to the movie that other Dreamworks releases have not really used.  Presented in 2.40:1 widescreen aspect ratio, the picture is beautiful.

The audio is presented in (almost a given) 5.1 surround sound, and is beautifully mixed.  Again, it is starting to become hard to find an animated release these days that does not look and sound amazing.  as I stated before, this is a great time for animation.
I (Ascully) took a look at the Blu-Ray release of the movie and while I liked the actual movie the Video and Audio were just breathtaking. Video is handled by the AVC codec at a bitrate of roughly 25MBPS and audio is in the TrueHD lossless format. These type of movies are where Blu-Ray shines, no murky dark scenes just pristine colorful bright images throughout the entire movie. There were also no signs of compression artifacts or edge enhancement, this is  right up there in the top tier of Blu-Ray releases.

Value: 6/10
Of course I loved Kung Fu Panda, and I really enjoyed the Secrets of the Furious Five, but there just is no excuse for releasing the two of them side by side as a package deal, when they could have been on one DVD.  Especially at a time when cash is tight for everyone, this just seems like a bad move.  I think that if you have kids, Kung Fu Panda is a must have for your DVD collection, but unless you can find this two-DVD set for the same price as the single disc Kung Fu Panda, I would not pay the extra money for a 24 minute short.  Having said that, if you can find the two disc for the same price, or you run across the single disc, buy it.  I enjoyed it, with or without my 10 year-old kid hat on my head.

Overall Score 8/10

The menu is also decent, with a shot of the Shrek house, decorated for the season.  Again, colorful and festive, so no real complaints.


Features: 4/10
The features on the Shrek the HallsDVD are just kind of random, and not really always related to Shrek at all, which is a bit annoying.  I understand that the Shrek the Halls movie itself is under 30 minutes, so we shouldn’t expect too much from the extras, but if they are going to sell the short movie as its own DVD, give us some related extras with it.  Otherwise it just feels like this is an attempt to cash in.

• 12 Days Of Christmas Sing Along -This, along with the Deck the Halls sing along are not really even Shrek related.  The 12 Days of Christmas is a variation on the original song, but with the penguins from the Madagascar movies.  It is a strange mix, and I am not sure that it needs to be on this DVD.
• Deck The Halls Sing Along -Again, the penguins from Madagascar are doing the honors.  I am a bit disappointed that they didn’t take the time to make this with the Shrek characters, as it just seems tacked on.
• Gingy’s Dunking Game -This is an interesting game where three gingerbread cookies are displayed, and the trick is to pick the one that looks the most like Gingy.  Some of the arms and legs of the cookies are gone, presumably from someone like Santa Claus taking a bite.  This gets old, and is not what I would really call fun.  I really think that even young kids would not be too thrilled about these types of games.
• Shrek Carnival Craze Video Game Demo & Cheat Code -Drop the DVD into your PC and the Shrek Carnival Craze Video Game Demo starts up.  It is a mix of three different games aimed primarily at younger kids.
• Dreamworks Animation Video Jukebox -Dreamworks has a thing about including these jukebox’s for their animated films.  Basically this is a way to hear some of the popular tunes, with the scenes from several of the recent Dreamworks animated films.  It is decent I guess, but when the total time is longer than the running time of the Shrek the Halls movie, something is amiss.

The Movie: 7/10
Shrek the Halls is an interesting use of new animation to create a holiday tale.  All of the voice actors are back, including Mike Meyers, Eddie Murphy, Cameron Diaz, and Antonio Banderas.  Basically Shrek the Halls is the story of how Shrek learns about the Christmas holiday.

Shrek, living back in the swamp with Fiona and their 3 babies, had never experienced Christmas, as ogres really don’t celebrate any holiday.  He is tricked by Donkey into promising an amazing Christmas, but he realizes he has no idea how to go about creating such an event.  After buying a Christmas for Dummies book, he sets out trying to make everything perfect for Fiona and his kids.  Donkey ends up bringing all of the rest of the Shrek characters over on Christmas eve, which sends Shrek off the deep end, as he feels that Christmas is ruined.

When he tries to tell the babies his Christmas story, he is interrupted by Donkey, Puss n Boots, and Gingy, who all tell their warped view of Christmas.  Finally Shrek kicks everyone out, and when Fiona leaves with the kids, Shrek is forced to apologize and explain to everyone that this is his first Christmas.  Then everyone comes together to enjoy the real joy of Christmas; being with loved ones.

The story itself is fine, but because Shrek the Halls was made for TV, it clocks in at under 30 minutes, which is too short for the Shrek team.  It just feels forced from start to finish.  A good example is that each of the story told includes snippets of songs, which would normally be full length.  In the full length films the songs can take time to develop, but in this short, they just feel rushed, as does most of the movie.  It is great for little kids, but the one-liners and jokes just seem to fly by, which doesn’t allow for you to really savor anything.

I love the fact that all of the characters are back, and this really did have a lot of potential, but it just feels too forced.  I would have liked to see this expanded, as it really reminded me just how much fun the Shrek movies really are.  While the film is obviously aimed at both kids and adults, I was really thrown by Gingy’s story about Christmas, where he talks about a horrible experience he had when he was younger.  In it, he is sitting in a car with his gingerbread girlfriend, when Santa reached down and grabs her, before taking a bite of the cookie.  The scene is hysterical, but as my 3 year old watched it, I realized that they really make Santa out to be a huge, mean monster.  It was almost disturbing to see my son’s reaction to “bad Santa.”  It never would have been a big deal for me until I watched my son’s look of horror, as he asked my if that was the “real” Santa, and “why is he mean?”  Funny, but a bit disturbing for the really young kids.

I liked Shrek the Halls, but I am not sold on the idea of making holiday shorts using these types of characters.  It just doesn’t necessarily seem to work.  On the front of the DVD is says “an instant holiday classic,” which may have also been the tag line for the Star Wars Holiday Special back in 1978.  I imagine that the tag line wouldn’t have been aptly applied in that case either.  Shrek the Halls is fun, but I will stick with my Grinch and Heat Miser, thank you.





Audio & Video: 8/10
The video for this Dreamworks release is excellent.  There was nothing skimped on here besides the length of the program.  It looks every bit as good as the full length Shrek movies.  The DVD offers both full screen and wide screen modes, and both look amazing.

The sound is also great.  Lots of use for the surround sound, and it was excellently mixed.  I thought the levels were great also.


Value: 2/10
There really is not a whole lot of value here, seeing as this clocks in at under 30 minutes.  I know this was released on TV in 2007, but this just seems a bit ridiculous.  To me, this would make a great extra on one of the full length Shrek releases, not a full release.  It is fun, but it is just too short for me to recommend anyone run out and buy it.  With the extras just kind of thrown in, and not always Shrek related, I would say wait to see this one play again  on regular TV this fall.

Overall Score 5/10

Review Covers Blu-Ray & DVD Version

Cover Art and Menus: 10/10
Classic, perfect cover for this installment of the adventures of Dr. Henry Jones Jr. I love it. There is nothing I would add or take away. What more can i say?

The menu is designed for the movie, which is something I would like to see more and more considering the price of Blu-Ray. It’s the least they can do to make it a tad more fun to browse the extras. This disc has a themed menu system and even the time elapsed bar that pops up when you pause is made to fit the package….nice job.


Features: 10/10

• Pre-Production Featurette -I enjoy watching the planning and creation of movies, even if it’s kind of over produced and polished for my taste. We get talking heads of the highest ranking, Lucas, Spielberg, Ford, and the how’s why’s and who’s of this 4th Indiana Jones movie getting to the big screen.
  
• Indiana Jones Time lines – This is a very cool feature indeed. It shows the time line for the movies, so you can track Indiana’s adventures from the beginning. It also has a movie interpretation of world history so you can follow the pseudo archeological side of the Jone’s legend.
  
• Trailers – I’m not a fan of calling trailers “extras”, however, it makes for a full packaged deal so keep tagging them on folks.
• The Return Of A Legend Featurette – Does Indiana Jones need a 4th movie? Somebody thought so, and this is mix of sentimental looking back at Arc, Temple, and Crusade, while peeking in on the production of Crystal Skull. It’s more talking heads and glossy interviews, but hey, who can argue with the masters? I prefer the fly on the wall, hand held cam chasing the director and cast around without the extra editing on these kinds of extras. I’ll be sure to call up Lucas in the morning and have a chat with him about it.
• Production Diary The Making Of Kingdom Of The Crystal Skull - These are always fun to watch. They aren’t long, but to get a little tid bit of daily life on the set is great for the true fans of both the film itself and how it was made.
  
• Warrior Makeup Featurette – Those warriors we see for about 30 seconds, well, they have a buttload of time in the make-up chair, and this is their moment to shine in their very own extra. It does go to show just how much detail goes into these mega-production movies. Any other smaller flick would slap some paint on the background extras and leave it at that…but not Lucaberg. It’s top quality all the way for this two headed movie making giant.
  
• The Crystal Skulls Featurette - I had never heard of any crystal skull legends, so this was slightly educational for me. It’s not full blown National Geographic or Discovery Channel, oh no, but it did fill me in enough to understand why they chose the crystal skull as their mcguffin. (Spielberg and I like to use that word a lot.)
  
• Iconic Props Featurette – Where are the props from all the the Indiana Jone’s movies? Some have been sold off, but most are in a warehouse. How utilitarian.
  
• Adventures In Post Production Featurette – The music, the special effects, the CGI, the sound mixing, it’s all added after principal photography is done. Oh, and did you know Stephen likes to edit, cut, splice, REAL film instead of the digital method?
  
• The Effects Of Indy Featurette – How do we end up seeing Queen Elizabeth and the kid from Transformers sword fight across two moving vehicles? If it’s a mystery you would rather not solve, stay away from this extra. If it’s a question that burns in your soul, go for it. You might be surprised what’s real and what’s digital, I know I was.
  
• Closing Team Indy Featurette – A lot of the same people have worked on all four Jones movies, and this is a little audio visual tribute to them. (i.e. fancy credits)
  
• Pre Visualization Featurette – Bringing the script from paper to something watchable with digital story boards and animated bits and pieces is the way of these big movie makers these days.
  
• Photographs & Galleries – I think this is self explanatory.
  

The Movie: 7/10

Swashbuckling adventure for this generation. That’s how I romanticize the Indiana Jones series. It’s absolute fun and antics that make watching movies exciting in a kid-like way. I love that. The Kingdom of the Crystal Skull is the final chapter in the cinematic storybook of Dr. Henry Jones Jr. I have seen it twice and as much as it improves with a second watch, I’m still not sure it offers the kind of fairy tale ending I was hoping for, not that I”m going to spoil the ending. I’m saying the story of Crystal Skull, and a few specific elements, were not as satisfying as I was hoping they would be.

What I didn’t like about the movie is outweighed by what I really did enjoy, so that’s a good thing. I just wasn’t into the whole young punk kid from the 50′s part, or the fact that they killed off Henry Jones Sr. between flicks and only gave him a quickly passing mention and photo appearance. Even a flashback to a death scene or something would have felt more natural, but to just ditch him like that…come on Connery, you could have made a bed ridden cameo for a few bucks!!

What else didn’t style my hair for me? Some of the action looked “dodgy” as my husband, the Brit, would say. Not that he would say it about this movie, he’s too blinded by wide-eyed awe :) The swinging monkeys, the giant ant swarm, the sword fight on the vehicles, these are the true offenders of modern day special effects that are not executed seamlessly. Come on Lucas, you created and own one of THE most innovative companies for this kind of thing in the world, how could you let it happen? The monkeys and the kid flying from vine to vine looked patched together by an intern. The sword fight on the vehicles looked like it could have been in a movie about 7 years ago. The ants just looked a bit too digital, if you know what I mean? These might sound like minor offenses, but when you are buying into a fantasy world of treasure hunting, magical arcs, mystical stones, holy grails, and mind controlling skulls made out of crystal and reality kicks in the door by reminding you it’s all done in a studio and on a computer, the illusion is cracked and the fun factor drops a few notches.

What DID I like, LOVE. Marion, old Indy, Kate Blanchet, the sets, the style, the clothes, the details, and I even appreciate the relentless action. I prefer the earlier dialogue of Raiders and Last Crusade. There was more variety from quiet scenes followed by high action. This time around they cranked up the action so that there is barely a moment throughout the whole movie for building up the tension and relationships between characters. I understand that we know these people pretty well already, but it’s still kind of manic to make every single scene in motion. I like to have the downtimes so the uptimes are that much more exciting. Not that the action wasn’t fine and dandy, it was, I just missed some more intimate moments that got lost in the shuffle.

I will say that the first time I watched it I was slightly disappointed. I can’t put my finger on why, maybe I was hoping for a revisit to my favorite, Raiders of the Lost Ark with Marion and the groovy style that one brought to the series. When we were getting ready to watch it again I let go of those expectations and to be honest, it was so much better. I enjoyed it, even with the occasional crappy CGI and missing quieter moments. The story felt better the second time, the motorcycle riding kid fit in better, and when it was over I was finally satisfied with how things wrapped up. I always say people shouldn’t have expectations of movies, and that’s what I did. It didn’t serve me well almost ruining the end of Indiana Jone’s adventures for me. I’m glad I got a chance to soak it up again. It was worth it.





Audio & Video: 9/10
After last weeks disappointing Blu-Ray transfer of Forgetting Sarah Marshall we have the exact opposite here with Indiana Jones & The Kingdom Of The Crystal Skull. Paramount have done an outstanding job with one of the best transfers I have seen to date. This was one of the few movies I caught theatrically this year and our crappy fleapit theater did their usual job of destroying the look of the film with a bad projector, hairs on the reel, scratches on the film, and who knows what else.

The Blu-Ray version is a treat, and as I said in the podcast, there is something I can’t put my finger on with this movie. It’s either a filter or a special film stock that Spielberg has used that gives the movie a cool older look while preserving the ultra high detail of a movie from 2008. This disc has some of the best black levels I have seen. The scene in the cave with Mutt & Indy is pitch black in parts but you can still make out the detail on Mutt’s black leather jacket.

Audio is THX certified and is made to be loud. The movie is quite kinetic, and the sound mix backs this up. The sound is mixed a little low overall though, and I had to pump my amplifier up a few notches from its usual listening position. It’s not a problem but something I noticed anyway.

Overall Indiana Jones & The Kingdom Of The Crystal Skull is a great “sit back and relax and just go with it movie”. The DVD & Blu-Ray versions are amongst the year’s best when it comes to video and audio quality so it’s a no-brainer must buy if you are a fan of the series.


Value: 7/10
Sometimes value isn’t the issue. I know, it’s strange to hear that from me, Mrs. Doubtprice. It’s just that when I come across a movie that I’m sure will be slapped back in the DVD player over and over in the future, that does something to the cost to enjoyment ratio. Some movies are excellent, but not for multiple views. Some DVD’s are packed with amazing extras, but I don’t watch extras over and over so the value sits on the one time view. Indiana Jones, well, this Blu-Ray has all the goods for a great first time experience with tons of extras and a classically fun flick, along with the rewatchablity of the movie for years to come. Yes, we will again watch the whole series for fun someday and I want them on the shelf ready for action.

For around $25 it isn’t my ideal price, but this is the reason I save up the cash by not buying other DVD’s. It’s a delicate movie lover’s balance.

Overall Score 9/10

Blu-Ray & DVD Version Covered In Review

Cover Art and Menus: 7/10
I have looked at the logo for The Godfather nearly my entire life. That hand holding the marionette strings, the top swoop from the G to the D, it might just be one of the things that inspired my graphic design genes. It looks like someone drew it by hand and then refined it, cutting and pasting in the old school style. I don’t think I can uncloud a lifetime of appreciating that part of the cover image and be unbiased. The red blood spurt with images of key members of THE family, well, that part I could do without. I think it’s a bit garish and doesn’t do the story justice.

The menus on each disc are subtle but powerful at the same time. They have an image from the movie, non-spoiler, in the background with the navigation at the bottom. The three select shots from the movies are thought provoking and intriguing if you have never seen the movies, and bring a flood of “oh yea I remember THAT part!” for anyone who has seen them.

The extras disc has more graphic influence with some images from the movie but it’s a predictably ornate affair. I like it though, it’s appropriate. The menu for the extras from the older DVD release is just that, the menu from the older DVD release, so nothing to brag about there. Overall the packaging is understated, but sorta classy. It doesn’t really do much for me. I think I expected something more elegant or bold. I’m just glad they didn’t do some crazy new twist on the image of The Godfather movies, that would have been a disaster.

Features: 10/10

• Commentary By Director Francis Ford Coppola – Coppola has a very detailed way about him. He likes to give real details from the experience of making his movies. He sounds like more of a fan of the art of making a film rather than the sentimental aspect of watching movies.
• Godfather World (HD) – Can we even imagine a world without these movies? I mean, I hadn’t seen them until now and I still know the impact they have had on my entertainment experience through years of being a movie lover. That’s what this extra covers, how these movies have planted themselves in our culture, for better or worse.
• The Masterpiece That Almost Wasn’t (HD) – A feature length documentery with talking heads like Coppola, Spielberg, Lucas, and more. The creators of Zoetrope films discuss how The Godfather was to be a studio job for Coppola so he could make money to go back to their fledgling company to make non-studio films. Go figure. This covers a lot of quality information that kind of demystifies the movie a bit, gives it more of a real life history at the same time.
• Emulsional Rescue Revealing The Godfather – Amazing! The original film was never preserved properly so the folks who took on the job of putting together a new revitalized digital version had their hands full. From having to piece together sections of film from all over the world to pioneering techniques in film restoration and preservation, this extra is an excellent edition to the pot of goodies.
• The Godfather On The Red Carpet – Who goes to premieres? Everybody except you and me. I’m not every that interested in this portion of the DVD extras world, and this time it’s even less interesting because they are not even at the red carpet of The Godfather. They ask people at the premiere of Cloverfield about what The Godfather movies mean to them.
• Four Short Films On The Godfather – SHORT is right. These are just a couple minutes each and not really what I would consider films. It’s a bit misleading. I was hoping for more documentaries or analytical chatter boxes talking about the movies, but instead it’s just the tid bits listed below.
  • The Godfather Vs The Godfather 2 (HD) -Nope, it’s not a beefy arguement about which one is better or worse, just people talking about their thoughts and experiences of each one.
  • Cannoli (HD) -“Leave the gun. Take the cannoli.” How did that line, a great line in film history, get in the movie?
  • Riffing On The Riffing (HD) -People love to recite lines from the movie, even famous people.
  • Clemenza (HD) -Why didn’t they have an old version of Clemenza in the 3rd movie? Coppola explains. I didn’t like Clemenza anyway, not the Bruno Kirby version or the Part II version, so no big loss for me.
• The Family Tree -I really appreciate this feature. I get confused sometimes with who’s who, yea, I admit it. So, seeing the whole family on a chart, with links to their backstories is really a good thing for me. It’s not very exciting to look at, but it’s full of information about each family character.
• Crime Organization Chart -This is another great extra for me, Ms. Confusion. I was a bit fuzzy sometimes on who was who from one film to the next as they aged. Names get muddled for me, so seeing the chart of the whole mobster roster is a great thing, and it tells who plays the same characters as they age through the movies.
• Connie & Carlo’s Wedding Album – Blah, not interested. That jerk, who cares. Connie is one of my least favorite characters in the whole series anyway, so this glorified photo gallery isn’t for me.
• All Of The Extras From The 2001 DVD Release (22 in All In SD) – That’s right ALL of the extras that came on the earlier release are here. Tons of deleted scenes, more behind the scenes, making off footage.

The Godfather: 9/10
I had never seen The Godfather properly until now. I know, I know, it’s tragic. I have been a movie lover all my life and yet without this series to add to my cinematic memories. I think that’s a good thing actually. Seeing The Godfather now, after 40 years of life and seeing several thousand movies I have a perspective that’s not so much tagging onto the bandwagon with the millions of others who have taken on this cultural monolith of a flick.

The story is told beautifully. The characters all give me some kind of guttural reaction, some good, some bad. The look of the film, the world they live in, the colors, the darkness, the details, oh geesh, it’s all amazing to sink my eys into. What else is there to say that hasn’t’ been said already?

I’ll give it a try. Vito doesn’t interest me, yet. He’s powerful in a way that I don’t fully understand and it doesn’t intrigue me. That is until the moment he’s told about his son’s death, THEN I see him, through Brando’s occasional elegance and depth. (No I don’t think being stoic and talking with a gravely voice is acting brilliance.) He’s nearly been killed himself by rival gunmen and now his oldest son has been shot down by people in the world Vito himself has groomed him to be a part of, and the veneer goes away. That’s when I got interested in Vito, but then it fades with the onslaught of plot turns and other more dynamic characters stepping into the spotlight.

tom Hagen is by far my favorite character. Robert Duval makes me want to lean in and watch him closer and closer. He’s smooth and sleazy, trustworthy and treacherous. I can’t imagine any Godfather movie without him..oh…more on that later.

Sonny, the son who is shot down, well he’s a time bomb played by James Caan. It’s pretty clear that he’s not going to outlive his rogue attitude. He’s fascinating in a way, but then the whole macho husband with a chick on the side, hot headed thing, well, remember I’m 40. Those kinds of men are a serious annoyance in this life, so he didn’t do much for me. The only thing I did like about him was that he had a specific identity and never strayed from that. He didn’t get watered down by anything, just purely himself, untamed, I like that in a character.

Fredo is quirky, but creepy to me from the instant we first meet him, and he’s never redeemed. I can’t explain it exactly. He was the other end of the spectrum from Sonny and those two extremes, the tough guy vs. the weakling and how they function in a family like the Corleones falls to the back behind more interesting elements of the story, and characters.

Kate, played by Diane Keaton made a good impression in the beginning. Initially there is a charm about her I hadn’t ever seen in Keaton. She’s never been a favorite of mine. I like her and I’ve seen lots of her movies, but she’s not hooked me like she has a lot of other people. She gives off a theater vibe for a lot of this film. There are moments of greatness when she’s opposite Pacino, but that seems to happen a lot through this entire series. More on that later.

Kate and Michael (Pacino) are supposed to convince us that he’s not into the whole mob family thing and she’s his link to civilization. Come on people. From the very first scene it’s overtly thrown in our collective viewing faces that Michael is about to become the man he claims he doesn’t want to be. Personally I think Mikey has some issues and all his life, appearing to be the one who will get away from it all, with college and being in the military, well, he’s brewing some psycho tendencies just waiting to get out. When Vito gets shot and Michael steps in to save the day he has the excuse he needs to jump in head first. Everyone can pretend he was an innocent until that moment, but I think it’s always been brewing.

I won’t analyze the whole movie bit by bit. I think I need to see it a few more times before I can rightfully do such a thing. I will say that it’s beautifully paced, looks lovely, and for a gal who isn’t a fan of mob type movies, it’s a mind changer. The complexity of the crime syndicate combined with the simplicity of how problems are addressed (i.e. horse head in bed) is compelling, I have to admit that much. I think it’s fair to say that after seeing all three movies I have a different point of view about Vito, but I’ll cover that as I go along. I will say this, he had a foreboding and yet compassionate way about him throughout the movie so it twists your little mind into hating and rooting for him at the same time. That could be one of the things about this story, this movie, that makes it such a formidable piece of film making and story telling art.


The Godfather Part II: 9/10
We watched Part I, took a brief break and then watched Part II. In that break I thought to myself, “I would really like to see a whole movie about Vito Corleone, before he became the Godfather. Part II starts, and voila, my wish is Coppola’s command.

The prequel/sequel aspect of this part of the story is quite interesting to me for two reasons. First I so wanted to be more captivated by Vito, but to do that I needed something to understand about him, his past, his reasons for doing the things he does. And second, Michael as the head of the family didn’t mean much to me as a stand alone story. I felt like we had seen the upward swing of him and the only way to go would be down. While watching someone crumble is always fascinating, this is the one downfall of Part II for me, the transparency of the rise and fall scenario. Adding the life of Vito as told in flashbacks was like a custom made movie just for me.

Young Robert DeNiro as a young Vito took me by surprise. I knew DeNiro was in the movie, but I had no idea what role he played. I told you, it’s tragic that I have gone my whole life without watching these movies. I have not been sheltered, but never made any effort to know about them so I was totally in the dark. Imagine never having watched it before and having the chance to discover all of this for the first time…it’s very cool.

The back story of Vito’s life filled in a huge gap of wanting for me. I wanted to find him compelling. I wanted to have some compassion for him. I wanted to have a reason, one reason, not to hate him for being such a ruthless bastard. Part II satisfied all these desires amply. Talk about tragic, a young boy’s family murdered by the local Sicilian thug boss. He then travels to America and slowly, patiently makes something of himself. Yes he becomes a criminal, but there is a foundation there to build on. He could have chosen to be a totally honest hard working man. However he chose to be an honest hard hitting extortionist and favor doer which eventually lead him to more violent things like having horses beheaded and men killed. Even with all of these bad deeds, Vito had a REASON. What about Michael?

Michael now runs the family from his Lake Tahoe house on the water. It cheapens the whole New York dark and cozy feel for me. Moving some of the action to Vegas for financial gain, trying to move up in the world, it doesn’t have the same heart Part I has. Pacino is brilliant. No doubt about it. He’s subtle and brooding but explosive when it’s important. I still see that psycho hidden beneath, while he doles out orders, gets too big for his britches and eventually proving my point by having poor Fredo disposed of. His own brother, this guy ain’t no Vito.

Tom is still around, solving problems, doling out his own kind of justice in such a admirable/loathable way. Tom has always been considered a son to Vito, even though he’s not really part of the family. Not everyone thinks of him with as high regard as Vito did. He’s being held at arm’s length by Michael and it’s causing enough tension to convince me that Michael is starting to show his true colors. He has nothing to back up his actions. He has no tortured childhood. He wasn’t left an orphan by some jerk in Sicily. He was handed all of this on a silver platter and now, mixing with crooked politicians, tossing around large sums of charitable money, and trying to dominate other thug families, his cracks are starting to show. He has only his desire for power and to be in charge, the puppet master. It’s not enough to hold him and his life together.

The part of the story with Kate having and abortion to avoid bringing another Corleone into the world is interesting. She’s brave and bold and tries to get away with his children. Tha’ts not going to happen. We are convinced by the end of the movie that the most important thing in his life is protecting his children which means keeping them away from their mother. Why he didnt just kill Kate, I don’t know. Some secret thing about killing your children’s mother or something no doubt. I guess that doesn’t apply to killing your own brother, so many rules.

Overall I enjoyed Part II marginally less than Part I, HOWEVER, watching it again will probably change that. I didn’t focus on the details as much in Part II just because sometimes I was trying to keep up with who’s doing what to who. It’s just as stunning to look at, the style, the pace, the building of each part of the tale, it’s all here as if there was no gap between the two films. I will make a point to watch these two again in a couple of months when I have time to let them settle. What about Part III you ask? Hmmm I said it before, I’ll say it again, what can I say that hasn’t been said? Read on.


The Godfather Part III: 6/10
Ascully, my dear husband, fills in these templates with ‘Blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah’ and then I delete the blahs and write my thoughts on each movie. I sat looking at the blah blah blah blah’s for a while on Part III. I have heard all the negative hype. These movies might not have been in my head, but I live in the real world where people do express very strong opinions on this, the final installment of the Corleone sega. This means that yes, I know people don’t like it. People hate it, say it’s crap, rip it to shreds every which way. Well guess what, I like to think for myself. I like to absorb something on my own, form my own opinion and not go along with the crowd.

It’s it funny how sometimes we can be so wrong? I mean, i thought everyone was just being ultra picky. I like all 6 Star Wars movies. Gigli was NOT that bad. I liked Waterworld and loved The Postman. See where I’m going here. I’m a woman with my own mind. People aren’t very smart most of the time so The Godfather Part III seemed like it was probably just another mindless victim of over scrutiny and biased to the two beloved films that preceded it.

Do I have to say it outloud? Or can I just type it? I was wrong, wrong, wrong. I’ll get the formalities out of the way, The Godfather Part III was a sorry excuse for a movie, at least one pretending to conclude such an epic tale. My eyes were focused on the screen, my ears on the sound, but my mind she wandered. I found myself consciencously thinking how poorly written, poorly paced, often poorly acted the whole thing was. In my life of watching movies those thoughts never blatently cross my mind.

What did I like? Al Pacino.

What didn’t I like? Sofia Coppola, Andy Garcia, the whole Catholic church thing, the amounts of money that Corleone has acquired, and so much more. Michael has apparently handed his children back over to the mother he ripped them from several years ago. We get a flimsy letter in the beginning that tells that part of the story. Now those kids are grown up mostly. The son wants to be a singer and the daughter is the director’s daughter.

The acting from almost everyone except for Pacino, Keaton, and some perpherial people is actually so flat it’s distracting. What the hell was going on? I will never get an answer to that question, so I’ll move on to the next one. What year was this movie supposed to be taking place in? 1979, right? So why is the daughter always dressed like a an 80′s leftover? I watched all those John Hughes movie too. It’s like they never sent her to wardrobe, they just let her come into her shots with those horrible late 80′s early 90′s clothes on. It was so disappointing for such trivial things to make such an impression.

Let’s talk about story again, the church is a big business and it’s in debt. Some conglomerate of strange and almost 1950′s business men wants to keep Michael out of the picture so they can kill all the popes who don’t play along with their money making schemes. All of this and the implication that Michael is somehow going to save the pope, the church, starving children, and his soul. George Hamilton stands up very straight and obviously has the thought “I’ll never be as good as Duval.” running through is head constantly. It’s a farce people. I can’t think of any redeeming qualities…well, maybe a couple.

When Pacino does the confession it’s a very touching scene. It totally doesn’t fit with anything else in the whole entire series, but he does a great job. Also, we ar reminded of fact that Vito, Michael’s father (in case we have forgotten by now) had to recover from gun shot wounds inflicted by his dealings and the choices he made. Which is a fair storyline element in this epic tale with conflict of on the man vs. himself, the world, his environment, society. The problem is that we are reminded through Michael’s inferment as he copes with Diabetes, as if his body is his foe. He says it acts up when he’s stressed out. So, it’s like a cheap modern twist on the idea of man vs. himself.  It’s boring. It’s not compelling at all.

Keaton shines in this one for me, I can’t forget to mention that. The scene in Sicily at the table with Pacino, good stuff. It seems Pacino elevates most people he does scenes with, most people. I won’t rip anyone apart. Some were too young to know how bad they were, some were just not up to the challenge of competing with a legacy of amazing performances before them. It’s just a shame that the quality of almost every aspect of this franchise is crushed under some unseen pressure. Notice I have never refered to these films as a franchise until now. Seeing Part III moved me from the lovely thoughts of these elegant, satisfying films being a unique experience to thoughts of people cashing in on something that maybe should have been left alone.

The venom isn’t intendted. I wanted to like this movie, be a rebel, fight the crowd. The problem is that the more I think about it the worse it is. Unlike Part II which gets better as it marinades in my mind, strange how that happens, Part III causes an controllable head shake and eye roll. I sincerly wanted The Godfather Part III to be a wonderful three hours to get lost in another world, another place, with familiar but evolving characters, ideas, experiences. That didn’t happen and I just have to learn to deal with it.

Overall I am thrilled and proud to say I am now a card carrying Godfather fan. It might take years to perfect my affection, but that’s ok, I’m willing to put in the time.

Audio & Video by Ascully: /10
I didn’t appreciate how amazing the transfer and restoration of these movies were until I watched one of the extra’s on the fourth disc detailing the process. Then I was sold. Godfather 1 and 2 are really quite old movies and the masters were pretty much full of scratches. The team at Zoetrope hired one of the leading film restorers in the country and set about the long arduous process of restoring it frame by frame. Using the latest technology they scanned in a original negative combined from various 35mm prints and then spent a whole year touching up the images one pixel at a time. The result is amazing.

As I said in the Podcast, the director of photography Gordon Willis has the nickname “The Prince Of Darkness”. This isn’t by accident. He uses a unique light and shadows technique in his filmmaking. Some scenes are intentionally not lit at all to provide a more natural dark feel. You might think your television is broken at some points in the film since the detail is lacking, but don’t go reaching for the brightness control. Those blacks are meant to be black, this is by artistic intent. The movies are also not as sharp as some HD releases you find on Blu-Ray disc. This is because of the age of the prints. If you are looking for showcase HD material this isn’t it, but if you are looking for a more subtle filmlike image, the Godfather Restoration is the way to go.

The original first 2 movies had mono soundtracks at the time of release but the Coppola Restoration version of the movies brings them into the present with a full Dolby TrueHD mix. While these are not quite as dynamic as today’s rock’em sock’em feature films they do sound a lot better than the older DVD releases. But remember, the Godfather movies are more talk than action and that is where the sound excels right up in the center channel where it needs to be. The surrounds do not play a major part in the soundstage except for a few chapters of Godfather 3 which is the livliest of the bunch, I assume because it was made in the 90′s right as dolby surround technology was taking off.  All 3 movies sound better than they have in years.

Overall the Godfather Collection, especially on Blu-Ray, are the best versions of the movie on a home format avalible. Since the result of restoring these movies is a brand new 4K transfer that has been archived, we now have a peice of film history safe for many years to come.


Value: 7/10
Ok, don’t freak out. I know this DVD collection is packed full of movie and extra goodness. I still do not believe that it’s worth a hundred bucks. If you look closely online you will find it for around 50-60, but that’s still quite steep….then again, this is an entire weekend of entertainment. I would be willing to go as high as $35.00 for the set. Let’s face it, these movies have made a good chunk of change in their lifetime. This time around it should be about what the restoration is worth, and the new extras. Would I rent? No. Even after not being a lifelong devotee to the series, I still want it on my DVD shelf.

Overall Score 10/10

• Deleted And Extended Scenes – These scraps were tossed aside for whatever reasons, but they did take the time to finish them off with special effects, sound, and everything. There is a couple with some digital scribbling on them, but it’s still fun to see what the director decided was worthy of finishing, and still cutting from the final movie.
• I Am Iron Man: 7 Part Making Of - Excellent documentary style behind the camera look at the process of getting Iron Man from script to the big screen. I love these kinds of extras. It’s not overly produced or directed. There aren’t a lot of talking heads in boring interviews. It’s mostly following Favreau and the cast around, and as mundane as that sounds it’s well worth the time to watch it.
• The Invincible Iron Man: 6 Part History Of The Hero – Hey, another great extra! This package is shaping up. I have never read Iron Man. Let’s be honest, I’ve never read any super hero comics. I hadn’t even heard of Iron Man until
• Wired: The Visual Effects Of Iron Man – It’s a CGI fest for people who have yet to have learned about how visual effects are done in  these modern movies. I appreciate the effort they take to get this on the DVD. It’s fun to watch, but let’s be honest, after a few dozen views of computers crunching shapes and effects it all blends together after a while.
• Robert Downey Jr. Screen Test – Does a guy like Downey Jr. need to screen test for a role anymore? Testing lines and scenes with cast, crew, and mysterious folks is fun to watch. I wonder if he gets paid for it.
• The Actor’s Process – Robert Downey Jr. and Jeff Bridges work out how they will do scenes. It’s a great look at this aspect of making a movie if you are a budding actor. I love behind the scenes information but for some reason this doesn’t interest me at all.
• Still Galleries And More! - Galleries and “more” aren’t really extras, they’re just stuff shoved on a disc to make this list longer.

The Movie: 9/10

Iron Man? Isn’t that some animated movie from a few years ago? No? A comic book? Right. Never heard of it. That’s right, I had never heard of Iron Man before the trailers for this movie started floating around. This gives me a certain purity, if you will, when it comes to making a fair movie goer judgment about the cinematic version of this shiny gold and red dude.

What do I love about the movie. Yes, LOVE. I enjoyed it very much and there are a few reasons. The first and foremost element that charmed me more than a little is Robert Downey Jr. Come on, he’s fascinating to watch. He has a swagger and attitude that fits the Tony Stark character just right. I can’t explain exactly what it is about him that has always turned my crank, but whatever it is, it’s still there.

Of course this new thing with showing us a super hero discovering his powers or his true self, I like it. I might be on a bandwagon here, which sucks, but oh well. It’s satisfying to see Stark develop his idea, build his first suit, use it, learn from it, build another..etc. It takes the story from a place of almost reality to the world of heroes and villains, which is very interesting.

The next thing I really dig about the movie is the combination of audio, visual, music, all that stuff that makes an action movie a big powerful experience. The special effects are good enough to keep my from rolling my eyes. There are a couple of times when the ‘rag doll’ effect kicks in with some shabby CGI involving some movies by Iron Man. Other than that I thought it all looked great. It wasn’t 100% seamless, but sometimes flaws are overpowered by everything that’s right about a movie.

What else was enjoyable? Gwyneth Cold Play and Jeff Bald Bridges, they both held their own against the semi-crazy styling of Mr. Downey. I haven’t seen Paltrow in something that made me like her except Proof, and now i can add Iron Man to the list. She’s not got a lot of umph as a character, but she’s important enough to give me the feeling that she’s valuable in Stark’s world and in his life.

I also really like Terrence Howard as Roadie, Stark’s best friend. Between he and Pepper Potts (Paltrow) I got the strong sense of friendship and almost family for the genius billionaire Stark. Unlike a lot of these movies, these relationships are solid and the dialogue between them feels right. It’s a good foundation for some outrageous action sequences that can sometimes outshine the personal connections between characters, but Favreau and his writing team got it right for Iron Man.

The suit? Yes, it’s very cool. There are some “hero” moments that even got my feathers fluffed for justice and saving the world from danger. The technology makes me jealous. I want holograms and touchscreen everything. It’s all big and bold, but it all still fits the universe they all live in. I buy it, you know what I’m saying. We have all seen movies that have the ultra modern gadgets that don’t really fit in just right. Favreau and his team found a groove that works. Here’s hoping other movies follow this example.

What I didn’t like will be brief, but worth noting. The occasional bad human movement CGi is always a problem for me. I let it slide when I like the rest of the movie enough. I just wish they would never let these little slips happen at all these days.

I also don’t fully get what Iron Man’s agenda is. I know he wants to stop contributing to the evils of the world with his weapons manufacturing. I know he wants to protect people from bad guys. So, how does that translate in this movie to super hero antics? There are a couple of moments when he takes on the big task of rescuing victims and putting bad guys in their place, but i was left feeling a little super hero deprivation.

Overall this movie is an impressive summertime treat for me. Oh dear that sounds like some quaint old auntie talking, fair enough. It also kicks ass and got my heart racing a time or two, which is good for an aging broad like me.





Audio & Video: /10
I think I have found my personal superhero favorite in Iron man. I also think I have found the perfect disc to show off my HD Home Theater room. I can’t imagine a better looking or better sounding disc coming along this year (or any year for that matter). Paramount is using the AVC codec at a average bit rate of 29mbps and lossless Dolby TrueHD 5.1 clocking in at a crazy 3.8mbps on the scale. This makes one of the year’s hottest Summer blockbuster tickets that much hotter in its journey home. I could go on and on about how great the video and sound are on this release, but I would just be wasting time. Time that you could be using to get down the local DVD mart to get yourself a copy. Overall it’s a perfect superhero movie and a PERFECT home run hit for Paramount. If Blu-Ray didn’t have a killer application yet, it does now.


Value: 5/10
Iron Man is a quality action flick. I enjoyed it very much. The extras and packaging are excellent. So, why do I insist on saying that the value is only middle of the road? It’s still just a DVD folks. $27 is not reasonable for me to spend on an evening’s entertainment. For this caliber DVD I want to see a $14-$17 price tag on my movies. That’s just the way it is. If you give me a graphic novel, free movie tickets, plus a full length documentary about the making of the movie, THEN we are talking about something that’s worth my twenty dollar bill. Regardless of what I think about the price, this is a great DVD to add to your collection for a few reasons. I might complain about the price, but I don’t like how much my electric bill is either, but I don’t turn the air conditioner up just to save money:)

Overall Score 9/10

Review Covers Blu-Ray & 2 Disc DVD Edition

Cover Art and Menus: 8/10
They did make with this packaging. Sweeney Todd was a stage play long before it hit the big screen, so the theater style box is a throwback to the history of the story, pretty cool. The slip off cover isn’t a new idea, but with the window cut out to kind of frame the inside box (DVD Only), well, it’s not just like all the others. I like that.

The menu is an almost still image behind the navigation. There are some moving parts, but not much to brag about. Both discs of the 2 disc set have the same kind of menu. Functional, moody, but nothing too exciting.


Features: 8/10

• Burton + Depp + Carter = Todd Featurette – Very good collection of interviews and clips from the making of the movie that covers the process from idea to the finished film. Excellent extra you will find on the single disc version.
• Sweeney Todd Is Alive The Real History Of The Demon Barber – Another excellent extra that takes us through the history of Sweeney Todd from the first Penny Blood in British newspapers to the current interpretations. It’s a very cool story about a man who some believe is a real person…you be the judge.
• Musical Mayhem Sondheim’s Sweeney Todd – Yet another good documentary type extra that tells us the behind the scenes of how Sondheim created his 70′s version of the story and then how that became the Tim Burton movie version.
• Sweeney’s London – The original story of Sweeney Todd is controversial, is he real or not? This extra takes us through a tour of the time in which the original Todd was supposed to have lived. His address, the customs, fashion, etc. of the time and it’s really quite educational. Don’t be afraid, you won’t melt if you learn something.
• The Making Of Sweeney Todd – Making of’s, as they are, are good. This one is standard, but still fun to watch.
• Grand Guignol A Theatrical Tradition – Learning more more more!! I never had heard of Grand Guignol, a French gore theater experience from the 20′s and 30′s. It’s fascinating and makes me want to look into the subject even more. Lovely extra!!
• Designs For A Demon Barber - Costumes are important for a period piece. This is a run down of how they decided on the styles and personalities of each lead character.
• A Bloody Business – A good demonstration of how they got so many cut throats to bleed so violently. Whew, bloody for sure, but very cool to see the man behind the curtain, so to speak.
• Moviephone Unscripted With Tim Burton & Johnny Depp – A one on one with Burton and Depp answering questions from Moviephone internet readers. It’s pretty fun to watch certain people, and these two are entertaining, so it’s worth a watch.

Movie: 9/10
I find it hard to talk about movies I really really enjoy. I’m not sure why, I guess it’s because I want to just enjoy it as I watch it and then in my head without spilling out all the drooling accolades to the general public. Oh, but I do write my little reviews every week, and do the podcast discussion, so I am finding it hard to keep it all to myself, as you can imagine.

What do I love about Sweeney Todd? I have no idea. That’s the truth. I watched it once on my laptop, which was a sad way to watch any movie, but it was what I had at the time and even with the small dark screen and headphone sound, I fell in love completely with this story and with the whole movie.

No, I’m not a fan of musicals. No, I’m not a huge fan of Johnny Depp. No I’m not obsessed with Tim Burton, or dark stories, or blood and gore, or anything like that. I do like Johnny Depp. I have enjoyed every Burton flick. I haven’t always liked Helena Bonham Carter….so it all sounds kind neutral. The funny thing is, from the opening moment of the movie when we meet Sweeney Todd coming back to a grubby dark London I was hooked.

The story unfolds pretty quickly. Todd was married to a beautiful young woman and had a small daughter. An unscrupulous judge, played by Alan Rickman, send Todd to prison wrongly and proceeds to (apparently) rape the young wife and then takes the daughter to raise as his own. That’s what got me I think. This man loved his wife so much and then his whole life was taken from him by some greedy perverted sleazebag and now, after 15 years of prison he’s come back to hopefully get his life back. That’s not going to happen so revenge becomes his obsession.

The look of the movie is typical Burton dark and grungy. I love it. The contrast of the music with the grim setting is another thing that gets my attention. It’s all just different than anything I have seen in a long time, if ever and I appreciate the break from convention. Don’t be scared off by the darkness, or the loads of squirting blood. It’s not scary or traumatizing, it’s just extreme and jolting sometimes. Not everyone who falls prey to the demon barber chair and the human pie maker Mrs. Lovett deserve to have their throats slit, but gosh, I kind of forget about that as the montage of gruesome killings floats before my eyes. I’m just so in the zone of believing that this guy is motivated by hate and anger to take it all out on the shithole city and culture he has come to despise.

Everyone does a good job, some better than others, but overall the acting is spot on. There are a few moments when the campiness gets a little tad too much, but then it’s reigned back in so it wasn’t distracting. The singing is all good. I’m not an expert in singing so I’m impressed with these people who are not professional singers, and it all sounded natural and not the overly over-sang musical style.

A young man finds the 15 year daughter of Todd hidden away and wants to rescue her. Todd only wants to kill the evil judge who ruined his life. Mrs. Lovett only wants to make some dosh and have Mr. T for her own and have a nice cozy life. Everyone has their own very strong motivations for all the things they do. Nothing is left to the imagination, we are taken from song to song, lyric to lyric and it doesn’t leave room for much reading between the lines. It reminds me of old 30′s and 40′s horror movies, which adds to my already gooey love of the movie. The straight forward story and no brooding hidden agendas to wonder about or interpret.

The music is not the West Side Story style where they all break into a song and dance routine every 2 minutes. There is some spoken dialogue and when someone sings it’s just what they want to say or what they are feeling, without any big musical numbers to make it corny at all.

I can’t say enough good stuff about this movie. It transported me. I am impressed with the characters, the look, the songs, the story…..not much more to say:)



Video & Audio By Ascully: /10
Paramount were out of the HD war when Sweeney Todd was released on DVD, and only now chose to bring it to Blu-Ray disc. This is a movie that is made for High Definition so its great that its finally here. Sweeney Todd is a dark movie, what am I saying its not Dark its almost black in tone and visually. Paramount have done a great job with this transfer preserving the inky black look of old London and its inhabitants. Using the AVC codec at a average bitrate of 24mbps (it sounds a little low but there is less information on darker movies). Audio is delivered as always in uncompressed Dolby TrueHD and is another reason the Blu-Ray version shines. The musical numbers sound alive and come at you from all angles.

Overall Sweeney Todd on Blu-Ray disc was worth waiting for and is a definite upgrade from the DVD version, and even better its around the same price as the DVD if you look around online.

Value: 6/10
I want a DVD to cost LESS than it does for me to go the theater. Until that day, no matter how much I love a movie, I will not be satisfied with the prices. You are going to pay around 25 bucks for Sweeney Todd. It’s not a great deal, but then again, I’m a cheap chick. I want to own this one just because I will watch it again, and probably again. So it’s worth the cash. If you are just curious about Burton’s first musical, rent it and enjoy the extra moo-la in your pocket.

Overall Score 8/10

The menus are slightly better, featuring Indian themed music and 1970’s hippy background. It fits with the film’s theme, and isn’t over the top. It’s not great, but it is better than the cover, which is supposed to be funny merely because Mike Myer’s is in character.


Features: 6/10
The Love Guru, like many of Mike Myer’s DVDs has a ton of deleted scenes and bloopers, which are honestly quite funny. It is worth watching some of the bloopers just to see how much fun they had making this movie. Some of the deleted scenes (especially one featuring Verne Troyer supposedly skating) are left out of the film for good reason, but some seemed to me to be needed to advance the (limited) story.

There are also some Featurette’s that were actually pretty entertaining. One short, “Hockey Training for Actors” was about how they went about filming the hockey scenes, which Myers felt needed to be realistic, as he is Canadian. It was truly amazing to learn that Romany Malco, who plays the NHL leading scorer Darren Roanoke had never really skated before.

Also included was a feature on how they used and created animatronic elephant and an ostrich for the movie, and how it worked in real time. The feature was entitled “One Hellava Elephant.”

Finally there was a short called “Mike Meyers and the Love Guru: an Inside Look.” This short was really kind of a throw away, with Myers talking about why he decided to make this movie, as well as interviews with some of the other actors and such. My least favorite feature on the disk really.

Finally there was the entirely too short piece called “Back in the Booth with Tim and Jay,” which brought back the two hockey announcers from the movie to give even more in depth coverage of the hockey action. Played by Steven Colbert and Jim Gaffigan, the pair were absolutely hysterical through the movie, and in this extra.

I also need to mention that the Love Guru Package that I reviewed included a digital copy, that can be transferred to your itunes to view on your iPod or iPhone, or watched on your PC using Media Player. I really like this idea, and it takes the struggle out of having to find a way to take movies that you own and get them into a digital format that you can use. The flexibility that this offers is great, and it looks like more and more DVD releases are going to include these digital copies. I for one am happy that they are being included.





The Movie: 4/10
I am a bit torn on the Love Guru. I am starting to wonder if I have outgrown (dare I say matured) to the point where Mike Myer’s humor is no longer really funny to me. I mean there were points in the movie where I laughed out loud, but there were also points where I felt that Myer’s just gave up and went low brow for some really cheap attempts at humor.

I guess I have either really changed, or Mike Myers has. Maybe it is both.

The Love Guru is about Guru Maurice Pitka, who is of course played by Mike Myers. Myers gives Pitka an Indian accent, and the full Indian/guru outfit, complete with an ashram and an elephant. Guru Pitka is a man who is constantly fighting to become the next Deepak Chopra, and he is battling with himself to realize what his mentor has burdened him with, which is to find true love inside himself. Interestingly enough, Guru Pitka’s mentor is played by Ben Kingsley, who plays a crossed eyed guru, which made me think of a bastardized version of himself in Gandhi.

Guru Pitka is hired by the owner of the Toronto Maple Leafs hockey team, who is played by Jessica Alba. The Maple Leaf’s lead scorer Darren Roanoke is struggling to find his scoring form after his wife takes up with rival Los Angeles Kings goalkeeper Jacques “le Coq” Grandes, played by Justin Timberlake. As would have it, “le Coq” is aptly named, and the tradition of Mike Myers using penis jokes in his movies continues.

Guru Pitka is left to struggle through treating Roanoke as the Maple Leafs try to break a curse on the team by winning the Stanley Cup. All hilarity ensues, or is supposed to, as the cast fights to straddle the line between story and overused punch lines.

I really wanted to like the Love Guru. Mike Myers has a track record of being really funny at times, like in So I Married an Axe Murderer, or the first Austin Powers movie, but it really seems like his last movies have just relied on sight gags and dance numbers. I miss the clever Mike Myers, when he would develop a character that was outright funny, and not rely on wiener jokes and using Mini Me for laughs.

It just seemed a bit tired. I really did laugh, but I had to struggle through some inane jokes to get to the funny parts. Maybe I did grow up a little bit, and maybe Mike Myers is still really funny to some people, but I couldn’t help but think that this felt like watching old Beavis and Butthead reruns; been there and done that. Overall there were some funny parts, but numerous penis jokes, a pissy mop fight, and watching elephants hump just doesn’t do it for me anymore.





Video & Audio: 8/10
The audio for the Love Guru was good, and the levels were great. There were a few musical numbers (again, seen that before in a Myers’ movie) and they sounded great.

The video was just average. I didn’t think there was really much to it, and I guess this type of movie doesn’t need much in terms of video, but the colors were not as bright as I thought they could be. There was a great scene involving a Bollywood type of interplay between Jessica Alba and Mike Myers that looked very realistic and funny, but overall just average.


Value: 4/10
I can’t say to even spend time watching the Love Guru unless you are the type of person who wants to see Mike Myers play “the funny guy” again. This just was too much of the same, and the jokes were not great. It is funny in parts, but I think it will be a long while before I sit down to watch this in its entirety. Basically if you thought the last two Austin Power’s movies were the best, you will like this one, otherwise stay away.

Overall Score 5/10