// Category Archive for: DVD/Blu-Ray Reviews

Alien 2: On Earth

By Ann Clarke

Midnight Legacy films, for some fucked-up reason only known to them, felt the need to re-release the Italian film known as Alien 2 Sulla Terra. That translates to Alien 2: On Earth. After wasting 84.25 minutes of my life watching this . . . I have to wonder why they even went through the trouble.
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Bob Dylan Revealed

By John Lane

One can expect the usual onslaught of products and merchandise to cash in on Bob Dylan’s 70th birthday on May 1. Just as we have become used to more Beatles product every time Ringo coughs or Paul sneezes, so too must we be inundated with Bob Dylan product when he reaches a significant birthday mark.
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Bob Dylan: The Never Ending Narrative 1990 – 2006

By Paul Casey

Despite my trepidation that The Never Ending Narrative, which documents Dylan’s commercial and critical comeback, would be another super cheap cash-in akin to Bob Dylan World Tour 1966: The Home Movies, I was pleasantly surprised. Sure, it is still pretty cheap—the most direct interview subjects are a pair of engineers—but unlike that earlier movie, it actually has Dylan music! Although it is not exactly overflowing with it, there is just enough to hold things together. The majority of the film is taken up by a series of music journalists, most of who specialize in discussing Bob Dylan. Most of these are entertaining, clearly know their subject, and help disguise the film’s shortcomings.

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I’m The Real Victim Here: I Spit On Your Grave Remade and Revisited

By Michelle Patterson

Victimhood has had an ironic stranglehold on cinema since the medium’s very inception. The “woman’s picture,” along with the romantic comedy and action-adventure genres, tap into the potential for an audience to live both vicariously through the film and also fully explore their empathetic side. The horror film has also allowed this to continue for over a century now.
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A History Lesson, Part 1: Punk Rock in Los Angeles in 1984

By Less Lee Moore

My interest in this documentary on some of the bands in the mid-80s L.A. punk scene was piqued by the inclusion of Redd Kross, which, as anyone who knows me will attest, is my all time favorite band. Not because they are necessarily the best band in the world, or the most famous, or the most infamous, but because they forever changed my life for the better, a topic too lengthy to get into here, but which is, unsurprisingly, completely relevant to a discussion of A History Lesson Part 1.

This is not your standard glossy, let’s-explain-why-punk-rock-is-so-important documentary. It’s comprised of old footage shot by Dave Travis, a fan and friend of the bands featured—The Meat Puppets, The Minutemen, Twisted Roots, Redd Kross—interspersed with current interviews from members of those bands. The immediacy and importance of all the bands is captured in the grainy footage, and rather than coming across as embarrassing, it’s completely invigorating.
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America’s Music Legacy: Dixieland Jazz (DVD)

By Danny R. Phillips

It has been said that Jazz is the only truly American music style. While other genres blend rhythm, tones, and instruments from other countries, Jazz—whether it be Davis, Coltrane, Armstrong, Hancock, Holliday, or Horne (or god forbid, Kenny G.)—was hatched, raised, nurtured, and perfected here within our shores.

Dixieland Jazz, a mash up of blues, ragtime, and other stylings is a perfect choice for the series America’s Music Legacy; it has a rich, colorful history that is explored here by host Al Hirt, the Jazz trumpeter and Dixieland luminary. Much like the Blues installment of the this series, it includes live performances and is packed with clips of giants who have already left us: piano great Fats Waller, Louis Armstrong, and Eubie Blake.
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America’s Music Legacy: Blues (DVD)

By Danny R. Phillips

The series America’s Music Legacy, with installments on Dixieland Jazz, Folk, Country, Soul, and others has the goal of documenting the foundations of America music. And with this chapter, “Blues,” they do a fine job.

Though it can seem slightly hokey and the performances painfully staged (the performances are set in “clubs” with “customers” in the audience; when the audience does get movin’, it still seems like they’re just playing a role), the real saving grace is the fact that this DVD focuses on the music. Despite the lack of energy and wildness that the blues should inspire and a spontaneous feeling of excitement that the genre can sometimes generate, there are some great performances by great players to be found.
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Sister Smile (Suor Sorriso): The Tragic Tale Of The Singing Nun DVD

By Hanna

Suor Sorriso, also known as Sister Smile, is a cult classic in a lot of ways; it has also served to revive interest in the real-life “Singing Nun,” also known as Jeannine Deckers. There has been a demand for Sister Smile on DVD for some time; many viewers will be watching this film for its position in cinema history. Whatever its cinematic merits, though, I found the almost entire lack of factual accuracy or congruency difficult to surmount.
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Punk: Attitude On DVD

By Emily Carney

Don Letts, the director of the 2005 documentary Punk: Attitude, was the man who was most instrumental in bridging the gap between punk rock and dub reggae; without his influence, albums such as Public Image Ltd.’s Metal Box/Second Edition probably wouldn’t have existed, or have been as seminal. Letts made his first rock film, The Punk Rock Movie, in 1978; this effort, captured on a very of-its-time Super 8 camera, was quite murky and grainy, and even had a limited VHS tape release.
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David Bowie: Rare And Unseen

By Christian Lipski

Is it an indication that America’s litigious society has been imported to the UK, or just a production company with a guilty conscience? In addition to excited copy about the disc’s contents, the back cover of David Bowie: Rare and Unseen includes the following definitions: “Unseen: Believed unseen since first broadcast. Rare: Believed never released on DVD.” It’s unknown why they felt it legally prudent to put that text on the case, but at least the viewer knows what they’re getting, which is admirable. Regardless, if you live in the US, most if not all of the material on the 60-minute DVD is both rare and unseen.
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