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Michael Giltz: DVDs: It's Tina Fey's World...
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Michael Giltz
Posted October 10, 2008 | 03:08 PM (EST)
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DVDs: It's Tina Fey's World...
Read More: 30 Rock , Alfred Hitchcock , Animation , Disney,
Dvds, Movies, Orson Welles , Ray Harryhausen , Sarah Palin , South Park, The Simpsons ,
Tina Fey , TV Shows , Entertainment News
...and we just live in it. Seriously, has any female
comedian ever dominated the zeitgeist the wayTina Fey is doing right now? (Certainly almost nomen have done so either.) Fey isn't just starringin the Emmy-winning 30 Rock Season 2 ($39.98;
Universal), the way Roseanne and Mary TylerMoore and Lucille Ball did on their definingshows in decades past. It's her baby in every way,with Fey also writing and producing. Fey also hashit films to her name like the modest comedyBaby Mama and the more successful Mean Girls.
A multi-million dollar bidding war ensued over
her upcoming memoirs. And to top it off, she is a dead-ringer for VP candidate Sarah Palin and hasdone double duty by imitating Palin on easily the funniest political humor on Saturday Night Livethat we've seen in decades. If there's ever been a funnier, more spot-on imitation of a politicalfigure, stretching from Rich Little's Nixon to Will Ferrel's George Bush, I can't think of it.Nonetheless, despite the inherent pleasure in being contrary and attacking conventional wisdom, Itake no pleasure in saying that 30 Rock just isn't that funny for me. I want to like the show; I
SHOULD like the show. But I don't. I find the humor too broad, the acting too cartoonish and thesituations both too knowing and too dumb. Yes, Alec Baldwin finds genuine humor in his role asthe suit and I can usually find something to make me smile in every episode. It's certainly a smartshow made by smart people. But even watching again Emmy-honored episodes like the CarrieFisher guest spot or Baldwin getting all ghetto in Tracy Morgan's therapy session can't compare tothe heart of say The Office or the stronger, more believable ensemble on How I Met Your Mother
Season 3 ($39.98; Fox). That show is a solid comedy that's found its signature by reveling in
complicated flashbacks and an ensemble that feels like a family, the way so many of the bestsitcoms seem to do. (And Neil Patrick Harris was robbed at the Emmys, but the rest of the gangelevates their material just as much.) 30 Rock follows in the tradition of shows I've loved from The
Dick Van Dyke Show to The Mary Tyler Moore Show to Buffalo Bill and NewsRadio, so I'll keep
tuning in every once in a while. And it's no big deal: Fey's got the world on a string -- she doesn'tneed me too.
So tell me, what do you think of Tina Fey?
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Michael Giltz: DVDs: It's Tina Fey's World...
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/michael-giltz/dvds-its-tina-feys-world_b_133697.html [4/5/2009 1:23:08 PM]Maybe Some People Shouldn't Be Forgiven -- The intriguing British drama Boy A ($24.95;
Weinstein/Genius) tells of a young man released from prison, given a new identity and struggling
to mainstream back into society. Slowly, we learn the horrific crime he committed as a child, the
miserable life that shaped him and watch as the protagonist shyly builds a new life even as he (and
we) wonder if he deserves it. Nicely acted and well directed, Boy A is similar in a way to Kevin
Bacon's The Woodsman, a movie that showed a pedophile and made us empathize with the man
while not ignoring the dark urges that would always be with him. Boy A is quite different: the deckis stacked wholly in favor of our hero who is handsome, charming, smart, bashful, wholly regretful
and shown to be the reluctant pawn in the terrible crime that has defined him. It doesn't wholly let
him off the hook (we see glimpses of his violent nature, for example), but you could hardly make astronger case for wanting to see the perpetrator of such a crime get rehabilitated. But what makesthe film worthwhile, beyond its intelligence and fine supporting cast led by Peter Mullan as amentor, is Andrew Garfield as Boy A. He is remarkably good and clearly a talent to watch. Boy Amay or may not have a future, but Garfield surely does.
Good Night, Shyamalan -- M. Night Shyamalan's new movie The Happening ($29.99; Fox) is
surprisingly bad. I say "surprisingly" because even as others have piled on his increasingly
unsatisfying movies, I've always defended the inherent gifts he has as a filmmaker -- the visual
flair, the ability to sustain suspense, and the impressive technical command exhibited at times in
The Village, Signs and of course The Sixth Sense. And yet here we have a movie about some sort of
mysterious plague sweeping the Northeast United States -- it's like Hitchcock's The Birds, but with
plants instead of pigeons -- that is hapless on every level. It's not just the leads Mark Wahlberg(who is generally very good) and Zooey Deschanel who are coached into giving awful, wide-eyedperformances. It's every single actor in every single role, from the construction worker at thebeginning to the soldier in the middle to Betty Buckley at the end. Watching people committsuicide, it turns out, is deeply unsuspenseful. And for all of Shyamalan's angry denials he likes twistor surprise endings (as if being the new Rod Serling or O. Henry were a bad thing), the movieagain ends with just the sort of gesture you would expect. Some have suggested the movie includesa stealth defense of Intelligent Design, the anti-science, anti-fact argument that religious beliefs inCreationism must be defended by mocking and belittling science. It's possible, though thatreligious argument is undercut a bit towards the end when Buckley's wacko is shown wigging outin a room filled with iconic images of Jesus. In any case, the movie is almost bizarrely inept, suchas a scene where Wahlberg decides to brave the potentially poisonous outdoors to reach his wife.Instead of running outside with a wet cloth covering his mouth like any sane person would, hewalks out slowly and deliberately and breathes in as much air as possible. Maybe it was an act offaith? Perhaps. But I'm losing faith in Shyamalan.
Doctor Who? Doctor Who -- The BBC's Doctor Who has been an enduring fixture for decades,
with countless mini-dramas behind the scenes as they transitioned from one Doctor to the next or
fought with the BBC to increase their paltry special effects budget from 5 pounds an episode to ten
pounds. Doctor Who: The Trial Of A Time Lord ($59.98; BBC Video) captures one of those
defining moments, this one from the mid-80s when a driving creative force behind the series at
the time conceived of a grand trial of the Doctor (for crimes he had committed and crimes hewould commit in the future) but died in the middle of writing it. Fans will debate the 14 part resultendlessly. Also just out is the single disc Doctor Who: The Brain of Morbius ($24.98; BBC Video),
which contains one four-part adventure and lots of extras. But really, this is no way to handle sucha cumbersome, long-running show. I continue to wish the BBC would stop dribbling out all theseboxed sets and single discs. They're so bulky and poorly organized that it would take practically anentire library just to stock them on your shelf. Surely the only logical approach to this massiveseries is to give definitive boxed sets with the complete adventures of each Doctor in as compactand inexpensive a package as possible.
Masters Of Cinema -- I can't quite rank special effects genius Ray Harryhausen with Orson
Welles and Alfred Hitchcock, but he's as pioneering as Welles and certainly as entertaining as
Hitchcock. From Harryhausen, the only auteurist special effects guy (as Leonard Maltin has said),we get two releases. Ray Harryhausen Collectible Gift Set ($80.95; Sony) has three previously
available deluxe editions of Earth Vs. The Flying Saucers, 20 Million Miles To Earth and It Came
From Beneath The Sea . The real draw here is a wonderfully fiercesome collectible figurine of the
monster Ymir. It's great-looking, but surely a creature like this connected to Harryhausen shouldbe "posable" (Is that a word? I mean jointed like GI Joe so you could move it around) so fans could
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Michael Giltz: DVDs: It's Tina Fey's World...
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/michael-giltz/dvds-its-tina-feys-world_b_133697.html [4/5/2009 1:23:08 PM]use it in their own stop-motion productions. Just a thought. Also out is the fun B-movie The 7th
Voyage of Sinbad ($19.94; Sony), with that classic battle between Sinbad and the skeleton. From
Welles, we get Touch Of Evil 50th Anniversary Edition ($26.98; Universal). The sound mix is
stronger though I think the image is about the same as the 2000 edition. But it's great to have allthree versions in one set (the preview version, the theatrical version with Henry Mancini's
propulsive score dominating the opening sequence and the restored version that follows the Welles
memo for how he'd like the film recut as closely as possible). Finally, we get three gems from
Alfred Hitchcock in two disc sets: Rear Window, Vertigo and Psycho ($26.98 each; Universal).
Again, I can't see any notable difference in sound or picture quality between this and the last two
reissues of these films. If you own them already, no need to upgrade. If you don't own them, of
course, these are classics and you should. Me, I'd start with Rear Window, but you can't go wrong.
NOTE: Mike Clark of USA Today says that Touch Of Evil is disastrously cropped, just like the last
reissue. (It's not clear on the DVD because most versions are different from the original studio-led
theatrical release, so the usual warning about changes to the format weren't a red flag. Apparently,
the proper Welles version is a little boxier, but Universal was worried that people with plasma and
LCD screens wouldn't like that so they cropped off some of the image on the top and the bottom to
make the movie MORE letterboxed. If this wasn't so tragic, I'd laugh. For decades, studios
chopped up movies because they insisted people hated the black bars. Now they ADD black barsbecause they think people want movies to be more letterboxed. What people really want is to seethe movies the way the filmmaker intended. Shame on Universal. How long do we have to wait for
yet another DVD release that will get it right?
Animation: From Disney To Cartman -- Any Disney animated movie not named The Black
Cauldron is usually referred to in a knee-jerk fashion as a classic. I wouldn't say that about
Sleeping Beauty ($29.99; Disney), however. The film is presented in the widescreen format it was
originally intended with some fine extras. But to me, it's clearly second-tier Disney. Though it's
described as Disney's most expensive animated film to date, that certainly isn't demonstrated onscreen. In classics like Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs and Pinocchio , every inch of every frame
is alive with subtle touches. In Sleeping Beauty, cheap work-arounds are just as prominent. Lookat the opening scenes where the three good fairies and one evil one come to bless the new babyprincess. The grand scene of a castle's fairest and finest is merely a painted, unmoving backdrop -even courtiers and banners aren't animated but just stiffly pose in one position with only thecentral two or three people on screen even moving at all. It's the same labor-saving device used oncartoons like The Flintstones and to me it's a blot on the entire film. On the plus side, "I Wonder" is
a nicely unconventional tune and the final battle ain't bad. It's all fine for kiddies, but not nearlyimaginative enough to deserve the title of "classic." The Simpsons do, and their Eleventh Season
($49.98; Fox) finds the show still in relatively top form and the set is loaded with the extras fanshave come to expect from them. If you didn't buy the single volume sets of Speed Racer that came
out recently, you're in luck: Speed Racer: The Complete Classic Collection ($49.98; Lionsgate) has
a nifty Mach 5 design (albeit one too bulky to fit on most shelves) and every episode along withsome extras. This is how they should have released the show in the first place -- not in thosemodest, single volume sets. It remains an intriguingly sober series for one essentially geared tokids. Speed Racer The Next Generation: Fast Track ($19.98; Lionsgate) shows how hard that tone
is to recapture, even with a plot ripped off of Tron. Care Bears Flurries Of Fun ($26.98; Fox)repacakges three individual DVDs filled with the fluffiest, tamest fun. The Smurfs Season OneVolume Two ($26.98; Warner Bros.) seems positively subversive in comparison. And in
comparison to that, You're Not Elected Charlie Brown and A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving
($19.98; Warner Bros.) seem like sophisticated arthouse fare. Luckily, there's always the foul-mouthed, closeted Cartman, who is celebrated in The Cult of Cartman: Revelations ($26.98;
Paramount), which contains 12 notably vulgar episodes of South Park focused on Cartman along
with Life Lessons proferred by Cartman himself.
Monsters Vs. Munsters -- They came out at the same time and after a very brief popularity
flamed out in just two season. Nonetheless, I've always considered The Addams Family to be the
"smart" version of your friendly neighborhood monster when compared to The Munsters. But this
is splitting hairs since both are low-brow comedies of the most obvious sort, enlivened only verymodestly by fine actors like Fred Gwynne as Herman Munster and John Astin as Gomez Addams.The Munsters: The Complete Series ($69.98; Universal) is a nicely thorough compilation for thosewho care, including every episode, two TV movies, the unaired pilot and more.
In The Mood -- I think being in the right mood to see a particular movie is an under-appreciated
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Michael Giltz: DVDs: It's Tina Fey's World...
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/michael-giltz/dvds-its-tina-feys-world_b_133697.html [4/5/2009 1:23:08 PM]element of liking a film. Sometimes, you just want to see a dumb stoner comedy and that's when a
silly movie like Harold & Kumar Go To White Castle seems like genius. Other times, you're ready
for an austere, four hour art house movie. Being in the right mood is important and recognizing
when you're NOT in the right mood is equally significant. Critics don't always have the luxury of
waiting until they can give a film its best shot. But that's the beauty of DVD. The movie will always
be there, just waiting for you to say, ok, I'll give it a shot. And so, The Visitor ($29.97; Anchor Bay).
I really liked director Tom McCarthy's The Station Agent . I also like Richard Jenkins in Six Feet
Under. But just the trailers for this movie put me off. I was not receptive to the seemingly
heartwarming story of a widowed college professor (Jenkins) who gets in touch with his humanity
again thanks to the dark-skinned immigrant who is more in touch with the elemental in life, as
symbolized by his drumming. So I waited and waited, even though the movie was solidly reviewed
and did quite well at the box office for an art house movie. When it came out on DVD, I held onto
it until I felt as open to the movie as possible and then gave it a shot. And disliked it immensely.
(But at least I tried.) Indeed, the movie was everything I feared -- as unconventional and surprising
as The Station Agent was, this one embraced every cliche and took the most obvious route
possible. I'm not sure what offended me more: the idea of a college professor having a gigantic,
empty spare apartment in New York City (dude, I could really use that place) or the absurd
suggestion that a man who found strangers illegally living in his home would immediately rush
outside to find them and invite them back in again. For a man so closed off to his feelings since his
wife had died, that was a pretty remarkable moment early in the film. And couldn't they have
offered at least SOME excuse for this fantastic event? Maybe it could at least have been raining or
the woman could have been visibly pregnant. Just give me some reason to forgive the essential plot
twist that a man would find two people in his home and ask them to stay for as long as they want.
Truly, it boggles the mind. Of course, the young couple aren't so much illegal immigrants as
cultural exchange ambassadors. He's a sexy and handsome drummer in a jazz trio and she's abeautiful artist who creates jewelry and the such. The anger over their illegal status is heavy-handed and trite ("He's a good person!" thunders our hero at one point) and the symbolic finale istoo much to bear. Many others enjoyed this movie more than me and it's certainly not incompetentin the vein of The Happening. But you better be in the right mood to see it. For me, apparently,that mood will never come.
An Open Mind And An Open Heart -- Perhaps the best way to bridge cultural differences in
the world is to learn more about each other. The US, of course, dominates pop culture around the
world with its movies and TV shows and music and books. Two modest DVDs give us glimpses intothe rest of the world. Sufi Soul: The Mystic Music Of Islam ($19.95; Riverboat) is a fine, if brief
look at the music of the followers of Sufi, the most tolerant and celebratory strand of Islam whichdominates in Senegal and elsewhere. Hosted and written by the excellent travel writer WilliamDalrymple, we meet and learn and especially see performances by artists like Rahat Fateh AliKhan, Mercan Dede, Abida Parveen and (briefly) the great Youssou N'Dour. Only 50 minutes long,the documentary film does include extras with complete performances that last another 36minutes, though given the capacity of the DVD it's a shame that it isn't twice as long. If nothingelse, the movie will send you to the world music section of your music store. Even more barebonesis the travel documentary The Sacred Sites of the Dalai Lamas: A Pilgrammage To The OracleLake ($24.95; Michael Wiese). It's one in a series of films traveling to parts of Tibet and elsewhere
that are prominent in the hearts of those who practice Buddhism.
Also out this week: Lou Reed: Berlin ($24.95; Weinstein/Genius), the concert film of his
underappreciated song cycle; Mobile ($39.99; Acorn), a British miniseries that proves Michael
Kitchen is more than just Foyle's War but can't overcome a so-so story any more than the next
actor; Mission: Impossible Fifth Season ($49.99; Paramount) finds Lesley Ann Warren joining the
IMF; The Three Stooges Collection Volume Four 1943-1945 ($24.96; Sony), which collects the
slapstick that kept people smiling through the end of WW II, even as Curly suffered strokes and
became incapacitated; Body Heat ($28.99; Warner Bros.) is so steamy on Blu-Ray you'll try to
wipe the sweat off your TV screen even as you shy away from Kathleen Turner's man-eatingbrilliance; Halloween ($24.95; Dimension/Genius) is a 3 disc set of the Rob Zombie remake which
unfortunately does not contain the original theatrical cut but only his unrated director's cut, a discof extras and ANOTHER disc with a 280 minute (!) making-of documentary that must set somesort of record for one movie; Mister Roberts ($24.99; Acorn) is an ok TV movie version starringRobert Hays and Charles Durning and Kevin Bacon of the classic play filmed more famously byHenry Fonda and Jack Lemmon; Cesar Millan: Mastering Leadership Vol. 1-3 ($49.99; R2) is theTV host's guide to dog whispering your pet; time hasn't been overly kind to Beetlejuice ($19.98;
Warner Bros.) which seems less anarchic and more sitcomy today but still has to be one of MichaelKeaton's shinier moments; Hell In A Cell ($34.95; WWE) contains 15 complete pro wrestlingmatches, with Mick Foley talking you through the highlights; The Alice Faye Collection Volume 2
Michael Giltz: DVDs: It's Tina Fey's World...
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$40,000($49.98; Fox) collects five more musicals starring the competent Faye -- all of them just "okay" at
best; Sidney Crosby: On The Ice And Beyond ($24.98; Warner Bros.) is a generous, nearly four
hour look at the youngest captain in league hockey history; Slacker Uprising ($9.95;
Disinformation) is a look at Michael Moore's noble effort to increase voter turnout in 2004 andhe's making it widely available to goose young people again but frankly it seems like old news and
even bad luck to talk about 2004 right now; Midsomer Murders Set Eleven ($49.99; Acorn)
features more grisly goings-on in Midsomer County, which must have a high immigration rate or
there'd be no people left by now; and Michael Palin's Full Circle ($49.98; BBC Video) is his latest,
absorbing travelogue -- this one focused on the Pacific Rim.
So tell me, what do you think of Tina Fey?
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Posted October 10, 2008 | 03:08 PM (EST)
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DVDs: It's Tina Fey's World...
Read More: 30 Rock , Alfred Hitchcock , Animation , Disney,
Dvds, Movies, Orson Welles , Ray Harryhausen , Sarah Palin , South Park, The Simpsons ,
Tina Fey , TV Shows , Entertainment News
...and we just live in it. Seriously, has any female
comedian ever dominated the zeitgeist the wayTina Fey is doing right now? (Certainly almost nomen have done so either.) Fey isn't just starringin the Emmy-winning 30 Rock Season 2 ($39.98;
Universal), the way Roseanne and Mary TylerMoore and Lucille Ball did on their definingshows in decades past. It's her baby in every way,with Fey also writing and producing. Fey also hashit films to her name like the modest comedyBaby Mama and the more successful Mean Girls.
A multi-million dollar bidding war ensued over
her upcoming memoirs. And to top it off, she is a dead-ringer for VP candidate Sarah Palin and hasdone double duty by imitating Palin on easily the funniest political humor on Saturday Night Livethat we've seen in decades. If there's ever been a funnier, more spot-on imitation of a politicalfigure, stretching from Rich Little's Nixon to Will Ferrel's George Bush, I can't think of it.Nonetheless, despite the inherent pleasure in being contrary and attacking conventional wisdom, Itake no pleasure in saying that 30 Rock just isn't that funny for me. I want to like the show; I
SHOULD like the show. But I don't. I find the humor too broad, the acting too cartoonish and thesituations both too knowing and too dumb. Yes, Alec Baldwin finds genuine humor in his role asthe suit and I can usually find something to make me smile in every episode. It's certainly a smartshow made by smart people. But even watching again Emmy-honored episodes like the CarrieFisher guest spot or Baldwin getting all ghetto in Tracy Morgan's therapy session can't compare tothe heart of say The Office or the stronger, more believable ensemble on How I Met Your Mother
Season 3 ($39.98; Fox). That show is a solid comedy that's found its signature by reveling in
complicated flashbacks and an ensemble that feels like a family, the way so many of the bestsitcoms seem to do. (And Neil Patrick Harris was robbed at the Emmys, but the rest of the gangelevates their material just as much.) 30 Rock follows in the tradition of shows I've loved from The
Dick Van Dyke Show to The Mary Tyler Moore Show to Buffalo Bill and NewsRadio, so I'll keep
tuning in every once in a while. And it's no big deal: Fey's got the world on a string -- she doesn'tneed me too.
So tell me, what do you think of Tina Fey?
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Michael Giltz: DVDs: It's Tina Fey's World...
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/michael-giltz/dvds-its-tina-feys-world_b_133697.html [4/5/2009 1:23:08 PM]Maybe Some People Shouldn't Be Forgiven -- The intriguing British drama Boy A ($24.95;
Weinstein/Genius) tells of a young man released from prison, given a new identity and struggling
to mainstream back into society. Slowly, we learn the horrific crime he committed as a child, the
miserable life that shaped him and watch as the protagonist shyly builds a new life even as he (and
we) wonder if he deserves it. Nicely acted and well directed, Boy A is similar in a way to Kevin
Bacon's The Woodsman, a movie that showed a pedophile and made us empathize with the man
while not ignoring the dark urges that would always be with him. Boy A is quite different: the deckis stacked wholly in favor of our hero who is handsome, charming, smart, bashful, wholly regretful
and shown to be the reluctant pawn in the terrible crime that has defined him. It doesn't wholly let
him off the hook (we see glimpses of his violent nature, for example), but you could hardly make astronger case for wanting to see the perpetrator of such a crime get rehabilitated. But what makesthe film worthwhile, beyond its intelligence and fine supporting cast led by Peter Mullan as amentor, is Andrew Garfield as Boy A. He is remarkably good and clearly a talent to watch. Boy Amay or may not have a future, but Garfield surely does.
Good Night, Shyamalan -- M. Night Shyamalan's new movie The Happening ($29.99; Fox) is
surprisingly bad. I say "surprisingly" because even as others have piled on his increasingly
unsatisfying movies, I've always defended the inherent gifts he has as a filmmaker -- the visual
flair, the ability to sustain suspense, and the impressive technical command exhibited at times in
The Village, Signs and of course The Sixth Sense. And yet here we have a movie about some sort of
mysterious plague sweeping the Northeast United States -- it's like Hitchcock's The Birds, but with
plants instead of pigeons -- that is hapless on every level. It's not just the leads Mark Wahlberg(who is generally very good) and Zooey Deschanel who are coached into giving awful, wide-eyedperformances. It's every single actor in every single role, from the construction worker at thebeginning to the soldier in the middle to Betty Buckley at the end. Watching people committsuicide, it turns out, is deeply unsuspenseful. And for all of Shyamalan's angry denials he likes twistor surprise endings (as if being the new Rod Serling or O. Henry were a bad thing), the movieagain ends with just the sort of gesture you would expect. Some have suggested the movie includesa stealth defense of Intelligent Design, the anti-science, anti-fact argument that religious beliefs inCreationism must be defended by mocking and belittling science. It's possible, though thatreligious argument is undercut a bit towards the end when Buckley's wacko is shown wigging outin a room filled with iconic images of Jesus. In any case, the movie is almost bizarrely inept, suchas a scene where Wahlberg decides to brave the potentially poisonous outdoors to reach his wife.Instead of running outside with a wet cloth covering his mouth like any sane person would, hewalks out slowly and deliberately and breathes in as much air as possible. Maybe it was an act offaith? Perhaps. But I'm losing faith in Shyamalan.
Doctor Who? Doctor Who -- The BBC's Doctor Who has been an enduring fixture for decades,
with countless mini-dramas behind the scenes as they transitioned from one Doctor to the next or
fought with the BBC to increase their paltry special effects budget from 5 pounds an episode to ten
pounds. Doctor Who: The Trial Of A Time Lord ($59.98; BBC Video) captures one of those
defining moments, this one from the mid-80s when a driving creative force behind the series at
the time conceived of a grand trial of the Doctor (for crimes he had committed and crimes hewould commit in the future) but died in the middle of writing it. Fans will debate the 14 part resultendlessly. Also just out is the single disc Doctor Who: The Brain of Morbius ($24.98; BBC Video),
which contains one four-part adventure and lots of extras. But really, this is no way to handle sucha cumbersome, long-running show. I continue to wish the BBC would stop dribbling out all theseboxed sets and single discs. They're so bulky and poorly organized that it would take practically anentire library just to stock them on your shelf. Surely the only logical approach to this massiveseries is to give definitive boxed sets with the complete adventures of each Doctor in as compactand inexpensive a package as possible.
Masters Of Cinema -- I can't quite rank special effects genius Ray Harryhausen with Orson
Welles and Alfred Hitchcock, but he's as pioneering as Welles and certainly as entertaining as
Hitchcock. From Harryhausen, the only auteurist special effects guy (as Leonard Maltin has said),we get two releases. Ray Harryhausen Collectible Gift Set ($80.95; Sony) has three previously
available deluxe editions of Earth Vs. The Flying Saucers, 20 Million Miles To Earth and It Came
From Beneath The Sea . The real draw here is a wonderfully fiercesome collectible figurine of the
monster Ymir. It's great-looking, but surely a creature like this connected to Harryhausen shouldbe "posable" (Is that a word? I mean jointed like GI Joe so you could move it around) so fans could
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Michael Giltz: DVDs: It's Tina Fey's World...
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/michael-giltz/dvds-its-tina-feys-world_b_133697.html [4/5/2009 1:23:08 PM]use it in their own stop-motion productions. Just a thought. Also out is the fun B-movie The 7th
Voyage of Sinbad ($19.94; Sony), with that classic battle between Sinbad and the skeleton. From
Welles, we get Touch Of Evil 50th Anniversary Edition ($26.98; Universal). The sound mix is
stronger though I think the image is about the same as the 2000 edition. But it's great to have allthree versions in one set (the preview version, the theatrical version with Henry Mancini's
propulsive score dominating the opening sequence and the restored version that follows the Welles
memo for how he'd like the film recut as closely as possible). Finally, we get three gems from
Alfred Hitchcock in two disc sets: Rear Window, Vertigo and Psycho ($26.98 each; Universal).
Again, I can't see any notable difference in sound or picture quality between this and the last two
reissues of these films. If you own them already, no need to upgrade. If you don't own them, of
course, these are classics and you should. Me, I'd start with Rear Window, but you can't go wrong.
NOTE: Mike Clark of USA Today says that Touch Of Evil is disastrously cropped, just like the last
reissue. (It's not clear on the DVD because most versions are different from the original studio-led
theatrical release, so the usual warning about changes to the format weren't a red flag. Apparently,
the proper Welles version is a little boxier, but Universal was worried that people with plasma and
LCD screens wouldn't like that so they cropped off some of the image on the top and the bottom to
make the movie MORE letterboxed. If this wasn't so tragic, I'd laugh. For decades, studios
chopped up movies because they insisted people hated the black bars. Now they ADD black barsbecause they think people want movies to be more letterboxed. What people really want is to seethe movies the way the filmmaker intended. Shame on Universal. How long do we have to wait for
yet another DVD release that will get it right?
Animation: From Disney To Cartman -- Any Disney animated movie not named The Black
Cauldron is usually referred to in a knee-jerk fashion as a classic. I wouldn't say that about
Sleeping Beauty ($29.99; Disney), however. The film is presented in the widescreen format it was
originally intended with some fine extras. But to me, it's clearly second-tier Disney. Though it's
described as Disney's most expensive animated film to date, that certainly isn't demonstrated onscreen. In classics like Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs and Pinocchio , every inch of every frame
is alive with subtle touches. In Sleeping Beauty, cheap work-arounds are just as prominent. Lookat the opening scenes where the three good fairies and one evil one come to bless the new babyprincess. The grand scene of a castle's fairest and finest is merely a painted, unmoving backdrop -even courtiers and banners aren't animated but just stiffly pose in one position with only thecentral two or three people on screen even moving at all. It's the same labor-saving device used oncartoons like The Flintstones and to me it's a blot on the entire film. On the plus side, "I Wonder" is
a nicely unconventional tune and the final battle ain't bad. It's all fine for kiddies, but not nearlyimaginative enough to deserve the title of "classic." The Simpsons do, and their Eleventh Season
($49.98; Fox) finds the show still in relatively top form and the set is loaded with the extras fanshave come to expect from them. If you didn't buy the single volume sets of Speed Racer that came
out recently, you're in luck: Speed Racer: The Complete Classic Collection ($49.98; Lionsgate) has
a nifty Mach 5 design (albeit one too bulky to fit on most shelves) and every episode along withsome extras. This is how they should have released the show in the first place -- not in thosemodest, single volume sets. It remains an intriguingly sober series for one essentially geared tokids. Speed Racer The Next Generation: Fast Track ($19.98; Lionsgate) shows how hard that tone
is to recapture, even with a plot ripped off of Tron. Care Bears Flurries Of Fun ($26.98; Fox)repacakges three individual DVDs filled with the fluffiest, tamest fun. The Smurfs Season OneVolume Two ($26.98; Warner Bros.) seems positively subversive in comparison. And in
comparison to that, You're Not Elected Charlie Brown and A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving
($19.98; Warner Bros.) seem like sophisticated arthouse fare. Luckily, there's always the foul-mouthed, closeted Cartman, who is celebrated in The Cult of Cartman: Revelations ($26.98;
Paramount), which contains 12 notably vulgar episodes of South Park focused on Cartman along
with Life Lessons proferred by Cartman himself.
Monsters Vs. Munsters -- They came out at the same time and after a very brief popularity
flamed out in just two season. Nonetheless, I've always considered The Addams Family to be the
"smart" version of your friendly neighborhood monster when compared to The Munsters. But this
is splitting hairs since both are low-brow comedies of the most obvious sort, enlivened only verymodestly by fine actors like Fred Gwynne as Herman Munster and John Astin as Gomez Addams.The Munsters: The Complete Series ($69.98; Universal) is a nicely thorough compilation for thosewho care, including every episode, two TV movies, the unaired pilot and more.
In The Mood -- I think being in the right mood to see a particular movie is an under-appreciated
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Michael Giltz: DVDs: It's Tina Fey's World...
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/michael-giltz/dvds-its-tina-feys-world_b_133697.html [4/5/2009 1:23:08 PM]element of liking a film. Sometimes, you just want to see a dumb stoner comedy and that's when a
silly movie like Harold & Kumar Go To White Castle seems like genius. Other times, you're ready
for an austere, four hour art house movie. Being in the right mood is important and recognizing
when you're NOT in the right mood is equally significant. Critics don't always have the luxury of
waiting until they can give a film its best shot. But that's the beauty of DVD. The movie will always
be there, just waiting for you to say, ok, I'll give it a shot. And so, The Visitor ($29.97; Anchor Bay).
I really liked director Tom McCarthy's The Station Agent . I also like Richard Jenkins in Six Feet
Under. But just the trailers for this movie put me off. I was not receptive to the seemingly
heartwarming story of a widowed college professor (Jenkins) who gets in touch with his humanity
again thanks to the dark-skinned immigrant who is more in touch with the elemental in life, as
symbolized by his drumming. So I waited and waited, even though the movie was solidly reviewed
and did quite well at the box office for an art house movie. When it came out on DVD, I held onto
it until I felt as open to the movie as possible and then gave it a shot. And disliked it immensely.
(But at least I tried.) Indeed, the movie was everything I feared -- as unconventional and surprising
as The Station Agent was, this one embraced every cliche and took the most obvious route
possible. I'm not sure what offended me more: the idea of a college professor having a gigantic,
empty spare apartment in New York City (dude, I could really use that place) or the absurd
suggestion that a man who found strangers illegally living in his home would immediately rush
outside to find them and invite them back in again. For a man so closed off to his feelings since his
wife had died, that was a pretty remarkable moment early in the film. And couldn't they have
offered at least SOME excuse for this fantastic event? Maybe it could at least have been raining or
the woman could have been visibly pregnant. Just give me some reason to forgive the essential plot
twist that a man would find two people in his home and ask them to stay for as long as they want.
Truly, it boggles the mind. Of course, the young couple aren't so much illegal immigrants as
cultural exchange ambassadors. He's a sexy and handsome drummer in a jazz trio and she's abeautiful artist who creates jewelry and the such. The anger over their illegal status is heavy-handed and trite ("He's a good person!" thunders our hero at one point) and the symbolic finale istoo much to bear. Many others enjoyed this movie more than me and it's certainly not incompetentin the vein of The Happening. But you better be in the right mood to see it. For me, apparently,that mood will never come.
An Open Mind And An Open Heart -- Perhaps the best way to bridge cultural differences in
the world is to learn more about each other. The US, of course, dominates pop culture around the
world with its movies and TV shows and music and books. Two modest DVDs give us glimpses intothe rest of the world. Sufi Soul: The Mystic Music Of Islam ($19.95; Riverboat) is a fine, if brief
look at the music of the followers of Sufi, the most tolerant and celebratory strand of Islam whichdominates in Senegal and elsewhere. Hosted and written by the excellent travel writer WilliamDalrymple, we meet and learn and especially see performances by artists like Rahat Fateh AliKhan, Mercan Dede, Abida Parveen and (briefly) the great Youssou N'Dour. Only 50 minutes long,the documentary film does include extras with complete performances that last another 36minutes, though given the capacity of the DVD it's a shame that it isn't twice as long. If nothingelse, the movie will send you to the world music section of your music store. Even more barebonesis the travel documentary The Sacred Sites of the Dalai Lamas: A Pilgrammage To The OracleLake ($24.95; Michael Wiese). It's one in a series of films traveling to parts of Tibet and elsewhere
that are prominent in the hearts of those who practice Buddhism.
Also out this week: Lou Reed: Berlin ($24.95; Weinstein/Genius), the concert film of his
underappreciated song cycle; Mobile ($39.99; Acorn), a British miniseries that proves Michael
Kitchen is more than just Foyle's War but can't overcome a so-so story any more than the next
actor; Mission: Impossible Fifth Season ($49.99; Paramount) finds Lesley Ann Warren joining the
IMF; The Three Stooges Collection Volume Four 1943-1945 ($24.96; Sony), which collects the
slapstick that kept people smiling through the end of WW II, even as Curly suffered strokes and
became incapacitated; Body Heat ($28.99; Warner Bros.) is so steamy on Blu-Ray you'll try to
wipe the sweat off your TV screen even as you shy away from Kathleen Turner's man-eatingbrilliance; Halloween ($24.95; Dimension/Genius) is a 3 disc set of the Rob Zombie remake which
unfortunately does not contain the original theatrical cut but only his unrated director's cut, a discof extras and ANOTHER disc with a 280 minute (!) making-of documentary that must set somesort of record for one movie; Mister Roberts ($24.99; Acorn) is an ok TV movie version starringRobert Hays and Charles Durning and Kevin Bacon of the classic play filmed more famously byHenry Fonda and Jack Lemmon; Cesar Millan: Mastering Leadership Vol. 1-3 ($49.99; R2) is theTV host's guide to dog whispering your pet; time hasn't been overly kind to Beetlejuice ($19.98;
Warner Bros.) which seems less anarchic and more sitcomy today but still has to be one of MichaelKeaton's shinier moments; Hell In A Cell ($34.95; WWE) contains 15 complete pro wrestlingmatches, with Mick Foley talking you through the highlights; The Alice Faye Collection Volume 2
Michael Giltz: DVDs: It's Tina Fey's World...
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/michael-giltz/dvds-its-tina-feys-world_b_133697.html [4/5/2009 1:23:08 PM]
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$40,000($49.98; Fox) collects five more musicals starring the competent Faye -- all of them just "okay" at
best; Sidney Crosby: On The Ice And Beyond ($24.98; Warner Bros.) is a generous, nearly four
hour look at the youngest captain in league hockey history; Slacker Uprising ($9.95;
Disinformation) is a look at Michael Moore's noble effort to increase voter turnout in 2004 andhe's making it widely available to goose young people again but frankly it seems like old news and
even bad luck to talk about 2004 right now; Midsomer Murders Set Eleven ($49.99; Acorn)
features more grisly goings-on in Midsomer County, which must have a high immigration rate or
there'd be no people left by now; and Michael Palin's Full Circle ($49.98; BBC Video) is his latest,
absorbing travelogue -- this one focused on the Pacific Rim.
So tell me, what do you think of Tina Fey?
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