Blu-ray: THE EXORCIST (1973)

11 10 2010
Buy It Now!
Buy It Now!

Read my original review of THE EXORCIST!

This Blu-ray release transfers both the original theatrical cut and the 2000 never before seen cut into 1080p for the first time. For a film from the 1970s, the look is impressive in HD. While wide shots contain noise, many close-ups and medium shots are pristine. Dirt and damage has been cleaned up almost completely. Details pop in things like fabrics. For the most part more details emerge in the brighter lit scenes. The picture problems are fleeting. Black levels are a bit inconsistent and some shots are soft.

As for the sound, the extended cut is presented in DTS-HD Master Audio 6.1 surround and the original cut is DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 surround track. The soundscape was intended to mix the bombastic with moments of eerie silence. The LFE emphasizes the unearthly sound moments from furniture flying across the room and the unnatural voices that possess Regan. The 360 experience is nice as unsettling sounds emerge from the rear speakers than sweep across the room like an apparition. Like the picture transfer, most of the problems with canned or hollow sounds are most likely a result of the aging originals.
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EXPELLED: NO INTELLIGENCE ALLOWED (2008) (*1/2)

8 10 2010
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Check Out the Trailer

Host and co-writer Ben Stein and director Nathan Frankowski take a Michael Moore approach to their documentary on Intelligent Design. The tone is snarky and the slant is obvious. It’s an opinion piece. Each viewer will experience the film differently depending on the ideology they bring in. But unlike Moore’s films, EXPELLED lacks the same wit and too often intelligence.

Stein begins by interviewing professors who have lost their jobs over their ID beliefs. The film argues that academia has no tolerance for alternative theories to Darwinism and will eliminate all those threats. He interviews many ID scientists who claim that it is valid science and not Creationism dressed up under another name. God has nothing to do with it.
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RED RIDING: IN THE YEAR OF OUR LORD 1983 (2010) (***1/2)

6 10 2010
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Check Out the Trailer

The third and best film in the RED RIDING trilogy reveals the mysteries and conspiracies that surrounded the first two films. In the process, it unveils the sick depth of the cover-up. What distinguishes this entry from the others is its emotional center. The previous two films followed a crusader looking to uncover the truth. This film puts us into the shoes of one of the conspirators as he struggles with the guilt of what he’s done.

Maurice Jobson (David Morrissey, THE OTHER BOLEYN GIRL) was a supporting character in the other two films, appearing only briefly. But, especially with his actions at the end of the first film, knew had a much bigger role to play. He was part of the police conspiracy to cover-up the crimes of businessman John Dawson (Sean Bean, LORD OF THE RINGS), because he was poised to make them rich in a land scheme. Now Jobson is confronted again with the child murders of 1974 when another little girl goes missing.
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RED RIDING: IN THE YEAR OF OUR LORD 1980 (2010) (***1/2)

6 10 2010
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Check Out the Trailer

The second installment in the RED RIDING trilogy based on David Peace’s novels is the least connected to the other films in the series, but integral to the overall story the three films tell. Director James Marsh (MAN ON WIRE) approaches the material as a straight police procedural. One careless statement sets this story rolling and its full ramifications are not known until the very end.

The Yorkshire Ripper is sending panic throughout the community. Peter Hunter (Paddy Considine, IN AMERICA) is brought in to help the investigation. But why him? He’s known for ruffling feathers within the police ranks with his dogged investigations, particularly the one into the Karachi Club massacre, which ended the previous film. He puts together a team of the department’s top investigators — Helen Marshall (Maxine Peake, TV’s SHAMELESS) and John Nolan (Tony Pitts). He tries to keep his past affair with Helen quiet. When they try to get information from the previous investigators, they hit a brick wall. Officer Bob Craven (Sean Harris, 24 HOUR PARTY PEOPLE) tells Hunter that they’ll catch their Ripper and he can have his own.
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DIARY OF A WIMPY KID (2010) (***1/2)

4 10 2010
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Check Out the Trailer

Having been based on Jeff Kinney’s young adult book, which was based on a collection of comic strips, I wondered how the film would work as a feature film. With its stream of consciousness style, the book doesn’t have the narrative structure that a feature would need to sustain momentum. But with a few tweaks to the original text, the film finds a focus, giving Kinney’s keen middle school observations even more punch.

Greg Heffley (Zachary Gordon, THE BROTHERS BLOOM) is about to start middle school and his anxiety is growing by the minute. He believes it is the dumbest idea ever invented because it mixes kids who haven’t hit their growth spurt like him with gorillas who have to shave their bodies twice daily. He worries about saying or doing the wrong thing. Making matters worse is his best friend Rowley (Robert Capron, THE SORCERER’S APPRENTICE), who still plays with toys, listens to boy bands and is completely oblivious to the rules of tweendom. His older brother Rodrick (Devon Bostick, LAND OF THE DEAD), a high schooler in a band called Löded Diper, puts the fear into him by saying he won’t even survive his first day.
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THE SOCIAL NETWORK (2010) (****)

1 10 2010
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Check Out the Trailer

Mark Zuckerberg’s Facebook business card read, “I’m the CEO, bitch.” It sums up nicely the impression that one gets about the youngest billionaire on the planet from this film. David Fincher’s drama, his best and most sophisticated film to date, presents in detail the creation of the social networking site and the legal issues that surrounded it. Zuckerberg had to simultaneously fight two lawsuits against him. As the film’s tag line so aptly states — you don’t get to 500 million friends without making a few enemies.

In the film’s opening conversation, Zuckerberg (Jesse Eisenberg, ZOMBIELAND) comes off as both arrogant and insecure to his girlfriend Erica Albright (Rooney Mara, A NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET). He’s obsessed with making a name for himself at Harvard and after she breaks up with him that night, he goes home and does just that. He blogs terrible things about her and then hacks into the school network, steals the images of the female students and creates a website that randomly selects two pictures and allows the viewer to rank the hotness of each one. He did this while drunk.
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