Shout! Factory continues its celebration of the one and only Bruce Lee by offering fans their chance at one of two double feature DVD sets that feature some of the best international entertainment starring Lee. With the newest 40th anniversary release of “Enter the Dragon” around the corner, Shout! Factory gives fans their own Bruce Lee fix with new releases of some of his most iconic movies.
Mill Creek Entertainment offers drama fans four very acclaimed and intresting dramatic features for folks looking to save money. Sydney Pollack directs the 1977 film “Bobby Deerfield,” a film starring Al Pacino as a race car driver who finds himself falling for a mysterious and terminally ill young woman. Through the woman’s final days alive does Pacino’s daredevil character learn more about life. There’s also the 1965 “Baby, The Rain Must Fall” directed by Robert Mulligan starring theg reat Steve NcQuen. McQueen plays Henry Thomas, a young man who loves to sing in his band and is pressured by his mother to go back to school and get his educaiton.
When Thomas’ Wife and daughter come back in to town looking for a home, Thomas gets a new sense of priority. Though McQueen is far fetched as a rockabilly singer in a band, he has a good chemistry with co-star Lee Remick. Marlon Brando stars in the 1966 Arthur Penn directed “The Chase.” In it, Brando a sheriff named Calder known for being something of a puppet who finds a new mission when a local begins having an affair with a gangster Charlie “Bubber” Reeves’ wife.
Based on the British sitcom “Til Death Us Do Part,” Norman Lear’s American sitcom “All in the Family” has managed to live on for decades as one of the most volatile and controversial American television series of all time. Even decades after its premiered, “All in the Family” continues to live on as a series that examined many themes about the world that are still relevant, and still widely examined by the greatest minds. In its nine season run, “All in the Family” explored themes of homosexuality, capital punishment, abortion, religion, the Vietnam war, feminism, civil rights, rape, racial stereotypes, sexual dynamics, homophobia, terrorism, gun control, and so much more.
“All in the Family” did so with a fearlessness that signaled a series that was willing to tackle such issues with a sincerity that made it very popular, while also making audiences laugh non-stop. With relatable down to Earth characters, “All in the Family” went to live on television for nine seasons, and conceived five spin offs of varying success. Norman Lear examined the themes deemed incredibly taboo in the seventies with a comedic dynamic that used its characters to become the catalysts for such arguments and dissections of what was troubling the world in the seventies, and what’s going to continue troubling the world.
The canvas of television has changed drastically since “The Simpsons” premiered. Reality TV was a fresh concept, FOX was only just starting out, and the animated sitcom was a wildly unexplored idea. Before “The Simpsons” the only real animated sitcoms we had was “The Flintstones,” a pop culture gem that spoofed “The Honeymooners” and was intended for adults. Instead it ran for five seasons and eventually became a franchise meant for children. Then there was “The Jetsons” a rip off of “The Flintstones” that focused on a family in the future, another mature series that became a hit with children later on in its run. Back then it was pretty apparent that just about everyone assumed animation was strictly for children.
As with all box sets, there will be controversy and debates among horror fans about what belongs in this set and what doesn’t. “The Bride of Frankenstein” is the only sequel, there’s a baffling inclusion of the Claude Rains “Phantom of the Opera.” And no “The Fly”?
In either case, included in a wonderful box set, with a copy of the 48-page booklet “The Original House of Horror,” and of course eight horror gems for fans of Universal Studios that completely changed the horror genre forever. Not to mention, they changed the way film was made, forever.
Dracula
(1931, 75 min.)
For me the main attraction of “Dracula” is the performance of Dwight Frye. While “Dracula” is a stellar and often compelling bit of vampire fantasy horror with the great Bela Lugosi offering the most iconic portrayal of the vampire lord, for me the performance that always stuck out was Dwight Frye. His turn as the assistant Renfield is magnificent and his devious laugh is just chilling.
This is a man who has lost all semblance of his persona to Dracula, and now just an animal. He’s mad, and he’s vicious. “Dracula” lives up to its reputation as an entertaining and whimsical bit of horror cinema with remarkable performances, and incredible set pieces, all of which marked a turn in the genre thanks to director and visionary Tod Browning. “Dracula” is where Bela Lugosi was at his all time greatest, and as the count, he drips magnetism, charisma, and threat of a century old monster desperate for blood shed and willing to destroy whom ever he feels stands in his way.
You’re probably saying, “Hey Cinema Crazed, I have over a hundred and twenty seven hours to kill. What ever shall I do?” Well, I have just what you’re looking for, friend-o. From Mill Creek Entertainment comes the double boxed set of your usual horror classics and not so classics all compounded in to a hundred horror movies and twenty four discs all for your viewing pleasure. With spiffy cover art like you see at left, and the movies included, what else would you want? What else, I ask? Well? Answer me, damn it.
Featured among this massive set is two episodes of “Alfred Hitchcock Presents” entitled “The Chaney Vase” starring Darren McGavin and “The Sorcerer’s Apprentice” starring Diana Dors! There’s also “The Amazing Mr. X” from 1948, “The Ape” from 1948, “The Ape Man” from 1943, and various other gems like “The Brain That Wouldn’t Die ” from 1962, the always terrifying “Carnival of Souls” from 1962. As usual there’s the classic that started the entire slasher sub-genre, “Dementia 13” and the John Barrymore 1920 classic “Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde.”
Now compared to the likes of “Heathers” and “Clueless,” 2004’s “Mean Girls” is a rare teen comedy that manages to come shockingly close to the charm and humanity of a John Hughes film thanks to the sharp writing of Tina Fey who explores the battle of the sexes, the female dynamic and the struggle for superiority among the opposite sex with a mild box office hit that went on to live its remaining days as a classic among teenage audiences. Starring a slew of up and comers including Rachel McAdams, Amanda Seyfried, and Lizzy Caplan, and offering hilarious supporting performances from SNL stars, “Mean Girls” is a movie I didn’t love the first time out. But watching it a few years later I realized it’s a classic for a reason and is one of the few interesting teen comedies ever released. And we have Tina Fey to thank for that. She, of course, went on to write the underrated sitcom “30 Rock,” but here she taps in to the teenage persona and does it better than most writers today can ever hope to. Here’s why we like “Mean Girls” and why you should like it too…