What are you watching now? - (This is my brain on TV!)

[Terry]

I just watched the extended versions of Fellowship of the Ring and Return of the King (I watched Two Towers a couple weeks ago.) I love these films. They make me bawl my eyes out (I'm such a softy, and Peter Jackson just NAILED those performances.)

Anyone notice that the editing of the battle scenes looks like the Shrewsbury sequence in Falstaff?

Anybody seen PJ's new King Kong?

I am going to watch The Triangle, which was a miniseries from the Sci-Fi Channel. It was done by Rockne O'Bannon, who brought us that great Star Trek rip-off SeaQuest back in the 90s. Had you heard that Jonathan Brandis, the kid who played Lucas, hung himself about a year ago? Very sad. Anyway, my sister gave me a DVD-R of The Triangle. It looks cool enough.

Speaking of Sci-Fi Channel, anybody seen the new Battlestar Galactica series? I saw the cut pilot that they showed on NBC and thought it was great (in a crap sort of way.) Though I missed Jonathan "Dr. Smith" Harris doing the voice of one of the Cylons ("By your command" he always got to say.)

Speaking of Jonathan Harris, he had a role on the second season of Freakazoid. He got to do his old "bubble-headed booby" schtick again. It was awesome. God, that was a weird cartoon. I could never decide if I liked it or thought it was funny, but I kept on watching it. AND it had oblique Ed Wood references (like Freakazoid bellowing "Pull the String!" for no apparent reason.)

[Terry]

Nobody's watching anything. OKay, that's well and good enough. TV is an abhorrent wasteland of ignorance, stupidity, hatred and judgement anyway.

Today I used my TV for video games. I killed lots of Dinosoids in Turok 2 and lots of Spanish villagers (perhaps Basques) in Resident Evil 4.

[Jeff Wilson]

I finally delved into the Val Lewton set last night, and watched BEDLAM, which starred Boris Karloff as the crooked head of the titular asylum in London. Bizarre casting choice (and Welles connection) was Billy House as an English lord (!) of dubious moral values. Odd film, I was expecting something with a more horror bent, but it seemed more interested in moral crusading. Enjoyable nonetheless.

[Terry]

Yesterday I pulled out some old Nintedo 64 games and used my TV for that - I didn't watch any movies or regular TV. I played Hybrid Heaven and Aidyn Chronicles, which both kind of suck but are enjoyable in a cheesy sort of way. Then I played Final Fantasy IV on my Nintendo DS until I fell asleep. Yes, I also have games for the Playstation and the PC, but I am not ashamed to like Nintendo as well. My Atari 5200 still gets some use too!

[Terry]

Val Lewton did Cat People, didn't he? I've read that one of those Cat People films reused the Ambersons sets, but I haven't seen it.

[Jeff Wilson]

Lewton produced the films in the set, which were made for RKO, so there are Welles connections throughout. Robert Wise directed a couple films in the set, if I recall.

For DVD reviewing purposes, I also just watched THE FOOTBALL FACTORY, a wannabe GOODFELLAS-FIGHT CLUB type thing about soccer hooligans, which produced by the makers of the Grand Theft Auto video game series. I'm going to be watching Warner's new discs of CABIN IN THE SKY and HALLELUJAH in the next couple days as well. Both have beautiful original poster art covers.

[Shaunfon333]

Just got finished watching The Rockford Files Season 1. Starting Miami Vice Season 2. I'm in a TV series on DVD mode right now for some reason.

...And then I will be watching in the coming weeks, DVD's that I've ordered for my new all region DVD player. This list would include:
The Trial (Studio Canal, France), Treasure Island (UK), Falstaff(France),
Le Criminel ("The Stranger", France) and a great Humphrey Bogart Collection I picked up from Amazon UK.

There are so many great DVD options opened up to you when you have an All Region player, it's amazing and weighs heavily on my bank account.

[Roger Ryan]

Val Lewton did Cat People, didn't he? I've read that one of those Cat People films reused the Ambersons sets, but I haven't seen it.

The "Ambersons" sets were used predominently in "Curse Of The Cat People" directed by Robert Wise. A strange sequel in that it is primarily a fantasy ghost story with almost no relevance to the action of its predecessor. Regarding reusing Mercury Production sets, I believe Mike Teal pointed out that Lewton's "The Ghost Ship" utilizes the same boat sets seen in "Journey Into Fear".

The Val Lewton productions are wonderfully atmospheric; my two favorites are both directed by Jacques Tourneur - "Cat People" and "I Walked With A Zombie" (don't let the title fool you - this one is a very eerie tale involving voodoo curses).

[jaime marzol]

cat people--
from what i remember reading, there was a war ban on building sets because of the materials involved, so they had to use old sets. the guy walks the woman home, they enter the brownstone, he sees the ambersons staircase and comments, "never surprises me what you can find in these brownstones." a pretty funny moment if you know it's the amberson staircase.

also notice the huge prop birthday cake. this huge cake sits covering most of the table as the guy and woman sing happy birthday to the kid. a cake for 25 people. they never cut into it. it sits on the table as they sing.

i was not a huge fan of that film, it was ok. but recently saw wise's BORN TO KILL, and it is damn good.

[Tony]

My holiday viewing, so far:

"The Mayor of The Sunset Strip": kinda depressing: for such an important and influential guy, Rodney seems to have a most depressing and lonely life.

"Monty Python: The Meaning of Life": fabulous! I'd never seen it, and it's right down my metaphysical alley! Very solid, and beautifully filmed.

"Beneath the Twelve Mile Reef" : surprisingly absorbing: kind of a Cuban/American "Romeo and Juliet" with a georgeous score by you know who, so beautiful ( a veritable symphony) that I ordered it last night on cd, right after watching the film: it's one of the first stereo scores, and the cd is in stereo too! ( Available from Film Score Monthly .com)

"Brokeback Mountain": very solid script and performances, very emotional: most of the audience was crying or at least teary-eyed by the end; kind of a gay "Romeo and Juliet". The Heath Ledger character kinda reminds me of George W....really!

"Memoirs of a Geisha": much better than the reviews: not only visually beautiful, but a terrific and moving story, made only a little creepy by the fact that the two characters meet and fall in love when the girl is 9, and the guy is like 35... really! ( Kind of a Chinese pan-generational "Romeo and Juliet")

"Curse of the Jade Scorpion": I like everything Woody does, including this one; (I'm comfortable watching Woody, just as I am with Orson, Hitchcock, Kubrick, Kurosawa, Mizogouchi, Fellini, Lean et. al.)

"The Fantastic Four": well-made, enjoyable garbage

"National Lampoon Family Christmas": Saw this when it came out, thought it was a scream, saw it again Christmas Eve, thought it was...much less funny.

Has anyone seen Kong?

I'm still on my Christmas break til the 9th, so....

[Roger Ryan]

I did see the new "Kong" yesterday. Very enjoyable, but not a masterpiece and certainly too long for an adventure film. It greatly respects the original (a first!) and I thought most of the modifications were interesting. I was perhaps more impressed with how Jackson's visual effects team recreated 1930s New York than the effectiveness of the dinosaurs or Kong himself! I adore the new DVD of the original Kong; the two-and-a-half hour making-of documentary is superb.

[jaime marzol]

i watched....

the blue max... excellent, better than i expected.

my darling clementine reco dvd.... excellent. excellent commentary, and documentary.

the unknown chaplin dvd is 4 stars, and the dvd has extras that you didn't see if you have a tv copy.

nicholas and alexandria i've watched about 40 minutes and so far so good.

mcbride's commentary on GRAPES OF WRATH is excellent.

bonus disc for EASY RIDERS RAGING BULLS. if you liked the first, you will like the bonus disc. i liked it a lot.

since i've enjoyed mutiple viewings of THE AVIATOR, i looked for some of howard's films. i got HELL'S ANGELS. it's ok. could have been better. the biggest shock of all was jean harlow. always heard her name never, really saw her that i know of. then i see her on HELL'S ANGELS. she's like a cheap tart you pick up at ihop after all the bars are closed. what was the big deal? i don't get it. she's no garbo, and she's no deitrich. in AVIATOR, the woman that plays hepburn after the second viewing, is really good.

AVIATOR double disc set is packed with extras.

marty hits another homerun in my book

the new goodfellas with henry hill commentary is good, and also has good bonus disc. the casino 2 dvd set is also excellent, with great commentary and docs.

the biggest surprise was murnau's FAUST. it's breathtaking, and i think much more advanced, if smaller, than BIRTH OF A NATION.

also murnau's SUNRISE, 2 disc set, has incredible extras.

the sinatra tony rome movies were an incredible time capsule of miami beach in the 60s.

can't remember anything else i've seen.... oh, yes, i watched an episode of bonanza, and there was everet sloan! good actor.

[Tony]

Tonight I watched Elia (the Informer) Kazan's "A Face in the Crowd" with Griffith, Neal, Mathaeu and Franciosa: terrific story, great script, good direction, very far ahead of it's time; only one problem: Griffith hasn't an ounce of the necessary charisma required for the chatacter to be believable. Still, he got Sherrif Taylor out of it...so we got Opie, and "Happy Days" and "Cinderella Man", so God doesn't play dice with the cosmos, apparently...

PS: Jaime: What "Sunrise" do you have that's 2 discs? I have the single disc edition that you had to send in proofs of purchases to get!

[Terry]

I watched the 1977 Japanimation version of The Hobbit, worth mentioning for the fine job John Huston did voicing Gandalf. The Glenn Yarbrough songs are part of what make this a cult classic. Camp aside, it is still allright, and captures the book pretty well.

[jaime marzol]

the SUNRISE i have i think is from australia? i don't know why i think that. the restorers did a top notch production of the menus, very tastefully done, 2 discs, commentary, excellent commentary, extras, other takes of a longshot with intellegent commentary. i can't say enough about it.

another great assembly by restorers is M. very cool, imaginative, navigational eye candy.

very cool to have a great movie done real nice. cool menus, intellegent commentary, documentary, extras, talking head footage. not a naked film slammed on a disc with a chapter index as the only extra.

KINO makes 2 or 3 or 4 great VON STROHEIM dvds. not as great as SUNRISE, but worthy.

catch a great film, INHERIT THE WIND. stanley kramer really directed a great film that some reviewers said was heavy handed. for me the heavy handed parts work with the topic. a lot of good performances. some very groovy framing in the preacher scnes. and best of all, gene kelly didn't dance!

the flynn documentary with chistopher lee narrating was released on dvd with extras. the complete interviews that only snippets were used originally. a very good offering if you like flynn.