Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street, the movie musical starring Johnny Depp and directed by Tim Burton, arrives on DVD today (Tuesday). Personally, I thought the movie was a disaster - the music is terrible, the story boring (amazing, considering the movie is about a serial killer who slices people’s necks and then has his “girlfriend” turn the bodies into meat pies to serve to unsuspecting patrons) and the acting overrated, but apparently I am in the minority. A lot of people loved Sweeney Todd for a reason I cannot fathom… usually, when I hate a movie and others love it, I at least can identify the reason; with this one, the only thing that comes to mind is that people are so consumed by the fact that Tim Burton and Johnny Depp are teaming up once again that they have convinced themselves it must be good.
Anyway, regardless of how good (or bad) Sweeney Todd is, I have to say the DVD is excellent. I have the two-disc Special Collector’s Edition, and it is jam-packed full of behind-the-scenes featurettes, documentaries and more that give you all kinds of insights into the film. It basically looks like the DVD staff went out and found every random thing they could find about Sweeney Todd, the movie or otherwise, and shoved them onto the discs… and the result is surprisingly good.
While there are plenty more features than this, the memorable ones that stand out are:
Sweeney Todd movie press release, with Tim Burton, Johnny Depp and the rest. Basically, the cast and crew take questions from the press and answer them in an insightful but often funny way. I realized that I had never before actually heard Burton speak. Some of Helena Bonham Carter’s comments about having to sleep with the director (and then about Depp not having slept with anyone, ever) to get her role are quite entertaining.
The truth about Sweeney Todd, an examination of the facts and fictions that are built into the character. I was surprised to see that the character has actually been around for centuries in some form or another, and that there is actually debate as to whether the man really lived or not. It seems clear to me that there is no real Sweeney Todd, and instead his character is a result of many different real-life and legendary people that have cropped up over the years.
Okay, that’s only two, but there are a slew of special features, all of which are useful in their own way. Not are overwhelmingly long, but have just the right running length to be useful without being boring.
I still think the music in the film sucks, though. I like musicals, but I clearly don’t like musicals where the characters sing sentences.
There Will Be Blood, one of the best if not the best movie of 2007, makes its way onto DVD April 1st, and with it comes a 2-disc Collector’s Edition. From the actual box down to the features within, the DVD stays true to the look and feel of the film, with a rugged, turn-of-the-century approach and memorable visuals.
While the special features are not anything to scream about, they are, relatively speaking, quite good for a dramatic epic such as this. There Will Be Blood contains but a few real featurettes, most of them pretty simple, but they work and are surprisingly interesting:
15 minutes of pictures and research. Normally, I’m not a fan of looking at picture galleries, but in this case, I’ll make an exception. Played to the overture, you can watch 15 minutes of photos and old footage that were presumably used to capture the gritty details of There Will Be Blood, from the way characters looked to the oil rigs. While not super informative, it is interesting to see how things looked back then, as well as how close the movie comes to capturing the essence of the time and place where There Will Be Blood exists.
Deleted scenes. Several deleted scenes are included, and while none may have added to the rather long running time, they are certainly quality scenes that were simply cut for pacing purposes. The most notable deleted scene is one called the “Fishing” sequence, which explains how the oil rig is reopened after the big explosion. This scene is informative, though I can understand why it was removed: unlike the rest of the movie, it focuses too much on the specific drilling methods used at the time, which really doesn’t tie in with the movie’s purpose.
“The Story of Petroleum”, ca. 1923. The DVD set also contains an actual silent, black & white promotional film created by both the U.S. government and Standard Oil to depict how oil is pumped from the earth. The “documentary” is interesting in more ways than one, as it does drill, forgive the pun, into tiny details at times about the process as well as shows lots of footage that was clearly used as inspiration for Paul Thomas Anderson.
All in all, for the type of movie There Will Be Blood is, this 2-disc Collector’s Edition is worth purchasing. The movie is extraordinary, and there are just enough quality special features to make it worth the extra money. You can read my full There Will Be Blood movie review here.
Sean Penn’s Into the Wild is now available on DVD in a 2-disc Collector’s Edition. While the movie is one of the better films of 2007 (I hesitate to say one of the year’s best), the DVD is lackluster by anyone’s definition.
The second disc, which houses the special features, contains only two featurettes, one titled “The Story, the Characters”, the other “The Experience.” Both of these go on to explain the creation of the characters, the sets and so on and so forth, but I found neither of these to be particularly informative or memorable. Mind you that I watched these features while going on 30-hours of only a couple hours of plane sleep, but there is nothing here worth noting. In fact, I found the featurettes to be rather promotional, as if they were made before the Into the Wild’s release to get more people excited in this interesting tale.
That’s not much of a DVD review, but that is all Into the Wild has to offer. Why Paramount Vantage has to waste such resources to create a second disc for those featurettes is beyond me, as the set seems more comparable to a standard, single-disc release.
Nevertheless, the movie Into the Wild is still a good one, featuring great acting and an incredibly unique story. You can read my full Into the Wild movie review here.
It’s Friday, March 28, 2008, and as any good moviegoer should be thinking, you’re wondering what movie you should invest in this weekend. For new wide releases come to theaters today, all aiming for that top spot at the weekend’s box office. Thankfully, three of the four movie are potentially worthwhile films, at least on paper.
21, starring Kevin Spacey, Kate Bosworth and that guy from Across the Universe, is about a group of students (lead by their teacher, Spacey) who decide to rip off some Las Vegas casinos by counting cards. Of course, their greed gets the better of them and things spiral out of control. I’m not always a huge fan of gambling movies, but when done right, they can be very good (Rounders, anyone?). Mainly, I want to see this movie for the fact that Bosworth looks hot in it, but one should not discount the talented cast involved.
Run, Fatboy, Run is the long delayed Simon Pegg comedy. The release date delay is worrisome, and after seeing the trailer over and over again when it was originally slated for the fall, I haven’t seen much promotion, if any, in recent months (though, admittedly, I haven’t been going to see much of the garbage in theaters - and I fast forward through TV commercials). Regardless, Pegg is on a roll (Shaun of the Dead, Hot Fuzz) and Run, Fatboy, Run looks pretty funny.
Stop-Loss is an Iraq war drama about a young man (Ryan Phillippe) who returns home from war only to find that the military has decided to send him right back. Not happy about the fact that he has to leave his girlfriend (wife?), he considers going AWOL to Canada. Some people aren’t big fans of Phillippe, but I think he’s actually a pretty good actor given the right material, and Stop-Loss could be right up his alley. The marketing team has also done a great job with an excellent trailer that strikes upon the themes of the film. Considering that other, bigger Iraq-themed films have flopped over the last year, I wouldn’t expect this one to stick around for too long - but it has the potential to be good.
The last of the movies is Superhero Movie, but, considering this spoof is from the same group of people that have created some of the worst movies in recent memory (Epic Movie and Date Movie), I would not go see this film if my life depended on it. In fact, if you go and see this film, you are supporting the creation of more terrible spoofs in the years to come.
As I’m sure you’ve heard by now, Regal Theaters/Cinemas/whatever the official name of the company is, has announced that they will officially begin showing Red Band trailers to restricted audiences. As my loyal readers know, I’m not a big fan of censorship, and while having PG-rated trailers is not exactly censorship, it’s great to see that a company is going against the tide of political correctness and overzealous religious groups to show advertising more suitable for the target audiences of certain films.
Red Band trailers are previews made for restricted audiences, i.e. those attending R-rated, NC-17 and unrated movies. You’re used to seeing Green Band trailers, which are “approved for general audiences” and currently shown in theaters. Studios have been complaining for years that Green Band trailers are not as effective for marketing certain movies to their target audience. If you are a teenage guy and you go to an R-rated movie and see a preview for American Pie that’s full of inappropriate humor and even nudity, you’re more likely to see the film. What if you like gory horror movies; wouldn’t a Red Band trailer full of explicit gore entice you to go see an upcoming movie?
Basically, Red Band trailers allow studios to show a lot more footage for certain movies than they have been previously, as exemplified with the Pathology movie trailer. Want to see a more detailed breakdown of the difference between Green Band trailers and Red Band trailers? Check out this great post.
Kudos to Regal for going the other direction and appealing to the studios. The studios are happy, I’m happy, and hopefully other theater chains will follow suit.
Most of you have probably not seen the movie trailer for The Children of Huang Shi, a war drama starring Jonathan Rhys Meyers, Radha Mitchell and Chow Yun-Fat. The movie is about a war journalist in China in the 1930’s who decides to help transport a bunch of children over a dangerous mountain pass to spare them from violence.
The look of the film, directed by Roger Spottiswoode, is quite nice; it has a very crisp, rich look to it. That being said, the movie trailer isn’t very exciting. It’s constructed well enough, but is rather slow and uneventful. Better use of music and proper pacing would have done wonders for what otherwise looks like a pretty intriguing story.
The release date for the picture is a bit suspicious; if this were very good, I would think Sony Pictures Classics would launch it later in the year as award bait. Considering that the film arrives in theaters in May, that does not bode well.
The Kite Runner, considered one of the better foreign language films of 2007, comes to DVD today. The film actually got a lot of attention, even though it was nowhere to be found at the Academy Awards (other than a nomination for music). While a lot of people liked this film, I found The Kite Runner to be nothing more than a quality TV movie. The first half of the movie is quite good, but the modern day scenes suffered from stale directing (and Marc Forster is directing the new James Bond movie, no!!!!) and flat acting. The final part of the movie plays out like an action movie, but the action is rudimentary at best (Marc Forster, no!!!!).
That being said, The Kite Runner isn’t that bad. It might even be worth watching, but I wouldn’t expect an amazing film by any means. The DVD offers these bonus features:
Commentary by Marc Forster (Quantum of Solace, no!!!), Khaled Hosseini and David Benioff (wouldn’t it have been cooler to have the two young boys provide commentary?)
“Words from The Kite Runner” - I don’t know what this is, but I don’t really care
Images from The Kite Runner - Seriously? How can companies still market image galleries as real bonus features? Why would you even want to look at an image gallery when you can just watch the movie?
Theatrical trailer
Again, The Kite Runner is probably worth seeing, but I get annoyed at the praise this film undeservedly receives.
I recently watched the new movie trailer for Tropic Thunder, starring Ben Stiller, Robert Downey Jr. and Jack Black. Surprisingly, I think this movie looks pretty damn funny.
I’ve grown tired of Ben Stiller, and, after his last God-awful film, The Heartbreak Kid (honestly, one of the worst comedies ever), I had really lost faith. However, Tropic Thunder looks like a whole different can of worms. For one, it’s more of an ensemble bit, which is nice, and two, the movie looks not unlike Hot Fuzz is some ways or another. The movie is going to have a ton of action, some pretty good special effects and a lot of jokes.
After all, the plot of the movie is that several actors who think they’re filming a movie get involved in a real Asian conflict; in other words, it’s like Platoon, only funny. The highlight of the trailer: Robert Downey Jr. gets an experimental surgical procedure to play his part - he dyes his skin black to look like a black man. How is that not funny?
Overall, I think the trailer’s very effective. It starts off looking like a legitimate action/war movie, complete with 60’s music, crashing helicopters and huge explosions. From there, it gets funnier and funnier as it goes along. I’m definitely looking forward to Tropic Thunder.
Somehow, despite stints in a mental facility, her “ownership” being transferred to her father, an odd British accent, a bitter custodial battle and more, Britney Spears has managed to release a new music video. This music video is animated, and features Britney Spears as a superhero who fights bad guys, flies through the air and more. Too bad the music video sucks.
Don’t get me wrong: I have nothing against Britney Spears. I love comebacks, and I hope she gets to do one of those one of these days. At first, her self destructive behavior was a bit entertaining, but once we found out she has some more serious issues, it became more troubling than anything else. I think even the biggest Spears haters are hoping that she stops makes a fool for herself and at least lands on even footing, though feel free to correct me if I’m wrong.
Regardless, this new Britney Spears music video, called “Break the Ice,” does not spell comeback in any way or form. Here are five reasons why:
The song is terrible. Like most Britney Spears songs, the techno mix is over-the-top, cheesy and manufactured. If her real voice is in there somewhere, it’s hard to tell. The song sounds like countless other forgettable pop songs before it, and doesn’t have the quality to be a big radio hit or the beat to succeed at dance clubs. Unfortunately, the song sounds like a Britney Spears song, which means it might have been successful five years ago.
The music video has nothing to do with the song. If the lyrics have something to do with what’s happening visually, I didn’t pick up on it. The song begins and the music video begins, but rarely do the two seem synced or even related. The video doesn’t feature a singing superhero, and when it does show Britney’s lips, they don’t match up to the words we’re hearing. It seems as though the animators were told to make a three-minute superhero cartoon, but were never given the song to work off.
The animation isn’t very good. Aside from the fact that the music video has nothing to do with the Britney Spears song, the animation isn’t intriguing enough to make us watch for watching’s sake. Had everything matched up, it wouldn’t be that big of a deal, but as is, it seems as though this music video needed to look really, really cool and really edgy to overcome its deficiencies, but alas, that is not the case. The animation is basic at best, and not worth even a minute of your time.
Britney Spears isn’t in the music video. I’ve never liked Britney Spears’ songs. Over the course of her up-and-down history, there are probably two or three songs that I’ve tolerated enough to listen to. However, that hasn’t stopped me from looking at her. Even now, after everything, she’s pretty good looking, and the only reason I’d even consider watching her old music videos were to see her strutting her stuff in some sexy outfit. Unfortunately, this “Break the Ice” video does not show even a second of the real Britney Spears, which begs the question: “What’s the point?”
Yes, it’s true. I’ve taken a break from FilmJabber for a few days to fly several hours from Seattle, Washington down to Lima, Peru. It’s my first time to South America and I’m certainly looking forward to it… of course, as you read it, I’ll have already been in Peru for several days. After spending a couple days in Lima, I should be on my way to the ruins of Machu Picchu, what is supposed to be one of the most beautiful, wondrous and mysterious manmade structures in the world.
From there, I drop down in the Amazon to stay at some eco-resort where there’s no electricity. Sounds great, except for the bugs, Yellow Fever and malaria. Thinking of diseases, I had to get four different vaccinations - that was fun. I don’t mind needles, but my arms hurt for a day. I also have take malaria pills every day for a month. :o(
I’ll be back on March 31st, but keep checking back as I have some great blog posts planned. After all, I don’t want you to have separation anxiety and do something foolish, like take a gander at one of those other, lesser film sites.
Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street, the movie musical starring Johnny Depp and directed by Tim Burton, arrives on DVD today (Tuesday). Personally, I thought the movie was a disaster - the music is terrible, the story boring (amazing, considering the movie is about a serial killer who slices people’s necks and then has his “girlfriend” turn the bodies into meat pies to serve to unsuspecting patrons) and the acting overrated, but apparently I am in the minority. A lot of people loved Sweeney Todd for a reason I cannot fathom… usually, when I hate a movie and others love it, I at least can identify the reason; with this one, the only thing that comes to mind is that people are so consumed by the fact that Tim Burton and Johnny Depp are teaming up once again that they have convinced themselves it must be good.
