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The Secret Life of Walter Mitty

Peter Oberth — Tue, 05 Feb 2013 13:59:15 +0000

In this comedic adaptation of James Thurber's short story, Ben Stiller stars as Walter, a milquetoast proofreader for a magazine publishing firm. Walter is constitutionally incapable of standing up for himself, so he retreats into his fantasy world, where he is heroic, poised, self-assured, and the master of his fate. Stiller directs from a script by Steven Conrad, with Kristen Wiig, Patton Oswalt, and Shirley MacLaine rounding out the starring cast.

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The Secret Life of Walter Mitty,

Ben Stiller,

Kristen Wiig,

Patton Oswalt,

Shirley MacLaine,

Adam Scott

The Secret Life of Walter Mitty

In Theatres:

Dec 25, 2013

Starring:

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Genre:

Comedy,

Sci-Fi

Bernie (BLU-RAY)

AJ Garcia — Wed, 03 Oct 2012 18:36:39 +0000

Bernie

Review:

Blu-Ray

Exclusive?:

Did You Know?

Grade:

3.95

Real residents of Carthage, Texas who knew the real Bernie Tiede and Marjorie Nugent appear in the film providing commentary on the events.

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The first time I saw Bernie I loved it. It’s classic Linklater, Jack Black as you’ve never seen him before, and a story too good to be true, though it is. It made me laugh, shocked me, and overall left me completely satisfied with my experience. I’ve got nothing bad to say about the film itself. So what have I got to say about the Blu-Ray transfer for the film?

PICTURE QUALITY:
Honestly the transfer is amazing with only small hiccup and that is an issue I had with the color. Definition is amazing throughout. You’ll find it hard to find a stronger picture as far as definition goes. Color, when it applicable is amazingly warm and very natural. So what’s all the fuss about my issue with the color?

There are certain scenes in the film that throw off skin color. It offers up a red shade of skin color and a yellowish hue to the overall picture. At best I can only describe it as an overabundance of warmth and possibly an issue with lighting. In an interior scene where Jack Black is in church doing his thing the color scheme feels washed out with a yellowish tint. Maybe this is just the natural hue of natural lighting, but it just looks off. Some interviewees also get washed over with a strange deviation in the color scheme as they give their two cents. It’s a noticeable flaw but it never interferes with the overall HD quality of the picture other then color.

Audio is sharp for this picture. While it is mostly a dialogue driven film there are some key Jack Black scenes where Black sings as you may have never heard him before. The guy is just awesome and it seems there is no limit to the range he has in his voice. Definitely worth checking out for that aspect alone.

BONUS FEATURES:
~Three featurettes, two of which focus on Black’s singing, the other on the interviewees of the film.
~Deleted Scenes
~Previews

Talent(s):

Other Pictures:

Starring:

Matthew McConaughey

Jack Black

Shirley MacLaine

Bernie

AJ Garcia — Fri, 25 May 2012 15:48:55 +0000

Bernie

Review:

Theatrical

Exclusive?:

Did You Know?

Grade:

4.35

The film is based on a 1998 article in Texas Monthly which was written by Skip Hollandsworth. ~IMDB

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Based On A True Story

Based on a true story, Richard Linklater’s Bernie follows a funeral director who befriends a millionaire widow. The two become close companions, traveling to foreign countries, spending lavish weekends at luxurious spa’s, attending the opera and going to Broadway musicals. The small town of Carthage (located in Texas) is a buzz with weather the two were just close companions or lovers. In any case Bernie (Jack Black; The School Of Rock) is a much loved member of the community, even if his companion, Marjorie Nugent (Shirley MacLaine; Terms Of Endearment), is hated by all. When Bernie, who has been under constant duress by a very possessive Marjorie, shoots and kills her he decides to hide her body and continues on with his life, doing his best to cover up her absence to the townspeople, her family, and her persistent financial advisor.

Linklater uses a documentary type approach towards telling the story of Bernie Tiede. Townies, Bernie’s employer at the funeral home, friends and neighbors all chime in on the story of Bernie and Marjorie in interviews, most of it to hilarious effect. In the black comedy tradition Linklater really manages to capture something as dark as murder and create a laugh fest out of it. Jack Black, who over the years has slowly drifted out of my interests, actually provides one of his best performances, possibly ever. Shirley MacLaine is also fantastic.

We all knew Jack Black could sing. Most people who didn’t know were pleasantly surprised when he appeared in the 2000 film High Fidelity where he pretty much closes out his performance in the film with a cover of Marvin Gaye’s Let’s Get It On. If your like me you had never heard of Tenacious D until way later. In any case his performance in Bernie is marked with some pretty amazing songs such as Amazing Grace and a performance of Seventy Six Trombones from the musical The Music Man, among others. I was completely blown away by his musical range in this film. He’s actually a very beautiful singer. As for his acting, superb. If you stay with the film towards the back end of the credits you see a short clip of the real Bernie Tiede in prison which pans over slowly to reveal Jack Black listening to him speak. Obviously he put a lot of time and work into recreating the mannerisms, speech, and quirky tics of Bernie Tiede. It’s not exactly Jim Carrey in Man In The Moon but it’s far from his usual performances that are give or take.

Like a lot of Linklater’s previous work he manages to piece together Bernie with a social commentary that alternates between an in your face example of what’s wrong with the world as mirrored by the reactions to the Tiede case as well as laying low and allowing you to kind of come to your own hypothesis about how we treat one another in the world, weather it be judging someone on their sexual preferences, appearance or whatever. Some of the characters manage to toss out these idea’s naturally while others, like Matthew McConaughey’s (Dazed and Confused) sometimes over the top portrayal of Danny Buck, the man who tried Bernie Tiede in trial, is more overblown in his prejudices. In any case Linklater delivers another solid film that manages to be quirky, dark, and more then a bit odd at times, but all together an enjoyable film that I can see myself enjoying with multiple views. I highly suggest seeing it. Enjoy.

Talent(s):

Other Pictures:

Starring:

Shirley MacLaine

Matthew McConaughey

Jack Black

Terms of Endearment

Peter Oberth — Sat, 19 May 2012 00:00:46 +0000

Terms of Endearment covers three decades in the lives of widow Aurora Greenway (Shirley MacLaine) and her daughter Emma (Debra Winger). Fiercely protected by Aurora throughout childhood, Emma runs into resistance from her mother when she marries wishy-washy college teacher Flap (Jeff Daniels). Aurora is even more put out at the prospect of being a grandmother, though she grows a lot fonder of her three grandkids than she does of her son-in-law. Flap proves that Aurora's instincts were on target when he enters into an affair with a student (Kate Charleson). Meanwhile, Emma finds romantic consolation with an unhappily married banker (played by John Lithgow, who registers well in a rare "nice guy" performance). As for Aurora, she is ardently pursued by her next-door neighbor, boisterous astronaut Garrett Breedlove (Jack Nicholson). After 75 minutes or so of pursuing an episodic, semi-comic plotline, the film abruptly shifts moods when Emma discovers that she has terminal cancer. Terms of Endearment won Academy Awards for Best Picture, Best Director and Best Screenplay for TV veteran James L. Brooks making his first feature film, Best Actress for MacLaine, and Best Supporting Actor for Nicholson. It was followed by a sequel, The Evening Star (1996), which again featured MacLaine as Aurora.

Terms of Endearment

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In Theatres:

Nov 23, 1983

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Running Time:

2 Hours, 12 Minutes

The Turning Point

Peter Oberth — Fri, 18 May 2012 17:30:28 +0000

One of a cycle of '70s post-Women's Liberation "women's pictures," Herbert Ross's drama uses the ballet world to examine the conflict between family and career. Former dance colleagues Deedee (Shirley MacLaine) and Emma (Anne Bancroft) are reunited when Emma's New York ballet company stops in Oklahoma City for a performance. Having dropped her career for marriage and motherhood, Deedee envies prima ballerina Emma's limelight life; aging Emma, realizing that her days as a star are numbered, wishes that she had the fulfillment of a family like Deedee's. Tensions simmer when Deedee's talented teenage daughter, Emilia (Leslie Browne), moves to New York to join Emma's company. As Emma maternally bonds with Emilia, and Emilia falls in love with womanizing dancer Yuri (Mikhail Baryshnikov), Deedee feels that she's losing her place even as a mother. After Emilia's triumphant debut, Deedee's and Emma's resentments boil over into an all-out catfight that ends when they realize they can unite in happiness for Emilia's future. Splitting the desires to nest and to work between two characters, Ross and writer Arthur Laurents reveal the difficulty faced by women in a world of expanding options. As in Michael Powell's and Emeric Pressburger's seminal ballet film The Red Shoes (1948), dancing and a personal life don't mix, even as the films display ballet's seductive power here in the gracefully integrated numbers by dance stars Browne and Baryshnikov. Despite reservations about its melodramatic aspects, The Turning Point earned box-office success and eleven Oscar nominations (but no wins). Even if its wife/work struggle seems a bit old-fashioned, Deedee's and Emma's final bond suggests that the next generation may not have the same regrets.

The Turning Point

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In Theatres:

Nov 14, 1977

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Running Time:

1 Hour, 59 Minutes

Steel Magnolias

Peter Oberth — Thu, 17 May 2012 18:45:17 +0000

The title refers to those seemingly frail Southern belles who survive any and all deprivations through whims of iron. Robert Harling's original stage play was set exclusively in a Louisiana beauty parlor where an all-female cast of characters laughed, cried and compared menfolk. The film expands the playing field by including scenes at picnics, hospitals and the like, and by visually depicting the males who never appeared in the stage version. Dolly Parton plays the goodnatured beauty-shop owner, while Shirley MacLaine is the cantankerous town eccentric, decked out in grungy overalls and speaking fluent Trash. Well-to-do Sally Field bravely endures several assaults to her sensibilities, not the least of which is the illness (and subsequent death) of daughter Julia Roberts. The performances are first-rate, with the possible exception of Daryl Hannah's overemphatic portrayal of a gawky hairdresser. The film stumbles a bit in its depiction of the male characters as fools and deadheads, and in the final overlong hospital scenes involving the comatose Roberts, which play like a road company version of Terms of Endearment. Otherwise, Steel Magnolias is a prime example of ensemble filmmaking, lovingly coordinated by director Herbert Ross. (Sidebar: Herbert Ross was reportedly rather rough on Julia Roberts, deriding her lack of experience. The rest of the female cast rallied around Roberts and told the director to lay off or pay the price).

Steel Magnolias

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In Theatres:

Nov 15, 1989

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Running Time:

1 Hour, 58 Minutes

Postcards From the Edge

Peter Oberth — Thu, 17 May 2012 15:39:35 +0000

Mike Nichols lends some comic structure to Carrie Fisher's best-selling confessional novel concerning a woman's struggles with drug addiction and mother-daughter rivalry (subjects Fisher admits to understanding all too well). Meryl Streep, in her most full-blown comic performance up to that point, plays Suzanne Vale, a popular movie actress well on her way to a Hollywood crack-up. Suzanne suffers from blackouts and memory lapses, and awakens in the beds of men she doesn't remember; she is a barely-functioning wreck on the set of her latest movie. When a coke dealer who delivers stops by her dressing room between takes, she swiftly finds herself being rushed to the hospital, suffering the effects of a narcotics bender. While in detox, Suzanne attempts to piece her life and career back together, but her confidence is shattered when her mother arrives at the rehab clinic -- Doris Mann, a famed film icon from the 1950s and 1960s (Shirley MacLaine). Doris is soon soaking up the adulation and applause of Suzanne's fellow recovering drug addicts. Upon Suzanne's release, she must compete with her mother for attention and fame as she tries to walk a thin line as a recovering drug abuser.

Postcards From the Edge

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Postcards From the Edge

In Theatres:

Sep 12, 1990

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Running Time:

1 Hour, 44 Minutes

Bernie

Peter Oberth — Mon, 23 Apr 2012 13:44:57 +0000

Director Richard Linklater teams with writer Skip Hollandsworth for this darkly comic docudrama detailing the unusual friendship between a likable Texas mortician and a wealthy but reviled widow, and the shocking crime that followed. Inspired by Hollandsworth's 1998 Texas Monthly article that first caught the attention of Linklater, Bernie takes place in Carthage, TX, where effeminate mortician Bernie Tiede (Jack Black) enjoys a reputation as a friendly and upstanding member of the community. Marjorie Nugent (Shirley MacLaine), on the other hand, couldn't hold a lower position on the local social scale. Repressed and bitter, nasty Marjorie has isolated herself from her neighbors, and as a result has been essentially shunned in her small town. The moment Bernie shows Marjorie a shred of kindness, she clings to him tightly and refuses to let go. Meanwhile, as Marjorie becomes Bernie's sugar mama and the pair becomes inseparable, the local rumor mill begins to churn. Eventually, her intense jealousy becomes too much for Bernie to take. When the caustic widow's body is discovered stuffed in her own freezer, local District Attorney Buck Davidson (Matthew McConaughey) vows that justice will be served, but he finds it difficult to build a convincing case against Bernie as the locals rally to his defense.

Tags:

Bernie,

Bernie

In Theatres:

Apr 27, 2012

On Blu-Ray:

Tuesday, August 21, 2012

Starring:

Studio(s):

Director(s):

Genre:

Running Time:

1 Hour, 44 Minutes

PG-13

Brief Strong Language and Some Violent Images

Bernie

Pandora — Fri, 09 Mar 2012 16:21:43 +0000

Photos:

(Posters Images)

Movie:

Bernie

Exclusive?:

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The Apartment (BLU RAY)

Lee Roberts — Thu, 09 Feb 2012 04:28:30 +0000

The Apartment

Review:

Blu-Ray

Exclusive?:

Bonus features

Grade:

3.75

Commentary, trailer

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THE APARTMENT:
C.C. Baxter (played by Jack Lemmon) is known as a ladies man at his apartment building. Every day, sometimes a few times in one day, Mr. Baxter has women over to his place for some fun. At least that’s what he has made his neighbors come to think of him but truth is Mr. Baxter is lending out his apartment to some of his bosses at work so they can bring over some women they are seeing. While allowing his bosses to cheat on their wives at his apartment, Mr. Baxter quickly climbs up the corporate ladder going from just another of the many insurance reps to becoming the assistant director. Everything seems to be going by like normal until the director and boss of everyone J.D. Sheldrake (played by Fred MacMurray) gets ahold of the key to the apartment so he can take Fran Kubelik (played by Shirley MacLaine) to the apartment, Mr. Baxter finds out that the girl he has fallen in love with from the elevator at work is so in love with his cheating boss that she will take her life if she can’t have him.

SHUT UP AND DEAL:
When not reading the description of The Apartment I had no clue what the movie was going to be about. With the cover art showing the three main actors, Shirley MacLaine, Jack Lemmon, and Fred MacMurray with a keyhole shape around them I just figured it was going to be a comedy about an apartment with something going on between the three characters. However, I quickly found out that the movie was nothing like what I thought it was going to be about and in fact was a little surprised to find out that a film that came out in 1960 the topic was a little risqué. Once The Apartment had played for about 10 minutes I knew exactly what was going on and when they introduced Shirley MacLaine it was easy to see where the story was going to go.

The Apartment had this funny, a little sad, and serious plot going for it where it had me wanting everything to work out for the character Mr. Baxter. Jack Lemmon done a really good job making his character Mr. Baxter be this guy who is trying to keep his job by allowing his bosses to have affairs at his apartment while at the same time he is still knowingly helping his bosses have affairs. It’s actually Shirley MacLaine that steals the movie with her character Fran by making me want to feel bad for but at the same time I couldn’t fully like the character because she was knowingly having an affair. Though it did help that she is a good actress and looks amazing in this movie.

Though the plot of the film is good the only problem I had with the movie is that it’s a half hour too long. Around the first hour and twenty minutes I was ok with how the movie was flowing but by the hour and half mark I was getting a little distracted. Though the all scenes play parts in the plot development some could have been shortened. During the scene where Mr. Baxter is taking care of the sick Fran it could have been cut down to just showing quickly that he was doing so then moving on. By the time the movie was over with the ending, though took 2 hours to get to, it was over in 5 minutes. I still enjoyed the movie but with it being so long along with having a slower moment in the middle, it would be easy to get distracted with the movie.

BLACK AND WHITE ON BLU RAY:
This movie came out in 1960 so having it on Blu Ray was iffy for me at first. With the cover on the Blu Ray case and the photo on the back being in color I figured it wouldn’t look that great because most of these older films that are color don’t transfer over that well to Blu Ray. Luckily though The Apartment is in black and white allowing the picture quality to pretty good. At times I was able to spot some scratches in the picture but overlooked this because after all it is a movie that’s over 50 years old. Still, for such an old movie it looks really good on Blu Ray with some good audio levels. Being that it’s a film that was made in the times when it was carried by dialog with no musical score being played behind it, having good audio is a key element.

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