American Pickers, Volume Four (2011/A&E DVDs)/The Beatles: Their Golden Age (MVD DVD)/The Callers: The Art Of Auctioneering (2012/First Run DVD)/Dance Moms – Season One/Pawn Stars, Volume Five (2011/A&E
DVDs)
Picture: C+/C/C+/C/C+ Sound: C+/C/C/C+/C+ Extras: D (Callers: C+) Episodes:
B-/C/B-/D/B
Now for
some reality TV and other special interest releases…
American Pickers, Volume Four continues the adventures of Frank
Fritz and Mike Wolfe going to any locale where they can get into someone’s vast
collection of collectible, buy what they can for the least amount of money and
make a profit on it. They have fun and
the show can be fun, but they can be crass at times and at this point in the
series, it seems like they are overly hyping up the yelling, hooting and
hollering in what feels like desperation.
Still, the 2-DVD set has eight episodes and they still know how to find
interesting items, so the most important aspect of the show still works.
Featuring
none of their classic music, The Beatles:
Their Golden Age is a slap-together look at the band with often too-rough
archive footage that can be hard to watch, a mixed narration on the band and is
something that is just not that well done.
The Beatles Anthology was far superior and after endless indie Beatles
releases, this is pretty unnecessary.
Save some good footage here and there and when the narrator is on the
money, this is a poor disc worth skipping unless you are a diehard fan of the
band.
Susan
Sfarra’s The Callers: The Art Of Auctioneering
(2012) makes for a nice companion piece and alternative to shows like Pawn Stars, American Restoration and American
Pickers by showing small town auctions and bidding from the point of view
of the oral tradition of being the person who speaks the bid over a
microphone. It also shows us the less
valuable items often up for bid and how for some, it is survival or a way of
life.
With many
interviews and questions you would never see asked on Auction Hunters, we get 89 minutes of another side of Americana and it is much
quieter than its TV series counterparts.
I thought this was well done and worth going out of your way for,
especially if you like any of the series noted.
Made in
Pittsburgh, Dance Moms – Season One
(2011) has to be one of the worst reality TV shows of late with a teacher (Abby
Lee Miller) who is always angry, bitter and rather obnoxious. She makes bad situations worse, is
dysfunctional and the young ladies trying to dance all seem to be exploited
throughout. A moderate hit, I hope this
show folds soon because I expect disaster from it soon and it makes the city it
comes from look bad. Why do parents put
yup with this? Is she the only dance
teacher in town? Likely not. What a cynical exploitation show.
Last and
not least we have Pawn Stars, Volume
Five (2011) which is as strong a set as we have seen to date with more
goodies going into the 24-hours-a-day Las Vegas store run by the three
generations of Harrison men. Some of the
items are one-of-a-kind, others priceless and this also offers one of the
funniest shows to date. We get 16
episodes over two DVDs and it only makes me wonder why this is not on
Blu-ray. A really good set.
The 1.33
X 1 image on the Beatles DVD and anamorphically
enhanced 1.78 X 1 image on Moms are
both softer than expected and weaker than they should be. The remaining DVDs
are anamorphically enhanced 1.78 X 1 and though they are also HD shoots, they
look better despite their moments of softness and motion blur. Color is good on all the discs for the most
part, but not great. The lossy Dolby
Digital 2.0 Stereo on all five DVD releases are good, but the A&E shows are
better than the Beatles piece or Callers because of their lower budgets
and other audio issues.
There are
no extras on any of these discs except some extra footage (yikes) on Moms and Callers offers Bonus Scenes, Bonus Interviews and a PDF guide to
being a caller of bidding and auctions.
- Nicholas Sheffo
