Bones:
The Flesh & Bones Collection
(aka Complete Series/2005
- 2017/Fox DVD Box Set)/The
Removalists
(1975/Umbrella Region Free PAL Import DVD)/The
Saint Double Feature w/Hugh Sinclair: The Saint's Vacation/The
Saint Meets The Tiger
(1941/RKO/Republic/Warner Archive DVD)
Picture:
C+/C/C Sound: C+/C+/C Extras: B-/C-/D Main Programs: C+
PLEASE
NOTE:
The
Saint
DVD is now only available online and can be ordered from our friends
at Movie Zyng via the order button atop this review or on top of our
right hand sidebar, while The
Removalists
Import DVD is now only available from our friends at Umbrella
Entertainment in Australia, can only play on DVD and Blu-ray players
that can handle the PAL DVD format and can be ordered from the link
below.
Here's
a new set of thriller dramas for you to know about....
Bones:
The Flesh & Bones Collection
(aka The
Complete Series)
is a nicely boxed set of all 12 seasons of the
'I-cannot-believe-it-ran-that-long' hit show (like Supernatural,
for instance) with
Emily Deschanel as the title investigator, though the name exceeds
her and covers her situation and Angel/Buffy
veteran David Boreanaz as Booth by her side each week. We have had
three of our writers cover various seasons over the years and here is
that coverage...
One
DVD set
http://www.fulvuedrive-in.com/review/4754/Bones+%E2%80%93+Season+One
Two
DVD set
http://www.fulvuedrive-in.com/review/6006/BONES+%E2%80%93+Season+Two
Six
Blu-ray set
http://www.fulvuedrive-in.com/review/11249/Beware+(2011/Maya+DVD)/Bones+%E2%80%93
Eight
Blu-ray set
http://www.fulvuedrive-in.com/review/12394/Bones:+The+Complete+Eighth+Season+(2012
Twelve
DVD set
http://www.fulvuedrive-in.com/review/14973/Bones:+The+Final+Chapter+-+Season+12+(2016
Not
a big fan of the show, but neither were my colleagues, yet for what
did work, it took the show a while to get started, then it peaked in
the middle and dropped off quality-wise very quickly into a
for-fans-only affair. The leads have some chemistry, but this always
plays like a wanna-be imitator of the more successful likes of The
X-Files or Hart To Hart. However, only fans would want to
take on this set, unless you're doing deep research on the show for
some reason.
Extras
in this big boxed packaging include audio commentary tracks on select
shows throughout the seasons and Gag Reels on most seasons, while
each season adds at least one Behind The Scenes/Making Of featurette
to be seen after watching that applicable season.
Tom
Jeffrey's film adaptation of David Williamson's play The
Removalists
(1975) is not bad, though it has some limits in still playing like a
filmed stage piece via too much time indoors. Still, the story of
how a cynical older cop (John Hargreaves) and younger new cop mess
up a volatile situation of a young woman (Jacki Weaver) accusing her
husband of abuse, which they act on with no evidence gets more
complicated when they get the title man (Chris Haywood) to help throw
the suspect out of his house by storing his property 'temporarily'
until his legal woes are settled.
The
film is about a very serious thing, but is also trying to be darkly
comic, though is not successful as a dark comedy, especially as that
does not gel with domestic abuse whatsoever. If we take the film as
politically incorrect, then it fails and is a dated relic, but the
actors are good and this is a drama that serves a both a time capsule
of sorts and holds its own as a raw piece of Australian Cinema of the
time. In all this, it is definitely worth a look, so its good
Umbrella Entertainment has issued is as a Region Free PAL Import DVD.
Trailers
are the only extras.
The
Saint Double Feature w/Hugh Sinclair
is a decent set of B-movie actioners featuring the last new actor to
play troubleshooter Simon Templar before Roger Moore made a huge hit
of him in the 1960s on TV worldwide. Sinclair is a solid choice for
the role in the last RKO film in their original series, The
Saint's Vacation
(1941), which has friends, the press and enemies alike trying to
figure out where is off too before getting involved in another caper
(RKO abandoned the series for The Falcon, which was cheaper to
license, but Saint creator Leslie Charteris successfully sued over
the switch) and then Sinclair returned for The
Saint Meets The Tiger
later that year at Republic
Pictures from the very first Saint novel. That studio was hoping to
pick up the series to be a kind of money machine, buy it did not work
out.
Warner
Archive has issued both on a single DVD and they are definitely worth
your time, whether you've seen the other films, Roger Moore TV
series, Ian Ogilvy TV revival or even heard the Vincent Price hit
radio series. Pre-James Bond, the studios took this property
seriously and did what they could to bring it to life, especially as
the books continued to sell, along with comic books and the like. A
shame RKO did not continue with Sinclair or he might have has the
longest run with Templar there.
There
are sadly no extras, but we have covered every film and TV adaptation
of Simon Templar we could get our hands on, and then some, so you can
look it up through out search engine or start with the link to the
George Sanders Warner Archive DVDs at this link...
http://www.fulvuedrive-in.com/review/12412/All+Hallow's+Eve+(2013/Image+DVD)/Bounty+Kill
The
anamorphically enhanced 1.78 X 1 image on the Bones DVDs look
good for the format, but they looked better on Blu-ray, with the
first four seasons shot on 35mm Kodak Vision-series color negative
film stocks, then HD for the remaining seasons, extending the show
visually by default (though they never got to use Vision 3 film to
their detriment) and it is just fine for what we get. The look is
nothing memorable to me, but it is at least consistent.
It
is also the best performer on the list, but that is only because the
1.33 X 1 color image on Removalists (which can reveal good
color at times) and the 1.33 X 1 black & white transfers of the
two Saint films are on the soft side, have some damage and
could use restoration upgrades. Look and atmosphere-wise, they look
as good as anything in Bones. They are watchable, but I know
they can look better, maybe for Blu-ray as well?
As
for sound, the lossy Dolby Digital 5.1 on the Bones
DVD box episodes are about even with each other and sound the best
here as expected for a recent recording, but they sounded better
lossless on Blu-ray. All three films on DVD are here in lossy Dolby
Digital 2.0 Mono, but they have flaws, hiss and sound a generation
down. You can hear them just clearly enough, but be careful of high
playback volumes or volume switching.
To
order The
Removalists
Umbrella import DVD, go to this link:
http://www.umbrellaent.com.au/
-
Nicholas Sheffo