America
As Seen By A Frenchman
(1960/MVD/Arrow Blu-ray)/The
Carer (2016/Corinth
DVD)/The Deuce: The
Complete Third Season
(2019/HBO DVD*)/Million
Dollar Mermaid
(1952/MGM/*both Warner Archive)/Pitching
In: Series 1 (2019/Acorn
DVD)
Picture:
B+/B-/B/B/B Sound: B/B-/B/B-/C+ Extras: B/C/C/C+/C Main
Programs: B/C+/B+/B-/B+
PLEASE
NOTE:
The
Deuce
DVD and Million
Dollar Mermaid
Blu-ray are now only available from Warner Bros. through their Warner
Archive series and can be ordered from the link below.
Now
for a new set of dramas from several mediums....
America
As Seen By A Frenchman
(1960) is
a fun time capsule piece by Francois Reichenbach that is appropriate
for the time in which it is made and ultimately a portrait of a more
pure and peaceful time in America.
The
film is exactly as the title indicates: a French documentarian spent
18 months traveling the USA circa 1960 and documented it as any
filmmaker would. Being from a different culture and background, his
unique perspective is at times humorous. Prison rodeos, Miss America
pageants, assembly lines, Disneyland, all sorts of subjects are
photographed here, which gives the film a feel akin to a softer
version of the exploitative Mondo films of the time, especially with
the use of voice over narration. Watching the film now, so much has
changed in some ways and in other ways not, which is part of what
makes this an interesting and recommendable watch.
The
film also stars legendary filmmaker Jean Cocteau, Paul Klinger, and
June Richmond to name a few.
America
As Seen By A Frenchman is presented in 1080p high definition on
Blu-ray disc from Arrow Video and has a 2.35:1 widescreen aspect
ratio paired with an original French uncompressed mono 1.0 track
(with English subtitles) that sounds excellent. The film has been
respectfully remastered and looks and sounds very good considering
its age. The color and overall image are clean and leave little to
gripe about. The score is also notable by Michel Legrand (Une
femme est une femme, Never Say Never Again).
Special
Features include:
Newly
translated English subtitles
New
video appreciation of the film by author and critic Philip Kemp
Image
gallery
Reversible
sleeve featuring original and newly commissioned artwork by Ignatius
Fitzpatrick
and
FIRST PRESSING ONLY: Illustrated collector's booklet featuring new
writing on the film by Caspar Salmon.
Brian
Cox and Coco Konig star in The Carer (2016), also known as
Shakespeare Fur Anfanger, which is a touching drama that the
older crowd is sure to enjoy. Brian Cox stars here as Sir Michael
Gifford, an extinguished Shakespearian theatrical actor who alienates
his friends and family due to contracting an incurable illness. His
daughter makes a last ditch effort to hire him a caretaker for his
final years, who happens to be a refugee with artistic aspirations of
becoming an actress. The two kindred spirits end up touching each
others lives in ways neither thought possible as they become unlikely
friends.
The
film also stars Emilia Fox, Anna Chancellor, Karl Johnson, Selina
Cadell, and even former James Bond star himself, the late, great Sir
Roger Moore.
The
Carer is presented in standard definition on DVD with an
anamorphically enhanced, widescreen aspect ratio of 1.85:1 and a
lossy English Dolby Digital 5.1 mix mix (48kHz). Compression issues
are evident on the DVD and of the norm for the format, however, this
film is quite well shot and produced with direction by Janos
Edelenyi. The soothing soundtrack by Attila Pacsay is soothing and
appropriate. Overall, the film looks and sounds as good as to be
expected here.
Special
Features include:
Interviews
and
a Trailer
The
Carer is akin to a Hallmark Channel-style film and isn't too
heavy or hard to watch. The style of the film, being from a
Hungarian director, has a 'foreign' feel to it that helps liven up a
formula that's been done more than once.
It
is now a new era in Midtown, New York, circa the early 1980s, where
you could find sex, drugs, rock n' roll and prostitutes on every
corner every night. When the 1970s ended it turned into the seedy
underworld of pornography, amateur VHS home porn movies and AIDS.
With The Deuce in the middle of it all, follow the lives of the
bartenders, pimps, gigolos, prostitutes, police, mobsters and actors.
But through it all they were just people, friends and family trying
to make a living ...and now their way of life is endangered when the
city wants to tear down midtown and build a new high-rises in The
Deuce: The Complete Third Season
(2019).
The
Deuce is bar in midtown run by the Martino twins, Vincent and Frankie
(both played by James Franco), it is a front for the mob but every
drug, prostitution, alcohol comes through there first. But now, both
Vincent and Frankie want more money but everyone else is not happy
with them getting a smaller piece of the pie. Eileen 'Candy' Merrell
is one of the few prostitutes became successful, she got out of the
game and now she directs and makes films featuring feminist's
pornography, but she never thought about her business is basically
turning female 'actresses' into whores. While the rest of the girls
in the sex industry has dreams of acting and hoping to becoming a
star one day, but more often just end up used, abused and burned out.
Lori
is a sex worker/stripper, she could have become a successful actress
but because of her drug addiction it costed her everything and she
learned that being a whore was the best that she will ever get and,
in the end commits suicide. Abby is the bartender with the heart of
gold, helping every girl or person with a washed-up dream to keep
going. Now it's the 80s and business seems to be slowing down and
the city council wants to bulldoze midtown and uses the police to
find any excuse to get rid of the porn industry and those living in
Midtown. At the turn of century everyone is either dead or gone and
only Vincent is left as he walks through Times Square, he sees the
ghost of his friends and the phantoms of his past.
This
series is about those who work in the porn industry, but they aren't
just prostitutes, gigolos, film makers. This HBO cable TV series
humanizes them, they are men and women, people with families and
dreams, but reality is cruel and life is vicious, in the end what
they really wanted was a little dignity in a world in a world that
need them but hated them for their jobs. It also shows how these
people rode a wave of underground culture we will never see again.
Maggie Gyllenhaal leads the rest of the cast.
The
anamorphically
enhanced 1.78 X 1 image and lossy Dolby Digital 5.1 sound play as
well as they can for this older format, but they cannot match how
good the First
Season
Blu-ray looked and sounded. The show is well-produced and deserves a
larger audience than it has received. Extras
include setting the scenes with each episode.
Mervyn
LeRoy's Million
Dollar Mermaid
(1952) us juggling two kinds of films at once, a biopic and despite
no singing or much dancing, a backstage musical as the film tells the
story of real life Australian swimmer and diver Annette Kellerman
(Esther Williams in prime form) starting with a few scenes from her
childhood and her ambition to take her swimming talents and become a
star out of them, hopefully making serious money out of them in the
process. This becomes a little more likely when she meets James
Sullivan (Victor Mature) who is already promoting all kinds of
novelties.
They
eventually find some publicity stunts to show off her talents, but
some do not go as smoothly as others and as this is the beginning of
the 20th
Century, her outfits start to shock a very sexually oppressed world.
However, we get some great swimming sequences, including a few
classics that put Williams on the map and have been imitated and
referenced often since (Miss Piggy in The
Great Muppet Caper
a relatively more recent example) so that makes this film at least a
minor classic in the Musical genre.
But
it also takes the material and audience seriously and holds up well,
despite a few aged parts and points. It does not make Kellerman an
outright saint or gets too phony, so cheers for it bucking
conventions that still haunt biopics today. Definitely, this one is
worth a look. Walter Pidgeon, Jesse White, David Brian and Donna
Corcoran also star.
The
1080p 1.33 X 1 digital High Definition image transfer is in
incredibly good shape with hardly a flaw, looking eve more incredible
as it was shot in dye-transfer,
three-strip Technicolor often exactly on the money with some amazing
uses of color, but not just in things like clothes and sets. It also
is in the naturalism of the outdoors and is held back for dramatic
effect. Another restoration does well. The DTS-HD MA (Master Audio)
2.0 Mono lossless mix is also impressive for its age, the old
theatrical mono sound and this film will likely never sound better.
Extras
include an Original Theatrical Trailer, the live action Pete
Smith Specialty
short Reducing,
the classic MGM animated cartoon short The
Wise Little Quacker
(Tom & Jerry) and an audio only radio version of the film from
Lux
Radio Theater
with Williams and Pidgeon.
Off
the North Wales coast lies the small but beautiful community of
Daffodil Dunes. The owner/pillar of the community is Frank
Hardcastle (Larry Lamb) who recently announced his plans to sell
community and retire. That is until his wayward daughter Carys
(Caroline Sheen) suddenly returns and tells her father that 'she'
will take over Daffodil Dune and return it to profitability.
However, not everyone in the community is happy with changes that she
is making in Pitching In: Series
1 (2019).
Daffodil
Dunes is a small but picturesque village in Northern Wales, it is
mainly populated by retirees who earn money off vacationers and
sightseers, but they really all they want is peace, quiet and a pint
of ale at the end of the day. Frank Hardcastle is the unspoken
leader of the small community (because he owns most of the lands) and
has earned everyone's respect and trust over the years because he
cares for all the members in the community. Carys, however is
Frank's prodigal daughter who sudden returns and decides to 'take
over' her father's business and 'save' Daffodil Dunes from being
sold, but secretly she is running away from a failed marriage and
wants to profit off of Daffodil Dunes by turning it into a modern
health spa with juice bar. Carys has big shoes to fill and sadly
Frank will have to put his retirement on hold and save his Daffodil
Dunes from Carys' plans until she learns to put people first before
profit.
This
was a picturesque drama about a bunch of old retirees who are trying
to save their village from being sold. Most the episodes is how the
older villagers resisting against modernization and the various drama
between all the characters. Hayley Mills also stars.
The
anamorphically
enhanced 1.78 X 1 image looks fine and takes advantage of its
locations, but the lossy Dolby Digital 5.1 can be on the weak side
and is very dialogue-based. Extras
include behind the scenes featurette, characters and trailers.
To
order either The
Deuce
DVD and/or Million
Dollar Mermaid
Blu-ray from Warner Archive, go to this link for them and many more
great web-exclusive releases at:
http://www.wbshop.com/
-
Nicholas Sheffo (Million),
Ricky Chiang (TV) and James
Lockhart
https://www.facebook.com/jamesharlandlockhartv/
