Athena
(1954/MGM*)/Beate
(2017/Corinth DVD)/Shoplifters
Of The World
(2018/RLJ Blu-ray)/There
Was A Crooked Man...
(1970/*both Warner Archive Blu-rays)/Watching
TV With The Red Chinese
(2012/DVD)/Who
Is Harry Nilsson? (And Why Is Everybody Talkin' About Him)
(2010/Blu-ray/both MVD)
Picture:
B/C+/B-/B/C+/B Sound: C+/C/B-/C+/C+/B- Extras: C/D/C/C/D/B-
Main Programs: C+/D/C/C+/C+/B
PLEASE
NOTE:
The Athena
and
There Was A Crooked Man...
Blu-rays are now only available from Warner Bros. through their
Warner Archive series and can be ordered from the link below.
The
following releases are all of a quirky nature, good or bad, and worth
noting no matter what...
We
start with Richard Thorpe's Athena
(1954) delivering an awkward musical that shows why the genre started
to go into decline at this point. Oddly, some parts of this MGM
release it involves a group of mostly women who believe in exercise
and very healthy foods decades before our current craze for them and
even a few years before hippies started to promote such food. This
was apparently at the time such talk and ideas started.
Debbie
Reynolds and Jane Powell are two of the women involved and get
involved in the not-as-healthy Edmund Purdom (in a role Roger Moore
might have also played at the time, a British guy with money and
class, despite being a sometimes bore) and singer Vic Damone, with
supporting work by Louis Calhern, Linda Christian, Evelyn Varden, Ray
Collins and a pre-Hercules Steve Reeves joined by other period
bodybuilders. Yes, it is that odd.
However,
it is the mixed and not very memorable music score by Hugh Martin and
Ralph Blaine that just does not click. I did not remember any of the
songs when this was over, though some of the dancing is not bad and
the songs never gel into a larger narrative. However, MGM put some
money out for it, so it is a mixed disappointment and a curio fans
might want to check out.
Extras
include an Original Theatrical Trailer and three outtake musical
numbers.
Samad
Zarmandili's Beate
(2017) starts out at a business that makes ladies under-apparel and
it is played for some lite humor, but soon, the Italian production
starts going all over the place, as some of the ladies at the factory
they work at start their own competing business. They also 'borrow'
some things from their former employer, then nuns get involved and so
do odd politics, but then it veers towards backstabbing, humiliation
and gets lost its own mess it wallows in.
Anything
politically intended gets lost in all this and the result is one of
the poorest 94 minutes I have suffered through of late. The actors
are trying, but they are trapped in this mess and it starts going bad
early. See at your own peril.
There
are no extras.
Stephen
Kijak's Shoplifters
Of The World
(2018) is one of those films that stars out decently, then does not
know where to go in its second half. The band The Smiths suddenly
breaks up (this is set a few decades ago before Morrissey went on his
infamous solo path) and we meet a group of fans who do not respond to
all of this too well. I bought much of this at first with the mostly
unknown cast, but the script fails to build on this, be a character
study or detail more deeply about the music and why they get so
upset.
Co-producer
Joe Manganiello play a hard rock DJ forced at gunpoint to stop
playing his genre of music acts and start playing Smiths hits, which
he is not too happy to do. It reminds us of less violent things used
to be.
Fans
of the band might get a kick out of it and you may want to see it for
its better moments, but it also has plenty of missed opportunities,
so see it for yourself if you are curious.
Two
behind the scenes clips are the extras.
Joseph
L. Mankiewicz's There
Was A Crooked Man...
(1970) is the famous writer/director's Western/Heist film with much
dark comedy, politically incorrect language, in-jokes, attacks on
racism (though some might consider it a little racist depending) and
has a strong cast that includes Kirk Douglas in the lead, Hume
Cronyn, Warren Oates, Burgess Meredith, Lee Grant, Arthur O'Connell,
John Randolph, Alan Hale, Martin Gabel, Michael Blodgett, Claudia
McNeil, Henry Fonda and even Victor French.
Mankiewicz
has a David Newman/Robert Benton screenplay that he can run with and
you can see why so many known names signed on to this film. It was
not a huge hit, but has a cult following involving the promise of the
recovery of a stolen fortune and prisoners and almost everyone in a
go-for-broke situation. I never loved this film, but now, I can see
how much more ambitious it was then when I first saw it so many years
ago. It is worth a look for those interested, especially for those
who might like the humor of the Maverick
TV series.
Extras
include an On
Location
vintage featurette on the making of the film and an Original
Theatrical Trailer.
In
a place with endless possibilities, three Chinese exchange students
came to study in NY in the 1980s, Tze, Wa and Chen. They make friends
with their next-door neighbor Dexter who helps teach them English,
American culture and lingo, but little do they know things are going
to get complicated when Chen starts dating American girl Suzanne, who
is also sleeping with Dexter. Soon, their friendship is tested and
become rapidly tainted and what once a cultural exchange turns into
prejudice and tragedy in Shimon
Dotan's Watching
TV With The Red Chinese
(2012).
Tzu,
Wa and Chen just came to United States to study, the first thing they
do is make friends with their neighbor Dexter and become friends.
Afterwards the school film major wants to make a documentary on how
Chinese view American TV and culture, but things turn sour when Chen
started dating an American girl, little did he know the girl was
sleeping with both Dexter and the film director. Once the director
found out she was dating Chen, he starts bullying and harassing Chen,
making prank phone calls and calling him a spy. Chen is then beat up
and mugged by African Americans and he is then harassed daily by the
black kids who live below him. Chen then becomes paranoid and buys a
gun, added on the girl Suzanne breaks off with all the guys whenever
they become serious, Chen falls into a deep depression and his life
ends in tragedy.
This
film is like almost a cultural representation of the culture clash
between American and Chinese cultures. All the character played the
stereotypes of what people think the minority culture is. One
wonders if this movie would have been any different if characters had
been other minorities (or even gender), African, Middle Eastern,
etc... In the face of a world pandemic, people need to rise above
fear and prejudices, and instead of blaming others, act responsibly.
Extras include a trailer.
Finally
we have John Scheinfeld's Who
Is Harry Nilsson? (And Why Is Everybody Talkin' About Him)
(2010) for which I would immediately answer is one of the greatest
singer/songwriters of all time. Unfortunately, addictive behavior
and too much partying held him back, but he still managed to be
prolific and this is the amazing story of his rise to fame and all
the twists and turns until his untimely death.
Early
on, the best talent in the business knew he was something special
with The Beatles immediately recognizing him and Davy Jones of The
Monkees cutting two of his songs certain either could be a huge hit,
but he then landed work making songs of the TV version of The
Courtship Of Eddie's Father
(the Bill Bixby hit series is not really covered here anywhere at all
in the only major gap here) and then comes John Schlesinger's
Midnight
Cowboy
(1969) and Nilsson is permanently on the map.
Interviewees
are prominent and many, including Producer Richard Perry, Yoko Ono,
Micky Dolenz, Ray Cooper, Eric Idle, Randy Newman, The Smothers
Brothers, Ringo Starr, Paul Williams, Jimmy Webb, Van Dyke Parks,
Terry Gilliam, Brian Wilson, Robin Williams and other friends and
family. It is also an unintended glimpse into one of the most vital
and priceless periods in music and entertainment history by the
talents that made it happen. This is a must-see documentary.
Extras
include extensive interview clips and additional footage that would
not fit into the documentary, Deleted Scenes, the ''Loneliness''
Music Video with a Yoko Ono introduction and an Original Theatrical
Trailer.
Now
for playback performance. The 1080p 1.33 X 1 digital High Definition
image on Athena
does a pretty good job of capturing the original three-strip
Technicolor presentation of the film and the 35mm vault materials
were apparently in really nice shape. The digitally-shot 1080p 2.35
X 1 digital High Definition image transfer on Shoplifters
is also surprisingly good and that helps make it more watchable and
the 1080p 2.35 X 1 digital High Definition image transfer on Man shot
in real anamorphic Panavision on 35mm film was also issued in
dye-transfer three-strip Technicolor, though in a grittier way
considering it is a Western. These three tie for the best-looking
presentations on the list.
The
1080i 1.33 X 1 digital High Definition image transfer on Nilsson
is an upscale from a well-produced, late low-def digital production
that upscales as good as one can expect. I should add that the film
clips were transferred pretty well too.
Both
DVDs are in anamorphically enhanced 1.78 X 1 presentations and are
passable for the format, but the lossy
Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo sound in each case can be limited,
especially with Beate,
weaker than it ought to be and the poorest here.
As
for the rest of the sound on the Blu-ray discs, the DTS-HD MA (Master
Audio) 5.1 lossless mix on Shoplifters
has some sound field issues at times, but along with the PCM 2.0
Stereo on Nilsson,
has the best sound on the list. That leaves the two Warner Archive
releases, Athena
(Stereo)
and Man
(Mono) with DTS-HD MA (Master Audio) 2.0 lossless mixes that sound as
good as they ever will, but both show their age unavoidably.
To
order either of the Warner Archive Blu-rays, Athena
and
There Was A Crooked Man...,
go to this link for them and many more great web-exclusive releases
at:
https://www.amazon.com/stores/page/ED270804-095F-449B-9B69-6CEE46A0B2BF?ingress=0&visitId=6171710b-08c8-4829-803d-d8b922581c55&tag=blurayforum-20
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Nicholas Sheffo and Ricky Chiang (TV)