The Cranberries – 20^th Century Masters Millennium Collection

DVD-Video Music Videos

 

Picture: C+     Sound: B-     Extras: D     Music Videos: B-

 

 

The Cranberries are one of the great Irish Rock bands of our time and for those who may not have been interested in getting a DVD of their work, Universal Music continues their inexpensive, convenient 20^th Century Masters Millennium Collection with five Music Videos from The Cranberries.  The five video featured are as follows:

 

1)     Linger (Directed by Melodie McDaniels)

2)     Zombie (Directed by Samuel Bayer)

3)     Ridiculous Thoughts (Directed by “Freckles Flynn” [Samuel Bayer])

4)     Salvation (Directed by Olivier Dahan)

5)     Animal Instinct (Directed by Olivier Dahan)

 

 

Dolores O’Riordan (Burton) has one of the most beautiful, expressive, distinct, resonating vocals in music and she makes every song the band ever cut so compelling to listen to, even when the songs vary as they do.  She tends to excel in the more serious compositions, the ones that allow her to push her voice.  As for the videos, they are again (as is usually the case in the series) a good sampling of the work of the artist(s) featured.

 

Without a doubt, Linger is one of the all-time great Music Videos, by one of the art form’s most underrated of all directors: Melodie McDaniels.  A tribute and rebuttal of the films of Jean-Luc Godard in the 1960s, the clip takes on any issues of the genius director’s objectification of women in his auteur cycle, bringing out the female viewpoint.  That she does this all in Godard’s visual style remains remarkable indeed.  Zombie is about the struggle for Irish independence and the life toll that takes, directed by the also-great Samuel Bayer.  Its mix of color and monochrome is striking and effective.  The relationship was not to last with Bayer and the band, as they had major fallout on the Ridiculous Thoughts video.  That it is included here is odd, but Bayer got his cut of it, which is on the loaded Stars – The Cranberries: The Best Of Videos 1992 – 2002 DVD, which was issued in 2002.

 

Salvation and Animal Instinct were directed by Olivier Dahan, who picked up clips in Bayer’s absence and shot at least as many videos for the band.  That’s not a bad set, but the Stars set offers 17 clips, plus alternates and a bunch of extras.  Outside of content, there is the performance of both discs to consider.

 

Both are sporting 1.33 X 1 full frame images, even if any image happens to be letterboxed on Stars, it is not anamorphically enhanced like on You & Me, Analyse, Time Is Ticking Out, This Is The Day or Stars.  Unfortunately, you can tell the five clips here are a generation down from what appears on the Stars set, which looks particularly more photo-realistic on Linger.  You can also see slight image missing from this set on all four sides of the picture, where it is present on Stars.  However, besides price, the other great feature of this new set is the sound.

 

The Stars set is in Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo, which fares well, but is not as clean, clear or crisp as the PCM 2.0 48kHz/24Bit sound on this new set.  That has been a highlight of all the DVDs in this series and is a plus here.  That makes performance spilt between the two releases discussed.  The only extra is a frame-by-frame list of all the titles to date, but no audio is included.  If you are a huge fan of the band, you will probably buy both, but even the most passively curious will not be disappointed by this 20^th Century Masters release.

 

 

-   Nicholas Sheffo