Getting Back to Normal

Move to new pad now done, unpacking very not, but here's a cluster of DVD reviews just uploaded.

First up is Jonathan Demme's Rachel Getting Married from Sony Pictures Classics, the deserved/overhyped indie drama where Anne Hathaway looks grungy and nearly ruins a wedding. Sony's DVD is loaded with lots of goodies for this commendable film, but whether viewers will warm to the movie and Hathaway's performance after the Oscar spotlight is up in the air. Best advice: pretend you know nothing about all of that, and the film will work quite well.

Transporter 3, from Maple (Canada)/Lionsgate (U.S.) is another collaboration between sporadic director/Europa Corp bigwig Luc Besson, and Robert Mark Kamen. Much like the Taxi franchise, the quality, maturity, and plots turn to weaker Jello-O in each sequel, and Transporter 3 is no different. You do not put an action star in a car for much of the film's running time, and you don't cast a hair stylist to co-star. Besson's fetish for leggy women with runny, druggy makeup is also present, and director Olivier Megaton really fumbles some excellent action scenes. How? Read the review.

And not long ago I reviewed The Hilarious House of Frightenstein, a Good example of classic indiginous programming from the seventies. Now comes the Bad: The Starlost. Never heard of it? No problem, because the entire weekend was spent dissecting the series which many Canadians remember as being quite awful.

Is it a misunderstood series axed before it had a chance to develop into a special something the original promo materials trumpeted with great pride?

NO ! NO ! NO !

But VCI's complete series release proves two things: for fans, it's worth snapping up in spite of the hefty price tag; and once again a Canadian show is available as an import (although you can't blame the show's original co-producer, CTV, for wanting to distance themselves from the clunker. Then again, CTV also made The Eleventh Hour. And The City. And force Ben Mulroney on the nation, daily).

Coming next: soundtrack reviews, and a comparative DVD review of Anna Biller's unabashed Radley Metzger salute, Viva (2007), released in Canada by Anchor Bay/Starz, and in a longer cut in the U.S. by Cult Epics.



- MRH