2016 was an impressive year for movies on disk, with a wide variety of new and classic releases, prestige productions and exploitation, and some interesting rediscoveries … too many to pick just a handful of “bests”.
Year-end ruminations: 2016
Tag: Docu-drama
New releases from the BFI, 2016: Part 2
Two new BFI releases, Peter Hall’s Akenfield (1974) and Andrew Grieve’s On the Black Hill (1988), view the 20th Century through the relationships of people in rural Britain to the land, evoking physical hardship and timeless mystical connections.
October viewing notes
Some fairly random thoughts on an old TV show, a couple of violent satires, and large-A Acting in the films of Bennett Miller.
Brief viewing notes, July 2016
Recent viewing ranges from classic noir to mediocre ’80s thriller, from low budget horror to a documentary about one of the great craftsmen of fantasy film.
Two More from Twilight Time
Twilight Time have released two very different movies on Blu-ray: Ralph Nelson’s religious parable Lilies of the Field, which won Sidney Poitier the first ever best actor Oscar for a Black star, and Richard Fleischer’s bleak 10 Rillington Place, the true story of British serial killer John Reginald Christie, which features Richard Attenborough’s finest performance.
Late winter viewing, part two
A mixed bag of recently viewed disks, from an obscure, poetic black-an-white drama to a garishly perverse piece of Greek exploitation, with some gialli and Japanese sci-fi animation thrown in.
Blu-rays from Network
Britain’s Network are releasing a lot of previously hard to find movies on disk. Two new Blu-rays, Peter Yates’ Robbery and Val Guest’s 80,000 Suspects, resurrect a couple of interesting titles from the ’60s.
Criterion Blu-ray review: Richard Brooks’ In Cold Blood (1967)
Criterion’s Blu-ray of Richard Brooks’ In Cold Blood (1967) gives the film a stunning visual presentation and enhances it with a substantial collection of supplements dealing with the original murder case, author Truman Capote’s approach to reporting the story, and the stylistic and technical innovations brought to the project by Brooks and his collaborators.
Criterion Blu-ray review: The Honeymoon Killers (1969)
The Criterion Collection has released an impressive hi-def upgrade of Leonard Kastle’s gritty, blackly comic true-crime feature The Honeymoon Killers (1979).
Viewing notes July-August 2015
A round-up of recent disk-watching ranges from comedy to horror, mock-umentary to documentary, a poverty row classic and major discovery from the late silent period.
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