Category: DVD/BLU-RAY

Studying the stain of violence, 1969's "More Dead Than Alive" takes on a troubling reality with the western genre, where men of sheer brutality have to eventually move on with their lives, with some looking to step away from such physical temptations. For Cain (Clint Walker), a history of violence has left him unemployable, tempted by sideshow owner Ruffalo (Vincent Price) to pick up a gun after 18 years of imprisonment and revive a brand name, "Killer Cain," that's made him a legend in the old west — a legacy he wants nothing to do with until financial strain demands to be tended to. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

When we last left Detective Inspector Robert Lewis (Kevin Whatley), he entered retirement, shutting down decades of police service to live a life of love and leisure with his girlfriend, forensic pathologist Dr. Laura Hobson (Clare Holman). The last episode of the previous season almost felt like a series finale, putting its lead character out to pasture as Detective Sergeant James Hathaway (Laurence Fox) was promoted to Detective Inspector, thus paving the way for some type of spin-off following the icier partner as he takes over all criminal investigations. "Inspector Lewis: Series 7" thankfully reinstates the old dynamic between the cops, with all teases pointing to the conclusion of the show shooed away for this cycle of three episodes, quickly returning to Oxford evildoing with particularly educated suspects. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

There has to be a story behind "Samurai Cop." There are always stories when movies are this insanely bad. B-cinema welcomes a new contender with this 1991 endeavor, which attempts to marry martial arts cinema with buddy cop clichés, hoping to give birth to a new action hero in star Matt Hannon. With glam rock hair and a gym rat body, Hannon is a force of one in "Samurai Cop," doing his best to generate screen mayhem while writer/director Amir Shervan botches every possible technical challenge of the movie. The result is no-budget, brain-dead thriller that doesn't contain a single scene of filmmaking competence. To some, it's bad movie heaven, huffing the fumes of a botched effort that doesn't even bother to make sense. For everyone else, the feature is merely acceptable as a curiosity, permitted a rare chance to view futility in motion as Shervan labors to hold the whole wacko thing together. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

Films about post-war life are relatively common these days, openly exploring the mental strain of combat and the demands of civilian life on those who've endured hell. However, in the 1970s, such a topic was difficult to approach, especially when discussing the Vietnam War. While not a groundbreaking feature, 1978's "Coming Home" was a key piece of the Vietnam conversation, striving to provide a look at lives stained by distance, violence, and guilt, using the conventions of a romantic movie to help ease viewers into challenging ideas about a conflict that was only beginning to be dramatized by Hollywood. Directed by Hal Ashby, written by Waldo Salt and Robert C. Jones, and starring Jane Fonda, Jon Voight, and Bruce Dern, "Coming Home" offers incredible talent to bring tension to life, creating a potent look at fresh wounds and broken hearts, sold with unusual sensitivity. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

It started innocently enough: filmmakers Bruce Sinofsky and Joe Berlinger (the "Paradise Lost" documentaries) were called in to document Metallica's (singer James Hetfield, drummer Lars Ulrich, and guitarist Kirk Hammett) return to the studio to record their new album, which would eventually become 2003's "St. Anger." The studio time was booked, the equipment set up, and the helmers ready to capture the creative process. Unfortunately, the band was a mess, having just lost longtime bassist Jason Newsted, while internal friction heated up to such a degree that the presence of Phil Towle, a $40,000-a-month psychologist and "life coach," was necessary to assist band communication and focus. What was intended as mere months in the studio became over two years of footage. "Some Kind of Monster" chronicles this arduous journey toward metal clarity and patience. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

1969's "Sam Whiskey" explores a sillier side to the wild west, with the titular character (played by Burt Reynolds) a man of angles and tricks, but willing to work for others if there's enough money involved. Reynolds and his ease with mischief is a fine match for William Norton's screenplay, embodying a rascal with complete comfort. The feature doesn't quite live up to its potential, but "Sam Whiskey" is undeniably amusing, especially when it sets aside its intentions to be an askew heist movie and enjoys the chemistry shared among its stars, including Angie Dickinson, Ossie Davis, and Clint Walker. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

Bram Stoker's novel "Dracula" has served as inspiration for countless adaptations, with every production out to spin the source material their own way, with some pledging respect to the author's creation, while others merely reflect the book's nightmarish intentions. 1979 was a particularly fertile year for bloodsucker efforts, though none attempted to mount such a richly cinematic world as "Dracula." Directed by John Badham, the feature invests in a highly gothic world of stone castles, howling winds, and open flames, trying to celebrate the period while emphasizing the titular character's powers of seduction, finding a pouty leading man in Frank Langella, who, armed with coke dealer hair and his kitten purr of a voice, works to embody his own version of Dracula — one more interested in the removal of nightgowns than the spilling of blood. A game attempt to celebrate Stoker and tweak established elements, "Dracula" is ultimately sunk by its own stasis, finding Badham unable to work the material into the frenzy he's hoping to achieve. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

It's always been difficult to separate Roger Moore the everyday actor from his iconic turn as James Bond during the 1970s and '80s. 1984's "The Naked Face" is a good reminder that Moore can act away from shaken martinis and exotic locations, doing the concerning psychoanalyst routine in this adaptation of Sidney Sheldon's 1970 literary debut. Patient and subtle while his co-stars chew the scenery, Moore is a highlight in this effective mystery, which manages to achieve a sense of misdirection while openly detailing the face of the killer. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

David Hess lived a colorful life, working through music and movie worlds, enjoying a few near-misses during his career before achieving cult success with his starring turn as Krug in Wes Craven's "The Last House on the Left." Capable of communicating menace and managing no-budget demands in front of the camera, Hess was less successful behind the camera. 1980's "To All a Goodnight" was his directorial debut, picking a cheapy slasher production to kick off his helming career, and while his history with the genre certainly aided the work, general filmmaking ineptitude ruins the fun at every turn of the feature. Painfully amateurish, tone-deaf, and screwy all-around, "To All a Goodnight" represents the lazier side of horror, where the people in charge stopped at the concept, not the execution, leaving behind a dull, doofy effort that's full of mistakes and fails to chill. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

A sequel to 1973's "White Lightning," 1976's "Gator" arrives with full confidence that the audience is ready to accept the franchise's brand of violence and southern-tinged comedy. However, "White Lightning" was raw and hungry to please viewers, presenting a nimble version of Reynolds, still in the infancy of his massive fame. "Gator" arrives in the midst of the actor's heyday, and while it isn't a lazy performance, the Reynolds (who also directs) featured here is a bit too comfortable, failing to reignite the flame of machismo that served the character so well before. Aggressive in fits, but in desperate need of a tighter edit, "Gator" fails to build on the achievements of its predecessor. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

Perfecting his good ol' boy screen persona, Burt Reynolds makes a mighty fine southern hero in 1973's "White Lightning," a roughhouse revenge picture that makes the most out of its star's mischievous charms and Arkansas locations. Directed by Joseph Sargent and scripted by William Norton, "White Lightning" doesn't sustain its excitability, but the first hour packs quite a punch, setting up a suitably enraged story that gives Reynolds plenty to work with as the movie unleashes all sorts of car chases and collisions of masculinity. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

The director of "Two-Lane Blacktop" and "Silent Night, Deadly Night 3," Monte Hellman is more of a fascinating filmmaker than a consistent one. 1988's "Iguana" represents Hellman's quest to explore the limits of power and the lasting sting of humiliation, adapting Alberto Vazquez-Figueroa's novel for the screen. The result is undeniably powerful and unflinching, but also stiff and unconvincing, with inefficient editing and wooden performances sinking a provocative island adventure story. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

I know the idea of yet another remake in the cinema landscape is enough to trigger a wave of eye-rolls, but if there's any picture that deserves a second pass at perfection, it's the 1977 Italian production, "Stunt Squad." An origin story for a supercop series, the effort has all the ingredients to delight as escapism and chill as a procedural, making it ideal fodder for an excitable helmer to transform the material into a roughhouse actioner that leaves audiences breathless. This could be one of those rare times when a do-over might actually improve on the original. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

After scraping through most of the 1970s with intelligent B-movies, director Jonathan Demme took a sharp turn toward the cinematic with 1979's "Last Embrace," an extended Hitchcock homage starring Roy Scheider and Janet Margolin. Bathed in a warm, excitable score by Miklos Rozsa and shot by the great Tak Fujimoto, "Last Embrace" certainly isn't sloppy. However, this adaptation of the book "The 13th Man" (written by Murray Teigh Bloom) doesn't offer the snap Demme is looking for, and while the production has aspirations to be "North by Northwest," it mostly comes to attention in frustrating fits. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

Well, if a production is determined to rip-off "Carrie," there's no reason to be subtle about it. 1978's "Jennifer" looks to cash-in on the outcast subgenre of horror, forgoing Stephen King plotting to raise a holy ruckus, being the rare movie to use snake handling as a method of screen torment. While derivative and missing the stylish curves of a Brian De Palma picture, "Jennifer" manages to find a few thrills of its own, with star Lisa Pelikan submitting committed work as the titular demon seed, showing surprising comfort with snakes and goofball plotting as she tries to turn a thin idea into a rounded performance. Missing any real scares, "Jennifer" retains an adequate amount of tension as mischief is played out, hitting all the highlights of a 1970s fright film without ever generating any authentic psychological disruption. "Carrie" was bizarre and unsettling. "Jennifer" is merely amusing, with the occasional surge of evil. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

In one of his final films, screen icon Gary Cooper slipped into a dark space with 1958's "Man of the West." Although early scenes suggest a routine rise-of-the-hero story to come, the picture is actually quite cynical and forbidding. Director Anthony Mann doesn't pull many punches with this adaptation of a Will C. Brown novel, depending on his aging leading man to articulate the stomach churn of unease as Cooper's character, reformed outlaw Link Jones, returns to the source of evil that initially sent him down the wrong trail in life, facing malevolent Uncle Dock (Lee J. Cobb) and his band of criminals, who want to keep the one that got away in place as they plan out a new bank robbery. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

Without a genre mentor to guide me during my formative moviegoing years, I stumbled on the work of director Mario Bava almost by accident. It was a viewing of "Danger: Diabolik" on "Mystery Science Theater 3000" that opened my eyes to the helmer's work, watching the rare movie on that masterful program that dodged the riffing, revealing itself to be an inventive, charmingly loopy effort with a distinct period vibration. 1965's "Planet of the Vampires" isn't Bava's best picture, but it provides another portal into an unknown world, boasting visuals that are remarkable in their originality and homegrown construction, mirroring "Danger: Diabolik" in the way it takes absolutely nothing and creates an entire world in-camera, highlighting brilliant design achievements and sheer ingenuity. While Bava possesses a filmography filled with highlights in horror, his most fertile work seems to emerge beyond the demands of terror, unleashing his imagination in full. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

Here's a comedy that opens with string of public bombings and an act of suicide. Either it's insane work or French. Turns out, 1965's "Viva Maria!" is a little of both, with director Louis Malle (who also co-scripts) guiding a highly bizarre farce that teases darkness while engaging in madcap antics that often resemble an episode of "The Benny Hill Show." It's Brigitte Bardot and Jeanne Moreau as circus performers transformed into Central American revolutionaries. If that isn't enough to entice a viewing, perhaps this isn't the film for you. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

Instead of becoming the final chapter in the Johnny Worricker Trilogy, "Salting the Battlefield" provides more of a pause on the ongoing tale of MI-5's most conflicted spy (Bill Nighy) and his ongoing war of rumor and discretion with the Prime Minister (Ralph Fiennes). Writer/director David Hare attempts to complete a storyline that originated in 2011's "Page Eight," but breaking up is apparently hard to do, with "Salting the Battlefield" terrific with dramatic encounters, but less successful with closure, leaving the door wide open for Worricker to return and tend to his scattered life once again. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com

It's been three years since writer/director David Hare introduced Johnny Worricker in "Page Eight," exploring the nervous existence of a habitually composed MI-5 officer caught up in a corruption scheme involving the Prime Minister (Ralph Fiennes, returning for a split-second cameo). When we last left the character, he was taking off on a plane to parts unknown, but it turned out he was headed for the sun and sand, with "Turks & Caicos" picking up the chase in paradise. Of course, any relaxation is fleeting, with Worricker returning to the defense when the troubles his left behind manage to find their way back to his doorstep. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com