Universal Catalog Titles on Blu

[tenia]

What was bad about All Quiet?

Quite DNRed, but also plenty of shots where ringing is very intrusive.

[Gregory]

Hm. I haven't upgraded my DVD of it yet (due to the fairly high price tag) but this is the first I've heard about it unfavorably. Zooming in on the Beaver caps, it looks pretty fine to me, especially for a Universal blu.

[bigP]

Citizen Kane gets a UK release on November 19th

Not as stacked in terms of extras as the Region A, by any means, but there are a couple of nice exclusives on the UK Blu.

Anatomy of a Classic - a 50 minute feature presented by Barry Norman
Audio Commentary by Film Historian Ken Barnes
The original film budget
Welles off-screen (the original 1938 radio broadcast of The War of the Worlds and Welles' 1945 commerical recording of Oscar Wilde's The Happy Prince)
Blu-ray Exclusive - The Restorarion of Citizen Kane

[Drucker]

Citizen Kane gets a UK release on November 19th

Not as stacked in terms of extras as the Region A, by any means, but there are a couple of nice exclusives on the UK Blu.

Anatomy of a Classic - a 50 minute feature presented by Barry Norman
Audio Commentary by Film Historian Ken Barnes
The original film budget
Welles off-screen (the original 1938 radio broadcast of The War of the Worlds and Welles' 1945 commerical recording of Oscar Wilde's The Happy Prince)
Blu-ray Exclusive - The Restorarion of Citizen Kane

A totally different set of extras than the US Version (which is just a port of the DVD extras, not even in HD) is more than welcome. I may have to get this.

[What A Disgrace]

If I ever need a Blu-ray of Kane (or, more accurately, if I can afford it), I'll definitely get the UK Blu. The US Blu doesn't have anything I want, that I don't already have on the DVD.

[hearthesilence]

The Norman documentary may be preferable to the American Experience piece they used here in the States. The American Experience piece was nominated for an Oscar, but it's a piece of shit, IMHO. "Tasteful" production values like any other PBS documentary, but as history it's garbage, cherrypicking facts to fit a narrative the producers were aiming for, one with some pretty sleazy tabloid overtones. (Actually reminds me of the Clinton documentary the same show put out earlier this year - another waste that glosses over far more interesting and important aspects of its subject in favor of sleazier material that seems more trivial with time, i.e. the intern/Lewinsky affair.) One historian demanded they take his name off the piece, and those who still had theirs in the credits publicly trashed the piece when it aired. If you didn't know much about Kane or Welles before watching it, I don't think you'd walk away with any real appreciation of the film as art or what it accomplished or why it's so important, none of that was treated as a primary concern.

[Drucker]

I guess this all comes with the caveat that it's hopefully the same transfer as the Warners US edition, which is excellent.

[manicsounds]

Be warned that the UK "Citizen Kane" may be region locked, for those without region free players.

[Drucker]

E.T. Review on Bluray.com. We have a new reviewer!

[stroszeck]

I promise you it wasn't a film like Enter the Void or Antichrist, much as some childhood revisionists would like to believe

Thats a strange quote for a review of E.T. I've never heard this film compared to Noe or Von Trier...where do these people come up with this stuff?

[ShellOilJunior]

The line before it is even more amusing. There's nothing like telling the reader how to feel then putting them down if they don't agree with you:

But if you're incapable of giving in to escapism, if you're incapable of losing yourself in a heartfelt adventure, then perhaps it's time to question what it is that made you fall in love with movies in the first place.

[domino harvey]

I have never been able to stand E.T., even as a kid, because the alien is just too damn ugly. Escapism would have provided me with a more palatable creature!

[matrixschmatrix]

I have never been able to stand E.T., even as a kid, because the alien is just too damn ugly. Escapism would have provided me with a more palatable creature!

Haha, are you literally my sister, because this has been her opinion since she was five years old

[The Narrator Returns]

Yeah, well your face is ugly, and it smells like a butt!

I was on the debate team in high school.

[ShellOilJunior]

I have never been able to stand E.T., even as a kid, because the alien is just too damn ugly. Escapism would have provided me with a more palatable creature!

It's a good film but just doesn't do much for me these days. It's probably because teachers put this on for my classes damn near every year in grade school. I practically associate those old television carts with the film (on vhs, of course).

[hearthesilence]

But if you're incapable of giving in to escapism, if you're incapable of losing yourself in a heartfelt adventure, then perhaps it's time to question what it is that made you fall in love with movies in the first place.

Oh please, it's a problem if you don't like escapist fantasies that are corny as shit? Give me a fucking break.

EDIT: To be fair, the homage to The Quiet Man is hilariously awesome. Wish the movie went more in that direction.

[knives]

I'm sure even Spielberg (at the time) though it as a B side at best since he sent all of his best men and women to work on Poltergeist instead. I'm in Domino's boat incidentally. I doubt I've ever been able to sit all the way through.

[warren oates]

I promise you it wasn't a film like Enter the Void or Antichrist, much as some childhood revisionists would like to believe

It's worth noting that Enter The Void only exists because Gaspar Noe's mom showed him Kubrick's 2001 when he was seven instead of something more age appropriate and less inspiring like E.T. Cool mom.

[matrixschmatrix]

Does that mean Irreversible is also the fault of her non traditional parenting? Because if so I'm never showing any prospective children I have any Kubrick ever, just to be safe

[warren oates]

On the level of form, being that it was more or less intended as a dry run for the visual ideas and camerawork in Void, yeah. But not so much with respect to the content. Yet your no-Kubrick rule is pretty airtight, being as the man himself practiced it with his own brood, at least until they were well into their late teens.

[Brian C]

The line before it is even more amusing. There's nothing like telling the reader how to feel then putting them down if they don't agree with you:

But if you're incapable of giving in to escapism, if you're incapable of losing yourself in a heartfelt adventure, then perhaps it's time to question what it is that made you fall in love with movies in the first place.

It's just a case of this guy's insecurity getting the best of him. Millions of people love E.T., there's no reason for him to get so defensive about it.

[colinr0380]

On the level of form, being that it was more or less intended as a dry run for the visual ideas and camerawork in Void, yeah. But not so much with respect to the content. Yet your no-Kubrick rule is pretty airtight, being as the man himself practiced it with his own brood, at least until they were well into their late teens.

When did Noe watch Zardoz?

[willoneill]

I promise you it wasn't a film like Enter the Void or Antichrist, much as some childhood revisionists would like to believe

See, the problem with the reviewer's argument is that they are implying that you should still be loving the same films you did as a kid when you first started loving movies. But people get older, and their tastes should actually mature. I doubt I'm the only person on this forum who's been profoundly disappointed when they've gone back as an adult to some of their childhood favorites. When I was 5, I used to like that "Baby: The Lost Legend" or whatever it was called dinosaur movie with Sean Young. I'm sure it's probably a pile of shit.

[Gregory]

Seems like it's most commonly with Spielberg that defenders must resort to this argument (I've seen it thus applied on this forum and off (Ebert)). "If you don't like this thing that I like, or if you raise any questions or criticisms of it, then it must be because you've forgotten how to enjoy movies in the pure way that a child would. Children don't raise such questions, so why should I, a film reviewer, do so?"

[dustybooks]

I never liked E.T. much even as a kid because something about it stressed me out. I associate it with headache pains still. Don't know why exactly -- I had the same issue with larger-scale disaster type movies like Armageddon and Independence Day but this is the only intimate-ish film that induced that particular sort of migraine. Wonder if there's an explanation for that.

Anyway, I gave it another shot recently and while I admire its evocation of childhood (the Halloween scenes are great), I agree with Domino; the alien is so off-putting. Plus I find it makes too literal and thus cheapens the idea of the "imaginary friend." I actually like a lot of movies that draw inspiration from or pay homage to E.T. -- incl. In America, Super 8, and more recently Beasts of the Southern Wild -- considerably more than E.T.. And I'm a Spielberg defender generally.