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Entries tagged with 'Sony'
Posted Jun. 30, 2008,
Vantage Point Is Goofy But Enjoyable -- and Now Out on DVD
By Dennis Dermody
Vantage Point, a goofy yet enjoyable Rashamon-study of the assassination attempt on the United States President (William Hurt) at a peace convention in Spain, is out this week on DVD. We see the scene of the crime (at a town square) repeated from several different perspectives -- from Dennis Quaid, as a secret service agent who once took a bullet for the president; from Forrest Whitaker, playing a tourist with a video camera taping the incident; from Sigourney Weaver, as a TV producer; and a host of others, as the scenario repeats itself endlessly until it begins to come into focus. As the lens clears you see double-dealings, dummy presidents, wily terrorists, not to mention a little girl with an ice cream cone who figures into the nonsense. When it finally gets to a harebrained car chase around the city between Dennis Quaid and a rouge cop, all reason has been thrown to the wind. Director Pete Travis’s film has an annoying Groundhog Day repetition in the beginning, but eventually one kind of gets into all the crackpot coincidences and preposterous plot twists.
Posted Jun. 9, 2008,
Pirates and Stranglers and Tongs, Oh My!
By Dennis Dermody
I had the best weekend watching the great DVD set, Icons of Adventure, featuring four rare adventure films from the British Hammer Studios better known for Christopher Lee’s Dracula films.
The Pirates of Blood River (1961) stars Kerwin Mathews (The 7th Voyage Of Sinbad) who escapes from a hellish prison and is rescued by a crew of pirates, led by Christopher Lee, who head to Mathews' hometown in order to plunder it. Oliver Reed plays one of the bloodthirsty “maties," in this rousing adventure.
The Devil-Ship Pirates (1963) is set when the British fleets were fighting the Spanish Armada. It’s also about the “Diablo,” a Spanish ship filled with pirates (again led by Christopher Lee) who find their ship so damaged they are forced to land ashore in England and subsequently convince the seaside town that the Spanish won the war and force them to help repair their ship.
Posted Mar. 5, 2008,
Hammer DVDs: The Nanny and The Strangler of Bombay!
By Dennis Dermody
Got the word that come summer Sony is releasing a box of action adventures from the British studio most known for the Christopher Lee Dracula films, Hammer. The box is supposedly going to include the bloodthirsty Stranglers of Bombay, Terror of the Tongs, Pirates of Blood River and Devil Ship Pirates. Also on April 8, Fox is releasing the excellent 1965 Hammer thriller starring Bette Davis -- The Nanny. In that film Bette is definitely Auntie Maim!
Posted Oct. 5, 2007,
Eight Items or Less: "I'm Not There" Is "Not a Bob Dylan Movie," The Bowery Hotel Has Slippery Bathrooms and Thursday Nights Just Got Busier
By Gari Pini
1. The cover story in this week's New York Times Magazine claims that the new Todd Haynes film I'm Not There is "not a Bob Dylan movie." Cate Blanchett, one of the six actors portraying Dylan in the film, tells the magazine that "I don't know that it does make sense," and Richard Gere finds the film "kind of cosmic." (via Editor and Publisher)
2. The Wall Street Journal sends a writer, unannounced, to the Gramercy Park Hotel and the Bowery Hotel. Besides spending a small fortune at both, she can't get into the bar at the Gramercy and slips on the floor of the bathroom at The Bowery ("The bruise was not pretty.")
3. DJ Danny Tenaglia is selling his "DJ Booth/Spaceship" for $25,000.
4. Another new club night starts next Thursday, October 11. This one, presented by Kenny Kenny and Josh, is called Sebastian, located at 27 West 24th and features Scissor Sister DJ Sammy Jo. Hosts include Amanda Lepore and Sophia Lamar.
5. Sony has introduced a new Cyber-shot camera that they claim can sense when people are smiling and then automatically shoots a picture.
6. In the just released list of the thousands of bands scheduled to play at this year's CMJ music festival we were intrigued by these numerally-monikered two: 1900 and 1990. As Alexis said, the 20th century is the new wolf!