BluRay Bargain Bonanza

By Christopher P. Jacobs
Movies Editor

The unfortunate recent demise of Hollywood Video and Movie Gallery has left fewer video rental options, but was a brief bonanza for BluRay and DVD collectors as clearance prices plummeted over the past couple of months. At prices around $12 for BluRays normally selling for $20-30, naturally the hot boxoffice hits sold out first, but as prices kept dropping weekly to around $8, $6, $5, then $4, many of the remaining titles were lesser-known and limited-release films (lots from Sony Classics, Thinkfilm, Magnolia, etc.) that were true bargains at less than the cost of a movie ticket.

As a result, I wound up with close to three-dozen BluRays of movies I’d missed on their theatrical runs over the past few years, as well as many that never even played locally. Most I’d never have considered buying at regular prices, but suddenly seemed worth checking out at these prices on BluRay. This made an ideal opportunity to arrange mini-festivals of double and triple-features featuring certain actors or thematically-related stories, all with a picture and sound quality comparable to today’s digital-projection multiplexes. The theatrical experience was compounded in a few cases, when the automatic preview trailers built into the BluRays coincidentally promoted the next films I was planning to watch!

Below are brief summaries of several titles that might intrigue viewers for one reason or another, followed by quick letter-grades for the movie itself, video quality, audio quality, and quality of extras.

THE OTHER MAN (2008) has probably been the biggest disappointment of the batch I’ve seen so far, despite its powerhouse cast of Liam Neeson, Laura Linney, and Antonio Banderas. What seems like it’s going to become a taut suspense thriller at first, quickly degenerates into a tediously drawn-out and hackneyed love-triangle-mystery, but a sudden plot twist towards the end almost redeems it and makes it at least worth watching. B- / A- / A / B-

I’VE LOVED YOU SO LONG (2008) was one of the few foreign films available, and unexpectedly turned out to be the best of all the titles at the clearance sale. Kristin Scott Thomas (speaking fluent French) stars as a moody ex-doctor recently released from prison and reuniting with her estranged sister’s family. Brilliant performances, powerful writing, and effective direction keep the film spellbinding throughout, as personalities play against each other and the truth behind the prison sentence gradually becomes revealed. It’s a must-see for anyone looking for thoughtful, strong character drama. A+ / A+ / A+ / C+

EASY VIRTUE (2008) features Kristin Scott Thomas in a drastically different role, this time as the domineering matriarch of a disintegrating British aristocratic family in the late 1920s who greatly disapproves of the free-spirited new American wife (Jessica Biel) her impetuous son has brought home. This is no stodgy drama, however, but a delightful screen adaptation of the Noel Coward stage comedy that pokes vicious fun at British society and manners, with a serious undercurrent about the effects of the war and changing times. Colin Firth gives a memorable performance as Thomas’ disillusioned, sarcastic husband, and a darkly hilarious sequence revolving around a pesky pet Chihuahua is unforgettable. A / A+ / A+ / A-

THEN SHE FOUND ME (2007) has rather a different role for Colin Firth as the troubled romantic interest for a troubled Helen Hunt. It’s a pleasant character drama with a darkly comic undercurrent, which Hunt not only stars in, but directed, co-wrote and co-produced. Hunt’s character is 39, single, and dying to have kids of her own (she’s a schoolteacher who was adopted). But a hasty marriage to longtime friend and co-worker Matthew Broderick ends disastrously, then her mother dies, and then soap-opera star Bette Midler shows up claiming to be her birth mother, all the while she’s building a tentative relationship with single father Firth. B / A- / A / B+

DAN IN REAL LIFE (2007) is sort of a reversal on that situation, with Steve Carrell as a widowed father of three daughters, falling for mystery-woman Juliette Binoche on his way to an annual family reunion, only to discover when he arrives that she’s the new girlfriend of his brother (Dane Cook). It’s all beautifully acted with an excellent ensemble cast, well-directed, and wonderfully written up until about the last quarter, which starts to become much more sentimental and predictable. A- / A- / A / A

TAKING WOODSTOCK (2009) is an enjoyable comedy-drama by Ang Lee, based on the memoirs of a guy who inadvertently helped the iconic rock festival take place near his family’s motel when he was barely college-age. The light-hearted dramatization of all the behind-the-scenes debates, crises, and other activities is sometimes episodic, but captures the summer of 1969’s atmosphere well and really makes you want to watch the legendary 1970 documentary “Woodstock” right after it, whose split-screen techniques it periodically imitates (so I did!). A- / A / A / B+

HAIRSPRAY (2007) is the hit musical remake of John Waters’ offbeat satire about the early 1960s. The music is fun and the cast is certainly energetic, but the social commentary tends to be so consistently heavy-handed that the filmmakers seem more to be congratulating themselves on how progressive their attitude is compared with the uptight bigotry of that era’s middle-class public. B+ / B / A+ / A

CADILLAC RECORDS (2008) is far more serious and more effective at dealing with the role of popular music in broadening public attitudes towards race relations. It chronicles the evolution of blues from 1940s Mississippi to Chicago, into what became known as rock and roll in the 1950s, up into the 1960s, specifically through the founding of Chess Records. The music and lives of such real-life musicians as Muddy Waters, Chuck Berry, and Etta James come to life in memorable performances by Jeffrey Wright, Mos Def, and Beyoncé Knowles, with Adrien Brody as Leonard Chess. A- / A / A / B

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