Blu-Ray/Movie Collection Review: A Nightmare on Elm Street Collection

 

This set contains the seven "main" Nightmare on Elm Street movies, including the 1984 original movie, 1985's Part 2 (Freddy's Revenge), 1987's Part 3 (Dream Warriors), 1988's Part 4 (The Dream Master), 1989's Part 5 (The Dream Child), 1991's Freddy's Dead: The Final Nightmare, and 1994's Wes Craven's New Nightmare. The original film was written and directed by Wes Craven and starred Robert Englund (in the iconic role of Freddy Kruger), Heather Langenkamp as Nancy Thomson, Johnny Depp (in his first movie role), and John Saxon. Craven would mostly bow out of the series until the final movie, New Nightmare, which he also wrote and directed (although he was a co-writer of the screenplay for Part III). Langenkamp would appear in three of the seven movies, and Englund appeared in all of them. This set does not contain the Freddy vs. Jason crossover movie with Friday the 13th, nor does it have the 2010 remake. All of the movies are centered around Freddy Kruger, who was a serial killer of children in life and who, after he was burned alive by the parents of the town he lived in, was able to return as a supernatural killer who could enter and kill in a person's dreams.

A Nightmare on Elm Street was one of the definitive horror movie franchises in the 1980s. It definitely suffered from what almost all of the series, like Halloween and Friday the 13th, did: It got too bloated and too goofy, to the point where there were more bad movies in the series than good ones. The one constant throughout, however, was the fact that Robert Englund made Freddy cool and funny and maximized his time on the screen. Not surprisingly, the three best movies were the ones in which Heather Langenkamp was involved either playing Nancy (in Parts I and  II) or herself (In a New Nightmare). Also not surprisingly the two best were the first and last movies in the series where Wes Craven was directly involved as the writer and director. In fact, the best movie of the series, in my opinion, was the final film, Wes Craven's New Nightmare, which blended the fictional characters with the lives of real-life actors. In fact in that movie Freddy probably had the least "personality" but was far scarier when he was onscreen.

This is a five-disc set (Parts 4 and 5 share a single disc, as does Freddy's Dead and A New Nightmare). The movies all look okay on Blu-ray. Given how old they are and the fact that most of the movies were made before CGI was really well developed, most of the movies do not look anywhere near as good as more recent movies do (and HD sometimes amplifies the fakeness of the effects). Some of the effects are pretty cheesy, and although I think they did about as good a job with the transfer absent a complete restoration as possible, there are limitations with movies this old. The original movie is on its own disc, then each subsequent disc has two movies. 

Each of the discs has bonus content for the movie or movies on that particular disc. The last disc is a DVD of bonus material that has between 3 and 4 hours of additional bonus content. It looks like most (but not all) of the bonus material was carried over from the various DVD releases that have been put out over time, as opposed to newly created for this release. The first movie has the most bonus content, and then it tails off somewhat after that. Most of the bonus material is behind-the-scenes features with the actors or filmmakers of the particular movies. Each movie has at least one commentary track and then there are some deleted and alternate scenes for some of the movies. The Bonus DVD also includes a couple episodes from the (really bad) Nightmare on Elm Street TV series. and some more behind the story kind of features.  All in all though, if you are a more casual fan of the series and do not need every single extra in existence and just mainly want the movies, then it is worth adding to your collection.

DVD/TV Series Review: Devious Maids: Season 1

 

Devious Maids was a dramedy that ran for four seasons from 2013 to 2016. The first season consisted of 13 episodes that aired during the summer and fall of 2013. The show starred Ana Ortiz, Dania Ramirez, Roselyn Sanchez, and Zoila Diaz, who all worked as maids for various families in Beverly Hills, as well as Rebecca Wisocky, Tom Irwin, Brianna Brown, Brett Cullen, Marina Klaveno, Grant Show, and Susan Lucci as the various rich booses of the maids.  

The show has a very similar feel to Desperate Housewives, which is not unexpected given that it has the same showrunners. Like that show, the women are the main characters. There are many twists and turns, and the show revolves around a main storyline (here, the murder of a maid who was much more than she seemed) with a bunch of ancillary stories around it. The other stories keep the main plot from dominating so much that its resolution results in the end of the series.

For those who get the DVDs, each disc has deleted scenes for the episodes on that particular disc. The final disc has a short making-of feature based on filming in Atlanta and a blooper reel. So, there are not a ton of extras, but what was included is good. It should be noted that while the show ran for four seasons, only season 1 was released on DVD, so if you are one who likes to keep a complete collection of physical media, this is the only season you can get on DVD (and none of the seasons or the complete series was released on Blu-Ray).

The show is a blend of comedy and drama. It plays up and makes fun of a lot of different stereotypes from the crazy and/or corrupt and/or lazy rich society, everyone wanting hot maids (and some pretty funny jokes about having to settle for unattractive ones). The show does a good job of developing the characters and making you care about what is going on with them. Susan Lucci steals every scene she is in, basically playing an exaggerated version (almost a caricature) of the soap opera character she played for years. If you are into evening soap operas, this is definitely worth taking a look at.

 

DVD/TV Series Review: ALF: Season 1

 

The first season of ALF consisted of 26 episodes that aired during the 1986-1987 TV season and starred Max Wright, Anne Schedeen, Andrea Elson, Benji Gregory, John LaMotta, Liz Sheridan, and Paul Fusco (who is the voice and puppeteer of ALF). The show's premise is that an alien life form (or ALF) from the planet Melmack crash-lands in the San Fernando Valley of California into the garage of the Tanner family. They end up taking ALF (real name Gordon Shumway) in as a member of the family, and hilarity ensues. 

The DVD set is a four-disc set, with the episodes spread substantially evenly across the discs. There are no bonus features, but the episodes have English captions. The show is a fairly standard procedural sitcom, with each episode (aside from the occasional two-part episodes) having a self-contained storyline. It is a family-friendly sitcom that both kids and adults can enjoy. Some of the jokes are definitely aimed at adults and will go over the heads of most kids, but for the most part, there is nothing that is inappropriate for kids in the show. Some of the jokes in the show are very topical to the mid to late 1980s, which definitely dates it. On the whole, however, it holds up pretty well nearly 40 years after it aired. It is definitely worth the time to watch, especially if you enjoyed it as a kid.

Workout Update: 645 Cardio/Lift 4 Day 21

For day 21, I did the two recovery workouts from Lift 4 in the morning and the 645 cardio workout with the harder moves in the evening. Each of them went well and I can tell my flexibility and range of motion have improved a bit more this week from prior weeks.

Workout Update: 645 Cardio/Lift 4 Day 20

For day 20, I just did the 645 cardio workout in the evening. I did not do the recovery workouts from 645 since I started incorporating them after the 645 workouts during the week. Since it is an off day from Lift 4 I mixed in higher intensity, higher-impact exercises, including one from P90x's plyometrics workout.  

Workout Update: 645 Cardio/Lift 4 Day 19

Day 19 was Legs in Lift 4, which this week went back to using weights. Again, using the microplates helped me increase the weight on the squats without biting off more than I could chew and losing my form. This week is also a 50/50 workout, so it had a HIIT component after the weights, which thankfully did not include triple bear. Therefore, for the 645 workout in the evening, I did low-impact, lower-intensity exercises. 

Blu-Ray/TV Series Review: Baywatch Hawaii: Season 1/Baywatch Season 10

 

Baywatch Hawaii is mostly a spin-off show from the original Baywatch series, which aired for nine seasons and partly a tenth season. The first season consisted of 22 episodes that aired during the 1999-2000 TV season. The cast was mostly new, but it did bring over Brooke Burns, Michael Bergen, Michael Newman, and, of course, David Hasselhoff from the parent series. Hoff still received top billing in the show and Newman was credited as a series regular, but both of them were really recurring characters that would appear here and there, but they were not in every episode. Hoff mainly acted as a producer on the series. He was featured in the first episode and then appeared in a few more before basically disappearing until the end of the season. Simone Mackinnon (who appeared in the Australian episodes in the parent series) was also brought on as a series regular. The new cast members include Brandy Ledford, Jason Brooks, Stacy Kamano, and Jason Momoa (in his first acting role).

The show continues the format of a procedural prime-time soap opera that worked for the parent series. There were a few story threads, especially in the last 1/3 of the season, that flowed from episode to episode, but most of the storylines were limited to a single episode. The basic plotline is that Mitch moves to Hawaii after the events that ended the original series, as he is basically going through a midlife crisis. He almost ends up botching a rescue (as a private citizen) and then works to set up a lifeguard training center to bring in and train lifeguards from all around the world in different techniques that they can bring back home.  

The blu-ray set is a four-disc set with the episodes spread evenly throughout the discs. The set is imported from Germany, so you need a Region 2 or Region-free blu-ray player in order to watch them. The menus are in German and the audio track on the episodes defaults to German. But you can switch to the English audio track from your player's settings. There are not any English captions, however. The discs include the remasted episodes and the non-remasted standard-definition versions of the episodes (which allows you to see the boost in A/V quality of the remasted episodes over the non-remastered episodes). All of the bonus content is on the fourth disc. That includes trailers for some of the episodes and the series itself, and a short (about 8 minutes long) making-of featurette that is mostly an interview with Hoff about moving the series to Hawaii and then includes interview snippets from a couple other cast members. 

Overall, the series is okay. It has a similar (but not the same) feel as the parent series in terms of style and tone. It is definitely a prime-time soap opera that can get a bit cheesy. Of course, the cast is ridiculously good-looking, and the show takes advantage of that fact, having the cast members wear as little as possible most of the time. The show does not get as many notable guest stars as the parent series got. This season, the only recognizable guest stars are Jeremy Jackson (reprising his role as Hobie for a single episode) and Pamela Bach (who was still married to Hoff at the time), playing yet another character (her third different character) between the two series. The show is enjoyable and worth watching as long as you don't expect it to be anything more than it is. 

Blu-Ray/TV Series Review: Modern Family: Seasons 1-4

 

Modern Family is a wonderful comedy that aired on ABC from 2009 to 2020, starring Ed O'Neil, Julie Bowen, Ty Burrell, Sarah Hyland, Eric Stonestreet, Nolan Gould, Jesse Tyler Ferguson, Rico Rodriguez, Aubrey Anderson, Ariel Winter, and Sofia Vergara. This is a blu-ray box set of seasons 1-4. If you have not seen the series but have heard how great it is, believe it. It is one of the funniest shows on television. The easy comparisons to make are to shows like The Office, Parks and Rec, and Arrested Development. If you like any of those shows, then you will probably like this one as well. But I would say it is a blend of those two with a little bit of  Married With Children and the shows it was making fun of, like The Cosby Show, Family Ties, etc, then you would get Modern Family. It has a message of family love and togetherness that the more sappy 1980s sitcoms had, with a little bit of the dysfunction of Arrested Development or Married With Children sprinkled in. But part of the reason it is so funny is because you can buy it as being a "real" family dealing with real situations. In fact, a lot of the moments that are put into the show are based on the writers' real experiences.

The series tells the story of a family headed by Jay Pritchett (played wonderfully by Ed O'Neil), his daughter and her family, his gay son and his partner and their adopted daughter, and his "trophy wife" and stepson. Sometimes, the entire family interacts with each other, and sometimes, it is the members of the individual families. They are interviewed documentary style (for a reason that is not really explained) and those are cut into whatever story is playing out. The comedy is not as off-color as it could get in Arrested Development or Married With Children, but there are times when you definitely are surprised at what they get away with. It does have a similar flow to The Office and Parks and Rec, where the jokes could combine what someone is saying, someone else reacting, and something visual in the background.

O'Neil is definitely the most well-known cast member. It is hard to hear him without thinking of Al Bundy, but the character is very different. He is more like a crusty old grandpa in this one, whereas Al Bundy was a middle-aged loser. Julie Bowen and Ty Burell have great chemistry and play off each other so well. I honestly think their interactions make the show work as well as it does. Even though the show is the definition of an ensemble cast, it gives all the characters great stories to work with, even though there are times when an episode is devoted to one or two characters over the others.

As far as this set. Unlike some season packs where you just get the individual season sets packaged separately, this has all 12 discs in one flip/keep case. Kind of like how the individual season sets would be packaged just in one large case. The discs play fine in US blu-ray players as long as you update the firmware on your player. Unlike what the one-star reviewers on Amazon seemed to think, they are coded to be able to play in the US (the set appears to be Region Free), but if you have not updated the firmware on your player (presuming you have one that can be updated), they may not play. I believe that this set is now out of print, and the subsequent seasons were all released on DVD. The A/V quality of the blu-ray is good, but it is not really a show that necessarily needs to be seen in HD. 

Each season has deleted scenes and family interviews on each disc. The third disc of each season set has all the behind-the-scenes and making-of features, and there are commentary tracks on select episodes. In all, I would say the extras for each season amount to around 45 min of material, give or take. Definitely enough to make those who like going through that stuff happy. I came late to this show, and I am glad I listened to the people who said how great it was. If you like slightly off-beat sitcoms, this is definitely worth checking out.

Blu-Ray/Movie Review: My Week With Marilyn

 

My Week with Marilyn is a movie from 2011 starring Michelle Williams, Eddie Redmayne, Kenneth Branagh, Judi Dench, and Emma Watson. It tells the story of the filming of the movie The Prince and The Showgirl from the late 1950s. Specifically how the third assistant director on the film (or Gopher as is more aptly titled) played by Eddie Redmayne befriended and ultimately fell in love with Marilyn Monroe, played by Michelle Williams. It does a great job telling the story of how unreliable she could be to work with and how Laurence Olivier, portrayed wonderfully by Kenneth Branagh, who was the star and director of that movie, both despised working with and was in awe of Marilyn. He put up with her both because he was trying to use her appeal as being the biggest actress in the world at the time to revive his lagging career and because he wanted to sleep with her.

The A/V quality of the blu-ray disc is very good. While there are not really any special effects or CGI of note used in the movie, there are some really nice cinematographic shots that look great in HD. As for extras on the Blu-ray, there is a commentary track on the movie by director Simon Curtis and a 20-minute making-of/behind-the-scenes feature. Ultimately, the movie is very good. For Williams's part, although she did not have the appeal of Marilyn (although, let's face it, few actresses before her or since could even come close), she did very well at showing Marilyn's vulnerability, flaws, and loneliness. She did a good job at showing that the public face Marilyn gave was just an act, and was not really her. And while the movie does not deal with her death, it certainly sows the seeds of the fact that it was that duality and both not wanting the fame, but not being able to give it up that caused her to drink and become more and more dependent on pills to function which ultimately led to her death. It is absolutely worth the time to watch, regardless of whether you are a fan of Marilyn Monroe or otherwise.

Book Review: Star Wars: The Living Force

 

The Living Force is a 2024 canon novel written by Jonathan Jackson Miller. It is an ancillary side story set a year before the events of The Phantom Menace. The plot involves the members of the Jedi Council embarking on a goodwill mission to a planet named Kwenn, where a Jedi outpost is set to be decommissioned after Qui-Gon informs the Council about how lawless gangs have taken over the planet in the Jedi's absence. 

The hardcover version of the book is moderately long at almost exactly 400 pages. While I think the book is fine and the story is okay, I think it is mostly unnecessary. It does show how the Jedi were seen outside of Coruscant by the "regular" people in the galaxy and the consequences of taking children to study at the temple. It also fleshes out a bit more of Syfo Dias' backstory and reveals that the members of the Jedi Council were not fond of his methods. The book also establishes how Master Depa Billaba became the mentor to Caleb Dume, who would rename himself Kanan Jarrus and become instrumental in the early rebellion against the Empire. Aside from those few points, however, the book did not do a lot to set up the prequel trilogy. Personally, I think the book would have been much better had it included more of Palpatine (he did make a couple of appearances) and did almost a split story about the Jedi's standing diminishing and the Sith maneuvering in the background. Ultimately, the book is okay, and while I would not call it one of my must-read novels in the canon material, it is worth the time to read, even though it is probably not a book that most people are likely to re-read multiple times.

Blu-Ray/Movie Review: The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor

 

The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor is the third (and hopefully final) entry into the Mummy franchise of movies. It is a 2008 sequel to the original 1999 movie and its 2001 sequel. Brendan Fraser and John Hanna reprise their roles as Rick and Jonathan. Maria Bello takes over the role of Evie from Rachel Weisz, and Oded Feher does not return. The major additions to the cast, aside from Bello, are Jet Li, Michelle Yeoh, Isabella Leong, and Luke Ford, who takes over the role of Alex, Rick and Evie's son. What made The Mummy work as a franchise was the character development and the chemistry the cast members had with each other. Without Rachael Weisz and Oded Fehr (whose character would not have fit into this story anyway), the movie is not the same and ultimately does not work well at all.

This time, the movie is set in 1946, in China, and the Mummy is played by the awesome Jet Li. In fact, the only reason I give this even 2 stars is because of Jet Li and Michelle Yeoh. They both did a great job with their characters, and the cinematography and visual effects are great. However, there is a total lack of continuity in the story in the first two movies. First, you are expected to believe that Brendan Fraser has aged 26 years from the first movie without looking much older (this movie was made nine years after the original). It was a big stretch to believe that he had aged 10 years between the first and second movies (which were made two years apart), but they needed to do a much better job at making Fraser look older. Also, the kid Alex from the second movie is now grown up and has lost the British accent in favor of an American one, and is very little like how he was portrayed in the second movie. And John Hannah is given little, if nothing, to do in this movie, and it just seems like his character is there to tag along. I think the decision to recast the character of Evie was horrible, and they would have been better off to have killed off the character than bringing someone new in. Even though I do not think Bello was horrible in the role, the character just did not have the same feel as how Weisz played her.

The A/V quality of the blu-ray is very good. While the transfer is not as good as today's new movies get, it is much better than the first two movies and the CGI effects look more realistic than they did in the first two movies. As far as extras go on the disc version, there are a few deleted and extended scenes,  a 20-minute making-of feature, a commentary track on the film, and a handful of other items. This definitely does not have as many extras as the blu-rays for the first two movies did, but not bad for what is there. 

Ultimately, this movie did not have to be made. I think the producers thought they had a much stronger franchise with The Mummy than they really did. Without all of the original cast, which they did get for The Mummy Returns, it just fell very flat. Luckily, it seems that they got that message since no other attempts at continuing the franchise (and no, I don't count the Tom Cruise movie) have been made. It is worth picking up on blu-ray if you are one who wants to keep your collection as complete as possible, but it is definitely not a must-watch and nowhere near as good as the first two movies.

Blu-Ray/Movie Review: The Mummy Returns

 

The Mummy Returns is the 2001 follow-up to the 1999 movie. In a rare feat (one that would not be repeated in the last movie of the trilogy), the entire cast, including Brendan Fraser, Rachel Weisz, Arnold Vosloo, John Hannan, Patricia Velasquez, and Oded Fehrand and crew, including director Stephen Sommers, from the first movie, returned for this one. This helped the movie retain some continuity from the first film, even though it really expanded on the story. The big additions to the cast are The Rock, playing the Scorpion King and Freddie Boath, who plays Alex O'Connell. 

The movie is set 10 years after the first movie. The Mummy is resurrected in order to kill the Scorpion King (played by The Rock in his first movie role), and of course, the events pull the now-married Rick and Evie O'Connell along with their son and her brother Jonathan. Oded Fehr and Patricia Velasquez also return and are given much more to do and are involved much more in the overall plot in this movie. Rachel Weisz was given more action scenes, including a sai fight in a barely-there outfit against Patricia Velasquez about halfway into the movie and another one at the end. She was much more of an action heroine in this movie than she was in the first. Which ultimately is good, although the plot twist through which that happened was kind of silly.

Like the first movie, this one is very special effects-laden as well. There are new creatures from the first one, and the effects, while not as good as they would be today, are slightly improved from the first film. Although the CGI characters still look quite cartoonish in this movie, If you are one of those who only want to see it because The Rock is in it (which was probably more of an issue when it was released in theaters and he was at the height of his WWF/WWE fame), he is really only in the move a total of about 15 min. 5 at the beginning in the flesh, and about 10 at the end as a dumb CGI creature. I think it would have been much better to have him resurrected as a human and essentially have a three-way battle between the main characters at the end.

The A/V quality of the blu-ray is very good. As far as extras go, there is a commentary track for the movie, a 20-minute making-of feature, a three-minute interview with The Rock that was actually done for the spin-off Scorpion King movie, and a short feature on the visual effects along with a few other things. 

Ultimately, whether you like this or not depends on your feelings about the first movie. If you hated the first one, then you will likely hate this one, too. If you liked or loved the first one, you will at least like this one as well. While some elements from the first movie were incorporated into this one, it was not a carbon copy of the first one. It is a good action-adventure movie that, like the first movie, has some humor mixed in. If you are a fan of the genre or the actors involved, it is worth the time to watch.

Blu-Ray/Movie Review: The Mummy

 

The Mummy is a 1999 action/adventure movie starring Brendan Fraser, Rachel Weisz, Arnold Vosloo, and John Hannah. Oded Fehr and Patricia Valasquez have supporting but important roles as well. The movie is a retelling of the 1930s version of the story. It utilizes many of the same characters and story elements, but it is its own movie. It is not a shot-by-shot remake by any means. This version utilizes a ton of CGI animation and a green screen. It is set in the period between World War I and II, and so it blends ancient Egypt with the 1920s modern world. The premise of the story is that a group of adventurers and scholars are at a dig site in Egypt. They inadvertently release the spirit of high priest Imhotep (played by Vosloo), who then, as an almost immortal being, tries to resurrect his mistress Anck-su-namun (played by Valasquez).

The movie itself is a blend of action, comedy, and romance. Along with somewhat cheesy drama. In some ways, it pays homage to old monster movies, and in some ways, it is a tongue-in-cheek spoof of them. The ensemble cast of Brendan Fraser, Rachel Weisz, Arnold Vosloo, and John Hannah all do a great job with their respective roles. Fraser shows he has the chops to be both funny and somewhat of an action hero...Although not necessarily a larger-than-life one. Hannah is great at blending being a cowardly, weasel with reluctant bravery when the need arises so that you actually like and root for his character. It is hard to buy Weisz as the nerdy librarian they portray her as in the beginning of the movie and their attempts to make her kind of frumpy and tone down how gorgeous she really is did not work all that well. But once they turned the character into more of a leading lady kind of role for movies like this, she worked well. I thought Vosloo, did a fine job as the mummy, especially given that so much of his performance was based on expression as opposed to dialog. He said very little throughout the film, and when he did it was never in English, Regardless of that he was able to portray being menacing, smug, concerned, and scared without needing to say much.

If you get the blu ray, the movie looks and sounds very good. The special effects are good but dated, so some of the things are not going to be as good as in a movie made today. However, it looks about as good as a movie from that time could without a major restoration (which it may get if it is released on 4k). There are quite a few special features, with the longest being a 50-minute featurette centered on the digital effects used to create the various mummies in the movie. There are also some deleted and extended scenes and a couple other short making-of featurettes.

Ultimately, the movie is enjoyable as long as you do not go into this movie thinking you are about to see an Academy Award-winning best picture or get a best actor/actress performance. You won't. It is purely a big-budget, special effects popcorn movie. If you look at it as a somewhat funny action/adventure movie, and if you generally like those kinds of movies then you will probably like this. Also, it is not meant to be an accurate period piece from either ancient Egypt or early 1900s Egypt. So, if you are one who would nitpick things that are wrong, you probably want to stay away from this. Otherwise, it is worth the time to watch.

Workout Update: 645 Cardio/Lift 4 Day 18

Day 18 was shoulders in Lift 4 (which was an interval workout) and 645 cardio immediately followed by Lift 4's foam rolling. The shoulder workout was good. The microplates worked well to increase weight, but not so much that my form was compromised. Doing the foam rolling after the 645 cardio (which was the less intense version again) helped a lot, both to cooldown and to work out knots in my muscles.

Blu-Ray/Movie Review: Memento 10th Anniversary Edition

 

Memento is a 2000 suspense-thriller/mystery that was written and directed by Christopher Nolan. The movie starred Guy Pearce, Carrie-Anne Moss,  and Joe Pantoliano. It came out before Christopher Nolan was a household name (this was his second movie). It was a relatively low-budget film that was part revenge story, part drama, part dark comedy, and part love story. The basic plot is that a man named Leonard Shelby (played by Pearce) is looking for his wife's killer, but because of a head injury, he cannot make new short-term memories. He remembers everything up to his accident but becomes a blank slate every few minutes. As a result, he takes Polaroids of the people he interacts with, writes notes to himself, and tattoos clues onto his body. The twist is that the movie is shown in reverse. You get a scene, then it will roll back about 5 min or so, and show the events leading up to what you just watched. And keeps doing that throughout the entire movie, so you do not find out everything until the very end.

The A/V quality of the blu-ray is good. While there is not much in the way of special effects (if any) or really any sprawling cinematographic shots, the movie does look and sound good in the HD format. As far as extras go, there on the Blu-ray, there is about 25 min' worth of behind-the-scenes material. Commentary on the film from Nolan, a copy of the script, a gallery showing the various clues tattooed on Leonard and his diary. It's not a ton of material, but it's good for what is there.

While the writing and directing are great, the key to the movie being as good as it is was the acting. Guy Pearce, as the main character, Lenny/Leonard, does a great job both when he is narrating the rules for his life and when he is onscreen. Joe Pantoliano and Carrie-Anne Moss, both having come off making the original Matrix film when this came out, are great at playing characters that are much more than they seem. What you find out by the end/beginning of the movie is that all the characters are pretty morally gray. It is much more like Inception (with a little bit of The Fugitive mixed in) than the Dark Knight movies, but to the extent you can say Nolan has a style, it definitely follows it. It is not a movie you can have on in the background and get what is going on. You really do have to pay attention all the way through, or you will miss too much. That said, it is a unique drama/mystery that is worth multiple viewings.

Blu-Ray/Movie Collection Review: The Ultimate Matrix Collection

 

This is a six-disc box set with the original Matrix trilogy (1999's The Matrix and 2003's The Matrix Reloaded and The Matrix Revolutions). It also includes the set of animated shorts, The Animatrix, which fleshed out the content in the movies). The movies starred Keanu Reeves, Carrie-Anne Moss, Laurence Fishburne, and Hugo Weaving and included a strong supporting cast including Harry Lennix, Gloria Foster, Lambert Wilson, Monica Bellucci, and Joe Pantoliano, to name just a few. 

The Matrix franchise has been around long enough now that pretty much everyone knows the story. In a war between humans and machines, humans lost and were used as batteries to power the machines. A few formed a resistance and continued the war in an almost covert fashion (or so we are led to think).
The first movie was truly groundbreaking, both in the story (let's face it, it was one of the few original movies of its time that was not a reboot or sequel) and in terms of special effects. The whole "bullet time" concept that they used to give characters powers in The Matrix was like nothing that we had seen up to that point. Yes, CGI and digital effects have evolved in a huge way since then, but the original film was really the bridge between what was being done in films like Blade to what you got in the Harry Potter films, the Lord of the Rings movies, and almost every sci-fi/fantasy movie out now.

Most of the criticism of the movies themselves tends to center around the continuation of the story in Reloaded and Revolutions. Although given that the anticipation for the Matrix sequels rivaled that for the Star Wars Prequels (which also came out at the same time) given the popularity of the original film, I honestly don't know what story they could have told that would satisfy everybody. In some ways I do think the filmmakers had the Lucas complex of falling too much in love with the CGI, especially since at that point they did not have the technology to make the digital characters look as real as Gollum in LOTR, so during the burly brawl in Reloaded when they switch from the actors to all digital it looks like a video game. I personally however think the story continuation that was done in the 2nd and 3rd films is better upon repeated viewings than when I originally saw them in the theater.

What makes the set shine however is the tons of bonus material. For each 2 hr movie, you get anywhere from 3-4 hrs of bonus content per disc. There are multiple commentaries on each movie and several making-of and behind-the-scenes features for each movie. The extras include a lot of explanation of the digital effects and why the filmmakers and crew did things the way they did and a great look at the stunts and the training that all the actors did to do as much of the fight sequences and wire work as they could. Say what you want about Keanu Reeves's acting ability, but he busted his ass when it came to training to do the fight sequences which were of course the staple of his character.

Aside from the bonus material on each movie disc, you get all the Animatrix features that fleshed out the story (both before the original movie showing how the war started) and in between the films where we got bits and pieces of information but not the entire story. Plus you get a bunch of bonus material on how the animatrix stories were made. Finally, there are 2 discs that revolve more around the story itself, how the filmmakers came up with the story, and some of the early concept art, as well as the featurettes from the video game. So if you are one who loves going through the bonus material on the discs then you will be extremely happy with all you get, because you can spend hours upon hours with all that is there.

The A/V quality of the movies on blu ray is very good. There are some limitations because of the fact that the movies are older now (with the first movie being about 15 years old), but they are better on blu-ray than the original DVD releases. I would say that this set really is for hardcore fans of the series overall. If you hated the second and third movies as some do, then you are far better off getting the stand-alone Matrix blu ray and being done with that. Because that is only a small part of what you will get in this set. If you like the other movies but do not really care about going through all the bonus material then you probably just want to stick with the movie trilogy. But if you want to get the entire experience, then you cannot go wrong with what is here.

Blu-Ray/Movie Collection Review: Lethal Weapon Collection

 

This is a five-disc set with the four original Lethal Weapon series of buddy-cop movies (1987's Lethal Weapon, 1989's Lethal Weapon 2, 1992's Lethal Weapon 3, and 1998's Lethal Weapon 4). All of the movies starred Mel Gibson as Martin Riggs and Danny Glover as Roger Murtaugh. Throughout the series, Gary Busey, Mitchell Ryan,  Joe Peschi (who would be a co-star in parts 2-4), Patsy Kensit, Renee Ruso (who would co-star in parts 3 and 4), Chris Rock, and Jet Li (among others) would co-star.  It should be noted that this set only contains the theatrical versions of the movies. If you strongly prefer the extended editions of the movies, which to this point are only available on DVD, then you will probably want to steer clear of the Blu-ray set. It does, however, include the extended scenes (for films 1-3) included as bonus material on the disc for that movie. 

As I said above, there are 5 discs in all in this set. There is one disc for each movie, and then a 5th disc that contains 4 separate featurettes (one for each movie) which is essentially a 25th-anniversary commemorative documentary, with the highlight being a sit-down interview with Donner, Gibson, and Glover, interspersed with interviews from some of the other actors (mainly Renee Russo and Chris Rock) and filmmakers from the series. They also weave in some footage from the filming of each movie. In all the bonus disc has about 2hrs worth of additional material. The bonus material on Lethal Weapon 4's disc is a 30 min compilation of alternate and deleted scenes and gag reel material from each movie. So between the 4 movies, all the deleted scenes and bonus material there is about 10.5 hrs worth of content for those who go through all the extra features.

As far as the quality of the movies goes. Obviously, the A/V quality is better in the 4th movie than any of the others. You can tell there was no heavy film restoration done, so the movies pretty much look exactly the same as they always have. So, you are not getting the great jump in picture quality that you would get from movies that have a ton of CGI or released more recently. That is why sticking with the DVDs for those who prefer the extended editions of the movies is fine. I am not sure that the material included on the bonus disc is out there on the DVD releases though so you may want to take that into consideration. Hopefully, at some point, especially if a fifth movie gets made, there will be 4k restorations of all the movies, but that remains to be seen.

Overall, I am very happy with the set and would recommend it to anyone who is a fan of the series, especially those of us who are old enough to have seen all (or, in my case, the last three) of the movies in the theater when they were originally released. The movies mostly hold up well, but some of the dialogue (especially from the first two movies), is cheesy and/or would be considered non-PC these days. Even so, they still hold up as movies with great action blended with comedy and drama.

Workout Update: 645 Cardio/Lift 4 Day 17

Day 17 was the rest day in Lift 4 and 645 cardio. I decided that I am going to do one of the Lift 4 recovery workouts every day, alternating between the roll and recover routine and the stretching routine. I will do it after the 645 cardio as a cooldown. Then, on Sunday, I will do both of the recovery routines. So today, I did the 645 cardio routine with exercises that are harder for me and then did the Lift 4 stretch routine immediately after. 

Blu-Ray/Movie Review: Gia

 

Gia is a 1998 biographical movie that tells the story of the rise and fall of model Gia Carangi, who shot to fame in the late 1970s and early 1980s. The movie stars Angelina Jolie, who plays Gia as an adult, Elizabeth Mitchell, Faye Dunaway, and Mercedes Ruehl. Mila Kunis also has a small role as a young Gia. The movie dramatizes Gia's career and how her life was ultimately cut short due to heavy drug use and contracting AIDS from using infected needles. The story spans essentially a 9-year time frame from when she was discovered at 17 to her death at age 26.

The A/V quality of the blu-ray is good. It is an upgrade in video quality from the DVD, but since there are no CGI effects or even great cinematographic shots, it is not a movie that you necessarily need to upgrade to HD if you already own the DVD. There are no bonus features included on the blu-ray, just the movie itself. 

Overall, the movie is very good. The strength of the movie is the acting. While all the actors do a wonderful job, Angelina Jolie really shines. It was one of her relatively early roles as a lead, but it established that she had real acting chops. The role really did call for someone who could pull off being flawlessly gorgeous when all made up, but could also pull off being crazy, vulnerable, caring, dramatic, and funny. Angelina was able to do all of that, and as a result, it is more than just a movie where she looks hot and is naked for a few minutes (although that is not bad either). It is absolutely worth the time to watch.

Workout Update: 645 Cardio/Lift 4 Day 16

Day 16 was the back and biceps circuit workout from Lift 4 and 645 cardio. Again, I mostly used the microplates to add 2.5 lbs to most of the exercises, which was a good way to increase weight while maintaining proper form. In the 645 workout, I chose more intense exercises since there was no HIIT in the Lift 4 workout. 

Workout Update: 645 Cardio/Lift 4 Day 15

Day 15 was the start of week 3, which means increasing the amount of weight on the Lift 4 exercises. This was the chest and triceps workout, which is a 50/50 workout in week 3. I used the microplate magnets to add weight to my metal dumbbells, which was all I needed for most of the exercises to make them more challenging. I chose very low-impact exercises in the 645 cardio workout since the Lift 4 workout had the HIIT component.  That worked out well.

Workout Update: 645 Cardio/Lift 4 Day 14

On Day 14, I did the two Lift 4 recovery workouts in the morning and then the 645 cardio workout in the evening. There are no major details to discuss about either of them. I did include more intense exercises in the 645 workout since there was no Lift 4 cardio today.

Book Review: miracles & fate on 78

 

Miracles and Fate on 78 is a book written by Ari Schonbrun around the 10th anniversary of the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks. The author worked at Cantor Fitzgerald on the upper floors of the north tower of the World Trade Center. Had he been at his desk, he would have been trapped above the impassable impact zone, but due to a couple of delays, he was on the 78th floor below the impact zone and was one of a few Cantor employees who were in the building when the plane hit that survived, and the only one of those few who was not injured. 

The hardcover version of the book is short, coming in at 180 pages. Schonbrun discusses his day on 9/11, from helping his son fill out a form for school, which delayed him getting to work, to his choice of elevators when he got to the building, which made him take a longer route once he got up to the 78th floor, helping an injured co-worker who was severely burned down the stairs and to the hospital, to how he ended up getting home. Then, he talks about how his life has changed in the aftermath. He does discuss his faith and how it impacted him both before and after 9/11. While that may turn some people off, I do not feel that he gets overly preachy about it. Even though the book is short, it does pack an emotional punch and is absolutely worth reading.

DVD/Movie Review: Private School

 

Private School is a coming-of-age comedy from 1983 starring Phoebe Cates, Betsy Russell, Matthew Modine, Kathleen Wihote, and Ray Walston. The best way I can describe this movie is a combination of Porky's and Fast Times at Ridgemont High, yet nowhere near as good as either of them. However, if you were a boy anywhere near puberty in the 1980s this was one of the movies you always hoped came on cable late at night when you got to stay up late. The script and acting are atrocious. Even though the movie had some young stars who would go on to be relatively good actors, they were not given much to work with, even by teen sex comedy standards. There were also some whose careers never made it out of the 1980s. It has about every 80s movie cliche you can imagine (right down to the cheesy music montage). 

The DVD is very bare-bones. There are no extras such as deleted scenes, making-of featurettes, or the like. Realistically, given that it was not one of the major teen comedies of the 1980s and is far more of a cult classic, it is not surprising that it did not get a more expensive DVD release.

The two best things about the movie are Betsy Russell and having some relatively good songs on the soundtrack. Phoebe Cates was the big star in the movie, coming off her role in Fast Times. And although she was the "sexy one" in that movie, she plays the rather bland "good girl" in this one. She is of course still gorgeous and did show a little bit toward the end of the movie, but Betsy Russell is the one who amps up the sex factor here. Ultimately you know what you get with this. It is not great by any means. Do not expect an Academy Award winner, but if you fall within the demographic who remembers this movie from your youth, you can have a good laugh at how good you probably thought it was when you were young and fondly remember ogling Betsy.

DVD/Movie Review: Out of Sight

 

Out of Sight was a 1998 crime-drama/dark comedy directed by Steven Soderbergh and starring George Clooney, Jennifer Lopez, Ving Rhames, Don Cheadle, Steve Zahn, and Albert Brooks. The movie is, at its core, a love story (albeit a twisted one) about a bank robber/prison escapee (Clooney) and a federal marshal (Lopez) who is in the wrong place at the wrong time. It is also very much a drama with some very funny moments. In that way, it really does not fit any label perfectly. It is part love story, part chase movie, part criminal looking for one last score. The story is told part in the present and part through flashbacks (in an almost pulp fiction-like manner). That part of it really works well, and I think it ultimately makes the movie better than it would have been had it run in chronological order.

As far as extras on the DVD version go, there is a 25-minute making-of documentary, a commentary track by Steven Soderbergh, 22 minutes worth of deleted scenes, and select scenes that highlight certain songs from the movie. All in all, enough to keep those who like going through the bonus material happy.

The strength of the movie is the stellar ensemble cast. Clooney (who was probably at the height of his ER fame when the movie was made) and Lopez were the stars and the focus of the movie, but everyone from Ving Rhames, Don Cheadle, Albert Brooks to Steve Zahn (who steals nearly every scene he is in) works perfectly. There are also cameos by Michael Keaton and Samuel L Jackson, which, although brief, are very good. Clooney and Lopez either had very good chemistry or faked it well because you can buy the sexual tension between the two that the movie was going for. It is a very good movie that is absolutely worth the time to watch.