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Everyone’s favorite blue and yellow chugger is making tracks on his very own DVD! In these six traintastic episodes plus Chugger Spotlights, a Bonus Badge Quest Episode, and a new music video – Brewster starts the digging of a new tunnel, saves new chuggineers Zack, Tyne and Fletch from a flash flood caused by a bursting river, and pitches in to fix Old Puffer Pete. And with friends like Wilson and Koko along for the ride, Brewster and your own little chuggers will discover the importance of helping others and working together as they ride the rails and honk their horns!

FROM THE BACK OF MY BRAIN:

“Chuggington: Brewster Leads the Way” is a compilation of six episodes running slightly over an hour. They stop floods, help out friends and indulge in teamwork. Never at anytime do they discover a taste of human blood and begin killing. That would be “Maximum Overdrive” and that was a great movie. This is a show meant to entertain your Pre-K kids.

Chuggington is what it is. Most of the reviews feel odd, because I’m not sure if I’m supposed to talk about how the Chuggington crew did the same stuff they were expected to do. Honestly, these are nothing more than extended advertisements for reader parents to remember that there’s a new thing to shut their kids up for an hour. I do this for you people. I am soon to join your ranks and I wish that you remember my efforts.

The DVD comes with a bonus toy train, extra episode, DVD-ROM style activities and a character montage. The A/V Quality is on par with past Chuggington releases. That being said, the Dolby track was loud enough for any kid. I just wish the transfer was a little cleaner. Still, it works for parents of young kids.

RELEASE DATE: 02/11/2014

ESCAPE PLAN

Blu-ray reviews

TroyAnderson

January 29, 2014

FROM THE BACK OF THE BOX:

When a structural-security authority finds himself set up and incarcerated in the world’s most secret and secure prison, he has to use his skills to escape with help from the inside.

FROM THE BACK OF MY BRAIN:

“Escape Plan” is the joining of Schwarzenegger and Stallone into a totally hetero bromance set in a prison. Schwarzenegger is already in the big house, when Stallone is recruited to break into the place. It’s a top secret, off-the-books facility that no one is supposed to know about but the CIA. Unfortunately, they betray Stallone and it’s time for revenge! 50 Cent and The Passion of the Jesus play well off our two leads, but this is their movie. After all, nothing is as compelling as watching old men fumble around in prison.

The supporting cast is fairly strong for a thin plot. Jim Caviezel portrays a terrifying and capable warden. The least that can be said about everything else, the better. It’s not like I was expecting much from the movie, especially since it delivered on its throwback appeal in a way that “The Expendables” didn’t. That being said, I don’t expect to see a sequel anytime in the future. Also, what was up with not really having any sort of female development? Sure, Amy Ryan tried to be the lone taco in the sausage fest, but it felt forced. Yeah, I’m the guy that’s going to choose to complain about that.

The Blu-Ray comes with a DVD copy, Digital copy, commentary, featurettes and interviews. The DTS-HD 7.1 master audio track is insane, as it blows up my back speakers in a way that I haven’t experience in the last few months. The 1080p transfer is strong with deep blacks too. I know that I shouldn’t give glowing reviews just because it made my home theater light up, but it was amazing. In the end, I’d recommend a purchase.

RELEASE DATE: 02/04/2014

NEWHART: THE COMPLETE SECOND SEASON

Blu-ray reviews

TroyAnderson

January 29, 2014

FROM THE BACK OF THE BOX:

Bob Newhart returns as Dick Loudon, the New Yorker who runs a small B&B in Vermont with his wife Joanna (Mary Frann). Things operate a little differently up in ski country, as exemplified by their disparate group of friends and neighbors including Larry (William Sanderson) and his brother Darryl (Tony Papenfuss) and his other brother Darryl (John Voldstad).

Season Two highlights include Dick fighting against the advances of a celebrity author, Joanna challenging the town’s historical practice of the men and women eating separately during the town’s potluck dinners, Stephanie (Julia Duffy) getting lost in a snowstorm, Kirk (Steven Kampmann) planning to sell the Minuteman Cafe and more!

Newhart marked the return to television for multiple Emmy nominated actor and legendary comedian Bob Newhart. If you like Bob, you’ll love Newhart.

FROM THE BACK OF MY BRAIN:

“Newhart” enters its second season after 20th Century Fox let the first release die on the vine. I get it, major studios. You don’t believe that classic television deserves an unmolested releases into an uncaring market. Well, this market cares and it cares a lot! Shout already has Season 3 scheduled for April. If you’re just tuning in, this is the season where early attempts at Newhart finally became the show we love. Julia Duffy and Peter Scolari show up, the MTM meow is correct and we get that classic Mancini opening tune. It’s brilliant and it brings me back to childhood.

Bob Newhart has always been an early entertainment staple for me. I grew up watching this show and the first comedy album I ever listened to was “The Buttoned Down Mind of Bob Newhart”. So, I’m easy sell for the material. Looking at it from a harsher stance, there’s about half the season that plays like dead weight. The “My Fair Lady” episode and Larry, Darryl and Darryl finally clicking were the highlights. That being said, it would still take another year for the show to come into its own.

The DVD comes with no special features. Plus, Shout Factory gives you a warning early on about the video quality. This is the best it’s going to get from the original filming sources that were made available. After that, it’s all on the table for you. Great stuff all around and well worth revisiting.

RELEASE DATE: 02/11/2014

RED METAL: THE COPPER COUNTRY STRIKE OF 1913

Blu-ray reviews

TroyAnderson

January 28, 2014

THE PLOT THUS FAR

An epic labor strike that devastated Michigan’s Copper Country in 1913 haunts the American labor movement to this day. Among the notable elements of that strike was the death of 73 children at a union Christmas party, a tragedy immortalized by Woody Guthrie in his ballad “1913 Massacre,” performed in the film by Steve Earle. The event remains the deadliest unsolved manslaughter in U.S. history.

WHAT WE THOUGHT

“Red Metal: The Copper Country Strike of 1913″ is a look at how Big Business has never stopped trying to murder the working class for decades now. A harsh eye is placed on the repercussions that early labor organizers felt from industries that didn’t believe they had to support their human laborers. I would appreciate a much grander series about all of the atrocities that American business has committed against the country’s working class. But, that series would last longer than “The Simpsons”.

The material is just amazing. Steve Earle shows up, we get a comprehensive history and there are connections to the struggles of today all in under an hour. Material like this isn’t for everyone, so I don’t expect to see a ton of readers breaking their ass to pick this up. However, it’s important to take a look at our not-too-distant past and see that the world is still a fouled up place beset by great inequity. It’s only through understanding and rising up a joined people that we can begin to cast off the shackles of oppression and begin a trek towards something better.

The DVD comes with no special features. The A/V Quality is strong with a supportive transfer and a Dolby audio track. The Dolby track doesn’t get much back channel action. In the end, I’d recommend a purchase to fans of documentaries about the American working class.

RELEASE DATE: OUT NOW!

ENTER TO WIN A BLU-RAY COPY OF “DIANA”

CONTESTS

TroyAnderson

January 28, 2014

The highly discussed film, DIANA, which takes audiences into the private realm of one of the world’s most iconic and inescapably public women, Diana, Princess of Wales, is available digitally 2/4 and on DVD and Blu-ray 2/11. In support of the release we’d love to partner with your site to host a giveaway of the new Blu-ray filled with extras!

Sixteen years after her sudden death, acclaimed director Oliver Hirschbiegel (the Oscar®-nominated Downfall) explores Diana’s secret love affair with Pakistani heart surgeon Hasnat Khan (NAVEEN ANDREWS, “Lost,” The English Patient), the human complications of which reveal the Princess’s climactic days in a compelling new light. Hirschbiegel directed from a screenplay by award-winning playwright Stephen Jeffreys, inspired by the book Diana: Her Last Love by Kate Snell, which was in turn drawn from extensive interviews with close friends and confidantes. The result is a window into the tumultuous, change-filled period from 1995-1997, in the wake of Diana’s shattering divorce from Prince Charles, and at the moment when she stood on the cusp of a different life, evolving into a global humanitarian, a master of maneuvering fame and becoming her own woman.

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SIX MILLION AND ONE

TroyAnderson

January 27, 2014

FROM THE BACK OF THE BOX:

A filmmaker and his siblings research the experiences of their late father, who survived the Holocaust during World War II.

FROM THE BACK OF MY BRAIN:

David Fisher really wants you to feel for his father. However, his family keeps getting in the way of this insightful look at the Holocaust. David Fisher spends a substantial amount of time using documents and beginning the road to piecing together what happened. The Fishers fight and give David grief the entire time until he finally talks them into joining. If my parents had been brutally tortured and nearly killed, I would love to find out what happened. The distancing between the events and the presents almost makes David’s siblings seem like monsters.

When the film moves into interviewing US Soldiers that liberate Joseph Fisher’s camp, the film finds its footing. David knows what he wants to do, but he can’t ever find the balance to produce an incredible documentary. When David researches the past and actually pieces together a history of his father, the film moves to the next level. Why did he bother with his family? None of them had anything to do here other than obligation. It was pretty trite for such serious fare.

The documentary was almost hard to watch, as the Fishers are so casual about the atrocities that happened to their father and family. Since David chooses to be observational, we can’t say that he was passing judgment on anything that took place. But, it’s hard to be a living document when the material is about your family. I would say it feels petty to argue about how one presents their family on film, but we live in a post “Capturing the Friedmans” world. I do believe that David Fisher should eventually get a second crack at the same material. However, it didn’t come together for me on this first outing.

RELEASE DATE: 01/27/2014

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