All
About Lily Chou-Chou
(2001/Film Movement Blu-ray)/Baby
The Rain Must Fall
(1965/Sony/Columbia*)/Blue
Velvet
(1986/Criterion Blu-ray)/J.
T. LeRoy
(2017/Universal Blu-ray)/Yanks
(1979/Universal/*both Twilight Time Limited Edition Blu-rays)
Picture:
C+/B/B+/B/B Sound: C+/B-/B/B/B- Extras: C-/C+/B+/D/C+
Films: B+/C+/B/C+/C+
PLEASE
NOTE:
The Baby
The Rain Must Fall
and Yanks
Blu-rays are now still available from our friends at Twilight Time,
are limited to only 3,000 copies each and can be ordered from the
link below while supplies last. Criterion has issued Blue
Velvet
in a 4K upgrade and you can read more about that at this link:
http://www.fulvuedrive-in.com/review/16485/Blue+Velvet+4K+(1986/MGM/De+Laurentiis/DEG/C
Now
for a wide variety of dramas, including a modern classic...
Yuichi
is your average high school boy, decent grades, but his passion is
listening to his idol singer Lily Chou-Chou. He listens to her music
to escape reality, the bullies and the stress in life. He posts
online as 'Philia' a self-proclaimed number one fan/manager Lily
Chou-Chou fansite, but as real life continues to beat on him the
violence escalates, can Lily be enough to save his soul?
In
Shunji Iwai's All
About Lily Chou-Chou
(2001), Yuichi is/was a good boy, but his 'friends' he hangs out with
are low-lifes, bullies and thieves. He is bullied, beaten, ridiculed
and only used as a piggy bank or scapegoat. Both he and his friend
Hoshino were potential school valedictorians with a good future, but
both fall from grace and the only way they can avoid being bullied is
become bullies themselves.
They
become involved in crime from shop lifting, stealing, even rape, but
still Yuichi holds on to Lily Chou-Chou as his life line as if it is
the one thing that could forgive him and save him. But the final
straw is when Yuichi and Hoshino end up at a Lily Chou-Chou concert
and he is back stabbed by Hoshino when he takes his ticket and
destroys it. Yuichi waits until the concert is over and stabs and
kills Hoshino as the crowd leaves, forever tainting Lily Chou-Chou
concerts and fans for murder.
This
was an coming of age film, watching it was hard, it reminded you what
was like growing up in high school, having hopes and dreams ...and
then being shattered by life and bullying. And like any teenage boy,
they try to find escape through fantasy... but when the fantasy is
destroyed so are they.
Robert
Mulligan's Baby
The Rain Must Fall
(1965) is an early example of many things,m including a more
naturalistic, realistic and honest filmmaking in U.S. cinema and
Hollywood cinema at that, it is an early lead role for Steve McQueen
and one of the earliest feature films to be built around a hit song.
Ironically, we even know of a silent film that did just that, but the
MTV 1980s accelerated such productions and most of them were awful.
This film is not.
McQueen
is a singer/musician who wants to be a success and is playing bars in
a small town that is new to him, but his little daughter and her
mother (Lee Remick) are on their way to visit him and he (as well as
the people he knows) are not expecting this. He also gets into his
share of fights and is not always fitting into the more laid-back
town.
This
did not hurt the 'cool guy' reputation that eventually made McQueen a
legend and is not a bad film, but it can also be a little flat and
predictable, yet I like its moderate flow enough that if you are
interested, you should give this one a look. Based on a Horton Foote
play and co-produced by Alan J. Pakula, it arrived as a New Wave of
filmmaking was coming to the U.S. and does what it does much better
than most serious dramas and slice-of-life films have tried since.
Don Murray also stars and in this case, the song was made for the
film, not made as an afterthought after a hit record.
David
Lynch's Blue
Velvet
(1986) is back, this time as an expanded Criterion Blu-ray edition,
but we did cover the older Blu-ray and you can read more about the
film's plot, et al, here...
http://www.fulvuedrive-in.com/review/11269/Blue+Velvet+(1986/DEG/MGM+Blu-ray)/The+Conv
The
improvements in the new edition are amazing, even more so when you
compare both directly and even better, it is interesting how the film
has aged so well and still is ahead of its time in ways no one could
have imagined when it first arrived in movie theaters worldwide. The
performances more remarkable, the risks taken more stark and Lynch is
vindicated in his vision here as well as as an overall filmmaker and
auteur. His fans can celebrate that and that the film has received
such great, deluxe treatment.
Justin
Kelly's J.
T. LeRoy
(2017) is based on a true story of how a writer (Laura Dern) made up
a male persona to sell a book... as a young gay man. However, the
success means she needs someone to pretend to be this person who does
not exist ands gets it with a young lady (Kristen Stewart) who slowly
gets involved. At first, the writer is nice and seems like a
laid-back retro-counterculture type, but friction slowly develops and
that's when things start to run into trouble.
The
leads are fine and I like them both very much, always have, but
despite great efforts from them and a solid supporting cast, I was
not totally convinced by the film, though the story is very viable.
The script and director just get into too much evenness in the
narrative and maybe a few things are not made clear enough, and/or a
little too much is assumed. Still, it is a film worth a look if you
like the actors or are interested in the story, so you might want to
catch this one if so.
Diane
Kruger, Jim Sturgess and even Courtney Love also star.
Finally
we have a personal epic from John Schlesinger, Yanks
(1979) with Richard Gere and Chick Vennera as best friends fighting
WWII in the Northern U.K. and how that effects everyone, plus how so
many people land up changing each other's lives. Gere gets involved
with the daughter of a young shop owner (Lisa Eichhorn) and William
Devane with Vanessa Redgrave. Running a very long 139 minutes, it
shows Schlesinger can handle epic filmmaking versus the personal
kinds of films hie is most known for, but can hit some dull spots
(think Day
Of The Locusts)
while still delivering important things to see and say.
This
was only the second time I ever saw the film and the same problems
remain, but I got more of what he was trying to say so many years
later and realize it is a more remarkable film because it would cost
much more money to make this today, as well as the fact that most
studios and production companies would not even back it.
Though
handled by Universal in the U.S. and funded by German money, it is
mostly a British film because of the talent behind and in front of
the camera, but especially Schlesinger. I can see why it is coming
out as a Twilight Time Limited Edition Blu-ray, but it deserves to be
available as such along with the Schlesinger films (Sunday
Bloody Sunday
(reviewed elsewhere on this site, Midnight
Cowboy)
Criterion has already issued, so get it while you can if you want it.
The
1080p 1.78 X 1 digital High Definition image on Lily
has some good shots, but it also has more than its share of shots
that look off, have definition issues and make the transfer uneven,
while the
DTS-HD MA (Master Audio) 5.1 lossless mix (Dolby Digital theatrical)
is dialogue-based and shows its age, so only expect so much there
too.
The
1080p 1.85 X 1 black & white digital High Definition image
transfer can show the age of the materials used, but this is far
superior a transfer to all previous releases of the film
The
1080p 2.35 X 1 digital High Definition image transfer on Rain
can show the age of the materials used, but this is far superior a
transfer to all previous releases of the film and has been very well
restored by Sony. I was even impressed by some of the shots
throughout and not just close-ups.
The
1080p 2.35 X 1 digital High Definition image transfer on Blue
Velvet
is a new transfer co-supervised by Lynch, from a new 4K master that
manages to definitely outdo the older Blu-ray that looked good for
its time and pleased many a fan. However, the detail, depth and
further color range is stunning, richer, wider and gives the film a
new impact it has never had anywhere but on the very best film
prints. Shot with J-D-C Scope lenses, it is (give or take Cimino's
Year
Of The Dragon,
reviewed on Blu-ray elsewhere on this site) best use of these lenses
ever (Return
Of The Jedi
is the most commercially successful use of these lenses to date) and
this is yet another stunning Criterion Blu-ray that pushes the limits
of the format. Note the clearer difference between how indoor and
outdoor shots are filmed.
Finally,
the 1080p 1.85 X 1 digital High Definition image transfer on Yanks
looks as expected from the original release of the film (on its 40th
Anniversary) and it has a slightly dark look to match and evoke the
period in which it takes place without overdoing it. Fans will be
pleased.
As
for sound on the rest of the films, LeRoy
and Blue
Velvet
are here in DTS-HD MA (Master Audio) 5.1 lossless mixes, both
dialogue-based, but you would think LeRoy
would be the sonic champ, yet Lynch and company created a deceptively
complex soundtrack and this is the same soundmaster used on the older
Blu-ray, but it sounds just marginally better and can more than
compete with any film here. Nice.
The
DTS-HD MA (Master Audio) 2.0 Mono lossless mixes on Baby
and Yanks
are from films originally issued in optical theatrical mono, but the
restoration efforts have brought out the best possible in both, so
they sound as good as they can here and probably will anywhere, so
that's good too.
Extras
on Lily
include making of the film featurette and trailers. Baby
and Yanks
have
illustrated booklet on the film including informative text and yet
another excellent, underrated essay by the great film scholar Julie
Kirgo and Original Theatrical Trailers, plus Yanks
also adds an Isolated Music Score Track with some Sound Effects and a
feature-length audio commentary track by Kirgo, Nick Redman (who is
no longer with us, so it is one of his last) and actor Chick Vennera
from the film. LeRoy
has no extras, but Blue
Velvet
is loaded with them and it includes...
Alternate
original stereo soundtrack, "Blue
Velvet" Revisited,
a feature-length meditation on the making of the film by Peter
Braatz, filmed on-set during the production (though we get many
stills, much of the footage is Super 8mm film format and is very
interesting), The Lost Footage, fifty-one minutes of deleted scenes
and alternate takes assembled by Lynch, Mysteries of Love, a
seventy-minute documentary from 2002 on the making of the film, an
Original Theatrical Trailer and an illustrated booklet with tech info
and essay by Kristine McKenna called A
Suburban Romance, Only Different.
To
order
Baby
The Rain Must Fall
and/or Yanks
limited edition Blu-rays, buy them while supplies last at this link:
www.screenarchives.com
-
Nicholas Sheffo and Ricky Chiang (Lily)
