Roxy Hunter & The Mystery Of The Moody Ghost Movie + The Prince & The Pauper (Sony DVD)

 

Picture: C+     Sound: C+     Extras: C     Telefilms: C

 

 

The market for bubblegum young lady entertainment is hotter than ever and sadly, more plastic than ever.  One of the most interesting sins of this has been the wall many productions have hit trying to be Nancy Drew.  Besides a recent feature film deservedly bombing, there are many other young investigators (always above the Dora the Explorer crowd) and Roxy Hunter is the latest would-be franchise.

 

The Mystery Of The Moody Ghost Movie has the curious nine-year-old (Ann Wallace) moving into a house that is haunted and/or full of secrets and tricks.  Unfortunately, the teleplay is never cleaver enough to back that high concept up and the final product is all over the place with little focus.  Is that so hard?  Guess so.

 

Sony is also issuing a new version of the oft-told The Prince & The Pauper where twins of opposite socio-economic sides meet, realize they are twins and pretend to be each other.  Featuring the stars of “Zack & Cody” Cole & Dylan Sprouse, this is a version so inept and mall-friendly that Dickens would have thrown a brick at the TV.  It is silly, phony, dull and has a surprising lack of energy.  In this case, get the book instead.

 

The anamorphically enhanced 1.78 X 1 in both cases may be shot in HD, but have all kinds of motion blur, colors are dull and depth is a problem.  I remember when TV productions used to look good.  Now they look like bad TV news or soap opera productions.  The Dolby Digital 5.1 mixes are somewhat compressed, do not use all channels that well and dialogue recording is only so impressive.  Extras on Roxy include bloopers, deleted scenes, Music Videos and our copy came with jewelry.  A making of featurette is the only extra on Pauper.

 

 

-   Nicholas Sheffo