Chaplin's
Mutual Comedies: 1916 - 1917
(Flicker Alley Blu-ray Set)/Looney
Tunes Collector's Vault, Volume Two
(1930 - 1963/Warner Blu-ray Set)/Woody
Woodpecker and Friends: Golden Age Collection
(1940 - 1966/Universal Blu-ray Set)
Picture:
B Sound: C+/B-/C+ Extras: C+/C/C Films: B/B/B-
PLEASE
NOTE:
The Looney
Tunes Collector's Vault, Volume Two
Blu-ray set is now only available from Warner Bros. through their
Warner Archive series and can be ordered from the link below.
Now
for three sets of classic comedy shorts...
The
Flicker
Alley Chaplin's
Mutual Comedies: 1916 - 1917
collection has been reissued in a Blu-ray Set, originally issued in
2014 with DVDs, it is strictly Blu-ray now and their restoration work
holds up very
well. The classic gems include:
The
Floorwalker,
The
Fireman,
The
Vagabond,
One
A.M.,
The
Count,
The
Pawnshop,
Behind
the Screen,
The
Rink,
Easy
Street,
The
Cure
(1917, Mutual Films with Chaplin's Lone Star Studios,) The
Immigrant,
and The
Adventurer.
Chaplin
was in really great form at this point and these are among his
funniest shorts, some of which you many have seen bits of somewhere,
albeit in not as good a shape as we get here. To see them with more
clarity, detail and depth makes them more effective, funny,
impressive and timeless, a genius who has more than mastered the
short form. I cannot strongly recommend these enough and am glad
they are back in print.
Extras
include
The
Birth of the Tramp
(2013) documentary by Serge Bromberg and Eric Lange which chronicles
Chaplin's rise to stardom in concordance with early cinema's growth
from fairground attraction into an international industry.
Chaplin's
Goliath (1996) - Directed by Academy Award winner Kevin
Macdonald, which tells the story of Charlie's nemesis Eric Campbell,
who achieved screen immortality with his appearances in eleven of
these comedies.
and
a Souvenir Booklet featuring notes on the original films by film
historian and author Jeffrey Vance (Chaplin: Genius of Cinema).
The
Looney
Tunes Collector's Vault, Volume Two
(1930 - 1963) gives us new upgraded restorations never issued on
Blu-ray before or some never even issued on DVD! The first set was
fine and as we review these shorts and the related franchise once or
twice a year now, this is one of the best yet. This time, with notes
in some places, we get...
DISC
ONE Never before on DVD or Blu-ray in a WB cartoon collection.
"A-Lad-in
His Lamp"
(with Jim Mr. Magoo Backus as the Genie,) "Ain't
That Ducky",
"Bone
Sweet Bone",
"Boston
Quackie"
(spoofing the detective character and series Boston
Blackie,)
"Boulevardier
From The Bronx",
"The
Bird Came C.O.D.",
"Country
Boy",
"The
Daffy Duckaroo",
"Dr.
Jerkyl's Hide"
(bully dog Alfie and his sidekick go after Sylvester, but get a big
surprise when he drinks the infamous 'Hyde' formula and fights
back!,) "The
Egg-Cited Rooster"
(a Foghorn Leghorn/Henry Hawk the chickenhawk short with its moments,
some of which have not aged well), "Fastest
With The Mostest"
(songs in this Sylvester/Tweety short are a riot, et al,) "Fowl
Weather",
"I
Taw A Putty Tat",
"I
Gopher You"
with The Goofy Goofers raking on a corporate food factory!, "I
Was A Teenage Thumb",
"Little
Blabbermouse",
"Mother
Was A Rooster"
(Foghorn Leghorn lands up with an ostrich for a son,) "Pests
For Guests"
(Elmer Fudd Vs. The Goofy Goofers!,) "The
Rattled Rooster",
"A
Sheep In The Deep"
(Sam & Ralph classic,) "Sock-A-Doodle
Do",
"A
Street Cat Named Sylvester",
"To
Itch His Own",
"A
Waggily Tale",
"Woolen
Under Where"
(another Sam & Ralph classic, with one of the greatest endings in
animated shorts history) and "Zoom
At The Top".
DISC
TWO First time remastered in HD on a WB cartoon collection.
"Awful
Orphan"
(Charlie Dog drives Porky Pig nuts!,)
"A
Bird In A Guilty Cage"
(Sylvester & Tweety destroy an old school mega department
store!,) "Bowery
Bugs",
"Claws
For Alarm"
(Sylvester & Porky in haunted house,) "Crowing
Pains"
(rare Henry Hawk/Sylvester/Foghorn short,) "Frigid
Hare",
"Hare
Remover",
"The
Heckling Hare",
"Hop
and Go",
"Hyde
and Hare"
with Bugs Bunny, "Jumpin'
Jupiter",
"The
Last Hungry Cat"
(Sylvester & Tweety send up Alfred Hitchcock!), "Mexican
Boarders",
"Mouse
Menace",
"Odor
Of The Day",
"Often
An Orphan"
(Charlie
Dog drives Porky Pig nuts again!,),
"The
Pest That Came to Dinner",
"Ready...Set...Zoom!",
"Scent-imental
Over You",
"Stop!
Look! And Hasten!",
"To
Beep Or Not To Beep",
"Wagon
Heels",
"Whoa,
Be-Gone!",
"Wise
Quackers",
and "You
Were Never Duckier"
(rare Henry Hawk/Daffy Duck short.)
I
understand some of the shorts being pulled because of dated items
that are offensive, racial, sexist or otherwise, but some were nto
done with hate or there would have been more objections to them in
the 1970s, yet things have changed. Still, some are classic either
way and offer some of the greatest moments in animated history,
shorts or otherwise.
Extras,
all on Blu-ray #2, include a "Bowery
Bugs"
commentary by Michael Barrier
"The
Heckling Hare" commentary by Greg Ford with archive audio
of Tex Avery
"Mexican
Boarders" commentary by Greg Ford with archive audio of
Friz Freleng
"Stop!
Look! And Hasten!" commentary by Greg Ford
and
"You Were Never Duckier" commentary by Eric
Goldberg.
You
can also see more of our growing coverage of the series, et al, at
this link:
https://fulvuedrive-in.com/new/viewer.cgi?search=looney+tunes
And
here's one for the Quackbusters compilation feature film
Blu-ray:
https://fulvuedrive-in.com/review/16573/Daffy+Duck's+Quackbusters+(1988)/Tom+and+Jerry
Woody
Woodpecker and Friends: Golden Age Collection
(1940 - 1966) is the second random collection of Universal/Walter
Lantz animated shorts the studio has issued and happens to share
(mostly) the same cover image as this second DVD volume of the shorts
we reviewed a good whiel ago at this link:
https://fulvuedrive-in.com/review/6946/The+Woody+Woodpecker+and+Friends+Classic+Cartoon
Though
not exactly the same set (this is one disc and that was 3 DVDs with
75 shorts!,) we do get some good ones including...
Woodpecker
in the Rough (1952)
Get
Lost! Little Doggy (1964)
Greedy
Gabby Gator (1963)
Heap
Big Hepcat (1960)
Romp
In A Swamp (1959)
Rough
Riding Hood (1966)
Science
Friction (1963)
Billion
Dollar Boner (1960)
Andy
Panda Goes Fishing (1940, only his second
short!)
Good-Bye
Mr. Moth (1942)
The
Bongo Punch (1957)
Little
Televillain (1958)
Fractured
Friendship (1965)
Paw's
Night Out (1955)
Pig
In A Pickle (1954)
Pigeon
Holed (1956)
The
Talking Dog (1956)
Witty
Kitty (1960)
Adventures
of Tom Thumb Jr. (1940)
The
Sleeping Princess (1939)
Kittens'
Mittens (1940)
Syncopated
Sioux (1940)
The
Flying Turtle (1953)
The
Mouse and The Lion (1953)
Flea
For Two (1955).
My
fellow writer is a bigger fan of the series, where find it amusing
and more hit than miss, but not always as remarkable as the Warner,
Fleischer or some of Disney and MGM shorts, yet they have their
moments and are for an audience on the younger-end of the age scale.
Still, they are likable enough and worth catching in these solid
upgrades, which look far better than the DVDs ever did.
Extras
include a
bunch of shorts on how these animated shorts were made, while the
second title is a Halloween short with Woody and Chilly Willy.
Cartoonland
Mysteries
Spook-a-Nanny
Drawing
Woody and Andy
Directing
Animated Cartoons
Timing
a Cartoon
Character
Movement
The
Animators Job
Using
Backgrounds
Drawing
with Walter Lantz
Storyboarding
Woody Woodpecker.
Now
for playback
performance. The 1080p 1.33 X 1 black & white digital High
Definition image transfers on the Chaplin's
Mutual Comedies
can show the age of the materials used, but these are far superior a
transfer to all previous releases of the film including DVDs we've
covered here and is much more like the better 16mm and Super 8 film
prints issued over the years of the home movie eras. They often had
the best 35mm footage they could finds and the painstaking work
really pays off. I
am just a little disappointed that the soundtracks are all rendered
in lossy Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo and even Mono instead of lossless
sound. Save that complaint, it is another great release from Flicker
Alley, who takes care of silent classics as well as anyone.
The
1080p 1.33 X 1 digital High Definition image transfers on both the
Looney
Tunes Collector's Vault, Volume Two
and Woody
Woodpecker and Friends: Golden Age Collection
can show the age of the materials used sometimes, but these transfers
are far superior to all previous home video releases of these short
films and when in Technicolor, can really shine and show off how good
the
dye-transfer, three-strip Technicolor prints could and do look. That
includes more than a few demo moments in each set, especially the
Warner ones and not just because it is two discs versus one.
As
well, the DTS-HD MA (Master Audio) 2.0 Mono lossless mixes in both
sets are the best these have ever sounded on home video, but the
Woody
Woodpecker
shorts still have sonic limits and issues that we were not expecting,
despite how bad the sound was on the DVDs. Either there is a problem
with the soundtracks that developed in the vaults we do not know
about, they were recorded with or in some way that has stopped them
from aging well or the technology used was as limited as most of the
animation the likes of Hanna Barbera was using on their TV
productions in the 1960s. Either way, it is annoying for the shorts
to look so good and not have sound that comes close too often.
To
order Looney
Tunes Collector's Vault, Volume Two
Warner Archive Blu-ray, go
to this link for them and many more great web-exclusive
releases at:
https://www.amazon.com/stores/page/ED270804-095F-449B-9B69-6CEE46A0B2BF?ingress=0&visitId=6171710b-08c8-4829-803d-d8b922581c55&tag=blurayforum-20
-
Nicholas Sheffo
