Starship Troopers [1997] Blu-Ray

I finished reading Joe Haldeman’s THE FOREVER WAR (great read) and it put me in the mood to watch STARSHIP TROOPERS – as I remember it being similar (if only because it involved war against aliens on other planets and sex).

I guess it had been long enough since I saw it that I didn’t remember the cheekiness of it all – the little commercials and how everyone was “perfect”. I think I honestly just remember it being a war, bug, boobie flick. Starship Troopers is a sci-fi war satire – it’s fun – but I’m not sure if it holds up enough for me.

I mean – how can you not be all over that chick, Dizzy (played by Dina Meyer), if she constantly fawns over you and Denise Richards (your "girlfriend") is constantly flirting with other guys? Is it the boobs? I guess he’s just out of high school or college – or whatever – and he hasn’t learned there’s more to life than great boobs... Aw... I think I just broke my own heart with that comment... With her dying breath – she thanked God that she was finally able to have sex with you for 20 minutes? I mean – c’mon!!!!! That out does boobs any day!

One thing I never ran into before was that my Blu-Ray player refused the disc – even though it looked perfect. It was an older release so I didn’t expect that I needed to update my firmware – as even with brand new releases I’ve never had to. So, I returned it to N’flix as defective and asked for a new one – and the new disc gave me the same grief.

A quickie Google search and I discovered that I needed to “add” more memory to my Blu-Ray player to get the disc to play! I’ve never heard of that!

I grabbed the podunk SD camera card that came with my camera (which I never unwrapped as I purchased a better card at the same time) – I slid that into my Blu-Ray player and the movie loaded up fine. That’s just weird to me.

The movie looked AMAZING! It’s a fantastic looking movie on Blu – if you love the movie – you will want to upgrade (or wait until the XXth anniversary release that is sure to come out). If you like the movie and want to watch it – rent it on Blu – it looks great.

The Magnificent Seven [1960] blu-ray

A small town is under attack by a gang of hoodlums – and they go out and hire seven gunfighters to protect them.

I had fond remembrances of this film – it’s good – not great – not sure how people could really say that it is better than SEVEN SAMURAI with a straight face. It’s a cute film – but it’s just too Hollywood’ed up. This viewing what I really took away from it was how great a performance Eli Wallach put into this film – how Robert Vaughn’s character is the most interesting and complex of the Seven – and how skivvy Steve McQueen’s character made me feel. I mean, did he really long for the simple life? Or did he just want to rape some women? I felt he was far too aggressive with the women and the town folk had every reason to hide them away. And I still want to samurai sword chop that “kid” and his romance story.

Anyway – this was a really great looking blu-ray conversion. Everything was crisp and clear and nice – up until there was a fade out scene – then things got really muddy. This being a Hollywood western – there were many fade-outs – but I wouldn’t know how you’d fix something like that. I saw only a few small scenes where the full picture wasn’t as crisp as you’d hope – but the blacks were black and not grainy. If I loved the film – I would get the blu-ray of it.

Bullit [1968] Blu-Ray

I finally unwrapped my BULLIT Blu-Ray disc that I got for cheap on Amazon – I really wanted to follow along with the plot this time – all my previous viewings left me lost by the time Frank was being talked down to by his girlfriend for being too callous. I really liked the styling’s of the film and the car chase was amazing – and that kept me coming back to this film – and though I lost the plot it didn’t matter to me as much.

This time I kind of spaced in the beginning of the film – and came back to the film usually where I lose the plot. I still like the film – but knowing it completely hasn’t made me jump to the love plateau. I somehow feel like that chase is the climax of the tension of the film – and you’re almost left with a bit of a new plot to figure out. Maybe it’s because it’s more internally developing as opposed to the external – “let’s sit down and review what has gone on thus far” kind of plots.

If you haven’t seen it – I recommend it – it’s a very good movie. I’m going to give it more time and try and watch it all the way through again.

As a Blu-Ray – unfortunately it’s not as great as I had hoped. There seemed to be a fair amount of static in the background and in the dark scenes – the foreground was crisp and the colors really popped well. Steve McQueen and the cast looked great! The car chase left certain things blurry (as they should have been) - but certain classic scenes looked really nice. When it comes to the other scenes - I have to wonder if they were skipped over. For that reason, I have been putting off getting older films on Blu-Ray because I get the feeling that studios aren’t going to put the money in to doing a FULL clean restoration of older titles unless they are TOP titles. I get the feeling that they are just sharpening them up and releasing them as Blu-Ray to pad their catalog.

Then again I may not fully understand Blu-Ray. I do remember an in-store demo showing how in a battlefield the blurry soldiers behind the focal point – were clear. And I remember seeing the boat on the ocean where the background waves were as crisp and clear as the ones in the foreground. I’m not sure if that’s really the point of the medium or if it’s a mere selling point to get you to jump.

My experience with films shot before Blu-Ray and digital technology – has been mixed – but mostly on the poorer side. TERMINATOR did not look great / FRENCH CONNECTION looked horrible / THE WILD BUNCH was so-so (though I stopped watching a half-hour into it – I wasn’t in the mood for it) / BULLIT was nice in the foreground – spotty in the background.

It will start becoming a cost selling point if I don’t start seeing a big improvement in the Blu-Ray’s that I rent of older films. If the Blu is cheaper – I’ll do it – but if it will just look like an upconvert of the cheaper DVD – I might as well save the coin. Though I have been noticing in some of the newer releases on Amazon of the films I have been interested in that the Blu-Rays are coming up cheaper than the DVD – but these are newer films – I think that’s the beginning of the possible phase out (I hope not though).

The French Connection - Blu-Ray

After typing this up – it’s more a product review than a movie review – so you’ll be warned.

I liked the movie quite a bit – but the blu-ray print was so awful that it seriously detracted from the film in such a way that I’m left thinking about the digital noise more than the story. Apparently the director added digital fuzz and filters to lend the film a grittier look for the blu-ray – which distracted me quite a bit. There was a scene where they were tailing someone – and they showed a shot outside their window and it was so fuzzy and grainy it took me right out of the moment. Then another scene where Popeye was across the street from his tail and he clapped his hands together – and they showed a close-up of that – and it looked like a big gray and black grainy mess – and I had to sit and think what that was all about. I couldn’t tell you about how the color filters affected the film – because it was my first viewing – but I almost felt like I was watching a bootlegged VHS copy it was so dark and ugly.

This is not how you release a “classic” on any format – it was pathetic. I don’t care if you want your film to have a different look – it’s a slap in the face of all the people who worked on the film – who have watched it and hold it up as a classic and even first time watchers who don’t want to see a bunch of disgusting digital fuzz and just watch what everyone keeps talking about. Put your fucking Ego away – and make a different film with all the elements you wanted – and leave the original alone.

The film was really interesting though – I loved that car chase under the elevated-train – that was intense – it’s exactly what action movies don’t have these days. I liked that 70’s cop movie feel that just kind of leaves you scratching your head and wondering about it all.

Star Wars

Despite my issues with George Lucas and all – I found it to be a great experience to show the original 3 Star War films to my girlfriend for the first time ever. We watched the original-original trilogy and she quite liked them – they are universal themes and great popcorn entertainment – so there’s not much to dislike.

My new stance is – if Georgie doesn’t want to release the original-original trilogy on Blu-Ray – good for him. I don’t care. My days of being a Star Wars worshiper are over. My wallet will stay closed for all future Star Wars fun. Georgie released a perfunctory print of the original-original on DVD a few years ago to shut up the fans – and that’s as much I will be shat on by him anymore. But a thought did cross my mind...

If he’s so unhappy with how the original three came out that he felt he needed to constantly “fix” them – why doesn’t he just remake them? Someone will one day – they are remaking Lethal Weapon, Mad Max, Suspira, Wizard of Oz, Arthur – right now! Hell, just about any foreign film that has any merit these days gets remade almost immediately! Why not beat everyone to the punch – create your complete vision – it’s your destiny.

Another thing – this whole Admiral Ackbar “It’s a trap!” joke has gone too far – sick of it – get over it – it’s not that funny.