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I SPIT ON YOUR GRAVE Screen Comparisons — New Ronin Flix Blu-ray vs Anchor Bay’s 2011 Release
I Spit On Your Grave Special Edition Blu-ray Box set arrived November 10th from Ronin Flix
To be completely honest, this was my first title from Ronin Flix and I didn’t know what to expect from the indie distro. The packaging was immaculate and the presentation of the discs was impressive, but that’s not what this post is about. The cover on the 2020 release of the infamous 1978 exploitation classic boasted a “A New 4K Scan From the Original Camera Negative”, and I was excited to check it out given the previous release was almost a decade old at this point. I was surprised at what I found when I started digging in to compare the two releases head to head, you can check out my findings and screenshots after the jump.
My primary complaint with the Anchor Bay disc was and still is the brightness and contrast of the image, which didn’t bode well at times, given how fair lead Camille Keaton’s complexion is. Another issue is the color correction or lack thereof especially given the the use of red in the film, which is a transformative color for the heroine, it appears almost as a pink or magenta in some scenes because of this color imbalance present. The more I dug into the Anchor Bay release for this review, the clearer it became, that the detail in the older scan was a symptom of the brightness and contrast being maxed out to summon the digital details, along with a bit of a DNR thrown in for good measure. Don’t get me wrong for its time this was a solid transfer, but these tricks haven’t aged well and I also think the trend for a more natural and “film-like” transfer has only benefitted recent releases.
The first thing you notice about the Ronin transfer right off the bat is the color correction, skin tones (primarily our lead’s) on this new transfer appear more natural and pleasing to the eye. The colors aren’t as washed out or murky as the Anchor Bay disc tend to be, with reds most definitely bright red. The image also doesn’t look as blown out or artificial in brighter scenes and there’s a pleasing contrast throughout. The film grain is thankfully left intact, with little to no DNR visible. This coupled with the film’s original restored mono track, only hammer home what Ronin was going for with their restoration here, delivering the closest thing you’ll get to seeing a new 35mm print unspool for the first time.
But don’t simply take my word for it, check out the screens below:
Top: Old Anchor Bay (2011)// Bottom: New Ronin Flix (2020) 
Top: Old Anchor Bay (2011)// Bottom: New Ronin Flix (2020) 
Top: Old Anchor Bay (2011)// Bottom: New Ronin Flix (2020) 
Top: Old Anchor Bay (2011)// Bottom: New Ronin Flix (2020) 
Top: Old Anchor Bay (2011)// Bottom: New Ronin Flix (2020) 
Top: Old Anchor Bay (2011)// Bottom: New Ronin Flix (2020) 
Top: Old Anchor Bay (2011)// Bottom: New Ronin Flix (2020) 
Top: Old Anchor Bay (2011)// Bottom: New Ronin Flix (2020) 
Top: Old Anchor Bay (2011)// Bottom: New Ronin Flix (2020) 
Top: Old Anchor Bay (2011)// Bottom: New Ronin Flix (2020) 
Top: Old Anchor Bay (2011)// Bottom: New Ronin Flix (2020) 
Top: Old Anchor Bay (2011)// Bottom: New Ronin Flix (2020) 
Top: Old Anchor Bay (2011)// Bottom: New Ronin Flix (2020) 
Top: Old Anchor Bay (2011)// Bottom: New Ronin Flix (2020) 
Top: Old Anchor Bay (2011)// Bottom: New Ronin Flix (2020) 
Top: Old Anchor Bay (2011)// Bottom: New Ronin Flix (2020) Except where noted, all 16:9 screen images in this review are direct captures from the disc(s) in question with no editing applied, but may have compression or resizing inherent to file formats and Medium’s image system.
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Two Cents Tries to Survive a Bad Destiny with TERMINATOR: DARK FATE
Two Cents is an original column akin to a book club for films. The Cinapse team thoughts on each film using a maximum of 200 words each. Guest writers and fan comments are encouraged, as are suggestions for future entries to the column. Join us as we share our two cents on films we love, films we are curious about, and films we believe merit some discussion.
The Pick:
An unstoppable destructive force that continues to return no matter how many seemingly fatal attacks it weathers describes not only the Terminator, but the Terminator franchise itself. No matter how many times you blow up the car it’s in, the robot-skeleton is going to keep lunging out of the fire.
There have been four separate cinematic attempts (plus a short-lived but cultishly adored TV show) to continue the Terminator saga after 1991’s T2: Judgment Day invented the modern blockbuster and seemingly concluded the story John Connor, the future savior of humanity from the robot uprising, and his mom Sarah in such a way that there could be no more sequels.
Well they made ’em anyway. First up was T3: Rise of the Machines, a fairly standard attempt to keep things going past the original point of no return. That movie did OK but audiences weren’t super-responsive so a few years after that, with Arnie occupied as governor of California, producers took an entirely different approach with Terminator: Salvation, a sort of prequel/sequel combo that followed John Connor (now played by Christian ‘having a fit about lights’ Bale) into the future war while laying the groundwork for the first film’s time travel shenanigans.
Salvation was a disappointment, though, so plans for more installments with that cast got junked and a few years after that we got Terminator: Genisys a sort of…simultaneous remake/sequel/prequel/reboot? Call it a franchise filmmaking turducken. Genisys revisited the events of the first Terminator, only this time the aforementioned time travel shenanigans have resulted in a completely different result.
Genisys bombed spectacularly and was widely hated by audiences and critics, leading to the immediate abandonment of planned future installments. So after a whopping four years off, the Terminator franchise returned with Terminator: Dark Fate, which pulled the classic “ignore every movie we made since the last one we know everybody liked” move and sets itself up as the true direct sequel to T2.
With a story by James Cameron (returning to his franchise for the first time since T2), Dark Fate follows a cybernetically enhanced soldier from the future Grace (Mackenzie Davis) as she tries to protect Dani (Natalia Reyes), a young woman destined to play a major role in humanity’s eventual war with a machine uprising, against an unstoppable Terminator (Diego Boneta).
It’s a new war, but pretty soon old soldiers like Sarah Connor (Linda Hamilton, also returning for the first time since T2) and eventually an original T-800 (Arnie), all swept up in the battle to preserve the present so the future might be saved.
Directed by Tim Deadpool Miller, Dark Fate received a surprisingly warm reception among critics, but audiences, perhaps burned on too many attempts to jump-start the old machine, did not show up.
Instead of a new start to the series, Dark Fate now stands as possibly the most definitive ending the Terminator franchise has had since Sarah Connor drove off into the oncoming storm. As endings go, is this a fitting resting place or a fate worse than facing Judgment Day?
Next Week’s Pick:
Not to be confused with Wes Craven/Eddie Murphy joint Vampire in Brooklyn, the Netflix exclusive Vampires vs The Bronx arrived just a bit too late to make our Halloween “Trick or Treat” scheduling but we wanted to feature it. So now we are. Join us!
Would you like to be a guest in next week’s Two Cents column? Simply watch and send your under-200-word review to twocents(at)cinapse.co anytime before midnight on Thursday!
Our Guests
Dark Fate is the best cinematic Terminator sequel after T2. It has a coherent story, a consistent tone, and some good action sequences. Much like its predecessors, however, it is torn between adhering to narrative formulae and committing to a new direction. This schism is best embodied by what it does to its returning cast.
Where T2 boldly reinvented Sarah by making her the new Kyle Reese, DF seems afraid of pushing her into unfamiliar territory and so angering those fans and critics, for whom any deviation from her now-iconic T2 persona is an act of blasphemy. It opens with the “shock death” of John Connor, yet it’s not so much a game-changing turn as a convenient excuse for Sarah to permanently revert to her “crazy, intense, badass” ways. (It also doubles as a tacit admission that like the three sequels before it, DF has no idea, as to what to do with John as a character.)
By contrast, the movie finds new venues to explore with the aged T-800. Carl is a cyborg that can be bargained and reasoned with, that feels pity and remorse, that has even found love. This material is risky and could’ve easily fallen apart. But the film treats it sincerely and Schwarzenegger helps sell it by turning in what may be one of his best performances. One wishes DF took a similar risk when it comes to the franchise’s ostensible main character. As a send-off to Sarah Connor, it falls short. (@mls532)
Brendan Agnew (The Norman Nerd):
When this movie was announced, I rolled my eyes, certain it would suck. At a certain point, you eventually learn that the stove is gonna burn you.
But then they went and made the first good Terminator movie since 1991, and I don’t know where that leaves my stove metaphor, because this movie slaps (the, uh, stove doesn’t hurt if you slap hard and fast enough — NAILED IT). Keeping Linda Hamilton’s Sarah Connor as the spine of the series rather than finding increasingly boring Johns was, in hindsight, always the right call. I cannot overstate how great Hamilton is at stepping back into the combat boots, and Schwarzenegger delivers arguably his best acting in his defining role I’m this film. However, what makes Dark Fate work as a whole is that it continues the trend of gradually building the heroic ensemble (from a two-hander in The Terminator to a trio in T2) with the addition of Natalie Reyes’ Dani and Mackenzie Davis’ Grace. Davis in particular absolutely *rocks* the super-soldier from the future routine, Reyes takes what could have been a thankless retread in a lesser version of this movie and uses it to demonstrate her range, and the chemistry the group has once everyone’s, uh, assembled by the midpoint of the film is a unique mix of delightful and desperate.
I don’t use “assembled” accidentally, because Deadpool director Tim Miller is clearly borrowing from the dominant blockbuster genre just as Cameron did when he injected his original sci-fi horror concept with late-’80s stunt-heavy action for T2. Miller keeps clashes between familiar parts fresh (Davis + improvised weapons = YES), but also leaves the skin-of-your-teeth danger of T1 and T2 intact — in no small part thanks to some delightfully eerie work by Gabriel Luna as the metal menace in pursuit. It’s also About Stuff in a way Terminator movies haven’t been without Cameron (who worked on the story). This series has never been subtle, but Luna donning a particular uniform for an Act 2 escape sequence in a specific setting is the kind of big swing I can’t help but respect.
The task of spinning so many plates in a relatively trim 2 hours leads to some fraying at the edges, and there’s a few concepts that play solidly but I’d have loved to see fleshed out, but the best thing about Dark Fate is that it plays every card in its hand. It tells a complete story and then rides off into the sunset — no “the sequel is where the GOOD STUFF is!” bullshit here. Just — FINALLY — a third good Terminator movie.
And now they can stop making them. For real this time. (@BLCAgnew)
The Team
By a wiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiide margin, this is far and away the best of the post-T2 sequels, but that mostly just goes a long way towards proving that Terminator as a franchise was completely tapped out of potential by the end of T2. The original Terminator is a perfect, stripped down chase movie and T2 blew that basic set-up into a blockbuster spectacular while having fun reversing various character dynamics and pulling the rug out from what audiences expected.
Dark Fate tries a similar game, but amounts to little more than a retread of T2 with shinier graphics. There are attempts to update the various Terminator touchstones to better reflect 21st century fears and politics but then doesn’t really know what to do with notions like the savior of humanity being an illegal immigrant besides plug them into the same cat-and-mouse game that Cameron has been staging for forty years. Miller does a fine job with his set-pieces, but there’s nothing especially impressive or memorable about anything he stages in this film, even as the cast (especially the riveting Davis) are throwing themselves into things with abandon.
And while it’s fun to have Hamilton back more grizzled than ever, her presence sinks the movie in the same way that Harrison Ford showing up as Han Solo sort of sank Force Awakens. Suddenly the vibrant and exciting new characters can’t help but feel like ancillary faces to the icon’s well-deserved victory lap (especially since, again, Dark Fate doesn’t really have anything for Hamilton to do after she’s back in play besides replay the hits from T2).
If Dark Fate was the first Terminator movie since 1991, it’d be easier to shrug off its familiarity and just enjoy a return trip. But Terminator has been so over-mined and so totally exhausted that it’s hard to do anything but shrug at another trip down memory lane, no matter how well-done a trip it is. (@TheTrueBrendanF)
I’m that oddball that likes all the Terminator films in varying degrees. While the sequels failed to hold up to Cameron’s originals (T2 being one of my favorite films of all time), I certainly don’t hate any of them.
Still, Dark Fate certainly manages to be the most satisfying followup since T2, although I dislike the lazy and messy franchise practice of latter sequels scrapping the earlier ones they don’t like to fit a new narrative. (In the case of Terminator movies, it’s not as egregious of a rift since we can simply accept them all as alternate timelines).
Bringing back Linda Hamilton as Sarah Connor is a great fan service and reframing both the future’s looming threat the next great hope for humanity was certainly a bold choice for the film, but it’s unquestionably Schwarzenegger’s character that stands out most as my favorite character and with the most delightfully weird (even by Terminator standards) and redemptive arc. Like T2, Dark Fate has something that’s been from the franchise lately — heart. (@VforVashaw)
Next week’s pick:
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GHOST DOG: THE WAY OF THE SAMURAI: A Melange Masterpiece [Criterion Review]
A 1999 time capsule unlike any other
The Way of the Samurai is found in death. Meditation on inevitable death should be performed daily. Every day one’s body and mind are at peace, one should meditate upon being ripped apart by arrows, rifles, spears, and swords, being carried away by surging waves, being thrown into the midst of a great fire, being struck by lightning, being shaken to death by a great earthquake, falling from thousand foot cliffs, dying of disease, or committing seppuku at the death of one’s master. And every day without fail one should consider himself as dead. This is the substance of the Way of the Samurai. — Yamamoto Tsunetomo, Hagakure: The Book of the Samurai
Perhaps one of American cinema’s great raconteurs and renaissance men, Jim Jarmusch frequently mixes and matches disparate influences to create his distinctive cinema. Similarly, one of America’s most important and influential hip hop artists, RZA, draws inspiration from virtually everything he and his peers encountered growing up in New York City (though most importantly, his Wu-Tang Clan drew from martial arts cinema). So when Jarmusch and RZA teamed up to collaborate, along with star Forest Whitaker, a truly unique melange masterpiece was birthed.
It’s somewhat difficult to pinpoint which element or elements of 1999’s Ghost Dog: The Way Of The Samurai tip the scale and place the film into that elusive category of “masterpiece”. This is perhaps to be expected from a film which itself plays with so many varying genres and influences as to be quite hard to pin down. On its most basic level, Ghost Dog is the story of Forest Whitaker’s titular character, an assassin working on assignment for a somewhat ramshackle Italian organized crime crew in a similarly ramshackle (but unnamed) corner of perhaps New York City. Ghost Dog is an enigma to virtually every other character in the film. Indeed, he’s mysterious to even us audience members. But above all Ghost Dog is an adherent to a particular code. He’s an ardent student of the Hagakure, an ancient samurai text. A gentle giant, a professional assassin, an avid reader, a hip hop connoisseur, a friend to little girls and ice cream men, a loyal “retainer” to the mid-tier gangster who once saved his life and now feeds him hits (John Tormey as Louie): Ghost Dog contains multitudes. But it’s that code around which he builds his life which is of primary importance, it seems, to both Ghost Dog and to Jarmusch.
Via its own labyrinthine codes of conduct, our endearing and somewhat inept gaggle of gangsters hire Ghost Dog for a job (Louie communicates with Ghost Dog exclusively through carrier pigeon) to kill a made man. When Ghost Dog executes this mission, somewhat flawlessly on his part (although a witness who happens to be one of the head gangsters’ daughters is mistakenly present at the scene of the crime and, bizarrely, passes along a copy of Rashomon to him), the gang still sets out to execute Ghost Dog. Perhaps it’s because the witness can pin the execution on the gang itself, or perhaps it’s a confusing justification for their own actions as the victim was one of their own “made” men, so Ghost Dog has to die for killing their guy… even though they hired him. But ultimately it seems what Jarmusch is interested in exploring is the conflict that arises from varying codes clashing together and adherents following those disparate codes to their ultimate conclusions.
Unlike any other gangster or hip hop film, Jarmusch seems to be acting as DJ for the audience, picking and choosing the most unique hooks or breakbeats, character traits and stylistic flourishes, to keep the audience constantly guessing and looking forward to what’s next. But that analogy almost indicates a frenetic or climactic atmosphere, when in fact there’s a resolutely quiet soul to Ghost Dog. Yes, there’s an Italian gangster who spits Flava Flav lyrics, and yes Ghost Dog holsters his gun with a flick of the wrist akin to a samurai holstering his blade, and yes there’s a hilarious relationship between Ghost Dog and Isaach de Bankolé’s Raymond the Ice Cream Man where they don’t speak a single word of the others’ language but they communicate freely nonetheless. There are loud parts, in other words. Some “in your face” ideas that Jarmusch mixes in with the film’s many subtler aspects such as the small ways in which a young Black girl (Camille Winbush as Pearline) is an echo or heir apparent to Ghost Dog, or the seemingly non sequitur sequence in which Ghost Dog and Raymond observe a man methodically building a boat on an urban rooftop which will never see the ocean. The entire project, disparate as it may be, is held in an almost transcendent union by RZA’s absolutely singular musical score. A work of near perfection, Jarmusch apparently pushed RZA to create something entirely, uniquely his own, and this glimpse into the creative prowess of RZA’s 1999 brain is inspired.
Peppered throughout the film are dozens of Hagakure quotes, narrated by Ghost Dog and placed on screen with text. We’re meditating on the way of the samurai along with our character. The various readings don’t always seem to directly apply to the scenes they precede or follow, though certainly some do. And in the end it does seem that this exploration of the multi-dimensional Ghost Dog wants most to meditate on how far people are willing to adhere to the codes they espouse. While Ghost Dog follows an ancient code unlike that of anyone around him, he finds peace and a path through life. Alas, the way of the samurai is a path of death. And Ghost Dog will dispatch violently those gangsters who attack him. Yet he’ll also submit to the will of his master, even if his flummoxed and unworthy master has no idea he wields this kind of power over Ghost Dog. I could be misreading things, but I sense that Jarmusch paints Ghost Dog as a noble character precisely because he’s principled, and is willing to follow his code even unto its final consequence.
When a white-haired and white-skinned American filmmaker shined an enormous spotlight on hip hop culture in 1999, then mixed and matched that with Eastern philosophy and the Italian mafia, something uniquely special was born. Jarmusch and RZA have continued to have creative encounters through the years since, and Whitaker, Jarmusch, and RZA have all continued to contribute mightily to the arts as the decades have passed. This flashpoint in time that was Ghost Dog has retained all of the cool, the quirk, the profundity it captured in a bottle in 1999 and has perhaps even grown in my estimation in the decades since. One gets the sense that never before Ghost Dog could this film have been possible, and, never since.
The Package
The Criterion Collection is important. And while I’ve been a fan for decades, never before has the value of curation been more apparent to me than now, in the age of streaming, when content is released at such a breakneck pace it can be almost impossible to sift through the noise. With their selections of titles and reverent treatment of those films which become part of their catalogue, Criterion is doing the Lord’s work in a way that’s perhaps even more important now than ever before. This release is no different, with hours of bonus content and thoughtful essays which make you feel great about paying for a superior product.
Eschewing a traditional commentary track, Jarmusch none the less hosts an audio Q&A in which has answers dozens of curated fan questions and regales the audience with insights and opinions which are quite fascinating. Jarmusch riffs on what kinds of music he’s listening to today, contemporary thoughts about 2020 happenings, and of course, reflections on Ghost Dog. Perhaps most fascinating about this feature length audio track is that Jarmusch himself hasn’t seen Ghost Dog in over 20 years and is simply going off of memory in his anecdotes. Beyond that track the disc is packed with great and unique interviews, insightful essays, and even a pamphlet collection of the various Hagakure quotes collected from the film.
This is the kind of release that gives you new perspective and insight into a masterful film, which makes it an easy recommendation.
And I’m Out.
Ghost Dog: The Way Of The Samurai is now available on Blu-ray from The Criterion Collection
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THE DONUT KING Shows One Man’s Delicious Search for “The American Dream”
Alice Gu’s winning documentary is now available on DVD
Alice Gu’s The Donut King was the film I most looked forward to seeing at SXSW 2020. Sure, there were other, bigger titles set to premiere at the festival, but this unique documentary about a Cambodian immigrant who helped start a boom of independent donut stores in Southern California sounded like something I had to see. Missing out on that possible festival premiere was only one of the many negatives of this pandemic year, but thanks to Kino Lorber, The Donut King is being released on DVD this week.
“Uncle Ted,” as he is called by the many other Cambodian refugees he would help set up donut shops, is called the “Donut King” because of that and his overall impact on the industry in southern California. Gu’s lively documentary moves at a compelling pace; through use of a non-linear timeline, we learn how Ted Ngoy came to America after the Khmer Rouge overtook the Cambodian military, how his family made do in very basic shelter at Camp Pendleton and eventually came to buy a million-dollar mansion a decade or so later, and the many innovations Ngoy and other Cambodian refugees brought to the business of making donuts in America.
Gu shows Ngoy from all angles: the man who would sponsor 100+ Cambodian families fleeing to America is also a Reagan/GOP donor who would come to lose his empire (of sorts) after some shady doings. Through illustration, family photos, and commentary from Ngoy, family members, and former business connections, his moving and incredible story is told. The film is infused with whimsy and unexpected depth.
While viewing the new DVD — a fairly basic package with only a trailer as a bonus feature — I was struck by how Ngoy’s life would make a fascinating biopic. But I doubt any adaptation would capture the same rhythm and drive found in Gu’s documentary, or include the layers of storytelling involved here. In The Donut King, Alice Gu has made one of the best documentaries of the year.
The Donut King is now available on DVD from Kino Lorber.
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PENINSULA, Or: How I Learned To Stop Worrying & Embrace Zombie Action
Train To Busan Presents: Tons Of Fun
I kept waiting for the moment when I was going to sour on Peninsula. The audience and critical reception had been so mixed-to-poor, after all. Its predecessor Train To Busan was so widely loved. Expectations in check, I fired up Peninsula with somewhat of a wince on my face. That wince gave way to smiles, and the turn simply never came. I had a damn fine time “at the movies” with Peninsula.
With my own reception being strongly positive (and, if I’m being totally honest, my reception of Train To Busan itself being that it’s solid and emotional but not revelatory), it begs the question: What did I see in this film that didn’t seem to resonate with so many others?
To answer that I’ll need to unpack the zombie genre from which this series of films hails just a bit. Undoubtedly birthed by the brilliant George A. Romero with his seminal “… Of The Dead” series, the last decade of entertainment has been saturated by the undead thanks in large part to Robert Kirkman’s breakout comics and television series The Walking Dead. Zombies have long been mainstream now. A genre unto themselves. A creature that, yes, in some forms existed prior to Romero’s iteration, but has become entirely defined by Romero’s vision. Today it’s a common refrain among film fans that zombies are over. Once they reached prime time TV, they became passé. And there’s simply too. many. zombie. properties. I frequently subscribe to this same line of thought myself. I couldn’t keep up with The Walking Dead after a couple of seasons. I’m not interested in a whole lot of the zombie experiments that have come along, from zombie romances to Disney zombies to zombie sharks or what have you.
And yet. Beyond all reason and logic, filmmakers keep coming up with new zombie riffs that resonate with audiences, entertain, break through the noise, or find a new cultural critique to explore through the walking metaphors who used to be us. Train To Busan itself seemed to really break through the crowd with a one-two punch of being a Korean take that’s executed with fast-zombie energy, and most importantly filled with heart as a distant father finds redemption and learns how to be a real parent whilst protecting his daughter from the zombie outbreak. Following an entirely new set of characters and set 4 years into the zombie outbreak depicted in Train To Busan, Peninsula isn’t a sequel so much as a new story set in that same universe. Writer/Director Sang-ho Yeon is actually completing somewhat of a zombie trilogy here with Seoul Station (animated), Train To Busan, and now Peninsula.
And so we come back around to why this film seemed to resonate with me so: And that’s that Peninsula may be a zombie film, but it’s also a straight up pulse-pounding action film… as many zombie titles are. And as a tried-and-true action cinema fanatic, it’s no wonder that this corner of the zombie genre appeals to me greatly. And here’s the thing: It’s a pretty badass action movie.
A full-on “men on a mission” movie, we follow Jung Seok (Dong-Wan Gang) at first through the tragedy of the zombie outbreak happening in the Train To Busan timeline. This prologue sets up Seok as a military officer who experiences tragedy as he loses some of his immediate family to the outbreak while onboard a ship. His ship ultimately lands him in Hong Kong, one of the last ships to escape “the peninsula”. Four years later the zombie outbreak seems to have been contained to the peninsula, and Jung Seok is an outcast in a city that doesn’t want him and sees him as a potential threat. Pirates arise to work on pilfering the wealth that remains in the zombie-ridden peninsula, and soon Jung Seok finds himself headed into the infected zone to find a truck stuffed to the gills with American currency. His team of outcasts just have to get in and out quickly and they’ll split the rewards with the shady pirate who’s recruited them. We all know it’s going to go sideways, but it’s HOW it plays out that makes all the difference.
Sang-ho Yeon seems to be having a blast with this movie. Writing in an Escape From New York inspired post-apocalyptic Korea, we meet all kinds of survivors, degenerate warlords, scavengers, and absolute hordes of top-speed undead. And with inspirations like John Carpenter or George Miller’s Mad Max series, you’re absolutely speaking my language. Jung Seok is quickly swept up with a family of survivors and begins to emotionally connect with them as they plan their escape from the infected zone. A couple of scene-stealing young sisters have survived thus far by perfecting the art of drifting their armored SUV into the zombie hordes and if that plot development doesn’t sound like fun to you, then I can see how Peninsula might not connect… because there’s a whole lot of mowing down hordes whilst drifting going on here.
With frequently poor-looking and weightless CGI and an emotional core that’s not quite as primally resonant as that of Train To Busan, I guess I can understand how people came away from Peninsula disappointed. I, on the other hand, felt entirely dialed in to the breakneck action/adventure vibe Yeon was able to achieve with this film and it hit the spot in a most satisfactory way. And while the emotions might not run as high, there’s still plenty of character moments and a forged family redemption narrative that feels effective and vital to invest the audience in the spectacle of it all.
I don’t mind some weightless CGI if I’m being taken on a wild ride by a confident filmmaker and simultaneously connecting with the cast of characters I’m meeting. And the Fast & Furious series has trained me to stop worrying and enjoy enormous vehicle chase scenes devoid of even a modicum of physics. Yeon is clearly aping Fury Road with a massive chase sequence that has to be seen to be believed here in Peninsula, and while it doesn’t match anything found in that masterpiece (what does?), one can’t help but be entertained by Korea’s action-packed take on George Romero’s undying creations.
And I’m Out.
Train To Busan Presents: Peninsula is available on Digital now and 4K Ultra/Blu-ray/DVD on November 24th from Well Go USA.
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4 Reasons Why BILL & TED FACE THE MUSIC is Most Excellent
A non-heinous third installment hits home video
I had a journey of anticipation with Bill & Ted Face The Music unlike anything I’ve ever had before. A lifelong fan of both Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure AND Bill & Ted’s Bogus Journey (I think it’s the best of the series), I’d always been interested in seeing a third film come to fruition. As decades ticked by it seemed increasingly unlikely to happen, but rumors across the internet were that the script for Face The Music was something special, and as the career trajectories of stars Keanu Reeves and Alex Winter varied and planets seemed to align… one began daring to hope that not only would a third Bill & Ted adventure happen, but that it might even be great. After all, writers Chris Matheson and Ed Solomon birthed these characters and wrote them through both previous adventures, so if anyone could stick the landing with a trilogy capper decades later, it’d be these gentlemen. As news hit that Bill & Ted 3 was greenlit, I was giddy. My anticipation was through the roof. Then I grew a serious pair of cold feet. I think it must have been COVID blues, but even though I enjoyed the trailer for the film, I began to dread seeing the movie. What if it was terrible? What if, after all these years of waiting, the final product was an embarrassment? What if the magic was gone? What if the journey was, indeed, bogus?
I needn’t have worried.
A trilogy capper truly decades in the making, Bill & Ted Face The Music may not have the same feel of the first two films in the sense that it comes from an entirely different era of filmmaking (a WHOLE lot of green screen going on), but it fits like a glove with the previous adventures and in doing so creates perhaps one of the most consistent and delightful trilogies brought to life by the same core creative team that’s ever graced the silver screen.
As the film has long been available and is just now making its home physical media debut, I’m going to review the film without holding back on spoilers, so be warned as I list out 4 key elements that make Face The Music a righteous series ender.
1: It’s Hilarious
My trepidation melted away within mere moments as I found myself laughing uproariously in the opening wedding scene in which infamous series side character Missy is marrying Ted’s younger brother Deacon (after having divorced Ted’s father) and never stopped throughout. I’ve often found reviewing comedies to be a particular challenge because there’s a simple binary to it. Did I laugh? A lot? Yes? Okay, then it’s a good comedy.
But the comedy of the Bill & Ted films has a few key ingredients that are important to highlight.
For one thing, Face The Music proves the miracle of casting and chemistry. Keanu Reeves and Alex Winter, together, playing the characters of Ted “Theodore” Logan and Bill S. Preston, Esq., respectively, are the very definition of movie magic. As much as we all (rightly) love Keanu Reeves, he isn’t primarily known as a comedic genius. And as much as we all respect the remarkable documentary work of actor-turned-filmmaker Alex Winter, he hasn’t been quite the A-list leading man star that Keanu has become. And yet, when you put these two together on screen, their various strengths and weaknesses, the baggage of their different careers outside of these films… it all melts away and the magic of a perfectly executed “schtick” takes over. And that schtick works effortlessly, never feeling rusty or forced even when emanating from the bodies of now 50+ year old actors playing characters who were almost certainly only ever envisioned as affable teens at the start.
Aside from the effortless delivery from our leads, the comedy bits also flow naturally from the pens of Chris Matheson and Ed Solomon. Mixing elements of time travel and heaven and hell shenanigans from the first two films with a new hook that’s just as ridiculous as any of the previous movies’ plots, Face The Music manages to simply write a series of gags and character moments and plot points that are absolutely hysterical as much as they are often head-scratchingly weird (just like Station!).
Honestly the funniest gag that had me rolling with laughter and also genuinely brought the story into the 21st century and ushered these characters into adulthood was the therapy scene in which both Bill and Ted end up in couples therapy because their wives are concerned that Bill and Ted are a little too… inseparable, and that their marriages may be suffering as a result. Bill and Ted are entirely incapable of understanding why this therapy session wouldn’t happen with ALL FOUR of them sitting on the same couch, and can’t see the weirdness of saying “we love you” to their wives instead of “I love you”. The execution of this sequence is absolutely hilarious, with Jillian Bell as the flummoxed therapist really knocking it out of the park. It’s comedy gold, richly establishes the present state of our characters, and reinforces the childlike goodness of Bill and Ted while also highlighting how their uniqueness might have some real world consequences not explored in the previous films.
2: It’s Smart
It’s not easy being this dumb. Bill and Ted are famous cinematic dunces, known for their jovial camaraderie with one another and their baffling foolishness to seemingly every adult around them. Having grown up with such famous cinematic idiots as these two, Beavis and Butthead, and Lloyd Christmas and Harry Dunne from Dumb And Dumber, I relished idiodic characters in my youth. But younger me didn’t realize the razor’s edge writers, creators, and stars walk on when bringing morons to life.
Key to the success of the Bill & Ted movies is that our heroes are twice as good natured as they are dumb. Those who see through or past their dim-wittedness, such as their princess-wives and their doting daughters, are rewarded by doing life together with genuinely nice guys who navigate tricky situations with a profound level of morality and loyalty that, despite their troubling inseparability, seems to come from their own friendship with one another.
There’s simply no getting around the fact that it takes smarts to make dumb so enjoyable. Matheson and Solomon once again prove their franchise MVP status in finding endless ways to make stupid both endearing and compelling to watch.
Their plotting goes a long way in this regard. From a “time travelling through history” hook to an “afterlife adventure” angle right up to this “encountering differing iterations of ourselves throughout time” angle, Matheson and Solomon are routinely creating madcap adventures for our idiot characters that are themselves interesting or at least offer something to think about. In Face The Music our heroes find themselves professionally floundering, their lives not having lived up to the prophecies their beloved Rufus (George Carlin) had told them about. Their band Wyld Stallyns haven’t saved the world, and they’re on the verge of a band breakup. But when Rufus’s daughter Kelly shows up (Kristen Schaal in a great casting choice which avoids any comparisons to the iconic Carlin) and whisks them back to the future to let them know that they have only HOURS to write the song that will save the world from imploding, the guys decide the only way to guarantee they’re able to succeed in writing the song is to go into the future to steal it from THEMSELVES! Queue a series of existential encounters between Bills & Teds of different eras, with absurd, hilarious results that also… kinda make you think.
Perhaps the greatest example of this dynamic between the intelligent and the idiotic in the series as a whole would be the presence of William Sadler’s Death. Portrayed as the Grim Reaper with visual queues from Bergman’s The Seventh Seal, Sadler’s Death is hilariously outsmarted by Bill and Ted in a series of games played for the fate of their souls which devolve into such trials as Twister and Battleship. Then, here in Face The Music these former Wyld Stallyns bandmates must bury the hatchet after Death tried to steal the band’s IP. It’s just absurd stuff, but also comically genius, and oddly compelling character work.
3: It’s Timely
These are dark times. No matter who you are or where you are, there’s a pandemic sweeping the planet and global politics are incredibly volatile. We’ve never been more connected, and yet it’s never been so easy for hate to proliferate. And while Bill & Ted Face The Music has been percolating as a concept for decades… through another fate of movie magic, this gem of optimism has come to us at precisely the time when we needed it most. To be honest, had I seen Face The Music even as recently as 2019, I’m not sure it would have landed with as much resonance for me as it did watching it home alone amidst a series of global and personal crises. I needed the persistent, buoyant optimism of Bill & Ted Face The Music. I needed to see good people with genuine issues and baggage of their own face the future, invest in their families, and save the day.
4: It’s the Future
About Bill and Ted’s families. I’ve already alluded to the hilarious couples therapy that sends “the princesses” on a time travelling journey of their own to encounter the same hilarious iterations of future Bill and Teds that our heroes keep encountering. But it’s the daughters, Thea (Samara Weaving) and Billie (Brigette Lundy-Paine) who provide the ultimate lynchpin of Face The Music. Having grown up as the daughters of the Wyld Stallyns, these two are mirror images of their fathers, innately good, joined at the hip as best friends, and yet… they’ve ditched the dumb and instead are full on musical prodigies with a vast well of musical knowledge to pull from. The climax of the film involves Bill and Ted realizing that saving the world really isn’t about THEM. They aren’t the saviors. They must let go of the promise they’ve lived their whole life believing: that their dumb asses would somehow save the world. They must give up their privileged/chosen status to pass it along to the next generation. A younger, smarter, more female generation. It isn’t Wyld Stallyns who unite the planet in song, it’s Preston/Logan. And of course, who would these young women be without the loving parents who raised them, treated them with dignity, and encouraged their musical giftedness. At the very moment when all hope was lost and reality was collapsing in on itself, two lovable idiots who’d spent a lifetime doing the work of worshipping their wives and doting on their daughters recognize that the future is female, and gladly pass on the mantle without regard to their egos or status.
But Thea and Billie themselves exhibit pluck and agency throughout the film as well. On their own time travelling journey, they borrow Kelly’s “future pod” thing and assemble the greatest band imaginable from all eras of history. When their time comes and all of history is about to collapse in a weird space-time phenomenon… and when their dads come to the realization that this isn’t about them… Billie and Thea are ready. They’ve been doing the work their whole lives. The song that saves the world flows out of them effortlessly because, unlike their dads who constantly look for the easy way to time-travel their way out of a problem, Billie and Thea have prepared for the moment. This all results in a righteous love letter to music as luminaries like Jimi Hendrix, Louis Armstrong, Mozart, and the Wyld Stallyns (complete with Death on bass) follow Preston/Logan’s lead and save the world through song. God gave rock & roll to you, indeed.
And I’m Out.
Bill & Ted Face The Music is now available on Digital, Blu-ray, & DVD from Orion Pictures and Warner Brothers Home Entertainment
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PLAY MISTY FOR ME Screen Comparisons — New KL Blu-ray vs Universal’s 2015 Release
Play Misty For Me Special Edition Blu-ray was released November 10 from Kino Lorber Studio Classics.
Play Misty For Me comes to Kino Lorber Studio Classics Blu-ray as part of their big push of Client Eastwood classics. While most of these films have had prior releases, they tended to be unimpressive — low on features or simply older or unimpressive transfers. KL’s new releases are upgraded with additional features, handsome packaging, and in many cases new masters.
Universal brought Play Misty for Me to Blu-ray in 2015. That edition included a couple of featurettes and some image galleries, but had a rather poor transfer of the film with garish edge enhancement and chonky digital noise. Kino’s new edition seeks to improve on both with a new 2K scan as well as additional bonus features.
At a glance, the new restoration seems softer, and it is, but the reason is superficial. Universal’s older transfer apparently employed artificial sharpening, you can see throughout that the video has telltale artifacts and chunkiness.
Aside from the softness, KL’s new restoration has the upper hand. A clearer image, much more robust colors, and a slightly wider cropping which captures more of the frame at the edges.
Right off the bat I did notice that the opening titles had slightly different placement and opacity, which leads me to believe the older transfer had digitally recreated titles while the new transfer scanned the original ones (speculation on my part).
Top: Old Universal // Bottom: New KL Studio Classics 
Top: Old Universal // Bottom: New KL Studio Classics Here’s one of the more apparent contrasts of noise. Observe the white “Cinzano” lettering which is smooth, albeit blurry, on the new transfer but noise-riddled (and artificially sharper) on the old one.
Top: Old Universal // Bottom: New KL Studio Classics Of all the screen captures I took, this one seemed the most demonstrative of digital noise. Even though the older transfer “feels” sharper that the new one, it exhibits an unnatural, cakey texture dude to artificial sharpening.
Viewing Clint’s head on this next comparison, you can really see the difference in additional screen area captured by Kino’s tranfer.
Top: Old Universal // Bottom: New KL Studio Classics Deeper color saturation helps the new transfer pop to life.
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Top: Old Universal // Bottom: New KL Studio Classics Additional screenshots rounding out the look of the transfers:
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Top: Old Universal // Bottom: New KL Studio Classics 
Top: Old Universal // Bottom: New KL Studio Classics 
Top: Old Universal // Bottom: New KL Studio Classics
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Except where noted, all 16:9 screen images in this review are direct captures from the disc(s) in question with no editing applied, but may have compression or resizing inherent to file formats and Medium’s image system. All package photography was taken by the reviewer.
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Unboxing the Ronin Flix’s Impressive I SPIT ON YOUR GRAVE Blu-ray Box Set — Video
This week sees the release of Ronin Flix’s massive special edition box set of Meir Zarchi’s Rape/Revenge duology of 1978’s I Spit on Your Grave and 2019’s I Spit on Your Grave: Deja Vu. The two films are supplemented by a third film in the set, Meir son’s documentary on his father’s transgressive masterwork Growing Up With I Spit on Your Grave. The doc gives a fascinatingly rare look behind the scenes at one of the notorious films to ever play grindhouses and even digs into the personal life of the director from his son’s candid point of view.
Ronin Flix was kind enough to send along a copy of the film to review and this is an unboxing of that set, enjoy. You can order yours here.
New collector’s edition box set set includes new 4K scan and restoration of the original uncut feature film, deluxe custom slipcase with original and newly commissioned artwork by Adam Stothard, 2 collectible fold out mini-posters (16″x20″), 2 replica VHS box-style magnets (2″x3 1/2″), and a newly commissioned 44 page book featuring exclusive historical photos and liner notes by horror writers Michael Gingold and Meagan Navarro. Available while supplies last.
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THE BEGUILED: Kino Lorber Revives a Slice of 70’s Southern Gothic on Blu-ray
Don Siegel’s adaptation of Thomas Cullinan’s Civil War thriller finds new life in a 2K restoration
The Beguiled occupies a somewhat strange place in the filmographies of its collaborators, notably its director Don Siegel and male lead Clint Eastwood. Siegel is known more for his other action and sci-fi films — Invasion of the Body Snatchers in 1956, and his Beguiled follow-up Dirty Harry — and Eastwood at the time was fresh off his collaborations in Italy with Sergio Leone and other Westerns and War Epics throughout the 1960s. It’s certainly an odd choice for either director to suddenly play against type in a sexually-charged Civil War chamber piece, but through the strength of its ensemble of veteran actresses led by screen legend Geraldine Page, The Beguiled manages to toe a fine line between its masculine and feminine energies — it’s a film that rebels against both its period trappings and the social norms of The Beguiled’s present, depicting its Southern belles with agency and drive, even as they fall victim to and scheme against Eastwood’s despicable and eventually emasculated Yankee lothario.
The film follows the girls of the Seminary for Young Ladies in Civil War Mississippi, led by the firm yet kind Martha Farnsworth (Geraldine Page), whose lives as devoted Confederacy supporters are upended when young Amy discovers the wounded Corporal John McBurney (Clint Eastwood) on the outskirts of the property. Near death, Martha and fellow teacher Edwina (Elizabeth Hartman) decide it’s best to restore John’s health before delivering him to his future captors. During his convalescence, though, John quickly charms and seduces many of the women in the home, from Edwina, to younger students, to the school’s slave, Hallie (Mae Mercer), as a ploy to avoid future capture. His appeals to their better natures, though, are not-so-subtly undercut by his womanizing nature — all of which John must face the consequences of as the school falls into a brimming hysteria.
It’s an unabashedly pulpy premise, and as one would expect from a more action-oriented pairing like Siegel and Eastwood, the film does fall victim to a catty male gaze as romantic tensions flare over the always-luxuriating McBurney. What tempers this, though, is how much The Beguiled spends within the drifting psyches of its female leads — however brief, Siegel drops into semi-Malickian voiceovers from each of the women in the school, revealing how each one is uniquely disrupted by this sudden injection of a masculine world of carnage and mayhem that they’d until then were successful in keeping at bay outside the school gates. A standout sequence dives into a hallucinatory vision by Martha as she finds herself fantasizing about McBurney, glorifying her sympathetic actions with paintings of Mary and Jesus — even alongside picturing McBurney’s dalliances with her students, and Martha herself with a taboo tryst of her own. What also surprises in the film is just how deservedly emasculated Eastwood’s McBurney becomes over the course of the film. McBurney feels like a seedier exploration into the inner devils of his Man with No Name character, doing away with his stoic silence in favor of a chameleon-like charm that allows the women of the Seminary to read into his intentions whatever they’d like.
McBurney’s hubris, though, ultimately sets up his downfall — as he deliberately misjudges just how much agency and willingness to take action his caretakers possess. McBurney is cut down by those who care for him, and justifiably so — he taps not just into an inner romantic urge, but an inner rage shared by the women of the Seminary, one once kept at bay by Martha and Edwina’s lessons on how women should behave once peacetime is achieved. For a film released at the dawn of the 1970’s, The Beguiled feels far more visceral than its future Sofia Coppola adaptation — it does away with any subtlety when it comes to the vitriol of its characters, eager to shake up what viewers from the 1860’s and 1960’s alike may think these women are capable of. It’s a film that, more akin to something like Ken Russell’s The Devils or even Robert Eggers’ The Lighthouse, urges a condemnation of subtlety or chastity in favor of confronting and embracing the more debased anger and violence within.
As part of their continuing releases of films in Eastwood and Siegel’s catalogue, Kino Lorber Studio Classics has released The Beguiled on Blu-ray in a brand new 2K restoration by Universal–allowing modern audiences who may be more familiar with Coppola’s more recent, subdued version to familiarize themselves with another generation’s compelling take on this slice of Southern Gothic.
VIDEO
Kino Lorber presents The Beguiled in its original 1.85:1 1080p widescreen version, sourced from a new 2K restoration by Universal. While the print may show some flecks and aging in its opening, sepia-tinged frames, The Beguiled’s restoration is quite rich and vibrant with a healthy amount of 35mm film grain. Moments lit by candlelight amidst darkness are warm and natural, free from any blocky “crush” of blacks or smudging of the film’s color palate. Outdoors scenes are somewhat blurred in long-shots, but this may be more to period technological limitations rather than a substandard transfer.
AUDIO
Kino’s release of The Beguiled features a 2.0 Stereo DTS-HD Master Audio track, restored alongside the film’s negative for this release. English SDH subtitles are provided for the feature film only.
The soundscape here is quite diversely layered, with phantom cannon fire and voiceover creeping in amidst the distinct dialogue and diegetic sound elements. Of particular standout on this track is Lalo Schifrin’s hallucinatory score, which begins with more traditional, haunting instruments of flute and acoustic guitar before leaning into a frenzied cacophony with elements of rock.
SPECIAL FEATURES
- Audio Commentary with Kat Ellinger, editor-in-chief for Diabolique. Kat Ellinger delves into The Beguiled’s place in period cinema, the context of the rise of anti-Westerns and subversive war cinema through the 1970s, and Clint Eastwood’s role in both. Also discussed are much of the film’s sexual politics, as well as criticisms of Sofia Coppola’s approach to the same source material in her 2017 adaptation (such as the somewhat misguided decision to cut the character of Hallie from the later film).
- Interview with Melody Thomas Scott: The actress behind The Beguiled’s Abigail recounts her experiences with the film, from casting, to her relationships with the other child and adult actresses in the film, to witnessing the development of Clint Eastwood and Don Siegel’s working relationship, which would continue alongside Scott with Dirty Harry. Scott also includes a fun anecdote involving her, Eastwood, and a practical joke with a Civil War needle. Recorded in 2020 for Kino Lorber’s release.
- The Beguiled, Misty, Don, and Clint: An archival featurette from the Clint Eastwood Icon Collection that delves into the working relationship between The Beguiled’s lead and director.
- Trailers From Hell: John Landis provides spoiler-ridden, off-color commentary on the trailer for The Beguiled.
- Trailers for The Beguiled, Coogan’s Bluff, Two Mules for Sister Sara, The Duel at Silver Creek, The Gun Runners, Madigan, Charley Varrick, and The Black Windmill.
- Reversible Cover with alternative poster art.
The Beguiled will be released on Blu-ray and DVD on November 10th, 2020 courtesy of Kino Lorber Studio Classics.
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THE EIGER SANCTION Screen Comparisons — New KL Blu-ray vs Universal’s 2015 Release
The Eiger Sanction Special Edition Blu-ray arrives November 10 from Kino Lorber Studio Classics.
Kino Lorber’s Studio Classics is currently releasing a big wave of Clint Eastwood catalogue favorites. While most have had prior releases, they tended to be barebones affairs or simply older or unimpressive transfers originally intended for DVD. KL’s new releases are upgraded with additional features, handsome packaging, and in many cases new masters.
The Eiger Sanction was originally released onbarebones Blu-ray in 2015. KL’s new edition does indeed come with great new bonus features and a new 2K Master, but doesn’t manage to hit a home run — viewing the transfers side by side, I was surprised to find which one I liked better.
The new transfer fares best in subjective areas — changes to the color timing and contrast may be considered better or preferable. The ruddier skin tones present in the updated transfer are probably accurate. Color gradients also appear richer and more subtle.
It’s also “cleaner” in terms of digital noise, with more pleasing grain.
Top: Old Universal // Bottom: New KL Studio Classics 
Top: Old Universal // Bottom: New KL Studio Classics 
Top: Old Universal // Bottom: New KL Studio Classics 
Top: Old Universal // Bottom: New KL Studio Classics 
Top: Old Universal // Bottom: New KL Studio Classics 
Top: Old Universal // Bottom: New KL Studio Classics However in other areas the new transfer just doesn’t hold up as well, particularly in sharpness. The transfer looks decent enough in standard play, but a side by side comparison with the older version quickly proves unfavorable as it’s noticeably softer throughout, sometimes surprisingly so.
In part, it’s possible this may be due to artificial sharpening in the older transfer. It did notice some evidence of this in its digital noise (sticky and bubbly looking grain), which looks like edge enhancement was employed.
The crisper look of the older transfer is especially noticeable in the text of the opening titles.
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Top: Old Universal // Bottom: New KL Studio Classics 
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Top: Old Universal // Bottom: New KL Studio Classics Opinions may vary, but personally I’ve to come to the conclusion that the new 2K scan is a slight step down from the previous one.
Which is quite a shame because this is a superior release in every other way. Kino’s disc boasts a ton of new (and newly added) features including interview, commentary, and perhaps most interestingly a vintage promo reel, making it greatly preferable over the prior barebones release.
Additionally, it has superior shelf presence with a beautiful slipcover and reversible artwork, all of which looks better than the awful “pasted head” artwork in the older Blu-ray.
If you don’t own the movie and just want to grab the best , I do think this is the version to buy despite the lesser picture quality — but it’s much harder to recommend as an “upgrade” unless you want the cool new extras.
Top: Old Universal // Bottom: New KL Studio Classics 
Top: Old Universal // Bottom: New KL Studio Classics 
Top: Old Universal // Bottom: New KL Studio Classics 
Top: Old Universal // Bottom: New KL Studio Classics
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A/V Out.
Except where noted, all 16:9 screen images in this review are direct captures from the disc(s) in question with no editing applied, but may have compression or resizing inherent to file formats and Medium’s image system. All package photography was taken by the reviewer.
