Cult Films

(Blu Monday Wednesday is our roundup of what's new in Blu-ray...)

My Browncoat-loving heart was pretty tickled to watch Firefly on Blu-ray.  Joss Whedon's much-loved, much-lamented sci-fi/Western is one of my all-time fave TV shows, and it's a treat to have it in high definition.  The series wasn't shot in HD so it's not the best thing I've ever seen, but it is an improvement over upconverted DVDs, and the punchy sound (DTS HD 5.1 compared to the DVDs' 2.0 surround) is a definite upgrade.  In addition to the original bonus features, there are a couple new ones: a 25-minute conversation among Whedon, Nathan Fillion, Ron Glass, and Alan Tudyk in which they discuss the series and a number of specific episodes (Fillion recalls thinking he was getting fired after the first episode), and a new commentary track by the four fellows on "Our Mrs. Reynolds."  And since it's easy to get sucked into watching multiple episodes, it's nice to have a Play All feature on the BDs.  Also coming this year: the follow-up movie, Serenity, on Blu-ray.  I confess that I already have Serenity on HD DVD, DVD, and Collector's Edition DVD, and will no doubt be picking up the Blu-ray as well.  Hey, it's Firefly! --David

New Blu-ray pre-orders that have recently hit the catalog:

• King Kong
• Groundhog Day
• John Adams
• Miracle at St. Anna
• Pretty Woman
• Rent: Filmed Live on Broadway
• The Bourne Trilogy
• RocknRolla

Filmmakers Mark and Jay Duplass have written a celebrity blog for us to promote their new film, Baghead, which is now available for pre-order.  If you're a fan of mumblecore, check out our list of essentials in this emerging movement in American independent film. -- Brooke

Why the hell are we trying to make a horror film about a guy with a paper bag on his head?  This, even more than “to be or not to be” was the question for myself and my brother Jay going into shooting Baghead. We had just come off of our first micro-budget feature The Puffy Chair, a sensitive, funny, quirky relationship movie that wowed Sundance, sold big, played incredibly well in theaters, DVD, and TV, and gained us favor in the indie world the world over. So, again, why would we be so stupid as to make a horror movie based around a guy with a bag on his head?

I’m still not quite sure. When I look back, what we should have done is clear… we should have made another relationship movie to cash in on Puffy’s success. But, we were compelled to make Baghead, so we did it. And then something really interesting happened. We discovered that we are hopelessly and helplessly ourselves on set. For example, even if something terrifying was happening in the horror plot, we couldn’t help training the camera on all of the little personal dynamics happening among the 4 lead characters, just like we did on The Puffy Chair. No matter how eerie or cool-looking our lighting got, we were infinitely more obsessed with the chubby guy whose advances were being rejected by the hottie girl.

About a week into filming, we realized we had something VERY different on our hands. We had a horror movie shell… “guy with bag on head comes to get 4 people in a cabin in the woods.” We all know this set-up, right? Not too original. But, we were making a highly sensitive relationship dramedy inside of this horror film because, in the end, that’s what Jay and I know how to do best and that’s what we love showing.

So, basically, we started panicking. How do you make a movie work that’s scary, funny, and (ultimately) endearing and touching as we understand the nature of our desperate, sweet, tragically flawed lead characters? The answer was… I hope we don’t @&*# it up.

On week 2, we happened to catch a glimpse of the film Saw on TV, and it became clearer to us how Baghead could be a really interesting film for this time frame in cinema. Saw is great in its own right, but it’s mean, it’s gory, and it’s not really scary. Somehow, the crazy sound design, gore, and effects, took the film further and further away from being actually scary. Whereas, with Baghead, we somehow stumbled into something genuinely frightening, with our $50,000 budget, no sound f/x, no score, no make-up… just a ridiculous paper bag and the question of “who the hell is under that bag?” So, we started to feel smart. Confident. Inspired in new ways. We even waxed philosophical about how brilliant we were to “come up with his concept” (that we totally lucked into, btw)…

On week 3, we finished the shoot and all looked at each other a little shell shocked. What did we just do? Is this movie even gonna work? Cut to a year later. We’re opening the film at the Sundance Film Festival and every buyer is calling us, making insanely inflated offers, asking us how we came up with such a brilliant, genre-smashing concept.

I guess it kinda comes down to the old adage our dad used to tell us… “I’d rather be lucky than good.”

--Mark & Jay Duplass

(Blu Monday Saturday is our roundup of what's new in Blu-ray...)

It may be the best-looking Blu-ray disc I've seen yet, and it's not a major theatrical blockbuster.  It's called Baraka, a 1993 experiential film by Ron Fricke, who also worked on Chronos and Koyaanisqatsi.  There's no dialogue and no plot--the filmmakers traveled to 24 countries and filmed nature scenes, factories, monasteries, and big cities, sometimes juxtaposing images such as baby chicks being rushed down an assembly line intercut with a sped-up Tokyo subway scene.  So it's primarily a sensual experience, and for presentation this disc is tough to beat. Shot in 70mm and scanned in 8K UltraResolution (8,192 pixels across the frame, the highest resolution available), the film looks incredibly gorgeous and detailed, and the DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 (@96k/24bits) is also impressive. Also on the disc (both in high definition) are a seven-minute restoration featurette and a 76-minute (!) piece on the making of the film.   Intrigued?  You can get a look at the making of Baraka below.  (I did have some intermittent playback problems from the scene-selection menu, which probably means it's time to update my PS3 firmware.) --David

New Blu-ray pre-orders that have recently hit the catalog:

• Tropic Thunder
• The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor
• Pinocchio
• Wedding Crashers
• Any Given Sunday
• Being There
• The Mask
• Dumb and Dumber
• Becket
• Election

Halloween has always been my favorite holiday - as a kid for candy and costumes, as an adult for, well - for the exact same reasons.  The only major difference in my celebration now and then is the ridiculous number of horror movies I watch throughout the month of October (and the adult beverages I might consume, but that's another story).  I'm going to write about some of my favorites a little later this month.

There aren't a ton of horror fans here at Amazon Movies & TV (to these misguided haters I say - have you ever seen Dead Alive? Lord of the King's Peter Jackson and one of the BEST MOVIES EVER). So, there's only a handful of us who'll be writing and getting excited about all the bloody, gory, terrifying greatness that you should be marathoning this month (and getting for crazy cheap over at our Halloween Store).  Because our numbers are semi-limited, we've solicited the Horror experts over at Bloody-Disgusting.com to share lists of their hands down favorite horror flicks.  They'll be posting each Friday this month, so if you love horror or find yourself intrigued but aren't sure where to jump in, make sure to check back each Friday in November, including the last one - Halloween! 

And hey, while you're here - what are you going to watch to celebrate this year? 

--Kira

What it is:   Heralded by audiences and critics alike, Sleeping Beauty was the final fairy tale to be produced by Walt Disney himself. When an enchanted kingdom and the most fair princess in the land fall prey to the ultimate mistress of evil, the fate of the empire rests in the hands of three small fairies and a courageous prince's magic kiss. Their quest is fraught with peril as the fellowship must battle the evil witch and a fire-breathing dragon if they are to set the Beauty free.

Why It's Significant: Experience this groundbreaking film restored beyond its original brilliance in the way Walt envisioned it -- pristine, utterly breathtaking, and in High-Definition! Ok, so maybe Walt didn't know about Blu-ray ;).This is one of Disney's first titles to feature  BD Live capabilties PLUS an extra bonus standard definition DVD that is included so you can watch this classic at home and in the mini-van. Disney is also releasing a two-disc platinum edition available on DVD. --Angela

P.S. Did you know Sleeping Beauty's name was Aurora? You can learn more fun princess trivia in our Princess Store.

Continuing our series of Essentials*, here's our Essentials list for independent films. Here's what our writer said:

As nurtured in Hollywood, moviemaking evolved from technological curiosity to mainstream entertainment early on, in partnership with the movie palaces that could exploit major studio productions for the masses. But some of North America's greatest films were made by independent filmmakers; artists driven by a passion for their craft creating work they could express in their own, distinctive voice. Whether seen in a neighborhood multiplex or on the small screen, these essential North American independent features offer a new world of possibilities.

* "Essential" is not the same as "best," so these are not top 10 lists, but more a library-building guide that samples the significant DVDs from a genre, a decade, or a career.

Essentials by Decade: Landmark Indie Films (in no ranked order)

 Blue Velvet (Special Edition)

Pulp Fiction (Two-Disc Collector's Edition)

 Days of Heaven - Criterion Collection 

 One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (Two-Disc Special Edition) 

 The Usual Suspects (Special Editon) 

 Fargo (Special Edition)

 Being John Malkovich 

 Mean Streets (Special Edition)  

 sex, lies, and videotape 

 My Own Private Idaho - Criterion Collection 

More essentials by Genre

Peter Bogdanovich, one of the most celebrated of the so-called New Hollywood directors, was Old Hollywood at heart. A life-long film devotee, he chronicled on index cards every film he ever saw between the ages of 12 and 30. Grand total (with shorts and cartoons): More than 5,300! A former critic and astute writer about movies, his two collections of interviews with legendary directors and actors (Who the Devil Made It and Who the Hell's In It) are must-reads for film buffs. The Oscar-nominated director spoke with Amazon.com about his Essential films. --Donald Liebenson