DVD review: "Coraline"

"Coraline" is a delightful movie, and it's always a delight to see a film get a first-class video release right out of the gate.

The two-disc collector's edition DVD has almost everything a fan of this stop-motion animation gem could desire. To start with, it includes both 2-D and 3-D versions of the film. (Four sets of cardboard 3-D glasses are included with the DVD, though they're a bit flimsy. Far be it from me to suggest swiping sturdier plastic ones from a current showing of "Up.")

It also includes a digital copy of the film for legal downloading to your portable video device -- something that should be standard issue with DVDs, as far as I'm concerned. Luckily, studios seem to feel the same way and are including it with more DVD releases, and on most Blu-ray discs.

A 35-minute making-of documentary details the painstaking way in which animators move puppets frame-by-frame to lend the illusion of motion. There's also a featurette on casting the voice actors -- I hadn't even realized that John Hodgman (the "I'm a PC" guy from those TV commercials) supplied the graceful voice of the father -- and several deleted scenes.

A commentary track by writer/director Henry Selick and composer Bruno Coulais provides plenty of behind-the-scenes details. Selick says he was pressured to do the film in a half computer-generated/half stop-motion format, but successfully resisted. And he reveals that Dakota Fanning was nine years old when she was cast as Coraline, but was 14 by the time they finished.

The story, based on the novel by Neil Gaiman, is about a girl who moves with her two workaholic parents to a dreary boarding house. She discovers a passageway to an alternate world where her "Other Mother," "Other Father" and all their neighbors are much friendly versions of themselves -- except for their creepy button eyes, which portend sinister developments.

In the mold of Selick's "The Nightmare Before Christmas," "Coraline" relies on gloomy imagery to weave a joyous tale of visual splendor.

Movie: 3.5 stars
Extras: 4 stars

A little business...

In an effort to generate a little revenue, I'm pleased to announce a new advertising effort here on this site.

I'm starting out with some product links, and hope to add a few banners and widgets as soon as I get it figured out.

The terms of the agreement preclude me from saying who my new partner is, though it's pretty obvious if you scroll through the posts below.

It's pretty simple: If anyone clicks through my portal and buys a DVD, I get a piece of the sale. I have now added these links to all my DVD reviews and "Reeling Backward" features from the first of the year.

So please, if you were planning to buy any DVDs online anyway, please come here to Captain Critic and click on my link. It doesn't cost you anything extra; the only difference is I get a little taste.

DVD review: "Notorious"

For someone who had never acted before, Jamal Woodard gives a confident, swaggering performance in "Notorious" as legendary rapper Biggie Smalls, aka Notorious B.I.G. This affecting biopic tracks Biggie's life from the tough streets of Brooklyn, where few would have believed that the shy boy named Christopher Wallace and labeled "too fat, black and ugly" would become one of the transformative figures of the hip-hop world.

With his mix of sweetness and braggadocio, Woodard captures the essence of Biggie, who quickly climbed from two-bit street dealer to the top of the charts, only to be gunned down at age 24 in the East Coast-West Coast rap rivalry of the 1990s that also claimed the life of Tupac Shakur. "Notorious" doesn't back away from showing the rivalry's nastiness, although it generally depicts Biggie as the victim, rather than the instigator of the feud.

That's not surprising, considering this film was produced by Biggie's real-life friends and business partners, including Sean Combs (who's ably portrayed in the movie by Derek Luke). Other key figures in Biggie's life include his mother Voletta Wallace (Angela Bassett), protégé/lover Lil' Kim (Naturi Naughton), wife Faith Evans (Antonique Smith) and mentor-turned-enemy Shakur (Anthony Mackie).

The "Notorious" DVD comes with both the theatrical and unrated director's versions of the films, plus an exhaustive amount of extras. In addition to the usual making-of documentary, there's also featurettes about casting and training the actors, many of whom studied with their real-life counterparts; a look at the lyrical creation style of Biggie; how they re-created the raucous concert scenes; 10 brief deleted scenes; and archive footage of the real Biggie performing.

A clever addition is the "Biggie 360" feature with a rotating view of the Los Angeles intersection where he was murdered, with keys to video clips about various landmarks and personal perspectives.

There are two separate commentary tracks, one by the filmmakers (including director George Tillman Jr. and screenwriters Reggie Rock Bythewood and Cheo Hodari Coker) and the other by Biggie's real-life family and friends, including mother Voletta.

Movie: B-plus
Extras: A-minus

DVD review: "Milk"

Sean Penn is just amazing in “Milk,” playing Harvey Milk, the first openly gay politician elected to public office. What’s most incredible about his Oscar-winning performance is that it’s so different from anything he’s ever done before. Harvey Milk could fire up crowds in his call for gay rights, but he was not an angry man trying to buck the system. He was cunning and charismatic and delighted in co-opting the political machine, so that’s how Penn plays him: a subtle charmer.

Director Gus Van Sant and screenwriter Dustin Lance Black do a great job of showing Harvey’s political ascent – the scenes of Milk and his partner Scott (James Franco) building a political movement out of their Castro Street camera shop breathe with an organic authenticity, helped by an impressive array of supporting actors. The film is less successful at portraying Milk’s personal life; his relationship with a flighty Latino boyfriend is so underwritten as to become comical.

There’s a decent array of extra features on the DVD, but it’s notable for the total absence of participation by Van Sant and Penn. Although both are glimpsed in the bonus material, they never speak directly about making this movie, and there’s no commentary track. Three brief deleted scenes add little, though one where Milk dresses up as a clown for a publicity stunt is visually arresting.

Of the three featurettes, the best is “Remembering Harvey,” a 13-minute documentary in which many of Milk’s real-life allies depicted in the movie, including Cleve Jones and Anne Kronenberg, reminisce about the man and his legacy. Carol Ruth Silver, who co-sponsored Milk’s anti-discrimination legislation, starkly admits his death helped the gay rights movement: “It’s a sad thing to say, but martyrdom works.”

A 14-minute doc, “Hollywood Comes to San Francisco,” consists of the usual blather and self-hype from the actors and filmmakers; Josh Brolin lets us know that he think Milk’s sacrifices were akin to those of “Jesus, and Gandhi.” Well.

Movie: B-plus
Extras: C-plus

"Pride of the Yankees"

Catching up on an old classic I'd missed, I watched "Pride of the Yankees" yesterday, with Gary Cooper as Lou Gehrig.

It was good, though very dated. The acting style is very 1942, with lots of rapid-patter dialogue and what today would be considered stilted delivery. You always expect some character to say, "Oh, a wise guy, see?"

Cooper was better than I expected, playing a character who was depicted as a straitlaced "boob," to use the parlance of the cynical younger reporter. I was surprised by the depiction of Gehrig's friendship with an older sportswriter played by Walter Brennan. The hack pals around with the baseball player, and happily demurs from writing about his personal life when Gehrig asks him to. Can you imagine that sort of relationship between a journalist and a pro athlete today?

I rather liked Teresa Wright as Mrs. Gehrig. She's a real firecracker, to again use the terminology of the time. Although once they get hitched, she immediately becomes less interesting. I think that's the way America, and certainly Hollywood, saw women back then: once they get married, they give up their own life to be a wife and mother.

One of my favorite games to play is to spot character actors in roles in different movies. When I saw the tiny little man playing Gehrig's father with a thick European (German?) accent, I immediately pegged him as the husband half of the couple in "Casablanca" who practice their newfound English on Humphrey Bogart in preparation for moving to America: "What watch?" "10 watch." "Such watch!"

Turns out I was right, and the actor's name is Ludwig Stossel. I thought that Elsa Janssen, the woman playing the mother, was also the same actress who played Stossel's wife in "Casablanca," but it's not.