Category Archives: Blu-Ray Movies

Lara Croft: Tomb Raider [Blu-ray] [2001] [US Import]

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ASIN: B000I0QLZU

Category: DVD

Price: New Prices From :- £13.14

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Editorial Review: Amazon.co.uk Review
Angelina Jolie is the first and best reason to watch Lara Croft Tomb Raider. She gives an extraordinarily committed, physically demanding performance, taking on the mantle of the video game heroine with real conviction and energy, and becoming the embodiment of every teenage boy’s wish-fulfilment fantasy female. She’s tough, sexy and tomboyish all at the same time, and even has a plummy English accent to give her a touch of class. It’s a shame that the movie doesn’t live up to Jolie’s high standards. A soulless juggernaut of computer-generated effects and one-dimensional characters, the film falls into the same trap that has ensnared every other video game adaptation before it. The convoluted plot–which is concerned with a mysterious planetary alignment, a quasi-Masonic secret society known as the Illuminati and a mcguffin called the Triangle of Light–takes itself far too seriously. Oddly for a film with such a pedigree, the only humour is to be found in the endless repetition by Jolie of the word “bugger”, which presumably is hilariously funny to American audiences. Director Simon West, an alumnus of the Brookheimer-Simpson school of filmmaking, choreographs the action sequences spectacularly enough, and their impact is boosted hugely by Jolie’s ability to perform almost all the stunt work herself. But the end result is an empty experience that leaves the viewer with the feeling that this much-loved character and this dedicated actress could have been better served.

On the DVD: Eschewing the need for a second disc, this DVD still has plenty of additional material to keep fans happy. There’s no single making-of documentary, but rather a series of shorter pieces on specific aspects of the production–the original game, the transition to the big screen, the special effects, the stunt work and the rigorous training endured by Jolie (apparently she got so good she could do the stunts better than any of the stunt doubles). There’s also U2′s “Elevation” video, some deleted scenes, DVD-ROM features and a chatty commentary from director Simon West. The widescreen picture and thumping surround soundtrack are impressive. –Mark Walker

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Eyes Wide Shut [Blu-ray] [1999] [US Import] [Region A]

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ASIN: B0013FSXT6

Category: DVD

Price: New Prices From :- £6.86

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Editorial Review: Amazon.co.uk Review
Visually beautiful, Stanley Kubrick’s last completed film Eyes Wide Shut blends the sinister, the sensual and the clinical in a combination that is rather too personal and idiosyncratic to be entirely successful as the final statement about gender and sexuality he intended it to be. Adapted by Frederick Raphael from the Dream Story of Freud’s friend Schnitzler, it shows a young successful couple confront the dangers that lurk beyond monogamy; Nicole Kidman’s Alice does little more than fantasise, flirt and dream, but even this causes guilt and pain. Doctor Bill (Tom Cruise) does rather more–he visits a whore, crashes an orgy and continues to ask questions when warned off; if no disaster ensues, and it is possible that two people die as a result, it is only luck that averts it.

Much of the best of what is here is to be found in occasional moments of stillness–Cruise walking through a morgue–or wild comedy–Cruise’s attempt to hire a costume in the middle of the night interrupts major shenanigans at the fancy-dress shop. Cruise and Kidman do what they can with material that never means as much as it aspires to, and the standout performance is Sydney Pollack’s, as a worldly wise client.

On the DVD:Eyes Wide Shut on DVD is presented in lavish Dolby Sound that makes the most of the obsessive Ligeti piano piece and Shostakovich waltz that dominate the score, and in the 1.33:1 ratio that was Kubrick’s considered choice. It has subtitles in English, Arabic, Bulgarian and Rumanian, two TV spots and informative interviews with Kidman and Cruise, as well as with Steven Spielberg, to whom Kubrick had talked at length about his artistic intentions. –Roz Kaveney

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