Review Category: DVD/Blu Ray

IP MAN: THE AWAKENING

By Ed Fortune

Ip Man: The Awakening is a sort of prequel to the beloved IP Man martial arts action movies. Focusing on the legendary Ip Man (who in the real world was the Wing Chun master who taught Bruce Lee), this new movie feels like a pale imitation of a beloved movie.

Prequels can be tricky things. On the one hand, you want the whole thing to be its own original movie, and on the other hand, you want it to reflect the vibe and strength of the movie, so it feels like part of the series. It can be a tricky balance, made even more difficult in the case of action movies because it’s difficult to replicate good action sequences without feeling repetitive.

Ip Man: The Awakening avoids these issues by being set far enough back from the original movie that it barely registers and only shadows the broad emotional beats of 2008’s Ip Man. To call this a prequel is a little dishonest; it draws upon the same real-life inspirations as other Ip Man movies but has no real connection beyond sharing a name.

Set in early 1900s Hong Kong, the movie introduces us to the young Master Ip Man, a nice enough chap with legendary martial arts prowess. After a rather fine action sequence on an old-timey tram cart (which feels like we’ve seen it before), we are introduced to a broadcast of thugs and allies who aid Ip Man in ousting some fiendish British criminals from Hong Kong. This feels like a martial arts classic at points but is let down by being too slow.

There are some nice touches here; it’s fun that the English baddies bang on about Bartitsu, the precursor to mixed martial arts that was invented by Victorian gentleman EW Barton-Wright. That style stole many ideas from both boxing and Japanese martial arts and fits this story of Chinese martial arts in British Empire occupied Hong Kong very well. It also lets the movie have some fun action scenes (with a variety of props) but a lack of budget squanders this potential. The talented Tse Miu feels almost criminally underused as the titular Ip Man as the direction fails to focus on his natural talents. There is little charm or humour to the action scenes, alas.

It’s a perfect introduction to Hong Kong action movies in the sense that it has a gentle pace and plenty of action scenes, but if you’re familiar with the genre, you will find this a little bit boring. An unworthy pretender to a fine legacy of films.

Ip Man: The Awakening premieres on the Icon Film Channel on April 3rd and released in selected UK cinemas from May 5th.

ADALYNN

By RICH CROSS

An intimate, domestic horror with a focus on maternal angst and mental health, Adalynn depicts the pressure cooker that builds around the first bewildering days of motherhood. It can be a daunting challenge for any parent, and in this case, it’s made worse by the reverberations of agonising personal trauma. The result is an intense narrative which leaves the viewer experiencing the same sense of dislocation and doubt that overwhelms this fragile family.

Young mum Adalynn has brought her newborn home from the hospital. Her husband has to attend a work conference, leaving her to care for the new infant alone. Sydney Carvill delivers a spirited performance as Adalynn, carrying large sections of the film alone as her character wrestles with postpartum depression, poor impulse control, immersive delusions and the fear that her child has been targeted by a mysterious unseen menace. She’s put through an emotional wringer as Adalynn’s grip on reality comes unstuck, and the jump scares multiply. The bold musical score by Vahid Jahandari ratchets up the sense of peril, particularly in the second act – the most impressive section.

The plot resets itself many times, as whole sequences are revealed as dreams or disturbing hallucinations. It’s an effective conceit for any dramatist, but when overused (as it is here), it risks leaving the impression that on-screen events are arbitrary and without consequence. The script by Jerrod D. Brito does have valid things to say about resilience and the costs of aspiring to perfect parenthood, and director Jacob Byrd keeps things up close and on edge throughout. But the film’s final reveal is robbed of impact by something self-evident from the opening scene.

ADALYNN is available now on DVD and through streaming services in the US.

DOCTOR WHO THE COLLECTION – SEASON NINE

By Paul Mount

It’s 1972, and Doctor Who is cooking on gas. Three years on from its first cancellation crisis in 1969, the show, given a last chance to justify itself following tumbling ratings towards the end of Second Doctor Patrick Troughton’s era and with no viable replacement option having presented itself, had triumphantly reinvented itself for the bright new age of colour television. Flamboyant Third Doctor Jon Pertwee had fully cemented himself as the face of the rogue Time Lord and teaming him with the bubbly Jo Grant (Katy Manning) in his second season and broadening the show’s ‘Earth exile’ format to allow the Doctor to venture back into space at the behest of his Time Lord superiors allowed to show to properly flex its creative wings. Season 9 arrives as the latest in the BBC’s Collection Blu-ray boxsets and – despite the fact that, ironically, the final two stories in the season are noble (and rare) Pertwee-era failures – it’s another superb release demonstrating the care and devotion lavished upon these sets by a behind-the-scenes team determined to make them the absolute last word in Doctor Who on physical media.

Season 9 was potentially a difficult set of episodes to prepare for delivery on the more unforgiving Blu-ray format – several of the stories were amongst the last casualties of the BBC’s 1970s policy of wiping or destroying master tapes of productions no longer deemed of commercial value. Stories such as Curse of Peladon and The Time Monster were ultimately either returned to the BBC from overseas broadcasters or retained only as black-and-white prints. Previous VHS and DVD releases have utilised available technology in attempts to restore them to an acceptable quality, but slightly blurred images with washed-out or indistinct colour betrayed their provenance as episodes sourced not directly from the BBC Archive. This eight-disc boxset is an entirely another matter, though; the soundtracks have been improved immeasurably – there’s even a 5.1 option for The Sea Devils, the classic third serial from the season that pits Pertwee and the Royal Navy’s finest against both the Master and the aquatic cousins of Season 7’s Silurians – and the images for Peladon, The Mutants, and The Time Monster are hugely improved, the former having lost much of the fuzziness of earlier releases. They’re still not perfect, of course, and never will be, but it’s surely a given that it’s not possible for them to ever look better than this, and only the most ardent, nit-picking fans [In Doctor Who fandom, are you sure? – Ed] would be minded to bother finding fault.

The stories themselves are, by and large, classics of the era. Day of the Daleks sees the return of the show’s most famous metal meanies after a five-year absence, and it’s a thrilling and imaginative action story let down by the fact that the BBC clearly only had three Dalek props available and had forgotten to employ the actors who provided the original, memorable voices (the upgraded ‘special edition’ version with new series voices, extra Daleks and a few new scenes, is also included here). Curse of Peladon continues the show’s clever contrivance to break the potential monotony of the Doctor’s Earth exile by virtue of the Time Lords dispatching the Doctor into space to sort out some bit of cosmic dirty business they’d rather not get involved with. It’s an immersive Gothic tale full of intrigue, betrayal, gloomy corridors, and palace intrigue – and a nice plot twist regarding a familiar old enemy. The ‘greatest hits’ theme of the season continues in The Sea Devils, one of the most memorable (and oft-repeated) stories from the classic series, a landmark serial from the Pertwee era despite the fact that none of the UNIT (United Nations Intelligence Taskforce) regulars often associated with this period make an appearance. Despite the fact that the story could have been hand-crafted for them! The series is rounded off by two ambitious but flawed – and, it has to be said, slightly tedious – serials. The Mutants sees the Doctor and Jo dispatched to Solos in a thinly-disguised anti-Colonialism parable where the native Solonions are fighting for independence from their human ‘masters’ and The Time Monster is a rather silly pot-boiler that sees the Master (the irreplaceable Roger Delgado) trying to control an embarrassingly-unconvincing creature called Kronos for purposes of his own via an extended and largely uninteresting runaround in a very stagey-looking Atlantis where Hammer star Ingrid Pitt attempts to give her dialogue more gravitas than it deserves.

Even slightly shaky Pertwee-era Who is worth a look, though and despite the failings of its last two serials, Season 9 is still an essential purchase for fans and collectors. The specially-commissioned new features are again a highlight. The absence of an extended Matthew Sweet interview with some contemporary alumnus from the show is keenly felt, but a new ‘making of’ for The Time Monster taking Katy Manning and John Levene (UNIT’s Sergeant Benton) back to the filming location is good value, as is a feature looking at the work of veteran stuntman Stuart Fell, Katy Manning revisiting the season’s other locations and a fascinating piece on the career of director Michael E. Briant. There are some other new bits from the archive, including convention footage and features from the previous DVD releases and a lavish and informative booklet on the making of the season. Here the late Pertwee is quoted on his desire to turn Doctor Who into a science fiction version of James Bond; Season 9, looking bigger, brighter and better than ever on Blu-ray, is probably as close as he got to making that particular dream come true.

Doctor Who The Collection – Season 9 is available now on Blu-ray.

WALKING THE EDGE

By Chris Jackson

Making its UK Blu-ray debut, Walking The Edge is a semi-forgotten vigilante thriller from 1985, in which a taxi driver, Jason (Robert Forster, a man whose list of credits is longer than most people’s entire bodies), picks up a lady named Christine who, unbeknownst to him, is on her way to seek revenge on the gangsters who killed her husband and son. When her initial attempt to take the gang all out at once doesn’t quite go to plan, Jason hides her away and uses his street contacts from his side hustles as a bookie’s debt collector to stay one step ahead of the mob. With both groups simultaneously hunting and hiding from each other, the chase is on as the film shuffles along towards its unfortunately less than thrilling conclusion.

After establishing credible motivations for both sides, the film then spends far too long doing not much of anything at all, with Christine holed up in hiding while Jason pootles around town in his cab, collecting money as part of his side hustle and giving free rides to prostitutes (not a euphemism). Things pick up slightly in the last half an hour, but ultimately lead to a flat conclusion that does very little to leave a lasting impression. The overall experience isn’t helped by some very bizarre dialogue, seemingly a combination of mob talk and baseball references that often makes it feel like characters are talking in code. Continuity errors and plot holes pepper the entire movie as well, adding to the general air of confusion.

Two audio commentaries are included, first with film historian Chris Poggiali and film producer Matt Verboys, and another with Walking The Edge director Norbert Meisel and the film’ stars, Nancy Kwan and Robert Forster. A 12-minute interview with score writer Jay Chattaway discusses his work on both Walking The Edge as well as genre favourite Maniac, and a 23-minute chat with former cop turned movie adviser / technical consultant, Randy Jurgensen, delves into his strong history with the cast of the film. A very robotic 10-minute video essay goes rather overboard in its praise of the plot and script, before the disc is rounded off with the usual stills and trailers.

STAR TREK: STRANGE NEW WORLDS SEASON 1

By Iain Robertson

When Strange New Worlds debuted last year, it was hailed by reviewers (including myself back in issue 479) as the best live-action Trek in years. And it was, at the time. After several underwhelming seasons of Discovery and Picard, the adventures of Captain Pike (Anson Mount) and co. were a breath of fresh air. Unlike its contemporaries, the all-new adventures of the Enterprise (still the greatest starship ever) actually felt like Star Trek: a fun, if derivative, cousin to The Original Series.

Since then, of course, we’ve had the third season of Picard, which, besides redeeming that show, has – to date – given us the best season of Trek in decades. The complex, adult drama, complete with its cracking, Dominion war-inspired story, has made Strange New Worlds look, well, a little lightweight. Maybe it was the dearth of good live-action shows (the two current animated ones, Lower Decks and Prodigy, remain excellent), the return to an episodic, adventure-of-the-week format, or the pure nostalgia factor, but a year on, Strange New Worlds comes across as a fun, if insubstantial, entry in the Trek canon.

That said, there’s a lot to enjoy here. The cast – headed by Mount’s charismatic, jovial Christopher Pike (a world away from Jeffrey Hunter’s introspective 1960s take on the character) – are uniformly excellent. Standouts including Celia Rose Gooding as a young Uhura, Babs Olusanmokun as Dr M’Benga (a two-appearance Original Series character elevated here to series regular) and Bruce Horak as Chief Engineer Hemmer. The ten episodes are all entertaining, taking in everything from bizarre comedy (The Elysian Kingdom), horror (All Those Who Wander) and a possibly ill-advised remix of one of the Original Series’ most revered episodes (A Quality Of Mercy, which is included here alongside its inspiration, 1966’s Balance Of Terror). Elsewhere, there are good old-fashioned Trek moral dilemmas (Children of the Comet/Lift Us Where Suffering Cannot Reach), body-swap comedy (Spock Amok) and even space pirates (The Serene Squall). With such a broad selection, it’s impossible not to find something to enjoy here. Consequently, not everything will be for everyone, with the two comedy episodes, in particular, leaving me cold.

The Blu-ray set is, as usual with modern Trek releases, comprehensive. There’s a near hour-long making-of documentary, various video blogs recorded on Anson Mount’s phone, a gag reel, a Mount/Akiva Goldsman commentary, and several deleted scenes (for the most part insubstantial, although there’s an extra ten minutes of footage for All Those Who Wander).

One minor drawback, though. Beautiful as the Blu-ray is, Strange New Worlds was shot in 4K HDR, and in May, will become the first Trek series to receive a 4K Blu-ray release. If you can’t wait for then (or if you’ve not yet gone 4K), this is a great set for show fans.

SHEPHERD

By Martin Unsworth

Eric (Tom Hughes) is going through a crisis. His wife has died along with their unborn child, and his thoughts haunt him. He decides to take a job as a shepherd in a remote Scottish island with just his dog for company, and the ferry woman (Kate Dickie) provides an ominous introduction to his new career. As he attempts to get used to the solitude, his issues manifest even further.

Shepherd is a brooding, bleak, atmospheric nightmare that grips with ease. Writer/director Russell Owen has crafted a movie that draws you in from the start. Opening with a quote from Dante’s Inferno, it sets the prescient for what’s to come. Hughes is superb as the tormented lead, given an anxiety-inducing performance. A lot of the heavy lifting is provided by the sound design, which envelopes us with howling winds and creaking timber, and Callum Donaldson’s score is wonderfully oppressive. Likewise, Richard Stoddard’s cinematography makes the beautiful but desolate landscape into a foreboding menace of its own.

As Eric descends further into madness, his guilt and fears manifest in various ways. There are perhaps a few too many dream sequences and startled awakenings, but there are still some genuine shocks to be had. Shepherd is a powerful film that won’t be for everyone, but fans of tortured soul movies and great ghost stories will find plenty to enjoy. There will likely be comparisons with The Lighthouse, but Russell Owen stamps a unique mark on this, and it deserves to find an appreciative fan base.

SHEPHERD is out now in the UK on digital and Blu-ray.

ENTER SANTO

By Chris Jackson

Enter Santo brings together the first two films starring Rodolfo Guzman Huerta, better known as Mexico’s most famous luchador, El Santo. Produced in parallel in 1958 in Havana at the height of the Cuban Revolution, these films helped kickstart the luchador action movie genre that eventually saw Santo (along with several others) become a genuine folk hero and pop culture icon in his home country. His career didn’t get off to the most promising of starts though, as the two films in this collection demonstrate.

In Santo vs. the Evil Brain, police officer Santo is kidnapped and brainwashed by the evil Doctor Campos, a maniac determined to gain world domination through the use of mind control, while in Santo vs. the Infernal Men, Santo helps the authorities to take down a gang of drug smugglers. The former film is easily the more entertaining of the two, but neither of them could really be considered “must-see” unless you’re a hardcore Santo completist. Due to the two being made at the same time, and probably also courtesy of some severe budget restrictions, a lot of locations and actors appear in both films, making for quite a confusing double bill as the déjà vu creeps in almost immediately when the second film starts. Both are endearingly ropey, with campy sci-fi B-movie plots, shaky camerawork and questionable continuity (watch for extras appearing and disappearing between shots), but the scenes of 1950s Havana are a treat to see, beautifully clear and detailed thanks to a tremendous 4K transfer. Considering the age of the footage, the conditions the films were made under, and the journey that the tapes have probably taken over the last 60 years, it’s held up remarkably well.

The special features, however, are the real high point of this set. “Looking for El Santo” is a 30-minute mini-documentary following Viviana Garcia Besne – granddaughter of the producer of both films – as she spends four days in Havana visiting locations that were used in the films. Viviana returns for a full-length feature, “Perdida”, where she goes into detail about her family and their contribution to both Santo’s movie career and the wider realms of Mexican cinema. Elsewhere, there’s a 10-minute interview with Joaquín Cordero (Evil Brain’s Doctor Campos), and the 30-minute Máscara vs máscara, in which a lucha movie expert called The Killer Film delves into Santo’s wrestling and movie career and the history of Mexican wrestling and lucha movies. Between all of these features, there’s plenty of archive photos and memorabilia, forming a fascinating insight into a world that’s rarely talked about.

Enter Santo contains a couple of entertaining (albeit primitive) main features, backed with some excellent extras. Plus, luchadors running around battering people just looks cool as heck. Fun stuff indeed!

BATMAN: THE DOOM THAT CAME TO GOTHAM

By Ed Fortune

Reworking Batman so it fits into the Cthulhu Mythos is such an obvious idea it’s hard to believe it’s not been done more often. The Doom That Came To Gotham is a DC Animated Movie based on the Mike Mignola graphic novel of the same name, and it’s a delicious blend of superhero silliness and cosmic horror.

Sharp horror fans may notice that the title sounds a bit like the H.P. Lovecraft short story The Doom That Came To Sarnath, but it’s only very loosely based on this work; this is very much a Batman story, albeit an Elseworld one. What we actually get is a sort of ‘greatest hits’ of the Cthulhu Mythos wrapped up in Batman’s own world-building. The entire thing is set in a 1920s-style world, which works incredibly well for Batman, Gotham has always had one foot in nostalgia, after all.

We open with Bruce Wayne and a collection of his wards investigating a frozen wasteland. Some eldritch horror is tainting the land, and Bruce and chums are not only horrified to discover horrifically altered penguins but that one of their former associates has become corrupted by some sort of weird power. And then it gets weirder as the team return to Gotham. Bruce has been away from Gotham for so long that he has become something of a stranger, shocked by how corrupt it has become. This, and many other moments, blend the world of Batman and the horror of HP Lovecraft into one gloriously weird bit of fin.

The Doom That Came To Gotham remixes old Lovecraft ideas and classic Batman very well without losing sight of either. It avoids turning into a Hellboy story with the Bat family, nor does it melt into weird fiction halfway through. Instead, we get superb performances from David Giuntoli as Batman, and Tati Gabrielle is pretty much perfect as Kai Li Cain, one of Bruce’s wards. Jeffrey Combs is always a pleasure and nails the creepy vibe of this movie’s version of Kirk Langstrom. It’s brilliantly cast throughout.

The Doom That Came To Gotham is exactly as weird, crazy and fun as its premise suggests, and if you’re a fan of all things animated Batman or just like weird horror, you should see this.

Batman: The Doom that Came to Gotham is available on Blu-ray and DVD from March 27th

THE LAST HUNTER (1980)

By Martin Unsworth

Cult Italian director Antonio Margheriti (Cannibal Apocalypse) dipped his lens in several genres over his career. This entry, set during the Vietnam War, echoes hits such as The Deer Hunter and Apocalypse Now in part but revels in its gory exploitation tropes.

Captain Henry Morris (David Warbeck, The Beyond) is sent on a mission to disable a radio transmitter deep in the Vietnam jungle. Aiding him in getting there are a ragtag bunch of soldiers led by Tony King (Sharky’s Machine) and Bobby Rhodes (Demons). With them documenting the war is photographer Jane Foster (Tisa Farrow, Zombie Flesh Eaters). It won’t be a peaceful mission, however, as danger is behind every corner.

Warbeck is a familiar face to fans of exploitation films, particularly Italian ones, and isn’t given enough credit for his acting chops. Allegedly in the running to play James Bond at one point, his early death from cancer at only 55 was a sad loss indeed. He’s in full action-man guise here and helps make the movie a highly entertaining watch. It was also included on the extended ‘section 3’ list of ‘video nasties’ in the early ‘80s and it’s easy to see why. Margheriti deploys the gore liberally and arguably better than some of the better-known horror fare. The futility and brutality of the war is conveyed well – as much as any ‘worthy’ release. There’s no escaping the exploitation roots, but that makes it all the more enjoyable. It’s certainly a cut above the regular Euro mockbuster type, though.

This is the first release of a new boutique label, Treasured Films, and it’s an impressive presentation. The film itself looks fabulous, but there is also a wealth of bonus features. A feature-length documentary about the director includes plenty of archive interview footage of the man himself (who died in 2002) and is an excellent overview of his career. There are also separate interviews with various people involved created especially for this release that cover both The Last Hunter and elements of Margheriti’s career. An interesting video essay gives the film an intelligent overview. There are also more gems in the 58-page booklet, including informative pieces on Margheriti and Warbeck’s Italian movies, as well as a fun archive interview with the actor. The release is an essential purchase for fans of cult horror and Euro releases, and it’s a pleasure to say the film itself is much better than you’ll expect.

The Last Hunter is released on Blu-ray on April 10th from Treasured Films.

FILL ‘ER UP WITH SUPER (1976)

by RICH CROSS

A seventies’ road movie with a difference, Fill ‘Er Up With Super is a film that could only have been made by an experimental, free-thinking French auteur keen to set themselves apart from mainstream francophile cinema. Director Alain Cavalier is more interested in presenting the interactions of the four twentysomething men who share a cross-country road trip than he is in depicting the landscapes and characters they encounter. This is a meditative reflection on the themes of friendship, aspiration and male identity, which just happens to unfold in and around a Chevrolet station wagon.

Car salesman Klouk (Bernard Crombey) is infuriated when his boss insists he cancels a holiday to deliver a new vehicle to a demanding client personally. Enlisting his friend Philippe (Xavier Saint-Macary) for company, the pair are soon joined by hitchhiker Charles (Etienne Chicot) and his sidekick Daniel (Patrick Bouchitey). They are an ill-matched foursome, but they all share a sense of disappointment about the limitations of their lives. None of them deals with their frustrations particularly well, as their questionable opinions (about women in particular) and repeated poor decision-making attests. Cavalier intends the film to be a subtle Gallic comedy, but the lack of clarity about the film’s message makes for sparse laughs.

What’s most entertaining is the film’s naturalistic, minimalist aesthetic. It’s shot like an unglamorous fly-on-the-wall documentary, with dialogue (although scripted during rehearsals) that sounds improvised and unpolished. The glimpses of real-life France feel authentic and a world away from the romanticised norms of the travelogue. The transfer to Blu-ray looks and sounds great, and this limited edition package comes bundled with some thoughtful special features.

FILL ‘ER UP WITH SUPER is available on Blu-ray from RADIANCE FILMS.