The Balcony is Closed - For Now

Greetings friends.

Due to other commitments, I have decided to close this blog for the time being in order to determine its future, it may continue, it may not, I don't know at this stage.

But as the title says, the balcony is closed, for the moment.

Simon W.

Blu-Ray Review - Casino Royale: Collector's Edition (2006)

The Movie:

Casino Royale is the first of the new James Bond and also the first to star Daniel Craig in the title role following Pierce Brosnan’s departure, here he has been given his licence to kill and OO ranking for the first time and he’ll want to use if he intends to succeed at stopping Le Chiffre, a private banker for the world’s terrorist groups, as well as that, he finds himself in love with Vesper Lynd, a woman who will change him in more ways than one.

Out of all the Bond films, I tend to vote this one as my favourite as it feels more like a traditional action picture instead of a traditional Bond film, gone are the girls in bikini’s, the gadgetry and the cars and instead we get some real emotion as well as some terrific action sequences and a wonderful song by Chris Cornell, unfortunately at nearly 2.5 hours in length, the film runs a little long in the third act with the sinking house, despite that though, its terrific: 4 out of 5.

The Blu-Ray:

Casino Royale has now been issued in a brand new 2-disc Blu-Ray and 3-disc DVD edition in time for the upcoming Quantum of Solace; there are no differences in the extras between the two apart from having them on 2 discs on the DVD version and 1 on the Blu-Ray.

Another thing I want to add before I move onto reviewing the disc is that the film has received uncut status here in Australia as compared to America and England where the film was slightly toned down for the appropriate rating, the disc is also region coded for all regions and the packaging is very similar to last year’s Close Encounters 2-Disc, with a very nice slip case and a booklet in the disc holder itself.

The Video quality of the film is very good, the beginning in black and white was probably the nicest area as it felt like film due to the grain being used, the rest although it looks great, the colours sparkle and the skin tones aren’t too overdone, it looks a little too polished for my eyes.

The audio however is another story, it is truly immersive especially when the opening song kicks in, the music sounds good as does the gun sounds during the Freerunning chase, a great mix.

Disc 1 Extras:

Picture in Picture Commentary by Director Martin Campbell and Producer Michael Wilson: This is a very cool feature, Campbell and Wilson will appear in a small screen on the left and right of the screen and talk about the film, although I would like to have seen the PiP appear through the whole film, its still a very cool feature, the commentary itself doesn’t disappoint either, Campbell and Wilson have a great rapport with each other and it’s a nice follow up to their Goldeneye track, by far my favourite extra on this set.

Crew Commentary: This is a crew commentary hosted by Barbara Broccoli who also is one of the commentators, you hear from such people as Phil Meheux, David Arnold and others, it’s a good commentary but not a great one.

Know your Double O BD-Live Game: This is a special game created for this release, it was fun to play but most fans will find it boring after a while.

Disc 2 Extras:

Disc 2 holds the bulk of the extras, almost all of which are in 1080p apart from a few minor ones, but how good are they, read on to find out.

Deleted and Extended Scenes: here a 4 scenes that were cut from the film, showing Bond in hospital, spying on people and at a cricket match, the cricket match scene was good but the others were a bit dull, these 4 cuts join the 95% of Deleted Scenes that were best left out of the film.

Featurette – The Road to Casino Royale: This first video feature delves into the struggle to get the rights to the book as Cubby and Harry couldn’t secure them when they got the rights to Fleming’s books, most of the time is spent on the 50’s and 60’s versions of the story, but this feature was good and I enjoyed it.

Featurette – Ian Fleming’s Incredible Creation: This goes more into author Ian Fleming and his experiences in World War 2 as an intelligence agent in MI6, whilst okay, it’s not as good as the bio doc on the Living Daylights DVD.

Featurette – James Bond in the Bahamas: This feature goes into the history of Bond in the Bahamas and some of the locations used in some of the films that used it as a location, this feature I actually found to be rather boring, as it said very little about Casino Royale but it does have some amazing underwater footage.

Featurette – The Secret Road to Paradise: This feature continues the history of Bond and the Bahamas by going more in depth on a particular area of the Bahamas, as with the first feature on this subject, I don’t have much interest in the Bahamas so I didn’t hold much interest for me.

Featurette – Death in Venice: This is a more traditional production featurette and the only other use of interview footage with Daniel Craig and Eva Green; it goes into the sinking house finale of the film, an area that brought down the film for me, but this feature was an okay watch.

Featurette – Becoming Bond: This is one of 4 holdovers from the film’s first release, this is a general making of about the film and contains some very nice thoughts with Craig from the set of Golden Compass, its his honesty about taking the role and what to do with it that makes this feature.

Featurette – James Bond for Real: This feature is a general look at the stunt work in the film, which I thought was well done as it felt real and not computer generated, it goes into the Freerunning chase, the airport chase and the creation of the stunts in general, all in all, a good watch.

Featurette – Bond Girls are Forever: This was one of my favourite extras on this set, as Maryam D’Abo, who was in the Living Daylights, interviews and hosts this special on the history of the Bond girls and how the legacy has changed over the years, the girls interviewed are honest and D’Abo and Carey Lowell have a great time talking about working with Timothy Dalton, a great watch.

Featurette – The Art of the Freerun: Like the Bond Girls feature, this is one of the more enjoyable features, as it shows Sebastian Foucan at work, which is simply amazing to watch and marvel at, he also seems to have no regrets about being part of the Bond legacy, very good stuff.

Storyboard Sequence and Comparison – The Freerun Chase: This is both a storyboard sequence and comparison of the Freerun chase in the film and both are separate options, it was good to see but a general storyboards to screen feature would have been much better.

Featurette – Catching a Plane from Storyboards to Screen: This one I liked as it goes into the planning and shooting of the airport chase at Miami airport, the reason I enjoyed is because it shows the crew hard to work preparing a big action scene, fans should enjoy this as well.

Featurette – Filmmaker Profiles: This contains 6 filmmaker profiles ranging from Martin Campbell to David Arnold, they talk about their first reactions to Bond, how they signed up for the series and their work on Casino Royale, these were good to watch and again fans should find themselves satisfied.

Music Video – You Know my Name by Chris Cornell: This is most likely my favourite extra on this set after the PiP Commentary, it’s the original music video for the title song and I liked it mostly because I love the song so much.

Final Words:

It saddens me to say this, but this release is a big disappointment, although the sound mix, the PiP Commentary and the Music Video were good, the rest was very bland and the video features were to scattershot and glossy at times, if you already have the first release stick with that otherwise if you don’t, grab this one, you might enjoy it more than I did.

Film Review - TMNT (2007)

TMNT or Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles to name it correctly concerns the newest adventures of the four turtles who were mutated to human size via toxic waste dumped in their sewer, this time they have defeated their old nemesis the Shredder and this time have to stop his old clan now run by media mogul Max Winters from conquering the world once again.

How I felt about this film is pretty much the opinion I had of the 3 spider-man films, none of them for my money have been as good as the cartoon shows bearing their names, the CG animation is somewhat middle of the road and the absence of Shredder made me lose interest very quickly, I mean how can you off your main arch enemy, it feels like having a Star Wars film without Darth Vader and we all know what happened there.

I wish I could be more enthusiastic, but I have to give this a 1 out of 5 as to me, it just didn’t work.

Film Review - The Rock (1996)

The Rock concerns a retired US army officer played by Ed Harris who steals a powerful lethal gas and seizes control of Alcatraz in San Francisco where he plans to launch the gas unless benefits are paid to the families of soldiers who died in the line of fire, to stop him a biochemist played by Nicholas Cage as well as a team of soldiers have to storm Alcatraz in order to do just that.

The Rock is both a good movie and a bad movie all at once, I liked the storyline of the Ed Harris character as it felt like a nice departure from the more typical “Destroy the World” storyline that’s in most action pictures as well the casting of some great actors like Michael Biehn, Sean Connery and the late John Spencer but the plot of the rock turns into Die Hard on Alcatraz as Cage and Connery have to both foil the threat and save the hostages, swell.

But all in all, the Rock wasn’t that bad so I give it a 3 out of 5.