What Blu-Ray did you watch last night?

[Graham Ritchie]

Well without doubt its quite a week in more ways than one, but a good one at that

Tuesday through until Friday we had our grandson staying with us as its still the school summer holidays. We always watch a movie at night its almost become a tradition.

Tuesday night I picked out "Storm Boy" for him, which he had never seen before, end result he really enjoyed it

Wednesday night...Connor pick was "Jaws 2" another movie he had never seen, however I did say its not as good as the first one, but that didn't matter he enjoyed it .

Thursday night....another Connor pick "After Earth" I sneaked out in the dark during this one for a cup of tea . Its not a bad movie and he enjoyed it

Friday night granddaughter "Ella" visit for two days "Storm Boy", yet again went down a treat with Ella, she likes anything with animals and again she had never seen it.

Saturday night I picked this one for her, and certainly one of my favorite films from the past and that's "Born Free" that one was a hit as well.

Tonight I am on my own, and have no idea what to watch, but will think of something glad I bought a spare lamp for the Epson .

[Graham Ritchie]

Well folks my memory can't be all that bad, as after watching "Peter Pan" the live version from 2004 I started thinking that I ran the 35mm print the same time as "Master and Commander". Looking through our old paper work, there it was "Peter Pan" arrived 23-12-03 from UIP, the day after, being the 24-12-03 the print of "Master and Commander" arrived from Fox.

Both films did really well arriving just before Christmas Day. I think in the US you do your dates a bit different anyway I always thought the live action version was very well made. The cast, the special effects, the music was all good stuff. filmed in the Gold Coast, Australia.

But for me the winner in this film was the one legged parrot, giving poor actor Richard Briers, remember him from the very successful and popular The Good Life TV series a hard time. I do think the parrot should have got a Oscar for its performance.

Anyway its all good stuff working at the cinema you land up if you want it that is all kinds of things after a film finishes its run. In this case the poster now in our home cinema and the flat 35mm trailer. Around that time I bought the Super8 Scope trailer which is of excellent quality and is part of one of my Super 8 Scope reels. I should add that the blu-ray picture and sound are excellent, projected using the Epson

The film distributors were always sending us all kinds of promo stuff, when arriving in the morning at the door were features, trailers, posters, etc to promote there films, it was like Christmas presents had arrived lets get them upstairs and see what goodies they have sent . I sometimes think we could have opened up a museum will the stuff that came through over the years.


Movie Poster in our home cinema....

35mm trailer, its still in excellent condition.

[Graham Ritchie]

PS...Drat I forgot to include the parrot

[Lincoln Thorn]

In the mood for a ghostly tale tonight, so gonna press play on the GHOST STORY (1981).

[Douglas Meltzer]

Lincoln,

After reading and enjoying Peter Straub's book, the film version of Ghost Story was a bit of a disappointment to me. The cast however, is great, led by Fred Astaire in his last movie role.

[Graham Ritchie]

After watching the above "Peter Pan" 2004, it was the turn of "Finding Neverland" tonight. Its based on the story of James Barrie, and how he came to write "Peter Pan". Yvonne and I first watched it at the cinema years ago when it came out, the ending is a real tear jerker.

I thought that the casting was excellent, with Johnny Depp at his best in this one. If you have never watched "Finding Neverland" search it out, its a good movie.

[Lincoln Thorn]

Lincoln,

After reading and enjoying Peter Straub's book, the film version of Ghost Story was a bit of a disappointment to me. The cast however, is great, led by Fred Astaire in his last movie role.

I agree it’s not nearly as good as the book, but I have soft spot for it! Melvyn Douglas, Fred Astaire, John Housemann are fun to watch though!

[Graham Ritchie]

Tonight.... Outstanding film, I cant remember the exact running time, but I think it was close to 3 hours including a intermission, with excellent blu-ray picture and sound. Its really the kind of movie that you can make a night of it, due to its length. George C Scott gives an amazing Oscar winning performance.

[Graham Ritchie]

Mr Bean had a screening this week, with the 1997 film "The Ultimate Disaster" I took Steven when he was about 11 years old to watch it at the cinema when it first came out, we both enjoyed and still do. Yvonne my better half can't stand Mr Bean so it was no use asking her if she wanted to watch it with me the other night .

Excellent picture and sound

[Brian Fretwell]

Last Night "Some Like it Hot". It reminded me of two other films "the Stunt Man" which used the same hotel and the Foghorn Leghorn cartoon "bntu Raids" which ends with two roosters being married by the farm dog and ends on the same "Nobody's perfect" line.

[Brian Fretwell]

"Frenzy" Hitchcock's record of the last days of Covent Garden Market as a fruit and vegetable market before it was redeveloped after the market moved to Nine Elms. Lots of murders too. At the time some people put it down as not being a "who done it" as we all knew the murderer early on. Now it seems more the inspiration for TV shows like Colombo where we all watch to see if the murderer will get away with it.

PS too late to correct my spelling in the earlier post that should have been "Banty Raids" as the cartoon. That was the first Warner cartoon I bought and is on low-fade stock.

[Graham Ritchie]

Its hard to imagine that after 20 years I still remember running the 35mm print of "Black Hawk Down" in fact and strangely enough, I just put the 35mm trailer onto one of my 2000ft trailer reels this week during a bit of a sort out. Checking our old cinema paper work the print arrived on March 2002 and left for another cinema a few months later. If I remember right it was a very nice print.

Tonight I watched the movie in blu-ray using the Epson, however a film print would be better .

[Graham Ritchie]

Last night I watched the "special features" that came with the above blu-ray. I would highly recommend watching them, as they give a very interesting account to the basic military training given to all the actors at US bases before heading out to Morocco for filming. Its also very interesting to note the accounts by those that were actually involved in the Somalia raid in 1993 talking to the actors.

One thing also that stands out, was that Ridley Scott did manage, but only at the last minute to get actual US military "Black Hawk" helicopters flown to Morocco in C5 aircraft, plus actual rangers to do the scenes of the rope decent from the Black Hawk helicopters. The military adviser said later that they did the approach and decent "eight times" for the film and no one got hurt coming down those ropes, no actors did that part that was left to the experts

So if you have ever watch the actual film, do take time to watch the special features. In particular The essence of combat six part behind the scenes documentary on the making of the movie.

[Graham Ritchie]

Its taken we a while to get around to watching "The Last Crusade" 1989. I have to admit that of the Indiana Jones films, only Raiders and Crusade are the ones that I really like. "The Temple Of Doom" just didn't work for me. I was glad when Steven Spielberg came back to do Crusade and put the fun back into it.

The casting of Sean Connery was also brilliant, I understand that after he retired years later from acting, he did mention how much he had enjoyed making "The Last Crusade". Another actor that was recommended by Harrison Ford to Steven Spielberg at the time of casting was River Phoenix who only a few years previous had played his son in "The Mosquito Coast" 1986.

Anyway The Last Crusade is a fun ride from start to finish its a great nights entertainment

Some quick screen shots of the blu-ray

[Ed Gordon]

Its taken we a while to get around to watching "The Last Crusade" 1989. I have to admit that of the Indiana Jones films, only Raiders and Crusade are the ones that I really like. "The Temple Of Doom" just didn't work for me. I was glad when Steven Spielberg came back to do Crusade and put the fun back into it.

Raiders and Crusade are the two most popular of the series. Temple of Doom comes in third. I watched the whole series (thanks to Covid isolation!) recently and the only memorable scene from Temple that I remember is the opening with Kate Capshaw singing "Anything Goes" in Chinese.