Godzilla Minus One (2023)

One of the best films of 2023 finally gets a disc release (and in a number of different editions to boot) from distributor Anime Limited.

We're at the end of World War II. A kamikaze pilot fakes a problem with his plane and lands on a remote island, where he witnesses all his colleagues dying at the hands (and teeth) of a huge dinosaur-like creature known by the locals as Godzilla.

He makes his way back to Japan only to find Tokyo in ruins and those who knew him disgusted that he did not die honourably in battle. He meets a girl with a baby who is not hers and the three move in together. Soon he has a job helping to diffuse sea mines by using his gunnery skills, and it's not long before his boat is deployed to help deal with a huge mysterious sea creature that's approaching Tokyo.

GODZILLA MINUS ONE was a deserved smash hit on its release last year, beating out much higher budgeted contenders to win the best visual effects Oscar and providing a welcome beacon of integrity in a market swamped with soulless Disney Marvel burnout movies. 

And it's very much the human interest element that makes GODZILLA MINUS ONE the hugely affecting success that it is. As well as his makeshift family life at home, our lead has his 'bunch of mates' family at sea, all of whom come to play an important part in the climax. That's not to say the effects aren't great too because they are. Apparently achieved on a fraction of what the other films in its Oscar nomination category cost, Godzilla has never looked better or bigger or more terrifying that here. 

Anime Limited (and Toho) are releasing GODZILLA MINUS ONE in a variety of packages. If you want the bare bones there's a standard Blu-ray with two sound options. The English dub is ok but the American accents do feel a bit incongruous. That mix is in Dolby 5.1 but the Japanese dialogue version has been mixed in Dolby Atmos.

There's also a Deluxe four disc edition which gives you the film on 4K UHD, on Blu-ray, GODZILLA MINUS ONE MINUS COLOR on Blu-ray (which is actually pretty atmospheric. It would be interesting to run it in a double bill directly before the original GODZILLA), and a fourth Blu-ray disc of bonus features. All those discs apart from the black and white version of the film are available in a steelbook. 

        The Bonus Disc includes an excellent 67 minute making of with plenty of behind the scenes footage and an interview with writer / director / VFX artist Takashi Yamazaki. There's also 20 minutes of VFX footage showing how scenes of that and live action were combined to achieve the final result, plus a 23 minute electronic press kit.

        The disc also contains four interviews from four special screenings of Godzilla movies that commemorated the release of GODZILLA MINUS ONE and all featuring director Yamazaki with special guests. These were the original GODZILLA (1954) with guest SHIN GODZILLA co-director Shinji Higachi; GHIDORAH THE THREE HEADED MONSTER (1964) which was the first Kaiju Yamazaki ever saw - the guest this time is legendary monster suit maker 88 year old Keizo Murase who made not just King Ghidorah but also Godzilla and Mothra amongst others; GODZILLA GMK (2001) with guest director Shinsuke Kaneko who directed the first film Yamazaki did FX for; and SHIN GODZILLA with guest editor, writer and chief director Hideaki Anno. Finally there's a collection of 68 minutes of footage from the various premieres around the world. 

GODZILLA MINUS ONE is out now in the three different editions outlined above and if you're a fan, definitely get an edition that includes the bonus disc.

The Second Act (2024)

"Frequently Very Funny Indeed"

The latest comedy from quirky French writer-director Quentin Dupieux, and the film that opened the Cannes Film Festival this year, get a digital release from Signature Entertainment.

David (Louis Garrel from Bertolucci's THE DREAMERS) is being hounded by Florence (Léa Seydoux from lots of things including Cronenberg's CRIMES OF THE FUTURE and Bertrand Bonello's THE BEAST) who is madly in love with him. But he doesn't have any feelings for her so he arranges for them to meet at an isolated café called The Second Act in the presence of his friend Willy (Raphaël Quenard who plays the title character in Dupieux's excellent YANNICK). Florence brings her father Guillaume (Vincent Lindon from TITANE) along and, in the presence of hopeless waiter Stéphane (Manuel Guillot), the scene is set for sheer excruciating awkwardness.

However, the story quickly becomes more awkward, and the film itself more meta, as the actors constantly break character, complain about their roles, insult each other, and prolong the telling of the story. At one point it transpires they are acting in the first film ever to be written and directed by AI, and the AI even comes to talk to them via a laptop.

Even at a brisk 80 minutes (a typical run time for a Dupieux opus) THE SECOND ACT does begin to flounder in its attempts to go even more 'super meta' at the end, but even so this is a very funny, inventive, ambitious piece of work, one which on the one hand occasionally feels like Beckett or Pirandello while on the other could almost be an 80 minute Monty Python sketch. Some of the sequences are laugh out loud hilarious, especially a wine pouring scene that just goes on and on and becomes funnier as it does so.  It might just be Dupieux's best work so far. Fans will need no further persuasion and if you're yet to encounter his work this is an excellent place to start. Here's a clip that unfortunately doesn't do the film justice as it's one of the rare bits where no-one really breaks character:

Quentin Dupieux's THE SECOND ACT is out on digital from Signature Entertainment now.

Critters: A Four Course Feast (1986 - 1992)

Arrow Films are releasing a limited edition box set of all four CRITTERS films in 1080p HD (no 4K this time around) with 2.0 stereo and 5.1 surround audio options for all the films. You also get a 60 page book with new writing, double-sided posters for all the films and reversible sleeves but for now let's take a look at the films:

Critters (1986) 

A charming, occasionally gory and frequently amusing movie which was a big hit back in the day. In the extras we're told the aim was to produce 'PG-13' horror, which meant in the UK CRITTERS got a 15 certificate, but you can certainly see where with a few cuts it could have been PG over here.

Somewhere in space, in a maximum security prison run by a creature named Zanti (a nice and unostentatious gag for Outer Limits fans) a renegade band of hungry bitey little furballs called Krites steal a spaceship (how maximum actually is this security?) and set off for earth. They are pursued by two shapeshifting bounty hunters and everyone converges on a small Kansas farm. The Krites start chomping and the bounty hunters start blowing everything up.

If you've not seen CRITTERS you may be expecting some ultra low-budget Charles Band-style tomfoolery. Actually CRITTERS was a New Line production, has a decent budget, good acting (from Dee Wallace and Billy Green Bush amongst others) and special effects, and a pseudo Jerry Goldsmith score from David Newman. It feels a little slower now than it did back in the day but you can still see its heart is firmly in 'fun monster movie' territory.

Extras include two archival commentaries, one from Barry (producer) & Don (star) Opper and the other from special effects boys the Chiodo brothers. There's a new commentary from Matty Budrewicz and Dave Wain who have contributed new commentaries to all four films and on this one they're joined by screenwriter Shane Bitterling (PUPPET MASTER X and similar fare). Extras ported over from the 2018 Shout Factory release include a 71 minute making of and a 22 minute tribute to screenwriter Brian (Domonic) Muir. You also get 12 minutes of behind the scenes footage of the Krites being manipulated, the alternate ending which didn't do so well with test audiences, trailers TV spots and an image gallery.

Critters 2: The Main Course (1988)

Scott Grimes, Don Opper, Lin Shaye and Terrence Mann all return from the first film for this David Twohy / Mick Garris-written sequel which sees the eggs left behind at the end of the first film hatching and causing havoc. 

Like a lot of sequels this one 'goes bigger' - instead of a farm we now have an entire small town under attack. It's actually good fun and is arguably better than the first film, with some fun ideas (the Easter Egg hunt where the eggs turn out to be critters, the Krites' battle sphere) and feels as if it's been made with as much care as the first, even if there are a couple of repeated FX shots.

Extras include two archival commentaries from Mick Garris and the Chiodo Brothers with another new commentary from Budrewicz and Wain. There's a making of documentary, which like the one for the first lasts over an hour, behind the scenes footage (24 minutes), 13 minutes of additional scenes for TV, trailer, TV spot and image gallery.

Critters 3 (1991)

Horror writer David J Schow provides the screenplay for this one, which features Don Opper again, as well as Nina Axelrod (from MOTEL HELL), Frances Bay (from IN THE MOUTH OF MADNESS) and, in his first film role, Leonardo Di Caprio. Kristine Peterson directs this tale of the Krites coming to Los Angeles. Any thoughts that they're going city-wide this time will be dashed once you realise the action is going to be restricted to an apartment building. It's not bad but the lower budget means it suffers in comparison to the first two. 

Extras include a Barry & Don Opper commentary, a new Budrewicz and Wain commentary and a making of featurette which lasts 27 minutes and includes screenwriter David J Schow but not director Peterson), plus the usual bits and pieces (trailer and image gallery).

Critters 4 (1992)

'Will they ever stop?' some viewers must have been thinking with the release of this fourth film, this time set on a space station, and making enthusiasts for crap sequels wonder quite why so many franchise part fours used the same idea (LEPRECHAUN 4, HELLRAISER 4). Don Opper and Terrance Mann are present and correct and this time we also get Brad Dourif and Angela Bassett as well as Anders Hove (SUBSPECIES and a couple of Lars Von Trier movies), Eric DaRe (from Twin Peaks) and Hammer star Martine Beswick's voice.

Extras include an archival commentary from Rupert Harvey, who produced the first film but also gets to direct this time around, and a new one from Budrewicz and Wain. There's also a making of featurette (22 minutes), trailer and image gallery.

CRITTERS: A FOUR COURSE FEAST! is out in a limited edition Blu-ray box set from Arrow on Monday 2nd December 2024

Watership Down (1978)

At last! Martin Rosen's stunning, touching and above all faithful adaptation of Richard Adams' novel gets the 4K treatment from the BFI.

You probably know the story by now - a bunch of rabbits leave their warren after one has a premonition of it being destroyed (which turns out to be true). They have a number of adventures in their quest to find a new home - the Watership Down of the title - and then have to defend it against the marvellous villain that is General Woundwort.

Richard Adams' novel made a huge splash when it was published in the mid 1970s. Nobody could decide on the target audience, though, and so Penguin published it in both adult and children (through their Puffin imprint) editions. Consequently for a lot of nine and ten year olds (myself and my friends included) it was our first taste of more adult-orientated fiction and we loved it. Kids went rabbit mad and when the film came out there was no question of us going to see it. 

In the excellent booklet that accompanies the extras Martin Rosen says he would have preferred the film to have not be awarded a 'U' certificate. Interestingly it's only recently that I've learned that a few people (and parents) felt traumatised by it. Certainly there was no outcry back in the day - we just all left the cinema with tears in our eyes because of how lovely that ending is, and, I suspect now watching it through older eyes, because of Angela Morley's score, rather than because of any 'scary violence'. In fact it was a relief to a lots of us kids at the time to see an animated film that that didn't portray animals in the 'Disney cute' style.

The BFI's 4K transfer is a wonder, and will be especially of interest to animation fans because it really allows you to see a level of detail in the compositions that was previously impossible. Extras include some ported over from previous releases - a 2005 commentary track from Martin Rosen (with Chris Gore), a 17 minute conversation with Rosen and editor Terry Rawlings, and 12 minutes of discussion with the animators ('Defining a Style'). There's a new commentary from academic animation scholars Catherine Lester and Sam Summers, 14 minutes of storyboard comparisons, a 28 minute Super 8 digest version, and, most fascinating of all, 3 minutes of home super 8mm footage from Arthur Humberstone of the animators at work. 

There's also a bunch of interesting 'odds and ends' short films including 'Bolly in a Space Adventure', a five minute cartoon from the psychedelic era. Do not watch unless you want the brief theme tune stuck in your head forever. There's also the creaky 'Once We Were Four' (nine minutes), Rabbits for Profit (15 minutes) and another creaky one -Cartoonland, Make Believer (17 minutes).

Finally, the set comes with a double-sided poster, four postcards, and an 80 page book that offers more fascinating insights into the making of the film and its release and reception. 

    Hey! I got to the end of this and didn't mention Bright Eyes. It wasn't quite the Brian Adams 'Everything I do' of 1978 but it was a song you couldn't move for for weeks back then. 

Martin Rosen's WATERSHIP DOWN is released by the BFI on 4K UHD and Blu-ray on Monday 25th November 2024 

Monster Summer (2024)

"Highly enjoyable horror adventure for all ages"

There's something strange going on in a small town on the island of Martha's Vineyard. Children are disappearing for a few hours and when they turn up again they seem to have been drained of all their youthful vitality. The disappearances have coincided with the arrival of black-clad Miss Halverson (Lorraine Braco) who rents a room from the mother of teenage Noah (Mason Thames). Soon Noah and his friends are convinced that she's a witch. But how to prove it? And what to do when they do? Can mysterious retired policeman Gene (Mel Gibson) help, or will he just make things worse?

MONSTER SUMMER is teenaged adventure horror done right. Director David Henrie exhibits the kind of lightness of touch, yet seriousness of approach that we used to see from Joe Dante, or even Steven Spielberg, with a confident and frequently inspired sense of visual storytelling that means you're never less than fully involved in the story.

The young leads are likeable and work well together, and while some films of this type can overdo the cultural references, dialogue mentioning NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD or THE TERMINATOR never feels forced. Mel Gibson as the retired policeman with a past is excellent, delivering a nuanced, touching and appealing performance, such that by the end when there's talk of vampires and werewolves you'll be wanting this disparate group to have another adventure. Surprisingly good. Here's a trailer:

MONSTER SUMMER is coming out from Signature Entertainment on Digital on Monday 25th November 2024