THE SHINING (1980) (4K UltraHD Review)

THE SHINING (1980) 

Label: Warner Bros. Home Entertainment
Region Code: Region Free (4K), A (Blu-ray) 
Duration: 144 Minutes
Dating: R
Audio: English DTS-HD MA 5.1 with Optional english Subtitles
Video: 2160p UltraHD Widescreen (1.78:1), 1080p HD Widescreen (1.78:1) 
Director: Stanley Kubrick
Cast: Jack Nicholson, Shelley Duvall, Scatman Crothers, Danny Lloyd 

I was eleven years-old the first time I watched The Shining on late-night cable, I remember it well, it was a chilly winter's night in Upstate New York and I was staying at my friend Barry McDonald's house. I use to love staying at his place because his folks had satellite TV with all the cool channels, and his parents love to watch semi-raunchy comedies, which I thought was cool. As the night bore on his folks would usually go off to their room and leave us alone watching Terminator or something of that ilk, and then Barry would either fall asleep on the floor or retire to his room for the night. I would stay up late into the wee-hours to watch scary movies, and one night I tuned into something called The Shining, I was transfixed by the birds-eye view of a yellow VW driving up a winding road, and it scared me something terrible. It's the tale of a father who moves his suffering wife and young son to a mountaintop resort, the grand Overlook Hotel, to be the caretaker for the place while it's closed down for the five-months of winter during the off-season.

While there the aspiring author and recovering alcoholic begins to lose his grip on reality, succumbing to seemingly supernatural forces that inhabit the Overlook, forces that are pushing him to ax-murder his whole family, including his supernaturally attuned son Danny, who has something called "the shining", a psychic link of a sort that also allows him to tap into the supernatural vibes of people and places. 

This was probably the first film I ever watched where I was acutely aware of the movement of the camera, an early adopter of the Steadicam, which allowed for gorgeous disembodied and fluid camera movements that give the film an eerie atmosphere, especially when combined with the thrum and drone of the dissonant score. 

Something I've caught onto in the years since first watching this is that Nicholson's character Jack Torrance was already a bit of nutter from the opening scenes of the film, or there's just something about Nicholson's manically arched eyebrows that broadcast crazy, or maybe it's a bit of both. The dad who at one point dislocated his young son's shoulder out of anger has since sworn off the sauce, and sees the secluded five-month caretaker job as a way to keep dry and work on his new novel, but seclusion and hallucinations, supernatural or otherwise, begin to chip away at his sanity, with his family's every action beginning to grate on his frayed nerves until he erupts into an unforgettable ax-wielding kill-spree!

The cast here is fantastic, and if you have ever read or watched any interviews with the cast and crew Kubrick really put them through the wringer, with legendary amounts of shooting the same scene again and again, playing psychological games that chipped away at the sanity of poor Shelly Duval to keep her in a constant state of hysteria, literally on the verge of a nervous breakdown. Even the lovable Scatman Crothers (Deadly Eyes) was not immune to the director's actor brow-beating, having to do so many takes it nearly brought him to tears! Was it worth it, it must have been, because the end result is a technical marvel of a dread-filled film with a core cast of characters who drive the film to the delirious heights of fright.

Young Danny Torrance as played by Danny Lloyd always gave me a young Corey Feldman (The Goonies) vibe without the comedic slant, he's really terrific here playing against both Duval and Nicholson, and even in his early scenes with the cook played by Scatman Crothers, whose character also has "the shining". The kid has a great range of emotion, but doesn't overplay anything, the scenes of him enthralled in terror - which are many - are all well-done, it's a shame he didn't go onto do more in film. Duval's character use to irk me quite a bit, coming off as a simple-minded victim of domestic abuse, but in the end she comes through with an inner-strength that turns me around on her character. As stated before Nicholson is in top demented form here, when I was a kid I though it was the Overlook that drove him mad, but when I watch it now he just seems like a bomb with the fuse already lit from the opening scenes, which combined with alcoholism, cabin fever, and a malevolent supernatural forces, are a recipe for psycho-thriller terror.

This of-course is based on Stephen King's blockbuster novel of the same name, and it's directed by a Kubrick who was at the top of his game, but the finished film was less than pleasing to the author who compared the film to a "big, beautiful Cadillac with no engine inside it”, continuing to disparage it for years in the press and interviews which sort of drove me mental, how could he not think this was a masterpiece? Looking back at it now and having read the novel I can see where the creator is coming from, the character of a good but struggling alcoholic father driven to terrible deeds by a malevolent force is lost in Kubrick's film. That said, if you've seen the TV mini-series version of the story directed by Mick Garris (Sleepwalkers), which is spot-on faithful to King's novel, killer CGI topiary and all, you will known that truer to the source does not necessarily mean better. Kubrick made the superior film (sorry Mick), not just a superior King adaptation but one of the best horror film's ever made in my humble opinion.  

Audio/Video: Stanley Kubrick's The Shining (1980) arrives on 4K UltraHD from Warner Bros. with a new 4K scan from the original camera negative, slightly cropped from the original 1.85:1 widescreen to a widescreen TV friendly 1.78:1, which I am sure is gonna be controversial, but I personally found it fine all things considered, though you do lose some very minor information on the edges of the frame. Re-framing aside the image looks superb, with a healthy amount of grain throughout, which also allows for rich texturing and fine detail to shine through in 4K! Colors looks natural and true, the HDR color-grading allowing for deep hues and contrast and clarity are very pleasing. The blacks are deep and inky with superior shadow detail throughout. Right from the opening opening helicopter shots of the Torrence's yellow VW Bug driving up the winding sidewinder road the improvement is readily noticeable. 

Audio comes by way of an English DTS-HD Ma 5.1 with optional English subtitles. Again, like the Pan's Labyrinth 4K UHD I am a bit disappointed we do not get a Atmos upgrade, but the DTS is nothing short of excellent. Notably we still do not get the original mono audio mix, which n this day and age of 4K with it's vast storage is a damn shame, but like I said, the audio as presented with the DTS os solid, and not something to worry too much about. 

Extras on the 4K disc is limited to the audio commentary by steadicam inventor Garrett Brown and Kubrick biographer John Baxter. Onto the Blu-ray we get nearly all the vintage extras from Warner's 2007 Blu-ray, with the exception of the original fullframe trailer for some strange reason. The Blu-ray also offers the new 4K scan of the film in 1080p HD without the benefit of the HDR re-grading, which is cool, I sort of hate it when we just get a recycled Blu-ray from a past release with the 4K releases.

The 2-disc release arrives in a black eco-case with a one-sided sleeve of artwork featuring a new illustration that I liked very much, and there's a slipcover containing the same artwork. Inside there's a digital redemption code for 4K digital copy of the film. Note, make sure to check out the cool variant artwork on the Best Buy Exclusive Steelbook exclusive, it's pretty darn cool, I might double-dip to have that on my shelf, also hoping we see a Steelbook with the original Saul Bass artwork at some point.

Best Buy Exclusive Steelbook edition  

Special Features: 
- Commentary by Steadicam inventor Garrett Brown and Kubrick biographer John Baxter 
- The Making of The Shining (35 Mins) *
- View from the Overlook: Crafting The Shining (26 Mins) *
- Wendy Carlos, Composer (8 Mins) *
- The Visions of Stanley Kubrick (17 Mins) *
* Blu-ray Extra Only 

The new 4K UltraHD of Stanley Kubrick's The Shining looks phenomenal, lack of new extras, Atmos or the original mono is absolutely a downer, but not even close to a deal-breaker. The improved picture quality on this is outstanding, if you're a fan of this supernatural psycho-thriller you need this release in your life, highly recommended! 

WOLF (1994) (Indicator Blu-ray Review)

WOLF (1994) 

Label: Powerhouse Films/Indicator Series
Duration: 125 Minutes 
Rating: BBFC cert: 15 
Region Code: Region-Free 
Audio: English LPCM Stereo 2.0. English DTS-HD MA Surround 5.1 with Optional English Subtitles 
Video: 1080p HD Widescreen (1.85:1)
Director: Mike Nichols
Cast: Jack Nicholson, Michelle Pfeiffer, James Spader, Kate Nelligan, Christopher Plummer

Director Mike Nichols’ (Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?) directed this 90's take on the werewolf genre starring Jack Nicholson (Chinatown) as Will Randall, a buttoned-down book editor turned lycanthropic menace is a fun, star-studded  genre mash-up. We have the always magnetic Nicholson starting out as an aging editor, but when he encounter's an injured wolf on a snowy Vermont road in the middle of the night it ends with a bite on his hand under the full moon. Shortly afterward the area around the wound begins to strangely sprout hair, his decrepit vision improves and the old-timer has a renewed zest for life, in addition to a keen sense of smell and hearing. His amplified sense of smell catches one of his fact checkers at the publishing house off guard when he smells vodka on the man's breath and makes comment of it, bewildering the man. 

James Spader (Jack's Back) shows up as Will's sycophant protégé, Stewart Swinton, who secretly plots against his mentor with new boss billionaire Raymond Alden (Christopher Plummer, Dreamscape) to usurp Will's position at the publishing house. Along the way Will discovers his wife Charlotte (Kate Nelligan, Dracula) is having a an affair with his younger protege, that little bastard steals not just his job but the guy's wife, that motherfucker. It's a fun little tale of corporate greed and the cutthroat ways of the publishing world, a story that on it's own would have been engaging even  before you add the element of lycanthropy to the mix. As the Nicholson's character begins to wolf-out he gets a new taste for life and makes a play to reclaim his throne at the publishing house, along the way striking up a friendship/relationship with Alden's smoking-hot daughter Michelle Pfeiffer (Into the Night), who at first sees him as just a sympathetic old man but as he begins to seemingly regress in age and become more spry something more develops between them, which irks her billionaire father to the delight of Nicholson's character.

As I have already said, the cutthroat world of NYC publishing and the story of greedy ladder-climbing alone would make this an interesting movie, with Nicholson's character being aided in part by his loyal secretary Mary (Eileen Atkins) and co-worker Roy (David Hyde Pierce of TV's Frasier) who assist him ably and enthusiastically when the worm-turns after his sudden demotion, just the dramatic movie is pretty great and the star-studded cast is a fun watch. plus it's rather funny in a sly sort of way, not a comedy, but legitimately funny, as showcased by a scene of Nicholson pissing on a competitors leg in at the urinal, marking his territory. 

Onto the good stuff, the way the werewolf-ening happens is more downplayed than your average werewolf film, and it's worth noting no one says the word werewolf throughout the whole movie, it's more about being possessed by the spirit of the animal. Thankfully we do get some werewolf transformations courtesy of a man who knows a thing or three about werewolves, make-up effects legend Rick Baker (An American Werewolf in London), transformations which don't end in full-on hairy werewolves, but instead shaggy-faced men with sharp teeth and animal-eyes and claws. The effect is great, particularly on Nicholson who looks fearsome towards the end. Spader's character also gets in on the transformation but his is not quite up to snuff in my opinion, he has a bit of a pretty-boy face and the wolf-mane just doesn't frame him the same way as Nicholson, but what he lacks in fearsome visage he makes up for in straight-up meanness, stabbing Nicholson with a pitchfork and attempting to rape a frog-legged Pfeiffer. The wolf versus wolf battle at the end wasn't too bad at all, it holds up way better than what we saw with Universal's digital-monstrosity The Wolfman (2010)... now there's a sad story about Rick Baker working on a film that went wrong, through no fault of his own, but that's a different movie, so let's move on.

Watching Wolf this time around I enjoyed it more than I ever have before, when I caught it in the cinema during it's initial release I think the way younger me was looking for a more traditional werewolf flick, like what I grew up with in the 80's,  and this one doesn't quite go there. However, in a lot of ways this is the old familiar story of a man cursed by a bite, but it nicely mixes in a story about 90's greed culture that holds up as do the special effects.     

Audio/Video: Wolf (1994) arrives on Blu-ray from the UK's Indicator framed in 1.85:1 widescreen on a single-disc region-free Blu-ray. I have the Region A Blu-ray from 2009 and couldn't detect an appreciable difference between the transfers aside from noting that skin tones look more natural to me on the Indicator release. The image is sharp and detailed, black levels look great, colors are nicely saturated, and there's some good fine detail to the image, with the Rick Baker make-up effects coming through strong. Audio on the disc includes both English LPCM Stereo 2.0 and English DTS-HD MA Surround 5.1 with Optional English subtitles. The surround option offers up some nice us of the surrounds, it's crisp and well-balanced, perhaps a bit artificial in the mix, but the Ennio Morricone score sounds wonderful, but I preferred the stereo mix on this one. 

Onto the extras, the US release was bare bones so it's nice to get some extras on the Indicator release, beginning with a brand new 55-min making of doc with SFX legend Rick Baker, screenwriter Wesley Strick and producer Douglas Wick, a good watch, detailing the genesis of the project, writing the script, creating the special effects and working with Mike Nichols and Jack Nicholson. There's also about 25 minutes of archival interviews with the cast and crew that seem like they were done for an EPK at the time f the film's release. Additionally we get a few minutes of b-roll footage, these include shots of Pfeiffer in a vehicle doing a poor man's process shot and of Nichols directing scenes, the disc is finished up with the theatrical trailer and an image gallery. 

Sadly we don't have any new interviews with the main cast, I would have loved to hear from Nicholson, Pfeiffer and Spader. I've always heard of an alternate ending and deleted scenes for this one, but it's just not here, I'm assuming Indicator made the effort to find as much as they could but the elements just were not available and the stars were not available, or did not care, to take part in any new interviews, which is too bad, but at least we get some new extras. 

Packaging extras include a 20-page booklet with cast and crew info, notes about the transfer, an appreciation of the film by author Brad Stevens, a vintage promotional interview with Director Mike Nichols, and vintage interview excerpts from producer Douglas Wick, plus selected critical response from the time of the movie's original release in the cinema. 

Special Features: 
- The Beast Inside: Creating ‘Wolf: a new documentary on the making of the film with new interviews from SFX legend Rick Baker, screenwriter Wesley Strick and producer Douglas Wick (55 min) HD 
- Never-before-seen archival interviews with actors Michelle Pfeiffer (1 min), James Spader (2 min) and Kate Nelligan (2 min)
- Never-before-seen archival interviews with director Mike Nichols (8 min), producer Douglas Wick (3 min) and writer Jim Harrison (3 min)
- Never-before-seen archival interviews with SFX maestro Rick Baker (2 min) and production designer Bo Welch (3 min)
- B-roll footage (4 min)
- Original Theatrical Trailer (2 min) HD (Fullframe)
- Image gallery: on-set and promotional photography (24 images) HD 
- Limited edition exclusive booklet with a new essay by Brad Stevens, an overview of contemporary critical responses, and historic articles on the film 
- Limited Blu-ray Edition of 3,000 copies 

Wolf (1994) is a fun watch with a the star-studded cast, Nicholson's transformation from buttoned-down book editor to wolfed out predator makes for good entertainment, as does James Spader doing what he does best as the slimy younger guy looking to steal Nicholson's thunder, and truth be told he steals the show several times throughout. Add to that mixture some hairy werewolf action and you have a truly entertaining slice of lycanthropic-cinema, enhanced by the special effects work of Rick Baker, it'd be hard not too have a good time with it, just don't expect a bloodbath, this was directed by Mike Nichols (The Graduate) after all - he's was a classy guy.   

Blu-ray Review: The Terror (1963)

THE TERROR (1963)
[Blu-ray + DVD Combo]

Label: HD Cinema Classics
Region: [Blu-ray] Region FREE [DVD] 0 NTSC
Rating: R
Duration: 79 mins
Video: 1080p 1.78:1 Anamorphic Widescreen
Audio: English Dolby Digital 2.0 and 5.1 with Spanish Subtitles
Director: Roger Corman (Jack Nicholson, Francis Ford Coppola, Jack Hill, Monte Hellman, uncredited)
Cast: Boris Karloff, Jack Nicholson, Dick Miller, Dorothy Neuman, Sandra Knight
Tagline: A New Classic of Horror Comes to the Screen!

Film: Roger Corman's The Terror is set in France in 1806. Lt. Andre Duvalier (Jack Nicholson) is a soldier in Napoleon's army who's become separated from his regiment, he awakens on a beach where he encounters a hauntingly beautiful woman named Helena (Sandra Knight) whom walks into the surf and disappears. Thinking she must have been overcome by the waves Duvalier follows her in and nearly drowns himself all the while being dive bombed from above by a vicious hawk. Losing consciousness he awakens (again) inside the villa of Katrina (Dorothy Neumann), an old witchy woman. He inquires if she knows of the young woman and she replies that he must have imagined her during his near fatal drowning.

Undeterred Andre further searches for the woman through the forest until he comes to the castle of Baron Von Leppe (Boris Karloff, Frankenstein) who reluctantly allows Andre to enter after he flashes his Napoleonic credentials. As if Nicholson and Karloff weren't enough for a ticket to this film legendary b-movie character actor Dick Miller (Bucket of Blood, Gremlins) also appears as the Baron's major domo. Inside the castle Andre happen upon a portrait of a woman whom bares an uncanny resemblance to the mysterious woman he seeks. The Baron informs him that he is mistaken as the woman in the portrait, his wife, died twenty years prior. Andre is obsessed with the young woman and continues to search for the woman's identity despite everyone's insistence that she is merely a figment of his distressed mind. He continues to encounter her but starts to wonder if he has gone mad, is she an apparition, a restless spirit, who is she really? And how does the witch Katrina figure into the story?

The acting is suitably melodramatic with pre-New Hollywood Nicholson giving a decent performance, he's definitely charming but not nearly French, fun stuff. Karloff seems a bit lost at times, he gives it a good go though but it's obvious this is just another paying gig. While the film is uneven, it's a wonder that the film is as watchable as it is given it's strange production, the sets are fantastic stuff. The towering Gothic castle, a macabre cemetery steeped in fog, creepy crypts and eerie red, green and blue lighting really go a long way towards creating an entertaining and atmosphere spookfest. It's a bit slow at times but the film's final 15 minutes are wonderfully twisted and memorable. 

The legend of this film holds that once wrapping on The Raven, which starred Boris Karloff as Dr. Scarabus, Corman immediately went into production on The Terror utilizing sets from The Raven and A Haunted Place. He tossed Karloff a few extra bucks to remain on for four additional days of shooting. While Corman shot the bulk of the film with Karloff in four days the film's production went on for nine more months, making it one of the longest Corman shoots ever I would imagine. In those nine months Corman left it to a handful of aspiring directors on staff to shoot second unit, and they're notable names, too. They included star Jack Nicholson who would go onto direct the Going South among others, Francis Ford Coppola  (The Godfather)who that same year would direct Dementia 13 and reportedly shot for 11 days only get 10 minutes of footage in this film, Jack Hill (Spider Baby, Coffy) and Monte Hellman (Two Lane Blacktop). Not too shabby.  

DVD: The film gets a AVC encoded 1.78:1 widescreen transfer in glorious 1080p HD. More so than either the Poor Pretty Eddie or Dementia 13 Blu-rays from HD Cinema Classics I thoroughly enjoyed the 1080p bump here. Perhaps because this film has for so long languished in the public domain that to see a nice HD presentation with vibrant colors, nice deep blacks and digitally restored has breathed new life into a film I've seen numerous times but never so eye popping as this. So, it looks pretty great, better than we've ever seen it on the home entertainment front, but there is that usual HD Cinema Classics application of DNR which removes the film grain which in turn smears the fine detail and textures, particularly in the facial features but I found the plasticine tendencies less bothersome here than with previous HDCC Blu's. Audio option include both Dolby Digital 5.1 and 2.0 Mono with optional Spanish subtitles. The 5.1 opens it up a bit but only minimally, the 2.0 is thin but adequate for what it is. None of the HDCC Blu's I've reviewed feature lossless audio, c'mon folks it's 2011 let's get with it. Special features are limited to a trailer and a digital restoration trailer. That's a bummer but to see the film given a 1080p spit shine is pretty great, too.

Special Features:

- Movie Trailer (1:15) 1080p
- Before and After Restoration Demo (1:06) 1080p
- DVD of the film with same special features in SD.

Verdict: In years past I've not found myself particularly enamored with this film, no doubt the lacklustre presentations we've seen haven't exactly aided the film's reputation. HD Cinema Classics have given us a very attractive 1080p presentation of the film that enhanced my viewing experience, it's like watching it again for the first time. The Terror while not great is quite an entertaining Gothic melodrama from the master of b-movie cinema with decent performances from a pre-New Hollywood Nicholson and late-era Karloff. Neither are at their peak but this Blu-ray comes recommended, it's a definte good time. 3.5 outta 5