Bad movies don't die - they just get DVD extras

Tag : Spandex Material

Just as there are fans of Xanadu , so there may conceivably be people who harbour fond memories of The Hudson Brothers Razzle Dazzle Show and they may be glad all 16 episodes have been released on DVD. Inthis 1974-75 children's show, taped in Toronto with such Canadianstalwarts as Ted Zeigler and Billy Van, brothers Bill, Mark andBrett Hudson sing and goof around for half an hour. The frenetic,unfunny material is excruciating to watch, more so because of thecanned laughter. Dock the show further points for co-opting thetitle of an earlier, much better Canadian children's show, Razzle Dazzle . (Zeigler himself had a better kids show in Montreal: Johnny Jellybean .) Bill Hudson was married in the late seventies to Goldie Hawn, aunion that produced Kate Hudson.
Careless (2007) is one of those quirky independent films where the dad'seccentric, the buddy-confidant cracks wise and the shaggy-dog plotis loopy but genial. Colin Hanks plays a mystery-bookstore employeewho finds a severed finger on his kitchen floor and, with the helpof his dad (Tony Shalhoub) and friend (Fran Kranz), won't restuntil he finds out where it came from. Rachel Blanchard is themysterious love interest.
The theatrical release of The Love Guru has occasioned the DVD release of So I Married an Axe Murderer (1993), a much straighter Mike Myers comedy in which his SanFrancisco character fears his new wife (Nancy Travis) may be aserial killer. The best part is Myers's second role as hischaracter's Scottish father, with an accent he later used for Shrek and the Austin Powers character Fat Bastard. But why is the DVDbilled as a "special edition" when there are no extras?
Futurama , the amusing but cancelled animated sitcom created by The Simpsons ' Matt Groening, lives on through made-for-video movies. In Futurama: The Beast with a Billion Backs , an alien creature voiced by David Cross has a yen for Earthlings.Extras include all the scenes from a 2003 Futurama video game, with Fry, the robot Bender and the other characterslooking odd in their semi-3-D form.
Twelfth Night (available through http://www.kochcan.com ) is John Dexter's 1969 British TV production of the cross-dressingShakespeare comedy. Joan Plowright plays both Viola (shipwreckedwoman poses as man) and Sebastian (her twin brother), a feat thatwould be impossible to pull off on the stage. Alec Guinness has adeft turn as the humiliated Malvolio, but wrote that he wasunsettled during the filming by a comment from visitor LaurenceOlivier, then married to Plowright: "Fascinating, old dear. I neverrealized before that Malvolio could be played as a bore."
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Extra! Extra!
Whatever you think of 10,000 BC , in which Roland ( The Day After Tomorrow ) Emmerich posits that woolly mammoths built the pyramids, there isno disputing the arduous on-location work (South Africa, NewZealand) put into this Apocalypto -like tale. But the vagaries of marketing mean you won't see themaking-of segments unless you watch the Blu-ray version or a thirdDVD disc available only at Best Buy. The first extra is a skippablepromo. The second has entertaining tips from visual-effectssupervisor Karen Goulekas on designing computer-generated effects.The hardest to pull off are hair and water. Cue the sabre-toothtiger in the watery pit.
Extra! Extra! Extra!
Persepolis , based on Marjane Satrapi's graphic novels, is a starkly animatedtale of Satrapi's life in and out of Iran before and after theayatollahs took over. She says she held out for an animated versionbecause if it had been live action, "right away it would be anethnic film. ... But drawings, with their abstract quality,emphasize the universal." There's an option of original Frenchsoundtrack or English version, where Gena Rowlands subs forDanielle Darrieux as the grandmother. Chiara Mastroianni, whovoices Marjane in both, was directed to sing Eye of the Tiger as badly as she could. "It doesn't happen very often in life thatyou can sing off-key and people will actually thank you for it."