DVD Collectors Online

The Detective, a review by KinkyCyborg

Title:The Detective
Year: 1968
Director: Gordon Douglas
Rating: NR
Length: 114 Min.
Video: Anamorphic Widescreen 2.35:1
Audio: English: Dolby Digital: 2-Channel Stereo, English: Dolby Digital: Mono, Spanish: Dolby Digital: Mono, French: Dolby Digital: Mono
Subtitles: English, Spanish

Stars:
Frank Sinatra
Lee Remick
Ralph Meeker
Jack Klugman
Horace McMahon

Plot:
When the son of a politically influential man is brutally murdered, thick-skinned detective Joe Leland (Frank Sinatra) is assigned to the case. His job becomes even more challenging when he must convince the entire police department to see past the victim's sexuality. After the dead man's roommate is convicted, and Leland moves on to his next case, it appears as though the two cases are linked and the wrong man may have been penalized. With an all-star cast that includes Lee Remick, Tony Musante and Jack Klugman, THE DETECTIVE is one of Sinatra's most gritty and powerful films.

Extras:
Scene Access
Feature Trailers
Closed Captioned


I've never particularly liked Frank Sinatra.... his music or his acting, with perhaps one exception, Von Ryan's Express which I really enjoyed him in. Ocean's 11 I liked but not because of anything to do with his performance. Everything I've ever seen or read about the man leads me to believe he was the most arrogant celebrity of his time.

Surprising subject matter for The Detective considering the year this was made which made it an interesting watch, although it painfully dragged at times. Sinatra looked bored throughout the film and showed absolutely no range of emotion at all. Jacqueline Bisset is stunning... never seen her with short cropped hair before and daddy likes! Lee Remick on the other hand looked like a creepy Stepford Wife... not my cup of tea. Bit parts for Robert Duvall and Jack Klugman.


Was ok, but one watch is enough.

KC


Rating:

(From KinkyCyborg's Random Reviews 2010 on July 10th, 2010)

Simpatico, a review by Rich

Simpatico



Vincent (NICK NOLTE) and Lyle (JEFF BRIDGES) were once the best of friends - training thoroughbred horses in 1970's California, tearing up the highway in a '58 Buick, spending nights around a campfire, dreaming about the future. Seduced by the highstakes world of horseracing, they plan the perfect scam. In the process, they destroy an innocent man's life and the friendship of a lifetime.
Twenty years later, Carter is the multi-millionaire owner of a Kentucky horse farm while Vinnie is a down-and-out deluded barfly living on the edge in California. The time has come, in Vinnie's mind, to settle the score.
Tricking Carter into travelling back to California, Vinnie sets off for Kentucky to ruin Carter and his wife (SHARON STONE) and offer restitution to Simms (ALBERT FINNEY), the man whose life was destroyed all those many years ago.

Very disjointed, contrived and purposeless film, despite an enviable cast list, you feel little sympathy for the characters and it all feels very awkward. The leads have little chemistry together and are generally unconvincing, the plot becomes ludicrous as it searches for entertainment, and the most unfulfilling ending imaginable is coughed up.
Perhaps the only interesting part of the film is watching Nolte clean himself up in a suit, and Bridges's decline to drink and a vest, a real role reversal.
Keeners role as the messenger in particular was unbelievable, seriously is anyone really that stupid?
I read this was adapted from a play, one can only be grateful we were not subjected to this on a stage!
   

**Catherine Keener mini-marathon


(From Riches Random Reviews on August 30th, 2009)

"Battlestar Galactica" Marathon (1978-2009), a review by DJ Doena

Synopsis: The Cylons somehow always know the position of the fleet and follows it mercilessly. 33 minutes after the fleet has arrived at the new jump coordinates a Cylon fleet arrives also and starts to attack. The fleet has just commenced its 237th jump and the pilots and the crew of the Galactica have been awake for more than 5 days straight without relieve or pause. They have to put an end to this or they will make one final, deadly mistake.
Meanwhile another Number Eight (numerical designation of human copies that look like Boomer) pretends to have come back to Caprica to get Karl "Helo" Agathon out of there.

My Opinion: This was a great start to the show because you are thrown right in. One doesn't know how much time lay between their jump over the "red line" and the first time the Cylons found them again but it can't have been much. And then we see them already 5 days into this 33 minutes rhythm, all exhausted and on duty for over 130 hours and no hope of release except death. It was only the first of many hard situations to come but it showed directly that this won't be an easy journey.

Synopsis: When Boomer (a Cylon who doesn't know she is one) regains consciousness she finds herself soaking wet and she also has a plastic explosive plus a detonator in her hands. When she secretly brings it back she discovers that 6 more are missing from an arms locker. Soon after a huge explosion erupts in Galactica and 60% of the water tanks are emptied into space. If the fleet doesn't find a new water source it won't survive.

My Opinion: This was also a good episode, I liked it how Boomer struggled with herself, how she tried to override her Cylon programming without even knowing that it's there. I also liked it how both Adama and Roslin didn't really like the ceremonial pomp but both did it to make the other one feel better. I also took notice of Alex "Crashdown" Quartararo for the first time, because now I know his actor Sam Witwer from the eight season of Smallville.

Synopsis: They have found water, but in its liquid form it is to salty to be used, but there are also huge masses of frozen fresh water. It will be hard and dangerous work to mine that water and Apollo offers freedom points for the men on the prison ship if they are willing to help. But the prisoners stand united behind former terrorist Tom Zarek who uses the situation to take hostages and demands elections.

My Opinion: While I liked to see the classic BSG alumni Richard Hatch (Apollo in classic BSG), I never cared much for Tom Zarek or his "mission". At no time this character was somehow likeable, he's simply a bad guy who happens to be human. This was also the first episode that Starbuck becomes an all-purpose Swiss knife (Is that a pleonasm?) because otherwise there would be no reason why she would lead the marines to rescue the hostages and it's also her who carries the sniper rifle. But I am not mad about this, because it gives her more screen time.

But I really love this quote from Adama: "There's a reason you separate military and the police. One fights the enemies of the state, the other serves and protects the people. When the military becomes both, then the enemies of the state tend to become the people."

Synopsis: An accident on the landing deck occurs which kills twelve Viper pilots and injures seven more. Adama gives Starbuck the task of training pilots to become Viper pilots since Starbuck had been an instructor before the war. What Adama doesn't know is that Starbuck passed Adama's son Zek in basic flight even though he should have failed because she was engaged to him. Soon after he died in his plane.

My Opinion: Another thing I like about this show: Past events are rarely forgotten, no pushing of the reset button after the episode has ended. And also the occasional flashback to a pre-war Caprica. This episode also introduces two new pilots: Brendan "Hot Dog" Costanza and Louanne "Kat" Katraine and the latter one will become a worthy challenger of Starbuck's and she will call Starbuck out when no one else dares to. Starbuck needs that on occasion and that's why I like Kat.

(From "Battlestar Galactica" Marathon (1978-2009) on September 1st, 2009)