DVD Collectors Online

One Night with the King, a review by Hal

Title: One Night with the King
Year: 2006
Director: Michael O. Sajbel
Rating: PG
Length: 122 Min.
Video: Anamorphic Widescreen 1.78:1
Audio: English: Dolby Digital: 5.1
Subtitles: English, Spanish

Stars:
Tiffany Dupont
Luke Goss
John Rhys-Davies
John Noble
Tommy 'Tiny' Lister

Plot:
With lush cinematography, a mesmerizing score, and an all-star cast that includes Peter O'Toole, Omar Sharif and John Rhys-Davies, 'One Night With The King' is a sweeping epic about Hadassah, the young Jewish orphan who becomes the biblical Esther, Queen of Persia.

Born into poverty, Hadassah (Tiffany DuPont) grows up to become a beauty who catches the eye of the powerful King Xerxes -- and ultimately becomes his bride. But despite her position, Hadassah's life is in danger, as the state has decreed all Jews will be put to death. Defying warnings to remain silent, however, Hadassah struggles to save her people, even as she attempts to hide her heritage, in this exciting and inspiring story about courage, faith and destiny.

Extras:
Scene Access
Feature Trailers
Closed Captioned

Reminiscent of the lavish studio productions of the 1950s, this film was beautifully photographed, elegantly costumed and given a majestic musical score.  Tiffany Dupont, Luke Goss and James Callis give moving performances as they deal individually with revenge, duty, honor, love, loyalty and betrayal.  Since I have a soft spot for historical novels and have a particular interest in the history of Judaism, I was thoroughly satisfied with this one.  While Joan Collins and Richard Egan did a credible job in the 1960 version, Esther and the King, I enjoyed this version much more.

Rating:


(From One Night with the King on July 22nd, 2010)

Alucard, a review by addicted2dvd

Title: Alucard
Year: 2003
Director: John Johnson
Rating: NR
Length: 150 Min.
Video: Widescreen 1.33:1
Audio: English: Dolby Digital Stereo
Subtitles: N/A

Stars:
Jay F. Barber
Liam Smith
Rebecca Taylor
David Harscheid
Karthik Srinivasan

Plot:
A modern telling of Bram Stoker's classic!

Extras:
Scene Access

My Thoughts:
This is another movie from the Mortuary of Madness box set I got this past October. I went into this one with caution.... for two reasons. First it is in a box set of very low budget movies. Second it is a low budget film that is 2hrs. 30min. long! And that is a long time to sit through a low budget horror film. The picture quality of this movie is surprisingly good for such a cheap low budget boxset. As is the Audio. The story is interesting... but SLOW! Unfortunately every time it started to get good they decided to change the subject... going to another diary and such. I think the main thing that goes against this movie is the length. And the fact that they seemed to want to concentrate more on the dramatic story telling over the horror of the story.Which after a while got tiresome. So once again... I think the length of this movie is what hurt this movie more then anything else. They could have easily cut this movie in half... and we would have had a right good low budget modern telling of the story.



(From Weekend Movie Marathon: Unwatched DVDs on December 19th, 2009)

Tom's Buffy and Angel Marathon, a review by Tom

09. What's My Line Pt. 1 (1997-11-17)
Writer: Joss Whedon (Created By), Howard Gordon (Writer), Marti Noxon (Writer)
Director: David Solomon
Cast: Sarah Michelle Gellar (Buffy Summers), Nicholas Brendon (Xander Harris), Alyson Hannigan (Willow Rosenberg), Charisma Carpenter (Cordelia Chase), David Boreanaz (Angel), Anthony Stewart Head (Giles), Seth Green (Oz), James Marsters (Spike), Eric Saiet (Dalton), Kelly Connell (Norman Pfister), Bianca Lawson (Kendra), Saverio Guerra (Willy the Snitch), Juliet Landau (Drusilla), Armin Shimerman (Principal Snyder), Michael Rothhaar (Suitman), P. B. Hutton (Mrs. Kalish)

An episode I always liked. The introduction of Kendra and thus a second slayer (which paves the way for Faith ). Bringing Oz and Willow closer. I always felt that from this episode on, Buffy started its rise to greatness.

Rating:




10. What's My Line Pt. 2 (1997-11-24)
Writer: Joss Whedon (Created By), Marti Noxon (Writer)
Director: David Semel
Cast: Sarah Michelle Gellar (Buffy Summers), Nicholas Brendon (Xander Harris), Alyson Hannigan (Willow Rosenberg), Charisma Carpenter (Cordelia Chase), David Boreanaz (Angel), Anthony Stewart Head (Giles), Seth Green (Oz), Saverio Guerra (Willy the Snitch), Kelly Connell (Norman Pfister), Bianca Lawson (Kendra), James Marsters (Spike), Juliet Landau (Drusilla), Danny Strong (Hostage Kid)

This episode turns the table for Dru and Spike. Now she's the strong one, and he will be bound to a wheelchair for awhile.

Rating:

(From Tom's Buffy and Angel Marathon on February 14th, 2009)