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The Devil's Messenger, a review by addicted2dvd

Title: The Devil's Messenger
Year: 1962
Director: Herbert L. Strock
Rating: NR
Length: 71 Min.
Video: Full Frame 1.33:1
Audio: English: Dolby Digital: Mono
Subtitles: N/A

Stars:
Lon Chaney, Jr. [Lon Chaney]
Michael Hinn
Ralph Brown
John Crawford
Bert Johnson
Chalmers Goodlin

Plot:
Three macabre tales of terror are featured in this frightful thriller hosted by the incomparable "Mr. D" (Lon Chaney Jr.). A psychotic photographer is faced with a beauty that haunts his pictures and dreams in one tale. A scientist becomes obsessed with a frozen "Ice Princess" that leads to an unfortunate ending in another tale. Finally, a man fears his own death after a visit with a fortuneteller in the last of these horrifying stories.

Extras:
Scene Access

My Thoughts:
This is another anthology that came in that 100 movie boxset I recently got.  This one I enjoyed quite a bit.  Of course Lon Chaney, Jr. plays the devil. Sitting in hell checking everyone in... when Satanya (played by Karen Kadler) who is there because she committed suicide. He gives her the chance to earn her way out of hell by making her the Devil's Messenger. Her job is to deliver items to people that are about to do something to earn their way to hell. Which is the wraparound story for the three stories (deliveries that she has to make) in this movie. while I enjoyed each of the movies.... the first one was best by far. The image on this release is decent with some flaws. The audio is pretty good... except for the scenes in hell... which seemed to be recorded in a cave as there is a problem with echoing making it harder to understand what is being said. But over all I am definitely glad I got this one in the set.



(From Movies of the '60s Marathon on May 14th, 2010)

The Falcon And The Snowman, a review by KinkyCyborg

The Falcon And The Snowman



Title:The Falcon and the Snowman
Year: 1984
Director: John Schlesinger
Rating: R
Length: 131 Min.
Video: Anamorphic Widescreen 1.85:1
Audio: English: Dolby Digital: Dolby Surround
Subtitles: English, French

Stars:
Timothy Hutton
Sean Penn
Pat Hingle
Joyce Van Patten
Boyce Children

Plot:Extras:
Scene Access
Closed Captioned


Captivating true story about a young, privileged man who lets his idealistic views and discontent towards his government lead him to impulsively sell secrets to the KGB. Bringing his loose cannon, drugged out friend along for the ride, they quickly find themselves in way over their heads.

Second or third time watching this now, I've always liked this movie. Showing how the CIA would (and probably still does) coerce and manipulate foreign governments, it fascinates me how they feel it incumbent to stick their noses into everyone's business. For Timothy Hutton's character, Boyce, selling out his country was his way of protesting this political interference.

Hutton was great. He was thriving in the 80's as a hot young actor in demand but like many other young actors from that era, re: Brat Packers, his relevance has waned mostly, playing in mostly low budget straight to video movies now, although he has seen a bit of a resurgence in his new TV series Leverage.

Now Sean Penn on the other hand who, in my opinion, gave his best ever performance in this movie despite his young age, was giving us a taste of things to come in his brilliant, if not turbulent career. Daulton Lee was immortalized by Penn's role as the shifty, fast talking, drug dealing spy wannabe. Dealing in espionage which already breeds paranoia, his constant cocaine and heroin use just compounded his troubles and brought him precariously close to being terminated. Penn is masterful in portraying troubled, desperate men and this was a grand performance.

Great movie. This should be mandatory in anyone's collection!

KC

Rating:

(From KinkyCyborg's Random Reviews 2010 on November 21st, 2010)

Tom's TV Pilots marathon, a review by Tom

Kujibiki Unbalance: The Collection (2006/Japan) IMDb | Wikipedia Anime Works (United States) Length: 375 min. Video: Anamorphic Widescreen 1.78 Audio: English: Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo, Japanese: Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo Subtitles: Commentary, English

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Plot:
Chihiro has always had rotten luck in life. But at the prestigious Rikkyouin Academy, where everything is decided by drawn lot, or kujibiki, he finds his luck changing when he draws the lot for student council president. He and his harem of student council candidates undergo a year-long, impossible apprenticeship under the current ruling body, which happens to be led by one of Chihiro's childhood friends. The road to success is filled with zany misadventures, innocent romances, and a wild humor that is sure to please.

Each disc includes an episode of Genshiken!


Kujibiki Unbalance

Writer: Shimoku Kio (Original Material By), Michiko Yokote (Screenwriter)
Director: Tsutomu Mizushima
Cast: Fujiko Takimoto (Chihiro Enomoto (voice)), Ai Nonaka (Tokino Akiyama (voice)), Ami Koshimizu (Ritsuko K Kettenkrad (voice)), Kumiko Nishihara (Renko Kamishakujii (voice)), Kazuko Kojima (Koyuki Asagiri (voice)), Yukana (Kasumi Kisaragi (voice)), Reiko Takagi (Risa Humvee (voice)), Masayo Kurata (Komaki Asagiri (voice)), Yuko Goto (Kaoruko Yamada (voice)), Yuko Sasamoto (Shinobu Enomoto (voice)), Kayo Sakata (Kujibiki Commission Chairwoman (voice)), Eri Nakao (Kujibiki Commission Member (voice)), Nobuyuki Hiyama (Harunobu Madarame (voice, uncredited)), Kaori Mizuhashi (Chika Ogiue (voice, uncredited))

Kujibiki Unbalance was originally a show-within-a-show on Genshiken. A really over-the-top one at that. Then they made a real anime out of it. Though this is more like an reimagining. Strangely, it would probably have been better, if they made a straight-forward adaption of it.
I mainly bought this this, because it includes bonus episodes for Genshiken, which bridge the first and second season of that series.

Rating:

(From Tom's TV Pilots marathon on June 5th, 2012)