DVD Collectors Online

The Expendables, a review by dfmorgan

The Expendables

Year: 2010
Director: Sylvester Stallone
Cast: Sylvester Stallone, Jason Statham, Jet Li
Overview: SYLVESTER STALLONE stars as Barney Ross, leader of The Expendables, a tight-knit team of skilled combat vets turned mercenaries. Hired by a powerful cover operator, the team jets off to a small South American country to overthrow a ruthless dictator.

Once there, they find themselves caught in a deadly web of deceit and betrayal. Using every weapon at their disposal, they set out to save the innocent and punish the guilty in this blistering action-packed thriller.

Watched: 8th. Oct 2011
My Thoughts: A very enjoyable action film. Usual park your brain on the side table fare and just let your eyes and ears take everything in.

My Rating: A fun and enjoyable 3



(From Dave's DVD/Blu-ray Reviews on October 9th, 2011)

Fantasia, a review by addicted2dvd

Fantasia (1940/United States) Trailer | Walt Disney Studios Home Entertainment, Buena Vista Home Entertainment (United States) Director: Toccata and Fugue in D MinorSamuel Armstrong, The Nutcracker SuiteSamuel Armstrong, The Sorcerer's ApprenticeJames Algar, Rite of SpringBill Roberts, Paul Satterfield, The Pastoral SymphonyHamilton Luske, Jim Handley, Ford Beebe, Dance of the HoursT. Hee, Norman Ferguson [Norm Ferguson], Ave MariaWilfred Jackson Writing: Toccata and Fugue in D MinorLee Blair (Story By), Elmer Plummer (Story By), Phil Dike (Story By), The Nutcracker SuiteSylvia Moberly-Holland (Story By), Norman Wright (Story By), Albert Heath (Story By), Bianca Majolie (Story By), Graham Heid (Story By), The Sorcerer's ApprenticePerce Pearce [Perc Pearce] (Story By), Carl Fallberg (Story By), Rite of SpringWilliam Martin (Story By), Leo Thiele (Story By), Robert Sterner (Story By), John Fraser McLeish (Story By), The Pastoral SymphonyOtto Englander (Story By), Webb Smith (Story By), Erdman Penner (Story By), Joseph Sabo (Story By), Bill Peet [Bill Peed] (Story By), George Stallings (Story By), Ave MariaCampbell Grant (Story By), Arthur Heinemann (Story By), Phil Dike (Story By) Length: 124 min. Video: Full Frame 1.33:1 Audio: English: DTS-HD Master Audio: 7.1, French: Dolby Digital: 5.1, Spanish: Dolby Digital: 5.1, Commentary: Dolby Digital: 2-Channel Stereo, Commentary: Dolby Digital: 2-Channel Stereo, Commentary: Dolby Digital: 2-Channel Stereo Subtitles: English, French, Spanish, Commentary

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Stars:
Leopold Stokowski as Conductor
The Philadelphia Orchestra as Music as Played
Deems Taylor as Narrative Introductions
Ave MariaJulietta Novis as Soloist (voice)

Plot:Extras:

• Scene Access
• Audio Commentary
• Bonus Trailers
• Featurettes
• Gallery
• DisneyView

I have seen bits and pieces of this one before. But I think that this is the first time I seen the whole film. I did find it enjoyable. Some segments more then others. My favorite segment has to be "The Sourcer's Apprentice," At least for me one big downfall of this film has to be the narrarator. He just talked too much when introducing the segments. He should have announced the segments without telling us what we were about to see. So the film is entertaining enough... but could have been better.



(From 2018 Challenge: Box Office TOP 100 FILMS OF ALL-TIME (Domestic Gross) on April 11th, 2018)

I Love Lucy: The Complete Series, a review by addicted2dvd

Season Discs:
- Flubs
On every disc of the set that contains episodes they have this feature. The bulk of the episodes was recorded live in front of an audience. Because of this some mistakes made it to air. This feature points out many of these mistakes. It is a fun extra. One of my favorites... and one I felt I had to watch on every disc.
- Lost Scenes
- Deleted Scenes
- Featurettes
- Original Series Opening
- Original Animated Sequences
- Script Excerpts
- Production Notes
- Lucy Radio Series: My Favorite Husband (Several Episodes)
- Guest Cast Info
- Promotional Spots
- Original Cast Commercials
- Desilu / Westinghouse Sponsor Presentation
- Audio Commentary on episode Lucy and Superman, Lucy does the Tango & Country Club Dance

Bonus Disc
- Colorized version of "Lucy Goes to Scotland"
pretty obvious what this is. They colorized an episode from season 5 for some reason
- I Love Lucy:  The Movie
In 1953 with the TV show being so successful, Desilu decided to create a theatrical movie by stitching together three episodes from the first season (The Benefit, Breaking the Lease, and The Ballet.)  Some extra material was filmed to join the episodes together and an intro was created. The movie was never released, since studio execs thought it would hurt the box office results of Lucy and Desi's film The Long, Long, Trailer, which was in release at the time.  Shelved, the movie was forgotten until it was discovered 50 year later.
- A three minute Kinetescope excerpt from The Ed Wynn show
The first time Desi and Lucy appeared on TV together was as guests on The Ed Wynn show  in 1949.
- Phillip Morris introduction to First Episode
The disc concludes with the Phillip Morris introduction, by John Stephenson on the set of the show, to the first episode of I Love Lucy.


The Packaging:
The first thing you notice about this set is how it is packaged. Which while it is a fun thing... you don't feel too confident that the disc themselves are safe the way they are stored. Being in a multiple disc cardboard envelope I worry about the possibility of the discs getting scratched. I really like the good hard outer box... but instead of those accordion style cardboard envelopes... I would of preferred something more like THINpak cases for the discs protection. No I haven't had any problems with these discs. But I do worry a bit and feel the need to be extra careful.



The Show:
This sitcom really is a timeless classic. I absolutely loved the seasons 1-6. These were the original concept I Love Lucy half hour episodes. There was many... many episodes that I literally laughed out loud watching. To many great, hilarious moments to even attempt to list here. Though I will mention one of my favorite episodes being where Superman comes to Little Ricky's Birthday Party.

When the show went to hour length and named changed to the Lucy Desi Comedy Hour I felt  it went a bit downhill. I don't really feel that it could handle the hour long format as well as it did the half hour format. Sure I still enjoyed it. But it just seemed to lose some of the charm it had in the half hour version.

One thing this series became famous for is getting big named guest stars... most the time playing themselves. Some of the big names that showed up in this series includes....

- William Holden
- Eve Arden
- Ross Elliott
- Cornel Wilde
- Rock Hudson
- Harpo Marx
- Richard Widmark
- John Wayne
- Charles Boyer
- Bob Hope
- Orson Wells
- Claude Atkins
- George Reeves
- Cesar Romero
- Betty Grable
- Danny Thomas
- Red Skelton
- Milton Berle
- Ernie Kovacs

Half of these people I never heard of before myself.. but they seemed to be big in their time. Between the 2 versions of the series there is 194 episodes in this set to enjoy. Not to mention the tons of extras listed above. This set is definitely a lot of bang for the buck!


Over-all this is an excellent release for a great classic sitcom. I bought this series back in May of 2009... as I bought it as an early birthday present to myself. It took me till today to finish watching all the episodes. And there is still a ton of extras I still have to watch. The quality of the episodes looks great. though a couple of the extra I looked at could have used some more cleaning up. But this is a set I definitely would recommend if you were a fan of this series.



(From I Love Lucy: The Complete Series on July 22nd, 2010)