DVD Collectors Online

The Living Daylights, a review by Dragonfire

Armed with razor-sharp instincts and a licence to kill, James Bond battles diabolical arms merchants bent on world domination in this thrilling, lightning-paced adventure. Timothy Dalton brings energy, humour and ruthless cunning to his debut performance as Agent 007.

My Thoughts

This is a decent Bond movie, but it is far from one of my favorites.  The plot is fine, though some aspects of it - mainly the Russian military guy coming up with a plot - has been done before in the Bond movies.  The action scenes are mostly decent, though Bond and the woman use her cello case for a sled is just ridiculous and didn't work at all in my opinion.  Timothy Dalton is ok as Bond, though he isn't my favorite in the part.  He is more serious in the part and I missed the bits of humor that popped up in the previous movies.  The woman playing Miss Moneypenny is all wrong and I didn't believe her interest in James when she did attempt to flirt with him.  This is minor, but I hated the theme song. 

 

I still have to watch the extras on my DVD..and I'll get a more detailed review posted at Epinions eventually.

(From James Bond Marathon on May 26th, 2009)

The Twilight Samurai, a review by Antares

The Twilight Samurai (2002) 90/100 - All throughout the film I saw the influences of most of the great Japanese directors, with one exception. No Kurosawa. You get the tragedy of Mizoguchi, the family depth of Ozu and the bushido breakdown of Kobayashi. I don't know why, but for years I thought this was just an anime film, and my disdain for that kind of animation, kept me from watching this hauntingly beautiful and tragic film. It's definitely not a film for those who like a good blood letting in their chanbara escapades. The pacing is drawn out and it lets you immerse yourself into the day to day struggles of Seibei and his small family. You want him to find some happiness as he struggles to provide for his family in the midst of impending civil war and a famine which is ravaging the peasantry. I only wish I got to watch a better copy of the film, instead of the washed out version I found on Hiroyuki Sanada's wall.

Teal = Masterpiece
Dark Green = Classic or someday will be
Lime Green = A good, entertaining film
Orange = Average
Red = Cinemuck
Brown = The color of crap, which this film is

(From Antares' Short Summations on August 2nd, 2020)

Star Trek: Deep Space Nine - Marathon, a review by DJ Doena

Synopsis: Deep Space Nine is a former cardassian space station orbiting the formerly occupied planet Bajor. The Bajorans have lived for 60 years under cardassian rule but now they are free. The provisional government has asked the Federation for support and Starfleet takes over the management of DS9. It's commander is Benjamin Sisko, who has lost his wife three years ago in the battle against the Borg and now he must raise his son alone in the middle of nowhere. His second in command is Major Kira, a former bajoran resistance fighter. The rest of the crew are both Starfleet officers of all kind of races and Bajorans. Chief of security is Odo, a shape-shifter with unknown origins.
The spiritual leader of the Bajorans asks Cmdr. Sisko to study the "Tears of the Prophets", mythical orbs that have come to Bajor of the last ten thousand years. With their help Cmdr. Sisko discovers the only known stable wormhole in our galaxy and it leads to the Gamma Quadrant, to a point 70,000 light years away from DS9, on the other side of the galaxy. And suddenly the bajoran system has been put onto the map and the Cardassians will accept any excuse to re-take it.

My Opinion: It's very clear from the beginning that DS9 will be different than its predecessor Star Trek: The Next Generation (TNG). TNG played on a all-Federation-personnel Starfleet spaceship, while on DS9 uncounted cultures clash: Starfleet personnel, Bajorans and the civilians aboard the station - for example Quark, the Ferengi bar owner. And most of the characters have a background story and their lives haven't been straight-forward. I really like that. Unfortunately I can't really remember what I thought about them, when I saw them for the first time back in the mid-90s, but DS9 is now my favourite Star Trek show and one of my favourite Sci-Fi shows.
I also liked the idea of the "handshake" when the Enterprise made an appearance in the pilot episode, something they will do again when the Voyager departs from DS9 in their pilot episode. But the meeting between Captain Picard and Cmdr. Sisko also showed that these shows will be different.

Synopsis: A bajoran scout ship is being attacked by a cardassian warship but the pilot can be beamed out shortly before his ship is destroyed. He seeks asylum aboard DS9 because he was a member of the Khon-Ma, a "terrorist cell" during the occupation. Kira knows him from these days and she pleads to Sisko to grant asylum. But not all Cardassians have left the station. The local tailor Garak - who is suspected to be a spy - contacts Dr. Bashir in a rather unorthodox way and informs him about a meeting between two klingon renegades and the former terrorist.

My Opinion: The first episodes of the season will be used to introduce the viewers to the characters. While the pilot was mostly about Sisko and the loss of his wife at Wolf 359, this episode is about Kira and her past in the resistance. It was an OK episode, but I really liked the introduction of Garak, who will become an interesting guest character over the years.

Synopsis: Odo tries to throw a Bajoran out of Quark's casino/bar and wants him off the station. A few hours later that man is dead and there are no traces that could explain how the murder had left the crime scene. As chief of security Odo investigates but soon becomes a prime suspects and thus having a conflict of interest. Meanwhile Chief O'Brien's wife Keiko - who was a botanist aboard the Enterprise - has nothing to do on DS9 and becomes frustrated. When Sisko's son Jake befriends Quark's nephew Nog and subsequently gets into trouble, she decides that the station needs a school.

My Opinion: This episode introduces Odo who has also been security chief during the last years of the occupation. I really like that he's a man of principles who has his own codex and who values justice above all else. It was only consequent that it was he who pointed out that only a shape-shifter could have left the crime scene without leaving a trace. The story's hole was that the doctor couldn't figure out what these DNA particles were until it grown into a whole body. After all he was second-best in his year at medical school...

(From Star Trek: Deep Space Nine - Marathon on September 20th, 2008)