Films/DVD Asylum

Posted by petew (i) on March 04, 2001 at 20:49:49:

did a quick search to see what the other inmates had to say, and re-discovered Bruce's wonderful review. Thanks again for that Bruce.

I gave up on Netflix a few weeks ago, after months of not getting films they claim to have, and receiving 1 out of 5 times films that were so badly damaged they wouldn't play, even after a through cleaning and polishing with Auric Illuminator. Some wouldn't even read--quite obviously they were not from this region--some "customers" are apparently swapping their "foreign" or "pirate" DVD's for the Netflix Region 1 DVD's and Netflix is just sending them out again--none the wiser. Netflix has no customer support, no service, no feeback loop. It is a complete waste of time. Oh, they raise their prices three times a year, and spam you daily, and sell your personal info to other spammers. Nice way to run a business. I rank them right down there with cdnow for internet sleezyness.

so I'm in a film jones...even though the JVC S9000 VCR is superb at making the best of the grocery-store rental tapes...

...so I went out and bought the best S-video cables (Monster 1000) I could find and bought the Radio Shack Lineum speakers ($75) for the rear channels and hooked-up a bunch of Proceed amps to get all the surround thing going, and then I clicked the buttons on the remote and did the pay=per=view on the Dish network ($3.95 for 24 hrs in DD). first one was the Perfect Storm...on the satalite dish. Well....

Let me say this...good video cables are worth it. The picture was BETTER than anything I've seen from Netflix rental DVD's on my Dennon DVD5000 with S-video feed. And the surround sound, on DD, was really stupendeous. I was blown away, on the edge of my seat for what seemed like days. Good sound really increases the enjoyment of this kind of film.

Others have already picked apart the glaring flaws and discontinuities and outright redeculous "stunts" (Cloney hanging onto a swinging boom with one hand in a hurricane while holding a lit blowtorch in the other, forever...please...) but there are some great moments--some great hollywood moments--like the shark thing (I loved that one) and getting "hooked " (horrific scene being dragged under like that) and the wave effects--you gotta admit--were damn good--ok, they weren't "realistic", but it scared the crap out of me just the same. No, I disagree that this is a Petersen failure as a film. It is not "Das Boat", it's a 13-year-old-boy's action adventure film. That's all it trys to be. I liked it very much.

...it is a super film to be seen at home with powerful surround amplification and full-range speakers with a deep subwoofer. must be seen in surround at high volume. that's a must.

really enjoyed this one, quite pleased with the audio and video quality of the Dish Network rentals.

oh...premium video cables. they really do work.

oh...and if you haven't read the book...it's very highly recommended, --much much better than the movie (better effects, more gratuitous sex and violence, much more frightening).

I wrote this in context of the highly hearalded and much anticipated, 4th. "STORM OF THE CENTURY" we've had in the Philadelphia region in the last 10 years (the other three "STORM OF THE CENTURY" that we had actually did produce enough snow to warrant buying a shovel). Our local weather guys have been falling all over themselves for weeks predicting so much snow (up to three feet, and sustained winds of 60 mph) and high winds that "civilization, as we know it, will end".
The grocery stores have been so mobbed for the last three days I couldn't get near them, so I've been going to the State Store instead.

Now it seems...the storm is over. We got a little wind and it rained for an hour or so. STORM OF THE CENTURY! It's over. Now what do I do with all this milk, bread, and toilet paper? Most of my neighbors fought each other to buy every last snow-thrower East of the Mississippi--at full list price. Meanwhile, with all this rain and warm weather, their grass is gonna need cutting by Saturday.

God invented weathermen to make Astrologers look good.