Astaire & Rogers Ultimate Collector's Edition (Flying Down to Rio / The Gay Divorcee / Roberta / Top Hat / Follow the Fleet / Swing Time / Shall We Dance / Carefree / The Story of Vernon and Irene Castle / The Barkleys of Broadway)

Astaire & Rogers Ultimate Collector's Edition (Flying Down to Rio / The Gay Divorcee / Roberta / Top Hat / Follow the Fleet / Swing Time / Shall We Dance / Carefree / The Story of Vernon and Irene Castle / The Barkleys of Broadway) Review

Looking for some escapism from normal life??? THIS WILL DO IT! Allow yourself to be carried away by the uniqueness of Fred and Ginger in this complete set of their joint work. These disks provide the movie and pretty good extra features. Some of course are more entertaining than others. A couple of the movies have commentaries on the movies done by screen historians, adding much to the understanding of all involved with the picture. In these cases, the movie is completely replayed as an extra, with the commentary dubbed over the movie sound. Very interesting! The cartoons are fun, especially the one accompanying "The Gay Divorcee," which imitates Fred and Ginger! This is a great, economical way to have the complete set of these historic films. Please, oh please!, share them with the younger generation!

Astaire & Rogers Ultimate Collector's Edition (Flying Down to Rio / The Gay Divorcee / Roberta / Top Hat / Follow the Fleet / Swing Time / Shall We Dance / Carefree / The Story of Vernon and Irene Castle / The Barkleys of Broadway) Overview

Studio: Warner Home Video Release Date: 10/24/2006

Astaire & Rogers Ultimate Collector's Edition (Flying Down to Rio / The Gay Divorcee / Roberta / Top Hat / Follow the Fleet / Swing Time / Shall We Dance / Carefree / The Story of Vernon and Irene Castle / The Barkleys of Broadway) Specifications

2006 marks the arrival of five Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers films (Flying Down to Rio, The Gay Divorcee, Roberta, Carefree, and The Story of Vernon and Irene Castle) on DVD after the first five were released in 2005. The big package is this Astaire & Rogers Ultimate Collector's Edition, which contains all 10 films plus a CD, a bonus DVD with the documentary Astaire and Rogers: Partners in Rhythm, press-book replicas, and some other material. If you want the big package with the extra stuff but already bought the five films in 2005, you can get the Astaire & Rogers Partial Ultimate Collector's Edition, which includes everything except the actual discs of those first five films. Or, if you only want the five new films, pick up Astaire & Rogers Collection, Vol. 2 as a bookend to Astaire & Rogers Collection, Vol. 1.

The Astaire-Rogers films mix light romantic comedy (usually centered around mistaken identities and ending, inevitably, in blissful wedding promises) with elegant dinner wear and surreal sets intended to transport '30s audiences away from the Depression to such locales as Rio, Paris, and Venice. The two stars are also aided by a recurring stable of RKO players such as Edward Everett Horton (master of the double-take), Eric Blore, and Helen Broderick. And then there's that sensational dancing set to great songs by the likes of Irving Berlin, George and Ira Gershwin, and Jerome Kern, numbers that are not merely entertaining but also innovative for their time in that they reveal character and advance the plot. Add it all up, and you have a recipe for an irrepressible joie de vivre that practically defines the movie musical.

Flying Down to Rio (1933) headlined Dolores Del Rio and Gene Raymond, but it was the fourth- and fifth-billed stars who would rewrite cinematic history. Astaire and Rogers had limited screen time, but were still able to establish many of the trademarks of their later films. The heart of the film is "The Carioca," a company dance extravaganza in which they take the floor together for the first time; their eyes meet and their foreheads touch. Their dance lasts only a few minutes, but it was the highlight of the film and audiences wanted more. The Gay Divorcee (1934) is their best early picture, a loose adaptation of Astaire's stage show, 'The Gay Divorce.' The only song retained for the movie is Cole Porter's smash hit "Night and Day," which is the setting for a sublime pas de deux between Fred and Ginger. The closer is the sprawling 17-minute ensemble number "The Continental." Roberta (1935) was a step backward, with too much time spent on 1930s Parisian fashion and the romance between top-billed Irene Dunne (who gets the best Jerome Kern ballads, "Yesterdays" and "Smoke Gets in Your Eyes") and Randolph Scott. But as the second-banana couple Astaire and Rogers still get a tap battle, a romantic duet, and plenty of comic banter.

With a score by Irving Berlin, Top Hat (1935) is most famous for two numbers, Astaire's definitive tuxedo setting "Top Hat, White Tie, and Tails" and the feathery duet "Cheek to Cheek." But other joys include Astaire's "Fancy Free" declaration, "Isn't It a Lovely Day," and the grand finale "The Piccolino." Follow the Fleet (1936) changes the pace a bit, with Astaire playing a sailor, and it suffers from making him and Rogers the second-banana couple to the dull Randolph Scott and Harriet Hilliard. But it still has plenty of laughs and some classic Irving Berlin numbers, including "Let Yourself Go," which Rogers sings before she and Astaire compete in a dance contest; a Rogers solo tap number; "I'm Putting All My Eggs in One Basket," their best comic dance. The pièce de résistance is "Let's Face the Music and Dance," a show within a show in which the pair dons their customary evening formals. Effortlessly flowing from pantomime to song to dance, this sublime piece of storytelling is one of the series' defining moments. Maybe their most enjoyable picture, Swing Time (1936) features the set-piece "Pick Yourself Up," in which Rogers "teaches" Astaire to dance before they break into a spectacular number; the farewell ode "Never Gonna Dance," and the Oscar-winning "Just the Way You Look Tonight," from the team of Jerome Kern and Dorothy Fields.

Shall We Dance (1937) has a complex plot that has Astaire and Rogers actually getting married before the final credits roll, and turns George and Ira Gershwin's brilliant "They Can't Take That Away from Me" into a heartbreaking ode. Other great songs include "Slap That Bass," "They All Laughed," and "Let's Call the Whole Thing Off," unforgettably performed on roller skates. The eighth and ninth entries in the series tried some different approaches, with the underrated Carefree (1938) more of a comedy vehicle for Ginger (yet still including some fine dances and Irving Berlin songs as well as their first onscreen kiss) and The Story of Vernon and Irene Castle (1939) portraying the pair as historical dancing stars and using a score of turn-of-the-century standards. The Barkleys of Broadway (1949) is the oddity, reuniting the stars 10 years after their last RKO picture when Judy Garland had to be replaced due to health problems. It's trademark MGM: splashy colors, Fred in a gimmicky solo number (playing sorcerer's apprentice to a line of unoccupied shoes), Oscar Levant providing his usual dynamic pianism and acerbic personality, and a score that is at its best when it borrows songs from a previous generation (including the big ballroom number set to "They Can't Take That Away from Me"). The film falls short of their best work, but serves as a fond remembrance of the most glorious partnership in film history. --David Horiuchi

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Wagner: Die Meistersinger von Nrnberg [DVD Video]

Wagner: Die Meistersinger von Nrnberg [DVD Video] Review

Some of the sadness and anger that had attended Wagner's composition of Tristan had not yet dissipated in the 1860s. Wagner had suffered greatly from isolation due to his forced wanderings throughout Europe, and from constant financial worries because of the difficulties involved in staging his complex operas. Tristan proved especially difficult to stage given its many innovations and its radical departure from the music of the era. Wagner was also ill at the time. Yet Die Meistersinger Von Nurnberg is a radiant and endlessly life affirming opera, proving once again that the relationship between life and art is especially ambiguous in the case of genius. It premiered in Munich at the Nationaltheater on 21 June 1868. Appropriately enough it was Mid-Summer's day.

Often described as Wagner's only comedy, it is his sunniest opera, the one most redolent of daylight. It is certainly different than that quintessential nacht-oper, Tristan. Wagner wrote that he had composed Meistersinger as a means of dissipating some of his suffering, seeing it as a source of consolation and healing for the pain and sorrows of the past. One of the key words in Meistersinger is 'illusion'. Wagner had decided that all of human activity was underpinned by illusion. And that art was especially 'a noble illusion.' Thus, we have in Meistersinger, with its song contest and its contestants, a whole world of illusion. And Hans Sachs tells Walther that 'man's truest illusions are revealed to him in dreams'. Since reading Schopenhauer, Wagner had become convinced that creativity originated in the dream-world. Meistersinger is an opera about dreams. This production lovingly recreates that magic world with superb performances aided by Bayreuth's unique and beautiful sound.

This June 1999 television film is one of the finest and most elegant Meistersinger's I've yet seen, and its fabulous sound is only one of the reasons. The performances are splendid with each of the singers deeply immersed in their roles, the singing unforced and powerful as the voices are projected outward from Bayreuth's incomparable stage. Robert Holl as Hans Sachs has a deep, warm and softly contoured bass voice. Peter Seiffert as Walther is a large, barrel chested man that looks every inch the heldentenor and has a superb voice to match. Emily Magee is a fine Eva, though not particularly youthful in the role. Andreas Schmidt is a dignified Beckmesser, a problematic role historically. The cast is universally good, with no weak links.

One of the two real stars of this production is Wolfgang Wagner, the composer's grandson, who staged and directed this production in 1996 as well as creating the set design. This is one of the best productions of his controversial reign as director. It features a traditional stage design, though stripped of all superfluities. The opera is similarly staged: a traditional production that removes all the dross. Daniel Barenboim is the other star: his conducting is superb, with an attention to orchestral detail that facilitates the Bayreuther Festspiele's stunning orchestral clarity in the opera's complex inner melodic lines. Nevertheless, he is always cognizant of the big picture. The orchestra's splendid technique and dynamics are always in the service of the unfolding onstage drama. He builds dramatic tension by speeding the musical pulse when necessary, pulling-in the reins when the onstage drama dictates a sense of orchestral repose. The Orchester der Bayreuther Festspiele play with a beautiful directness under his baton, never giving in to the impulse to engage in dramatic overkill. They play with understated passion. It is a glorious musical experience. The two DVDs run for 274 minutes. The video was taken from a television broadcast and is clear with no artifacts. The sound is exemplary in PCM stereo, Dolby Digital 5.1 and DTS 5.1. There are no extras other than a booklet.

Daniel Barenboim has become a solid conductor of Wagner and this is a very fine performance. It's become my favorite DVD of the opera and makes for a good investment if you like Meistersinger. Strongly recommended.

Mike Birman

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Biography - Roy Rogers (A&E DVD Archives)

Biography - Roy Rogers (A&E DVD Archives) Review

My little boy is a Roy Rogers freak, and now that I've watched a few of his movies and after we brought this video home from the library, I can see why. Roy Rogers was a great person, and he is reminiscent of a time of innocence that is so far removed from entertainment in our culture today. I highly recommend this video, you'll find out just about anything you've ever wanted to know about Roy Rogers...my only gripe is that I wish they would update this biography. This was done 2-3 years before Roy died, and before his museum was moved to Branson. There are obviously still plenty of Roy Rogers fans out there, and we'd all like to know how this megastar bid his final "Happy Trails", and where one might visit his grave. Many would probably also like to see an updated bit about the new Branson museum. Roy was is and forever will be THE KING OF THE COWBOYS

Biography - Roy Rogers (A&E DVD Archives) Overview

In a time of innocence, his straightforward, all-American cowboy manner made him a beloved international icon. At the height of his fame, Leonard Frank Slye (a.k.a. Roy Rogers) was one of Hollywood's biggest stars. In 1948 alone, his movies sold nearly 100 million tickets. In the 1950s, more than two million children every month bought comic books, breathlessly following the adventures of Roy and his famous golden palomino, Trigger. Now, for the first time, BIOGRAPHY® presents the complete story of the boy from Cincinnati, Ohio, who became the "King of the Cowboys." Home movies, film outtakes, and rare television clips provide a glimpse into Rogers's lightning rise to stardom. From his humble beginnings as a radio singer and guitar player to his place in history as a matinee idol, this is an intimate portrait of ROY ROGERS, quintessential American hero. DVD Features: Interactive Menus; Scene Selection

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Donizetti: Don Pasquale [Blu-ray]

Donizetti: Don Pasquale [Blu-ray] Review

Donizetti: Don Pasquale [Blu-ray] Overview

'...Riccardo Muti conducts Don Pasquale in Ravenna - a great celebration for everyone.' This press quote from the Italian music magazine Il giornale della musica hit the mark exactly. Watching
this realistic, young and vital production, directed by the young
Andrea da Rosa and listening to a high potential and unspent young cast, you feel how powerful, charming and timeless this score by Gaetano Donizetti is. This production was recorded during the Ravenna Festival in the gorgeous and patriarchal Teatro Dante Alighieri. Maestro Riccardo Muti shows one more time, what it means to perform an Italian opera with a young and professional Italian cast an outstanding and breathtaking performance.

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High Society

High Society Review

Oh let me see now...( To coin the introductory phrase from the featured song, "Little One").
To describe this splashy, colorful, and stylish remake of "The Philadelphia Story" (sentimentally speaking this 1956 remake was also the favorite film of my late, maternal grandmother), one could use any number of superlatives, including, "Sensational", the title of a song that is part of the fabulous Cole Porter score crooned by stars Louis Armstrong, Bing Crosby, Frank Sinatra, and Grace Kelly(the last of whom would soon become the Princess of Monaco, and as one can see in this film, had the ring to prove it).
The action moves from the original Philadelphia location(ironically Kelly's birthplace) to Newport, where a planned society wedding of one Tracy Samantha Lord(Kelly), to the stuffy George Kittredge, (John Lund), an executive who works for Tracy's father, Seth Lord(Sidney Blackmer) is the focus of the story.
Coinciding with the slated nuptials is the annual Newport Jazz Festival, where Louis Armstrong and his band are the guests of Tracy's ex-husband, fellow Jazz musician, C.K. Dexter-Haven (Crosby), whose estate is just a hedge and a lawn away from that of his former in-laws.
A black cloud over Tracy's happiness is the estrangement of her parents(Margalo Gilmore plays her mother) due to Mr. Lord's stepping out on his wife with a dancer.
The comic reliefs in the story are Louis Calhern as Uncle Willie, and young Lydia Reed, aptly cast as Tracy's tomboyish kid sister, Caroline,who laments losing Dexter as a brother-in-law.
One "Spy" Magazine threatens to expose the Lord Family's scandal, and to offset that, Tracy reluctantly allows journalists Mike Connor(Sinatra) and his photographer Liz Imbrie( Celeste Holm) to cover her wedding. Tracy pulls a charade when they arrive after they are more or less entertained by Caroline.
There is one poignant moment prior to that when Dexter presents Tracy, who sits at the edge of the pool, before the bathhouse, fashionably painted salmon pink and turquoise, with a model of the True Love, the boat on which they honeymooned, and Tracy begins to reminisce. Dexter makes Tracy confront the personal issues leading to their marriage's failure. George arrives soon afterwards, expressing displeasure at Dexter's continued presence in Tracy's life.
Tracy develops a relationship with Mike and Liz as the story progresses. She takes Mike on a tour of Newport, pointing out occupied estates as well as boarded-up ones to be sold for taxes. They end up at her Uncle Willie's residence where she fixes him a drink as he serenades her.
As Louis Armstrong continues to give commentary and musical segeways like a Greek chrous member, Tracy's bachelorette party gets underway at Willie's house (The last such event before the home becomes a boys' school), where hijinks ensue and there are moments of mismatched partnerships before eveything falls into place, with our dear Satchmo having the final word.
Although of its time this film is timeless, and will continue to rank high in the annals of film for many years to come.

High Society Overview

This witty, musical version of The Philadelphia Story stars Bing Crosby, Grace Kelly, Frank Sinatra, and the jazz master himself, Louis Armstrong, playing the hottest trumpet in the land. Year: 1956 Director: Charles Waters Starring: Bing Crosby, Grace Kelly, Frank Sinatra, Louis Armstrong

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The Queens of Comedy

The Queens of Comedy Review

I've boughten this twice b/c I lost the first one. I love this show. I"ve made guys watch it and they admit it's better than Kings of Comedy. Every time I'm at a party and quote stuff from it I have the whole room laughing. It's hilarious. From hoola hoops to skinny B!%*#s.

The Queens of Comedy Overview

FOUR BLACK WOMEN, PROFANE AND BRASSY, BRING STAND-UP TO MEMPHIS'S ORPHEUM THEATRE.

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Platinum Comedy Series: Starting Lineup, Part II - Cedric the Entertainer

Platinum Comedy Series: Starting Lineup, Part II - Cedric the Entertainer Review

I decided to check this out because I had seen the first "Starting Line Up",plus I love the Platinum Comedy Series.Cedric's performance on here is funnier than ever.I love his jokes about Snoop Dogg.I hate Snoop,so I was glad to hear someone make fun of him.The other comedians on here are funny also.The first comedian on here,Leon Rogers,makes fun of the music I like,but he is hilarious!I love his impression of DMX.The second comic,Nema Williams,is not funny at all.I am white,so I like white comics,but I hated the way he was telling all black jokes to get laughs.The third comedian on here,Rodney Perry,was funny,but he cussed WAY too much.The last comedian on here is Prescott.He was funny,but again, he cussed WAY too much.This is better than Volume 1,but not as good as "D.L. Hughley Live" or Dave Chappelle's "Killin Them Softly".

Platinum Comedy Series: Starting Lineup, Part II - Cedric the Entertainer Overview

CEDRIC THE ENTERTAINER is a complete entertainer. He's won four NAACP Image Awards, co-starred with fellow Platinum Comedy King on the THE STEVE HARVEY SHOW, and won major accolades for his routine in the most successful comedy film of all time THE ORIGINAL KINGS OF COMEDY. Also, Cedric delivered a memorable performance in the Motion Picture BARBERSHOP. (75 M) That's not all, he is also the creator and star of the successful throwback variety show CEDRIC THE ENTERTAINER PRESENTS. CEDRIC now delivers the second edition to his wildly successful DVD comedy series "STARTING LINEUP".... CEDRIC THE ENTERTAINER'S "STARTING LINEUP PART II." CEDRIC showcases more of his natural comedic flair in front of his engaged audience at the Biloxi Grand Casino in Biloxi Mississippi. And once again, he showcases some of the hottest new talent on the comedy circuit as they show off their skills along side one of the ORIGINAL KINGS OF COMEDY. Buckle up y'all. It's about to get wild in here!

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