New York Asian Film Festival Is Back!

You can read more at Subway Cinema. They have the line-up posted now. I'm particularly looking forward to Sukiyaki Western Django, Miike's "spaghetti" western. Sounds right up my alley. I was actually stressing earlier this week about how much it would cost to order the DVD from Japan.

Thank you New York Asian Film Festival!

August Criterion releases

As reported by DVDBeaver, Criterion has announced their releases for August. They are:

Brand Upon the Brain! (Guy Maddin, 2006), Salo, or the 120 Days of Sodom (Pier Paolo Pasolini, 1975), The Small Back Room (Michael Powell & Emeric Pressburger, 1949), Twenty-four Eyes (Keisuke Kinoshita, 1954) and Eclipse Series 11: Larisa Shepitko Box Set Includes: The Ascent (Larisa Shepitko, 1976), Wings (Larisa Shepitko, 1966)

I can't say I'm really excited about any of these, in particular another copy of Salo.

As a follow-up to my earlier post about the BAM screening of Choke, I think I now have a date and time to see it. The June 5 9:40 showing will have a talkback following. I'm there! Read more here.

Criterion goes Blu-Ray!

This from the latest Criterion newsletter:

"Dear Criterion Collection Newsletter subscriber,

We’ve got some exciting news for this fall, and we wanted you to hear it first.

Our first Blu-ray discs are coming! We’ve picked a little over a dozen titles from the collection for Blu-ray treatment, and we’ll begin rolling them out in October. These new editions will feature glorious high-definition picture and sound, all the supplemental content of the DVD releases, and they will be priced to match our standard-def editions.

Here’s what’s in the pipeline:

The Third Man
Bottle Rocket
Chungking Express
The Man Who Fell to Earth
The Last Emperor
El Norte
The 400 Blows
Gimme Shelter
The Complete Monterey Pop
Contempt
Walkabout
For All Mankind
The Wages of Fear

Alongside our DVD and Blu-ray box sets of The Last Emperor, we’ll also be putting out the theatrical version as a stand-alone release in both formats, priced at $39.95. Our Blu-ray release of Walkabout will be an all-new edition, featuring new supplements as well as a new transfer; we will also release an updated anamorphic DVD of Nicolas Roeg’s outback masterpiece at the same time."

I'm very excited about Bottle Rocket. I knew they were working on a release of the film, but it's great that I can get it in Blu-Ray. Chungking Express is also new to Criterion, a film I have a love/hate relationship with. But I'm sure Christopher Doyle's work will look amazing in hi-def. Wong-Kar Wai fans may also be interested in Kino's first step into the Blu-Ray waters: Fallen Angels. You can read the details here. I say, bring on a decent edition of Ashes of Time!

My worry, with all the Blu-Ray hoopla, is that we're going to see fewer older titles released. Soon, the double-dipping will really start. Instead of finally seeing a decent DVD or Blu-Ray copy of Investigation of a Citizen Above Suspicion, we get crap like this. I mean, it's a cute movie, but who was beating down doors asking for this?!?

Hi-Def Region Coding...

Just thought I'd share this region coding map for Blu-Ray. As you're probably aware, standard definition DVDs are locked into 6 regions. That way, a consumer in South America can't watch a movie sold in the Asian market. To make a long story short, it's all crap, and it's why I own an All-Region DVD player.

Blu-Ray discs are split into 3 regions. It's interesting that North America and Japan/Southeast Asia are the same region. Most of the non-Region 1 SD DVDs I purchase are Japanese. So that works out in my favor.

You can also see this map here.

No Strippers for now...

It appears I got blocked on the Zombie Strippers! front. After a short couple of weeks, it has left NYC's fair screens. Poop, I say. Poop. I guess that's what Netflix is for...

I've been hearing rumors of X-Box 360's equipped with Blu-Ray drives showing up later this year. This from well-meaning friends who would rather I play Halo 3 with them. I loved Halo. Don't get me wrong. I bought an X-Box purely to play Halo 2. But there's something unsettling and undignified about wearing a plastic headset while playing a video game, the whole time listening to the most bigoted, racist bile come out of little kids' mouths. Plus it doesn't go well with my robe. Did I mention I like to go into full-on Lance mode when I'm home relaxin'? I just want a PS3 to play Blu-Ray movies, like the copy of Blade Runner I already picked up. I also want to waste a lot of time on GTA4. Besides, as far as those X-Box rumors go, I agree with this guy.

It's been awhile...

Wow. I haven't written anything in over a week. 1) I've been working, and 2) I haven't seen anything new or noteworthy. I do really want to see Zombie Strippers! (the exclamation point is part of the title, but I really do want to see it) I've heard nothing but good things. I'm also mildly interested in Iron Man. I understand that Robert Downey Jr. is great in it, and I'm a huge fan of his work. I think I'm just a little burned out on comic book movies. Does that mean I loose my geek credentials?

How's this for geeky? I just bought a new HDMI cable to replace the one hooked up to my DVD player right now. There's some minor distortion with my current one. You can notice that sometimes black isn't "true" black. I'm about to spend an hour or so doing some tests with the old cable and the new one. Exciting!

My new cable is from Blue Jeans Cable. I've been meaning to replace my crappy cable, but this little story prompted me to do it sooner rather than later. I hate Monster Cables, but I had no idea how pushy they are. If you have a moment, and love seeing the underdog make good, check it out. It's an interesting read.