Pads & Panels

Title: Platoon

Format: 25th Anniversary Blu-ray

MPAA Rating: R

Directed by: Oliver Stone

Written by: Oliver Stone

Starring: Tom Berenger, Willem Dafoe, Charlie Sheen, Keith David, Forest Whitaker, Francesco Quinn, Kevin Dillon, John C. McGinley

Studio: 20th Century Fox, MGM

Film Rating:

Blu-ray Rating:

Review by: Bill Jones

The Film

Oliver Stone’s Platoon has become a modern war film classic, so there’s not much else left to say about it. Telling the tale of a naïve American soldier’s (Charlie Sheen) descent in the horrors of Vietnam, it was one of the first films to come out of the Vietnam Conflict, and a personal tale for Oliver Stone, who himself was faced with question of morality with the things he saw overseas.

It’s an amazingly shot film with a cast of actors who have gone on to become major stars, and the core issues it deals with hold true today. But I’ve always found it to be fairly formulaic for such a groundbreaking war film, and for every iconic image there’s a line of dialogue or scene that doesn’t quite hold up today without a little bit of cheese. Still, Platoon has earned its classic status, and deserves to be seen in its new format. (more…)

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Title: The Usual Suspects

Format: Limited Edition Blu-Book

Directed by: Bryan Singer

Written by: Christopher McQuarrie

Starring: Stephen Baldwin, Gabriel Byrne, Chazz Palminteri, Kevin Pollak, Pete Postlethwaite, Kevin Spacey, Suzy Amis, Benicio del Toro, Giancarlo Esposito

Studio: MGM, 20th Century Fox

Film Rating:

Blu-Book Rating:

Review by: Bill Jones

The Film

The Usual Suspects is part of the lexicon for most film buffs at this point, whether for its big twist ending (and how to execute that ending in a way that lends itself to repeat viewings), its ensemble cast, as the film that catapulted the career of director Bryan Singer (X-Men, Valkyrie) and of course for Keyser Soze and the film’s unreliable narrator.

As the years have passed, many critics have had differing opinions on whether the story of five top-tier criminals who maybe not-so-coincidentally wind up in a police lineup together en route to hashing their next major heist is great or terrible. Many love and some hate the twist ending that involves all but one of the crew being murdered aboard a boat in the middle of their mission gone awry. (more…)

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Title: Spaceballs

Edition: Blu-ray

MPAA Rating: PG

Director: Mel Brooks

Writers: Mel Brooks, Thomas Meehan, Ronny Graham

Producers: Brooksfilms, MGM

Film Rating:

Blu-ray Features Rating:

Review by: Bill Jones

The Film

Intelligent old-school parody with a healthy dose of toilet humor doesn’t get much better than that of Mel Brooks – whether it be the western, history or science-fiction. And after a six-year hiatus from film in the 1980s, Brooks parodied the biggest science-fiction film of them all, Star Wars, with his unforgettable Spaceballs. (more…)

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