The Jolson Story

Customer Reviews:

You like old movies...you haven't lived till you see this one!.......2007-09-10

Like anothers, I've also seen this movie many times in the early 60's as a kid growing up in Newark N.J. I used to run around the house singing the songs! I never forgot how much I enjoyed this movie! I bought a used tape of this movie (vhs) about 10 plus years back and have watch it another 30-50 times...I even work on my computer and listen to it! I just like it, it works for me ....I hope someone reads this and decides to watch it for the first time. But you have to watch it ten to twenty times till you can just the club! Maybe it reminds me of my own childhood. I hope to receive my dvd that I just ordered from [...] by my 55th birthday,just weeks away. This movie always entertains me, yet you may not even like it, I hope you do! I imagine if you haven't seen it you wouldn't buy it! If you watched this in the pass you can easily get hooked(addicted). You haven't seen nothing yet ! Have a good life!

You ain't heard nothing yet.......2007-08-19

I think the Jolson Story should be required viewing ... the energy, vitality of the Jolson voice can transform a cloudy day to pure sunshine. Just a great movie..outstanding acting by Larry Parks and of course the Jolson voice...you'll find yourself singing in the shower for weeks afterwards. A five star, must see.

The Jolson Story.......2007-05-12

A superior musical of the 1940s. The film has held up well over 60 years. I first watched it when I was in grade school, then most recently at the age of 52, and I was surprised at how solid it remains. Like most biopics of its day, it plays fast and loose with the facts, but the story is entertaining and the production values very high. Lost of wonderful details and a great cast. Parks (oscar nomination) cannot convey the dynamic charisma reported about the live performances of the man he portrays, but then, Jolson himself could not do that on film, either. Still, Parks gives it his all, and lip sinchs magnificently. Terrific character actors fill in all the gaps. Still a great film.

The Jolson Story Still A Hit!.......2007-01-11

I saw the original Jolson Story 18 times as a youngster and went on to emulate the "Larry Parks" dead-on portrayal in school events and in my parlor. This DVD is exceptional in terms of color quality and sound. A wonderful restoration of a truly classic film that traces Asa Yolsen's rise from a young lad singing in the synogogue to the world's greatest entertainer. The Jolson songs and voice are still thrilling and there are lots of favorites to enjoy..Mammy, Rosie, California Here I Come! and more. As Jolson used to say, if you havent seen this video "You ain't heard nothing yet!"

The Jolson Story.......2006-11-10

I loved this movie growing up in Southern California. It was on every night for weeks on "The Million Dollar Movie," a local movie channel. Larry Parks is amazing as Al Jolson. Truly, the greatest entertainer who ever lived!

Average customer rating:

Funny, spooky, and delightful
There's a light, over at the Franken... er Femm ... place
The Old Dark House
It really was a dark and stormy night...
Great Classic

The Old Dark House
Starring: Boris Karloff , Melvyn Douglas , Charles Laughton , Lilian Bond , and Ernest Thesiger
Director: James Whale
Manufacturer: Kino Video
ProductGroup: DVD
Binding: DVD

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ASIN: B00000ILEU
Release Date: 2003-09-02

Description

A dark, gothic, one-of-a-kind macabre comedy. Directed by James Whale, subject of the acclaimed "Gods and Monsters," "The Old Dark House" tells the story of three weary travelers who find shelter in a mysterious Welsh manor, soon find themselves in the unwelcoming company of the psychotic Femm family--and never will they be the same!

Customer Reviews:

Funny, spooky, and delightful.......2007-08-12

This is such a great old fashioned dark house mystery. The characters alone are worth watching the movie. Movie greats Raymond Massey, Charles Laughton,Boris Karloff, and Melvin Douglas were so young way back then! The really corny old characters make the movie eerie enough to watch it to the end. What great fun!

There's a light, over at the Franken... er Femm ... place.......2007-06-23

I only noticed it mentioned by one of the earlier reviews but it immediately struck me that this must have had a strong influence on Rocky Horror Picture Show. Even some of the dialog had me finishing it in my head with the Rocky Horror version. ("There's a light ...", "Madness ... takes its toll"). You can almost hear the RHPS music (over the storm). It even has a little bit of "gender bending" -- not to be confused with homosexuality as one reviewer does. But the film soon casts its own spell and you're hooked on its terms. Have a potato! And some gin! Enjoy the ride.

In any case -- this is a minor masterpiece with some great performances. The Femm family are especially good and Charles Laughton is notable for what I think is his first Hollywood role.

Like many of the "strangers stranded in a spooky house" movies (of which this must have been one of the first) it is filmed almost as if it were a stage play, giving it much of its considerable charm. The cinematography and lighting are pure "Universal Horror". This film was a trend-setter. Anything it didn't actually originate it certainly made its own.

And the title of the film is perfect!

P.S. Why not five stars? Need to leave a little room for Bride of Frankenstein!

The Old Dark House.......2007-06-21

One of Whale's most indispensable horror films, "House" marries dark wit with bizarre, wonderfully eerie scenarios involving the three Femm children: addled atheist Horace Femm (Ernest Thesiger), his fanatically Christian sister Rebecca (Eva Moore), and older brother Saul (Brember Wills), a pyromaniac kept under lock and key--usually. Karloff, in his first big role, is memorably ghoulish as a gin-swilling servant, but Thesiger and Moore play the demented siblings to sinister effect. Inspired camerawork, spooky lighting, and brilliant ensemble acting from the whole cast put a sardonic twist on this sublime tale of gothic lunacy.

It really was a dark and stormy night..........2007-02-05

Any film that starts with the visual version of "It was a dark and stormy night" might otherwise be regarded with suspicion but not in the hands of director James Whale. Is it worth checking out? Absolutely as this is one of Whale's masterpieces using humor, some creepy imagery and a great cast (Boris Karloff, Melvyn Douglas, Raymond Massey, Gloria Stuart, Charles Laughton, Ernest Thesinger and other notable stage vets) to create a moody chiller with humor.

The extras include a thoughtful trivia filled commentary Gloria Stuart and a second commentary by Whale bigorapher and film historian James Curtis. Curtis Harrington provides a detailed introduction of how he became involved in saving the film, meeting Whale, etc. The video quality of this portion is so-so. The transfer of the film looks solid although it could use more digital cleaning up (like the recently reissued editions of "Frankenstein" and "Dracula"). Although the film appears a bit unsteady in the beginning, it improves. I personally thought the contrast could have been improved a bit as well. Audio sounds good but the volume is a bit low and probably could stand a bit cleaning up to get rid of some hiss and popping.

The follow up to Whale and his star Boris Karloff's "Frankenstein", this witty, cynical horror film is well adapted by writer Ben Levy. Thought lost for years (the original film has been out of circulation for at least 44 years when William Castle made his weak remake), director Curtis Harrington found a copy of the film from which this version is drawn.
The film was almost lost when Universal sold the rights to Columbia in 1963. Luckily director Curtis Harrington (who befriended director Whale late in life)while working at Universal asked to have the negative pulled and duplicated. Otherwise the film would be lost as the firs reel of this classic was in pretty bad shape.

Overall this is a pretty good reissue of a classic Whale film that has been out of circulation for too long. It's a classic right up there with Whale's "Waterloo Bridge", "The Bride of Frankenstein", The Invisible Man" and "Frankenstein" although closer in tone to "Bride" and "Invisible" than his straight horror films.

Great Classic.......2006-11-10

A great classic worth every penny. A bit dated but that makes it even better. From the director who brought you such classics as Frankenstein with Karloff and The Invisible Man with Claude Rains. They just don't make movies like this anymore. Highly recommended.

Britten - The Turn of the Screw / Bedford, Field, Davies, Greagor, Obata, Schwetzinger Festpiele, Stuttgart

Average customer rating:

A Riveting Production of Britten's Masterpiece of Horror

Britten - The Turn of the Screw / Bedford, Field, Davies, Greagor, Obata, Schwetzinger Festpiele, Stuttgart
Starring: Lilian Watson , and Helen Donath
Manufacturer: Arthaus Musik
ProductGroup: DVD
Binding: DVD

General | Opera & Vocal | Styles | Music

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ASIN: B00008JL6Y
Release Date: 2003-05-20

Customer Reviews:

A Riveting Production of Britten's Masterpiece of Horror.......2003-05-20

Benjamin Britten's 1954 opera based on Henry James's spooky ghost story, 'The Turn of the Screw,' is acknowledged as one of his masterpieces. The libretto by Myfanwy Piper is as allusive, poetic and psychologically powerful as James's original.

This production, from the 1990 Schwetzingen Festival was a co-production of Covent Garden and the Cologne Opera. The British cast includes Helen Field (Governess), Menai Davies (Mrs Grose), Richard Greager (Peter Quint), Phyllis Cannan (Miss Jessel), Machiko Obata (Flora), and Samuel Linay (Miles). The orchestra, conducted by Britten expert (and artistic director of Britten's own Aldeburgh Festival) Steuart Bedford, is the Stuttgart Radio Symphony Orchestra (well, fifteen players from that group anyhow - Britten's orchestration for chamber orchestra is a miracle of colorful economy). The stage direction, by German Michael Hampe, is suitably eerie, catching the increasing tension ['the turn of the screw'] as the story unfolds. The set and costume design is not credited in the DVD's booklet, but requires mention because the black, gray and white colors that predominate are so apt to the shadowy ambience of the story. Finally, the direction for video and TV by Claus Viller is as effective as it is unobtrusive.

The opera is in a prologue (sung by the tenor who later sings Peter Quint) and two acts comprising eight scenes each. Each scene is preceded by an orchestral interlude - a theme and fifteen variations. It tells of the arrival of a governess at an isolated English country house where her absent employer's niece and nephew and an elderly housekeeper live. She soon learns that the employer's butler and the children's former governess have both died but are now ghosts who haunt the estate, exerting a hidden but powerful and malevolent influence on the two children. The governess, good-hearted but barely more than an innocent herself, determines that she must protect the children and try to rid them of these evil influences. In the end that is accomplished, but only after young Miles has himself died. This simple bare-bones retelling of the story, of course, cannot relate the building terror of the story, nor the widening circles of its allusive text. I leave it to others to speculate about the psychological ramifications of the story; it works as a piece of theater alone without any need for psychologizing, although that can make it seem a richer, deeper work.

Suffice it to say, I found this production to be extraordinarily effective in all departments: the singers are all wonderful, both as musicians and as actors; the direction by Bedford is taut and musical; the playing of the orchestra could not be bettered; the stage direction and visual effects are fairly straightforward (none of the Eurotrashing of the opera that has become so frightfully common in German productions) and dramatically telling. I shall come back to this DVD again and again.

My highest recommendation.

Customer Reviews:

Patchy production ... heart-rending story........2002-06-18

As a former psychotherapist, it's appealing to view a film that doesn't try to "diagnose," but rather simply tells the story of a heroine who sought to surface through harsh parental abuse and family secrets over the course of 60 years.
If those reading this review intimately knew the tenuousness of life on the street or beach, in an institution of any kind, you would feel a tug of familiarity in this film. Although I'd not rate it as a great film, it's going to touch many if not most of us where it counts. Although I don't know the true story of this woman, I know that the struggle to both survive through the tangled psychological jungle of the human heart and spirit is well exemplified here. Although the quality of sound (what there is of it) and picture is very poor (the worst I've ever experienced on DVD), it's a salute to the story and the filmmaker that many times I felt moved by the journey this woman took ... to haltingly restore herself from horrendous abuse, some of which is only hinted at over the first 20 odd years of her life.
Reminescent of Shine, Slingblade, Joe Gould's Secret, The Fisher King, Breaking the Waves and other films about marginalized imbalanced people, this film retains a core of truth and courage beyond what any of us should have to bear as children and young adults.
Too bad the DVD quality positively stinks, for it does dislodge the viewer from focussing on fine performances in a fine film. Although the heroine's style seems somewhat stilted at times, I'm content to recommend this flick as wholly plausible given its context. I think it's good enough to own and watch again...

Kate Grenville, where are you?!.......2001-07-01

This adaptation by Steve Wright of the Kate Grenville novel directed by Jerzy Domaradzki is a misfire. Using ideas from Janet Frame's story of An Angel at my Table (which was memorably filmed by Jane Campion) and also the Australian urban legend of Bea Miles, this tale of a girl imprisoned for 40 years in an asylum and released as a new actress has great gothic potential, but the best the director can do is use European tints in the lighting and add a melodramatic score. And don't even get me started on the politically correct dreamtime ending! One ponders why Grenville herself did not do the screenplay. As it is, the division of screen time between Ruth Cracknell as the modern Lilian and Toni Collette as the young Lilian, mixes the tone, and things aren't helped by the actors not matching up well. Of the two, Collette is the more successful with her mute retarded vulnerability, allowing Domaradzki to shoot her naked, and the scene of her being chased by a black dog on the beach is probably the closest to the Grenville we want. Playing 3 roles - the father in both time frames and Lilian's brother- Barry Otto gives the best performance, controlling his usual mannered style and using it for character, and as the brother is given a soft sounding tuba as metaphor for his ineffectualness. (His father unfortunately gets lines like "You tight steamy little vixen"). However, Cracknell is doing a great lady of the stage condescending to make a movie, and gets an unintentional laugh when she says she opposes "posturing, posing and affectation". It's easy to see why Cracknell wanted the role since she gets to recite Shakespeare, a literary conceit used for madness which comes across as false, and Domaradzki has her recitals attract crowds in his fantasy world where otherwise this kind of person would easily be ignored. Although regarded highly in her country for her stagework, Cracknell is an actress without the slightest suggestion of lyricism, and Lilian presented as a Cassandra feeds into Cracknell's haughty manner. At one point she boasts that in her life she has taken risks, and it is delivered as "truth" rather than the self-deception it actually is. (Janet Frame's story of survival after her time in an asylum is more effective because her character writes ie does something with her life). To say that Domaradzki is to be admired for Cracknell providing some redemptive subtlety is akin to the story of the Dutch boy sticking his finger in the leaking dike. The revelations that come from the flashbacks of Colette's Lilian aren't too hard to predict. One is probably more surprised by a director who can waste an actress like Anne Louise Lambert as Lilian's mother. However there is a modern payoff for a montage of strapping flashbacks, and a clever line in response to news of a death by heart attack.

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