To celebrate the UK Double Play Blu-ray release of Studio Ghibli’s incredibly charming animated movie Whisper of the Heart (which we reviewed here) we are offering three lucky readers the chance to win a copy of the Blu-ray/DVD combo sets!

An endearing coming of age tale of adolescent angst, young love and self discovery, Yoshifumi Kondō’s Whisper of the Heart is a gorgeous movie well worth checking out, and StudioCanal’s Blu-ray/DVD looks phenomenal and comes with some fun extras, like an entire movie’s worth of storyboards, interviews and behind-the-scenes footage from the sound booth, a step-by-step look at Naohisa Inoue’s artwork coming to life, and more!


To be in with a chance of winning, simply email us here and include the following:

1. Your full name and mailing address.
2. The answer to the following: Which Studio Ghibli movie was a reworking of The Little Mermaid story?

(UK entrants only. One entry per household. Competition ends 23rd January 2012.)

Directed By Yoshifumi Kondō
Starring Youko Honna, Kazuo Takahashi, Takashi Tachibana and Shigeru Muroi

Though anyone familiar with Studio Ghibli will instantly think of talking animals and imaginative worlds of pure fantasy upon mention of their name, Whisper of the Heart is one of the animation giant’s few forays into more grounded, realistic territory. Set in 1995 Tokyo, it’s the coming-of-age story of one bright, confused young girl trying to find her place in the world, with little of the otherworldy elements you’ll find in Howl’s Moving Castle or Spirited Away (though a few daydreams and a story written by a character in the movie do provide the origins for anthropomorphic cat The Baron in Whisper of the Heart’s sort-of sequel The Cat Returns). But while it’s a simple, fantasy-free story, Whisper of the Heart is a lovely reminder that Studio Ghibli can find just as much beauty, magic and wonder in the real world as they can in magical lands of make-believe.

Stuck at the adolescent crossroads between the wonder and whimsy of childhood and the serious choices, drama and responsibility of being an adult, young Japanese schoolgirl Shizuku isn’t sure what she wants to make of her future. An avid bookworm, she spends much of her time at the library, her head buried in fiction, but when she notices that a boy has taken out all the same books as her before, she finds herself daydreaming about what he might be like. Not long after, she crosses paths with a boy who at first glance seems arrogant, annoying and the opposite of everything she wants in a guy, but soon she’s taking her first steps on a journey towards first love and self-discovery as she’s forced to suss out her strengths and decide her future.

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Whisper of the Heart isn’t the strongest Ghibli movie, but it’s never less than charming, with the studio’s trademark animation style bringing wonderful life and detail to everything from cramped Tokyo family apartments, hilltop views of the city to glowing sunrises. It’s a gorgeous movie, but one filled with the symbolic depth and character that you’d expect from Hayao Miyazaki’s animation house. Shizuku is a well-developed, endearing character who embodies all the curiosity, confusion and self-doubt of adolescence but evolves naturally into a strong, independent female protagonist, while the romantic entanglements of Shizuku and her friends capture the bittersweet pangs of young love and misplaced crushes with a sweet, delicate touch.

It’s a little too predictable in places, though (there’s never any doubt who the mystery boy in Shizuku’s library books might be) and the ending feels hurried and slightly out of place, but neither are enough to dampen the charm and joy that the rest of the film has to offer. It’s a shame we never got to see more from director Yoshifumi Kondō, who died not long after the film’s release, but Whisper of the Heart remains one of Studio Ghibli’s most mature and criminally overlooked offerings, and a wonderful coming-of-age tale well worth seeking out.

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Whisper of the Heart hits Blu-ray for the first time in the UK courtesy of StudioCanal. The Blu-ray transfer looks gorgeous, with vibrant, natural colours and crisp, problem-free detail that brings out the best in the movie’s beautiful background work.

Audio-wise, there’s the choice between the film’s original Japanese audio in DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 and an English DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 dub featuring voice work from Brittany Snow (John Tucker Must Die, Hairspray), Ashley Tisdale (High School Musical) and Cary Elwes (The Princess Bride, Saw). The Japanese audio is the way to go, but as dubs go, the English track is pleasantly performed.

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The Double Play Blu-ray also comes with a DVD copy and the following special features:

• Storyboards
• Background Artwork from “The Baron’s Story”
• 4 Masterpieces of Naohisa Inoue: From Start to Finish
• Behind the Microphone
• TV Spots
• Japanese Trailers
• Studio Ghibli Trailers

There’s picture-in-picture storyboards for the entire film, and while it’s debatable whether anyone will watch the whole movie that way, especially more than once, it’s hard not to admire the effort off including them all rather than a paltry little gallery.

‘Background Artwork from “The Baron’s Story”‘ offers a gallery of Naohisa Inoue’s background artwork for Shizuku’s daydream fantasy scenes involving talking man-cat The Baron (later seen in The Cat Returns), while ’4 Masterpieces of Naohisa Inoue: From Start to Finish’ provides a step by step look at the creation of the artist’s paintings. ‘Behind The Microphone’ is a behind-the-scenes promo showing the American voice dub’s cast in the studio, with interviews from them all, and also included is a selection of trailers for the film and other Ghibli features. All in all, it’s a pretty great disc for a lovely, charming film.

The Film:

The Blu-ray:

Whisper of the Heart is out on Blu-ray and DVD in the UK now.
Click here to order the Blu-ray from Amazon.co.uk.

To celebrate the 9th January UK DVD and Blu-ray release of monster hit Troll Hunter we are offering one winner the chance to win an extremely limited edition money can’t buy exclusively designed Troll Hunter t-shirt and a copy of Troll Hunter on Blu-ray! One runner up will also win a limited edition Troll Hunter t-shirt!

This “original and highly assured fusion of B-movie lore and fairytale terror” (The Hollywood Reporter) combines the vision of “Where The Wild Things Are” with the faux-documentary, found-footage stylings of “Cloverfield”, “REC” and “The Blair Witch Project” to produce an “enormously entertaining” (Variety) and suspense-filled creature feature that the Daily Star rated as ‘one of the finest monster movies ever“ and Total Film described as being “like David Attenborough taking a stroll into Roald Dahl’s brain.” ”Troll Hunter is Magnificent” (Jonathan Ross).

TROLL HUNTER bursts it’s way on to DVD & Blu-ray on 9th January 2012 (Momentum Pictures).


To be in with a chance of winning, simply email us here and include the following:

1. Your full name and mailing address.
2. The answer to the following: Which found footage movie saw Mean Girls actress Lizzy Caplan attempting to flee from a giant monster in New York?

(UK entrants only. One entry per household. Entrants must be 15 or over. Competition ends 20th January 2012.)

Directed By Marcus Nispel
Starring Jason Momoa, Rachel Nichols, Stephen Lang, Rose McGowan and Ron Perlman

An action-packed sword and sorcery adventure full of brawn, boobs and bloodshed, Conan the Barbarian is certainly an entertaining enough diversion, but a sloppy script, forgettable characters and a parade of uninspired set-pieces mean that it’s a movie that you’ll struggle to pick out of the expansive line-up of forgettable modern fantasy movies once the credits roll.

Rebooting John Millius and Arnold Schwarzenegger’s interpretation of Robert E. Howard’s classic pulp fantasy character, Marcus Nispel’s Conan the Barbarian plonks Game of Thrones star Jason Momoa in Arnie’s empty shoes, retelling the origins of the Cimmerian sword-slinger with plenty of modern flair. Born in blood on the battlefield and brought into the world via sword-assisted C-section when his mother dies, Conan is raised by his fierce warrior father (Ron Perlman). But when their village is ransacked by the army of Khalar Zym (Stephen Lang) – a villainous commander in search of a mystic, all-powerful mask – the boy is left orphaned. Growing into adulthood with vengeance in his heart and a sword in his hand, Conan (Momoa) adventures through the land, hacking off heads and bedding fair maidens, until a chance meeting puts him on the path to find Khalar Zym and finally avenge the death of his father.

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Fresh off his memorable appearance as imposing Khal Drogo in Game of Thrones, Jason Momoa is a great fit for the role of Conan in theory, but a half-baked script doesn’t really give him the opportunity to shine. Schwarzenegger was never anything resembling an impressive actor, but he has terrific screen presence and is a hell of a lot of fun to watch. His 21st Century replacement Momoa has the benefit of being a better actor, but the film doesn’t really allow him to do anything more than scowl for 90 minutes. There’s a moment in the film where Conan liberates a large group of topless Victoria’s Secret model slaves and the helpless, doe-eyed damsels all look at Conan pleadingly, asking, “What are we supposed to do now?” Momoa practically winks at the audience, picks up the beautiful model with one hand, then wanders off back to his ship with dozens of topless women in tow, all cheering and leaping for joy as if they just snagged a ride to Spring Break. It’s a daft moment, but the rest of the film never embraces the pulpy fun of its material again, and the rest of the movie is a sadly po-faced connect-the-dots adventure movie, with nothing close to the original’s silly, brash fun of Arnie getting drunk and punching out a camel.

There’s the clichéd ‘quest to avenge slain relative’ plot and the obligatory romance, which is dead on arrival thanks to a dull love interest (Rachel Nichols) and zero chemistry between its leads. Familiar character actor/typecast screen villain Stephen Lang (Avatar) spends much of the film quite literally drooling all over himself, while he and Freddy Krueger-esque sorceress villain Rose McGowan put in hammy performances without the usual fun of OTT scenery-chomping or providing much of a threat. The script lazily creates cardboard characters on a whim to serve as one-dimensional tools to nudge the plot along. Conan’s token black pal serves no purpose but to ferry him around on a ship, while a lock-picking thief character conveniently appears a couple of scenes before Conan needs to stealth his way into an enemy castle, then disappears just after.

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The film’s action, which is peppered with enough gory violence and outlandish blood spurts to keep anyone’s blood-lust satiated, gets the job done effectively, livening up an otherwise dreary plot. But even so, every set-piece feels uninspired and spliced in from countless other modern adventure flicks. A fight against a gang of magical sandmen feels borrowed from The Mummy movies, a horse and carriage chase scene feels copied-and-pasted from a very similar forest chase in this year’s Your Highness (or any number of other classic adventure movies) and a squid fight feels cast off from Clash of the Titans or Pirates of the Caribbean. With its enjoyable, but derivative actin and glossy, CG-heavy filtered visuals, Conan the Barbarian feels almost indistinguishable from every other forgettable fantasy retread to crop up lately.

Not an especially terrible movie, but not a truly worthwhile one either, Conan the Barbarian slips neatly into that No Man’s Land of late night Saturday beer and pizza viewing; it serves as a sporadically entertaining distraction, but a lazy script and derivative action scenes mean it doesn’t come close to topping the fun of the Arnold originals.

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• Audio Commentary with Director Marcus Nispel
• Audio Commentary with Jason Momoa and Rose McGowan
• The Conan Legacy
• Battle Royal: Engineering the Action
• Robert E. Howard: The Man Who Would Be Conan
• Staging the Fights
• Theatrical Trailer
• DVD Copy

The Double Play Blu-ray/DVD set includes high-def 2D and 3D versions of the film, along with a DVD copy and a generous helping of extras which are surprisingly enjoyable. A dry, dull commentary with director Nispel is paired with a more fun track from actors Momoa and McGowan, while the featurettes, which focus on the history of the character, Conan creator Robert E. Howard and the film’s production, all offer a solid, entertaining bunch of extras. The disc’s A/V presentation is utterly superb, with an explosive DTS-HD Master Audio and a stunning HD transfer (the detail in which is sometimes to the film’s discredit, drawing attention to some lifeless matte work and special effects).

The Film:

The Blu-ray:

Conan the Barbarian (2011) is out on Blu-ray and DVD in the UK now.
Click here to order the Blu-ray from Amazon.co.uk.

Directed By Darren Lynn Bousman
Starring Jamie King, Rebecca De Mornay, Patrick Flueger, Shawn Ashmore and Frank Grillo

Much like Insidious did for Saw creators James Wan and Leigh Wannell, Mother’s Day proves that the further Darren Lynn Bousman (director of Saws II-IV) gets from modern horror’s most lazy and nonsensically-plotted franchise, the more promising his career becomes. A remake of 1980′s trashy Troma movie of the same name, Mother’s Day is far from a masterpiece, but a heaping helping of gut-churning tension, a solid cast and a fantastic performance from Rebecca De Mornay elevate it far above the usual gutter of cheap torture porn horror movies.

When a bank robbery goes awry, a trio of criminal siblings find themselves on the run as a tornado warning hits the Midwestern US city. With one of them shot and the cops on their trail, the brothers head for their mother’s home in hopes of laying low and finding help. Unfortunately for everyone concerned, the house now belongs to a young suburban couple (Jamie King and Frank Grillo) who’re entertaining their friends as they all hunker down in preparation for the coming storm. The three bank robbers bust in and take the group hostage as they wait for their mom to arrive, but the lives of the friends are about to be torn apart as they realise that the criminals aren’t half as scary as their twisted mother (De Mornay).

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While Bousman’s last genre efforts relied pretty much exclusively on torture porn set pieces, Mother’s Day surprisingly trades in a much more measured brand of horror. Sure, there’s more than a few instances of explosively messy gore and scenes of cringe-inducing torment, but the film relies predominantly on tension and tightly wound character scenes for it’s more effective moments. There are a few too many people in the mix for all of the cast to be fleshed out and memorable, but the script manages to sprinkle in a refreshing amount of character substance here and there. In a lot of respects, it nails the central idea that the Saw movies often shoot for and fail at, prodding at the survival instincts and capacity for selfish violence within ordinary people. But where Saw never managed to construct much of any character amidst all the Rube Goldberg traps and shoddy, convoluted plotting, Mother’s Day fuels its tension and torment by giving the characters a little more layered meat than expected.

Bousman is aided greatly by the ensemble he’s put together. For the most part, the cast are solely asked to do the standard horror movie ‘cry, scream and act traumatised’ thing, but they handle it with gusto. Much more impressive is Shawn Ashmore who, as the doctor of the group George, serves as medic-at-gunpoint to wounded criminal brother Jonny (Matt O’Leary). He gets to interact with the twisted family most, and he and De Mornay get to engage in an effective back-and-forth dynamic as George slowly starts to get inside Mother Koffin’s head. Patrick Flueger and Warren Kole deliver fittingly threatening performances as brothers Ike and Addley, while the beautiful Deborah Ann Woll is just as impressive as their sister Lydia, the most conflicted member of the criminal brood. But Rebecca De Mornay completely owns the film as cruel, calculating and manipulative Mother. She’s absolutely fantastic, bringing the same level of iconic, memorably twisted creepiness to the movie as she did The Hand That Rocks The Cradle.

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There’s a streak of misogyny and grim cruelty that’s hard to stomach at times, but if you’re made of stern stuff, then Mother’s Day is a solid horror movie that’s a few notches better than the usual horror remake fare. It’s strained under the weight of a few too many twists and an overly large stack of characters, but it’s also bolstered by an excellent and wonderfully nutty performance by Rebecca De Mornay and an impressive supporting cast. It’s far from a masterpiece, but as home invasion horror movies go, Mother’s Day is a tense and twisted film well worth checking out.

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The movie hits UK Blu-ray courtesy of Studiocanal. The film itself looks good, but isn’t overflowing with visual style, and the same’s true of the Blu-ray A/V mix; the HD transfer looks crisp, clean and problem free and the DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 track delivers a perfectly clear audio experience to offer up the dialogue, creepy score, gunshots and jump scares without issues. It’s nothing you’ll use to show off your system to friends, but the Blu-ray gives a solid HD experience for you to get the most out of the tension and thrills of the movie.

The extras are few, but deceptively long, though despite packing in a tonne of content, it’s all of the usual unenlightening promo fluff variety. There’s an hour’s worth of solo interviews with the cast, some on-set B-roll footage and a trailer for the film.

The Film:

The Blu-ray:

Mother’s Day is out on Blu-ray and DVD in the UK now.
Click here to order the Blu-ray from Amazon.co.uk.

To celebrate the 24th October UK DVD and Blu-ray release of Mother’s Day (Studiocanal), we are offering a fantastic original cinema poster and a copy of the film on Blu-ray.

Rebecca De Mornay (Wedding Crashers; Lords of Dogtown) heads a killer cast in Mother’s Day, in a role the makes her psychotic character from ‘The Hand That Rocks The Cradle’ look like Mother Theresa!

Loosely based on Charles Kaufman’s 1980 Troma classic, Mother’s Day is a nail-biting thriller that has been described as ‘intense’ (Dread Central) and ‘ a gruesome pleasure” (The Sun).


To be in with a chance of winning, simply email us here and include the following:

1. Your full name and mailing address.
2. The answer to the following: Rebecca De Mornay starred in which other psychotic mother movie?

(UK entrants only. One entry per household. Entrants must be 18 or over. Competition ends 31st October 2011.)

Directed By Roy Ward Baker
Starring Andrew Keir, James Donald, Barbara Shelley and Julian Glover

While extending the lines to the London Underground system, a group of workers unearth prehistoric remains and a strange metallic object buried beneath the city. At first believing it to be an unexploded bomb, the military quickly cordon off the area and start inspecting the device, but their initial assumptions are quashed when they discover that the object is made of impenetrable metal unknown to man and unresponsive to heat. Hard-headed military commander Colonel Breen (Julian Glover) stubbornly refuses to believe it’s anything other than a WWII relic, but more free-thinking scientist Professor Quatermass has a much scarier notion: The object is an alien spacecraft that’s lain dormant for millions of years and is evidence of a martian attempt to colonise the planet of early man. Breen scoffs at the idea, but as the ship starts emitting unearthly vibrations and driving those around it mad, Quatermass’ idea becomes terrifyingly real, and threat no longer buried in the past.

A remake/adaptation of the six-part BBC serial, Quatermass and the Pit has left an indelible mark on the sci-fi/horror genre. Doctor Who has paid homage to and borrowed from the Quatermass serials on several occasions (1971 Doctor Who serial The Dæmons borrows liberally from Quatermass and the Pit), while genre legend John Carpenter’s work contains plenty of nods to Nigel Kneale’s brainchild, not least of which is The Thing – another tale of a buried alien craft containing long-dormant evil being unearthed and awoken by modern-day humans. Even 2001: A Space Odyssey tackles a similar thematic thread as Kneale does with Quatermass and the Pit. It’s not hard to see why it’s proven such an influential work, either, as the finest in the Quatermass series still holds up resiliently as an engrossing, intelligent and atmospheric sci-fi story.

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Sure, some of the film’s space-race-era ideas are more than a little hokey in hindsight (it’s a foregone conclusion in the film that whichever nation’s military lands on and lays claim to the Moon will then police the Earth from there with missiles), the effects carry that cheesy, dated ’60s charm and much of the laughable supporting acting threatens to unravel the film’s attempts to scare. But even so, the script still holds up as remarkably intelligent for its time. Though smuggling political and social commentary into sci-fi and horror stories was far from a revolutionary idea, having provided the backbone for the genre for much of the ’50s and ’60s, Quatermass and the Pit’s nods to the Cold War climate of fear and suspicion, genocide and racial prejudice are all handled with far more subtlety than most works of sci-fi allegory.

Thankfully Andrew Keir is rather fantastic as Professor Quatermass and delivers perhaps the defining interpretation of the character. The rest of the core cast is excellent, too, with Julian Glover proving incredibly good as pompous, bull-headed sceptic Colonel Breen and James Donald even more impressive and likeable as scholarly palaeontologist Dr Roney. While the promo material (and the Blu-ray menu) attempts to sell the movie with heaving cleavage, the actual film is infinitely more restrained than the usual Hammer offerings, and in an age where female characters were largely reduced to damsels in distress or set dressing, Scream Queen Barbara Shelley’s character provides an uncharacteristically intelligent and resourceful female co-star who stands head-and-shoulders with the guys as an amiable lead. Most importantly, though, Quatermass and the Pit is a gripping horror yarn that conjures up a riveting sci-fi narrative and a wonderfully effective atmosphere of Lovecraftian apocalyptic dread right through to its final moments.

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Having received a loving restoration and arriving on Blu-ray courtesy of Optimum Home Entertainment, Quatermass and the Pit looks phenomenal, and light years better than it ever has before. Colour reproduction is excellent, detail is staggering and there’s a healthy grain with no visible print damage or artifacting. It’s a gorgeous looking transfer and an incredibly impressive restoration. The lone English LPCM 2.0 track proves almost as impressive, and adds a shocking amount of depth to the ship’s chaotic vibration and the third act destruction, while dialogue is clear as a bell.

Along with the breathtaking restoration work, the ‘Double Play’ Blu-ray bundles in a bonus DVD copy of the film and a selection of extras that’re light on filler and contain a tonne of insight into the film, with a commentary recycled from past DVD releases and a stack of lengthy new interviews recorded for the Blu-ray:

• Commentary With Director Roy Ward Baker and Writer Nigel Kneale

Hidden away in the set-up menu, this track features Baker and Kneale chatting about the film’s conception and production. While the commentary tends to be rather dry, it’s essential listening for Quatermass fans.

• Interviews

A handful of critics, filmmakers and people connected to the film and Nigel Kneale provide interesting solo interviews (varying in length from 12-30 minutes each) talking about their thoughts and experiences as Hammer, Kneale and Quatermass fans. There’s insight from Judith Kerr, Joe Dante, Kim Newman, Julian Glover, Marcus Hearn and Mark Gatiss.

• “The World of Hammer” Sci-Fi Episode

A documentary episode focusing on Hammer’s sci-fi output and Quatermass and the Pit, narrated by Oliver Reed. Unfortunately Reed’s narration is awkwardly quiet and only delivered through one audio channel, so it can often be tough to discern through the dialouge and score of the clips shown.

• Alternate American Credits

The credits used for the American release of the film where it carried the alternate title ‘Five Million Years to Earth’.

• Original Trailer

• Alternate American Trailer

The Film:

The Blu-ray:

Quatermass and the Pit is out on Blu-ray and DVD in the UK now.
Click here to order the Blu-ray from Amazon.co.uk.

Directed By Stuart Beattie
Starring Caitlin Stasey, Deniz Akdeniz, Rachel Hurd-Wood, Lincoln Lewis, Phoebe Tonkin and Ashleigh Cummings

Dan Bradley’s remake of ’80s American teens vs. Russian invaders classic Red Dawn has really gone through the ringer. Despite a cast full of young ‘next big thing’ stars like Chris Hemsworth (Thor) and Josh Hutcherson (The Hunger Games), the movie has been delayed since 2009 due to the MGM’s bankruptcy woes and was then forced through reshoots to alter the Chinese villains into less offensive North Korean warmongers. And in that time, Tomorrow When The War Began – itself a thinly-veiled Australian remake of Red Dawn – has been filmed, released without incident and made Dan Bradley’s film pretty redundant even before it’s hit cinemas, channelling a paltry budget and a cast of former Aussie soap stars into a thrilling, explosive summer movie that rivals most Hollywood blockbusters.

As the school year comes to an end for the port town of Wirawee, country girl Ellie Linton (Caitlin Stasey) organises a summer camping trip to make the most of their last days of freedom. Ellie, best friend Corrie (Rachel Hurd-Wood), prim-but-sweet princess Fiona (Phoebe Tonkin), Corrie’s jock boyfriend Kevin (Lincoln Lewis), buff town troublemaker Homer (Deniz Akdeniz), hardcore Christian girl Robyn (Ashleigh Cummings) and Ellie’s crush/token Asian kid Lee (Chris Pang) all head up into the mountain paradise of Hell – a beautiful, secluded valley clearing. The gang frolic and have an amazing time, pledging to do the same again every year, thinking little of the formations of jets flying overhead during their last night. But when they head back into town, they discover that Australia has been invaded and occupied by Asian military forces, their families and friends either killed or rounded up in prison camps. Narrowly avoiding capture, the motley group of teens are forced to become Wirrawee’s last pocket of resistance in a war they never expected.

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Based on a seven-part cult series of teen novels, the unfortunately sparse character work on display in Tomorrow When The War Began calls attention to its young adult fiction roots at every opportunity. While it’s thankfully free from any overly melodramatic YA romance, the dialogue is filled with incredibly cheesy monologues from its cast that offer a five year old’s insight into war and loss of innocence – a sentiment echoed as director Stuart Beattie throws in some on-the-nose shots that are as subtle as an atom bomb, like a teenage girl firing an AK-47 as a child’s playground swing sways prominently in the foreground.

Ellie and Homer get fairly substantial and satisfying character arcs, but elsewhere we get to know little about the cast beyond the bare basics. Lee exists entirely as a token minority/love interest and is given little else to do, while the second religious girl Robyn refuses to wield a gun or kill someone, you predictably know exactly what be doing by movie’s end. Still, an incredibly likeable cast with effortless charisma means that the absence of character feels less prominent than it should as they enliven some spotty writing and turn the gang into a winning group of appealing kids worth rooting for.

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First-time director/veteran screenwriter Beattie, whose writing credits include big-budget actioner G.I. Joe and The Pirates of the Caribbean movies, isn’t the sharpest writer of character, but he certainly knows his way around an action scene. The action-heavy approach works wonders, and Tomorrow When The War Began is filled with stand-out set-pieces, including a garbage-truck-versus-military-buggies chase through downtown streets and a large-scale guerilla bridge assault. Beattie manages to wring plenty of tension out of the teens’ predicament and the film’s action is as taut, thrilling and explosive as most major Hollywood action blockbusters.

It’s let down by an absence of character, but an immensely likeable cast and a run-time chock-full of tense and exciting action makes Tomorrow When The War Began an excellent little summer action movie and a wonderfully entertaining start to a potential franchise. The ending leaves the door wide open for a sequel, and while the painfully overrated Twilight books/films have spawned an exponential and tiring glut of supernatural romance movies, this is one young adult series I’d much rather see spawn a few cinematic sequels.

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Being an action-heavy movie which showcases a tonne of gorgeous Australian locations and great cinematography, it’s no surprise that Paramount Home Entertainment’s Blu-ray does the film justice with a beautiful HD transfer and an excellent DTS-HD MA track which caters to dialogue and action equally well. Also included is a Russian DD 5.1 track, an English Audio Description track for the vision impaired, and English, Danish, Estonian, Finnish, Latvian, Lithuanian, Norweegian, Portuguese, Russian and Swedish subtitles.

While the disc’s special features (all in HD) are awkwardly laid out – the ‘Making Of’ documentary is placed outside the ‘Special Features’ section on the menu, while the commentaries are hidden away in the ‘Behind the Scenes’ sub-section of the ‘Special Features’ menu, rather than in the audio set-up area as on every other DVD/Blu-ray – there’s a plentiful selection of entertaining and impressive extras to keep fans of the movie happy.

• Commentary with Writer/Director Stuart Beattie

Beattie provides a talkative and informative commentary which covers at length the pitfalls inherent in adapting a beloved property to film, while pointing out the changes from book to screen and the tweaks needed to translate a novel set in 1993 to the 21st Century. There’s plenty of titbits about the logistics of filming, too, while Beattie points out a few impressively subtle visual framing moments.

• Commentary by Producers Andrew Mason & Michael Boughen

Andrew Mason does the bulk of the talking in a very dry track; Mason sounds actively bored, as if reading from a script, but still imparts plenty of interesting information about the movie’s production and technical aspects of the filming process.

• Mini Commentary by John Marsden (3 mins, 3 secs)

Series author John Marsden provides picture-in-picture commentary for a couple of scenes. He talks about his first impressions of the cast’s look in comparison to the image he had of the characters while writing and generally points how how impressed he was with the cast. Unfortunately it’s not very long and not candid enough to be worthwhile in comparison to a full commentary.

• ‘The Making Of’ (25 mins, 40 secs)

Deniz Akdeniz, Lincoln Lewis and Chris Pang host a fun tour behind the scenes during the movie’s filming. It’s an entertaining and surprisingly substantial feature, providing plenty of insight into set-pieces being filmed, hair and make-up tests, which shots in the film were computer generated, location scouting, start to finish CG comparison shots and storyboards, all interspersed with jovial, friendly tomfoolery with the guys as they muck around on set.

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• ‘The Characters’ (17 mins, 34 secs)

A selection of solo interviews with the cast (with a ‘Play All’ option), peppered with on-set footage. The quality of the interviews vary depending on the person, and much of the content is duplicated from the ‘Making Of’ feature, but there’s some entertaining conversation to be found from the cast.

• ‘On Set With Stuart Beattie’ (3 mins, 14 secs)

Beattie provides a couple of short interview snippets talking about the characters and the daunting prospect of adapting a popular book. It’s a bit pointless – most of it’s stating-the-obvious fluff, and nothing that isn’t discussed more in-depth in the commentary.

• ‘How To Blow Up A Bridge’ (12 mins, 33 secs)

A pretty extensive look at the preparation and staging of the bridge explosion.

• ”VFX Breakdowns” (2 mins, 32 secs)

A full step-by-step montage of the CG work for three scenes, divided by the effects studio who provided the work. The Lab handle the far-off establishing shot of post-occupation Cobbler’s Bay (the amount of minor detail put into a shot that we only see from a massive distance is pretty impressive), Iloura provide the Aussie jet shoot-down and FuelVFX covers a buggy crash during the truck chase

• Alternate Ending (2 mins, 21 secs)

Not a massively different ending from what’s in the final product (the shots are almost identical, but the dialogue is different) but it is a pretty big tonal change – the theatrical ending sees the characters assured and ready to kick ass, while the alternate ending closes on a more unsure, meditative note. It’s interesting to see, but the final version is the stronger ending.

• Interview with John Marsden (23 mins, 51 secs)

While the mini-commentary is a disappointingly short effort, this interview covers much more substantial ground as Marsden is grilled about his writing process, the series’ conception and character inspiration and the movie itself. It’s probably of more interest to fans of the books, since it’s centred more on the novels and the questions focus on content not covered in the movies, but regardless, it’s an incredibly interesting feature.

• Passage Readings (4 mins, 27 secs)

A trio of passage readings from the book by author John Marsden.

All in all, it’s an incredibly impressive, feature-stacked disc for an entertaining film, and fans of the books and movie are sure to be pleased with the treatment it’s received on Blu-ray. The UK disc is also region-free, handily for those in the US where the film has yet to hit theatres.

The Film:

The Blu-ray:

Tomorrow When The War Began is out on Blu-ray and DVD in the UK now.
Click here to order the Blu-ray from Amazon.co.uk.

Directed By Michael Mann
Starring William Petersen, Dennis Farina, Tom Noonan, Joan Allen and Brian Cox

Half a decade before Anthony Hopkins brought Dr. Hannibal Lecter to the big screen, Heat/Miami Vice director Michael Mann had already introduced the eloquent, liver-chomping psycho to audiences in 1986′s Manhunter. And though The Silence of the Lambs was the one that reaped all the accolades and box office rewards, it’s the criminally overlooked and underrated Manhunter that stands the test of time as not just a more tightly-wound, chilling serial killer thriller, but the best Lecter movie by a wide margin.

Based on the Thomas Harris novel Red Dragon, Manhunter centres around FBI Agent Will Graham (William Petersen), one of the country’s most gifted criminal profilers who possesses the unique talent of being able to burrow into the mindset of the psychopaths he hunts. After the chase for a serial killer leads him to capture twisted murderer Dr. Hannibal Lecktor (Brian Cox), Graham is left physically scarred and psychologically haunted, unable to shake the unimaginably dark thoughts he had to embrace in order to track down the killer. Now living a peaceful life of retirement with his wife and son having left the FBI behind, he’s coaxed into returning to the job by friend and former boss Jack Crawford (Dennis Farina) as the FBI are stumped in their hunt for a sadistic murderer dubbed The Tooth Fairy, whose lunar cycle of crimes leaves them with precious little time to stop him before he vanishes.

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Michael Mann, former showrunner for Miami Vice decades before he adapted the show to the big screen, brings the same visual style he pioneered there to Manhunter, with most of the film taking place in the perpetual orange-hued magic hour of sunrise/sunset, while night scenes are filmed with prominent blue filters. Mann also uses some unusual camera trickery in the last act – a final showdown between the police and Dollarhyde is peppered with distinct, jittery edits as In-A-Gadda-Da-Vita blasts on the soundtrack, lending the scenes a strange, nightmarish quality and making the serial killer feel even more monstrous. It’s an undeniably stylish film, but Manhunter is never style over substance; paced perfectly and with well-developed, three-dimensional characters, it’s an intensely gripping serial killer thriller as riveting as any detective movie.

CSI star William Petersen hasn’t always made the best career moves, having turned down major roles in Goodfellas, Heat and Platoon to take lesser roles in TV movies, and between Manhunter and the previous year’s other stylised, overlooked ’80s classic To Live & Die In L.A., we’re reminded exactly why that’s such a bad thing. With salt and pepper hair, five ‘o-clock shadow and brooding machismo, he’s the essence of ’80s cool (presumably Mann missed the look, since Tom Cruise was modelled into a dead ringer for Petersen in his later film Collateral), but couples it with an intense, psychologically haunted vulnerability that makes Will Graham as fascinating a character as the complex psychopaths he’s hunting. Where Anthony Hopkins channelled the serial killer into an entertainingly memorable but scenery-chewing, overly broad cartoonish villain, Brian Cox’s take on Lecktor (as the name’s spelt in Manhunter) is an infinitely more subdued and nuanced, and all the more frightening and effective for his human subtleties. Though he’s only in the film for three short scenes, it speaks volumes about Cox’s performance and crackling chemistry with Petersen that those scenes are so memorable, making Lecktor feel like a much larger presence in the film.

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But, much as in Silence of the Lambs, Lecktor is merely a secondary evil, playing caged consultant to the FBI as they hunt down an at-large murderer. In this case it’s Francis Dollarhyde (Tom Noonan), a twisted killer who’s murdering loving families around the time of the full moon, and whom the Feds have dubbed The Tooth Fairy due to his sick habit of biting his victims. As played by Noonan (Last Action Hero, Robocop 2) he’s an incredibly creepy presence – at 6’6, with a hare lip and ghostly white hair, he’s as psychically imposing as he is psychologically unhinged. But as with Cox, he’s played with a degree of layered subtlety, and the humanity we see in his awkwardly tender romance with blind photographer Reba McClane (Joan Allen) makes his acts of twisted evil all the more effective and unsettling.

A perfectly paced, incredibly taut, thoroughly gripping and immensely chilling journey into the mind of serial killers and the haunted psyche of the profiler who hunts them, Manhunter is a quintessential police procedural thriller. As visually stylish as it is psychologically unsettling, this woefully overlooked classic isn’t just the best Hannibal Lector movie, but one of the greatest serial killer thrillers ever made, and one that holds up perfectly decades later.

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Showcasing beautiful colour reproduction and gorgeous detail, StudioCanal’s UK Blu-ray sees Michael Mann and cinematographer Dante Spinotti’s trademark visuals preserved wonderfully. The film’s HD transfer and DTS-HD Master Audio track sees it looking as beautiful as it ever has and is a massive upgrade from DVD (a Linear PCM 2.0 audio track and English subtitles are also included).

• Director’s Cut

Included as a bonus feature in standard definition is the 119 minute ‘Director’s Cut’ of the film. The differences are comprised mostly of minor alternate dialogue and edits, with a few major scenes removed and others added, primarily a new ending scene in which Graham visits the family who were to be Dollarhyde’s next victims. The theatrical cut is a stronger version overall, but the alternate cut is a great bonus, even if it’s only a not-quite-amazing-looking standard definition version.

• Director’s Commentary (Available only on Director’s Cut)

Mann’s commentary track is a little too dry and descriptive at times, with more than a few spots of silence, but he shares a great deal of interesting anecdotes about the film’s casting process, production and a few of his guerilla filmmaking moments.

• ‘Inside Manhunter’ Featurette

A 17 minute chat with the cast about how they snagged the roles, the film and their heavy research processes. Though short, it’s an incredibly entertaining and informative feature.

• ‘The Manhunter Look: A Conversation with Dante Spinotti’ Featurette

A ten minute interview with the cinematographer, who talks about the shooting of the movie and the distinct visual style and colour palette.

• Trailer

The film’s original trailer.

The Film:

The Blu-ray:

Manhunter is out on Blu-ray in the UK now.
Click here to order the Blu-ray from Amazon.co.uk.

Directed By Joe Cornish
Starring John Boyega, Jodie Whittaker, Alex Esmail, Franz Drameh, Simon Howard and Nick Frost

For much of 2011, J.J. Abrams’ nostalgia-fest Super 8 has been championed as “the new Goonies”, but who’d have though that a British movie about a young, thieving gang of London street kids would claim that title? Attack The Block is the most deliriously entertaining Amblin Entertainment throwback and so much more: It’s loving a homage to the films of John Carpenter, Joe Dante, Steven Spielberg, Walter Hill and John Landis; a perfect gateway horror film for youngsters; the best monster movie in years and the tightest, smartest, funniest and most intensely enjoyable horror comedy since Shaun of the Dead.

When a gang of South London teens led by knife-wielding Moses (John Boyega) mug young nurse Sam (Jodie Whittaker) as she’s on her way home, something falls from the sky and flattens a car a few feet away from them. While Sam takes the opportunity to flee, minus her phone, purse and ring, Moses and the gang stick around to investigate. When an otherworldly creature bursts from the wreckage and attacks him, Moses chases the alien down and kills it, keeping its corpse as a trophy, believing it’ll fetch a lot of money. Before the night’s over, though, dozens more much larger and more ferocious alien monsters fall from the sky around the London, making a beeline for Moses and the gang and turning anyone caught inbetween into a savage, bloody mess. As the gang gears up to protect their block, the city’s first line of defense will be the kids they usually cross the street to avoid.

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It’s a tough prospect to ask people to identify with a gang of teen street kids, especially in England where they’re demonized in the papers every day, but writer/director Joe Cornish’s stroke of genius is in casting one of society’s (and most recent Brit movies’) familiar villains as the unlikely heroes, having us grow to love and root for them. And Cornish understands writing, character and structure like few screenwriters do, adding layers of thematic depth and social insight without resorting to cumbersome soapbox politics. He crafts three-dimensional, well developed characters without any expense to the lean, propulsive pace, showing us more about who these kids are in one quick, incredibly cool ‘gearing up’ montage than most movies can with forty pages of exposition.

It doesn’t hurt that he’s assembled a fantastic cast, either. Jodie Whittaker is excellent as nurse Sam, and the dynamic between her character and Moses is a great and well developed one. Nick Frost makes a small, but welcome appearance as a local drug dealer, but it’s the inexperienced, but natural teen cast that make the film. Young lead John Boyega has just been snatched up to star in Spike Lee’s new HBO drama series, and it’s no wonder why: Boyega’s a dead ringer for a young Denzel Washington and boasts a similar intensity and heaps of natural charisma and talent, making Moses an ambiguous hero who you can’t help but root for and cheer on. The same’s true of the rest of the young cast, and while Alex Esmail steals the most scenes as cocky, smart-mouthed Pest, the entire gang gets their own moments to shine. They’re kids you’ll grow to understand, empathise with and like a hell of a lot, lending even more impact when the bodycount starts to rise. It might have a tonne of incredible comedic moments, but it also juggles humour and horror with the same natural dexterity as An American Werewolf in London – it’s a monster movie that, while funny, doesn’t pull any punches and it’s all the more impressive for it.

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While it’s an impressive feat that Cornish crafts such well-drawn, fleshed out and likeable kid characters where so many more experienced filmmakers fail, even more stunning is his command of action and pace. Visceral, inherantly cool and immediately propulsive, Attack The Block is a movie with no dead weight. The tight, inventive camerawork is reminiscent of John Carpenter’s work (as is Basement Jaxx’s superb score), and the film’s visuals and action are the kind that remind you why you love movies: Cornish’s film is filled with moments of pure cinematic exhilaration, most notably a slo-mo chase scene in the last act that’s phenomenal. The design of the monsters puts the magic of cinema to use just as effectively. A subtle blending of man-in-suit practical effects and computer rotoscoping, with blacker-than-black fur and no facial features aside from a mouthful of luminescent blue teeth, Attack The Block’s aliens are one of the most visually distinctive and iconic movie creatures put to screen in a long time.

Attack The Block is a perfect film, and while it calls to mind such genre classics as Gremlins, Tremors, An American Werewolf in London and The Thing, or Amblin Entertainment kid-centric action-adventure movies like The Goonies and E.T., it carves its own unique identity, too, with its infectiously quotable street stang, amazing monster design, fantastic, memorable characters and iconic visuals. It’s an instant cult classic, and doesn’t just mark Joe Cornish as the most exciting Brit film talent since his pal Edgar Wright first burst onto the scene, but delivers the best damn monster movie in years, too.

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The movie hits home video courtesy of Optimum Home Entertainment and the Blu-ray arrives with a fantastic HD treatment and stunning audio which caters equally well to the films’ slang-laced dialogue, the alien creatures’ piercing screeches and Basement Jaxx’s amazing score.

There’s also a stack of special features which dispense with the usual padding and promotional crap that usually litters DVDs and opts to deliver a tonne of funny, informative and amazingly entertaining behind the scenes info:

• Executive Producer Commentary

Writer/Director Joe Cornish and executive producer Edgar Wright (of Shaun of the Dead/Scott Pilgrim fame) provide a superb commentary for the film. Cornish and long-time pal and collaborator Adam Buxton have, amongst other comedy projects, been on the air for years as hosts of their own radio show, so it’s no surprise that he’s an eloquent, funny and entertaining speaker, as well as a font of film knowledge. As well as chatting about the movie’s origins and inspirations, he and Wright turn the commentary into an incredibly funny and interesting insight into the perks and pitfalls of making your first feature. It’s a must-listen.

• Junior Commentary

Continuing the commentary love, Cornish gets together with the young cast of the film for another great track to talk about how they got into acting, their on-set experiences and their thoughts on DVD commentaries.

• Senior Commentary

Cornish is joined by adult members of the cast Nick Frost, Jodie Whittaker and Luke Treadaway. Though despite the ‘senior commentary’ label, young actors John Boyega, Alex Esmail and Franz Drameh sit in for this track, too. It’s another amazingly fun listen, filled with plenty of light-hearted banter, gags and interesting conversation.

• ‘Behind The Block’

An hour-long behind the scenes documentary that’s free from promotional fluff and full of interesting glimpses into the filmmaking process and plenty of hilarious, candid tomfoolery.

• ‘Creature Feature’ Featurette

Another feature that’s all fun insight and no fluff filler. It focuses on the film’s distinctive alien design as Cornish talks about the effects that bring the creatures to life on screen, while showing the rotoscoping techniques, CG augmentation and shows the film’s creature performer Terry Notary and the team doing their thing on-set.

• Unfilmed Action

Joe Cornish talks about an action scene involving Moses and Sam hanging from the side of the tower block and one involving Pest and an attack in a shop which didn’t end up getting filmed, but we do get to see the storyboards.

• ‘Meet The Gang’ Featurette

A short feature in which the young cast talk about their characters.

• ‘It’s a Rap’ Featurette

The teens all try their hand at freestyle rap while having fun on set.

• Trailers

The Film:

The Blu-ray:

Attack The Block is out on Blu-ray and DVD in the UK now.
Click here to order the Blu-ray from Amazon.co.uk.