When can we see Reviews of the DVD?
Once again Amazon have placed 14 reviews some more than 10 years old, of the FILM, not the DVD which doesn't come out til March 2013. I am not knocking the excellent reviews - they really are good, but they would be more use if they related to the actual DVD. Oh, Yes, I love the film, but might wait to see what remarks are made about the quality of the DVD which usually influences any purchase I make.
4 1/2 stars (BLU RAY) for a Fritz Lang spy thriller
There may be spoilers.
I remember getting a pretty good deal on this Criterion Blu ray edition of this Fritz Lang directed film. Although I had never seen it before, I will pretty much see anything with Lang's name attached, especially when he's in charge. The setting is England smack dab in the middle of WW II and the Nazi's are bombing the hell out of the place. Stephen Neale is about to be released from the "asylum" where he was placed after his implication in his wife's death. We are not sure early on what happened but it comes out in bits and pieces as the story develops.
Before getting on a train to London where he will get a fresh start (dodging bombs I guess) Neale stops for a charity event near the station. He's persuaded to guess the weight of a large cake which he correctly guesses thanks to a fortune teller who gives him the answer. Alas the fortune teller gave the information to the wrong man. After Neale boards the train, complete with cake...
Criterion-lite -- but Excellent
The Criterion Collection has licensed Fritz Lang's MINISTRY OF FEAR from Universal, and while they haven't given this picture first-cabin treatment -- there's no wall-to-wall commentary, and the only video supplements are a talk by a Lang biographer and the movie trailer -- it is well put together, and the picture looks and sounds great; I saw this in a theater just a couple of years ago, and the DVD compares well to the 35mm print shown at New York's Film Forum. The menu is easy to use, and the discussion about Lang and the movie is informative, especially in resolving differences between the movie and Graham Greene's original novel (Greene didn't like the movie adaptation). As for the film, it's a keeper -- perhaps not the best of Lang's wartime output (Scarlet Street, Man Hunt), but just below those in quality, and certainly superior to some of his other thrillers of his era (Cloak And Dagger).
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