Matching up action and comedy might be one of the greatest cinematic accomplishments of all time. Okay, that might be a little extreme, but for those who want to "turn on, tune in, and drop out", action comedies provide the perfect combination of aggression relieving explosions and fall down laughing dialog to complement whatever mood you're in. For fans of this genre, today's Blu-ray release of
The Losers will be a welcome addition to your Sunday-afternoon library.
Staff reviewer Ken Brown commented in his
Blu-ray review of The Losers, "The Losers is a fast and funny bit of Big Dumb Fun, but its action and humor aren't as savage or savvy as they could be. Still, you could do much worse. Warner's Blu-ray release fumbles out of the gate with a shallow supplemental package, but makes up for any shortcomings with a faithful, finely tuned video transfer and an explosive DTS-HD Master Audio track."
As a writer/director, Kevin Smith sculpts his films in a very tiny box of hilarious monologues and awkward situations, something that his fans eat up like so many chocolate pretzels. So when Smith stepped out of that comfort zone to direct
Cop Out, which is out today on Blu-ray, his fans (of which I am one) were a bit skeptical he could bring his magic to someone else's script. While the Bruce Willis/Tracey Morgan buddy film doesn't live up to Smith's more famous works, it's certainly no
Jersey Girl, and for that, we thank him.
For the
Blu-ray review of Cop Out, staff reviewer Ken Brown commented, "Cop Out, like so many R-rated comedies, will leave plenty of people laughing and plenty more shaking their heads." He continues, "Supplemental junkies and Smith fans will be thrilled with its Picture-in-Picture track -- one of Warner's finest Maximum Movie Modes to date -- but they'll be less ecstatic when it comes to its inconsistent video transfer and somewhat underwhelming DTS-HD Master Audio track."
Okay, enough with the new releases, let's talk about some catalog films. Criterion has clearly embraced the Blu-ray format tenaciously with an outstanding number of releases that out-guns some of the mini-majors who have more material and bigger budgets. This week, they release
The Red Shoes and
Black Narcissus, both of which receiving raving reviews from staff reviewer Svet Atanasov.
In his
Blu-ray review of The Red Shoes, he comments, "Criterion have produced yet another spectacular package that I have a feeling will end up being amongst the ten best releases of the year."