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The DVD commentaries thread

Started by Famous Mortimer, November 01, 2010, 10:47:14 PM

Previous topic - Next topic

bitesize

Quote from: Shameless Custard on May 25, 2012, 02:57:54 PM
Listened to the Edgar Wright and Simon Pegg track for Shaun Of The Dead last night. Not overly funny, but constant interesting tidbits about the making of the film, the people from comedy they really wanted in the film, how they feel it could've been improved, etc

Good stuff. Might get round to the Hot Fuzz one this weekend

Edgar Wright always gives good commentary - Hot Fuzz ones are really good, and the Scott Pilgrim one with him + Bryan Lee O'Malley is great too. did try the other Scott Pilgrim one with him and some technical bod from the crew but it was very dry - turned it off + listened to the cast one instead...

Custard

Quote from: danyulx on February 03, 2012, 05:59:35 PM
I must have heard one of the most disappointing, lacklustre audio commentaries of my life, the other night. Dennis Hopper's for his (great) film 'Out of the Blue'.

Dennis Hopper doing an audio commentary - a mad man, ain't he? - what have you got to lose? Quite a lot as it happens. Five minutes of silence, before he's finally prodded by the producer into muttering something like "I think that was shot in Montreal...... It was raining that day, I think..." Ad infinitum, for two hours.

John Waters and Werner Herzog do the best commentaries on the block. Terry Gilliam is great at them too. Commentaries are usually best when they couldn't give a toss about what's going on on screen and they just spend the running time ranting and raving about whatever they like instead.

I heard Matt and Trey's commentary for the 'South Park' film not so long ago. That was excellent.

I usually rip audio commentaries as MP3s and play them on my ipod as I'm gong to bed. Most of them help me sleep. I don't recall ever ever being sat in front of my TV watching a film with the audio commentary track on - it'd do my head in. In the same way anyone talking over any film does my head in. I don't care who they are or what they have to say. I thoroughly understand David Lynch's and Steven Spielberg's anti-Audio Commentary stance, by the same token I'm glad they - audio commentaries - exist, though. I'm conflicted.

I've started ripping the ones I wanna hear to mp3s, and I've gotta agree that it's really enjoyable listening to them whilst laying in bed, or out an about, rather than stuck inside, in front on the telly.

They feel like interesting, one-off podcasts of directors and actors you like talking about a film they once made. The visuals not being there doesn't matter half as much as I thought it might, especially if you know a film well enough, as then you can easily imagine in your head the scene they are talking about, and still get much out of it

Working through the Evil Dead ones now. Raimi and Campbell are fantastic together

Though my stack of other commentaries are really building up now on the iPod. So that's the next year taken care of

NoSleep

Quote from: Shameless Custard on May 25, 2012, 04:53:48 PM
Working through the Evil Dead ones now. Raimi and Campbell are fantastic together

Bruce makes a good go of the first film all alone, but the commentary for Evil Dead II tops it as he plays off of Raimi and the others (obviously enjoys an audience). I always enjoy the impeccable timing of his line "Say hello to... PAPA!!!" with the scene it accompanies, and wonder if he has extensively viewed certain parts of these films (and commented on them) at fan conventions etc.

thenoise

Quote from: dr_christian_troy on October 14, 2011, 05:11:44 PM
Thanks for the tip! I bought a Something Weird DVD the other day too. I've been wanting to delve into their library for a while, not sure where to start though?

It's all fantastic, if you're in the right frame of mind, but terrible if you aren't.  Personally I don't care too much for the (incredible tame) 'sexy' stuff, like the Harry Novak southern sex comedies, really badly dated and repetitive.  I love Doris Wishman though, truly unique in the best and worst senses of the word!

One of my favourites divides people greatly, 'Monsters Crash the Pyjama Party' - a loving tribute to the American 'Spook Show', a terrible feature (with TWO audio commentaries, mostly describing how the show would have been staged back in the day with actors coming into the audience and dragging people into the film!), a bonus film, shorts, trailers, nonsense and the most baffling menu design in DVD history.  I showed it to my girlfriend of the time last Halloween and she found it rather confusing really.

billtheburger

I really enjoyed the commentary by Alejandro Jodorowsky that he made in 2007 for the UK DVD of "Holy mountain", as subtitles to the film. It turns out he made all the actors (which only one actually was) take mushrooms and acid all the time. At one stage there is a castration and he, as the director when he had finished the shot he wanted, shouted "cut" and the actor, tripping balls, closed the shears around the guys bollocks nearly cutting them off.
He also nealy got himself decapitated, but the sword was blunt. He nearly drowned the whole cast. They met up with random shamens that "knew they were coming". He predicted fembots and the internet. Then at the end after nearly dying climbing up holy mountain - pissed the entire cast and crew of by changing the ending and not giving any definitive answers and then left them up there.
He tells of how he wanted to make "dune", but just ended up legging it with the money.
Seriously, this is only a tiny part of the commentary, it has so much more and is my favorite at this moment in time.

phantom_power

It would be great if Lovefilm and Netflix offered the commentaries as audio options for their streaming service. They already do subtitles and some audio descriptions for the visually impaired. Might there be some copyright thing preventing them from doing so or is it more that they think people don't care about them?

NoSleep

Possible it makes the DVD unique and is a selling point for people who are real fans of a film. Aren't Lovefilm and Netflix mainly about current films? Often the best commentaries are made at a later date and are often not on initial releases of DVDs (certainly not rental DVDs).

phantom_power

But I would have thought they would be able to offer whatever their rental version of the film has on offer. It is true that a lot of films have rental versions that are bare bones but some have extra features

madhair60

Quote from: thenoise on May 31, 2012, 11:14:05 PMOne of my favourites divides people greatly, 'Monsters Crash the Pyjama Party' - a loving tribute to the American 'Spook Show', a terrible feature (with TWO audio commentaries, mostly describing how the show would have been staged back in the day with actors coming into the audience and dragging people into the film!), a bonus film, shorts, trailers, nonsense and the most baffling menu design in DVD history.  I showed it to my girlfriend of the time last Halloween and she found it rather confusing really.

This is one of my favourite DVDs of all time.

Oh yeah, while I'm thinking about it. Does anyone know a site which lists all the extras on the DVD release?

play.com used to do this but now don't bother (I think since the Germans took them (spits on floor)). It sways my mind whether to buy something I dont need if its got an audio commentary with people I want to hear from.

I dont think amazon.co.uk do but could be wrong (if someone could show me where on the page).

Famous Mortimer

Quote from: Ralph Cifaretto on June 01, 2012, 10:13:27 AM
Oh yeah, while I'm thinking about it. Does anyone know a site which lists all the extras on the DVD release?

play.com used to do this but now don't bother (I think since the Germans took them (spits on floor)). It sways my mind whether to buy something I dont need if its got an audio commentary with people I want to hear from.

I dont think amazon.co.uk do but could be wrong (if someone could show me where on the page).
Amazon suck major balls at listing special features. I've been reduced to just googling them as and when I want the information.

thenoise

Quote from: billtheburger on June 01, 2012, 08:07:53 AM
I really enjoyed the commentary by Alejandro Jodorowsky that he made in 2007 for the UK DVD of "Holy mountain", as subtitles to the film. It turns out he made all the actors (which only one actually was) take mushrooms and acid all the time. At one stage there is a castration and he, as the director when he had finished the shot he wanted, shouted "cut" and the actor, tripping balls, closed the shears around the guys bollocks nearly cutting them off.
He also nealy got himself decapitated, but the sword was blunt. He nearly drowned the whole cast. They met up with random shamens that "knew they were coming". He predicted fembots and the internet. Then at the end after nearly dying climbing up holy mountain - pissed the entire cast and crew of by changing the ending and not giving any definitive answers and then left them up there.
He tells of how he wanted to make "dune", but just ended up legging it with the money.
Seriously, this is only a tiny part of the commentary, it has so much more and is my favorite at this moment in time.

Now sadly OOP and going for crazy money.  I don't suppose you know if the commentary is on any foreign releases?  I love his ramblings over El Topo and the old (Fantoma) Fando Y Lis disc.

olliebean

Quote from: Ralph Cifaretto on June 01, 2012, 10:13:27 AM
Oh yeah, while I'm thinking about it. Does anyone know a site which lists all the extras on the DVD release?

The purpose of www.dvdcompare.net is to compare the features on different regional releases of DVDs, but it's also useful if you just want to find a list of the extras on a specific release.

Quote from: olliebean on June 01, 2012, 11:47:28 PM
The purpose of www.dvdcompare.net is to compare the features on different regional releases of DVDs, but it's also useful if you just want to find a list of the extras on a specific release.

Yeah x 3. Thats lovely!

El Unicornio, mang

http://www.dvdbeaver.com/film/reviews.htm also compares different releases, with screenshots and even audio wave comparisons.

billtheburger

Quote from: thenoise on June 01, 2012, 09:47:01 PM
Now sadly OOP and going for crazy money.  I don't suppose you know if the commentary is on any foreign releases?  I love his ramblings over El Topo and the old (Fantoma) Fando Y Lis disc.
According to the DVDcomparey thingy, the region 1 and US Blu ray version contain a commentary that I'm assuming is the same.

mcbpete

Quote from: El Unicornio, mang on June 02, 2012, 02:32:06 PM
http://www.dvdbeaver.com/film/reviews.htm also compares different releases, with screenshots and even audio wave comparisons.
Yeah even though the site uses html that'd make a geocities website blush that site has been incredibly useful to me over the last couple of years in choosing blu ray purchases.