The Polson Report

1992 Hard Boiled directed by John Woo ...From Genius Home Entertainment

Hard Boiled completes a cycle of John Woo films that started with 1986's A Better Tomorrow

1987 A Better Tomorrow II 1989 The Killer 1990 A Bullet in the Head and rounding it out with

1992's Hard Boiled. These 5 Hong Kong Gangster epics illustrate John Woo's visionary stories of

love, friendship, betrayal, freedom, duty, authority and most of all, honor among friends.

Like Sam Peckinpah's "The Wild Bunch", these films are also ballets of blood. Typically, similar to the Chinese Kung Fu films of the 70's, the action scenes are overdone. In the case of John Woo, they are beautifully overdone.

Combining his American heroes such as Steve McQueen in Bullitt or Clint Eastwood in Dirty Harry, Woo recreates

anew the persona of cool combined with action sequences unmatched by any director since Sam Peckinpah.

Hard Boiled's opening scenes are with Chow Yun-Fat playing the sax in a jazz club. There are no explanations, just the visuals and the music. He's a cop. A lone wolf who means business, all the time. Closing in on a gun smuggling operation, there is a shootout in a tea house, that illustrates Woo's vision for blood, violence and beauty, wrapped up by intense action. The theme of Hard Boiled is typically Chinese but the hard core edge is very American. This movie is fast paced, with moments of humor, action sequences that illustrate Woo's directorial skills previous to his American movies (Broken Arrow, Face Off, Mission Impossible II, ect). Yun-at working with an undercover cop to eliminate a vicious crime ring and their boss, weave a curved path, laced with bodies, from beginning to end. However, several last minute script changes created a different ending that makes Hard Boiled, very easy to digest.

On the disc 2, there is an interview with John Woo and he illustrates this thoughts, which you can literally see in his movies. His english is somewhat hard to understand, forcing you and I to really listen to every spoken word. There is also an interview with Woo's producer Terrance Chang. Chang speaks clearly and describes his long standing relationship relationship with Woo, producing many of his films, including his American movies. There are also intervies with actors Philip Chan and Hard Boiled likeable villian, Kwok Choi. Theatrical trailers are also included.

The newly mastered print is beautiful and the film is wide screen (of course) Rp

DOA Dead Or Alive 5.1 Dolby Widescreen 2006 Demension/Genius Action/Martial Arts PG-13

For those of us that enjoyed Enter the Dragon, Bloodsport and the 70's martial arts movies, here is the combination that you have been waiting for. This is one of those movies that you have to rent before considering to buy. Lots of lean female bodies that can kick ass. Lots of really bad dialogue. I am pretty sure that some of the action is computer generated and the movie itself is only mildly entertaining. There was no story per se----kind of a ripoff of Bloodsport with no Van Damme. The action emulates Enter the Dragon without Bruce Lee. Eric Roberts, who did a very good martial arts film "Best of the Best" was the only name actor and he is looking old. All in all, I can only thank Tex for the honor of getting to review this movie. Unless you are a martial arts or fight fan, I would suggest this makes a good rental title! Rp

House  The Complete 3rd Season         Universal    Dolby Digital 5.1 sound   Anamorphic Widescreen 1.78:1

After watching the entire 3rd season of House, I chose an episode that truly represents the quality of the entire

season. This episode was entitled "The Jerk" and is on disc 5.

A young man/teenager is brought into the hospital with various disorders, anger being one of them. Also body pains that have not been diagnosed. This young man is not only a hyper smart chess champion but also as demonstrated unexplained fits of rage at anyone close by. His single parent mother who has brought him, blames herself for his condition, which is totally not the case. As the staff of doctors attempt to deal with his disorders, House enters the puzzle with some ideas of his own. One by one, theories fail and the boy grows closer and closer to an impending death. As the boy plays chess with the staff, several members lose chess games badly, obviously overmatched, much to the charin of the patient. House was one of the victims of these loses.

As part of an unsaid experiment, House purposely sets up another chess game with the patient. This time he taunts him,. in an effort to make him lose his composure. House still loses the game but the experiment succeeds when the boy goes into convulsions, revealing the nature of the disease. The most interesting part of this show was the fact that even after losing the 2nd chess game, House on his own, continued to study his moves, after the fact. He discovers that in reality, had he continued to play and not fold, he would have won the game.

This shows the true personality of the character of a dedicated doctor, unwilling to accept failure without trying every possible avenue and/or method of approaching and defeating disease. House, who has a coarse personality, sarcastic, nasty, direct, childish humor with tantrums of his own however he's a doctor's doctor. He never quits and this what the medical field really needs today. He is throwback to old time doctors with a modern twist. His staff, all 5 of the them are very diversified and professional. More importantly, they care.

Although I am personally not big on medical shows, this one hits home, due to the strength of the characters and the situations presented. The writers are excellent and this 3rd season of House, is the best one yet.

In addition to the complete 3rd season, there are bonus materials on the 5th disc of the set. Since I reviewed the episode entitled "The Jerk", I also want to bring to light, the extra material from that episode. It is in the special features and is called "Anatomy of and episode: The Jerk". The entire cast including House comment on how they portrayed their roles in this episode and explained in detail, exactly why. Also the crew explained their part of the action, the writer and producer, as well. It was like looking inside of the mind of House. For sure, it was worth watching, as were the rest of the bonus materials which were 1. the House soundtrack 2. The House prop dept

3. The House Production office   4. A Blooper reel   5. A commentary from the show's creative team

     In addition to the best season of House yet, the extras are the icing on the cake.   Rp

Reel Talent: First films by legendary directors Fox Full Screen

This double disc is a collection of first attempts at film making by directions that now are successful on the big screen making feature films. One such film is Thx 1138 by George Lucas. This USC film project was made into a feature film with Robert Duvall and James Caan. However, watching this pilot offering to the movie, with its' limitations, one can only see vague glimmers of what was to come. As much as I love movie facts, this double disc was very long and hard to watch. For the "reel" film buffs, they may enjoy these rough first attempts at professional filmmaking. It is an amazing leap from THX 1138 to Star Wars.

Some of the featured directors besides Lucas are Robert Zemeckis, Richard Bare and others. Rp

This is your Captain Ray Polson speaking. Paramount Studios presents Star Trek A Fan Collective Q

This collection is a 4 disc set which contains 12 hour long Star Trek adventures, all featuring the talents of that cosmic imp

Q (played perfectly by John De Lance). 8 shows are Next Generation stories 3 Voyagers and 1 Deep Space Nine.

When I was a kid reading comics in the 50's and 60's, I used to love a character in the Superman comics. His name was Mr. Mxyzptlk and he was a 5th dimension imp that plagued Superman. Q is the modern day version of this great character.

Watching this Q compilation, I became fascinated with the interaction between Q and Picard. In the beginning of their relationship, things were built on anger and resentment. Over time from advancing show to show, they came together as "almost" allies. Without saying too much, the 8 New Generation shows are an interesting presentation of good writing and acting.

This set is presented in full screen, 5.1 Dolby digital surround sound. Picture quality and sound were good. I would strongly recommend this set not just for Star Trek fans but for anyone who enjoys good science fiction and sharp tongued humor. Rp

The Roger Corman Collection Box Set MGM all widescreen except Bucket of Blood all Dolby Digital

All movies in this box set Produced and Directed by Roger Corman. Titles included are:

1962 The Premature Burial Ray Milland

1963 X The Man with the X Ray Eyes Ray Milland Don Rickles

1963 The Young Racers

1966 The Wild Angels Peter Fonda Nancy Sinatra Bruce Dern Michael J. Pollard

1971 Gas-s-s-s Bud Cort

1967 The Trip Peter Fonda Dennis Hopper Bruce Dern written by Jack Nicholson

1959 A Bucket of Blood

1970 Bloody Mama Shelley Winters Don Stroud Bruce Dern Pat Hingle Scatman Crothers

Most of these movies were originally American International releases, which were by far the best quality low budget movies made.

Roger Corman was a genius in shooting film on the cheap and still making movies that were watchable. He discovered and gave

movie making opportunities to many of today's biggest stars and directors. Such as: Robert De Niro, Bruce Dern, Jack Nicholson, Dennis Hopper and Francis Ford Coppola, as examples. He also was smart enough to use stars past their primes, utilizing their acting skills in

these low budget, high profit movies. Stars like Shelley Winters, Ray Milland, Boris Karloff, Vincent Price, Peter Lorre and others.

Out of the 8 movies, we reviewed The Man with the X Ray Eyes, Bloody Mama and The Wild Angels

The Man with the X Ray Eyes is a story about a scientist who while doing eye research, pushes the limits of science to far. Experimenting

on himself, his vision increases in power and he can no longer control the depth of what he sees. An interesting concept that possibly is not totally impossible yet more than likely improbable. Ray Milland does an excellent job as the scientist driven mad by his own discovery

Bloody Mama is the story of the Ma Barker gang, who terrorized the south with violent crime sprees. Shelly Winters plays an insane Kate Barker and her sons and companions include Robert De Niro, Bruce Dern and Don Stroud. All performances are good in this low budget action flick. it is very interesting to see a young Robert De Niro and Bruce Dern, in large parts, early in their careers

The Wild Angels was capitalizing on the infamous Hells Angels Motorcycle Club. In fact, some members of the Angels had parts in the movie.

This includes all of the hippie type language that was big in the late 60's. I hardly feel that the Angels acted in a watered down manner as this but it shows the clever side of Corman and his ability to make money, based on the headlines of the day. Acting was marginal based on a weak script but still enjoyable to see once again.

All in all, this box set is worth owning. Rp

Basic Instinct 2 Sony Pictures 116 minutes 2006

Tex and I have both reviewed this movie and we are coming from different sides of the center line. Tex insists that Basic Instinct 2, if watched as an individual film, is not a bad movie. I take the stance that it is a sequel and is a shadow of the original with Michael Douglas, a much younger Sharon Stone, Jeanne Tripplehorn and George Dzundza. The original was scored by Jerry Goldsmith and directed by Paul Verhoeven. Written by Joe Eszterhas. All of this talent in one movie, is damn hard to match.

Basic Instinct 2 continues the adventures of Catherine Tramell, whose sexual charge is stimulated "by getting away with it".

A series of murders, a very straight psychiatrist (David Morrissey), a sexual bomb waiting to explode (Sharon Stone) and a detective, who you really never know where he is at, are the central pieces to this modern day murder mystery. Ms Stone looks every bit of 15 years older but still looks damn good at near 50. Her acting is solid but appears a bit forced, due to a weaker script. On the other hand, David Morrissey cannot hold a candle to Michael Douglas's intensity or relentlessness.

To be fair to Tex, he is correct. As a stand alone movie, Basic Instinct 2 is average or average plus, by today's standards. It does have an off the wall ending. I give the original a 9 !/2. The sequel a 7, at best. It is worth watching----once. Rp

The Moody Blues Live-------Lovely To See You Image Entertainment

2005 widescreen dolby digital 5.1 dts surroundsound 106 min

In an era where old 60's bands continue to play to live audiences, the Moody Blues have made the transition of time and energy. With the three key pieces of the original band, guitar, vocals and drums, the current version of the Moody Blues are quite a bit like the originals. Like all of us that have aged 40 years, singing some of their great material from the late 60's, may not sound quite as strong in voice but compared to today's music, it is like a symphony. The band mixed new material with their classic songs like: Tuesday Afternoon The Voice Story in your Eyes Higher

& Higher I'm just a singer in a rock and roll band, Nights in White Satin and Ride My See Saw. Two songs that I had not heard before were "Lean On Me (Tonight)" and "I know you are out there Somewhere", both excellent cuts. The concert was well paced and their material was mixed well. It was obvious that the band members were happy to be on stage together again. The bonus material included on this disc is an interview with the Moody Blues Rp

Amazing Stories The Complete First Season Dolby Digital 5.1 Full Frame 10 Hours 21 min 4 discs...From Universal Home Entertainment!

Thanks to Tex, I have watched many, many TV dvd sets. I must say that this set is truly entertaining. This series which chronicled some very interesting stories, had top writers, directors and actors. I am sure that Speilberg modeled the series after The Twilight Zone or The Outer Limits. Once major difference is that each week was an unrelated story that didnt have to be science fiction or mystery. There were dramas and comedies, as well.

The list of featured actors is long: Gregory Hines, Keifer Sutherland, Kevin Costner, Mark Hamill, Eddie Bracken, John Lithgow, Andrew McCarthy, Beau Bridges and Harvey Keitel. Guest stars in cameo roles showed up, every now and then. Interesting Guest stars like Eve Arden, Tim Robbins, Charlie Sheen and Forrest Whittaker. The list of directors is equally impressive: Spielberg, Eastwood, Scorsese, Burt Reynolds and Tim Hutton, to name a few.

Some of the highlights were Ghost Train directed by Speilberg The Mission with Costner and Sutherland

The Amazing Falsworth starring Gregory Hines Mr Magic with Sid Ceasar as an aging magician. This is also a tribute to the best closeup magician at the Magic Castle in Hollywood, Bruce Cervon. Vannesa in the Garden directed by Eastwood and starring Harvey Keitel, Clint's ex Sondra Locke and Beau Bridges. Some of the other mentionables were The Sitter Gather Ye Acorns Boo Grampa's Ghost and the emmy award winning performance by John Lithgow in The Doll.

I didn't like every single story but all in all, this is a very strong 1st year series and should be owned and watched. Recommended Rp

The Moody Blues Live-------Lovely To See You Image Entertainment

2005 Widescreen Dolby Digital 5.1 DTS Surround sound 106 min