Ultra HD Blu-ray Movie Reviews

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Ultra HD Blu-ray Movie Reviews
Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs
Ralph Potts  |  Dec 22, 2023
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Generation after generation has fallen in love with Walt Disney’s iconic animated masterpiece, Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. Its story of love and friendship follows the beautiful and kindhearted princess Snow White, who charms every creature in the kingdom except one, her jealous stepmother the queen, who has it in for her after the Magic Mirror proclaims that Snow White is the fairest one of all. Forced to flee into the forest, Snow White meets and wins the hearts of seven diminutive miners and ultimately triumphs over the wicked queen.

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Ultra HD Blu-ray Movie Reviews
Solo: A Star Wars Story
Chris Chiarella  |  Nov 02, 2018
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Solo: A Star Wars Story is simply a terrific movie. Fans of Harrison Ford's timeless take on the flawed-but-gallant smuggler should rightly rejoice as Han has been handily rejuvenated by newcomer Alden Ehrenreich in this well-conceived “origin” story. We learn all of the things we never knew we wanted to know about him, like where he got his name, his furry co-pilot, and of course the keys to the fastest hunk of junk in the galaxy back when it was shiny and new.
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Soul
Chris Chiarella  |  May 14, 2021
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Pixar O.G. and now Chief Creative Officer Pete Docter touched our hearts with Up, then plumbed the intricacies of the human mind in Inside Out. It would follow, then, that his next movie would be Soul.

Together, these are arguably the most grown-up entries in the Pixar canon, not for any sort of overly mature content, but rather for their sophisticated themes and storytelling. And Soul might be the most adult-skewing: It's the longest of the three, exploring The Great Hereafter and even "The Great Before," namely where souls originate prior to their arrival on Earth. This concept requires quite a bit of exposition, and it's executed masterfully by Docter, co-writer/co-director Kemp Powers, and co-writer Mike Jones, through bold visuals and pithy gags.

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Ultra HD Blu-ray Movie Reviews
South American Way: Brazil and Sorcerer on 4K from Criterion
Chris Chiarella  |  Jun 24, 2025
Brazil (1985)
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Sorcerer (1977)
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Former Python Terry Gilliam's most notorious motion picture, Brazil, is not in fact set in the largest country on the South American continent, rather the title comes from a 1939 song, evoking romantic fantasies that echo our hero's longing for escape from his oppressive, bureaucratic world. Good-hearted Sam (Jonathan Pryce) is a government stooge whose world gets turned upside-down when he catches a glimpse of the literal woman of his dreams (Kim Greist), drawing him deeper into the authoritarian rabbit hole. What he finds is hilariously absurd, but soon enough he finds himself risking everything to oppose the regime.

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Spartacus
Chris Chiarella  |  Sep 11, 2020
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The timeless overclass/underclass struggle was never more memorably explored than in Spartacus, a film adapted from Howard Fast's fact-based, heavily dramatized book. Directed by young up-and-comer Stanley Kubrick and starring old-school movie idol Kirk Douglas in the title role, it's the sort of epic spectacle often aspired to but seldom achieved.
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Ultra HD Blu-ray Movie Reviews
Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse
Chris Chiarella  |  Oct 05, 2023  |  First Published: Oct 06, 2023
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Only a few moments into Across the Spider-Verse’s two-hour-and-20-minute runtime, we can begin to understand why this sequel to 2018’s Oscar-winning Into the Spider-Verse took almost five years to arrive. Dramatically bold and visually (and sonically) fearless, the movie is exhausting in the best possible sense, inviting the audience along on a mind-boggling adventure and daring us to keep up.

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Spider-Man: Far From Home
Chris Chiarella  |  Nov 15, 2019
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The true superpower on display in the current Spider-Man franchise might be its irresistible charm. Marvel's beloved signature character has certainly had some Hollywood ups and downs, but in his most recent iteration he seems content to exist in the shadow of Tony Stark/Iron Man rather than stand truly alone. Add to that irksome choice an abundance of high school drama and perhaps an over-reliance upon comedy and big-screen Spidey is at risk of alienating longtime fans. Still, Spider-Man: Far from Home somehow manages to engage us from start to finish.
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Spider-Man: Homecoming
Chris Chiarella  |  Mar 29, 2018
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Following his introduction to Marvel’s well-established “Cinematic Universe” in Captain America: Civil War, the beloved Spider-Man has been fully rebooted (again) in the wildly enjoyable Homecoming. Decked out in a new high-tech costume, he’s eager for big adventures, but until then, he occupies himself as a local do-gooder in his Queens neighborhood—when not attending high school. Young star Tom Holland is a perfect fit for Peter Parker and his alter ego, an agile dancer/athlete with an irresistible wide-eyed enthusiasm.
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Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse
Chris Chiarella  |  Apr 19, 2019
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An animated Spider-Man movie? In the midst of the character's latest live-action reboot? Using six different iterations of the character, all but one of which are only known to die-hard comic book fans? A direct-to-video tie-in, right? Wrong: Not only was Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse a big-screen box-office success, it also snagged an Oscar for Best Animated Feature Film of 2018.
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Spider-Man: No Way Home
Chris Chiarella  |  May 06, 2022
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Nostalgia--that "twinge in your heart, far more powerful than memory alone" as Don Draper famously explained it--can be a potent ally to the modern filmmaker. With its risky and highly publicized meta-twist (which I won't spoil here, just in case), Spider-Man: No Way Home managed to complete director Jon Watts' arachno-trilogy on an epic scale, capping not only this story arc but one far grander, much as Avengers: Endgame did for the whole of the Marvel Cinematic Universe.
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Ultra HD Blu-ray Movie Reviews
Spiral
Chris Chiarella  |  Oct 29, 2021
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An attempt to revive the popular Saw franchise, Spiral (full title "Spiral: From the Book of Saw," whatever that means) continues the legacy of creative torture-horror under the direction of Darren Lynn Bousman who long ago helmed Saws II-IV. The sadistic madman-with-an-axe-to-grind known as Jigsaw is long dead and now a new serial killer is on the loose, an apparent copycat except this time the murderer is specifically targeting dirty cops with his elaborate, painful deathtraps. Once again, the victims must make the brutal choice to do something horrible to themselves to escape or die in gruesome fashion.

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Ultra HD Blu-ray Movie Reviews
Star Trek: The Motion Picture – Director’s Edition 4K
Chris Chiarella  |  Oct 07, 2022
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With the theatrical re-release of Star Trek: The Motion Picture earlier this year, a new generation of fans has discovered its charms, thanks in large part to an extensive upgrade to the creator-approved Director’s Edition released on DVD in 2001 — the version personally overseen by director Robert Wise to better represent the movie the way he wanted to debut it back in 1979. But, now, a stunning new version of the film has emerged in the 2022 Director’s Edition, which presents this classic movie in 4K/HDR and Dolby Atmos for the first time.
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Star Trek: The Next Generation 4-Movie Collection
Chris Chiarella  |  Jun 16, 2023
Generations, 118 mins.
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First Contact, 111 mins.
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Insurrection, 103 mins.
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Nemisis, 116 mins.
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Like The Original Series before it, Star Trek: The Next Generation was a product of its time. Whereas Kirk & Co. embraced broad drama and the two-fisted clichés of ‘60s television on their space-faring adventures, Next Gen was more refined, drawing upon our greater understanding of science fact and taking lots and lots of time to discuss the characters’ feelings, too.

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Star Wars: Episode VIII-The Last Jedi
Dennis Burger  |  Jul 27, 2018
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Is Star Wars art or entertainment? The simplest answer to that question is, “It’s both, of course.” But Episode VIII: The Last Jedi proves the question to be less simple than it first appears. Because of all its silly creatures, swashbuckling adventure sequences, million-dollar-a-minute special effects, and cheeky humor, The Last Jedi is at its heart a deeply personal, deeply thematic, deeply deconstructive, big-budget indie film that forces longtime fans to contend with questions about what Star Wars even is and why its unique blend of mythology, arthouse pastiche, and B-movie kitsch works as well as it does.
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Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga
Chris Chiarella  |  Jul 31, 2020
There is nothing like Star Wars. Across its three trilogies of Roman-numeraled Episodes, creator George Lucas and the inheritors of his galaxy far, far away opened the minds of audiences across the globe as well as across generations of fiercely devoted fans, thanks to their unique spin on epic fantasy. Love it, hate it, or anywhere in the middle: Star Wars has left an undeniable mark on the world of entertainment.
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