Discland
edited by Jonathan Doyle
Cloverfield [BLU-RAY] (Paramount Home Entertainment, 6.3.2008) Disguised under deliberately goofy, yet deliciously edible-sounding, aliases such as Cheese and Slusho, Matt Reeves' Cloverfield was produced and rushed into theaters under an equally appetizing shroud of secrecy. From last year's incredibly elusive Super Bowl ad to the film's viral marketing campaign, Cloverfield had everybody scratching their heads and drooling in anticipation. Aside from the as-yet untitled title and the Blair Witch-ian visual style, the film's biggest appeal was the enigmatic creature who was last (un)seen hurling the decapitated head of the Statue of Liberty onto the crowded streets of New York City. All we knew about the mysterious beast was that it was big and angry. Now that the highy-anticipated project has come and gone, one question has fortunately been answered: Cloverfield was a major success. (continued)

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Traitor

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Babylon AD

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The latest Lewbowski Fest happened

The latest Lewbowski Fest happened in NYC about ten days ago, on 10.20 and 10.21, and it just hit me: why was there no documentary about this home-grown phenomenon on the just-out The Big Lebowski Universal Home Video DVD (released 10.18)? They issued two different special editions (a regular-regular and an "achiever's" edition, which cost $34 and change) and obviously spent a good amount of coin promoting them, but they couldn't cut together a short piece about the Lebowski fans? Will Russell and Scott Shuffitt have been putting on Lebowskifests since '02, and they're obviously genuine and repeating. Fox Home Video's Rocky Horror Picture Show special edition DVD (released in 2000) included a special feature about the fans showing up at midnight screenings, etc. When I ran my Lebowski Fest piece last March I reported there were three hand-made docs being assembled. One by a couple named Robin and Rose Roman. Another by a guy named John Nee, who has an outfit called Idiot Works and who also works for Adam Sandler's Happy Madison production company. And a third Lebowski Fest doc called "Over the Line," which was said by its maker, Eddie Chung, to be in post-production at the time. Universal Home Video couldn't get in touch with these people and use their footage to throw together a little short? As Walter would say, "Kinda derelict, dude."

Posted by Jeffrey Wells on October 31, 2005 at 6:31 AM

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