Being Thankful For Physical Media

When I was a kid, going to the cinema was big event. Recent films were not available on television right away; sometimes we had to wait for years after their release to watch them at home. There was no internet, no streaming, no DVDs, no Blu-rays. When the popular VHS format started to catch on in the 1980s it was miracle that I could own a copy of a favourite film. Video stores had limited stock at first but just looking at the box art of these video cassettes could be as a thrilling as the movies themselves. Of course, video tapes were a cumbersome and low-resolution medium compared to the 16K digital transfers of today.

Streaming and watching films on a big 4K home screen can be a satisfactory way to approximate the movie-going experience but before you think these films can be owned it is important to know your rights. Any film purchased for home viewing from a streamer can be withdrawn from the purchaser’s account or cloud service at anytime. As well, any digital copy of a film can be altered for content without the purchaser’s permission. This is why I still collect movies on disc. Sure they take up room, but they are mine to keep, and no one can edit or change them while I’m not looking. Everyday I am grateful for the honour of holding the fruits of many people’s artistic labours in my hands. I know the effort that goes into making a movie. Therefore, it is imperative that films be preserved on physical media – in the versions their creators intended -- for future generations to collect and enjoy. Here are some of my favourite home video versions over the years:

1982 - Star Wars (1977) was a milestone release on video tape in the VHS and Betamax formats. It is hard to describe to contemporary audiences how monumental this moment was for movie buffs and specifically Star Wars fans. The transfer may have been slightly fuzzy and the film’s Panavision glory panned and scanned into a 4:3 full screen presentation but it was still thrilling to own this historically popular film. This was the last time the film was released in its original theatrical version with no extra FX or sound additions. It has recently been announced that in 2027 the original cut of Star Wars will be made available once again probably in the hi-definition 4K format. It will be a turning point for disc collectors who have finally been vindicated after years of protesting against the inferior and bastardized versions approved by filmmaker George Lucas himself.

1991 – The first four James Bond films, starting with Dr. No (1962), were released by Criterion on the Laserdisc in letterboxed versions with an audio commentary by director Terence Young. For the very first time, viewers could see these early Connery classics uncut and accompanied by interesting background stories provided by the director. Due to the uncensored nature of these comments and anecdotes, the discs were eventually withdrawn and much sought after by collectors. After decades of audio and video tampering the Connery Bonds have only recently been restored to something close to their theatrical versions. Meanwhile, Criterion continues to be the premier releasing company of classic films on all subsequent disc formats.

1997 – The Digital Video Disc or DVD format was introduced, and Warner Bros. produced one of the best early examples. Sam Peckinpah’s The Wild Bunch (1969) was finally made available in the widescreen director’s cut, and the disc also included an important Oscar-nominated short documentary about the film. This release demonstrated the possibilities of both presentation and scholarship that the DVD format could provide to burgeoning numbers of film buffs and collectors. Unfortunately age and technology has done no service to this Western masterpiece which continues to be passed over for restoration and release on improved optimal formats. 

2007 – After a brief competition to decide which company would control the home video market’s higher resolution 1080p format, Sony emerged the winner with Blu-ray discs.

Ever since VHS there had been special edition box sets with various paper reproductions and other sundries housed in an elaborately designed case. However, all previous box sets paled in comparison with the Blade Runner 5 Disc Ultimate Collector's Briefcase Edition. This was the culmination of a long journey for Blade Runner (1982). During its original cinema release it was considered an unpopular failure. Surprisingly, the revised R-rated edition on tape was a big hit, as was the so-called director’s cut, shown in theatres in 1992 and later available on DVD. By 2006, director Ridley Scott was finally able to fix all the problems he had had with previous versions by creating Blade Runner - the Final Cut on Blu-ray. The Briefcase edition features this much improved edit along with all other available cuts of the film. In this very special edition there is also a 3.5 hour making-of documentary, numerous audio commentaries, photo galleries, featurettes as well as deluxe booklets, framed drawings and even toy replicas to display on your shelf. One of the great collectable sets for the ultimate Sci-fi cinephile!

2020 – In 2016 the next generation of Hsigh-Definition disc format was introduced – the 4K Ultra HD Blu-ray. This improvement meant discs could now be viewed in twice the resolution as the standard Blu-ray. No film has deserved this superior presentation more than Lawrence of Arabia (1962). If you haven’t seen this film in the cinema on an Imax or other large format screen, then the next best option is with this 4-disc UHD package, with the film transferred from an 8K scan of the original negative. If your home setup is up to the task, you should feel the sand of the desert in your eyes as you are enveloped in the spectacular images created by cinematographer Freddie Young under the direction of master filmmaker David Lean. In the style of its original road show screenings the movie is divided onto two discs with an intermission coming at the end of disc one. The third disc is a standard Blu-ray copy of this nearly 4-hour film. Disc four contains voluminous extras including: informative documentaries, featurettes, interviews, and deleted scenes. Restored by Columbia archivist Grover Crisp this is one of the most impressive showcases for the new 4K UHD disc technology and a must-have for the true movie buff.

Scares from Down Under

 

Australia didn’t become an international filmmaking destination until the mid-1990s.  Prior to then many American actors journeyed down under to act in local films that were being made by enterprising Australian directors. Road Games (1981) is a suspenseful killer-on-the-loose film made by Alfred Hitchcock disciple Richard Franklin who would later direct the underrated Psycho II (1983). The film stars Stacy Keach as a long-haul trucker crossing the desolate wilderness of Western Australia with only his pet dingo as a driving companion. Observing people along the road, Keach comes to suspect that a mysterious man in a green van might be the serial killer wanted for some gruesome murders. 80s scream queen Jamie Lee Curtis enlivens the narrative as a hitchhiker who teams up with Keach as they try to catch the dangerous and elusive murderer. A wild ride that is both startling and funny in equal measure. Available on Blu-ray and Shudder.

A different kind of vehicle provides the jolts in Dead Calm (1989), a suspense thriller from the producers of the Mad Max series that takes place mostly at sea. Starring Sam Neill and Nicole Kidman, in her breakout film role, as a couple who embark on an oceanic sailing vacation in a valiant attempt to heal the recent wound caused by the death of their son. After encountering a sinking schooner they take on board a lone survivor played with darkly photogenic charm by Billy Zane. Thus begins a cat and mouse game between the three protagonists as they struggle to survive at sea in an increasingly deadly situation. Neill as always anchors the film, but the raw performances of Kidman and Zane made audiences at the time take note of two new talented actors to watch. Available on Blu-ray

Considered by many to be one of the scariest films ever made, The Babadook (2014) is an experience that never leaves you. Writer-director Jennifer Kent creates a near perfect nightmare of dread and fear as we witness a single mother struggling to understand her emotionally disturbed young son. Things go from bad to worse when they are haunted by a ghostly creature seemingly come to life from the pages of a sinister children’s storybook. An unnerving depiction of mental breakdown and parental anxiety that will have you staring into the dark corners of your bedroom for weeks afterward. Available Blu-Ray and Shudder

If sideburns, bell-bottom pants and psychedelic 70s décor scare you then Late Night with the Devil (2024) is a truly frightening experience. In their spookily accurate recreation of a late night Hollywood talk show from 1977, Australian filmmakers Colin and Cameron Cairnes’s videotape homage will have you laughing and gasping in equal measure. The gimmick of a “live” exorcism gone wrong provides the shocking set pieces, but it is the attention to character details as well as production design and cinematography that will amaze vintage viewers who remember this pre-internet era of broadcasting. Available on Blu-Ray and Shudder.

Three Faces of Fear

 

Remakes have always been commonplace in Hollywood but for decades television series versions of feature films were always judged to be second rate. For every successful small screen adaptation like Buffy the Vampire Slayer there are dozens of forgettable attempts like Four Weddings and a Funeral and Lethal Weapon.

In 1962 after the movie going public had been scared out of the seats by Alfred Hitchcock’s Psycho (1960) actor-producer Gregory Peck had the idea to bring John D. MacDonald’s 1957 novel The Executioners to the big screen. Changing the title to Cape Fear, Peck hired the director of his previous film The Guns of Navarone (1961), Englishman J. Lee Thompson to bring a special Hitchcock-like quality to the project. Still fresh from his Oscar winning role as a southern lawyer fighting racism in To Kill a Mockingbird (1960), Gregory Peck this time starred as a different kind of lawyer, one capable of bending the law to protect his family who are being stalked by a psychopathic rapist and ex-con played by Robert Mitchum. Opposite Peck in one of the most memorable villain roles in his career, Mitchum is a terrifying menace whose bestial swagger oozes leering insinuations about Peck’s young teenage daughter. Fresh from Psycho, Hitchcock music composer Bernard Herrman contributes a nerve-jangling film score that accentuates the unrelenting threat and shock for a Sixties audience who were unaccustomed to overt depictions of sexual assault. Reactionary in its depiction of a justice system that seems unable to protect average citizens from violent criminals, the film was a significant hit with both critics and movie-goers alike.

In 1991 director Martin Scorsese and producer Steven Spielberg decided to update the same material for a contemporary remake. This Cape Fear would increase the violence and dramatic stakes by giving marital problems to the protagonist lawyer played by Nick Nolte, who in this version willfully suppressed evidence that could have helped his client’s case. Modern sensibilities are also expressed by turning the previously innocent daughter into a more sexually curious adolescent played by an Oscar nominated Juliette Lewis. Scorsese chose his most frequent on-screen leading man Robert De Niro to play the evil ex-convict who tortures the family of his former defence attorney whom he blames for his conviction. Unfortunately, De Niro’s theatrical Southern drawl and cartoonishly mannered performance undermines the credibility of the suspense. His cardboard villain together with Scorsese’s baroque camera and lighting effects, give the film an artificial melodramatic quality that only seems to work in the scenes of sexual danger between Lewis and De Niro. An hysterically colorful version that does not improve on the black and white original, Cape Fear (1991) must be viewed as a missed opportunity by this pair of world class filmmakers.

35 years and many f-bombs later comes this new 10 part streaming adaptation of Cape Fear starring Amy Adams, Patrick Wilson and Javier Bardem. Although executive produced by Martin Scorsese and Steven Spielberg and despite some rather heavy handed visual and musical references to their 1991 film, this Apple TV series version has all the excessive ingredients of an over-egged pudding. Now it’s the wife (Adams) who is the alcoholic defence lawyer whom ex-con (Bardem) blames for his wrongful imprisonment. To put it even more over the top, she gave birth to a daughter from a failed relationship during the trail, and after her client was convicted she married the prosecutor (Wilson). There is also a son, whose anti-social drug addiction leads him to bite off his own toe while in an anger induced stupor. Not to be left out of the various family crises, the husband and father is also using some sort of secret drug self-medication. Blood and gore take the place of any suspense in the early episodes making any shocks seem cliched and predictable. What aren’t as predictable are the performances, especially those of the two protagonists Adams and Bardem. Both are humanistic rather than theatrical in their acting styles, communicating a tense realism to their scenes together that helps to tamp down the melodramatic plotting. Their welcome chemistry should have kept audiences watching until the end but they were poorly served by a very free adaptation of the novel that goes right off the rails in terms of plausibility. The previous versions had their moments of histrionics but they never had you questioning the filmmakers for their narrative choices.

Cape Fear has always been a powerful story. It deals with the issue of legal justice versus primal instincts. Now more than ever themes like these are important to address and portray. Do we want to live in a society protected by the rule of law or do we allow the slow degradation of our primitive selves to govern our actions? Watch any of these three versions and ask yourself that crucial question.

A 1984 Voyage into the Unknown

 

1984 was supposed to be bad year for all of us if you believed George Orwell’s dystopian novel written in 1948. For me it was a memorable year and turning 16 was something I excited about. Being born in August means that the summer movie season is always an important time for me, but the Christmas movie season was also a big event and many of the films that opened around the holidays in 1984 still give me a thrill. Of all the films I saw at that time of year there were two that have special significance for me.

Living in Peterborough, Ontario at the time I was envious of the large capacity cinemas in Toronto. In 1984 a few of the old movie palaces were still in business and none was more spectacular the University Theatre on Bloor Street. The art deco theatre, built in 1949, was the largest cinema in Canada, with 1300 seats and a giant curved screen.

For me, going to the beautiful University was a more spiritual experience than going to church. The sheer size of the auditorium with its grand balcony made you feel in your bones the excitement of movie-going.

In May of 1980 I had stood in line for an hour at the University to see The Empire Strikes Back a day after it opened. The crowd was electric with excitement, for this was a sequel to the most popular film we had ever seen: Star Wars in 1977. The audience (including me) reacted ecstatically to the film.

In December of 1984 I decided to make a special trip to Toronto and the University Theatre to see another much-anticipated film, 2010: The Year We Make Contact, the sequel to Stanley Kubrick’s classic 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968). Being of a younger generation I had never seen 2001 on the big screen, only on television where its state-of-the-art design and special effects were impressive but diminished by the reduced size of the image. 2010 boasted the cutting edge of model and camera effects available to filmmaker Peter Hyams during this era before CGI. I can remember holding my breath and gripping the armrest while anxious astronaut John Lithgow executed a very long and dangerous spacewalk between two spacecraft. I was stunned and a little frightened by the recreation of the vast airless expanse of space near Jupiter. This was the first film I had ever seen starring Helen Mirren, whose Russian heritage made her ideal casting as a Soviet cosmonaut. Leaving the cinema that afternoon I felt like I had experienced as close as I would ever come to space travel.

Later that same day I went uptown to the Hyland Cinema at Yonge and St. Clair, where I saw the controversial adaptation of Frank Herbert’s sci-fi novel Dune. The Hyland was not as grand as the University, but with 790 seats it was still bigger than any cinema we had in my hometown. Still buzzing from my previous voyage into space, I was completely unprepared for this mind-blowing film. From its strikingly original production design and costumes, to its eclectic international cast of actors, Dune was a unique product that resulted from Dino De Laurentiis, a very commercial producer, hiring an idiosyncratic artistic filmmaking talent, writer-director David Lynch. With no points of reference for its singular world-building story, anyone watching the film who hadn’t read the book felt like they had been dropped in the ocean and told they had to swim to shore without any aid. At first, I felt overwhelmed by the detailed sci-fi mythology and unpronounceable names of characters. However, I very quickly decided to just let the film wash over me, keeping track of who and what I thought important while enjoying the other-worldly atmosphere created by the filmmaker’s imagination. I appreciate what Denis Villeneuve did with his version of Dune in 2021, but having survived this challenging film in 1984 has meant that Lynch’s vision will be what I measure all others by.

After my trip to Toronto, I enjoyed many other films during the holidays of 1984 including City Heat, the only film starring Clint Eastwood and Burt Reynolds; Starman, director John Carpenter’s sentimental sci-fi romance film; Runaway starring Tom Selleck as a cop in the future fighting evil robots and high tech weaponry; Johnny Dangerously an hilarious gangster comedy starring Michael Keaton; and finally A Passage to India, the multiple Oscar nominated last film of David (Lawrence of Arabia) Lean. None had the impact or sense of an event that I had sitting in those two now long forgotten cinemas.

1984 was a pretty good year for Hollywood movies, but I will remember it for my trip to Toronto, when I took a cinematic journey to the far reaches of space and beyond.

The Golden Years of Koepp

 

In Hollywood, screenwriters are one of lowest jobs on the creative totem pole. Since the beginning, producers and directors have used multiple screenwriters on any given project, often without credit. One of the most well-known names from this profession is David Koepp. He has been a successful working screenwriter for over 30 years. Koepp wrote or co-wrote some of the most memorable films of the 1990s and 2000s including: Death Becomes Her, Jurassic Park, Carlito’s Way, Mission Impossible, Spider-Man, Panic Room and Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. In the years 2025-26, Koepp has had his best years ever with five of his screenplays playing in cinemas. I loved them all, with my favourite being a project particularly close to his heart.

Koepp began his miracle year with the screenplay for Presence (2025), a haunting family drama directed by Steven Soderbergh. Soderbergh uses a clever observational camera style to communicate the point of view of a ghost or presence in an average suburban American house after a new family has just moved in. Less interested in jump scares and cheap shocks, Koepp has fashioned an emotional chamber piece that uses the supernatural to deepen the resonances as he comments on the modern alienation of parents and their grown children. Due to its ghostly first-person narrative, Presence was a hard sell to audiences. Happily, it ended up as a significant financial success, mostly due to its low budget. Pay close attention, this is a film that gets better with a second viewing.

Koepp immediately teamed with Soderbergh for an encore, now switching genres and countries with the British espionage drama Black Bag (2025). Spotlighting the starring duo of Cate Blanchett and Michael Fassbender as a cool pair of married spies, Koepp keeps the audience guessing with this smart and stylish exercise in paranoia by asking the question: “Can you trust your spouse if neither of you can be honest about your jobs?”. Soderbergh and Koepp are clearly enjoying themselves with their colourful cast of characters, including the tongue-in-cheek casting of 007 Daniel Craig’s Miss Moneypenny Naomie Harris, and ex-Bond Pierce Brosnan as a sardonic spy master. This is John Le Carre territory updated for a savvy post millennial tech generation. Despite good publicity and solid praise from the critics, Black Bag failed to connect with a wide audience. Hopefully it will feel more at home within the variety provided by streaming programming.

For his summer blockbuster of 2025, Koepp returned to the franchise that made his name. Jurassic Park Rebirth (2025) is not so much a re-boot as it is a “requel”, continuing the original legacy storyline while featuring new characters that can take the series in a different direction. An improvement on the previous Chris Pratt Jurassic trilogy, Rebirth introduces Scarlett Johansson as a tough mercenary, and Jonathan Bailey as a paleontologist leading a specimen recovery team to one of the experimental genetics islands now completely populated by mutant dinosaurs. Although slightly burdened by the second longest running time in the series, this is a very entertaining late entry that benefits from Koepp’s extensive knowledge of the subject matter as well as his confident staging of the suspense scenes. If the franchise were to continue, it needed the kind of assured script that Koepp has delivered.

In 2019 David Koepp published his first novel Cold Storage, a sci-fi horror story that had started as an outline for a movie. Koepp has said he enjoyed the new medium of a longer narrative, taking advantage of the opportunity to deepen the backstories of his characters in a way that a shorter film script cannot. With its sterling pedigree and popular genre ingredients the novel was sold a film project almost immediately. Not surprisingly, Koepp was hired to adapt his own work, and he wasn’t afraid to alter the satirical tone of the book to a more comedic blend of gore and laughs. The resulting film of Cold Storage (2026) has to be one of the most affectionate recent homages to the horror comedies of the 1980s. Extra value is provided by two bona fide horror heroes: Joe Keery, one of the stars of the retro 80s Netflix series Stranger Things, and Brit scream queen Georgina Campbell, highly praised for her role in Barbarian (2022). Fresh from his hilarious turn in The Naked Gun (2025), Liam Neeson gives another facetious performance as a bioterror operative who suffers from chronic back pain at the most inconvenient times. Shot in 2023, this European production sat on the shelf for over a year before being dumped into cinemas in February 2026 where it received little advance publicity. Sadly, despite strong reviews, cinema goers only had a week to see it before it disappeared. Hopefully this labour of love will its audience on streaming.

Koepp soon had another project opening in the summer blockbuster season of 2026. One that came with high expectations as he re-united with his War of the Worlds (2005) director Steven Spielberg for another alien invasion epic tantalizingly entitled Disclosure Day. Thankfully this was a welcome return to the era when Spielberg was the most popular and talented filmmaker working in Hollywood. Koepp and Spielberg acknowledge that Disclosure Day is meant to be the third part of an alien encounter trilogy beginning with Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977) and followed by E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial (1982). The story idea was developed by Spielberg and Koepp after researching the many recent alien spacecraft sightings that have re-ignited interest in the subject. Ever the showman, Spielberg can’t resist giving the audience the rollercoaster ride that it craves. With an infallible instinct where to put the camera, he effortlessly whips up a pleasing blend of suspense, emotional drama and action thrills. It is a solid piece of entertainment, although far from completely original. For example, keen cinephiles might nit pick his inspirations, including a villain obviously influenced by his friend and fellow film director Brian De Palma’s 1978 sci-fi/thriller The Fury. It is Spielberg’s most satisfying piece of genre filmmaking in nearly 20 years and it is all thanks to David Koepp – the screenwriter with the golden touch.

The Raiders of Steven Spielberg: Part Three

 

                                          

                                  The Phantom (1996) Dir. Simon Wincer

“For those who came in late…” reads the text on screen during the opening narration that relates the secret mythology of The Phantom (1996). Created by Lee Falk for the newspaper comic strips in 1936, The Phantom a.k.a. The Ghost Who Walks, is a purple clad hero who is the latest in a long line of men raised to fight crime from his jungle base in the fictional African country of Bangalla. Created after The Shadow and before Batman, the Phantom was the bridge between the early reality-based pulp heroes and the fantasy comic book heroes which were to dominate fandom in the ensuing decades. Directed with a breezy panache by Australian Simon Wincer (Free Willy) and starring a hunky tongue-in-cheek Billy Zane (Titanic), this Indiana Jones homage delivers all the required action-adventure elements including a spunky heroine, exotic locales, death defying stunts, the search for magical artifacts, and a show stopping femme fatale that introduced Catherine Zeta Jones to the big screen. Slightly let down by some lumpy plotting and a forgettable film score, this was the last major attempt to poach on Spielberg and Lucas’ ground before they came back with another sequel themselves. This year we will see Harrison Ford retire his hat and whip under the direction of James Mangold (Logan) with a finale that I hope lives up to the earlier films and their imitators.

The Raiders of Steven Spielberg: Part Two

 

                                       The Shadow (1994) Dir. Russell Mulcahy

 From the pages of the old pulp magazines of the 1930s came 1994's The Shadow, one of the most original and mysterious fantasy characters ever brought to the silver screen. A reformed criminal who is redeemed and taught the secrets of the mind by a Tibetan holy man, the Shadow is a one-of-a kind anti-hero who manipulates and terrorizes both villains and friends alike to serve his own ends as well as the scales of justice. Who better to embody such a handsome and egotistical hero than Alec Baldwin at the height of his Hollywood fame. Transformed by facial makeup partially hidden under a wide-brimmed slouch hat and brandishing nickel-plates .45s under his dark cloak, Baldwin with his sonorous deep voice personifies the duality of this deadly hero of the dark. John Lone (The Last Emperor) makes for a deliciously evil antagonist while amusing supporting performances are provided by Jonathan Winters and Tim Curry. Composer Jerry Goldsmith provides a suitably menacing musical accompaniment to the sumptuous art deco production design. Although Australian director Russell Mulcahy (Highlander) was a good choice to visualize such an effects driven project, he fails to bring the film’s contrived romance to life due to the miscasting of a stiff but sensational looking Penelope Ann Miller. Screenwriter David Koepp (Jurassic Park) went onto much bigger success with Mission Impossible (1996) and even wrote the unfairly despised penultimate sequel Indiana Jones and Kingdom of the Crystal Skull (2008). The idea to go back to the original pulp origins of The Shadow seemed sure fire at the time but audiences were just not ready for the off-beat humour Koepp brings to this fantastical tale of vengeance.