Digital Week – December 11

Marielle Heller’s adaptation of Rachel Yoder’s magical-realist novel about a mother whose post-partum depression manifests itself by transforming her into a raging canine at night literalizes this metaphorical conceit in such a way to make it risible rather than indelible. The movie often plays like the female version of the Mike Nichols-Jack Nicholson domesticated werewolf saga, “Wolf,” which is definitely not the intention. Amy Adams—who looks uncannily like Amy Schumer in several scenes—gives it her all, which isn’t enough; Scoot McNairy, as her husband, is barely tolerable, while the twins playing the terrible two-year-old, Arleigh and Emmett Snowden, are effective enough. Too bad Jessica Harper’s mysterious librarian isn’t given more screen time.

Once upon a time, there was a band named Chicago Transit Authority, and its first album, released in 1968, was a breath of fresh air in rock music, with a jazzy, bluesy, horn-oriented progressive sound. After a few more albums, the band morphed into the Chicago we know today, tuneful and musically elaborate hits giving way to sappy, MOR balladry thanks to singer Peter Cetera. This 2023 concert in Atlantic City celebrates that first album alongside all phases of the band’s career with a 2-1/2 hour set that features guest singers Robin Thicke, Chris Daughtry, Judith Hill and Voiceplay as well as slide guitarist-singer Robert Randolph and guitar slinger Steve Vai. The band—which still has a few original members left—is tight and well-oiled, and if some mawkishness is touched on (“Hard Habit to Break,” “You’re the Inspiration”), there are also sparkling versions of “Beginnings,” “Questions 67 and 68,” “25 or 6 to 4” and “Poem 58.” The hi-def video and audio are first-rate; extras include interviews with band members and guests.

Wim Wenders’ stylized 1984 road movie about a recluse who reconnects with his brother and son, then looks for his estranged wife in the bleak, wide landscapes of the American southwest, is a moody, one-of-a-kind masterpiece that’s alternatively introspective and expansive as well as intimate and detached. It’s also the summation of Wenders’ predilection for static longueurs, reaching its apogee in the final showdown between the hero (Harry Dean Stanton) and his wife (Nastassja Kinski)—this masterly sequence is perfectly written, directed, shot (by master cinematographer Robby Muller) and acted. Criterion’s UHD transfer, while flawed, gives Muller’s wondrous photography even further elevation; extras include Wenders’ commentary, deleted scenes, and interviews with Wenders, Muller, Stanton, composer Ry Cooder, novelist Patricia Highsmith and actors Peter Falk, Dennis Hopper and Hanns Zischler.

Italian schlockmeister Joe D’Amato may have outdone himself with this elaborate 1983 futuristic farrago set in a postapocalyptic southwest U.S. populated by marauding gangs, with only small bands of brave rangers who can put up a fight against them. The action set pieces are competently handled, and it’s lively if exceedingly choppy throughout; there’s even a charming actress named Geretta Geretta, who unfortunately doesn’t get much screen time. The UHD transfer looks impressive; there’s also a Blu-ray of the film that includes interviews with Geretta and D’Aamto as well as a soundtrack CD.

Based on Peter Brown’s bestselling 2016 kids’ novel. writer-director Chris Sanders has fashioned a crowd-pleasing if sentimental sci-fi journey of discovery and tolerance as a robot is discovered on a distant island by wild animals of all kinds—it soon learns enough to survive and even live harmoniously with other creatures. The beautifully rendered animation looks simply spectacular in 4K; there’s a Blu-ray of the film included, and both discs have many extras, including a commentary, an alternate opening with Sanders commentary and several featurettes.

This second volume of Severin’s boxed set series encompassing international folk-horror filmmaking is yet another tantalizing mixed bag: for every intriguing or disturbing entry, there are several that don’t reach their potential. The standouts are Slovak master Juraj Herz’s brilliant and unsettling double feature: “Beauty and the Beast” (1978), starring the exquisite Zdena Studenková as the naïve beauty, and “The Ninth Heart” (1979), set in a sinister world of marionettes. Also worthwhile are Polish director Marcin Wrona’s “Demon” (2015) and British director John Llewellyn Moxey’s “The City of the Dead” (1960), the latter starring Christopher Lee. There are 24 feature films on 13 discs, all lovingly restored, for the most part; voluminous extras include audio commentaries, interviews, short films, contextual intros and video essays.

Giallo master Dario Argento—still around at age 84—made several horror classics, but this four-disc set contains works for Italian TV: discs one and two showcase “Door Into Darkness,” the 1973 anthology series for which he was producer and host, and whose episodes are of the hit-or-miss variety; disc three features segments from the mystery series “Night Shift”; and disc four comprises the TV movie “Dario Argento’s Nightmares.” Argento cultists and completists will love this, but others might rather stick with “Suspiria” or “Opera.” The quality of the transfers is variable, considering the video sources; the many extras include audio commentaries, interviews, and the feature documentaries “Dario Argento: My Cinema I and II” and “Dario Argento: Master of Horror.”

This disappointingly schlocky horror film stars a game Halle Berry, who does what she can with the impossible role of Mother, a woman trying to protect her two young sons from something called the Evil while living in a remote shack in the woods—but are they really the lone survivors of an apocalypse or is she mad? Director Alexandre Aja and writers KC Coughlin and Ryan Grassby try and have it both ways as visits by malevolent spirits pile up, but the ending reveal is less purposeful than mechanical. Alongside Berry, both Percy Daggs IV and Anthony B. Jenkins are irreproachable as the boys, which helps a bit. There’s an excellent Blu-ray transfer; extras include featurettes, interviews and deleted scenes.

Japanese composer Ryuichi Sakamoto—best known for his Oscar-winning score for “The Last Emperor” (1987) as well as music for films like “Merry Christmas, Mr. Lawrence” (1983) and “Monster” (2023), his final score—died in 2023 at age 71, and this intimate portrait by his son Neo Sora is a rewarding record of Sakamoto’s final performance, just him at the playing several of his meditative keyboard pieces. I personally find much of this music repetitive and anything but transfixing, but the context of a sick man playing one last time is undeniably moving, and, shot in exquisite B&W by cinematographer Bill Kirstein, this plays as the ultimate tribute to a beloved artist. The film looks superb on Blu; the lone extra is an interview with Sora and Kirstein.

Nikola Petrović’s stark melodrama set in rural Serbia follows a prodigal son returning to his home village and finding that the ghosts of his family’s past are still present as an unbearable cycle of malevolence and tragedy continues, with fatal consequences. Although this irredeemably gloomy film is exceptionally well-made and acted, there’s only so much Slavic pain and treachery that can be endured—even 90 minutes is too much.

Simon Chambers’ moving and intensely personal documentary follows his eccentric Uncle David, whom Chambers chronicles for several years after he gets an email from David asking him to come over because he is “dying.” Chambers shows David as a lively, performative character who quotes Shakespeare speeches (“King Lear” is a special favorite) but remains riveting throughout. It’s an often difficult watch, but it’s filled with humor and empathy that makes this positively life-affirming, despite the fact that we are watching an elderly man suffering greatly, at least physically, before dying.