Not Just the Best of the Larry Sanders Show
By Vish Khanna

Eccentric comic genius Garry Shandling honours his groundbreaking series with this remarkably comprehensive and engaging set. The Larry Sanders Show completely altered the landscape of television, influencing unconventional reality-based sitcoms such as The Office, Curb Your Enthusiasm and Entourage, not to mention fostering the fledgling HBO network before The Sopranos made it a household name. The characters and writing were sharp, daring and unprecedented, sending up Hollywood egoism simply by revealing a bizarre kind of truth about the machinations of the celebrity industry. Due to alleged legal issues, to this day only the first year of this monumental show has been released and fans continue to clamour for the remaining five seasons. Instead, Shandling has inexplicably given us this lovingly crafted collection of 23 select episodes spanning the entire series, plus eight hours of surprising bonus footage. Classics like “The Spiders Episode,” “Hank’s Sex Tape” and grand finale “Flip” hold up strongly, as their brave honesty still induces an uncomfortable awe at the depths of these people. The meat of this set, however, consists of feature interviews with the entire cast, as well as Shandling’s personal visits with friends and associates of the show. It’s as captivating to view workhorses like Rip Torn and Jeffrey Tambor discuss their craft as it is to hear Janeane Garofalo and Scott Thompson suggest that they lucked into the most memorable roles of their careers. Then there is the odd recluse that is Shandling, who reminisces with Alec Baldwin about his turn on the show while the two spar in a boxing gym, shoots hoops with David Duchovny, meets with close friend Sharon Stone at her house for breakfast and philosophises with neighbour Tom Petty and, later, former protégé Jon Stewart. As he suggests to Jerry Seinfeld on a Central Park bench, the reality of fascinating people being themselves could be more intriguing than any storyline, and this idea is central to Shandling’s ethos. This ingenious set was surely worth the wait. Plus: “The Making of The Larry Sanders Show”; full cast interviews; deleted scenes; audio commentaries. (Sony)
Pan’s Labyrinth - Dir. by Guillermo Del Toro
Like the complex layers of symbol and metaphor that populate the fairytales it so richly draws from, Pan’s Labyrinth is a multiple viewing delight that rewards attention to minute detail as much as it delights in its surface offerings. And director Del Toro (Hellboy, The Devil’s Backbone) is as cons ...Read More
The Fountain - Dir. by Darren Aronofsky
Darren Aronofsky’s vision has come unstuck in time. The young auteur’s highly divisive and staggeringly ambitious pet-project, The Fountain, could be looked at as a younger sibling, meta-physical film-as-poetry version of Kurt Vonnegut’s classic novel. Weaving together three timelines, from past to ...Read More
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Afro Samurai - Dir. by Fuminori Kizaki
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Alpha Dog - Dir. by Nick Cassavetes
An Officer and a Gentleman - Dir. by Taylor Hackford
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Ball of Fire - Dir. by Howard Hawks
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Blood Trails - Dir. by Robert Krause
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Breaking and Entering - Dir. by Anthony Minghella
Catch and Release - Dir. by Susannah Grant
Death of a President - Dir. by Gabriel Range
Déjà Vu - Dir. by Tony Scott
Dirty Dancing: 20th Anniversary - Dir. by Emile Ardolino
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Flags Of Our Fathers - Dir. by Clint Eastwood
Fur: An Imaginary Portrait of Diane Arbus - Dir. by Steven Shainberg
Gary Cooper: MGM Movie Legends Collection
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How William Shatner Changed the World - Dir. by Julian Jones
Jane Eyre - Dir. by Robert Stevenson
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La Moustache - Dir. by Emmanuel Carrère
Letters From Iwo Jima - Dir. by Clint Eastwood
Little Children - Dir. by Todd Field
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Me & Michael - Dir. by Willard Morgan
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Music and Lyrics - Dir. by Marc Lawrence
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Pro-Life & Right to Die - Dir. by John Carpenter & Rob Schmidt
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Summer School: Life’s A Beach Edition - Dir. by Carl Reiner
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The Chocolate War - Dir. by Keith Gordon
The Ernest Hemingway Film Collection
The Good German - Dir. by Steven Soderbergh
The Hitcher - Dir. by Dave Meyers
The Italian - Dir. by Andrei Kravchuk
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The Pink Panther And Friends: The Ant And The Aardvark
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The Siege - Dir. by Edward Zwick
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Tyrone Power Collection
Venus - Dir. by Roger Michell
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Dangers - Messy, Isn’t It?
Dangers' 2006 release, Anger, was a forthright blast of acrimony encapsulated in traditionally abrasive hardcore. However, where that formula worked just fine, the Southern Californians ― Graf Orlock/Ghostlimb guitarist Justin Smith and long-time colleagues Al Brown (vocals), Tim Culver... Full Review
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