Gangland: The Complete Season One Review

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(More customer reviews)"Gangland: The Complete Season One (2007)", 4 disc set, A&E Home Video, Dist. by NEWVIDEO. ISBN 1-4229-0949-2. English, Color, 611 min.
This 4 disc DVD set provides more than 611 min. (extras)of over 10 hrs. of color video, mostly excellent quality footage, with narrated soundtrack and much original recordings of gang members, police and victims interacting. Each disc contains 3 to 4 topics dealing with Gangland culture and these include American Gangster Harlem, You Rat-You Die (MS-13), Mexican Mafia & LA County, Hells Angels, Race Wars (Latino vs Afro-American, Kings of New York, Chicago's Black P. Stones, Skinheads, Chicago's Ganster City, La Nuestra (Blood In-Blood Out), Basic Training (USAF skills), Blood Oath (Racism), Root of All Evil (100,000 member MS-13 in America).
Overall, this compendium of gangland footage is especially meaningful if you've had basic introduction into the culture of gangs via more recent publications as "A World of Gangs", The Gangs of Los Angeles" or "The Mexican Mafia" and are familiar with the deep-seated cultural aspects of street and prison gangs: their codes, signing, dress style, graffito, ghettos, rap music, drugs, and their allegiances.
Interestingly, if one were to confines one's knowledge of gangs to what is available in the press or radio, one would be almost totally uninformed and misinformed and naive on the subject. These DVDs are not a substitute for researched books on gangs but is a satisfying complement - and we are privy to seeing the youthfulness of its members, 'signing' of gangs, phlethora of tattoos and ghetto conditions that often, but not always, precedes gangland activity. There is some erratic edition of certain film clips which leads to some redundancy, but overall this is a relatively minor fault, but caused me to drop it by one star in rating.

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This series tells the insider story of some of America's most notorious street gangs. We learn how they've shaped their times and affected the neighborhoods that they controlled. From the destruction wrought by the heroin kingpins in Harlem of the 1970's to today's most dangerous gang MS-13, which has spread out from the inner city to infect unexpected turf - suburban communities, gangs have a rich yet deadly history. They usually start out as a form of protection for their members and the community but then, grow predatory as they feed on the very people that they purport to defend. With exclusive interviews and rarely seen footage, this is a raw look at life inside these gangs - from those who live it and the agencies that are working to stop them.

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Mask (Director's Cut, Widescreen) (1985) Review

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(More customer reviews)This new directors cut of "Mask" blows away the orginal DVD release. I'm not going to go on about how great the movie is, by now everyone already knows that. I will talk about this edition however. First of all the print is far clearer and more crisp than the original DVD issue. Next of course is the inclusion of the original Bruce Springsteen soundtrack which was recorded but never used in the theatrical and home video releases. In it's place was a Bob Seger soundtrack which was great, but not the original choice. The movie was shot with Springsteen in mind and in fact Rocky has a Springsteen poster hanging in his room. But Bruce is back and used to great effect. His music was used to set a timeline which was lost when the Seger songs were used.
Also included are 8 mins of deleted scenes that have been edited back into the film. One of these scenes (which was sort of referred to in the theatrical version) is a song sung by Rusty (Cher) and Rocky (Eric Stoltz). The song is "Little Egypt" and the scene runs about 4 mins. The other scene is one where one of the bikers dies and his funeral, again this was never before seen.
And finally, there is an easter egg of sorts, at the very end of credits, after a minute or two, Cher comes on screen and speaks about the craniofacial disease and how you can help.
I've always loved the Seger music in the film, particularly "Roll Me Away" at the end. But the Springsteen music works very well too, and as I said, is used as a timeline.
Director Peter Bogdonovich does a commentary as well as a 20 min interview about the movie. As I said in my headline, if you love this movie you will want this new edition, it's well worth it.

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Directed by Peter Bogdanovich, the moving and inspirational drama Mask, starring Cher, Eric Stoltz and Sam Elliott, is the extraordinary award-winning film based on the real-life story of Rocky Dennis, a disfigured teenager who overcomes pain, loneliness and prejudice through fierce determination, emerging as an outstanding young man and an inspiration to his classmates and teachers.The Mask DVD includes the Directors Cut of the film, and as a special bonus, the original Bruce Springsteen soundtrack, which was created for the film but never released in theaters.It contains several of his top hits, such as "Badlands," "Thunder Road" and "Born in the USA.

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