17 of 17 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
A Lot of Movies, Low Price, November 8, 2008
This review is from: Monsters Unleashed (9 Movies / 3 Discs) (DVD)
Movie/DVD Details:
Disc 1
approx. 241 minutes (4 hours, 1 minute)
Bonus: Classic Monster Movie Trailers
Gamera Vs. Monster X
1970, approx. 75 minutes, color
Gamera Vs. Gyaos
1967, approx. 87 minutes, color
Yongary, Monster From the Deep
1967, approx. 79 minutes, color
Disc 2
approx. 266 minutes (4 hours, 26 minutes)
Bonus: Monster Poster Gallery
Warning From Space
1956, approx. 87 minutes, color
Destroy All Planets
1968, approx. 90 minutes, color
War of the Monsters
1966, approx. 89 minutes, color
Disc 3
approx. 250 minutes (4 hours, 10 minutes)
Bonus: A History of Monster Movies
Gamera the Invincible
1965, approx. 86 minutes, b&w
The Giant Gila Monster
1959, approx. 74 minutes, b&w
Monster From a Prehistoric Planet
1967, approx. 90 minutes, b&w
My Review:
I think that this is a good collection of monster movies, with a majority of them being the early Gamera movies.
The video and audio quality on the discs are... passible. All videos are in fullscreen format, which usually means a lot of cropping. There is a lot of pixelation and compression on the movies, possibly due to cramming over four hours of movie content onto each disc, and all discs are single sided, so the quality is not much better than the other DVD releases from other companies. But, for around $8, the quality is what you get for your money.
The DVDs menus are okay. They are a little plain, but fine. Each movie contains eight chapters, and all of the chapters are named, instead of other releases where there would be only six chapters, and they would be lazily labled with numbers one through six. The Bonus Features make a nice addition, and interesting to watch.
I didn't like how the DVDs were particulary packaged for this release. When you open up the case, you have Disc 1 on the left, and then Discs 2 and 3 are on the right, overlaping each other. This has caused some scratching to the discs, and a lot of times, I can't always get both of them to snap into place. I was hoping that St. Claire would use a middle flap to put one of the DVDs in, but they didn't. What is really odd is that there are two hinges for flaps in the middle of the inside of the case, yet they didn't put any flaps in. They probably didn't want to spend more money, and thus, keep the prices lower.
Well, even though this release has its flaws, it is a good deal for the money. The quality may be rather poor, as all discs seem to have, unfortunetly, and the packaging may be below expectations, but it is an affordable way to view the movies, along with some special features. A good way to view most of the older Gamera movies for a low price, especially for people who haven't seen them before. If you have most of these movies on DVD already, then this product is really unnecessary, and the quality is not worth it, but the quantity and the price make this a good collection, especially for those beginning to watch older monster movies. I hope this review was helpful. Thanks for reading.
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5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:
1.0 out of 5 stars
Too good to be true..?, December 28, 2008
This review is from: Monsters Unleashed (9 Movies / 3 Discs) (DVD)
Yes. On face value a three disk set with 9 movies, including the rarely seen "Warning from Space", sounds great and at just a few bucks, a bargain, so on that score this set is worth getting.
But, if you're used to the more careful, respectful treatments from Classic Media and Tokyo Shock, then this will come as a disappointed - all the films here are blurry, dubbed, scan and pan, often with lots of scratches, muddy colours and poor sound.
The packaging is also a touch misleading, featuring images from "Gamera The Brave" and "Gamera 3", neither of which are on this disc.
The intentions are there but the execution is lacking, but for a few bucks its worth a punt, and younger viewers might find them fun.
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