New DVD Releases Coming Tuesday, March 7, 2006

There are a few movies coming out on DVD this week that are worth noting. Among them are Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire and Jarhead.

There are two, however, that I’m more interested in that aren’t getting much press.

First is Howl's Moving Castle. I’ve never watched any form of Anime since watching Star Blazers as a kid, but this movie has me interested. I’m planning on renting it and sharing my thoughts on it here.

Another movie that I’m interested in catching on DVD is the original The Shaggy Dog. I watched this as a kid and I remember liking it, but with Disney’s upcoming release of the updated The Shaggy Dog with Tim Allen, Disney has seen fit to capitalize on the hooplah and get the original one out.

Personally, I’ve enjoyed the original versions of Disney’s movies much more than the remakes. It could have been my childhood crush on Hayley Mills, but in my opinion, the original The Parent Trap was much better than the new one with Lindsay Lohan. I felt the same way about Freaky Friday (maybe I just don’t enjoy watching Lindsay Lohan all the time—I didn’t even attempt Herbie Fully Loaded).

So, what do I remember about the original The Shaggy Dog? Not much. It looks like the DVD has an original theatrical black and white version plus a color version. So was it filmed in color but distributed in black and white? I can’t imagine that they would have a colorized version.

I think the thing that makes the old one appeal so much to me is that I get fed up with old movies being thought of as outdated or somehow bad because they don’t have all of the new CGI visual effects that they can do nowadays. I also have this fear of these “outdated” movies being locked away because they are looked at as being obsolete in much the same way George Lucas has locked away the original releases of the original Star Wars Trilogy—but that’s a long discussion best left for another time.

There have been enough modernized remakes of classic movies that I’d like to hear anyone’s opinions comparing the old ones vs. the new. Do you think that your age and whether having seen, or not having seen, the old one affects which one you like better?