MOVIES NOW AND THEN

I apologize for delivering this holiday gift guide so close to the end of the season. This would have come sooner if I did not have to prepare for final exams. Nevertheless, as long as it is not yet December 25th, I can still offer movie fans some good holiday gift ideas.

This was the year in which I converted from DVDs to Blu-rays, and I have not regretted it once. The picture quality is such that you can see every cobblestone in the road, every shingle on the road and every line in person’s face. If you haven’t considered a Blu-ray player before, I’d say it’s about time to start. My model is a Panasonic DMP-BD45, which works fine despite not having Internet capability. If you want a regular player, I suggest a higher-level Panasonic unit. The best one I’ve seen, however, is Sony’s Playstation 3, which is Internet capable and loads discs at a much faster speed (not to mention Batman: Arkham Asylum is one of the best video games I’ve ever played).

Disney celebrates its 50th animated feature by releasing Tangled, a loose adaptation of the fairy tale “Rapunzel” that combines the storytelling conventions of the old classics with today’s computer animation. In many ways, the placement of this movie at that particular studio tally is a very fortuitous one. Tangled is a mostly harmonious work that pays reverence to Disney’s traditions and embraces the continuing advances in the medium of animation.