Modern Family: The Complete First Season [Blu-ray]

Review Specifically of the Blu-Ray
If you're reading through reviews on the Amazon product page, you are probably familiar with the riotously funny sitcom Modern Family. The show has been discussed and lauded by more eloquent souls than I, but I would like to comment on the quality of the Blu-Ray, for those interested.

Modern Family was filmed using very high quality cameras in the 16:9 aspect ratio which lends intself perfectly to a Blu-Ray transfer. For a television show, the quality is simply stunning (for comparison's sake, it blows The Office: Season 5 out of the water). Colors are very realistic and buck the trend of over-saturation while still offering plenty of "pop." With few exceptions, detail is crisp and contrast is again excellent. Audio quality and clarity is equally as impressive, although being an ensemble comedy, don't expect much from the rear channels.

The extra features consist of roughly 20-30 minutes (per disc, three discs total) of additional family interviews not aired...
Funniest show on ABC... wonder how quickly it will get canceled.
Truly one of the funniest shows on TV right now. This "mockumentary" comedy series was created by Christopher Lloyd and Steven Levitan, people behind Frasier and Just Shoot me and is just as funny as these two. Multinational, multisexual and exceedingly complicated (extended) family and their hilarious antics filmed by the Dutch TV crew.

Jay Pritchett (Ed O'Neill - he is back!!!) is the track-suit wearing oldest member of the family who is married to a Columbian goddess Gloria (Sofía Vergara), who brings her son Manny into the family.

Jay's Daughter Claire (Julie Bowen) a neurotic mother is married to Phil (Ty Burrell), a very awkward, know-it-all dad (he is not) and their 3 kids.

Jay's gay son Mitchell (Jesse Tyler Ferguson) and his partner Cameron (Eric Stonestreet), who just adopted a Vietnamese baby.

Show consists of great characters, excellent cast and expertly written scripts. This show is funniest on any network. Start with...
The best tv comedy out there today!
I never have before bought or even wanted to buy a DVD series of a television show, but this show is so funny and each week, I can't wait to see what's in store for the next upcoming episode. Season 1 is not even through it's airing at this time, but each weekly episode is strong and not one has never left me not laughing into hysterics. What a great cast! I'm so glad ABC signed on for a 2nd season. I've been saving each show on my TiVo (and how long can that last before you need to free up space)and later just love to playback an episode to watch...I'm always guaranteed a good laugh, no matter how many times watched. When this becomes a DVD set, I'm going to be one of the first in line to purchase it! I can't wait for its release!
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Machete [Blu-ray]

Pre-Double Dip Warning!
Jan 3, 2011:
This isn't so much a review of the film itself, but of the product. I'm writing to inform people of a future Double Dip. In an interview in October 2010, Robert Rodriguez said that there is going to be an "Ultra-violent Director's Cut" of the movie to be released on home video. No release date has been announced for that DVD yet, but I assume that version of the film will have the usual Rodriguez extras such as a commentary, a film school, and a cooking school (all of which are not on the current DVD/Blu releases).

If you like "Machete" enough to buy it, but don't care about different versions, extras, etc., then go ahead and get this version of the film. If LOVE "Machete" and you want to hold out, then save your money and wait for the next version of the DVD/Blu that will come out. Fair warning: looking at the double dips for other Rodriguez films such as "Grindhouse" and "From Dusk Til Dawn", the next release could be possibly several months or...
Interesting reactions to a fun exploitation flick.
Machete is a parody of a parody of a parody and it is extremely fun. Machete is a throwback to the old "grind-house exploitation" movies that tried to have a plot (which were always awful) and sometimes even a "massage" (which were terribly portrayed as well, although one understood what the "message" might be, whether it be as simplistic as "don't brake the law", or more sensitive subjects such as "rape", etc. In this case Latinos, which in some instances ARE being mistreated in this country, "illegal" or not, is part of the "plot" and "message"). In the 1970's these types of movies were seen, or at least attended to, for pure fun (and if one had a significant other, to play fun "games" in the darkness of the theater). And this is what Machete (along with Planet Terror and Death Proof) was intended as: a cheap, fun, exploitation flick. If these types of movies are "terrible" that's because they're SUPPOSED to be "terrible".
"Machete don't text."
It's wildly exaggerated. It's supremely ridiculous. It spoofs its message. Huzzah! It's the action-packed motion picture, MACHETE, that you aren't supposed to take too seriously. It fulfills the promise raised in one of the faux trailers from the 2007 theater release of Quentin Tarantino and Robert Rodriguez's double-billed GRINDHOUSE. A slew of big name actors graces this exercise in pseudo-exploitation cinema, but towering above them all is Danny Trejo as the brutish, laconic Machete Cortez, that vengeful ex-Federale. Trejo's face is so weathered it resembles a page out of a Thomas Guide. And yet he is somehow a chick magnet, if you buy into the film. No less than two hotties - Michelle Rodriguez and Jessica Alba - throw themselves at him.

When one sets foot on the vengeance trail, it's best to have a huge friggin' machete to wave around menacingly. Machete Cortez is an old school sort of hombre stalking a modern world. His impractical tool of choice is the machete, even...
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