DVD Delirium II

The International Guide to Weird

& Wonderful Films on DVD!

Nathaniel Thompson

FAB Press 2004

Web: Http://www.fabpress.com

DVD has taken the world by storm, in Australia we have had one of the biggest take-ups of DVD worldwide and the number of players in Australian homes is staggering (it is even higher if we count games consoles with DVD capability). It is also astounding to note just how many of these players are multizone, even though we may have a large DVD market, compared to the numbers of available titles in the US and the world, we are small fry and hence the vast majority of owners seem to opt for multizoned players or have their machines modded.

This means there is a huge market in Australia for titles outside the standard region 4. The question is how do we find out which are worth buying and which are rubbish. This is a serious issue. There are such a vast number of available titles and so many are simple “shovel ware” i.e. encode that old videotape onto a DVD and smack on a nice pretty cover. While this is an issue in every country since we are purchasing internationally with related exchange rate variations and postage costs Australian DVD collectors cannot afford to get it wrong too often.

While there are lots of titles which document the wonderful world of film, ranging from specialized books on splatter, cult, Asian films and so on to the more general video review books, most focus primarily on the themselves rather than the medium. So while these volumes will mention DVD releases (if we are lucky) we never seem to get enough information on differences between DVD editions, extras, encoding etc. This is where DVD Delirium comes in.

DVD Delirium II is an 'international guide to weird and wonderful films on DVD'. What that means is actually hard to tell, basically it covers films that engage and entrance the editors of the series. This covers everything from cult to artfilms, horror to simply DVDs worth watching. While a very good range of obscure and unusual films are covered, the coverage is balanced so that anyone with an interest in unusual films will be satisfied.

What stands out with DVD Delirium is that it balances reviews of the films themselves with extensive reviews of the various DVD editions. We get intricate summaries of the plot and details of movie trivia as well as discussions of the encoding, DVD sound quality, variations in regional editions and so on. This makes DVD Delirium one of the best books of its sort on the market. While there are lots of good film review magazines and books, DVD Delirium not only delivers reviews which are in the best bracket for content but covers DVD issues in such a way that it leaves all other review products behind.

For Australians this is a real joy. You not only get comprehensive reviews of films that we don’t often see on the shelves of our local DVD store, but we get accurate consumer information on which editions to purchase, which to avoid, which has more extras and so on. This is a mandatory volume for every DVD collector.

The only drawback is how much you are going to spend on DVD’s after you read about all these great films !

Sad to say DVD Delirium II (distributed by FAB Press) is not available in the Australia marketplace at present, the best way is to purchase online at http://www.fabpress.com

While you are there have a look at DVD Delirium I and some of the other great volumes they have, you won’t be disappointed.