Looking for DVD review sites

[Chris Desjardin]

I know about The Digital Bits, and DVDAngle.com, but are there any other web sites that have good DVD reviews?

[Ken_McAlinden]

Colin,
Can you think of any others?

Okay, just funnin'. Forum member Colin Jacobson is the primary reviewer at the dvdmg.com (http://www.dvdmg.com) site.

A good resource for web-based DVD reviews is DVD Basen (http://www.dvd-basen.dk/uk/home.php3 for the English language version). It is not a review site per se, but rather a site that indexes other review sites.

Regards,

[Emberglow]

I use DVDfile.com (http://www.dvdfile.com/) quite a bit. They go into some of the technical details on the discs as well as reviewing the movie.

[audiomixer]

www.dvdtalk.com

[jdrueke]

I really like http://www.dvdjournal.com/

[bugdaddy]

here's a few:

http://www.dvdverdict.com/
http://www.dvdtown.com/
http://www.thecinemalaser.com/

[Oatsdad]

Colin,
Can you think of any others?

I know nothing about this subject. What the hell's "DVD"? Some sort of sexually transmitted disease?

[BradOlson]

check Colin's signature for another one. www.allmovie.com also reviews DVDs

[SonicZone]

www.hometheaterforum.com (http://www.hometheaterforum.com). They're indexed on the home page; I think all those posts are subject line-prefixed "HTF Review".

[Oatsdad]

I usually don't like to comment on other sites - it kind of looks
self-serving. But what the hell - I have very definite thoughts, and maybe
someone will be curious to hear the perspective of an "insider" in the DVD
review biz.

Looking at the ones mentioned in this thread:

Digital Bits: very good for news, not so hot for reviews. They do
FULL reviews infrequently these days. Instead, they prefer package
reviews - a bunch of tiny reviews in one big post, usually under the
"Doogan's Views" banner. Those are a waste of time and an insult to the
studios and the readers. I doubt Doogan even bothers to spend more than a
few minutes with each title. Their full-length reviews are decent and
that's it. Stick with them for news but skip the reviews.

DVD Angle: a shell of what it used to be. Webmaster Paul Russell's a
good guy - he helped us out a lot in the early days. However, the site's
rarely up to date, and almost never ahead of the curve. Paul once planned
to expand to the point he could post 20 reviews a DAY - now the site barely
manages that amount in a month or two. The site includes too many
reviewers, but they're generally decent. The site simply is too
infrequently updated to be very relevant anymore.

DVD File: Another site that's dropped precipitously of late.
Webmaster Peter Bracke took a break and the site's been unable to recover.
DVD File used to be the best site for news - they've not updated that
section since before Labor Day! Some reviews have appeared over that span, but not many. After weeks of silence, whoever currently runs the site said Bracke would return in October. That didn't happen, so on November 4, they announced they expect him back "soon". Frankly, I think the site's pretty much dead - I don't think it'll ever return to its prior prominence.

DVD File was always a great news site, but I never had much use in its reviews. Some of the contributors are decent, but Bracke - who wrote most of the big articles - was weak. He clearly made up a lot of his reviews - they included glaring errors that simply made no sense coming from someone who'd looked at the DVDs or even watched the movies. I mean, he'd include major plot errors in his synopses. I didn't trust him because he lied so much. That site's reviews were always very suspect, so it's not a tragedy the site barely exists anymore, at least not in that regard - I do miss the news.

DVD Talk: Another site with so many reviewers it's tough to generalize. I know contributor Aaron Beierle also posts on his own site, Current Guide to DVD. He's not much of a writer, but he's a nice guy and he's honest. I don't think the reviews are great - he once wrote for us but we dropped him due to too little detail - but I like him and appreciate that he doesn't make up things in his reviews. Don't know anything about the site's other reviewers.

DVD Journal: Excellent movie reviews - TERRIBLE DVD reviews. They devote 90% or more of their energy to discussions of the films and usually say little about the DVDs themselves - picture, audio and supplements get very little mention. What's the point of a DVD site that doesn't discuss the DVDs? Call it a movie review site and leave it at that. I'd never visit it to learn about the discs.

DVD Verdict: Good site. Lots of reviewers, but most are good. One of the few I'd trust.

DVD Town: Ditto. A few rough spots, but generally a very good site. I'd recommend them.

Cinema Laser: Not a bad site, but amateurish. I don't have an active problem with it, but I think it's mediocre.

Home Theater Forum: Good site, primarily because of reader feedback. The reviews appear in threads just like posts here, so readers can comment on them. Most of the reviewers are good - again, any site with more than a couple will have ups and downs, but I can't complain much. Having to "answer" to the readers ensures thoughtfulness, so the reviews are usually pretty good.

Sites not mentioned:

DVD Review: four or five years ago, this was arguably the biggest DVD site on the Internet. I think its webmaster got married or had a kid, and the site declined. It still updates regularly, but I never liked it, even in its glory days. Its big problem? Tremendously biased reviews. No site kisses *** like DVD Review - for a long time they used some absurd reasoning to justify the fact they ran NO negative reviews. (It was literally their policy to only post positive articles!) Even now their reviews are flimsy, and they occasionally fake some elements. I don't trust them.

Upcoming Discs: Waste of time. Very brief reviews that tell us little. Don't bother.

Digitally Obsessed: One of the better sites. Very eclectic mix of titles and usually well-written, useful reviews. I like them.

Big Picture: One of the worst on the Internet. This is essentially a moot point, since they've apparently not posted a new review since early JUNE! Hard to tell for sure - they were the first site to demand payment from readers for "extra privileges", so maybe they're sending those suckers some content. I doubt it - their front page hasn't indicated any form of new review in months. They still update the news about once a month. Even when they offered reviews, they were a joke. Arrogant and self-aggrandizing, they couldn't be trusted at all. I shan't mourn the site's demise - good riddance!

Film Freak Central: Better for movie reviews than DVD information, it's still a good site. Main man Bill Chambers is funny and insightful, and he's also very honest. Nice site overall.