See everything I just wrote below about Netflix and the film “Ashes and Diamonds?” The same exact story goes for “Man of Marble,” another Wajda film. Only this time, I was able to watch until the 70 minute mark before things got all kablooie. I took the disc out and only then noticed a hairline crack that ran from the edge to the middle of the disc (the second half of the movie.) So I have to wait for a second replacement (third disc) on this film, too. And what really sucks is that the first half of the movie was AWESOME and I really want to finish it!! Could this be part of a master plan of Netflix to keep people from getting to the bottom of their queues? I doubt it — they still have to pay for postage back and forth on all these replacements. Maybe it just means that people who are into Iron Curtain-era Polish cinema don’t know how to treat DVDs?
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Welcome
Jordan Hoffman is a New York-based writer and film critic working for The Guardian, Vanity Fair, Thrillist, Times of Israel, NY Daily News and elsewhere.
He is the host of ENGAGE: The Official Star Trek Podcast, a member of the New York Film Critics Circle and challenges you to a game of backgammon.
Overall, Netflix is pretty good, but I’ve had a few issues as well. I rented one movie that came practically in two halves! Then I received a movie for my film class (ELEPHANT) yesterday, but instead, it was the PRINCESS DIARIES 2! Who made this mistake! Meh, o well. The price we pay for free shipping and movies coming to our house. . .
Well, Greencine is an option, but they’re based in San Francisco, so you’d better be ready to wait up to 5 days in both directions. That works fine with my movie-watching schedule (I pay for 5 at a time, and I’m rarely without a disk if I want one), but you might be a more frequent DVDer than I. On the plus side, in a year as their customer, I think I’ve only encountered one defective disk. So, alas, I still haven’t seen “Wild Zero”.