In
one of the alternate realities I occasionally construct in my head —
their shared commonality always being both an abundance of free time
and the unlimited resources to devote to such pranks — I obtain the
mailing lists of all of James Dobson, Pat Robertson and Jerry Falwell’s
umbrella organizations and send everyone contained therein a copy of Queer Duck for Christmas. Or, strike that, for Hanukah.

Despite
the assured proclamations of Bill O’Reilly that the title is a
correlative sign of the Devil’s rise — along with the Israeli-Lebanese
war, Brokeback Mountain, all California ballot initiatives, the
Tele-tubbies, mint-flavored Oreos and everything George Soros says —
and thus part of the impending apocalypse, Queer Duck actually
charts its roots all the way back to 1999, as a cult smash short on
Icebox.com. The moniker, though, is entirely apt, as the cheeky
animated movie does detail the over-the-top adventures of the
world’s most popular homosexual duck and all his fabulous friends — a
collection that includes hard-partying leather enthusiast Bi-Polar Bear
(voiced by Billy West), Openly Gator (voiced by Kevin Michael
Richardson) and Oscar Wildcat (voiced by Maurice La March).

Directed by Xeth (sigh… yes, Xeth) Feinberg, this sort of elongation of Queer Duck’s
wafer-thin conceit to a feature-length project wouldn’t work were it
not for the fact that it was written by four-time Emmy-winning The Simpsons
scribe Mike Reiss, who’s also a co-producer here. If it’s all a bit
slapdash, Reiss peppers the brisk, 72-minute romp with more than a
dozen winning musical numbers, including celebratory showstoppers like
“Gay Day in Happyland” and “Let’s Play Gay Baseball,” and Jim J.
Bullock pithily delivers the abundant quips as Queer Duck. These bits
are all spot-on in their attention to detail, and will delight and
remind fans of similar irreverent fare like South Park and The Simpsons, which each have their own storied history of tuneful send-ups.

Queer Duck is presented in a regular Amray case, with a Dolby
digital stereo audio track that ably handles the program’s musical
numbers. It’s presented in widescreen enhanced for 16×9 televisions,
and there’s an additional 5.1 surround sound track as well as optional
English subtitles. A clutch of featurettes highlighting the voice
personalities, animation and other elements of production are included,
as are five of the original Queer Duck Web shorts — including
the classic “Fiddler on the Roofie” and “Bi-Polar Bear and the Glorious
Hole” — and more behind-the-scenes footage. Queer Duck
certainly may not be for everyone, but it’s a smart niche comedy, well
done. In its own absurdist way, too, the film and show subtly attack
entrenched homophobic attitudes, undermining them by re-contextualizing
them in such a ridiculous arena. B- (Movie) B- (Disc)

Westerns
may seem staid and played-out as a film genre for some modern audiences —
particularly those whose closest interaction with a horse has been, say,
reading about busted-up Kentucky Derby winner Barbaro in the New York Times — but all it takes, as Broken Trail proves, is the right cast,
story and level of commitment to make it wholly fresh and engaging.

Lovingly
sculpted by writer Alan Geoffrion from an idea fertilized and nurtured by
Robert Duvall, and produced and directed by Walter Hill, the film is set in
Oregon at the close of the 19th century, when old cowhand Print Ritter (Duvall)
and his estranged nephew, Tom Harte (Thomas Hayden Church), become the
reluctant guardians of five abused and abandoned Chinese girls who are on the
verge of being sold into prostitution. As they make their way across a rustic
swath of land on a horse drive, the duo keep kidnappers (including an excellent
James Russo) at bay, but also develop a deeper understanding and appreciation
of one another.

Gorgeously
shot, the film — a two-part miniseries which bowed this summer and premiered as
cable net AMC’s entry into such production — benefits from cinematographer Lloyd
Ahern’s previous work within the genre (he’s shot some of HBO’s Deadwood) and with Hill — a hearty list
of collaborations which includes Wild
Bill, Last Man Standing and Geronimo: An American Legend. Duvall, of
course, has previously explored the genre in the award-winning Lonesome Dove miniseries and Kevin
Costner’s Open Range (and he also
worked with Hill on Geronimo), but
has, at 75, even further mellowed in a fashion that makes his offhand approach
and delivery seem all the more mesmerizing. Church, who owns and works ranch
property in Texas and was in acting
semi-retirement until Sideways helped
propel him back into roles, is likewise excellent. All in all, something as
meticulous and well constructed as Broken
Trail makes just over three hours seem substantial and perfectly
fleshed-out, contrasted with the 140-minute indulgence of something like, say, The Guardian.

Housed
in a regular Amray case, Broken Trail
is presented in 1.78:1 anamorphic widescreen, with an English language Dolby
digital 5.1 audio track and optional English subtitles. Supplemental extras
include a perfunctory sneak peak at AMC’s Hustle,
as well as a 23-minute making-of featurette that includes interviews with an
admirably broad cross-section of Broken
Trail’s cast and crew. B+ (Movie) C+ (Disc)

Wayne’s World it ain’t, but Interview columnist and general man-about-town Glenn O’Brien’s public access cable show TV Party, which ran on Wednesdays in New York City from 1978 to sometime in ’82, proves that cracked “basement humor” and pseudo-philosophizing have long had and probably always will have a place close to the American bosom, or at least some of its raging counter-cultural cowboys and cowgirls.

Loosely modeled on Hugh Hefner’s self-touting Playboy After Dark, which was at the cutting edge of the lifestyle trend that would take a generation to fully germinate into the explosion we see before us today, the black-and-white lensed TV Party tapped into the raucous New Wave and punk scenes, and featured a hip guest roster that included everyone from The Clash, Jean-Michel Basquiat and David Byrne to John Lurie, Nile Rodgers, Robert Fripp and Arto Lindsey. Luring (warning?) viewers with the welcoming solicitation to ease into “a television show that’s a costume party, but could be a political party,” O’Brien stirred things up in wild fashion, rocking a sort of Dolly Parton lesbian look for one of his Halloween episodes.

Still, the general consensus portrait that emerges from these various compiled solo discs is one of you-had-to-be-there anarchic silliness and archness — too abstract and dense for casual pop culture aficionados to puncture without an All-Music dictionary, sifter of absinthe and healthy superiority complex. Alongside the release of1979’s “Halloween Show” are two other TV Party compilations — the same year’s “Time and Make-Up Show” and 1981’s “Crusades Show,” on the heels of the release of the American hostages from Tehran. Trippy bonus footage on the latter includes a reading from Walter Steding and “Killer Rabbit,” featuring Deborah Harry. (Blondie guitarist Chris Stein was O’Brien’s pal and frequent co-host.) Housed in regular Amray cases, each TV Party title clocks in from 52 to 59 minutes, and is presented on a region-free disc in all its original cramped glory. There are no supplemental extras masked as academic dissections, however, so you’re watching… well, found footage of a very specific time and place. It’s like going a large, metropolitan high school reunion for a class (and school) of which you weren’t a part. D+ (Shows) C (Disc)