LATEST ADDITIONS

Ad-funded video-on-demand service Viewster is offering wrestling and mixed martial arts fans the chance to relive their favourite fights for free after signing deals with the TNA (Total Nonstop Action) Wrestling and UCMMA (Ultimate Challenge Mixed Martial Arts) organisations.

Regular readers may recall HCC previously getting an SVS subwoofer to play with. Dubbed the PC13-Ultra, it was a large upright tube and, frankly, so ugly it was best hidden away – although, with its 13.5in Peerless driver and a 1,000W amplifier, it could break windows and shake the foundations. Now, SVS has come back to Blightly some years later with a whole new range that still feels a bit American in flavour and concept. Aimed squarely at the seriously high-end market, yet cheekily less money than some, the SVS Ultra series employs a very sophisticated set of drivers and a real no-compromise approach to being loud as well as clear.

Of all the half-baked ideas that have come to home cinema over the years, CES 2013 sported perhaps the most ridiculous AV tech yet – the curved-screen TV. This is a case of technology for technology’s sake, because a curved screen for TV viewing is both pointless and completely foils all the good work put into making screens ultra-thin to hang on the wall. Hang a curved screen on the wall and you are going to have some serious wings sticking out, and that’s never a good look.

Director David DeCoteau throws together elements from Porky’s, Meatballs 2 and Weird Science with this uneven sex comedy about a nerdy freshman (Billy Jacoby) who is transformed into a babe magnet after being injected with ‘alien vitamins’ by mysterious new biology teacher Ms Zenobia (Judy Landers). The film’s first act - all pratfalls and comedy sound effects – feels more like a sit-com than a film - but things do get a little bit more interesting when the sci-fi elements start to kick in and it all ends up with a very silly shoot-out in a hideous New Wave nightclub.