Tony Iommi - Inside Black Sabbath

Rating:
Summary: Just another black sabbath completists DVD
Review: I give this DVD four stars but not because of the Black Sabbath stuff, you must rather check the classic rock performances within. That part is the one that worths your money.
Back to the Sabbath, you will see what you've always seen Tony Iommi speaking about the making of songs like Paranoid and Black sabbath, footage of the songs included(does it sound familiar?).
Take care if you read Smoke on the Water in the case, is not that Black Sabbath performance you've always been searching for, nah, it's just Ian Gillan Band performing (there are much better performances than this one -Rainbow with Joe Lynn Turner at the "Straight between the eyes tour" is one example-).
Completing this "Sabbath story" part are two promotional videos of the Tony Martin era (both of them included in the Black Sabbath Story vol. II).
So if you're a completist go ahead, buy it, if in anyway, as it was my case you feel dissapointed you can go to the performances of old groups like Uriah Heep and, believe me, you shall feel less upset about what you expected for a Sabbath DVD and you'll see who were the ones that deserved the four stars.

Rating:
Summary: Do you have money to waste?
Review: Let's break down this video item by item:
1-Image Quality
I can almost hear the VHS tape this DVD was made with.
Poor image transfer, i can see lines at the top and the bottom of the screen. Almost homemade quality.

2-Content.
Tony Iommy must have been pretty desperate when he made himself available for this video. Since the producers couldn't come up with enough decent questions to ask him, (and more than one camera to shoot him with) we must sit through some completely unrelated filler footage such as Ian Gillan and his band (not Deep Purple mind you) playing Smoke on the Water..
i guess videos of Sabbath WITH Gillan (such as Zero the Hero) are really hard to find nowadays. Other gems include some laughable cheese-filled videos of Martin-era-Sabbath such as the "Headless Cross" and "Feels Good to me". OUCH

Getting past the cheese filler, you get a half-way decent Tony Iommy interview, talking about several albums from the Ozzy era all the way to Tony Martin. Notably overlooked is Sabotage, possibly Sabbath's best album. OOPS

3-The Extras, "Classic Rock Showcase"
This is the best part; get ready to laugh at some Norgewian Bimbo dressed like a cheap groupie interview a whole bunch of middle aged guys about the joys of bands such as Nektar and Caravan. Also notable are some clips of a Uriah Heep "unpluggled" show / DVD.

This whole video is obviously a half-concocted idea of some businessman to cash-in on Black Sabbath.
If you have some money to throw out..

Rating:
Summary: Only for the hardcore Sabbath fan.
Review: This DVD is a repackaging of a rare Japanese laserdisc called "Careful with that Axe". It is a great sit down interview with Tony Iommi circa 1991. However, this DVD is a poor transfer. It looks like it was mastered off of VHS and offers no special options. Even chapter selections are unavailable. Included are previews for other releases from other bands from this company. Expect no rare Sabbath proformance footage as there is almost none.

If you're a hardcore fan, you will really enjoy this disc. However, expect a cheap package. I'd give it 5 stars, but the cheezy presentation knocks it down to 3.