Thursday, November 10, 2011

Domestic Disturbance : Widescreen Edition

  • Widescreen
Frank Morrison finds out that there is more than meets the eye when it comes to his son's new step-father and does all he can to make sure that his son is safe and stays alive.
Genre: Suspense
Rating: PG13
Release Date: 16-APR-2002
Media Type: DVDIf you focus on the effective casting of John Travolta and Vince Vaughan, Domestic Disturbance may grab your attention as a thriller that hits too close to home. After playing a greasy villain in Swordfish, Travolta ably serves up the good-guy charm as a divorced father who must rescue his teenage son from a murderous new stepfather, played by Vaughan with bad-tempered relish. Director Harold Becker is worthy of better material (like his earlier hit Sea of Love), but he handles this B-movie potboiler with professional flair, particularly in the setup involving an accomplice (the ! ever-reliable Steve Buscemi) who threatens to destroy Vaughan's small-town respectability. The plot's about as plausible as Britney Spears in a remake of Sophie's Choice, relying heavily on lame-brained cops and vast chasms in logic, but by the time Travolta and Vaughan engage in their inevitable showdown, even childless viewers may feel a twinge of parental instinct. --Jeff Shannon DVD

Eden Log

  • A man wakes up deep inside a cave. Suffering amnesia, he has no recollection of how he came to be here or of what happened to the man whose body he finds beside him. Tailed by a mysterious creature, he must continue through this strange and fantastic world. Enclosed, Tolbiac has no other option to reach the surface than to use REZO ZERO, secret observing cells in this cemetery-like abandoned mine.
A man regains consciousness at the bottom of a cave, with no concept of how he arrived there, nor any idea who the dead man is at his side. Only one thing is certain - he has to escape the menacing creature that s pursuing him. His journey back to the surface takes him through a cemetery - like world that's been abandoned by a mysterious organization called Eden Log.

Fahrenheit 9/11

  • Controversy.What Controversy? In the most provocative film of the year, Academy Award winner Michael Moore presents a searing examination of the role played by money and oil in the wake of the tragic events of 9/11. Michael Moore blends captivating and thought-provoking footage with revealing interviews while balancing it all with his own brand of humor and satire. Format: DVD MOVIE Gen
Controversy...What Controversy?

In the most provocative film of the year, Academy Award winner Michael Moore presents a searing examination of the role played by money and oil in the wake of the tragic events of 9/11. Michael Moore blends captivating and thought-provoking footage with revealing interviews while balancing it all with his own brand of humor and satire.
To anyone who truly understands what it means to be an American, Michael Moore's Fahrenheit 9/11 should be seen as a triu! mph of patriotic freedom. Rarely has the First Amendment been exercised with such fervor and forthrightness of purpose: After subjecting himself to charges of factual errors in his gun-lobby exposé Bowling for Columbine, Moore armed himself with a platoon of reputable fact-checkers, an abundance of indisputable film and video footage, and his own ironically comedic sense of righteous indignation, with the singular intention of toppling the war-ravaged administration of President George W. Bush. It's the Bush presidency that Moore, with his provocative array of facts and figures, blames for corporate corruption, senseless death, unnecessary war, and political favoritism toward Osama Bin Laden's family and Saudi oil partners following the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001. Moore's incendiary film earned Palme d'Or honors at Cannes and a predictable legion of detractors, but do yourself a favor: Ignore those who condemn the film without seeing it, and let the fac! ts speak for themselves. By honoring American soldiers and the! victims of 9/11 while condemning Bush's rationale for war in Iraq, Fahrenheit 9/11 may actually succeed in turning the tides of history. --Jeff Shannon

Blazing Saddles (30th Anniversary Special Edition)

  • The railroad's got to run through the town of Rock Ridge. How do you drive out the townfolk in order to steal their land? Send in the toughest gang you've got.and name a new sheriff who'll last about 24 hours.But that's not really the plot of Blazing Saddles, just the pretext. Once Mel Brooks' lunatic film many call his best gets started, logic is lost in a blizzard of gags, jokes, quips, puns, h
A madcap spoof of the classic Hollywood Western, Blazing Saddles is also one of the most gleefully anti-P.C. films ever produced by a major studio. When the sheriff of a small frontier town is killed, convict Bart (Cleavon Little) is appointed the first black sheriff of all-white Rock Ridge by the evil Hedley Lamarr (Harvey Korman), who hopes this will chase the townspeople from their homes. The naive Sheriff Bart soon catches on, realizing from the less than cheery welcome that the townspeople (who ! all seem to be named Johnson) aren't prepared for a black sheriff and that he was never meant to succeed at all. Enlisting the help of the sensitive town drunk (Gene Wilder), formerly the Waco Kid, Bart embarks on a plan to save Rock Ridge. A scathing spoof that deals with racism, sexism, and bodily functions, Blazing Saddles offers a contrast between picture and words that is shocking, subversive, and hilarious. Director Mel Brooks makes two memorable appearances--as both the sleazy governor and a Yiddish-speaking Sioux Indian chief--while Madeline Kahn does a sidesplitting Marlene Dietrich imitation as the town floozy. Featuring fabulous comic turns by Alex Karras and Slim Pickens, Blazing Saddles is raunchy, lovable, and uproarious.

Wrath of Gods

  • Director's Cut, 72 minutes
  • 2 hours of bonus material
  • 1 hour exclusive interview with Gerard Butler
  • Additional and extended scenes & exclusive interviews with the people behind Beowulf & Grendel
  • Subtitles: Spanish, German, French, Icelandic, Polish + Version for the hearing impaired
This touching and humorous movie has earned the raves of critics and won the hearts of audiences everywhere! To spare the feelings of her fatherless boy, Lizzie (Emily Mortimer -- Disney's THE KID) secretly authors letters from his "father" that detail seafaring adventures from around the world. But she cannot maintain this illusion forever. Torn between exposing the truth and protecting her son, Lizzie gets more than anyone bargained for when she hires a handsome stranger (Gerald Butler -- THE PHANTOM OF THE OPERA, LARA CROFT TOMB RAIDER: THE CRADLE OF LIFE) to play the role of a li! fetime! Winner at both the Heartland Film Festival and the Seattle International Film Festival, this entertaining motion picture is sure to touch your heart!Driven by intelligent, constantly surprising and moving performances from the film's leads, Dear Frankie stars Emily Mortimer (Lovely and Amazing) as Lizzie, Scottish mother of Frankie (Jack McElhone), a deaf and highly intelligent 9-year-old. Constantly uprooting themselves and relocating from town to town, Lizzie and Frankie are on the run from the latter's abusive father, a fact unknown to the boy, who believes his dad is a busy seaman sending letters full of adventure and love. In fact, Lizzie is writing those missives, but she is faced with a challenge when Frankie discovers his father's ship will dock nearby. Lizzie hires a kind, handsome stranger (Gerard Butler) to play Frankie's dad, creating an odd situation in which ever-growing lies become a conduit for love, and Lizzie's repressed desires come ! to the fore with a man posing as her husband. The moral tangle! s are of interest in director Shona Auerbach's charmingly paced, quietly insightful drama-comedy, but so is the glorious feeling of watching these characters come fully alive. --Tom KeoghUnited Kingdom released, PAL/Region 2 DVD: it WILL NOT play on standard US DVD player. You need multi-region PAL/NTSC DVD player to view it in USA/Canada: LANGUAGES: English ( Dolby Digital 5.1 ), English ( Subtitles ), WIDESCREEN (1.85:1), SPECIAL FEATURES: Cast/Crew Interview(s), Commentary, Deleted Scenes, Interactive Menu, Short Film, Trailer(s), SYNOPSIS: The title character in this bowl of Scottish blarney is a sweet nine-year-old deaf boy (Jack McElhone) who lives a fugitive existence with his beautiful mother (Emily Mortimer) and his chain-smoking grandmother (Mary Riggans). The family is forced to move every few months to avoid being tracked down by Frankie's violent, abusive father. The happiness of the boy, who is too young to remember the his father revolves around bogus letters p! enned by his mother posing as his devoted but absent dad, supposedly a merchant seaman. When a ship that coincidentally has the same name as the one his mother invented docks, she hires an impersonator (Gerard Butler) to play his seafaring dad. Although sensitively acted, the movie is a fraudulent mawkish yarn riddled with plot holes and improbabilities. SCREENED/AWARDED AT: BAFTA Awards, European Film Awards, Montreal World Film Festival, ...Dear FrankieWinner of 6 international film festival awards, this entertaining documentary tells the dramatic story behind the making of the epic movie Beowulf & Grendel, starring Gerard Butler, Stellan Skarsgard, Sarah Polley and Ingvar Sigurdsson. When Canadian director Sturla Gunnarsson and his cast and crew, including Gerard Butler and Stellan Skarsgård, set upon Iceland to film Beowulf & Grendel in 2004, they expected the usual complications involved in making a major motion picture. What they encountered was a ruthless Icelandic winter on a foreboding landscape, financing complications and a bizarre run of bad luck that led some of them to believe they were in an epic battle with the Norse gods themselves. Filmmaker Jon Gustafsson was along for the ride. Hired to play one of Beowulf's warriors, he's one set with his camera as the crew battles hurricane force winds and he's in the backroom as the producers scramble to shore up a collapsing deal, creating an intimate portrait of filmmakers fighting the odds in pursuit of a vision. If you liked "Lost in la Mancha" or "Burden of Dreams" you will probably like this one. DVD Special Features: 2 hours of bonus features, 1 hour exclusive interview with Gerard Butler, exclusive interviews with producers of Beowulf & Grendel, additional & extended scenes, chapter selection, Subtitles: Spanish, German, French, Icelandic, Polish, English, version for the hearing impaired.

Bride Wars (2009) Widescreen

  • Comedy
  • DVD
TWO BEST FRIENDS BECOME RIVALS WHEN THEY SCHEDULE THEIR RESPECTIVE WEDDINGS ON THE SAME DAY.

How important is the perfect wedding? Emma (Anne Hathaway) and Liv (Kate Hudson) have been best friends since childhood and each has always dreamed of an extravagant wedding at the Plaza hotel. When both friends get engaged in the same week, they rush to the exclusive wedding planner Marion St. Claire (Candice Bergen) to book the perfect weddings at the Plaza hotel. The reservations get mixed up and both weddings end up scheduled on the same day and, since there are no other suitable openings available at the Plaza, the friends find themselves in the impossible situation of having to decide who will sacrifice her long-held dream and change venues. It turns out that neither woman is willing to give up her plans for a perfect wedding and the friends turn against one ! another in a hilarious battle that results in everything from blue hair to rumors of pregnancy and embarrassing home videos accompanying one bride's walk down the aisle. Can even a life-long friendship survive the emotional turmoil of two weddings gone wrong? Bride Wars is an amusing look at the trials of friendship and love that's sure to inspire laughter and perhaps even a tear or two. --Tami Horiuchi

Stills from Bride Wars (Click for larger image)



     


Genre: Comedy
Rating: PG
Release Date: 28-APR-2009
Media Type: Blu-Ray

How important is the perfect wedding? Emma (Anne Hathaway) and Liv (Kate Hudson) have been best friends since childhood and each has always dreamed of an extravagant wedding at the Plaza hotel. When both friends get engag! ed in the same week, they rush to the exclusive wedding planner Marion St. Claire (Candice Bergen) to book the perfect weddings at the Plaza hotel. The reservations get mixed up and both weddings end up scheduled on the same day and, since there are no other suitable openings available at the Plaza, the friends find themselves in the impossible situation of having to decide who will sacrifice her long-held dream and change venues. It turns out that neither woman is willing to give up her plans for a perfect wedding and the friends turn against one another in a hilarious battle that results in everything from blue hair to rumors of pregnancy and embarrassing home videos accompanying one bride's walk down the aisle. Can even a life-long friendship survive the emotional turmoil of two weddings gone wrong? Bride Wars is an amusing look at the trials of friendship and love that's sure to inspire laughter and perhaps even a tear or two. --Tami Horiuchi

Stills from Bride Wars (Click ! for larg er image)



     

How important is the perfect wedding? Emma (Anne Hathaway) and Liv (Kate Hudson) have been best friends since childhood and each has always dreamed of an extravagant wedding at the Plaza hotel. When both friends get engaged in the same week, they rush to the exclusive wedding planner Marion St. Claire (Candice Bergen) to book the perfect weddings at the Plaza hotel. The reservations get mixed up and both weddings end up scheduled on the same day and, since there are no other suitable openings available at the Plaza, the friends find themselves in the impossible situation of having to decide who will sacrifice her long-held dream and change venues. It turns out that neither woman is willing to give up her plans for a perfect wedding and the friends turn against one another! in a hilarious battle that results in everything from blue ha! ir to ru mors of pregnancy and embarrassing home videos accompanying one bride's walk down the aisle. Can even a life-long friendship survive the emotional turmoil of two weddings gone wrong? Bride Wars is an amusing look at the trials of friendship and love that's sure to inspire laughter and perhaps even a tear or two. --Tami Horiuchi

Broken English

  • Croatian born NINA (Aleksandra Vujcic) escapes with her family from their war ravaged homeland to the culturally mixed suburbs of Auckland, New Zealand. Smothered by the controlling love of her volatile father, IVAN (Rade Serbedzija), Nina finds tender romance when she falls in love with EDDIE (Julian Arahanga), a New Zealand native (Maori). Frustrated, Nina knows there is no chance that she and E
Though made by the daughter of iconoclastic filmmaker John Cassavetes, Broken English is a surprisingly old-fashioned affair. Just as her friend Sofia Coppola wrote about a woman much like herself for Lost in Translation, Zoe Cassavetes has done something similar for her first film (although Before Sunset seems to have exerted a greater influence). Nora (Parker Posey in typically fine form) works in guest relations for a hip New York hotel, just as the writer/director once did. ! Her best friend, Audrey (Drea de Matteo, The Sopranos), has been married for five years, while Nora remains single. Her mother, Vivien (Gena Rowlands, Zoe's real-life mother), would like to see her settle down. First, Nora goes on a date with self-obsessed actor Nick (a mohawked Justin Theroux), then blind date Charlie (Josh Hamilton). Neither ends well. Nora laments, "Men hate me," but Audrey argues that Nora really hates herself. Her self-confidence gets a boost when she meets Julien (Melvil Poupaud, François Ozon's Time to Leave), a chain-smoking, fedora-sporting Frenchman. Just as she starts to falls for him, Julien returns to Paris, so Nora has to decide whether to stay...or to go. Much like the ladies of Sex and the City (on which Theroux guested), she's the kind of character who appears to have it all, but feels worthless if she isn't in a relationship. It isn't a particularly progressive notion--that the right man will solve every problem--but ! that doesn't mean plenty of women won't be able to relate. ! --Kathle en C. Fennessy

Angels & Demons [Blu-ray]

  • Condition: New
  • Format: Blu-ray
  • AC-3; Color; Dolby; Dubbed; Subtitled; Widescreen
In Ron Howard's thrilling follow-up to The Da Vinci Code, expert symbologist Robert Langdon (Tom Hanks) follows ancient clues on a heart-racing hunt through Rome to find the four Cardinals kidnapped by the deadly secret society, the Illuminati. With the Cardinals' lives on the line, and the Camerlengo (Ewan McGregor) desperate for help, Langdon embarks on a nonstop, action-packed race through sealed crypts, dangerous catacombs, and the most secretive vault on Earth!If the devil is in the details, there's a lot of wicked fun in Angels & Demons, the sequel (originally a prequel) to The Da Vinci Code. Director Ron Howard delivers edge-of-your-pew thrills all over the Vatican, the City of Rome, and the deepest, dankest catacombs. Tom Hanks is dependably watchable in his repris! ed role as Professor Robert Langdon, summoned urgently to Rome on a matter of utmost urgency--which happens to coincide with the death of the Pope, meaning the Vatican is teeming with cardinals and Rome is teeming with the faithful. A religious offshoot group, calling themselves the Illuminati, which protested the Catholic Church's prosecution of scientists 400 years ago, has resurfaced and is making extreme, and gruesome, terrorist demands. The film zooms around the city, as Langdon follows clues embedded in art, architecture, and the very bone structure of the Vatican. The cast is terrific, including Ewan McGregor, who is memorable as a young protégé of the late pontiff, and who seems to challenge the common wisdom of the Conclave just by being 40 years younger than his fellows when he lectures for church reform. Stellan Skarsgard is excellent as a gruff commander of the Swiss Guard, who may or may not have thrown in with the Illuminati. But the real star of the film is! Rome, and its High Church gorgeousness, with lush cinematogra! phy by S alvatore Totino, who renders the real sky above the Vatican, in a cataclysmic event, with the detail and majesty of the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel. --A.T. Hurley

Stills from Angels & Demons (click for larger image)

Heaven and hell are vying for human souls in vortices between humanity and the afterlife. When Lucifer and his demons overwhelm Archangel Michael and Gabriel, heaven is faced with the possibility of losing all souls on the planet.

Reincarnated in heaven, Michael must fight his way back to Earth to stop more demons from swarming the planet and help his brother Gabriel track down the devil before he tricks humanity into harvesting billions of souls into his fiery kingdom.

---------

"Angels and Demons: Perspectives of a Violent Afterlife" is an 11,250 word (approx. 50 pages in print) collection of short sto! ries.

PRODUCT WARNING: This work describes an alter! nate rea lity where God and the Devil have agreed to an afterlife that is based solely on how the person died. So, life and death aren't fair. It also contains strong language, violence, charred wings, and a naked angel running around Oslo. Sorry about that.Heaven and hell are vying for human souls in vortices between humanity and the afterlife. When Lucifer and his demons overwhelm Archangel Michael and Gabriel, heaven is faced with the possibility of losing all souls on the planet.

Reincarnated in heaven, Michael must fight his way back to Earth to stop more demons from swarming the planet and help his brother Gabriel track down the devil before he tricks humanity into harvesting billions of souls into his fiery kingdom.

---------

"Angels and Demons: Perspectives of a Violent Afterlife" is an 11,250 word (approx. 50 pages in print) collection of short stories.

PRODUCT WARNING: This work describes an alternate reality where God and the Devil have agreed t! o an afterlife that is based solely on how the person died. So, life and death aren't fair. It also contains strong language, violence, charred wings, and a naked angel running around Oslo. Sorry about that.No description available for this title.
Item Type: BLU-RAY DVD Movie
Item Rating: PG13
Street Date: 11/24/09
Wide Screen: yes
Director Cut: no
Special Edition: no
Language: ENGLISH
Foreign Film: noSubtitles: no
Dubbed: no
Full Frame: no
Re-Release: no
Packaging: SleeveIf the devil is in the details, there's a lot of wicked fun in Angels & Demons, the sequel (originally a prequel) to The Da Vinci Code. Director Ron Howard delivers edge-of-your-pew thrills all over the Vatican, the City of Rome, and the deepest, dankest catacombs. Tom Hanks is dependably watchable in his reprised role as Professor Robert Langdon, summoned urgently ! to Rome on a matter of utmost urgency--which happens to coinci! de with the death of the Pope, meaning the Vatican is teeming with cardinals and Rome is teeming with the faithful. A religious offshoot group, calling themselves the Illuminati, which protested the Catholic Church's prosecution of scientists 400 years ago, has resurfaced and is making extreme, and gruesome, terrorist demands. The film zooms around the city, as Langdon follows clues embedded in art, architecture, and the very bone structure of the Vatican. The cast is terrific, including Ewan McGregor, who is memorable as a young protégé of the late pontiff, and who seems to challenge the common wisdom of the Conclave just by being 40 years younger than his fellows when he lectures for church reform. Stellan Skarsgard is excellent as a gruff commander of the Swiss Guard, who may or may not have thrown in with the Illuminati. But the real star of the film is Rome, and its High Church gorgeousness, with lush cinematography by Salvatore Totino, who renders the real sky above the Vati! can, in a cataclysmic event, with the detail and majesty of the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel. --A.T. Hurley

Stills from Angels & Demons (click for larger image)


Frontrunners

  • FRONTRUNNERS is a smart and funny political documentary that follows the student council presidential campaign at one of the country s most prestigious public high schools: Stuyvesant High School in New York City. Follow 4 charming and idiosyncratic candidates as they navigate an electoral process that is said to be one of the most competitive at the high school level. These teenaged candidates fa
FRONTRUNNERS - DVD MovieCaroline Suh’s directorial debut, Frontrunners, is a charming, candid, and almost scary glimpse into the advanced levels of student sophistication in America’s top high schools. In this case, Suh, who has copious experience as a documentary producer, put her documentary research skills to use at Stuyvesant High School in Manhattan, an elite school in which students who aren’t admitted to Top Ten colleges are considered total rejects by their peers. Frontrunner! s charts the arc of the student government elections, starring four kids who want the presidency. Mike Zaytsev, Hannah Freiman, Alex Leonard, and George Zisiadis each select running mates and crave victory with varying degrees of conviction. The documentary is comprised of interview footage with the candidates at school, at home, and sometimes features the parents of the chosen few, expressing concerns about the pressures that are placed upon their children to succeed. The levels of competition are astounding; one scene capturing their "televised" debates shows how this school simulates real-life for hardcore training. Though the interviews are often hilarious, what really carries the film is ample footage of the candidates planning and enacting strategies. George, who seems to have been born to become president, cooks up political platforms as naturally as a thuggish student may shoot spitwads onto the classroom’s ceiling. Hannah, whose office bulletin board commemor! ates her trips to film festivals and theater events, is extrem! ely well -poised in front of a camera, resulting from what some may attribute to having been privy from her early years to a cultured lifestyle. So, as the presidential race unfurls, one sees not only a cutthroat teenage contest but also the ways in which students are shaped by their home lives. Frontrunners should provide proof to parents and public schools alike that youth will indeed succeed if one sets expectations and opportunity high. Bravo to Oscilloscope Laboratories (owned by Beastie Boy Adam Yauch) for releasing this humorously inspiring film. --Trinie Dalton

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