DVD

[Rasputin]

The Punisher: Extended Cut

Sorry, fanboys. No matter how you slice it, you can’t polish a turd. Jonathan Hensleigh’s The Punisher remains arguably the most misguided and ill-informed comic book adaptations of recent years. The biggest complaint from Punisher lovers: not staying truthful to the comic. This writer has little problem with that; I’d far rather have filmmakers take liberties with source material if it makes the end result more interesting. But in addition to Hensleigh’s film meandering...

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Meet The Parents - HD

It was inconceivable before 1997 that Robert DeNiro would become a comedic actor. Then he surprised us with his droll and sardonic Conrad Brean in Wag the Dog and, two years later, his self-parodying role of Paul Vitti in Analyze This. Peruse his film career since ’97 and he seems to split his time between the seriously dramatic and the silly. And since comedy is a dish best served dry, he is uniquely qualified.Meet The Parents taps into two well-established screen...

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Stranger Than Fiction - BD

As you can well imagine, I get to watch a huge variety of films, on average about 150 each year. Those of you who are familiar with my occasional rants know that I seem to be very sensitive to poor writing. I deplore scripts that are illogical or insult your intelligence; I admire screenplays that are as creative or unpredictable as they are entertaining. Finding such a movie is one of my greatest filmic pleasures, and I’m pleased to include Stranger Than Fiction within...

[Rasputin]

Bulletproof Monk - BD

Bulletproof Monk owes a debt to Indiana Jones. The film’s Macguffin is an ancient artifact that has the power to change the world, and in malevolent hands, not necessarily in a good way. The heavies are Nazis, intent on capturing the artifact for their own nefarious motives. And a single protector shall battle the forces of evil to keep the artifact from falling into the wrong hands. The artifact is the Scroll of the Ultimate, containing unimaginably powerful...

[Rasputin]

Trust The Man

This is a dramedy about two couples, their relationships, and their emotional growth. During the commentary, Woody Allen’s name was evoked several times; his style was cited as a template for the film. The film may be reasonably entertaining, but don’t expect it to come up to Woody Allen’s level.The first couple is Tom (David Duchovny) and Rebecca (Julianne Moore). He’s an advertising executive who left his job to become a stay at home dad.

[Rasputin]

Entrapment - BD

Entrapment is a wonderfully entertaining film featuring charismatic players whose performances lull us into a willing suspense of disbelief. It begins with a stunning nighttime heist of a Rembrandt from a high rise in New York City. The ambiguity of the sequence sets the tone for the film; everything is not as it seems. Robert “Mac” MacDougal (Sean Connery) is a master thief, long suspected but never caught. Virginia “Gin” Baker (Catherine Zeta...

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Total Recall - BD

Total Recall is based on the short story “We Can Remember It For You Wholesale” by pulp science fiction writer Phillip K. Dick (who was also responsible for the premise of Bladerunner). In this story he asks another question about the nature of reality. Since we’re a product of our experiences and sensory inputs, what if our memories could be replaced, our brains reprogrammed by a machine? Would our resulting identities be any less real? And how could one...

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Anything But Love: Volume One

Jamie Lee Curtis is the end-all. I mean, come on, she’s hot, she can throw jokes with the best of them, and she even survived a season with James Cameron on True Lies – she’s a legend. From Wanda to Halloween, Perfect to Freaky Friday, she’s shown as much instinctual chutzpah as down-home charisma, and that sets her apart from 75% of her acting peers.Her short-lived sitcom Anything But Love is something I definitely remember liking. I started tuning in as a teenager just...

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Hollywoodland

George Reeves: the man who inadvertently began the Superman myth that actors who assume the role come to a sad end. Brandon Routh was even asked about it in one of the supplements on the Superman Returns releases. Reeves was an ambitious actor, trying to enjoy a satisfying career in Hollywood, longing for stardom that eluded him. He had over fifty film credits, mostly in forgettable films, but with minor roles in Gone With The Wind, From Here To Eternity, and Cecil B. DeMille's...

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Stargate - BD

Ever wonder, I mean really wonder, how the pyramids were created? Come on, there is a little Mulder in all of us, one that knows how incredibly difficult it would have been for ancient man to create such structures on his own. Stargate taps into that wonder. It is a little bit of science fiction that sets out to offer its own version of what might have happened thousands of years ago. It's not believable in the slightest, but hey, it's all in the spirit of sci-fi fun. A military expedition...

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The Last Kiss

This is the third of a group of relationship films I’ve recently reviewed. It comes on the heels of Trust The Man and The Science Of Sleep. And of the three, I found this to be the most emotionally genuine and the most satisfying. It’s a tale of love and fear, the inability to look beyond marriage as an end and understand that it’s really a beginning. The Last Kiss is an American remake of the Italian motion picture L'ultimo bacio written by Gabriele...

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Fast Food Nation

Eric Schlosser’s 2001 best-seller Fast Food Nation, the repulsive, revelatory non-fiction account of how your drive-through burger goes from feed lot to your mouth, could have been committed to film any number of ways. Give credit to hot-and-cold director Richard Linklater for finding the least obvious, most interesting way to do it. At first blush, Fast Food Nation is ripe for the documentary form. But Morgan Spurlock’s Super Size Me already treaded similar ground, so to make Nation...

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Brazil: Revealed - BD and HD DVD

Brazil Revealed is part of the DISCOVERY ATLAS series. This series is a globe-spanning enterprise by the Discovery Channel capture in high definition the visually rich geographic and cultural heritage of nations around the world. As in all installments in the ATLAS series, Brazil Revealed intermixes the broad scope of its narrative with a handful of personal stories covering a variety of ethnic groups and cultures. These individualized portraits integrate into the larger context by journaling a...

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49th Parallel

From the legendary writing and directing team of Powell and Pressburger comes 49th Parallel, a combination propaganda film and wartime spin on Ten Little Indians. It was the third film the pair made as collaborators and it won an Oscar for Best Story (back when there was such an award). The movie wasn’t made to produce box-office receipts and popcorn-induced indigestion. The movie was a propaganda piece. As Powell himself said, “I hoped it might scare the pants off the Americans (and...

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Top Selling DVDs! Shopping

1. High School Musical
2. Ever After
3. One Fine Day
4. The Fast and the Furious
5. The Rock
6. One Night with the King
7. Wet Hot American Summer
8. Just Like Heaven
9. The Transformers: The Movie
10. My Summer of Love