Warchild

Sound: Dolby

Comments: A surrealist masterpiece.
Âge d'or, L'

Summary: Bunuel's first feature has more of a plot than Un Chien Andalou, but it's still a pure Surrealist film, so this is only a vague outline. A man and a woman are passionately in love with one another, but their attempts to consummate that passion are constantly thwarted, by their families, the Church and bourgeois society.

Languages: English, French

Subtitles: English

Summary: Robert Bresson always claimed his films are about hope and redemption, but so many end in death or suicide that it's a struggle to reconcile the statement with his films. His final film, based on Leo Tolstoy's story "The Counterfeit Note", is no different. It's the harrowing tale of an innocent man, Yvon (Christian Patey), whose victimization at the hands of an arrogant upper-class delinquent and a greedy shop owner sends him on a downward spiral into a life of crime. The once-happy husband and father turns bitter, angry, self-pitying, and ultimately coldly brutal in the chilling conclusion. It's Bresson's most expansive film and biggest canvas, weaving the paths of numerous characters across Yvon's journey, but he edits with jackrabbit jumps, running headlong through the story with a painful feeling of inevitability. On its simplest level, Yvon's story is an elaborate chain of cause and effect, the ripples of a selfish act resulting in the fall of a proud man and the destruction of his soul, and Bresson presents every link in that chain with precise, cold clarity. There is little hope evidenced in "L'Argent", but there is powerful sense of loss and sadness in this portrait of a society so obsessed with money that it loses its humanity. "--Sean Axmaker"

Languages: French, Dolby Digital 2.0; English, Dolby Digital 2.0; Spanish, Dolby Digital 2.0

Subtitles: English, Spanish, French

Sound: Dolby Digital 2.0

Summary:

Languages: German, French, Italian, Spanish

Subtitles: English, French, German, Polish, Czech, Hungarian, Hebrew, Turkish, Danish, Arabic, Bulgarian, Swedish, Finnish, Dutch, Norwegian, Portuguese, Greek, Spanish, Italian

Sound: Dolby

Comments: Born to poverty. Destined for stardom. He Lived the American Dream.

Summary: When Buddy Holly, the Big Bopper, and Ritchie Valens hopped a small plane after a Midwestern concert gig, early rock suffered one of its most striking tragedies. Holly's death in the plane's crash near Clear Lake, Iowa, was an obvious loss given the Texas rocker's international reputation. But Valens, a Pacoima, California, teenager, was much closer to the starting gate, his impact extending to just two national chart hits, the teen ballad "Donna" and his ebullient recasting of a Mexican wedding song, "La Bamba."
Director and playwright Luis Valdez, who had previously examined Southern California's Latino heritage through stage productions, brought a deep well of cultural identification and dramatic empathy to Valens's story. "La Bamba" thus probes Valens's underlying sense of cultural distance from the mainstream and acknowledges the inevitable racism of its setting, yet it's to everyone's credit that the movie avoids an excessive, revisionist emphasis; Valens's simple joy in music and the relative innocence of the era are felt, even though the script is careful not to sanitize earthier elements. Lou Diamond Phillips makes an impressive debut in the title role, matched by strong performances from Esai Morales and Elizabeth Peña, while the music gets kick started by the shrewd decision to draft Los Lobos to re-create Valens's music. Rock fans will also smile at savvy casting for Valens peers Eddie Cochran (Brian Setzer), Jackie Wilson (Howard Huntsberry), and Holly himself (Marshall Crenshaw). "--Sam Sutherland"

Sound: Dolby

Summary: A half-ruined merchant lives in the country with his son Ludovic and his three daughters. Two of the daughters, Felicie and Adelaide, are real shrews, selfish, pretentious, evil. They exploit the third daughter, Belle, as a servant. One day, the merchant gets lost in the forest and enters a strange castle. He picks up a rose for Belle and the castle's owner appear. He is a monster, half-human, half-beast, and possesses magic powers. He sentences the merchant to death, unless he give up one of his daughters. Belle sacrifices herself for her father and goes to the castle, discovering that the Beast is not so wild and inhuman as it seems.

Languages: French

Subtitles: English

Comments: From Xvid
Filed with Robot Jox

Summary: Based on the classic Emile Zola novel, Jean Renoir's La bete humaine was one of the legendary director's greatest popular successes, tapping into the fatalism of a nation in despair. Jean Gabin's emblematic portrayal of doomed train engineer Jacques Lantier granted him a permanent place in the hearts of his countrymen. Part poetic realism, part film noir, the film is a hard-boiled and suspenseful journey into the tormented psyche of a workingman. SPECIAL FEATURES: New, restored high-definition digital transfer of the original uncut version. Introduction to the film by Jean Renoir. New interview with director Peter Bogdanovich. Archival interviews with Renoir discussing his adaptation of Emile Zola's novels, his process with actors, and directing actress Simone Simon. Gallery of on-set photographs and theatrical posters. Theatrical trailer. New and improved English subtitle translation. A booklet featuring writings by film critic Geoffrey O'Brien, historian Ginette Vincendeau, and production designer Eugene Lourie.

Subtitles: English

Sound: MP3

Summary: Australia released, PAL/Region 4 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:
o English (subtitles)
o French (Dolby Digital 2.0) Synopsis:
Director Jean-Luc Godard, whose advocacy of Maoism bordered on intoxication, infuriated many traditionalist critics with his swiftly paced satire La Chinoise. Godard's then-wife Anne Wiazemsky plays a philosophy student who commiserates with the four members of her campus Maoist group. They are so taken by the external trappings of their cause--the posters, the Little Red Books, the by-rote chantings--that they seem not to grasp the true meaning of their political persuasion. Nor do they give any thought to the long-range ramifications of their terrorist activities. Godard is obviously on the students' side throughout, though he balances their fanaticism with the comparative gentility of old-style revolutionaries. Nonfans of Godard were given migraines by the director's perverse refusal to film even the simplest sequence in a linear, logical fashion. La Chinoise quickly gained the reputation of a "head film", best appreciated when the viewer is stoned. In these PC days, the audience for this sort of film is generally "straight"...which may be why it has seldom been shown in recent years. Special Features:
o Interactive Menu
o Scene Access

Sound: Dolby

Comments: Jetée, La
Film 12 Monkeys is based on

Summary: In a devastated Paris in the aftermath of WWIII, The few surviving humans begin researching time travel, hoping to send someone back to the pre-war world for food, supplies and maybe a solution to their dire position. One man is haunted by a vague childhood memory that will prove fateful.

Languages: Italian, Dolby Digital 2.0 Mono; English, Dolby Digital 2.0 Mono

Subtitles: English

Sound: MP3

Summary: Gelsomina is sold by her very poor mother to Zampano, an itinerant strongman. She follows him on the road ("la strada") and helps him during his shows. Zampano ill treats her. She meets "The Fool", a funambulist. She feels like going with him, but he puts confusion in her mind by pointing out that perhaps Zampano is in fact in love with her ...

Languages: English

Subtitles: English, Spanish

Sound: MP3

Summary: I loved Jerry Lewis movies as a kid, but naturally lost interest as I grew older and it seemed the movies simultaneously declined in quality while Jerry became increasingly annoying as a pontificating pseudo-intellectual. However his early work was interesting as he tried different things (silence in The Bellboy for example) and he made a couple of fine comedies early on. I have always found parts of It's Only Money and The Ladies Man hilarious. Many feel The Nutty Professor to be his best, and it has some good stuff, but I have always been partial to the all-out, anything-goes assault of gags in The Ladies Man, one of his best efforts. Also the shmaltz and sentimentality that marred so much of his later films is, for the most part, thankfully absent here.

Comedy, like beauty, is in the eye of the beholder, and you cannot fake a laugh. You either find a non-sequiter throw-away joke like the bit with the door cited above funny, or you don't. Likewise many of the non-stop gag setups and deliveries here will crack you up or they won't. Of course it's silly. It was meant to be silly. Silly done well, is just fine.

There are some great bits here: the opening "heartbreak" scene (hilariously exaggerated); the butterflies; the other "pain" jokes (the toaster); "baby"; the dance with George Raft; the surreal encounter with Miss Cartilage; the "sound test" with Doodles Weaver; the intrusions into Mrs. Wellonmellon's TV show and so on. And if none of the above make you laugh, there is the one certified classic routine of the "hat bit" with Jerry Lester doing his patented "slow-burn".

Jerry made good use of the elaborate set and his direction here is as concise and appropriate as possible. As to the DVD, unfortunately, on the Commentary Jerry offers a few useful insights, but Steve Lawrence seems to be there just to say "Great Jer" after every bit. Egregious, but I suppose they don't watch many DVD's, and fail to understand what a Commentary is about. Take the 5 stars in context.

Languages: English

Subtitles: English

Sound: Dolby Digital 2.0

Comments: Eve Sure Knows Her Apples !

Summary: A conniving father and daughter meet up with the heir to a brewery fortune-a wealthy but naïve snake enthusiast-and attempt to bamboozle him at a cruise ship card table. Their plan is quickly abandoned when the daughter falls in love with their prey. But when the heir gets wise to her gold-digging ways, she must plot to re-conquer his heart. One of Sturges' most clever and beloved romantic comedies, "The Lady Eve" balances broad slapstick and sophisticated sexiness with perfect grace.

Summary: Chang men jen

Languages: Japanese, Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo

Subtitles: English

Sound: Dolby Digital 2.0

Summary: Lady Snowblood (Shurayuki-hime) is caught by the police and sentenced to death for her crimes (in Lady Snowblood I). As she is sent to the gallows she is rescued by the secret police who offer her a deal to assassinate some revolutionaries.

Shura-yuki-hime: Urami Renga

Languages: English, Japanese

Subtitles: English

Sound: Dolby Digital 2.0

Summary: A flamboyantly blood-spattered samurai revenge picture with a twist: the implacable seeker of retribution is a slender female (Meiko Kaji) with a flawless ivory complexion and a dead-center killer stare. Born in prison, Snowblood is raised by a martial priest and trained to fulfill a single purpose: tracking down, and dismembering (or bisecting), the four cackling fiends who killed her father and persecuted her mother to an early grave. Adapted from another "manga" comic book written by Kasuo Koike, whose most famous work became the legendary "Lone Wolf and Cub" film series, this 1973 programmer stays close to its pulp-paper roots: images from the comics are deployed in a couple of montage sequences, and the story is divided into four chapters drawn from the monthly "manga" installments. Stalwart leading man Toshio Kurasawa plays a crusading journalist who writes a series of Japanese dime novels based on Snowblood's exploits, and manages to flush out a couple of the evildoers in the process. "--David Chute"

Languages: French, Dolby Digital 2.0 Mono

Subtitles: English

Summary:

Languages: English, French

Subtitles: English, French, Spanish

Comments: The dead shall inherit the Earth.

Summary: Legendary filmmaker George A. Romero returns to unleash his new zombie masterpiece! Starring Simon Baker, Dennis Hopper and John Leguizamo, Romero's latest undead epic finds humanity's last remnants battling to survive the unspeakable truth: The ravenous zombie hordes besieging their fortified city are evolving!

Languages: English, French

Comments: THE ADVENTURE YOU WILL NEVER FORGET!

Summary: The Land That Time Forgot
The action is unremitting (Films & Filming) in this elaborate fantasy adventure (Time) about a band of castaways who land on a mysterious island, only to realize its already inhabited by hordes of carnivorous creat

Sound: MP3

Comments: Behind a barrier of antarctic ice... a paradise of hidden terrors!

Summary: On a naval expedition to Antarctica, three men and reporter Maggie Hathaway crash-land in a crater 1000 m below sea level. There, they encounter steamy tropical forest, dinosaurs, carnivorous plants, and human footprints, as Maggie's clothes become more and more abbreviated.

Languages: English

Subtitles: English, Spanish

Sound: Dolby Digital 5.1

Comments: They'll Give Anyone A Badge.

Summary: The redneck rube from the "Blue Collar Comedy Tour" franchise plays a character much like himself in this feature, which balances Larry the Cable Guy's occasional excesses in toilet humor with strong comic performances from the supporting cast. Larry plays a dedicated health inspector who gets in over his head when the city mayor (Joe Pantoliano) personally appoints him to investigate a rash of food poisonings at five-star restaurants. Larry's ignorance of anything cultural that doesn't involve his truck or MoonPies proves a handicap, but his knowledge of vermin and disarmingly unabashed way of interviewing witnesses and suspects slowly gets him where he needs to go. For the most part, the movie gives the comedian plenty of room to indulge his gross-out shtick. But it helps to have some other talent on board, notably Tom Wilson as Larry's exasperated boss, Iris Bahr as a dreary new partner Larry thinks is a man, David Koechner as a halfwit friend, Joanna Cassidy as a restaurant owner, and Megyn Price as Larry's shy but headstrong girlfriend. "--Tom Keogh"

Sound: AAC

Comments: The search for true love begins outside the box

Summary: In this comedy, Lars Lindstrom is an awkwardly shy young man in a small northern town who finally brings home the girl of his dreams to his brother and sister-in-law's home. The only problem is that she's not real - she's a sex doll Lars ordered off the Internet. But sex is not what Lars has in mind, but rather a deep, meaningful relationship. His sister-in-law is worried for him, his brother thinks he's nuts, but eventually the entire town goes along with his delusion in support of this sweet natured boy that they've always loved.

Languages: English, Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo

Sound: Dolby Digital 2.0

Comments: A secret agent. A beautiful accomplice. A daring mission to prevent World War III. One thrilling adventure!

Summary: Laser Mission - The CIA and KGB are in a race to reach a scientist in Cuba. The race is on and the fate of the world is in their hands.

Languages: English

Subtitles: English

Sound: Dolby Digital 5.1

Comments: More Than A Hero. A Legend.

Summary: Based on Eric Knight's 1938 novel about a trusty pooch, "Lassie Come-Home," the film is set on the eve of WWII in a Yorkshire mining town. The Carraclough family is forced to sell Lassie to the Duke of Rudling when the family falls on hard times. When Lassie finds herself transported five hundred miles away to live in the Duke's remote castle in northern Scotland, she is determined to defy the odds and return to her home and the boy she loves. So begins an incredible adventure, set against a stunning series of British landscapes that sees Lassie facing dangers natural and human and finding help in unexpected places as she makes her way across the country, to reach home in time for Christmas.

Languages: English

Subtitles: English, French, Spanish

Sound: Dolby Digital 5.1

Comments: The goal is to survive.

Summary: A down and out cynical detective teams up with a down and out ex-quarterback to try and solve a murder case involving a pro football team and a politician.