DVD Releases for 6/29/10
Big, diverse batch of films. We’ll go alphabetically this week: The Crazies – Given it’s dead zone February release date, one would likely think this remake of George Romero’s low-fi Seventies flick didn’t have much going for it. Turns out, it was a solid, well-made genre piece that made good on all that it promised [...]
DVD Releases 06/08/10
Three big releases this week, but if you want something to prep for The A-Team (opening Friday), the complete TV series releases this week on DVD, as well as UFC’s Rampage: Greatest Hits. So something for the kids, too. From Paris with Love – John Travolta continues his downward spiral with a loud and annoying [...]
DVD Releases: 05/11/10
Another slow week, but at least what you get is mostly fun stuff: But first the serious one. North Face is based on real events. Set in 1938 as Nazi propaganda urges climbers to attempt to scale the treacherous north face of the Eiger in the Alps, two reluctant German soldiers ascend the mountain in [...]
DVD Releases: 05/04/10
Three notable films this week, just not all for the same reasons: Tokyo Sonata, one of 2009′s finest films (domestic or international) is about a family out of sync. From director Kiyoshi Kurosawa, best known for thrillers like Cure and Pulse/Kairo, this very quiet and intricate domestic drama is powerful and affecting. Nine should [...]
DVD Releases: 04/27/10
Big week, for the fun and serious: The big story this week is not the usual releases, but that Netflix has obtained Andrei Konchalovsky’s Runaway Train, a powerful film based on an Akira Kurosawa story. With Jon Voight playing the best role of his career, mining the depths of brutal existentialism while teaching young Eric [...]
DVD Releases: 04/20/10
Still so tired from the Dallas International Film Festival; here are your DVD releases for the week: Mammoth, directed by Lukas Moodysson, starring Michelle Williams, is about a butterfly effect of events around the world, involving a successful businessman, his surgeon wife and their Filipino nanny. The Lovely Bones, the much-derided Peter Jackson adaptation of [...]
DVD Releases: 04/13/10
As DIFF rolls on, there are some light entertainments coming to DVD this week to fill the gaps. Check out these three films: The Slammin’ Salmon is the latest from comedy team Broken Lizard (Super Troopers), detailing the shenanigans at a Miami restaurant run by a former heavyweight boxing champ (Michael Clarke Duncan). Indebted to [...]
DVD Releases: 04/06/10
A weird week for DVD releases, as we await the Dallas International Film Festival’s opening night, Thursday April 8th. Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans, director Werner Herzog’s strangely pedestrian-looking police procedural, benefits from one of Nicolas Cage’s most profoundly bizarre performances. He looks stooped over, like a marionette missing a crucial string. His [...]
DVD Reviews: 03/30/10
This week: Sherlock Holmes, The Baader Meinhof Complex, The Killer, An Education, Where the Wild Things Are, I Sell the Dead Guy Ritchie’s lovingly rendered Sherlock Holmes is a great looking film with crisp dialogue and a sense of fun that most of the 2009 holiday films forgot. Robert Downey, Jr. is in full-on Victorian [...]
