Saturday, June 25, 2011

National Lampoon's Vacation [Blu-ray]







National Lampoon's Vacation [Blu-ray] Overview


Everything is planned, packed – and about to go hilariously wrong. The Griswolds are going on vacation. In the driver’s seat is Clark Griswold (Chevy Chase), an Everyman eager to share the open road and the wonders of family togetherness. Myriad mishaps, crude kin (Randy Quaid), encounters with a temptress (Christie Brinkley), financial woes, Aunt Edna (Imogene Coca) on the roof, one security guard (John Candy) and 2,460 miles later, it’s a wonder the Griswolds are together. There’s never been a family vacation like it. Except maybe yours. And that helps explain why National Lampoon’s Vacation remains so popular…and so very funny.

National Lampoon's Vacation [Blu-ray] Specifications


Vacation paved the way for the John Hughes movie dynasty of the 1980s. Written by Hughes (who would go on to write, direct, and/or produce The Breakfast Club, Ferris Bueller's Day Off, Uncle Buck, Home Alone, and so on) and directed by Harold Ramis (Caddyshack, Groundhog Day, Stuart Saves His Family), the first Vacation movie introduces us to the all-American Griswold family: father Clark (Chevy Chase), mother Ellen (Beverly D'Angelo), son Rusty (future Hughes staple Anthony Michael Hall), and daughter Audrey (Dana Barron). They all pile into the car for a cross-country road trip to Walley World, stopping along the way to view the world's biggest ball of twine. John Candy, Imogene Coca, and Randy Quaid (as yokel Cousin Eddie) pop up along the way. The movie was a big hit, and was followed by several sequels--National Lampoon's European Vacation, National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation, and National Lampoon's Vegas Vacation--but this one is still probably the freshest and funniest of the bunch. --Jim Emerson



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Friday, June 24, 2011

Lehar: The Merry Widow [Blu-ray]







Lehar: The Merry Widow [Blu-ray] Overview


Lotfi Mansouri's spectacular last production as General Director of San
Francisco Opera with Yvonne Kenny making her debut in the title role,
new dialogue specially commissioned from Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright, Wendy Wasserstein, and an original ballet to set the scene 'Chez Maxim's', bringing fresh insight into Lehar's classic operetta.




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Wednesday, June 22, 2011

Red Riding Hood [Blu-ray]







Red Riding Hood [Blu-ray] Overview


In a medieval village a beautiful young girl falls for an orphaned woodcutter, much to her family's displeasure. When her sister is killed by the werewolf that prowls the dark forest surrounding their village, the people call on a famed werewolf hunter to help them kill the wolf. As the death toll rises with each moon, the girl begins to suspect that the werewolf could be someone she loves. Panic grips the town as she discovers that she has a unique connection to the beast--one that inexorably draws them together, making her both suspect...and bait.

Red Riding Hood [Blu-ray] Specifications


This is not your grandmother's Red Riding Hood. There's a basket of goodies (not exactly the edible kind), a sweet grandma, a winsome young lass in a beautiful red hood, and a Big Bad Wolf. But there the similarity ends. This Red Riding Hood is shot through the lens of the Twilight films--for wide appeal to the tween and teen audiences, and definitely not a bedtime story for the little ones. Helmed by Twilight director Catherine Hardwicke, Red Riding Hood bears a lot of the moody trademarks of the vampire series. Valerie (Amanda Seyfried), the plucky girl in the stunning cape, lives in a tiny medieval village whose geography is not specified--it's just very mountainous and remote. Valerie's heart belongs to her childhood friend Peter (Shiloh Fernandez), but as Red Riding Hood opens, she learns she has been betrothed to Henry (Max Irons). As if that love triangle weren't enough, it seems a dangerous wolf--or is it werewolf?--has been terrorizing the town for years, and its killing sprees have intensified. When the townsfolk kill a wolf, they think they have finally freed their town from tyranny, and throw a giant bacchanal--like Burning Man in the snow. But then Father Solomon (Gary Oldman, in wickedly good form) appears on the scene to tell the villagers they've killed only a gray wolf--not, in fact, the werewolf he knows is the true villain.

So the romantic pulls of Valerie, Peter, and Henry play out with a backdrop of true chills and mystery. The atmosphere created by Hardwicke, along with production designer Thomas E. Sanders and cinematographer Mandy Walker, is perfect for a goose-bumpy horror story with teen hearts caught in the balance. The set design of the village, especially, is rich with detail--even the trees in the surrounding forest seem to have branches made of threatening spikes. Seyfried is willful, passionate, and perfect as Valerie, and easily anchors a film that could have spun out. Other standouts include Virginia Madsen, Valerie's mother who has a dark secret in her own past, and Julie Christie as Valerie's rather peculiar grandmother. All Twilight fans, and those who love a good tale of star-crossed (or perhaps full-moon-crossed) lovers will enjoy Red Riding Hood. Just don't go walking in those big bad woods alone. --A.T. Hurley



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Monday, June 20, 2011

Angel Heart [Blu-ray]







Angel Heart [Blu-ray] Overview


Oscar® nominee Mickey Rourke (THE WRESTLER) is Harry Angel, a down-and-out Brooklyn detective who is hired by the mysterious Louis Cyphre (Oscar® winner Robert De Niro, RAGING BULL, THE GODFATHER: PART II) to track down a singer named Johnny Favorite on an odyssey that will take Angel through the desperate streets of Harlem, the smoke-filled jazz clubs of New Orleans, and ultimately to the swamps of Louisiana and its seedy underworld of voodoo in this cult thriller that is at once eerily thrilling, darkly sensual and completely unforgettable.

Angel Heart [Blu-ray] Specifications


Set in Harlem and New Orleans in 1955, this supernatural thriller stirred a brief controversy when released in 1987 because some scenes featuring Lisa Bonet (then a popular cast member of The Cosby Show) were considered too sexually explicit to be rated R. The edited material was restored for the unrated video release, and the movie now makes a fitting double bill with Fallen, with its similar plot about a sullen detective (Mickey Rourke) who is hired to find a missing person by a shady client with pointy fingernails named Louis Cyphre (Lucifer, get it?), played with subtle menace by Robert De Niro. Rourke's investigation leads him into an underworld of voodoo and forbidden desires, and as the mystery unfolds director Alan Parker fills every scene with conspicuous style and atmospheric excess, compelling critic Pauline Kael to observe that, "Parker simply doesn't have the gift of making evil seductive, and he edits like a flasher." And yet, this movie does cast a spell of its own (Roger Ebert's review was considerably more charitable), and the performances of Rourke, De Niro, Bonet, and Charlotte Rampling are well suited to the ominous mood. --Jeff Shannon



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Saturday, June 18, 2011

Madagascar (Two-disc Blu-ray/DVD Combo)

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