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Tora-San Collector's Set 1
- TORA-SAN, a 48-film series, is by far the
longest-running film series in Japanese history and the
second-longest overall in the world. Typical story lines have
Tora-san, a suitcase carrying, leisure-suit wearing, traveling
salesman visiting different parts of Japan, where he meets a
beautiful young woman, is smitten, and tells her if she ever
needs help, she should come visit him in his hometown. After
returning home to his family, which disapproves of his wandering
lifestyle, the damsel in distress shows up, and Tora-san falls
in love. Alas, his attempts to help her, and win her heart,
invariably cause her to fall for someone else. Included in the
set are the first four films of the series, “It's Tough being a
Man”, “Tora-san's Cherished Mother”, “Tora-san, His Tender
Love”, and “Tora-san's Grand Scheme”. DVD Release Date:
November 24th, 2009
The Art of Love - In his
2006 obituary, The New York Times called Walerian Borowczyk “the
internationally known filmmaker described variously as a genius,
a pornographer, and a genius who also happened to be a
pornographer.” And for the final film in his ‘Immoral Trilogy’,
Borowczyk created one of the most lushly bizarre erotic tales of
our time and perhaps the most ambitious work of his entire
career. The setting is Rome, 8 A.D., where the poet Ovid watches
over an epoch of forbidden seduction and unnatural acts among
maidens, centurions, servant girls and the occasional farm
animal. Marina Pierro (Behind Convent Walls), Laura Betti (Pasolini’s
Teorema), Milena Vukotic (Andy Warhol’s Dracula) and Massimo
Girotti (Last Tango In Paris) star in this sumptuous art/smut
classic, now fully restored – including the Roman Orgy sequence
– and presented uncut and uncensored for the first time ever in
America. DVD Release Date: November 23rd, 2009
I Died a Thousand Times - A
soggy remake of a classic, I DIED A THOUSAND TIMES was an
attempt to do HIGH SIERRA with Palance in the Bogart
role. The story remains the same (as it should; W.R. Burnett
wrote the original with John Huston and this time penned the
screenplay solo). Chaney is a dying criminal who wants to go out
in a blaze of glory by heisting the Frontier Hotel in Palm
Springs. He arranges for Palance to get sprung from prison to
aid him in the robbery. Palance gets to the aerie in the
mountains to be in on the planning with the other members of the
gang, Marvin, Holliman, and Lopez. Winters is an ex-taxi-dancer
who is attached to the mob. She likes Palance, but he finds
himself entranced by Nelson, a crippled girl from a poor family.
Eventually, he helps Nelson get the operation she needs to allow
her to function in the world once more. DVD Release Date:
September, 2009
Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince
BR - With the film version
of the sixth of J.K. Rowling's phenomenally popular series of
magical books about the boy with the mysterious mark on his
forehead, we have officially begun the countdown phase of
Harry's adventure at Hogwarts and his war with Voldemort,
"He-who-must-not-be-named." The seventh, and last book will be
released in their cinematic counterparts in two parts: November
2010 and July 2011. More than any Harry Potter movie thus far,
The Half Blood Prince ends without resolution.
Blu-ray Release date: December 8th,
2009
Lifespan - Gerontology
scientist Benjamin Land (Hiram Keller, FELLINI SATYRICON)
arrives in Amsterdam to work with Dr. Paul Linden (Eric
Schneider) who is said to be doing revolutionary work on
extending human lifespans (though Land notices that Linden seems
to have aged prematurely). Invited to stay at the other man's
apartment, he arrives to discover Linden has hanged himself.
Looking into Linden's work, he discovers that lab mice that have
lived twice their two-year lifespan, a mysterious flu epidemic
that killed nine people at the rest home where Linden was
testing hand-brain coordination, Linden's kinky mistress Anna
(Tina Aumont, TORSO), and a skulking Swiss industrialist (played
by a skulking Klaus Kinski) who seems to know Land's every move
before he does. DVD Release Date: May 30, 2006
Police Story
BR - It all begins here!
Director-star Jackie Chan's celebrated Police Story series began
with this classic action comedy, which features the inimitable
Jackie Chan charm and some of the most spectacular action
sequences ever put to film. Jackie Chan is cop Chan Ka Kui,
who's assigned to guard beautiful witness Selina (Brigitte Lin),
the girlfriend of evil drug kingpin Chor Yuen. Selina's presence
causes some friction between Chan and his petulant girlfriend
May (international star Maggie Cheung), but when the bad guys
come-a-calling, all that gets left behind. Glass breaks, bones
crunch, and anything and everything becomes a weapon in Police
Story! Blu-ray Release date:
September 15th, 2009
(500) Days of Summer
BR - Tom believes, even in
this cynical modern world, in the notion of a transforming,
cosmically destined, lightning-strikes-once kind of love. Summer
doesn't. Not at all. But that doesn't stop Tom from going after
her, again and again, like a modern Don Quijote, with all his
might and courage. Suddenly, Tom is in love not just with a
lovely, witty, intelligent woman -- but with the very idea of
Summer, the very idea of a love that still has the power to
shock the heart and stop the world. The fuse is lit on Day 1
when Tom, a would-be architect turned sappy greeting card
writer, encounters Summer, his boss's breezy, beautiful new
secretary, fresh off the plane from Michigan. Though seemingly
out of his league, Tom soon discovers he shares plenty in common
with Summer. By Day 31, things are moving ahead, albeit
"casually." By Day 32, Tom is irreparably smitten, living in a
giddy, fantastical world of Summer on his mind. By Day 185,
things are in serious limbo -- but not without hope. And as the
story winds backwards and forwards through Tom and Summer's
on-again, off- again, sometimes blissful, often tumultuous
dalliance -- all of which adds up to a kaleidoscopic portrait of
why, and how, we still struggle so laughably, cringingly hard to
make sense of love and to hopefully make it real.
Blu-ray Release date: December
22nd, 2009
The Tall Target - Director
Anthony Mann generates suspense from a story that logically
shouldn't have any—a New York cop trying to foil an
assassination plot against president-elect Abraham Lincoln. Fred
Zinnemann should have looked at this before he made The Day of
the Jackal. Mann understands that mood is more important than
plausibility in a thriller, and you could cut the mood here with
a knife. With Dick Powell, Paula Raymond, Adolphe Menjou, and
Ruby Dee (1951). DVD Release Date: September, 2009
Don't Deliver Us From Evil
- Director and former actor Joël Séria was warned from the start
that his debut film's combination of sex and religion might get
the film banned and it was; but not for its sexual or violent
content but for its seeming anti-religious bias (Séria went to a
Catholic school and he is decidedly unsubtle about religious
hypocrisy as a priest not only ogles Anne's calves during
confession but also becomes excited when she confesses to having
seen two nuns kissing). DVD Release Date: March 28th, 2006
The Animals Film - The new
release offers both the original - rarely seen - 1982 version of
the film, plus the directors 2008 cut, featuring a new and
energising conclusion. Controversial, confrontational and
riveting, this unique work received worldwide critical acclaim
for its filmic power, questioning how and why modern societies
exploit animals for food, fur, sport, entertainment and science.
It showed scenes that had never been filmed before and footage
uncovered through dogged research. In the UK it was broadcast on
Channel 4 during its first week on air in November 1982 and
caused uproar and thereafter was shown in cinemas and on TV
around the world. DVD Release Date: September 29th, 2008
Beyond a Reasonable Doubt
BR - For his remake of Fritz
Lang's last American film, 1956's Beyond a Reasonable Doubt,
Peter Hyams retains the German Expressionist's narrative conceit
but otherwise ratchets up the sleek car-commercial flashiness.
Whereas Lang's original was a condemnation of U.S. capital
punishment, Hyams's do-over has no such weighty issues on its
mind. Instead, it's merely content to spin a tale of murder and
intrigue about the efforts of transplanted TV news reporter C.J.
Nicholas (a false Jesse Metcalfe) to frame himself for the
murder of a prostitute in order to expose the evidence-planting
tactics of star district attorney Mark Hunter (Michael Douglas).
Blu-ray Release date: December
22nd, 2009
Miss Mend - Widely regarded
by the official Soviet press of the time as a prime example of
shameless “Western-style” entertainment, the serial was
nevertheless hugely popular, becoming one of the most successful
Soviet films of the 1920s. Miss Mend is an energetic,
fast-moving serial which opens a window on the phenomenon of
Soviet Americanism and reveals a little-known side of early
Soviet cinema. This new edition was mastered in high definition
from superb original 35mm elements produced by David Shepard and
Jeffery Masino, with digital restoration and editing being
carried out by Eric Lange of Lobster Films, Paris. Featuring a
“dream cast” of 1920s Soviet films stars and special bonus
features by film historians Ana Olenina and Maxim Pozdorovkin.
DVD Release Date: December 15th, 2008
Accident
BR - Any accident might be a
cleverly manipulated murder, and there are those who contract
themselves out as specialists in arranged accidental deaths. We
witness one such elaborate scheme at the start of Soi Cheang’s
movie – a film that obviously owes much to Francis Coppola’s
The Conversation – minus Gene Hackman. Accident is every bit
as dizzying, more so, I think, than Coppola's film, as his
protagonist becomes swept away by fears that the competition has
targeted him. "Brain" is a very careful planner. He is exacting
and patient, willing to abort a job if every detail is not
exquisitely in place seconds before the ax falls.
Blu-ray Release date: November
11th, 2009
The Blood Rose - Part
surgical horror, part gothic fairytale, all Eurosleaze, THE
BLOOD ROSE begins nicely with shots of a beautiful,
crumbling chateau and nicely melds period gothic settings and
clothing of the countryside with sixties pop art and clothes of
Paris but it cannot resist such outre French fantastique touches
as a pair of servant dwarfs in caveman furs, poisonous plants,
and the like. While the stylistic juxtaposition is interesting,
plotting-wise the familiar elements of the surgical horror films
(the investigating, disguised heroine, abducted female donors,
police investigation, and mad doctors) clash with the gothic
romance and result in uneven plotting and pacing. DVD Release
Date: August 28th, 2007
Berlin Express - The idea
for Berlin Express came from a Life article about an army
train moving through the Russian Sector of the city. Producer
Bert Granet worked with writers Curt Siodmak and Harold Medford
to develop the story. On the surface a simple rescue yarn, the
movie also serves as an allegory for Allied cooperation. The
choice of the characters' nationalities is obviously symbolic.
Each player represents one arm of the Allied forces. The Big
Four, whose combined efforts won the war, must work together in
this movie to free Paul Lukas and thus further the peace
process. DVD Release Date: September, 2009
Staten Island
BR - Sully Halverson is a
septic tank cleaner who is desperate to give his unborn son the
chance he never had. Jasper Sabiano is a deaf-mute deli worker
who wants to escape the mobsters that have infiltrated his life
and business. Parmie Tarzo, is a local mob boss, who dreams of
crushing the competition and becoming infamous any way he can.
These three men have two things in common they are all searching
for better lives and they all live in Staten Island - the
forgotten borough of New York City. Once their lives intersect,
nothing will ever be the same. Blu-ray
Release date: December 22nd, 2009
Written By
BR - Written by is a
fanciful, yet anguished study of the interminable, complex
problem of grief and letting go. It is now ten years since
Melody's family was devastated in an automobile accident that
left her father dead and herself blind. Melody was a child of
12, just old enough to know what death is, but young enough to
hang on to an imaginary world where things might be different.
Her mother and younger brother survived relatively unscathed,
but her family still grieves. Mother sits at the piano, unable
to get through her husband's favorite piece. Melody (Mia Yan)
has been unable to accept his death or move on, and even
contemplates suicide - her blindness making it that much easier
for her to retain the image of her family, and especially her
father, as they once were. Blu-ray
Release date: September 10th, 2009
Dances With Wolves
BR - His name, "Dances
With Wolves," is the fulfillment of his character, the
character he exposed in the opening scenes. He does what all
medicine people do--he builds relationships between this world
and other worlds--worlds of the spirit, of animals, of dreams,
of strangers, and of new human values. As the film ends, he will
try to bridge these worlds, and he begins the return journey to
"talk with those who would listen." Screenwriter Michael Blake
and Kevin Costner bridge two worlds themselves, and they do it
without a word about shamanism or the psychology of mystical
experience. I suspect, however, that they knew just what they
were doing. Blu-ray Release
Date: December 3rd, 2008
Party Girl - Although it's
basically a gangster movie, it's Charisse's dancing that is the
high point of the film. She slinks across the screen in her role
as a nightclub dancer who falls in love with Mob lawyer Taylor.
She wants him to go straight and testify against his former
employers, but they kidnap her to keep him toeing the party line
when his day in court arrives. The two leads are great at
displaying vulnerability around each other, but it's Cobb's role
as the gangster boss that steals the acting honors. DVD
Release Date: May, 2009
20th Century Boys - Last Hope
BR - The epic Japanese “20th
Century Boys” trilogy, based upon the hugely popular manga
by Urasawa Naoki, continues with its second instalment, “The
Last Hope”. Director Tsutsumi Yukihiko (“2LDK” and “Forbidden
Siren”) returns to continue the sprawling tale, with the action
again leaping around between different decades and generations,
following the characters as they try to prevent the impending
self prophesised apocalypse. With the original cast reprising
their roles and with even more special effects and grand
narrative adventure, the film was unsurprisingly another box
office hit on its domestic release, leaving fans even more
excited for the final chapter. Blu-ray
Release date: September 18th, 2009
Night in the Museum 2 - Battle of the
Smithsonian BR
- It was inevitable: a bigger, more elaborately staged, more
expensive Night at the Museum! And now that the filmmakers have
done the largest and most elaborate museum in the world, one
wonders where they go from here. The mind boggles. But back to
the Smithsonian, where most of Larry Daley's (Ben Stiller) once
treasured treasures are being shipped from the New York's Museum
of Natural History to make way for more interactive (that's
funny when you consider what Larry once had) technohip exhibits.
In the two year interim, Larry has become something of a celeb
as an infomercial huckster for his own "inventions." But, alas,
his heart isn't in it. Would yours, after once spending the
night with living historical icons? The rouse is that Larry must
get his keister over to their new home in D.C. before Kahmunrah
(Hank Azaria) wakes up, places the ancient life-arousing tablet
in the door of the tomb and invokes a sleeping army to take over
the world – or some plot to that effect.
Blu-ray Release date: December 1st,
2009
The Miners' Campaign Tapes
- In 1984 a group of independent film and video makers decided
to show their support for the miners' strike using the tools
they had available: their cameras. On the picket lines, at the
marches and in the soup kitchens, they recorded the testimonies
of the striking miners, their wives and supporters, in a fight
against anti-strike propaganda dominating the mainstream media.
DVD Release Date: November 30th, 2009
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