****new release list no. 255

Oy gevalt, so many movies this week – I feel like a meshuggina, because I’ve seen so few, yet it is only because I wanted to be a mensch, and spend time with my family, what with Trudy’s 5th birthday and all – and also, how would I forget, the Schuper Bowl! Seems like a big schlep to Florida for a lot of chullabaloo, if you ask me. And all the kvetching about the penalties? Then again, my team? Not there, so there you go.

Ah, but the film I saw? A SERIOUS MAN, from the fabulous Coen Brothers, Ethan and that other one. A polarizing movie, I had heard. Might need to be Jewish to enjoy, I read. The most depressing movie of 2009, I had been informed. For me? Meh. Now, the truth it should be told, Jewish I am, and quite a serious man myself (as anyone who knows me knows with certainty). So perhaps my opinion cholds little water, (for this I spend so much time writing this blog?), but I don’t recall needing to be black to understand BOYZ N THE HOOD, I didn’t need to be German to be awestruck by THE LIVES OF OTHERS…did I need to be Canadian to get THE ADVENTURES OF BOB AND DOUG MCKENZIE? Okay, maybe I did. And maybe I wasn’t. And maybe I didn’t get it. Still and all, for all you serious people out there, trying to understand not that “shit happens” but more “why does this shit always happen to me?”, I think, perhaps, you will find that A SERIOUS MAN is quite a funny movie, similar in fact to the dark genius of BARTON FINK, but perhaps more like BARTON FINKELMAN, or some such like that. Is it depressing? Bissel, bissela… It’s not total bobbemyseh, but to call it that would perhaps be missing the artists fercockt point. Anyway, the talent of the Coen Brothers (ahf mir gezogt! Right?) is on full display in this serious film, with deep and nearly hidden comedic undertones.

Fershtay?

Last call on this blog to invite you to the Grand Opening party for Succulence. This coming Saturday, Feb 13th, from 4pm to 8pm, snacks (including some sneak previews of Succulence products coming soon), music (Ralph Carney, of course) and revelry into the evening. Please come. Also, all weekend, from Friday through Monday we will be having a Grand Opening sale with 10% off everything in the store. Would you like to be on the Succulence email list? Send an email to thesucculence@gmail.com.

Alrighty then, see you down at the store.

Love and Kisses,
Ken

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............//NEW RELEASES//............

BAD GIRLS OF FILM NOIR: VOLUMES 1 and 2.
Film Noir.
Lizabeth Scott/Gloria Grahame/ Evelyn Keyes/ Cleo Moore/Audrey Totter/Jan Sterling/Ida Lupino/Janis Carter.
* There are four film apiece in these collections…on Volume 1 are THE KILLER THAT STALKED NEW YORK, TWO OF A KIND, BAD FOR EACH OTHER and THE GLASS WALL. Number 2 features NIGHT EDITOR, ONE GIRL’S CONFESSION, WOMEN’S PRISON and OVER-EXPOSED.

BRONSON.****ALSO ON BD****
Action.
Tom Hardy/Matt King/Amanda Burton.
Directed by Nicolas Refn.
* This fascination independent film from Britain was nominated for the Grand Jury award at Sundance, among other accolades. It is the ultra-violent story of a young man whose desire to become the most violent criminal in Britain was only barely supplanted by his desire to become a real life Charles Bronson. This very strange story is based on the real life tale of this guy who has spent something like 34 years in jail at this point, with about 30 of them being in solitary confinement!

COUPLES RETREAT.****ALSO ON BD****
Comedy.
Vince Vaughn/Jason Bateman/Jon Favreau/Malik Akerman/Kristen Bell/Kristin Davis.
Directed by Peter Billingsley.
* Goofy box office hit about four couples who end up at a tropical paradise vacation which is actually a couple counseling retreat. Whoop whoop! Stir up the Pina Colada’s or would we rather get lost in Margaritaville? I know…it’s my own damn fault.

EMMA (2009).
Drama/Comedy/Romance.
Romola Garai/Jonny Lee Miller.
* Another Austen adaptation, and from the reviews online, it looks like they did a great job.

ENDGAME.
Drama /Suspense/History.
Chewitol Ejiofor/Jonny Lee Miller/William Hurt.
Directed by Pete Travis.
* Golden-Globe nominated film about the secret and tense negotiations that brought the end of Apartheid in South Africa.

FREESTYLE.
Drama/Family.
Corbin Bleu/Madison Pettis/Penelope Miller.
Directed by William Dear.
* The Disney star with the tasty name gets out from his HIGH SCHOOL MUSICAL trappings and stars in a film! Yes, Mr Bleu plays Cale Bryant (mmm, Kale and blue cheese – where the hell did that come from?) an aspiring motorcycle racer who is hoping to win a spot on the national team.

HARDWARE WARS.
Sci-Fi/Comedy/Indie.
Directed by Ernie Fosselius.
* Brilliant 70’s era Star Wars parody. Did anyone see THUMB WARS?

I CAN’T THINK STRAIGHT.
Drama/Romance/LGBT.
Lisa Ray/Sheetal Sheth
Directed by Shamim Sarif.
* A young Muslim woman getting prepared to marry discovers she is gay.

I HATE VALENTINE’S DAY.
Comedy/Romance.
Nia Vadalos/John Corbett.
Directed by.
* A woman who is basically anti-relationship discovers she’s falling in love and doesn’t know what to do. So she kills him – psyche! Nah, she doesn't kill him, I think probably she marries him...but you'll have to watch to know for certain.

MY ONE AND ONLY.
Comedy/Drama.
Renee Zellwegger/Chris Noth/Kevin Bacon.
Directed by Richard Loncraine.
* Unusually yet mainstream road film about a wealthy woman in the 30’s who walks out on her cheating husband and hits the highways with her two sons traveling across the country in search of another rich man capable of taking care of them.

PETER AND VANDY.
Romance.
Jess Weixler/Jason Ritter.
Directed by Jay DiPietro.
* This romantic film tries to show how a couple’s relationship has become tired and boring by flipping around through time and showing them during different times and challenges.

THE PLEASURE OF BEING ROBBED.
Comedy/Drama.
Eleonore Hendricks.
Directed by Joshua Safdie.
* Slow and awkward comedy about a petty thief and the relationships she gets into, and out of.

A SERIOUS MAN.****ALSO ON BD****
Drama/Perhaps Comedy (to some).
Michael Stuhlbarg/Richard Kind/Sari Lennick.
Directed by Ethan Coen and his brother.
* This dark Jobian comedy centers around Larry Gopnik, a Jewish professor in Minnesota in the late 1960’s whose life is falling apart, one page of the Torah at a time. This movie is pretty awesome, even if you're not Jewish.

SERIOUS MOONLIGHT.****ALSO ON BD****
Comedy/Crime.
Meg Ryan/Timothy Hutton/Kristen Bell/Justin Long.
Directed by Cheryl Hines.
* Actress Cheryl Hines makes her feature film directorial debut with this loving comedy about an attorney who, in a fit of rage, duct tapes her philandering husband to a toilet right before their house is invaded by crooks.

THE SONG OF SPARROWS.
Drama/Foreign (Persian).
Mohammad Amir Naji.
Directed by Magid Magidi.
* From the director of THE WILLOW TREE comes this story of an ostrich farmer who leaves his farm in rural Iran to go to the big city to find a replacement hearing aid for his daughter. In Tehran, he is a fish out of water, and must struggle to maintain his equilibrium.

THE STEPFATHER (2009.
Horror.
Penn Badgley/Dylan Walsh.
Directed by Nelson McCormick.
* A bit of a twist on the old “my stepfather is so mean” storyline – this guy is beyond mean, he’s a killer! The nightmarish tale this remake is based on actually happened in my hometown at a house that I later delivered newspapers to.

THE TIME TRAVELER’S WIFE.****ALSO ON BD****
Drama/Romance/Sci-Fi.
Eric Bana/Rachel McAdams.
Directed by Robert Schwentke.
* It’s hard to be in a relationship. Making decisions together, scheduling events, getting along…it can be a challenge. And even more so when your partner’s rare genetic disorder sends him hurtling through time and space randomly and without warning. Based on the very popular novel by Audrey Niffenegger, this is a different kind of romance story than the standard fare.

XIII.****ALSO ON BD****
Action/Crime/Mystery/Thriller.
Val Kilmer/Stephen Dorff/Jessalyn Gilsig.
Directed by Duane Clark.
* Based on a graphic novel, this originally aired as a tv mini-series. The story follows a mysterious appearance of a wounded man in a tree who cannot remember who he is, or what he is doing there. He is marked with a tattoo that says “XIII” and that is his only clue. Unfortunately for him, secret security forces think he may be the person who assassinated the first female president several months earlier, and quite soon he must fight to escape and then try to discover the truth in his identity while on the run from seemingly everyone.

............//DOCUMENTARY/............

BIZARRE DINOSAURS.
Nature Documentary.
National Geographic.
Directed by Jenny Kubo.

CLIMBING REDWOOD GIANTS.
Nature Documentary.
National Geographic.
* Are you as fascinated by Redwoods as I am? They are so amazing, beautiful and enormous. The tops are said to be things of wonder, worlds unto themselves, and the articles I’ve read of the people who climb them have described something out of a fantasy movie.

............//TELEVISION/............

ANTHONY BOURDAIN: NO RESERVATIONS.
Food/Hilarity.
* Emmy-award winning food show about maverick Anthony Bourdain, traveling around the world and eating a bit here and there.

THE LIFE AND TIMES OF TIM: THE COMPLETE FIRST SEASON.
Animation/Comedy.
Steve Dildarian/M.J. Otto.
* Droll and situational comedy series that we’ve been hearing about for over a year. Season two is just getting started and finally the first season comes to DVD – tell me if you like it!

THE SARAH SILVERMAN PROGRAM: VOLUME 2.
Comedy.
* Potty-mouthed comedy shtick.

SECOND SIGHT: THE COMPLETE COLLECTION.
Drama/Television.
Clive Owen/Claire Skinner.
* British detective series about an investigator who is losing his sight during a challenging murder case.

............//KIDS/............

CURIOUS GEORGE MAKES NEW FRIENDS.

LITTLE EINSTEINS: ANIMAL EXPEDITION.

MICKEY MOUSE CLUBHOUSE: MINNIE’S BOW-TIQUE.

THE PENGUINS OF MADAGASCAR – OPERATION: DVD PREMIER.

............//NEW ADDITIONS/............

PINK FLOYD’S THE WALL: 25th ANNIVERSARY DELUXE EDITION.
Rock/Animation/Psychedlia.
Bob Geldof.
* I remember the first time I watched this, I was in a friend’s house, we were teenagers, and, ahem, experimenting with things, and as I watched I became quite worried that it was overwhelming obvious to his parents just how, ahem, experimental we had been. I think my mind expanded that day; later, it contracted.

****

*****new release no.254

Some very interesting movies out this week, such as ZOMBIELAND, a comedy about a few people struggling to survive the zombie’s that have taken over the earth – can you relate!!?? Starring Woody Harrelson, Jessie Eisenberg and Abigail Breslin.

Also out this week is AMELIA, the fictobiopic about the iconic pilot, Amelia Earhart starring Hilary Swank, Richard Gere and Ewan McGregor.

COLD SOULS is the story of Paul Giamatti (played by Paul Giamatti) an actor who decides to have his soul extracted to deal with the anxiety of opening a new play. His plans to re-install the thing are thrown into turmoil when his soul is hijacked and sent to Russia to be put in a crummy soap opera actress.

A couple foreign films of note this week are AS IT IS IN HEAVEN a Swedish film about a conductor retiring to his hometown, VANISHED EMPIRE – a tale of 70’s era Moscow and ONG BAK 2, a Thai martial arts film featuring Tony Jaa. Jaa, I said Jaa.

In the back at SUCCULENCE we are planning a big Grand Opening party on Saturday, Feb 13th from 4pm until we are ready to call it quits. That whole weekend from Friday-Monday will be a 10% Opening weekend sale on everything from plants to planters and household supplies including solar lighting and gorgeous metal art, so come and get a jump on your spring garden at Bernal’s newest arthouse nursery. We will have food and music and beverages and best of all, it will all be free to you! Hope to see you there!

Alrighty then, see you down at the store.

Love and Kisses,
Ken

******************************************************************************
KenFlix - the only Independent Monthly Subscription Film Renting Service in SF
If you are going to make a monthly commitment, make it a local one.
No due dates. No late fees.

ESUB -One Movie at a time – Three movies total – $9.99 + Tax/Month
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4SUB - Four Movies at a time – Unlimited exchange – $32.99 + Tax/Month
******************************************************************************

............//NEW RELEASES//............

AMELIA.****ALSO ON BD****
Drama/Suspense.
Hilary Swank/Richard Gere/Ewan McGregor.
Directed by Mira Nair.
* Hilary never looks quite as good as Amy Adams did while playing Amelia in NIGHT AT THE MUSEUM 2, and her blond hair never really sat right with me, yet I did believe the story of this woman, this eventual icon, who was driven by her own deep desires to fly high, up in the clouds, amongst the birds and the thunderstorms, over mountains, and ravines and eventually oceans, with few passengers or none. This telling of her story focuses a bit on her marriage to George Putnam (Gere, a little challenging to look at in his later years), her financing sugar daddy, and her affair with Gene Vidal (McGregor – do you realize how much like Jason Bateman he can look?), and it shows how she became one of the preeminent pitch people in the 30’s, hawking product after product in a rush to gather money to finance her flights. The tale is slow, but the air scenes are excellent and the drive of this pilot is visceral. Would she have become as iconic if she had lived? Maybe not, but it’s hard to say, after all, if she had lived, her star would have shined brighter than ever.

AS IT IS IN HEAVEN.
Drama/Music/Romance/Foreign (Swedish/English/Italian).
Michael Nyqvist/Frida Hallgren/Helen Sjoholm.
Directed by Kay Pollack.
* An internationally acclaimed musical conductor retires abruptly back to his hometown in Sweden, where his childhood was miserable and isolated. There, he is asked to become the church choir director, and his musical genius causes the choir to bloom. Nominated for the Best Foreign Film Oscar in 2005.

COLD SOULS.
Comedy/Drama.
Paul Giamatti/Emily Watson/Lauren Ambrose.
Directed by Sophie Barthes.
* The somewhat true story of Paul Giamatti (Paul Giamatti) follows the actor through an anxious and neurotic period preparing for the opening of a play. Being Paul Giamatti proves challenging, so challenging in fact, that when Paul (Paul) here’s about a new procedure of extracting and storing souls, he signs up, thinking that he will reinstall the thing after the performance. Oh, but Paul doesn’t know yet that his soul has been stolen and soon he has delved into the seedy world of soul-trafficking as he tracks his very soul to Russia, St. Petersburg to be exact, where his soul is ticketed for a soap opera actress. This dark and moody comedy was nominated for the Grand Jury prize at Sundance in 2009.

THE EVELYN WAUGH COLLECTION.
Drama/Romance/Comedy/Disintegration.
Kristin Scott Thomas/Angelica Huston/Judi Dench.
Directed by Charles Sturridge and Gavin Millar.
* This collection features two films made from Evelyn Waugh books, A HANDFUL OF DUST and SCOOP. Waugh’s particularly desolate brand of humor and cynicism is bleak and hysterical, and his stories often show a few minor mishaps become full blown disasters.

LOVE HAPPENS.
Drama/Romance.
Jennifer Aniston/Aaron Eckhart/Dan Fogler/Judy Greer.
Directed by Brandon Camp.
* This sentimental film is about grief, and coming to terms with loss. Eckhart plays a man who has become somewhat famous after writing a book about getting over his wife’s death. When Eloise (Aniston) comes into his life, though he feels the attraction, he also realizes that now he must face the true pain at the root of his heart.

MR. RIGHT.
Comedy/Romance.
James Lance/Luke de Woolfson
Directed by David Morris and Jacqui Morris.
* A glance at a community of men looking to find love and companionship and something more than Mr. Right Now.

NEW YORK, I LOVE YOU.****ALSO ON BD****
Comedy/Drama/Romance.
Natalie Portman/Shia LaBeouf/Bradley Cooper/Orlando Bloom/Christina Ricci/Robin Wright Penn/Hayden Christensen/Anton Yelchin/John Hurt/James Caan/Ethan Hawke/Drea de Matteo/Chris Cooper/Andy Garcia/Julie Christie/You/Olivia Thirlby/Cloris Leachman.
Directed by Fatih Akin/Wen Jiang/Brett Ratner/Mira Nair/Allen Hughes/Natalie Portman/Etc.
* This anthology film next in line after PARIS, JE T’AIME features a bunch of vignettes filmed by different directors set in the gorgeous and love-inspiring city of New York.

ONG BAK 2.****ALSO ON BD****
Action/Martial Arts/Foreign (Thai).
Tony Jaa.
Directed by Tony Jaa and Panna Rittikrai.
* This follow up to the popular 2003 film ONG BAK, is not really a sequel, but it is a Thai martial arts film in the vein of Conan the Barbarian, you know, boy loses parents in vicious attack by King, grows up super tough with serious street cred, eventually risks his life to get revenge on big daddy. If period piece stylized martial arts fighting is your thing, then you will love this film.

PLANET HULK.
Animation/Action/Sci-Fi.
Directed by Sam Liu.
* How many Hulks does it take to screw in a light bulb?

UNIVERSAL SOLDIER: REGENERATION.****ALSO ON BD*****
Action.
JCVD/Dolph Lundgren.
Directed by John Hyams.
* I think this is like Universal Soldier 5, but it might be 6, either way, some serious explosives are detonated during this film.

VANISHED EMPIRE.
Drama/Foreign (Russian).
Aleksandr Lyapin/Other Russians.
Directed by Karen Shakhnazarov.
* The scope of this film is large, but the tale is provincial…It is Moscow in the 1970’s, and the final decade of the Soviet Union, and the dissolution of the empire is experienced through the eyes of three people as they grow up and face their own personal successes and failures .

ZOMBIELAND.****ALSO ON BD****
Comedy/Horror/Gorefest/Zombedy.
Woody Harrelson/Jessie Eisenberg/Abigail Breslin/Bill Murray.
Directed by Ruben Fleischer.
* Some families you are born into, and some you find while fighting zombies together. That’s just nature’s way. I think at the core of this zombedy is the notion that sometimes if you stop searching for what you are after, you’ll find what you need has been there the whole time. In fact, if it weren’t for the uber gorefest, the outrageous scenarios, Bill Murray disguised as a zombie, and assorted other wild and supernatural setups, this might have been an after school special; the funniest, sickest and most demented after school special ever!

............//DOCUMENTARY/............

MAYBE GOD IS ILL.
Documentary/Foreign (Italian).
Directed by Franco Brogi Taviani.
* From Amazon: Award winning writer, Walter Veltroni takes us on a stirring, unforgettable journey across the vast continent of Africa to witness controversial stories of tragedy, turmoil and hope. Everyone knows Africa is going through a very difficult transition, but who really understands the depths of the wars, hunger and diseases that make up its everyday catastrophes? Are these problems close to being resolved or are they just the beginning of a spiraling pandemic of worldwide crises? Find out as Veltroni takes us on a very personal tour and never-before-seen look at the people of Mozambique, Angola, Senegal, Cameroon, Uganda and South Africa.

............//TELEVISION//............

DR. WHO: THE COMPLETE SPECIALS.
Sci-Fi.
* Pretty self explanatory, but here is much more info from Amazon: This stunning collection of Doctor Who specials – The Next Doctor, Planet of the Dead, The Waters of Mars and The End of Time, Part One & Two – is a must own for all Doctor Who fans. The four imaginative, action-packed specials are the farewell to star David Tennant, and Russell T Davies, the mastermind behind the rebirth of the modern Doctor Who. The specials culminate in the dramatic regeneration of the Doctor, giving fans their first glimpse of the Doctor as played by Matt Smith. The specials are packed with a terrific lineup of guest stars including Michelle Ryan (Bionic Woman), David Morrissey (State of Play, Sense and Sensibility), Lindsay Duncan (Alice in Wonderland (2010), Rome, Under the Tuscan Sun) and many more that we can’t reveal just yet!

A MIND TO KILL: SERIES ONE.
Detective.
* Tense and taut detective series about DCI Noel Bain (Philip Madoc) who is based in Wales.

............//KIDS//............

AIR BUD: GOLDEN RETRIEVER.

ELMO’S WORLD: LET’S PLAY MUSIC.

SCRUFF: A BRAND NEW SEASON.

............//NEW ON BLU//............

MYSTIC RIVER.
* Clint Eastwood’s classic starring Sean Penn, Tim Robbins, Kevin Bacon and Laurence Fishburne

****

****new release list no.253

There are 39 titles written in the blog this week, the biggest of them WHIP IT (roller derby film by Drew Barrymore starring Ellen Page), SURROGATES (sci-fi adventure starring Bruce Willis) and MICHAEL JACKSON’S THIS IS IT (really well-done film documenting rehearsals of the final tour that was supposed to begin a week after he died). In honor of all these titles, my blog today will mention none of them (except, ah, the aforementioned 3 titles). If you want to read about this films, and possibly miss my poor opinions on mostly non-film related stuff, then just page down a page or two, and you will find a most glorious list of foreign films, Criterion releases, kids stuff, New BD titles, Indie films, documentaries, and more.

Otherwise on to:

Important things that I have failed to address in the previous few months in no particular order (in fact, they probably could be put in better order):

1. The Anniversary of the Passing of David Ayoob. Dave, you were a wonderful business owner, a mentor, a neighborhood legend, and a motivator of goodness. The world still misses you! I wish we had bought the store from you before you retired into your love of your family and old cars. I can’t even tell you how many times I’ve wished I could call you and ask you questions about this or that. May you rest in peace, and may your family thrive!

2. Haiti. My gosh, that place got hammered. I have seen such amazing free-spirited generosity in helping financially with their hardships. We must always remember to try to help before disasters happen as well. Maybe this sort of mobilization is the central purpose of Facebook?

3. The Prop 8 Trial. This is a huge deal, obviously, but no matter what happens in this trial, equal rights are coming for all peoples. Count on it. There are so many things that are worth good debate, discussion and legal opinions, but this is not one of them. Let’s let love rule! The Merc has done a fair job documenting the trial…(Freud was clearly a genius, but the guy spent a lot of ink justifying his issues…)

4. Presidential hostility. No link here, just sorrow at something so amazing turning a bit sour. Have we forgotten the idiocy that usually inhabits this office? Have we forgotten the woefully terrible inheritance the current office was saddled with? Let’s get into the second term before we start with the biting rhetoric, people. Did some of us not cry in the street two Novembers ago when the impossible occurred? Just saying...

5. The Brilliance of Hippydom. No link here, just the actual and honest love of love.

6. The tragicomedy of AVATAR. Okay people, I know this is an unpopular opinion, but this movie didn’t do it for me. Yes, the visuals were out of this world, and I loved some of the initial sci-fi concepts bantered around (the actual connection between the beings, both animal and vegetable of the planet via hair follicles, among other things), and the acting was fine, meaning specific portrayals of characters were done well, and left nothing to be desired…But the story? Ah, the story…Why can’t we have a new story in Hollywood? Was there not a million (or a quarter of a billion?) different plotlines that could have been explored? Did we need Pocahontas falling in love with John who helps save the people from Chevron? I don’t know…I just wondered how this movie has made 1.5 billion dollars while Haiti, hunger and education (to scrape the surface of planetary depravity) all suffer? Okay, just saying. (FULL DISCLOSURE: I accidentally bought tickets to the wrong theatre when I saw this film, and they were not refundable, so I had to buy them again for the correct theatre putting a bit over $60 into the income of this film. Booya!)

7. How a Hot Tub will Complicate your Karma. Pretty simple and self-explanatory thought, and the reason I think it is cuz Amy and I were given a tub for free by wonderful neighbors (thank you thank you Jeff and Sharon!) and it is awesome! Though it probably does cost a lot to heat.

8. NOISEPOP 2010! For anyone who doesn’t know, Noisepop is an amazing music fest run by local San Francisco music industry types, who promote great local music as well as amazing rock from around the world. They put on a yearly festival that runs simultaneously at many local venues, and they also sponsor or co-sponsor many other events throughout the year. My wife Amy sings in an awesome 45-woman choir called Conspiracy of Venus that has been invited to open for John Vanderslice at the Swedish American Hall. My band, The Dont’s has played Noisepop the last couple years, and it has been a blast. It doesn’t seem like we’ll be in this year (although I heard a rumor that The Decemberists are playing a currently unlisted show at The Rickshaw and we’d do just about anything to open that show). The point is, if you like music, and wanna check out Noisepop, pick just about any show and buy your tix online ( because many of the shows sellout) and then be prepared for an awesome evening!

9. The Tiger Woods Scandal. Tiger Woods? I’d do him, and so would about a ½ billion other people, so why is this scandal such a big deal? I love how it has become a moralistic tale, with many people getting to hammer the guy in print about what a “bad” husband and person he is. I’m not defending his behavior at all. Adultery is wrong. But, first off, make sure to be super duper honest with yourselves about your behavior before you totally dis his, and then remember, he is barely a person, the guy is a corporation, and he’s just spreading the benefits. Gosh, as though people who drink Gatorade are all morally sound.

10. The Unbelievable Stupidness of the Late Night War. Although, that clip of Jimmy Kimmel ripping Jay Leno a new one on Jay’s own show was priceless.

Well, that's my list, and here come the movies.

Alrighty then, see you down at the store.

Love and Kisses,
Ken

******************************************************************************
KenFlix - the only Independent Monthly Subscription Film Renting Service in SF
If you are going to make a monthly commitment, make it a local one.
No due dates. No late fees.

ESUB -One Movie at a time – Three movies total – $9.99 + Tax/Month
1SUB - One Movie at a time – Unlimited exchange – $18.99 + Tax/Month
3SUB - Three Movies at a time – Unlimited exchange – $24.99 + Tax/Month
4SUB - Four Movies at a time – Unlimited exchange – $32.99 + Tax/Month
******************************************************************************

............//NEW RELEASES//............

THE BOYS ARE BACK.
Drama/Suspense.
Clive Owen/Emma Booth.
Directed by Scott Hicks.
* From the directory of SHINE comes this quiet tale of a sports writer who loses his wife to cancer and must raise two boys himself, in what becomes of triumph of will and growth. Sad, but not melodramatic.

BRIGHT STAR.
Drama/Romance.
Abbie Cornish/Ben Wishaw.
Directed by Jane Campion.
* John Keats was perhaps one of the world’s finest poets, and sadly died at the young age of 25 from tuberculosis (from Wikipedia: [the doctor] finally diagnosed consumption (now called tuberculosis) and put Keats on a starvation diet—an anchovy and a piece of bread a day—to reduce the blood flow to his stomach. He also bled Keats, which was a standard treatment of the day but would have contributed to his weakness). This is the story of his ill-fated love affair with the girl next door, Frances Brawne.

CARNERA: THE WALKING MOUNTAIN.
Drama/Fictobiopic.
Andrea Iaia/Paul Sorvino/F. Murray Abraham.
Directed by Renzo Martinelli.
* The somewhat true story of Primo Carnera, Italy’s first (and I think only) heavyweight champion boxer.

THE ESCAPIST.
Drama/Suspense/Crime/Thriller.
Brian Cox/Damian Lewis/Joseph Fiennes/Seu Jorge.
Directed by Rupert Wyatt.
* Twisty but standard-fare prison break film also featuring my favorite Brazilian rock star, Seu Jorge, who did those beautiful Bowie covers in THE LIFE AQUATIC. Have a listen, here’s one now.

FRONTIER OF THE DAWN.
Drama /Foreign (French).
Louis Garrel/Laura Smet.
Directed by Philippe Garrel.
* This movie is a sort of meditation on celebrity and its trappings…it is about a famous woman who is destroyed from within by the discovery by her husband of her affair with a young lover.

FUEL.
Drama.
C. Thomas Howell.
Directed by.
* It says drama, but I keep thinking of it as a comedy…why? I think because when I think “C. Thomas Howell (RED DAWN, THE OUTSIDERS)” I giggle. I am not sure why.

GISELLE: PERFORMED BY THE DUTCH NATIONAL BALLET.
Performing Arts.
Directed by Adrienne Liron and Jeff Tudor.
* The story of a peasant girl who dies from a broken heart after falling in love with an unattainable Count.

GREEN FISH.
Drama/Foreign (Korean).
Directed by Chang-dong Lee.
* This is the 1997 directorial debut of Lee, and it won many awards around the world on the festival circuit. It is the strange beautiful story of a young man who has just been released from the army and now must contend with the violent outside world. Between being beaten, engaging in an affair with a mobster’s girlfriend and joining the mob itself, he is just barely staying alive.

HIGHER FORCE.
Comedy/Foreign (Icelandic/English/Mandarin).
Directed by Olaf de Fleur Johannesson.
* David is a thug; he collects debts. He is a cowardly thug at that, at the low end of the thug ladder, abused and teased even by the thugs in his own gang. But, he yearns for more. He has a Chinese philosophy video called The Higher Force which is his religion. He waits for special things to happen to him. Special things happen. Causing David to make a stand for himself, or end up a corpse.

MERMAID.
Comedy/Drama/Fantasy/Foreign (Russian).
Mariya Shalaeve.
Directed by Anne Melikyan.
* This Amelie-ish fairy tale is about a young girl in Russia who grows up believing herself to have mystical powers to make her dreams come true.

PARIS, TEXAS.
Criterion/Drama.
Allan Levine/Nastassja Kinski/Dean Stockwell.
Directed by Wim Wenders.
* Evocative film about love, companionship, isolation and commitment. The tale of a lost soul found by his brother, re-animated by his son and driven to find his wife. On many people’s lists of the greatest films ever.

RIGHTEOUS TIES.
Comedy/Foreign (Korean).
Directed by Jin Jang .
* Korean gangster comedy.

ROBERTO ROSSELLINI WAR TRILOGY.
Criterion/War/Drama/Foreign (Italian).
Directed by Roberto Rossellini.
* Here are some descriptions of these films from Amazon:
Rome Open City
This was Roberto Rossellini’s revelation, a harrowing drama about the Nazi occupation of Rome and the brave few who struggled against it. Though told with a bit more melodramatic flair than the other films that would form this trilogy and starring well-known actors — Aldo Fabrizi as a priest helping the partisan cause and Anna Magnani in her breakthrough role as the fiancée of a resistance member — Rome Open City (Roma città aperta) is a shockingly authentic experience, conceived and directed amid the ruin of World War II, with immediacy in every frame. Marking a watershed moment in Italian cinema, this galvanic work was an international sensation, garnering awards around the globe and leaving the beginnings of a new film movement in its wake.
Paisan
Roberto Rossellini’s follow-up to his breakout Rome Open City was the ambitious, enormously moving Paisan (Paisà), which consists of six episodes set during the liberation of Italy at the end of World War II, taking place across the country, from Sicily to the northern Po Valley. With its documentary-like visuals and its intermingled cast of actors and nonprofessionals, Italians and their American liberators, this look at the struggles of different cultures to communicate and of people to live their everyday lives in extreme circumstances is equal parts charming sentiment and vivid reality. A long-missing treasure of Italian cinema, Paisan is available here for the first time in its full original release version.
Germany Year Zero
The concluding chapter of Roberto Rossellini’s War Trilogy is the most devastating, a portrait of an obliterated Berlin shown through the eyes of a twelve-year-old boy. Living in a bombed-out apartment building with a sick father and two older siblings, young Edmund is mostly left to wander unsupervised, getting ensnared in the black-market schemes of a group of teenagers and coming under the nefarious influence of a Nazi-sympathizing ex-teacher. Germany Year Zero (Deutschland im Jahre Null) is a daring, gut-wrenching look at the consequences of fascism, for society and the individual.

SAW 6.
Horror/Depravity/Sorrow.
Directed by Kevin Greutert.
* Number six in the series about a guy learning to use a jigsaw, ostensibly to become a jigsaw puzzle maker.

ST. TRINIAN’S.
Comedy.
Rupert Everett/Mischa Bartom/Colin Firth/Lena Headey/Russell Brand.
Directed by Oliver Parker and Barnaby Thompson.
* I think this is kind of a remake/updated version of the St. Trinian comedy’s of the 50’s. In this one, St.Trinian’s school for young ladies is populated by the most un-teachable girls around.

SURROGATES.****ALSO ON BD****
Action/Sci-Fi.
Bruce Willis/Ving Rhames/Radha Mitchell.
Directed by Jonathan Mostow.
* In this film, our isolation is even deeper than today’s I-phone-based society. The people live in their homes, never leaving them at all, instead interacting with each other with surrogate bodies, skinny, sexy and sleek. The world is free of crime, and fear, and, yet…there still is an FBI! Tom Greer (Willis) is one such agent who must come out of the surrogate world and actually begin an investigation when some of these avatars are attacked and their humans are killed.

WARSZAWSA.
Drama/Comedy/Foreign (Polish).
Agnieszka Grochowska.
Directed by Dariusz Gajewski.
* 2003 award-winning film about Warsaw, thieves, blackmail and other subculture.

WHIP IT.****ALSO ON BD****
Comedy/Drama.
Ellen Page/Drew Barrymore/Jimmy Fallon/Marcia Gay Harden/Kristen Wiig/Juliette Lewis/Daniel Stern.
Directed by Drew Barrymore.
* Drew’s directorial feature debut is about the Roller Derby scene in Austin, TX. Do you know about the resurgence of roller derby? We’ve got a league here in the Bay Area. In this film, Ellen Page plays Bliss Cavendar, a young woman in High School who is constantly fighting her mother’s 50’s era female conditioning. Her mom carts her and her younger sister around to beauty pageants and wants her to become a true southern belle. Instead, she auditions and gets accepted onto one of the derby teams in Austin and becomes Babe Ruthless, the fastest jammer in the league! Soon, her last place team starts winning some games, and the championship game looms. Unfortunately, it’s the same day as the big Blue Bonnet Pageant. What’s a southern girl to do? Page was good in this film, but you gotta hope she doesn’t get totally typecast as the high school outsider. And a note to Drew – don’t cast yourself in your next film, please.

............//DOCUMENTARY/............

ACT OF GOD: MEDITATIONS ON LIGHTING LIFE AND CHANCE.
Documentary.
Directed by Jennifer Baichwal.
* Baichwal’s follow up to MANUFACTURED LANDSCAPES is a psycho-spiritual investigation into the effects of being struck by lightning, both physical and metaphysical.

DAIDO MORIYAMA-STRAY DOG OF TOKYO-NEW PEOPLE ARTIST V03.
* From Amazon: Daido Moriyama: Stray Dog of Tokyo is a documentary that follows the life of photographer Daido Moriyama in the present, which has never been revealed before. Even though his charismatic presence has reigned over the world of photography since the late 60’s, his true persona had been hidden behind a veil of mystery, since he had refused any major appearances in front of any media in the past. Follow the charismatic photographer Daido Moriyama as he takes his first digital photos and observe his style of quick snapshots without looking in the finder. His stark and contrasting black and white images symbolize his fervent lifestyle.

MICHAEL JACKSON’S: THIS IS IT.****ALSO ON BD****
Music documentary.
Michael.
Directed by Kenny Ortega.
* How to handle the recouping of giant investment and expense for a huge tour that was canceled by MJ’s sudden death? Well…they had some incredible footage of rehearsals for the tour, and this film puts it all together into a pretty comprehensive vision of what the world was about to experience. We see the dancers, musicians and singers totally in love with Michael, some of them having their career-defining moment as performers with him. We see the production team, gently working with the King of Pop, calling him Sir, and adjusting to his every nuance. We see Michael, kind of crazy seeming, out there (on love, L.O.V.E., god bless you, I love you) (and perhaps on some other stuff, too), but still full of insane talent, dancing and singing with the looseness, dexterity and charisma that we’ve experienced with him for 40-ish years of spotlighted fame. I went to the Ipod the morning after I saw this film and put on Don’t Stop Till You Get Enough, and lost my own mind a little.

PAINTERS PAINTING.
Art Documentary.
Willem de Kooning/Jasper Johns/Andy Warhol.
Directed by Emile de Antonio.
* This 1973 film is a pretty inclusive history of the New York art scene from the 1940’s through the early part of the 70’s.

SOUL POWER.
Music documentary.
Muhammad Ali/James Brown/B.B. King/Don King/Bill Withers.
Directed by Jeffrey Levy-Hinte.
* This doc, combined with 1996’s WHEN WE WERE KINGS, documents the amazing concert and boxing match put on in Kinshasa, Zaire in 1974. The other doc featured music and focused on the boxing match. This one is the opposite. Lots of amazing performances including Celia Cruz and also The Spinners.

............//TELEVISION/............

BROTHERS AND SISTERS: THE COMPLETE FIRST SEASON.
Drama.
* Ask, and ye shall receive! Four Star is a little late getting to this show. But people have been talking about it, so we are giving it a shot. It is the story of a family focusing on the adult siblings and the problems they are dealing with (Denise? Anne? You out there? – We’ll be alright --I think). It was nominated for many Golden Globes and Emmy’s so it is clearly a pretty good show, and one of the stars is Rachel Griffiths of SIX FEET UNDER fame (Brenda Chenowith).

MI-5: VOLUME 7.
Drama/Spies.
* The Brits just tend to do television quite well, and this spy series is no exception.

............//KIDS/............

POKEMON ELEMENTS VOL 7: PSYCHIC.

POKEMON ELEMENTS VOL 8: DRAGON.

THE SPECTACULAR SPIDERMAN: VOLUME 4.

YOU’RE A GOOD MAN, CHARLIE BROWN.

............//NEW ON BLU/............

FAME (1980).
* Fly – High!

............//NEW ADDITIONS/............

THE PRESIDENT’S ANALYST.
Comedy/Sci-Fi/Madcap.
James Coburn.
Directed by Theodore J. Flicker.
* Our first DVD of this totally awesome crazy psychedelic zany 1967 film about the President’s analyst, and the difficult challenge of staying alive when the world’s spies are out to get him…

............//REPLACEMENT DISCS/............

BATMAN.
* Takes a licking, and keeps on ticking.

CARNIVALE: THE COMPLETE FIRST SEASON.

HOLES.

NAPOLEON DYNAMITE.
* Wonderful dance sequence.

REBEL MUSIC: THE BOB MARLEY STORY.
* Emancipate yourself from mental slavery, none but ourselves can free our mind.

VANILLA SKY.
* And quite Vanilla, at that.

****

****new release list no.252

Cold and wet, can you hear what I’m saying to you; cold and wet, that’s the message I’m conveying to you, how many times do I has to tell you that I’m cold and wet? Well stated by Gene and Dean Ween and so true this week! Cold and wet. Right even as I type. Cold. Wet.

Still and all, the winter helps us, the water is crucial and the weather diversity keeps us fresh and cold and wet! And cold. Oh, god, quick, call me a waaambulance.

Steven Soderbergh’s CHE (Parts one and two) chronicling the life of Argentinean Marxist revolutionary Che Guevara and starring Benicio Del Toro is finally here and it merited a Criterion release. There are a bunch of films here this week, including the family favorite CLOUDY WITH A CHANCE OF MEATBALLS, and please scroll on down to read about them. One note is that I bought WEEDS: SEASON FIVE on Blu-ray (and DVD) as a bit of an experiment – this is our first series title on BD. Let me know if this is a trend that should continue.

I realized the other day that it is almost three years since Amy and I bought Four Star Video (Mar 2007). We must have some sort of anniversary celebration/sale event. Not sure yet what we’ll do, but I’m taking suggestions…

Speaking of celebration/sale, SUCCULENCE is going to have a big Grand Opening party on Saturday, Feb 13th. Much more info to follow.

Alrighty then, see you down at the store.

Love and Kisses,
Ken

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............//NEW RELEASES//............

ACCORDING TO GRETA.
Drama/Romance.
Hillary Duff/Ellen Burstyn/Melissa Leo/Evan Ross/Michael Murphy.
Directed by Nancy Bardawil.
* Duff plays a young woman dealing with depression who gets sent to live with her grandparents for the summer. Once there, she falls for a guy she works with, only to have her grandparents try to veto the romance. Duff is actually a pretty talented actor who has potential if she can shake the teenybopper castings of her youth.

AMREEKA.
Drama /Foreign (English and Arabic).
Nisreen Faour/Melkar Muallem/Hiam Abbas.
Directed by Cherien Dabis.
*Nominated for the Grand Jury Prize at Sundance last year (and winner of many other festival awards) this film is about a single mother from Palestine who immigrates with her teenage son to a small town in Illinois.

CHE: PART ONE AND TWO.****ALSO ON BD****
Criterion/Drama/Biopic.
Benicio Del Toro/Benjamin Bratt/Franka Potente/Julia Ormond.
Directed by Steven Soderbergh.
* From Amazon.com: Far from a conventional biopic, Steven Soderberghs film about Che Guevara is a fascinating exploration of the revolutionary as icon. Daring in its refusal to make the socialist leader into an easy martyr or hero, Che paints a vivid, naturalistic portrait of the man himself (with a stunning, Cannes-award-winning performance by Benicio del Toro), from his overthrow of the Batista dictatorship, to his 1964 United Nations trip, to the end of his short life. [The film was] Originally released in two parts, the first a kaleido-scopic view of the Cuban revolution and the second an all-action dramatization of Che's failed campaign in Bolivia.

CLOUDY WITH A CHANCE OF MEATBALLS.
Animation/Comedy/Family.
Bill Hader/Anna Faris/James Caan/Andy Samberg.
Directed by Chris Miller.
* Did you read this kids book at home? Well, throw what you remember out the window (and watch out below), because significant liberties were taken with this story, so much that it really should be thought of as a separate piece of art (I used the word art in this film description – oookay). What they kept is the spectacular imagery of food falling to earth each day and feeding the people of the land. Eventually greed gets in the way of technology, and the dropping food becomes more and more dangerous.

ECLIPSE SERIES 19: CHANTAL AKERMAN IN THE 70’s.
Criterion/Drama/Experimental.
Aurore Clément/Chantal Akerman.
Directed by Chantal Akerman.
* The five films in this collection were made between 1972 and 1978 and feature intimate and quiet portrayals of isolation and loneliness. There are a couple shorts films, 1972’s LA CHAMBRE (11 min) and 1972’s HOTEL MONTEREY (62 min), both silent films. Then the three features are 1974’s JE, TU, IL, ELLE an erotic film about a woman (Akerman) on a road trip, 1976’s NEWS FROM HOME featuring letters written by Akerman’s mother being read over beautifully composed shots of New York City, and 1978’s LES RENDEZ-VOUS D’ANNA about a filmmaker traveling through Europe promoting her latest film.

THE INVENTION OF LYING.****ALSO ON BD****
Comedy.
Ricky Gervais/Jennifer Garner/Rob Lowe/Jonah Hill/Tina Fey/Jason Bateman/Christopher Guest.
Directed by Ricky Gervais and Matt Robinson
* This comedy focuses on a world where NO ONE LIES. How incomprehensible is that? Maybe John Lennon could imagine it, I’m not sure. In a world where no one lies, one man learns to lie, and benefit from his lies.

GAMER.****ALSO ON BD****
Drama.
Gerard Butler/Michael C. Hall/Kyra Sedgwick/John Leguizamo.
Directed by Mark Neveldine and Brian Taylor.
* This movie might have been called AVATAR if that other one hadn’t been. It is basically a futuristic story of a society where people are controlling other people in an on-line game world (as opposed to people not being able to control themselves in an on-line game world). The story centers around a player in a game who wants to regain control of himself outside of the game and destroy the people who created it.

KINGDOM OF THE SPIDERS.
Sci-Fi/Horror.
William Shatner/Tiffany Bolling.
Directed by John Cardos.
* This 1977 film features brilliant cover art, and amazing acting. Shat plays Rack Hansen, a Texas veterinarian who is trying to figure out what is killing the local farm animals, and in such a strange seeming way. Aha! What we have here…gentlemen…appears to be, giant…arachnids, migrating right for us. All in all, I think this movie really could use a cameo from Spock.

PANDORUM.****ALSO ON BD****
Sci-Fi/Suspense.
Dennis Quaid/Ben Foster.
Directed by Christian Alvert.
* When Payton (Quaid) and Bower (Foster, SIX FEET UNDER) wake up in pods on a spaceship in the dark, they have no idea who they are or what they are doing or where everyone else is. Gradually they remember they were on a mission with 60,000 others to populate a new planet as Earth has been destroyed. Pandorum refers to a space disease that causes people to go crazy and kill each other. Payton and Bower are afraid they will succumb to this, but their fears become less important in the wake of the blood-thirsty zombies that they seem to be sharing the ship with. Even more disturbing is the news that they are not zombies, but actually mutated humans from the original mission.

SMOKIN’ ACES 2: ASSASSINS’ BALL.****ALSO ON BD****
Action/Crime.
Tom Berrenger/Autumn Reeser.
Directed by P.J. Pesce.
* Smokin crack is more like it.

STREAMERS.
Drama/War.
Matthew Modine/Michael Wright.
Directed by Robert Altman.
* 1983 film just finally getting to DVD, STREAMERS is the story of four recruits getting ready to get sent to Vietnam and confronting their prejudices about each other.

WHITEOUT.****ALSO ON BD****
Action/Suspense.
Kate Beckinsale/Columbus Short.
Directed by Dominic Sena.
* Beckinsale plays a US Marshall on Antarctica who is tracking a killer right on the heels of having resigned and preparing to get back to the mainland. Unfortunately, the killer is on the loose, and the sun is about to set leaving Antarctica dark for the next six months.

............//DOCUMENTARY/............

THE BUTCH FACTOR.
Documentary.
Directed by Christopher Hines.
* This doc examines masculinity and male-identity as it relates to gay men.

NO IMPACT MAN.
Documentary.
Directed by Laura Gabbert and Justin Schein.
* This doc examines a couple in NY trying to abandon their high impact lifestyle and spend one year living in Manhattan with a zero level environmental impact.

OUTRAGE.
Documentary.
Directed by Kirby Dick.
* This doc examines the absurd hypocrisy of closeted politicians who vote to enact anti-gay legislation.

............//TELEVISION/............

DAMAGES: THE COMPLETE SECOND SEASON.
Drama.
Glenn Close/Rose Byrne/William Hurt/Ted Danson/Timothy Olyphant/Marcia Gay Harden.
* The second season in the Emmy and Golden Globe winning series about lawyers and the cut-throat world that lawyer Patricia Hewes (Close) inhabits.

THE PHILANTHROPIST: THE COMPLETE SERIES.
Action.
James Purefoy/Neve Campbell/Michael Williams.
* Adventure series about a wealthy man trying to help the world and traveling all across the planet in that quest.

WEEDS: SEASON FIVE.****ALSO ON BD****
Drama/Showtime.
Mary-Louise Parker/Elizabeth Perkins/Kevin Nealon.
* Season five in the show about everyone’s favorite hottie cougar drug dealer. As an experiment, we are trying a series on Blu-Ray as well as regular DVD…if the experiment is a success, perhaps many of the series will be carried this way. Please let us know what you think!

............//MORE NEW HIGHLIGHTED ADDITIONS/............

REVIEWS BY JEFF.

OVERLORD.
Criterion/War/Drama.
Directed by Stuart Cooper.
* One of the all-time great World War II movies, Overlord follows the life cycle of a British soldier from enlistment to warfare. We come to understand his hopes and his fears in between bouts of dead calm and frenzied action. Director Stuart Cooper mixes real documentary footage with the staged, and it's hard to tell the two apart. Also, the gorgeous black and white photography was shot by longtime Kubrick collaborator John Alcott and draws heavily from Robert Capa's war photos.

............//KIDS/............

CHARLIE AND LOLA: VOLUME 9.

FRANKLIN: FRANKLIN’S VALENTINES.

SCOOBY’S ALL STAR LAFF-A-LYMPICS: VOLUME 1.

THE SPECTACULAR SPIDERMAN: VOLUME 5.

............//NEW ON BLU/............

THE BOURNE IDENTITY.

THE BOURNE SUPREMACY.

............//NEW ADDITIONS/............

WALL STREET.
* Our first DVD of this Oliver Stone film comes on the heels of hearing they are making a sequel.

............//REPLACEMENT DISCS/............

THE JERK: 26th ANNIVERSARY EDITION.
* Steve Martin and a cast of hilarity front this Carl Reiner comedy.

****

****new release list no.251

So many great titles out this week, starting with the first must-see Iraq war film, THE HURT LOCKER. Set in 2004 Baghdad and following a group of bomb specialists, this film examines our addiction to adrenaline, and how well war fulfills that need.

IN THE LOOP is a new comedy about war (ha ha!) and the spin that goes on between the government, the media and the citizens and the incredible inanity of those who engage in the spin control.

MOON is the outstanding debut feature from Duncan Jones about Sam Bell, an astronaut almost done with a 3-year contract harvesting fuel on the moon who begins to have doubts and confusions about his employer, and himself.

BIG FAN is a brilliant debut from the writer of THE WRESTLER (Robert D. Siegel) about a football fan (of the utmost super obsessed variety) whose chance encounter with the star of his favorite team throws his entire life into question. This film features one of the greatest sports revenge scenes of all time.

DEPARTURES won the Best Foreign Film Academy Award in 2009. Hailing from Japan, the film is about a cellist who seeks new employment after his orchestra disbands and finds himself working as the person who prepares a corpse for his funeral and for the afterlife.

THE BURNING PLAINS is a tale of love and passion and guilt and hard life lessons starring Kim Basinger and Charlize Theron. Out this week is also FAME 2009, PASSING STRANGE (Spike Lee), POST GRAD (Alexis Bledel), HALLOWEEN II (the Rob Zombie version), and bunches more, including a couple new HIGHLIGHTED NEW ADDITIONS from Jeff (THE ALEJANDRO JODOROSKY BOX SET) and GLEE: THE COMPLETE FIRST SEASON. Please read on to hear about the individual movies.

Hey check out this interesting factoid. Netflix has made some concessions for their streaming services with Warner Bros film releases and they will no longer be carrying those hard-copy titles until 30 days after their release dates. Just another great reason to sign up for a Kenflix membership today.

My wife, Amy Shelf, is a Bernal based estate-planning attorney. Each year she sends out some information about her services. She posted this years email online and posted a separate blog entry about her philosophy for the coming year. She comes very highly recommended on the various Bernal listservs and would love to help you with your planning. Email her with any questions about her services.

SUCCULENCE is open Tues-Sunday, we are working hard to get people back there. You must walk all the way through Four Star to see the retail shop in the barn. Come check it out, and take a look at these awesome pics of the place.

Alrighty then, see you down at the store.

Love and Kisses,
Ken

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............//NEW RELEASES//............


A L’AVENTURE.
Drama/Erotic/Foreign (Fench)
Carole Brana.
Directed by Jean-Claude Brisseau.
* Ah, l’adventure of buying movies. Sometimes the gems are hidden and you must take a chance to find the perfect amazing foreign film that illustrates clearly what is so sorely missing in Hollywood…other times? Softcore arrives in the new release box and is slightly embarrassing. Either way, someone will probably dig this film from “Europe’s most daring director” (EXTERMINATING ANGELS, SECRET THINGS) about a young woman’s odyssey to find the perfect ‘la petit mort”.

APPEARED.
Horror/Foreign (Spanish).
Ruth Diaz/Javier Pereira.
Directed by Paco Cabezas .
* Then disappeared. Now re-appeared. Made in 2007, this horror film has a basis in reality. It is the story of a brother and sister traveling in Argentina who, through the finding of a diary detailing horrible tortures and murders, begin to witness the horrors they have read about. At the root of the story are the more than 30,000 people whose lives were destroyed by the Argentinean military dictatorship.

BIG FAN.
Drama/Comedy.
Patton Oswalt/Kevin Corrigan/Marcia Kurtz/Jonathan Hamm.
Directed by Robert Siegel.
* Ah to be a big fan of a sports team, to experience life as though the stars of your team are perhaps your friends; the shock and dismay when you realize these people don’t actually know your name. In BIG FAN, Paul Aufiero (Oswalt), along with his best bud Sal (Corrigan), are super duper sports-crazed New York Giants football fans. If you are a sports fan, you know what I mean. If you are not, think obsessive compulsive mixed with delusional and hopeful. These guys nearly bleed the blue and red of their team’s colors. However, when the unimaginable happens, and they have a chance encounter with their favorite player, defensive specialist Quantrell Bishop (Hamm), they cannot control themselves from trying to meet him, and things go terrible wrong. Finally, Paul is left with the biggest dilemma. How to reconcile reality with fantasy? Is it possible to still be a fan, even though his favorite team has literally beaten him down (as opposed to the metaphoric ways our favorite teams beat us down). Paul is no fair-weather fan, and the problem consumes him, as he searches for ways to make the situation better. Eventually, his resolution is so sublime, so thorough, and so complete, that it will make you cackle while watching, giggle while brushing your teeth twenty minutes later, and snort as you are falling asleep. With a terrific performance from Marcia Kurtz as Paul’s mother who wishes he would just grow up.

THE BURNING PLAIN .****ALSO ON BD****
Drama/Romance/Mystery/Foreign (English and Spanish).
Charlize Theron/Kim Basinger/Jennifer Lawrence/Robin Tunney.
Directed by Guillermo Arriaga.
* Written and directed by on the writers of BABEL and a producer of 21 GRAMS, this complicated film takes place during several time periods and deals with impulsive decisions, passions spinning out of control and eventually grief and guilt being processed and moved past.

DEPARTURES .
Drama/Music/Foreign (Japanese).
Masahiro Motoki/Tsutomu Yamazaki.
Directed by Yôjirô Takita.
* Yes, this film won the Best Foreign Language Film of the Year last year at the Oscars, and it also won 31 other awards world-wide. It is the story of a cellist who becomes unemployed when his orchestra disbands. With his wife, he moves back to his hometown and begins the arduous process of searching for a new gig. What he finds is a job unlike any he expected - he becomes a Nokanshi, someone who prepares dead bodies for their funeral and for the journey into the unknown. While the job is challenging, and painful, and a little yucky, he discovers the poetry in it and with great grace and love helps to usher his “clients” to the other side.

DOWNLOADING NANCY.
Drama/Suspense/Thriller.
Jason Patric/Maria Bello.
Directed by Johan Renck.
* Nancy (Bello) is an unhappy wife, who leaves her husband and hires someone she meets online (Patric, remember him from THE LOST BOYS?) to kill her. Instead they fall into a sort of sadomasochistic love affair. Ouch! Oh!

FAME.****ALSO ON BD****
Comedy/Drama/Family/Musical/Romance.
Kay Panabaker/Naturi Naughton.
Directed by Kevin Tancharoen.
* This remake of the 1980’s hit that spawned a TV series takes on the same stories of youth at the New York City High School for the Performing Arts.

GOLIATH.
Comedy/Indie/Mumblecore.
Nathan Zellner/David Zellner/Caroline O’Connor.
Directed by David Zellner.
* In this more then slightly off the beaten path mumblecore film, a man who has lost everything he values in his life (his job, his wife, etc) focuses all of his emotion on the TRAGIC loss of his cat, Goliath, for whom he searches desperately in this strangely (and somewhat painfully) weird film.

HALLOWEEN II (2009).
Horror.
Sheri Moon Zombie.
Directed by Rob Zombie.
* Those crazy Zombie’s are at it again, in this sequel remake to their original remake of the horror cult classic.

THE HURT LOCKER.****ALSO ON BD****
War/Action/Drama.
Jeremy Renner/Anthony Mackie/Brian Geraghty.
Directed by Kathryn Bigelow.
* We have been at this current war now in Iraq for just shy of seven years and we have already had countless narrative and documentary films about the toll this war has taken on the world. In this film, although we are introduced to several compelling characters, and introduced to their story and their experience, the main theme that is explored is addiction, and war as a drug. Humans must love war on some level, as we’ve engaged in it almost constant for all of time. Why can’t we all just get along? Not sure, but this film seems to suggest we just must have War, the way all addictions must be had. In this case, the user is Sgt Will James. With a baby boy at home, and a partner (who may or may not be his wife), he seems to have many reasons to survive the war and get safely home. However, the manner with which he goes about his business suggests otherwise. And his business? Why defusing bombs of course. Sgt. James puts on a suit that looks like some sort of alien battle gear full of heavy armor, and walks up to improvised explosive devices (IED’s in the industry) which have been left lying around Baghdad by insurgents either to be triggered remotely with a cell phone, or run over by a vehicle and designed to cause maximum damage (we see early on in a slow-motion scene that shows just how maximum the damage these things cause) and defuses them. He’s a bit of a renegade (as I guess someone who has defused 873 bombs is liable to be), and constantly puts his fellow team in danger because of his wing nut decision-making (like taking off his headset when he doesn’t want to hear what is being said). This does not make him popular, but this doesn’t seem to faze him. He is sort of a savant, or you could simply call him a junky, who does what he must without much consideration for who might get hurt by the consequences, simply because he must have his junk (adrenaline for James). The film is full of the heavy tension you might expect from a war zone, but no rah-rah pretension of some other war films. It is plain and simply terrible in Baghdad, like a bomb ready to go off. That we are prepared to go off. That we are waiting to explode. In the main character’s hands, over and over and over again.

I CAN DO BAD ALL BY MYSELF.
Comedy/Drama.
Tyler Perry/Taraji P. Henson/Adam Rodriguez/Gladys Knight.
Directed by Tyler Perry.
* Perry is back with another story in the tales of Madea. In this, Madea catches some teens robbing her home and sends them back to live with their nearly inaccessible Aunt April, a torch song singer who is struggling hard in her personal life.

IN PRAISE OF OLDER WOMEN.
Drama.
Tom Berenger/Karen Black/Susan Strasberg/Helen Shaver/Alexandra Stewart.
Directed by George Kaczender.
* Berenger (THE BIG CHILL) starred in this 1978 film about a young Hungarian man during war times (WWII) who turns to married women much older than him to learn about love and sex.

IN THE LOOP.****ALSO ON BD****
Comedy/Satire.
Peter Capaldi/Tom Hollander/Gina McKee/James Gandolfini/Chris Addison.
Directed by Armando Iannucci.
* This zany ‘who-said-what?” comedy is about media, government, spin and foul mouthed public employees (See: Daly, Chris). Heck, even Chris might blush listening to Peter Capaldi’s Malcolm Tucker, the Prime Minister of the UK’s head spin-doctor and the creative ways he thinks of dropping F-bombs on everyone around him. Tucker’s f-ing pissed the f off. He can’t f-ing believe the f-ing morons who run around acting like they know what the f-ing f they do and he’s especially in a state of shock regarding f-ing Simon Foster, the British Secretary of some f-ing thing or another. See Foster (Hollander) accidentally didn’t ride the exact center of the political fence in a radio interview about a possible up-coming war, and now every outlet, internet-based and otherwise, is running with the story. But what does it mean, will there be a war? Won’t there be a war? Does the public want a war? Does all the confusion change anyone’s mind? Wtf-ing f, right!? With Gandolfini (THE SOPRANOS) as a US General against the idea of going to war, but also dealing with the uncontrollable spin-machines of Washington, D.C.

MOON.****ALSO ON BD****
Sci-Fi/Drama/Thriller.
Sam Rockwell/Kevin Spacey.
Directed by Duncan Jones.
* Looks like Zowie Bowie grew up! Yes, Duncan Jones, the director of this film, is the 38-year-old son of David Bowie, the one he wrote “Kooks” for. If this incredible feature-film debut is any indication, he is in for a long career as a terrific film maker. Rockwell plays Sam Bell, an astronaut working on the moon for the corporation Lunar Industries mostly harvesting helium-3, which is a tremendous fuel source for earth. Sam’s contract is almost up, and he longs to go back to earth to his wife and young daughter. However, an accidental breach of the system enables him to make an insane and confusing discovery that makes him question everything he thinks about himself, and about his employers. Knowing his discovery puts him at risk, he must secretly plan a way to get himself off the moon and back to earth. Meanwhile, his only companion (besides himself) is the computer known as GERTY (Spacey, robotic, yet human) which assists him in all aspects of his job.

PASSING STRANGE: THE MOVIE.
Musical.
De'Adre Aziza/Daniel Breaker/Eisa Davis.
Directed by Spike Lee.
* This is a filming of the Broadway show about a young black musician who throws away the stylings of his Los Angeles based childhood and travels in Europe in order to expose himself to different experiences and broaden his reality. Narrated by Stew who also wrote the story, loosely based on his own experiences.

POST GRAD.
Comedy.
Alexis Bledel/Zach Gilford/Michael Keaton/Carol Burnett/J.K. Simmons.
Directed by Vicky Jenson.
* Cute and clever film about a recent college grad who moves back in with her family while trying to figure out what to do next.

RE-GENERATION.
Sci-Fi/Thriller.
Peter Stebbings.
Directed by Anais Granofsky.

............//DOCUMENTARY/............

BY THE PEOPLE: THE ELECTION OF BARACK OBAMA.
Documentary.
Barack Obama/John McCain/Michelle Obama.
Directed by Amy Rice and Alicia Sams .
* Produced by Edward Norton, this doc follows Barack on the road to the White House from 2006 through the successful election.

............//TELEVISION/............

GLEE: SEASON ONE, VOL.1: ROAD TO SECTIONALS.
Musical/Comedy/TV.
Dianna Agron/Chris Colfer/Jane Lynch/Kevin McHale.
Created by Ian Brennan and Brad Falchuk and Ryan Murphy and others.
* Ah, the guilty pleasure (as someone here put it yesterday) of watching this new show about a high school glee club. Nominated for 4 Golden Globes, the show obviously is doing something right. Full of singing and dancing and covers of many modern hits.

THE SIMPSONS: THE COMPLETE TWENTIETH SEASON.
Comedy/Animation/TV.
Bart/Homer.
* They appear to have skipped seasons 13-19 and gone straight from season 12 to 20.

............//MORE NEW HIGHLIGHTED ADDITIONS/............

REVIEWS BY JEFF.

THE ALEJANDRO JODOROSKY BOX SET.
FANDO Y LIS (1968), EL TOPO (1970), THE HOLY MOUNTAIN (1973).
Directed by Alejandro Jodorowsky.
* Chilean-born Alejandro Jodorowsky is like the mutant love-child of
Luis Bunuel and Werner Herzog. His LSD-induced mysticism blends
religious iconography with the freakish...

............//NEW ON BLU/............

FINAL DESTINATION 4.
The horror.

............//REPLACEMENT DISCS/............

BACK TO THE FUTURE 2.
Comedy/80’s Sci-Fi.

DOCTOR WHO: THE COMPLETE FIRST SEASON.

TWO BROTHERS.

****

****new release list no.250

Happy New Year. They tell me I should call it Twenty Ten. But I find myself saying Two Thousand Ten. They’ll never make me change! Never! All joking aside, I do find it funny that I spent most of my life waiting for “The Year Two Thousand” and now its ten years later. That feels strange. I wonder if the first ten years of the 21St Century were like the first ten years of the 20th. Do decades have similar flavors in the time-space continuum? I remember reading in high school something about this. I wonder if it will continue in this new decade. Some amazing things were invented in the1910’s. Much of Einstein’s great work was done then, such as the amazing Einstein Field Equation, you know, this one:



Yeah, that seems like a big, NO DUH, now, but back then, this was magical stuff. Also, cars – bunches of cars and many of their most exciting features were invented then. Not to mention, stainless steel, Boy Scouts (and Girl Scouts, just a scant two years later), minimum age working laws, Youtube (alright you got me, I made that up…), heck my name, Kenneth, was the 30th most popular name in that decade (as opposed to 116th in this last decade). See – things are interesting! Interesting is good, in that it remains of interest, as opposed to boring, or worse – uninteresting.

Unfortunately, some of the films out this week are uninteresting, so this bloggle (blog+babble) is about all you got. Although we do have at least several little indie and foreign films that some of you may quite enjoy. Such as LOREN CASS, the story of a group of kids in Florida trying to make sense of their senseless Floridian existence on the heels of race riots in St. Petersburg, or ADAM, a romantic comedy about a young man with Asperger's and a woman with a nice ass (awful, fail, delete -bad bad pun, really, I’m sorry, but I couldn’t resist) who fall in love – I hear this film rivals 500 DAYS OF SUMMER if you liked that one. Then there is LORNA’S SILENCE about two Albanian immigrants in Belgium making bad deals with gangsters in order to survive, and LAILA’S BIRTHDAY, a close look at life in occupied Palestine through the eyes of a father trying not to disappoint his daughter on her 7th birthday. The Hollywood films we got this week are 50 DEAD MEN WALKING, but I’m not sure where they are walking to; and FINAL DESTINATION 4 – THIS TIME WE REALLY MEAN IT (that last part is not in the printed title, but I am pretty sure that’s what they meant). The indie film TRUCKER starring Michelle Monaghan is about a young truck driver whose carefree existence is changed forever when her erstwhile 10-year-old son comes to live with her. In the regular release department, the final and probably most important release of the week is the 3rd season of BIG LOVE, the popular HBO series about polygamists with the polygamost. They own a successful business; they are cute and smart and witty; they have a swimming pool! It’s the good life!

By the way, January marks a new HIGHLIGHTED NEW ADDITIONS month at Four Star Video, and Jeff (as usual) has filled his section with some excellent picks. He had us get a batch of Woody Allen films we only had on VHS, as well as LADY SNOWBLOOD, THE EXILES, ALICE, THE TOMORROW SHOW WITH TOM SNYDER: PUNK & NEW WAVE (featuring Iggy, Elvis Costello, The Ramones and so many more), ZABRISKIE POINT and a few more. Scroll down to read his reasoning and reviews for all his picks.

Guess what? In the week since I last wrote, both Reinvintage and the retail photography supply and print shop at Kingmond Young Studios opened. Both stores look great, so let’s head down to these establishments and welcome them to the neighborhood.

In honor of the 2009 version of Fame, I thought I’d share this amazing time capsule. You want fame? Well fame costs…and right here is where you start paying.

Love and Kisses,
Ken

p.s. - People are always asking me what film the photos I post are from, and since I am unable to figure out how to post captions, I will start posting the info in this spot each week. This week's photo is from the Award-winning series BIG LOVE.

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............//NEW RELEASES//............

ADAM.
Comedy/Drama/Romance.
Hugh Dancy/Rose Byrne/Amy Irving.
Directed by Max Mayer.
* This is not your typical rom-com. Two neighbors, both dealing with serious issues (he has Asperger's Syndrome, and she has been through a painful breakup), find solace in each others company and begin a relationship. There is much debate online about which is better, ADAM of 500 DAYS OF SUMMER, with many agreeing that ADAM is the superior film…

50 DEAD MEN WALKING.****ALSO ON BD****
Action/Suspense.
Ben Kingsley/Jim Sturgess/Rose McGowan.
Directed by Kari Skogland.
* Based on a true story, this film follows Marty McGartland, a young Irish street kid who gets recruited by the Brits to spy on the IRA for them.

THE FINAL DESTINATION 4 (IN 3-D, 2-D and Triple D).
Horror.
Bobby Campo.
Directed by David R. Ellis.
* Are we there yet?

LAILA’S BIRTHDAY .
Drama/Foreign (Arabic).
Mohammed Bakri.
Directed by Rashid Mashawari.
* A former Judge in Palestine, who is forced to be a taxi driver because of government instability, struggles mightily to provide a good birthday for his 7-year-old daughter. This important film deals with real life in the occupied territory.

LOREN CASS.
Indie/Drama.
Kayla Tabish/Travis Maynard.
Directed by Chris Fuller.
* Ah, Florida, hotbed of so much, teen angst, political turmoil, retirement communities, Cuban strife, sweet citrus, cocaine, and the hot hot sun. This film takes place in St. Petersburg in the later portion of the 1990’s (two decades ago, kinda) after race riots divided the community, and concerns youth struggling to make sense of the senselessness of it all. Featuring a slamming soundtrack, and extraordinary performances by many no-name actors, it is a triumph that this film made it here to the video store at all.

LORNA’S SILENCE.
Drama/Foreign (French/Albanian).
Arta Dobroshi/Jeremie Renier/Alban Ukaj/Fabrizio Rongione.
Directed by Jean-Pierre Dardenne and Luc Dardenne.
* This film highlights the uncertainty of immigrant life, and the challenges that can be faced to make their dreams come true. It is the story of two young Albanians (Lorna and Sokol) living in Belgium. They struggle financially and long to open a snack bar. Unfortunately they don’t have the money. Enter aspiring mobster Fabio who has concocted a plan for Lorna to marry Claudy to gain citizenship and then to marry another guy for big bucks that will enable her dreams to come true. For it all to work out, Fabio must deal with Claudy, and Lorna must keep the whole thing a secret.

THE MINISTERS.
Drama/Suspense/Crime.
John Leguizamo/Harvey Keitel.
Directed by Franc Reyes.
* Murder, intrigue, deception, cops, revenge. You know the drill. Do you like Keitel? Then watch this film.

TRUCKER.
Drama.
Michelle Monaghan/Nathan Fillion/Benjamin Bratt/Joey Lauren Adams.
Directed by James Mottern.
* This indie is about a carefree truck-driving lady whose life gets thrown into turmoil when her 10-year-old son comes to live with her. The film won 5 awards on the festival circuit.

............//TELEVISION/............

BIG LOVE: THE COMPLETE THIRD SEASON.
Drama/Polygamy/HBO.
Bill Paxton/Jeanne Tripplehorn/Chloe Sevigny/Ginnifer Goodwin.
* Ah, Mormon life. I still remember hearing that Prop 8 should pass because marriage should only be between a man and a woman, and another woman, and another woman. I don’t know; it seems tricky. It’s hard enough trying to keep it together with one other person. Three partners? Yikes. As anyone who has watched this show knows, it ain’t easy for Bill Henrickson (Paxton) either. Between the challenges of domestic life times three, and running his business, and keeping ahead of the government and the uber-orthodox cult of Mormonism that he is beholden to, as well as hiding his marriages from the general public, it’s a wonder Bill has any space to kick back, drink a beer and watch some BYU on the tv.

............//KIDS/............

THE BACKYARDIGANS: JOIN THE ADVENTURER’S CLUB.

BUGS BUNNY’S CUPID CAPERS.

IRON MAN ARMORED ADVENTURES: VOLUME 2.

MAX AND RUBY: PLAYTIME WITH MAX AND RUBY.

NICKELODEON: WE LOVE OUR FRIENDS.

............//HIGHLIGHTED NEW ADDITIONS/............

ALL REVIEWS BY JEFF

ALICE.
Animation/Fantasy/Horror/Foreign (Czech).
Kristyna Kohoutova.
Directed by Jan Svankmajer.
* Here’s a Czech surrealist take on Alice in Wonderland. Director Jan
Svankmajer continues to use a creepy blend of live-action and
stop-motion animation and shows his fascination with insects and raw
meat.

THE EXILES.
Drama.
Directed by Kent MacKenzie.
* Try as I might, I can’t top Carlos Velasquez’s review of this film on
Amazon.com:

“The Exiles is an unpretentious, sincere film, done with the heart,
and the director apparently allowed the actors – mostly Native
Americans – to be themselves and play their culture. This exceptional
movie depicts a well-known, sad part of our society, with defeated
human beings, with defeated minds, as the main characters. It doesn't
matter where the plot takes place – the city or the reservation – the
stories are always the same. This is especially revealed in the long
scene in which the boys go to party on a hill in the city Los Angeles
known as Hill X, in which they drink and play the drums all night
long, as they did in their reservations. This is their way to
reminisce about their culture, their parents, their childhood, and
their land”.

THE EXQUISITE SHORT FILMS OF KIHACHIRO KAWAMOTO .
Animation/Foreign (Japanese).
Directed by Kihachiro Kawamoto.
* Beautiful stop motion animation from Japanese artist Kihachiro Kawamoto, who studied under the great Czech animator Jiri Trnka. These short films draw from traditional Japanese folk stories, Noh and Kabuki theatre. There are also a couple of cutout animation films set in modern-day, including one written by Kobo Abe (Woman in the Dunes).

LADY SNOWBLOOD.
Action/Drama/Thriller/Foreign (Japanese and English).
Directed by Toshiya Fujita.
* Um... what DIDN’T Tarantino steal from this movie? The Kill Bill-Lady Snowblood comparisons are endless. You've got the woman out for revenge (complete with list of people she's going to kill), story structure that's divided into chapters, and even the same god damn pop song. The Japanese original is artful, kick-ass and a whole lot of fun and remains one of the all-time great revenge flicks.

THE TOMORROW SHOW WITH TOM SNYDER: PUNK & NEW WAVE.
Television/Rock!
Directed by Ron de Moraes and Dan Funk.
* Uber-square Tom Snyder used to host a show that featured cutting edge musical acts. The list of names includes The Ramones, The Jam, Iggy Pop, Joan Jett, Elvis Costello and Patti Smith.

WILD COMBINATION: A PORTRAIT OF ARTHUR RUSSELL.
Documentary.
Directed by Matt Wolf.
* Arthur Russell’s music is hard to classify. Avant-garde electronic disco pop with cello? Whatever it is, it’s dreamy (and dancy) as hell. This documentary shows Arthur’s journey from straight Iowa farm-boy to queer New York underground artist, with a brief dalliance on a hippie
commune in San Francisco. There are insights from friends and admirers including Allen Ginsberg, Philip Glass and Jens Lekman. Be sure to check out the DVD extras for Lekman’s wonderful live take of Russell’s “A Little Lost.”

ZABRISKIE POINT.
Drama/Romance.
Directed by Michangelo Antonioni.
* Antonioni’s worst feature length movie features clunky dialogue and clueless acting, but it’s notable perhaps for the great soundtrack (Pink Floyd, Kaleidoscope, Grateful Dead) and glimpse into California counterculture of the 70s. Real-life Black Panther Kathleen Cleaver even makes a cameo. Most people find the nude hippie love-in at Death Valley most memorable, but for me it’s the spectacular end sequence (let’s just say it ends with a bang…)

WOODY ALLEN COLLECTION SET 3.
Comedy.
Directed by Franc Reyes.
* Woody Allen Collection Set 3
A Midsummer Night’s Sex Comedy (1982) / Zelig (1983) / Broadway Danny
Rose (1984) / The Purple Rose of Cairo (1985) / Hannah and Her Sisters
(1986) / Radio Days (1987) The start of Woody Allen’s love affair with Mia Farrow yielded some of the best films of his career. Too bad that didn’t end so well. Yeeesh. Anyway, if you haven’t seen Hannah and Her Sisters, Purple Rose of Cairo, or ESPECIALLY Zelig, do yourself a favor and catch up with the Wood Man.

............// NEW ADDITIONS/............

THE QUIET AMERICAN.
Drama/Suspense/Crime.
Audie Murphy/Michael Redgrave.
Directed by Joseph L. Mankiewicz.
* From the IMDB: In this adaptation of Graham Greene's prophetic novel about U.S. foreign policy failure in pre-war Indochina, Audie Murphy plays an innocent Young American opposite the older, cynical Brit Michael Redgrave. They play out their widely different views on the prospects stuggle for the hearts and minds of the Vietnamese people in their competition over a young woman. Murphy wants to reform her and make her a typical middle class American housewife; Redgrave accepts her inability to formulate or retain a political ideal and while promising her no real future, he objects to Murphy's attempts to change her.

****

****new release list no.249

Ahhhhh, right?

Another year coming to an end. And you survived it, which is pretty awesome. Close your eyes for a minute. Okay, wait, open them. It’s hard to read with your eyes closed.

Close your psycho-spiritual eyes for a minute and just listen to the inside of your mind.

What is that sound? Is it the sound of music flowing through the internet to your ears (Cornelius – Fantasma, for me right now)? Or it is the sound of the air purification system cleaning the dust out of the air so your nose doesn’t have to do its job? Or perhaps you are hearing the copy machine playing its mad raver house beat as hundreds of critical pieces of paper are processed into their natural destiny. Is it the rattle of files in your head seeking a cabinet? Can you drag those files to the recycle bin?

No? No paper? No purifier? No tunes? Maybe you are not at work (you lucky devil!). Maybe you are taking this week off and filling out an application to your mind for some of that rest and relaxation you’ve been promising yourself all year. Approved!

Yeah? Well, you definitely deserve it. Considering what you’ve been through this year! What a year, right? One of those years it is tempting to want to forget. 2009 is coming to a close, and many people are not so sad to see it go. Understandably, I guess. It has been probably one of the toughest years financially that our country has seen in a long while. Many small businesses suffered this year; countless people lost their homes; lifestyles were altered dramatically up and down the economic spectrum. Unemployment rose, home prices dropped, rentals climbed, credit rates increased and stress followed right along. What a year! Fears that began in the fall of 2008 were realized throughout 2009, and panic was difficult to abate (at least for me!). I certainly worked harder than I like to this year.

But…but…I don’t know. It was also kind of an awesome year, right?

To begin with, this whole financial crisis has really provided some amazing insight to us about frugality, and community and so many other things. Remember first learning about stone soup when you were a kid? How many people had stone soup this year? I’m not sure I dropped a rock in a pot of boiling water, but the meals I had with a can of refried and some rice and chopped cabbage were pretty awesome. And my sense of purpose with my cash (for the most part) has been pretty remarkable as well. Back at the beginning of the year, I pondered (in this very blog) which businesses might not survive 2009 in Bernal Heights, and off the top of my head I can only think of one that didn’t (Ladita) and look how many new things are starting! Succulence, Sandbox, the Bernal Marketplace, fit Bernal Fit, the new State Farm office (it’s an owner-run office, not a franchise), Reinvintage, perhaps a new photo supplies shop on our very block, whatever is gonna go in at floor level of the behemoth that is being built next door to Bernal Marketplace – are there more? Probably. That is a pretty big list for a small neighborhood in financial crisis, isn’t it?
I think I learned this year that unemployment was around 25% during the Great Depression, which somewhat soothed me thinking of the 75% that were employed. That’s a pretty big number.

For those of you out there who are in the midst of financial hardship, I sympathize with you, and I am hopeful for you. I hope for all of us the ability to stay positive, to remain compassionate, to rise above ourselves for the clearest vision (thanks, Amy!) and for the ability to keep our humor, our sense of balance, humility, poetry and awareness. I hope for dignity, preparation, thoughtfulness, open-heartedness, and inner peace. I hope as we contemplate our own fears, we do not become blind to those around us with less, those around us whose resources are dwindling, those around us whose safety net is frayed, or gone completely. I beg the universe to let everyone who works hard for a dream to attain it. I wish for all of us a warm bed, thick blankets, socks without holes, clean underwear and fresh vegetables.

If you are looking for an escape, I hope you can continue to let Four Star Video provide you with one. And if you are looking for a nice little plant to be your friend, then you’ve also come to the right place.

Happy Holidays and Happy New Year! Here’s looking forward to 2010 and the mystery’s that it will reveal.

Alrighty then, see you down at the store.

Love and Kisses,
Ken

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............//NEW RELEASES//............


GRITOS EN LA NOCHE (SCREAMS IN THE NIGHT).
Drama/Suspense/Foreign (Spanish)
Vanina Balena/Alejandro Genes.
Directed by Carlos Silva Nigri.
* The story of a son in town for his father’s funeral, and the local news reporter who knows more than she should about the death.

HIDING VICTORIA.
Drama.
Margo Harshman/Michael Wiseman.
Directed by Dan Chinander.
* Two women, with seemingly little in common, discover that commonality can be found if one looks hard enough. Victoria, a tough young adult, needs to find a job or go to jail. She finds one taking care of a 77-year old woman, Althea. Together they find solace in their secrets.

JENNIFER’S BODY.****ALSO ON BD****
Horror/Comedy.
Megan Fox/Amanda Seyfried/Johnny Simmons.
Directed by Karyn Kusama.
Written by Diablo Cody (JUNO).
* The JUNE production team is at it again, this time tackling the politically sensitive issue of satanic ritualistic killings among rock bands, and homicidal high school cheerleaders. Seriously! Jennifer’s body is coveted by many young men, and, after a somewhat chance meeting with a rock band who has turned to the occult to achieve success, she becomes demonically opposed to giving it to them. In fact, it is the bodies of these young men that Jennifer covets – to dismantle and eat! Ah, but Jennifer has a nice young friend named Needy (Seyfried, from BIG LOVE and MAMMA MIA fame) who is sweet and good and tender and doesn’t like all the senseless killing and decides to put a stop to all the madness. Will Needy escape unharmed? Will any of us?

9 .****ALSO ON BD****
Animation/Sci-Fi/Fantasy/Adventure.
Christopher Plummer/Martin Landau/Jennifer Connelly/John C. Reilly/Crispin Glover.
Directed by Marty Callner.
* This post-apocalyptic fantasy is about a bunch of raggedy dolls awakening in a world where most everything has been destroyed and machines are hunting for any forms of life in order to destroy them.

PARANORMAL ACTIVITY .****ALSO ON BD****
Horror/Mystery/Thriller.
Katie Featherston/Micah Sloat.
Directed by Oren Peli.
* This film somehow got super-hyped on the internet, and has become a bit of a phenomenon. It is about a young couple who is being bothered by a demon in the night that they decide to try to videotape in order to discover what is REALLY going on. I think the lesson is, don’t videotape what you don’t want to see.


A PERFECT GETAWAY.****ALSO ON BD****
Drama/Horror/Mystery.
Steve Zahn/Milla Jovovich/Kiele Sanchez/Timothy Olyphant.
Directed by David Twohy.
* Two couples hiking in beautiful Hawaii become aware of some psychopathic killing that is going on near them and this makes them frightened, distrusting, unfriendly, and inevitably puts their newfound friendship at risk.

WEATHER GIRL.
Comedy.
Tricia O’Kelley/Patrick J. Adams/Mark Harmon.
Directed by Blayne Weaver.
* Stormy weather ahead! Could be thunderclouds! Eminent chance of rain! Probably darkened skies! Take cover, cuz Seattle’s favorite Weather Girl is freaking out over her boyfriend’s cheating ways. And he’s the anchor of the news program. And I think it’s gonna rain!!!

............//DOCUMENTARY/............

BEAUTIFUL LOSERS.
Music/Art/Documentary.
Directed by Aaron Rose and Joshua Leonard
* This art doc follows a loosely connected group of artists in the early 90’s, influenced by Reagan, skateboards, graffiti, and the attitude known as D.I.Y. (do-it-yourself) who created styles and affectations that became well-known (such as the Andre the Giant image) even if they themselves did not.

............//TELEVISION/............

UNITED STATES OF TARA: THE FIRST SEASON.
Comedy/Drama.
Toni Collette.
Created by Diabo Cody.
* More from Diablo Cody! Ah, Tara, she has problems, and mainly they are related to herself. Actually, to different parts of herself. You see, she has dissociative identity disorder, and has at least four completely developed personalities competing for screen time. Yet somehow, she manages being a mom, and raising a family. A truly challenged family, yet what family isn’t?

****