****new release list no.164

Sorry about the paint-splattered carpet, but we are just a moment or two away from giving you the full red carpet treatment at Four Star Video! That’s right, just a week or so from now, you’ll be strolling along, browsing videos on our new red carpet. In the meantime, we are taking this opportunity to paint some shelving without too much of a concern about the existing carpet. Such is the luxury of change!

Meanwhile, some long awaited movies have come out this week, most notable THE GOLDEN COMPASS. Available on both Blu-Ray and DVD, this is the adaptation of the popular book by Philip Pullman. Also new to Four Star this week are THE DIVING BELL AND THE BUTTERFLY, 27 DRESSES, BERKELEY, and a batch of other stuff including THE BIG GAY SKETCH SHOW, BERNARD & DORIS (starring Susan Sarandon and Ralph Fiennes), AVIDA (crazy sounding French comedy), NANKING and a few others I will tell you about below.

Also, this Friday night, May 2nd, we are having another Four Star Screening! Please come and join us at 10pm for our showing of WALK HARD: THE DEWEY COX STORY. We will be asking for donations to cover our costs, and as usual there will be candy and soda available for $1. Bundle up and come on down!

A friend of mine passed along this interesting film article from the NY Times a few days ago. It mentions in brief one of my favorite freak films that we carried last year, WR: MYSTERIES OF THE ORGANISM. It’s a good read, hope you enjoy it.

Alrighty then, see you down at the store.

Love and kisses,
Ken

Ps. I now have a list of our for-sale movies in excel format, it may be off a bit, but let me know if you’d like me to email it to you.

............//NEW TITLES//............

AVIDA.
Comedy/French.
Mathieu Kassovitz.
Directed by Gustave de Kervern and Benoit Delepine.
* Have you heard of ketamine? Vitamin K, the kids call it. It is an animal tranquilizer that some people like to inject into their bodies to have very crazy psychedelic experiences. In this film, ketamine addiction and dog-napping just don’t go well together.

BERKELEY.
Drama.
Nick Roth/Henry Winkler.
Directed by Bobby Roth.
* Sex, drugs and rock-n-roll in Berkeley circa 1968 by the guy who brought us THE ELIZABETH SMART STORY.

BERNARD AND DORIS.
Drama/Biopic.
Susan Sarandon/Ralph Fiennes.
* Tobacco zillioniairess Doris Duke’s final days.

THE DIVING BELL AND THE BUTTERFLY.
Drama/Foreign (French).
Mathieu Alnaric/Emmanuelle Seigner.
Directed by Julian Schnabel.
* "Neo-expressionist" artist/painter Julian Schnabel appears to have successfully made the transition to filmmaker. In this tale, the true story of Elle France editor Jean-Dominique Bauby is told. Bauby had a stroke in 1995 that left him almost completely paralyzed except for his left eye. They were going to call this MY LEFT EYE, but MY LEFT FOOT seemed so similar (the previous statement is not true). Blinking out his autobiography, this is the tale of his inner world, a world of both memories and fantasy.

THE DOVE’S LOST NECKLACE.
Foreign (Arabic).
Directed by Nacer Khemir.
* From Amazon “This second feature in Nacer Khemir's Desert Trilogy is a visually ravishing folktale reminiscent of "The Thousand and One Nights." The story revolves around Hassan, who is studying Arabic calligraphy from a grand master. Coming across a fragment of manuscript, Hassan goes in search of the missing pieces, believing that once he finds them, he will learn the secrets of love. With the help of Zin, a lovers' go-between, he meets the beautiful Aziz, Princess of Samarkand. After encountering wars, a battle between false prophets and an ancient curse, he learns that an entire lifetime would not suffice for him to learn the many dimensions of love.”

GIRLS JUST WANT TO HAVE FUN.
Comedy/Musical.
Albert Cohen/Sarah Jessica Parker/Helen Hunt.
Directed by Alan Metter.
* A couple auditions to be the featured couple on a dance program on television.

THE GOLDEN COMPASS. ****ALSO AVAILABLE IN BLU-RAY****
Adventure/Fantasy.
Nicole Kidman/Daniel Craig/Dakota Blue Richards.
Directed by Chris Weitz.

27 DRESSES.
American Cheese-food.
Katherine Heigl.
Directed by Anne Fletcher.
* Soft American cheese-food squeezed through a charming can.

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

NANKING.
Documentary.
Woody Harrelson/Mariel Hemingway.
Directed by Bill Guttentag and Dan Sturman.
* Doc about one of the more terrible events in our illustrious history of atrocities.

THE TRUE STORY OF CHARLIE WILSON.
Documentary.
Directed by Aaron Bowden.
* No seriously, THIS is the way it happened.

............//SERIES//............

THE BIG GAY SKETCH SHOW: COMPLETE FIRST SEASON.
Television/Comedy.
* Sketch comedy by young up and comers.

THE CLOSER: COMPLETE 2nd SEASON.
Crime/TV.
Kyra Sedgwick.
* Season two of the story of Deputy Chief Brenda Johnson of the LAPD and her unorthodox police stylings.

FRIDAY NIGHT LIGHTS: COMPLETE 2nd SEASON.
Football/TV.
* Season two of the highly touted but under watched show about high school football in Texas.

I SPY: SEASON ONE.
Television/Spy.
Bill Cosby/Robert Culp.
* Awesome 1960’s series about a couple of American spies undercover as a tennis pro and his trainer.

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

THE RED BALLOON.
Family/Criterion/Foreign (French).
Directed by Albert Lamorisse.
* Criterion release of the beautiful film about a balloon following a little boy around the streets of Paris.


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

BELLE DE JOUR.
Drama.
Catherine Deneuve.
Directed by Luis Bunuel.
* Sexy and erotic surrealism in the classic Bunuel style.

THE DINNER GAME.
Comedy/Foreign (French).
* Comedy about friends who have a weekly competition to find the biggest idiot to invite to dinner.

FEARLESS.
* First DVD copy of this film about a man who survives an airplane accident and how it changes his life.

HARRIET THE SPY.
* Family story from the famous kids book.

HARVEY KRUMPET.
* Oscar winning animation.

HEAT AND DUST and AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A PRINCESS.
* Two Merchant Ivory films, one a feature (Heat and Dust) and the other a featurette.

JEEPERS CREEPERS 2
* Customer request.

LEAN ON ME.
* First copy of any sort here at the store of this high school principal battling drugs and crime story starring Morgan Freeman.

2001 MANIACS.
* Unfriendly southerners plan on killing yankee tourists. Not nice!

VERDI- AIDA: METROPOLITAN OPERA.
* A little opera for you, perhaps?

****

****new release list no.163

What’s up, what’s up? Lots of new flicks at Four Star Video this week. And lots of stuff on the agenda at the store, as well.

First up, did anyone have a better year of acting in 2007 than Philip Seymour Hoffman? The guy is fantastic. Last week we had BEFORE THE DEVIL KNOWS YOU’RE DEAD, in which he played a reckless brother leading his sibling into a deadly robbery. This week he stars in two of our releases. In CHARLIE WILSON’S WAR, Hoffman plays CIA agent Gust L. Avrakotos, who helps Charlie bring down the Soviet Union. In THE SAVAGES, Hoffman plays Jon Savage, a member of the walking wounded, who is forced by his fathers’ dementia to come to terms with his sister (LAURA LINNEY) and their challenging upbringing. Hoffman is the kind of actor who usually plays the character bits, as he did early in his career in films like MAGNOLIA and BOOGIE NIGHTS. You always wonder with some of these guys (like William H. Macy) what they could do with the real meaty roles, the ones they usually reserve for the thin, tall handsome fellas like Hanks, Cruise, and Crowe (who also had a terrific, albeit un-acclaimed 2007 – 3:10 TO YUMA, AMERICAN GANGSTER). Well, Hoffman is showing us that he can do just about anything; he is adept at creating compassion, empathy and interest, even in unlikable characters.

We also have a bunch of Criterion releases this week, including three from Japanese filmmaker Yasujiro Ozu. These silent films are of the social realism style and tell stories of families in and out of turmoil. We also have some comedy (THE TRAILER PARK BOYS: THE MOVIE), some foreign films (ADAM’S APPLES, NINA’S HEAVENLY DELIGHTS, ROMULUS MY FATHER) a bunch of horror/suspense films including the new one by Guillermo del Toro (THE ORPHANAGE) as well as others (CLOVERFIELD, ONE MISSED CALL). There is indie fare (HANNAH TAKES THE STAIRS) (as opposed to me, I ride the elevator), and drama (STARTING OUT IN THE EVENING). There is comedy TV (TIM AND ERIC: AWESOME JOB, GOOD SHOW), documentary (THE DEVIL CAME ON HORSEBACK), we’ve got some environmentalism (BIG IDEAS FOR A SMALL PLANET) and loads of new kids stuff and new acquisitions to our library including a 1971 Werner Herzog film called EVEN DWARFS STARTED SMALL.

In store news, we are having our carpet installed in a couple weeks, and in the meantime, we will be painting some of the wood shelving. Since the old carpet will be gone, we probably won’t be SUPER careful about the floor, so hopefully some paint spotted (and smelly) old carpet will only be an eyesore for about 2 more weeks. We are so psyched about our new carpet, it brings tears to our eyes (and we’re not talking about the expense either!).

Lastly, thanks to those of you who attended our 2nd outdoor film screening SUPER HIGH ME, which I have been told was very funny and well attended. If you haven’t yet checked out our screenings, they are in the back patio, and we’ll be doing them every few weeks. Look in the front window for information about the next one.

Love and kisses,
Ken

p.s. Email me if you’d like a list of the movies we have on sale right now. And then I can stress about putting that list together!

............//NEW TITLES//............

ADAMS APPLES.
Comedy/Drama/Foreign (Danish).
Ulrich Thomsen/Mads Mikkelsen/Paprika Steen.
Directed by Anders Thomas Jensen.
* From the director who also wrote AFTER THE WEDDING comes this story of a neo-nazi who is sentenced to community service at a church where he struggles with the priest.

CHARLIE WILSON’S WAR.
Drama.
Tom Hanks/Julia Roberts/Philip Seymour Hoffman/Amy Adams/Emily Blunt.
Directed by Mike Nichols.
* In the 1970’s and 80’s, the behemoth that was the Soviet Union loomed like the dark side of the moon on the so-called free world. This is the very unusual story of a couple of renegade Americans in power who get involved in covert operations that help change and shape the world.

CLOVERFIELD.
Action/Suspense/The Monster That Ate New York.
Michael Stahl-David/Lizzy Caplan.
Directed by Matt Reeves.
* POV monster movie filmed from a camera about some young people trying to get out of NY while some sort of monster thing is causing a terrific nuisance.

DEATH OF A CYCLIST.
Drama/Criterion.
Directed by Juan Antonio Bardem
* Javier’s uncle made this 1955 film about a couple having an affair who strike and kill a cyclist accidentally, who offer no help for fear of being exposed.

HANNAH TAKES THE STAIRS.
Drama/Indie.
Greta Gerwig/Mark Duplass.
Directed by Joe Swanberg.
* Little film about a young post-grad interning at a company where she is digging on a couple young men.

I WAS BORN, BUT…
Comedy/Criterion/Foreign (Japanese).
Tatsuo Saito /Tomio Aoki.
Directed by Yasujiro Ozu.
* The first (alphabetically, the 2nd in time sequence) of a trilogy of family based silent films from Japan in the 1930’s. This concerns parallel stories about a young gang of children and their fathers.

NINA’S HEAVENLY DELIGHTS.
Comedy/Queer/Foreign-esque (British).
Shelley Conn/Laura Fraser.
Directed by Pratibha Parmar.
* A young woman heads back to Glascow to take over the family curry house after her father’s death.

ONE MISSED CALL.
Horror/Remake.
Shannon Sossamon/Edward Burns.
Directed by Eric Valette.
* It’s like the video for that John Waite song from the 1980’s, MISSING YOU, where he’s at home, and his ex-girlfriend is knocking on his door, but he’s got his HEADPHONES on, and he can’t hear it, and he’s just trying to convince his friends that he’s not missing her, but he is, and he knows it and we know it and it’s just such a big snafu …. Well, no, it’s really not like that at all.

THE ORPHANAGE. ****AVAILABLE IN BLU-RAY AND DVD****
Horror/Suspense/Foreign (Spanish).
Belen Rueda/Fernado Cayo/Geraldine Chaplin.
Directed by Guillermo del Toro.
* The highly anticipated new film from the guy who brought us PAN’S LABRYNTH. When Laura (Rueda) decides to bring her family to live at her childhood home and open an orphanage for differently abled children, she doesn’t anticipate the supernatural forces that are already habitating the mansion. With one of my faves, Geraldine Chaplin as a psychic.

PASSING FANCY.
Drama/Criterion/Foreign (Japanese).
Takeshi Sakamoto/Tokan Kozzo.
Directed by Yasujiro Ozu.
* Another of the three silent film releases from Ozu, this tale is also from the 1930’s and concerns a newly widowed father struggling to raise his young son.

ROMULUS, MY FATHER.
Drama.
Eric Bana/Franka Potente/Martin Csokas.
Directed by Richard Roxburgh.
* A story of mental illness and a family struggling to raise a young son. Terrific acting make this film quite intriguing.

THE SAVAGES.
Comedy/Drama.
Philip Seymour Hoffman/Laura Linney/Philip Bosco.
Directed by Tamara Jenkins.
* A pair of very dysfunctional siblings are forced to confront their childhood when their father develops dementia and needs them to come together and make decisions about what to do. This is a dark comedy, full of difficult and painful human issues. The three main actors all give critically lauded performances, and this film is a must-see.

STARTING OUT IN THE EVENING.
Drama.
Lauren Ambrose/Frank Langella/Lili Taylor/Adrian Lester.
Directed by Andrew Wagner.
* An aging writer (Langella) is convinced by a young student that his career can be revived and vitalized. Ah, youth…

TOKYO CHORUS.
Criterion/Foreign (Japanese).
Tokihiko Okada/Emiko Yagumo/Tatsuo Saito.
Directed by Yasujiro Ozu.
* This is a silent film like the other two releases from Ozu. Again, the family and it’s relationship to economic status is explored.

THE TRAILER PARK BOYS: THE MOVIE.
Comedy.
Jean Tremblay/Rob Wells/Mike Smith/John Dunsworth.
Directed by Mike Clattenburg.
* I hear this is very funny, if you know the television series of the same name, then you know the humor.

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

BIG IDEAS FOR A SMALL PLANET: 1st SEASON.
Tele-doc-series.
* A show about the planet, and ways we can create solutions to the environmental problems that some very smart scientists claim that we have. But we know they are just kidding and that global warming doesn’t exist. Besides, if we have global warming, then how come it is so cold all the time? Huh? Answer me that! (****SPOILERS: JUST KIDDING).

TIM AND ERIC: AWESOME SHOW, GOOD JOB: SEASON ONE.
Teevee/Comedy.
Tim Heidecker/Eric Wareheim/John C. Reilly/Bob Odenkirk/Richard Dunn/”Weird” Al Yankovic/David Cross.
* Star studded cast for this demented sketch comedy show. Did you like MR. SHOW? Then you’ll dig this…

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

THE DEVIL CAME ON HORSEBACK.
Documentary.
Directed by Annie Sundberg and Ricki Stern.
* A film about the genocide being wrought in Darfur as exposed by a former US Marine named Brian Steidle whose photographs and first-person testimony condemn the government there.

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

BIGFOOT PRESENTS METEOR AND MIGHT MONSTER TRUCKS: V3.
Kids.

POKEMON 4EVER.
Kids.
* Follow Ash Misty and Brock on the adventure of a lifetime. Did somebody say “Battle”?

TODD WORLD: MAKING NEW FRIENDS.
Kids.

WHERE THE WILD THINGS ARE & OTHER MAURICE SENDAK STORIES.
Kids.
* Brilliant and strange, Sendaks’ tales will turn darkness and light upside and expose them to be one and the same.

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

THE ADVENTURES OF ROBIN HOOD.
* First DVD copy of this Errol Flynn masterpiece.

BIG WEDNESDAY.
Surfing.
Jan-Michael Vincent/William Kat/Gary Busey.
Directed by John Milius.
* Epic wave riding by a posse of surfers from the 1960’s.

BLUME IN LOVE.
Surfing.
George Segal/Susan Anspach/Kris Kristofferson.
Directed by Paul Mazursky.
* Customer request about a lawyer in California trying to win back his ex-wife.

THE CELL.
Horror/Suspense.
* First DVD copy of this evidently must-have-on-DVD film.

EVEN DWARFS STARTED SMALL.
Comedy.
Directed by the brilliant Werner Herzog.
* Freaky allegorical tale of rebellion from 1971.

GUMBY: THE MOVIE.vhs
Comedy.
* Too bad you won’t hear Eddie Murphy say “I am Gumby, dammit!” in this lovely rendition of the cartoon classic.

JEFF DUNHAM: ARGUING WITH MYSELF.
Stand-up Comedy.
Jeff Dunham.
* More from the puppet master.

THE LAUGHING POLICEMAN.
Drama.
Walter Matthau/Bruce Dern.
Directed by Stuart Rosenberg.
* Two SF detectives dealing with a mass murder of bus passengers.

SMOKEY AND THE BANDIT.
* Yeah, that film. Burt Reynolds, Sally Field…Jackie Gleason!

SNAKE PEOPLE.
Horror.
Boris Karloff/Charles East
Directed by Juan Ibanez and Jack Hill.
* First copy of any sort of this classic horror film about scientist presiding over an island cult of voodoo worshipers and other assorted freaks.

****

**** new release list no. 162

Our next screening is scheduled for this coming Sunday, April 20th, and it is going to be pretty freaking funny. Chris, this screening’s curator, had been planning on showing HAROLD AND KUMAR GO TO WHITE CASTLE on 4/20, which to those in the know is kind of a stoner monument of sorts. 4/20 is code to some, and to those who don’t know, we suggest GOOGLE. So plug that in there and see what you get. Anyway, so Chris was planning on showing this film until we heard about another movie called SUPER HIGH ME that is opening on a wide scale with over 700 screenings planned all over the country in a variety of venues, none charging admission! In this fascinating documentary, Doug Benson, a stand-up comic fascinated by the vision of SUPER SIZE ME, decides to consume as much marijuana as he can over a 30 day period and documents the affects that it has on his every day life. You can read about this film here: SUPER HIGH ME. We are excited to be taking part in this national screening release party, and we hope you will join us at the store. We will show the movie at 10:00 on Sunday night, April 20th in our outdoor patio at back. Entrance is free, and we will have candy and soda for sale. Please dress very warmly and bring blankets. If you aren’t familiar yet with our screenings, we have a nice projector, about 45 folding chairs, a couple heating lamps and a whole lot of fun. Please join us!

This week we have a couple huge movies as well as a bunch of other interesting sounding stuff. The big titles of the week are BEFORE THE DEVIL KNOWS YOU'RE DEAD (Philip Seymour-Hoffman, Ethan Hawke) and JUNO (Ellen Page, Michael Cera). These films couldn’t be more different; however they are both examples of terrific acting and stories that hit their mark terrifically. Also we have a potpourri of other great looking films from around the world, as well as a posse of hard hitting documentary films.

Hope to see you down at the shop!

Love and kisses,
Ken

............//CO-RELEASES OF THE WEEK//............

BEFORE THE DEVIL KNOWS YOU'RE DEAD. DVD and BLU-RAY****
Drama/Suspense.
Philip Seymour Hoffman/Ethan Hawke/Albert Finney/Marisa Tomei.
Directed by Sydney Lumet.
* Sydney Lumet has been directing since the 1940’s. Think about how amazing that is! He’s made a ton of films, and a bunch of them have been terrific (Dog Day Afternoon, Serpico, The Verdict, Network, 12 Angry Men). Many of his films have been full of New York imagery, and this one is no different. The film actually opens in Rio with Andy Hanson (Hoffman) and his wife Gina (Tomei) having hot vacation sex. A hint or two are dropped about their problems back home, but for the most part, we get an arousing and hopeful couple moment in bed. That’s it for the happy times, folks. The rest of the movie zig-zags around New York and New Jersey, and in and out of time sequence. We get Andy leading his pathetic little brother Hank (Hawke in a tremendous performance) into a terrible scheme. We get their father Charles (Finney) mourning the murder of his wife in an attempted robbery at their little strip-mall jewelry store and determined to find the killer. We get Gina in and out of her clothing, mostly as eye-candy for the men in her life, but wishing she could be more involved. We see Hank struggling to hold the respect of his teenage daughter, while his reputation is ravaged by his own stupid decision making. We see both brothers, drowning in their own increasingly serious problems. We see greed, hate, drugs the bonds that hold together a family disintegrating before our eyes. At the heart, this is a tense, crime-gone-bad story about a man trying to extract his due from a family that he feels wronged him, and the bill that comes due as a result of his actions.

JUNO. DVD and BLU-RAY****
Comedy/Drama.
Ellen Page/Michael Cera/Jason Bateman/Jennifer Garner.
Directed by Jason Reitman.
* How do you make a great film about teen-pregnancy that features a full-on birth scene and have it still seem wholesome? Pop some orange-flavored one-calorie tic-tacs in your mouth and watch. Juno (Page, in what should be a break-through role) is sixteen. She is a foul-mouthed, cynical, smart-ass kid, and a pretty funny one at that. The kind of kid that you wish you hung out with back in the meat-grinder that’s called High School. She’s got a good buddy, a great friend actually named Bleeker (Cera) who for one fateful night becomes about as good a friend as one can have (is that a male opinion? Fine...).
Unfortunately for Juno and Bleek, that night they skip all the great sex education they teach kids in school these days, and Junski ends up preggers. Well, well. That’s where the fun begins. For a minute, it seems like she will take care of the pregnancy with an abortion, but the relatively contrived and mostly not believable scene in the abortion clinic ends that possibility. No, Juno decides to have the baby and give it up for adoption, a decision that she knows will have some socially awkward and physically challenging realities, but she is a kid with fortitude and so it goes. Garner and Bateman play the strangely matched couple who await the child. I really loved the Bateman character, who was maybe kind of a putz, and certainly struggled with emotionally honesty, and perhaps was struggling letting go with his rock star dreams even as he entered his middle-age, and maybe those were all the things I loved about him. Garner is too thin, but seemed well equipped to play her role, and there were moments when her frail openness mixed with her inner fortitude struck very true to me as motherly qualities. All in all, though the writing wasn’t stupendous, the story struck a chord that was very relatable in today’s world. Guess what people, the kids are having sex! And some of them get pregnant. What happens next is up to everyone involved. Juno’s father suggests that hard drugs, school expulsion, or perhaps a DWI would be better than pregnancy. I gotta beg to differ.

............//NEW TITLES//............

ALIEN VS. PREDATOR: REQUIEM.
Horrorish/Sci-Fi.
Reiko Aylesworth/Steven Pasquale.
Directed by Colin Strause and Greg Strause.
* A wittle bitty town in Colorado becomes the battleground for the now classic interplanetary struggle between the alien Facehuggers and the Predators. I think the Predators just have too much offense; I can’t see the Aliens really pulling it out. Then again, it’s hard to predict, that’s why they play the games.

BAMAKO.
Drama/ Foreign (French/Bambara).
Aissa Maiga.
Directed by Abderrahmane Sissako.
* In this trial, the World Bank itself is accused of atrocities against the world with the background of a young bar singer (Maiga) and her out of work husband struggling to stay together.

BEFORE THE DEVIL KNOWS YOUR DEAD.
See Co-Release of the Week.

BLAST OF SILENCE.
Drama/Criterion.
Allen Baron/Molly McCarthy/Larry Tucker.
Directed by Allen Baron.
* 1961 film about a professional killer returning after an absence to NY for one last hit.

I WANT SOMEONE TO EAT CHEESE WITH.
Comedy/Romance.
Sarah Silverman/Jeff Garlin.
Directed by Jeff Garlin.
* A sort of “Confederacy of Dunces” type tale about a big ol’ fella who is living with his mom and having a kind of depressing existence and longs for some companionship to share a nice lump of cheese with.

INSIDE.
Horror/Foreign (French).
Beatrice Dalle/Alysson Paradis.
Directed by Alexandre Bustillo and Julien Maury.
* Super gore-fest about a pregnant woman being terrorized by another woman in her house. See Also: HIGH TENSION.

IN THE NAME OF THE KING.
Action/Fantasy.
Jason Statham/Leelee Sobieski/Ray Liotta/Claire Forlani/Burt Reynolds.
Directed by Uwe Boll.
* Krugs, the evil Gallian, a kidnapped wife, revenge, beasties…you get the picture.

JUNO.
See Co-Release of the Week.

LARS AND THE REAL GIRL.
Comedy/Drama.
Ryan Gosling/Emily Mortimer/Patricia Clarckson.
Directed by Craig Gillespie.
* Pretty awesome sounding tale of a quirky, delusional young man who falls in love with a blow up sex doll he orders on the internet. Cue that great Police tune “Won’t you be my girl, won’t you be my girl, won’t you be my, be my, be my girl…”

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

THE PIED PIPER OF HUTZOVINA.
Roc-Doc/Drama/Foreign (English/Russian/Ukranian).
Euguene Hutz.
Directed by Pavla Fleischer.
* Do you know the band Gogol Bordello? Trust me; they are a very great band. This is essentially a road movie with the lead singer of this band and the filmmaker who loves him as they travel through his native land of Ukraine.

WAR DANCE.
Documentary.
Directed by Sean Fine and Andrea Nix.
* Oscar nominated film about three children living in a displacement camp in Northern Uganda who find purpose and meaning by taking part in the national music and dance festival.

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

IN DEBT WE TRUST.
Documentary.
Directed by Danny Schecter.
* A powerful doc exploring consumer debt and the credit cards we are addicted to.

THIS DIVIDED STATE.
Documentary.
Directed by Steven Greenstreet.
* A doc following the controversy that ensued when the Utah Valley State College invited Michael Moore to speak on campus, and the political battles that ensued between liberals and conservatives regarding his freedom of speech.

RADIO CAPE COD.
Drama.
Directed by Andrew Silver.
* A quartet of love stories directed by the brother of one of our customers.

WAR MADE EASY.
Drama.
Directed by Loretta Alper and Jeremy Earp.
* Narrated by Sean Penn, this film explores the brilliant Orwellian deception that governments everywhere (but in this case, our government) employ to justify the expense and loss of life of wars that it wishes to pursue.

****

****new release list no.161

Thanks to those of you who braved the cold and came to our screening last week. It was fun! We’re hoping to schedule many more of these as the weather gets nicer.

THERE WILL BE BLOOD is our featured release this week. Although I rarely agree with the Academy, I have found most of the lauded films of 07 to be pretty terrific, and this one is no different.

Hey, were you in here last Monday during our plumbing nightmare? It was a bit startling, with quite a lot of water flowing in from upstairs in the apartments above. It was quite a sour lemons moment, but you know what? We are making lemonade with those lemons. Yup, it looks like the new floor we have needed forever is finally around the corner. The question is…what color should it be? Send in your suggestions…

One last reminder about this. Drop off your old electronics on April 13th, between 9am and 2pm, at Fairmount Elementary School (65 Chenery Street at Randall) This is a free E-Waste drop off to raise money for the school. You can drop off: computers, printers, monitors, etc.

Okey-dokey, then.

Love and kisses,
Ken

PS. Here is a short list of the more than 200 titles we have for sale. Our used DVD’s are $8 + tax.

ALPHA DOG, BABEL, BLACK SNAKE MOAN, BREACH, BOURNE ULTIMATUM, FRACTURE, THE GOOD SHEPHERD, I HEART HUCKABEES, LITTLE CHILDREN, THE LIVES OF OTHERS, MAN OF THE YEAR, THE PAINTED VEIL, PREMONITION, RUMOR HAS IT, YELLOW.

............//RELEASE OF THE WEEK//............

THERE WILL BE BLOOD.
Horror.
Daniel Day Lewis/Paul Dano/Ciaran Hinds.
Directed by Paul Thomas Anderson.
* Yes, there will be blood, and there will be some disagreements as well. Winning two Academy’s (BEST ACTOR and BEST CINEMATOGRAPHY) that were well deserved, this film is a deeply dark and relatively demented. And you know what? It’s even kinda funny! You have to have a very weird sense of humor to laugh with this movie, but if you can tap into your inner-weirdo, there are moments of hilarity (take, for example, the baptism scene). You may have heard that this film is “over the top” and “melodramatic” and yes those things are true. But the main subject matters are Oil and Religion, and I don’t think it could have been melodramatic enough. Can any of us truly imagine a world without these things? Our world is dominated by them, and this tale is about a couple of kooks hung up on getting them to the masses. But, it’s also about a couple of kooks hung up on rounding up power to feed some personal demons. And feed them they do. From the opening shot to the last line (one of the best I’ve ever heard), the film depicts a beautiful world of desolation, a private world full of wealth gained through loss and an ocean of oil waiting to be tapped. The sound design is also remarkable, its breadth of instrumentation and its use of chaotic rhythms draws the viewer emotionally deeper and deeper into the abyss. In the end, the argument of which film should or should not have won the BEST FILM Oscar will rage between this and NO COUNTRY FOR OLD MEN long into the future. I, for one, think that this year the Academy got it right. But I also think that THERE WILL BE BLOOD is a must see for any true cineophile, and that it is a triumphant and remarkable achievement.

............//NEW TITLES//............

DAY OF THE DEAD: THE NEED TO FEED.
Horror.
Ving Rhames/Mena Suvari/Nick Cannon.
Directed by Steve Miner.
* Suvari stars in this remake of the George Romero classic.

DEAD FISH.
Action.
Gary Oldman.
Directed by Charley Stadler.
* Crime, drama, homicide and a bit of dark humor thrown in.

INNOCENT VOICES.
Drama/Foreign (Spanish).
Carolos Padilla/Leonor Varela/Xuna Primus.
Directed by Luis Mandoki.
* Very realistic portray of El Salvador in the war-filled 1980’s and a mother trying to protect her son from the fighting around them.

JEFF DUNHAM: SPARK OF INSANITY.
Stand up Comedy.
Jeff Dunham.
* Hilarious stand up, featuring ventriloquism.

LIONS FOR LAMBS.
Drama.
Tom Cruise/Meryl Streep/Robert Redford/Michael Pena.
Directed by Robert Redford.
* Three stories woven together about the current war in Afghanistan and the politics that are driving it.

LOOKING FOR CHEYENNE.
Drama/Lesbian/Foreign (French).
Mila Dekker/Aurelia Petit.
Directed by Valerie Minetto.
* A disgruntled journalist leaves her lover and her home to find a simpler life. Her lovers’ attempts to get over her leave her flummoxed.

RESERVATION ROAD.
Drama/Suspense.
Joaquin Phoenix/Mark Ruffalo/Jennifer Connelly/Mira Sorvino.
Directed by Terry George.
* Tragic tale of a hit and run car accident that kills a boy and the anger, sorrow and guilt felt by the driver (Ruffalo) and the family who loses their son (Connelly and Phoenix).

RESURRECTING THE CHAMP.
Drama
Samuel L. Jackson/Josh Hartnett/Alan Alda/Peter Coyote.
Directed by Rod Lurie.
* Tale of a young sportswriter (Hartnett) who discovers that the homeless guy (Jackson, in another terrific performance) he has helped is actually a boxing champion who has been believed to be dead.

THERE WILL BE BLOOD.
See Release of the Week.

TICK TOCK LULLABY.
Drama/Romance/Lesbian.
Joanna Bending/Raquel Cassidy/Lisa Gornick.
Directed by Lisa Gornick.
* The struggles to have a baby both in a heterosexual or a homosexual relationship are chronicled in this true family values movie (take that, Right Wing!).

WALK HARD: THE DEWEY COX STORY. **** BLU-RAY AND DVD.
Comedy.
John C. Reilly/Jenna Fischer.
Directed by Jake Kasdan.
* Comedy from the Judd Apatow production team featuring Reilly as Dewey Cox, a hard rocking music icon. Dig the Beatles scenes…that’s good casting.

WATER HORSE: THE LEGEND OF THE DEEP.
Adventure/Fantasy.
Alex Etel/Emily Watson.
Directed by Jay Russell.
* Sort of a Loch Ness Monsterish tale about a creature and a boy in Scotland.
From the book by Dick King-Smith, who had his first book published at the ripe age of 57. So don’t be discouraged!

THE WORLD ACCORDING TO SHORTS.
Lots/Foreign (Many).
Directed by Hugo Maza and Daniel Skill and Hans Petter Moland and Adam Guzinski and Jane Malaquias and Andreas Hykade.
* A collection of six shorts from Chile, Australia, Norway, Poland, Brazil and Germany.

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

THE 11th HOUR.
Documentary.
Directed by Nadia Connors and Leila Connors Peterson.
* This pet project narrated and produced by Lenny DiCaprio is a stark look at Earth’s ecosystems and global environment concerns and details some potential ways we can change things before the midnight bell tolls on our fair planet.

FOG CITY MAVERICKS.
Documentary.
George Lucas/Francis Ford Coppola/John Lasseter/Sophia Coppola/Saul Zaentz.
* A doc celebrating the famed filmmakers of this tremendous nook.

MANDA BALA (SEND A BULLET).
Documentary/Foreign (Brazil)
Directed by Jason Kohn.
*An expose of sorts of Brazil’s class warfare.

............//SERIES//............

THE 4400: COMPLETE 2nd SEASON.
Television/Sci-Fi.
* More weirdness about those 4400 missing persons who have all suddenly returned. Where have they been? Crouching and hidden? Oh, shit, that’s a different movie.

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

DEXTER: THE FIRST SEASON.
Replacement copies already for this show. RIP D-Skins.

THE INSPECTOR GENERAL.
Musical.
Danny Kaye.
* Brilliant musical comedy featuring the genius of Danny Kaye.

LIFE SIZE.
* I cannot tell you how psyched I am to watch this Tyra Banks and LINDSAY LOHAN extravaganza. Until you’ve lived and lost like Lindsay…well, you know where I am going with this. I can tell you for certain, this is the first copy of any sort we’ve had of this fine flick.

THE NOTORIOUS BETTIE PAGE.
Replacement DVD of the biopic about Ms. Page.

SIX FEET UNDER: THE COMPLETE 4th SEASON.
Replacement DVD’s of this well-loved HBO series.

SUPER SIZE ME.
Replacement DVD of this documentary that grows to epic proportions.

****