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Dramatic Epics
One of the big Oscar contenders this year, nominated for Best Picture, Cinematography, and Best Supporting Actress, was Atonement (which did win Best Original Score). A young writer alters the lives of her sister (Keira Knightley: Pride & Prejudice, Pirates of the Caribbean) and her sister's lover (James MacAvoy: Last King of Scotland, Wimbledon), and forever alters their sweeping romance over decades, love and war.
Another sweeping romantic epic, Love in the Time of Cholera is the newest film by Mike Newell (Mona Lisa Smile, Donnie Brasco), spanning fifty years in South America as a beautiful woman is wooed by two competing suitors: Javier Bardem (No Country for Old Men, Live Flesh) and Benjamin Bratt (Demolition Man, Abandon). A film about family life and great love and life, Alpha Male is the story of a family that suddenly loses their beloved husband/father, and its impact throughout the years on the previously idyllic family.
Have a Nice Apocalypse
A couple near-future sci-fi are new this week: I Am Legend is the most recent update of the Last Man on Earth (with Vincent Price) and The Omega Man (with Charlton Heston), with Will Smith (I Robot, Wild Wild West) as the last man alive after a virus has wiped out humanity. Smith is a scientist struggling to cure the virus that's left deadly, dark-dwelling, twisted versions of humanity roaming the streets at night. I am Legend is available on DVD and Blu-Ray. Now with Rifftrax!
Southland Tales is our newest time travel/end of the world film. In a dystopian America, a porn star (Sarah Michelle Gellar: Cruel Intentions, The Grudge) has sequestered a politically connected actor (Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson: Walking Tall, The Scorpion King), while Seann William Scott (Mr. Woodcock, Bulletproof Monk) begins a ruse to discredit the militaristic police force... all of which is actually more complicated than it seems in the hands of Donnie Darko director Richard Kelly.
John Woo (Hard Boiled, Mission Impossible 2) produced the new anime feature this week: 
Appleseed: Ex Machina is a science fiction thriller, as a controlled society is upset when the mechanized members of society turn the city-nation of Olympus into a war zone.
Family Films
The new Disney film this week is Enchanted, where Disney plays with their own formulas as a princess (Amy Adams: Junebug, Talladega Nights) steps out of her fairy-tale and into New York. As a divorce lawyer (Patrick Dempsey: Freedom Writers, Sweet Home Alabama) takes her and helps her in a non-magical world, her prince (James Marsden: X-Men, The Notebook) arrives to save his missing damsel, and everyone learns that it's difficult to break into Disney Musical songs in the middle of Manhattan.
A seemingly normal teenager (Alexander Ludwig: The Sandlot 3, MXP: Most Extreme Primate)discovers he's a fantasy hero in The Seeker, and he must travel through time to maintain the delicate balance between light and dark, while being chased by the ominous Rider (Christopher Eccleston: 28 Days Later, The Others).
The skiing documentary Steep is about the world-class skiers who explore untested slopes, where there are no crowds, no ski lifts, and no safety measures, because "without risk... there is no adventure."
Gunplay
Revolver is the newest film from Guy Ritchie (Snatch, Swept Away) is another of his trademark gangster operas. Jason Statham (Crank, The Transporter) is an ex-con involved in an elaborate revenge plot to take down a man who has wronged him (Ray Liotta: Wild Hogs, Goodfellas), though he may have to fight past an even more clever enemy to come out on top.
Comanche Moon is the most recent entry in the Lonesome Dove saga, prequel follows a pair Texas Rangers (Steve Zahn: That Thing You Do, Rescue Dawn and
Karl Urban: The Bourne Supremacy, The Chronicles of Riddick) as they pursue outlaws across the west, and features Val Kilmer (The Salton Sea, Deja Vu) as Captain Inish Scull.
Battlestar Galactica has just released its much anticipated third season on DVD, and we have also picked up the second season of The Adventures of Young Indiana Jones. Rounding out our TV New Releases is the South Park miniseries Imaginationland, a feature-length South Park story.
