| <--prev |
Sweeping Epic
The historic, romantic epics always come out during Oscar season, and this week ushers in the release of Baz Luhrmann's (Moulin Rouge!, Romeo+Juliet) Australia. Set in the1939, an aristocrat (Nicole Kidman: Cold Mountain, The Golden Compass) travels from England to the outback to find her husband dead and his cattle ranch struggling to stay afloat. Out of her element in the rough and immediately making enemies by firing the corrupt cattle station manager (David Wenham: 300, The Proposition), which leaves her with only one employee (Hugh Jackman: X-Men, The Prestige), an unrefined drover unwilling to take orders. The two have to bring the cattle in to save their fortunes, and their long journey is constantly being sabotaged by their competitor (Bryan Brown: F/X, Along Came Polly) who wants to monopolize the cattle in Australia, but their adventure forms a bond between them that can last years, survive a world war, and span the globe. On DVD and Blu-Ray.
Comedies
A pair of PG movies are new this week. Beverly Hills Chihuahua is a talking dog adventure/comedy from Disney, with Drew Barrymore (Music & Lyrics, The Wedding Singer) providing the voice providing the voice for a little dog named Chloe, who gets separated from her owners (Piper Perabo: First Snow, Coyote Ugly and Jamie Lee Curtis: Christmas with the Kranks, True Lies) in Mexico and has to make her own Incredible Journey home. Ace Ventura Jr stars Josh Flitter (Nancy Drew, Horton Hears a Who) as the son of Ace Ventura, Pet Detective, who follows in his father's madcap footsteps to solve the mystery of a missing baby panda.
On the not-so-family-friendly front, the unfortunately titled Extreme Movie is a teen sex sketch movie, more along the lines of The Kentucky Fried Movie and Amazon Women on the Moon than more recent films like Epic Movie and Disaster Movie. The sketch film has a large ensemble cast, including Denise Boutte (Why Did I Get Married?), Vanessa Lee Chester (Harriet the Spy), Bryon Cotton (Holes), Patirck Adams (Old School), Ben Feldman (Cloverfield), Kyle Gass (Tenacious D, Elf), and Michael Cera (Juno, Superbad).
Subtitles
I've Loved You So Long features a Golden Globe nominated performance by Kristin Scott Thomas (The Other Boleyn Girl, The English Patient) as a woman who reconnects with her family after a fifteen year prison sentence. With nowhere else to go, she moves in with her 
estranged sister (Elsa Zylberstein: Modigliani, Jefferson in Paris), and the two women face an uphill battle against their shared past.
Since the prints of the original were lost, Wong Kar Wai (In the Mood for Love, My Blueberry Nights) composed a Redux of Ashes of Time, a sweeping period epic about a fallen swordsman (Leslie Cheung: Happy Together, The Bride with White Hair), and the paths taken by the fighters that once worked for him (Tony Leung: Infernal Affairs, Lust, Caution and Jacky Cheung: Once upon a Time in China, Wicked City), and the woman he loved (Bridgette Lin: Police Story, Chungking Express).
Love and Honor is Yoji Yamada's (The Hidden Blade, Twilight Samurai) third film in his samurai trilogy, about a low ranking samurai (Takuya Kimura: Hero, 2046) and his wife whose way of life is threatened when he loses his sight in an accident.
Smaller titles
Troy Garity (Steal This Movie, Sunshine) is on the run from drug dealers in the drama Lake City, and ends up finding refuge with his mother (Sissy Spacek: Carrie, Hot Rod) in his childhood home, and the family must heal the wounds of their past to face the future that lies ahead. With Rebecca Romijn (X-Men, Rollerball).
An old fashioned barber (John Ratzenberger: Cheers, Toy Story) has to make some 
changes after his partner dies in The Village Barbershop. After running a "man's man" operation, he keeps his business open by doing the unthinkable: he hires a woman (Shelly Cole: Prey for Rock and Roll, Art School Confidential). The unlikely partners find their barbershop to be a strange new place, as the pair forms a new and unlikely relationship.
The new action movies this week are Stiletto, about a mysterious woman (Stana Katic: Feast of Love, Company Man) who is systematically eliminating a Greek mob boss' (Tom Berenger: Training Day, Platoon) men, and In the Electric Mist, where Tommy Lee Jones (No Country for Old Men, Batman Forever) is investigating a series of murders in the New Orleans territories controlled by a notorious gangster (John Goodman: Raising Arizona, Evan Almighty), with Peter Sarsgaard (Rendition, Garden State) and Kelly Macdonald (Choke, The Girl in the Cafe).
New to Reckless Video's TV New Releases this week are the complete series of both the Australian highschool/reality series Summer Heights High and the vampire detective series Moonlight. We also have the 12-episode animated rendition of The Watchmen as a motion comic, as well as the new direct to video movie for DC's Wonderwoman. Reckless has picked up the first season of the classic Dick Van Dyke Show, a disc of The Mighty B!: We Got the Bee!, and two discs of Mystery Science Theater founder Joel Hodgeson's new project Cinematic Titanic: The Oozing Skull and The Doomsday Machine.
