| <--prev |
Getting ready for Halloween
Director Sam Raimi (the Evil Dead and Spider-Man trilogies) re-embraced the madcap, high energy horror that launched his career with Drag Me to Hell, where a young loan officer (Alison Lohman: Matchstick Men, Where the Truth Lies) refuses to help a gypsy and ends up cursed. With her life suddenly torn apart by violent hauntings, she begins to realize what's happening to her, and has to step up and fight against otherworldly forces if she wants to see another day. With Justin Long (He's Just Not That Into You, Live Free or Die Hard). On DVD and Blu-Ray.
Robert Pattinson (Twilight, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix) stars in The Haunted Airman as a downed pilot, confined to a wheelchair and recouperating in Wales. Suffering terrible nightmares, he begins to suspect that his doctor (Julian Sands: Stargate: The Ark of Truth, Boxing Helena) may have sinister motives... and he may either be going insane, or there may be something sinister in the hospital.
Disney's family-friendly Halloweentown with Debbie Reynolds (Singin' in the Rain, In & Out), as well as its sequel, Halloweentown II: Kalabar's Revenge, are both in the New Release section, to lighten up to Halloween offering this month.
Chris Marquette (Fanboys, The Education of Charlie Banks) wakes up in a post apocalyptic world in Infestation, 
freeing himself from a cocoon and finding that the world has become overrun with giant insects. As he and a group of survivors head out in search of safety and answers, they learn more about their new, dangerous world. With Brooke Nevin (I'll Always Know What You Did Last Summer, The Comebacks).
Comedies
Sandra Bullock (Premonition, Crash) returns to RomComs as a Canadian in need of a green card in The Proposal. Bullock is the unlikable editor-in-chief of a book company, but she enlists her combative underling (Ryan Reynolds: Wolverine, The In-Laws) to marry her, awarding him a promotion and keeping her from being deported. When a government official (Denis O'Hare: Milk, Baby Mama) investigates, the unlikely couple needs to be able to prove their marraige isn't a sham, and have to spend time together, with Reynolds' parents (Mary Steenburgen: Step Brothers, The Brave One, and Craig T. Nelson: The Family Stone, The Incredibles), as they travel the comic misadventures of couplehood. With Malin Akerman (Watchmen, 27 Dresses).
Will Ferrell's (Semi-Pro, Stranger than Fiction) newest adaptation of a vintage television show (after Bewitched), Land of the Lost re-imagines Ferrell as a bumbling, childish, know-it-all version of Dr. Rick Marshall, encouraged on his adventure by Cambridge-educated scientist 
Holly (Anna Friel: Pushing Daisies, Me Without You), and accompanied by their coarse tour guide Will (Danny McBride: Eastbound & Down, Pineapple Express). The trio find themselves out of normal time, in a land of lizard men and dinosaurs, as they struggle to get back home. The film marries Ferrell's improvisational style to a story that satirizes campy science fiction and embraces free-wheeling comedy gags.
New Zealand's Jack Brown, Genius stars Timothy Balme (Dead Alive) as an inventor who becomes the unwilling accomplice of a Monk from the middle ages. The monk (Stuart Devenie: The Frighteners, Her Majesty), who had tried to don a feathered cloak and fly to heaven, is spending time in purgatory for suicide... and when he ends up inside Balme's head, the two team up to build new wings, fly to heaven, and explain the mistake. Marton Csokas (Aeon Flux, Kingdom of Heaven).
Dameon Clarke (A Scanner Darkly, The Alamo) is a self-help guru and motivational speaker for a unique and controversial path to self improvement in How to be a Serial Killer. Both a black comdey and a mockumentary, the film focuses on his aquisition of a new apprentice (Matthew Gray Gubler: RV, The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou), and in teaching the new kid the rules and skills of leading a better life by killing the negative elements of society.
The new stand-up comedy DVD this week is Jim Jefferies' I Swear to God, as the Australian comedian pulls no punches (either in content or language) as he performs live on stage.
Seriously...
Atom Egoyan's (Felicia's Journey, The Sweet Hereafter) newest film is Adoration, where a teacher (Arsinee Khanjian: Irma Vep, Ararat) asks her class to translate a story where a terrorist plants a bomb in the luggage of his pregnant girlfriend, but the bomb was discovered and the plot averted. One of her students (Devon Bostick: Saw IV, Land of the Dead) imagines the story as his own, with his father as the terrorist, himself as the unborn child, and his mother (Rachel Blanchard: Snakes on a Plane, Without a Paddle) as the woman with the bomb. Living with his uncle (Scott Speedman: Underworld, Weirdsville), the boy's story reflects his own life, as he wonders if the accident that orphaned him could have been more than an accident.
The Thai drama Love of Siam follows two boys as their childhood friendship and interweaving family lives progresses into their teen years, and, as High School Seniors, though their social lives have taken different paths, the bonds of their childhood continue to influence them.
Documentaries
Recounting the legacy of Australian exploitation cinema, Not Quite Hollywood is the story of the audacious (if low-budget) cinematic revolution from down under. Through the 70's and early 80's, these films featured cars, guns, sex, and blood with an amount of creativity that made the most of their shoestring budgets, and the impact of the "Ozploitation" movement continues to influence filmmakers around the world.
Warren Miller's Children of Winter continues the tradition of lovingly shot acrobatics and skills of skiers and snowboarders across the globe, set to music, along with interviews with the athletes. Every Little Step is a look into the the life of the actors, singers, and dancers as they audition for a Broadway revival A Chorus Line, and the tale of a Broadway show from the people auditioning, the original cast, and the show's creators. The collections of clasic educational shorts, How to be a Man and How to be a Woman, provide an insight into the culture of the 1950s through the 1980s from the perspective of the institutions that sought to educate them.
This week's only addition to the TV New Releases wall is the first season of the fantasy adventure series Legend of the Seeker, starring Craig Horner (See No Evil) as a hero who takes up his sword against tyranny, and Bridget Regan (The Black Donnellys) as the fugitive who pushes him to fight.
