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Never too old for an adventure
Pixar's follow-up to Wall-E is director Pete Docter's (Monsters Inc) Up. About to lose his house and be moved into a retirement community, widower Carl Fredericksen (Ed Asner: For Apache the Bronx, Gigantic) decides to save his home, honor his wife's childhood dreams, and move to Paradise Falls, the South American wilderness explored by their adventuring hero (Christopher Plummer: Somewhere in Time, 12 Monkeys). Carl sets out to live his dreams and floats his whole home across the globe with tens of thousands of helium balloons when there's a knock on the door; a young Wilderness Explorer was on his porch at liftoff, and his adventure suddenly has unexpected guests. True to Pixar form, Up is exciting, funny, and touching... and (given their hot streak) will most likely add another Best Animated Feature Oscar to their mantle. On DVD and Blu-Ray.
Romantic Comedies
Jeffery Dean Morgan (Watchmen, Supernatural) stars as New York firefighter Patrick Sullivan, whose life gets turned upside-down when radio psychiatrist Emma Lloyd (Uma Thurman: Kill Bill, The Producers) tells his fiance to break off their engagement in The Accidental Husband. Patrick hacks into public records and have himself listed as Emma's husband-- allowing him to confront her, and get a bit of revenge.
He might have insinuated himself into the doctor's life, but their invented marriage doesn't sit too well with Emma's real fiance (Colin Firth: Easy Virtue, Nanny McPhee).
Katherine Heigl (27 Dresses, Knocked Up) is a television producer with ratings troubles in The Ugly Truth. When her station hires Gerard Butler (RocknRolla, 300), the popular but confrontational host of a show that has a cynical view of romance, the two don't get along... so they make a bet: she'll work with him if his advice helps her personal relationship and proves his theories, but if his advice fails, he'll leave her station, though the two of them might learn something else over the course of the wager.
Amanda Crew (The Haunting in Connecticut, Sex Drive) ends doomed relationships with panache and a gentle touch in The Break-Up Artist, but when a new artist takes her customers, she needs to adapt if she wants to keep her wardrobe closet full. Now the break-up artist, who never believed in love, has to help a guy win back the girl of his dreams and switch from ending relationships to starting them. With Ali Liebert (Harper's Island, Kyle XY) and Ryan Kennedy (The Invisible).
also new this week
The Merry Gentleman stars Kelly Macdonald (No Country for Old Men, Gosford Park) as a woman who leaves an abusive relationship and tries to find her way on her own in Chicago. She's befriended by a remorseful hitman (Michael Keaton: Multiplicity, Batman), and the two bond over their shared silences and the turmoil brought about by their paths in life as they each realize they need to make an important change.
On his own for four years, Shawn Hatosy (Nobel Son, Factory Girl) returns home for Thanksgiving to visit his dysfunctional family in Familiar Strangers. Over the holiday, he attempts to bridge to gap between his controlling sister (Cameron Richardson: Alvin and the Chipmunks, Open Water 2), his always-joking brother (DJ Qualls: Hustle & Flow, I'm Reed Fish), a distant father (Tom Bower: Appaloosa, High Crimes), and a mother in denial (Ann Dowd: Apt Pupil, Garden State)... possibly over an elderly dog or a game of donkey basketball.
A wandering lothario (Ashton Kutcher: What Happens in Vegas, Guess Who) meets rich women in Spread, drifting from relationship to relationship and living a life of ease, currently setting with Anne Heche (Prozac Nation, Wag the Dog), who gives him more than any of his wealthy women had before. His lifestyle is threatened when he meets a beautiful waitress his own age (Margarita Levieva: Adventureland, Noise) and he must choose what kind of life he wants to live.
In Kazakhstan, a man returns home from his time in the Russian navy in Tulpan. Reunited with his family, Asa dreams of being a heardsman with his own flock, but the only way to make that happen is to marry Tulpan, the only eligible bachelorette within 100 miles.
The two new documentaries this week are Enlighten Up!, where a skeptic is thrown into the world of Yoga, and follows where the exploration takes him, and Something to Do with the Wall, which looks at the character of Berlin both before and after the wall came down.
Finally, the "Ultimate Edition" of Watchmen is new this week, including all of the footage not shown in theaters merged with the Tales of the Black Freighter animated short, providing the most complete version of the classic graphic novel on film.
New this week to Reckless Video's TV New Releases are the 2nd series of BBC's Clatterford, as well as the complete early 70s action show Ultra Man and all six seasons of HBO's comic/horror series Tales from the Crypt.

