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Posts with tag DVD recommendations

Spin-ematical: New on DVD for 9/16

Filed under: New Releases », DVD Reviews », New on DVD », Home Entertainment »



There's a slew of new releases hitting shelves this week. Some are flashy, some are sweet, and some you should be ashamed if you spend your hard-earned money on them. As Peter said last week, we're still working out kinks in the new format, so weigh in below with your thoughts.

MAIN PICKS AND MISSES
Speed Racer (Pick)
Made of Honor (Miss)
The Love Guru (Miss)
The Babysitters (Miss)

INDIES ON DVD
Young@Heart, Finding Amanda, Harold, Snow Angels

BLU-RAY
Speed Racer, Hulk (2003), The Mist

COLLECTOR'S CORNER
High School Flashback Collection, Risky Business Deluxe Edition, and more!

New DVD Picks of the Week: 'The Promotion' & 'Monster Camp'

Filed under: Comedy », Documentary », New Releases », DVD Reviews », New on DVD », Home Entertainment »

The Promotion
After Dane Cook's Employee of the Month ripped out our interest in office-led comedies and stomped on it, The Promotion was a welcome breath of fresh air that has become a comedic emblem over here at Cinematical. It's graced a top films of 2008 list, popped up in a few fan rants, and has been part of a lot of multimedia. And now, after a modest release, the comedy is on DVD.

Seann William Scott and John C. Reilly play supermarket workers who vie for the same management position in a new store. Scott is told that he's a shoo-in for the gig, which will be nestled near his neighborhood, while Reilly is a new hire straight out of Quebec who is eager for the position. They fall into an insane battle of one-upmanship. In Scott's review, he said: "I just watched it with a jam-packed house at SXSW -- and these folks were laughing like nitrous oxide had just been pumped into the air ducts."

The disc features deleted scenes, a commentary with writer/director Steven Conrad and producers Jessika Borsiczky Goyer and Steven A. Jones, a making-off featurette, promotional webisodes, and finally, outtakes.

Check out Scott's Review | Buy the DVD

New DVD Picks of the Week: 'Nightmare Before Christmas' & 'Lynch'

Filed under: Animation », Documentary », New Releases », DVD Reviews », New on DVD », Home Entertainment »

The Nightmare Before Christmas

Last week, I alerted you to a few sneak previews for the new Collector's Edition of The Nightmare Before Christmas, and now you can see the discs in all their glory for yourselves!

The stop-motion classic stars Chris Sarandon as the voice of Jack Skellington -- the Pumpkin King of Halloweentown. He gets bored with the town's work of scaring humans on Halloween, and when he accidentally falls into Christmas and sees all the good tidings, he comes back with a plan to nab Santa and have Christmas Halloween-style. This, of course, leads to a whole big mess of kidnapping and stolen paramours.

Being a real Collector's Edition (and not a crappy re-release preying on our collector mindsets), there's a ton of special features to enjoy. There's a commentary, a tour of the Haunted Mansion done up for a holiday tour, a featurette on the seasonal transformation, Tim Burton's original poem narrated by Christopher Lee, and a making-of featurette -- just on the first disc! The second mainly includes the goodies from the previous release. There's Frankenweenie, Vincent, deleted scenes,art galleries and animation tests, a storyboard/film comparison, and a selection of posters and trailers. The blu-ray disc only offers an extra 30-second intro, but the ultimate contains a digital copy on a third disc, plus funky keepsake packaging and collectible extras.

Check out Patrick's Review | Buy the Collector's Edition DVD, the Ultimate Set, or the Blu-Ray disc

New DVD Pick of the Week: 'Nim's Island'

Filed under: New Releases », DVD Reviews », New on DVD », Family Films », Home Entertainment »

The movie DVD choices from this week's release schedule are quite scarce, but there is Abigail Breslin swinging in to save the day.

Nim's Island
In the vein of classic family adventure scenarios, Breslin stars as Nim, a young girl who lives with her scientist father on a far-off tropical island. Life is idyllic until Nim's dad (Gerard Butler) is stranded far away leaving Nim to not only survive on her own, but also fight off the tour companies that threaten her island home. But she needs help and unknowingly turns to the worst person for the job -- the agoraphobic author (Jodie Foster) of her favorite literary adventure character, Alex Rover.

The DVD has a healthy amount of features for those looking to dip behind the scenes. You can choose between two commentaries -- one with Jodie Foster and Abigail Breslin, and the other with directors/writers Mark Levin and Jennifer Flackett. There's also 3 featurettes, a piece called "Abigail's Journey and Working on Water," and finally, deleted scenes.

Read Jeffrey M. Anderson's Review | Buy the DVD

Other New DVD Releases (August 5)

Starship Troopers 3: Marauder
Heavy Metal
Miss Conception
Wasted

Be sure to visit Peter's Indies on DVD for more new releases this week.

New DVD Picks of the Week: 'Spaced' & 'Robot Chicken: Star Wars'

Filed under: Comedy », New Releases », DVD Reviews », New on DVD », Home Entertainment »

This is a pretty slow week for DVDs, but there are two more TV-themed releases just perfect for the movie world with slices of celebs and Star Wars content.

Spaced
Tim and Daisy are two strangers who meet while trying to find a new place to live. When they find the perfect apartment, one that requests a couple, they fake it and move in together. The pair try to keep this from the alcoholic landlady while dealing with their dysfunctional romantic lives and spending time with downstairs neighbor Brian, Tim's best friend Mike, and Daisy's best friend, Twist. It sounds fun enough, but add in a ton of geeky cultural references, and names like Jessica Hynes, Simon Pegg, and Nick Frost, and then the rabid fandom starts to make sense.

While it's a number of years old, Spaced has created a whirlwind in the last year -- one that has stretched well beyond its UK borders. And now, finally, we've got the saucy new DVD. You've probably heard about this release over the last few months, because it's not your everyday DVD release. It's a star-studded event.

The packed disc offers not only commentary from people like Pegg, Hynes, and Frost, but also commentaries from Diablo Cody, Matt Stone, Quentin Tarantino, and Kevin Smith, plus Pegg teaming up with a few others -- Patton Oswalt and Bill Hader. There's also biographies, homage-o-meter, teasers, outtakes, featurettes, alternate endings... and even more.

Buy the DVD

New DVD Picks of the Week: 'The Bank Job' and 'Meet Bill'

Filed under: Action », Comedy », Thrillers », New Releases », DVD Reviews », New on DVD », Home Entertainment »

The Bank Job
It sounds like your run of the mill caper movie. It stars Jason Statham, which means that it could go either way. Yet this flick fell safely on the positive scale -- nabbing itself a 78% fresh rating. Our Jeffrey M. Anderson said of the film: "The Bank Job doesn't add anything new to the genre, but it delivers everything we loved about it in the first place."

Statham plays a hustler in debt named Terry who is trying to even the playing field and go on with life in 1971. One day, an old friend and model (Saffron Burrows) pops by with a tasty, albeit illegal, proposition -- there's a bank that is getting its alarms changed, leaving it open for a nice case of robbery. However, instead of taking the monetary goods, they'll hit the safe deposit boxes. Terry does it, but ends up coming across a lot of dirty secrets that reach from the mob to the British government. Oh yes, and it's a true-ish story.

On the 2-disc DVD, you can sift through a commentary with director Roger Donaldson, Saffron Burrows, and composer J. Peter Robinson, plus deleted/extended scenes, and a few featurettes -- "Inside The Bank Job" and "The Baker Street Bank Raid." The first tackles details about the film, while the other tackles the real crime for those curiosu about historical particulars.

Check out Jeffrey's Review | Buy the DVD

New DVD Picks of the Week: 'Sex and Death 101' & 'My Blueberry Nights'

Filed under: Comedy », Drama », New Releases », DVD Reviews », New on DVD », Home Entertainment »

Sex and Death 101
Finally! I've been waiting eons for Sex and Death 101 to hit the shelves -- ever since there was news that writer Daniel Waters was not only taking another stab at directing, but that he would be reteaming with Winona Ryder. Sure, it wouldn't have her digging into her blue clothes for more Veronica Sawyer, but I take what I can get.

Simon Baker stars as an executive and ladies man whose world is thrown into upheaval by the appearance of an e-mail -- one that includes the names of all the women he's had sex with, plus all the women he will canoodle in the future. Ryder, meanwhile, is "Death Nell," a femme fatale who targets men guilty of sex crimes. Other faces that pop up include Leslie Bibb, Julie Bowen, Sophie Monk, Mindy Cohn (yes, that Cohn), Dash Mihok, Patton Oswalt, and Neil Flynn.

The release includes a commentary with Waters, plus a featurette called "101 Perversions."

Seeing that this is the 20th anniversary for Heathers as well, Anchor Bay is also releasing the 20th High School Reunion Edition today.

Check out Scott's review | Buy the DVD

New DVD Picks of the Week: 'Charlie Bartlett' and 'Definitely, Maybe'

Filed under: Comedy », New Releases », DVD Reviews », New on DVD », Home Entertainment »

Charlie Bartlett
It was set to come out in August, a darkly comic, drug-filled teaser to the impending back-to-school September. Then the film got bumped to February, and slid in and out of theaters with barely a second glance. This is too bad, because we're talking about a flick free of the booze and boobs teen movie mentality, and one that stars Anton Yelchin, Robert Downey Jr., Hope Davis, and Kat Dennings.

Charlie Bartlett is the story of a spoiled, ignored rich kid (Yelchin). With a mother (Davis) who is troubled and heavily medicated, he runs rampant with his own brand of living -- an Igby character with the talents of Veronica Mars. But when he's ravaged the available private schools, he gets sent to the public variety, where he ends up becoming not only a prescription drug dealer, but a pseudo psychiatrist. All would be well in this new gig, save for the fact that he's dating the principal's (Downey Jr.) daughter (Dennings), and the principal wants to bring him down.

It might have sneaked by without a glance, but the Charlie Bartlett disc offers a decent collection of features. First, there are two commentaries -- one is director Jon Poll with writer Gustin Nash, and the other is Poll with stars Yelchin and Dennings. There is also a Restroom Confessional featurette, and a music video for "Voodoo" by Spiral Beach.

Check out Erik's Review | Buy the DVD

New DVD Picks of the Week: 'Be Kind Rewind' & 'Chaos Theory'

Filed under: Comedy », Drama », New Releases », DVD Reviews », New on DVD », Home Entertainment »

Be Kind Rewind
When news first broke about the premise of this film, it seemed too good to be true -- Michel Gondry was making a movie about guys who remake classic movies. However, they wouldn't be just remakes; they would be "Sweded" classics because one of the guys had become magnetized and ruined a store full of VHS tapes. It sounded like a wacky dream come true, and it sounded like the perfect film fodder for Jack Black and Mos Def.

In reality, it was almost all there. The quirky bits were brilliant, but the save-the-store back story that Gondry was pressured to add could've been left out. But that didn't matter. Gondry's versions of flicks like Ghostbusters, Driving Miss Daisy, and Rush Hour were perfect -- and worth dealing with any sappy-themed fare that followed. Honestly, it could've been a lot worse, and I still would've enjoyed their scheme to film night shots during the day. That bit was sheer brilliance.

Anyway, now you can get your own copy of Be Kind Rewind, one that should be safe from your magnetically laced friends. The DVD offers an extended train scene with Mr. Fletcher, but not too much in the way of other added fare. There's a regular featurette called "Passaic Mosaic," which features chats with cast, crew, and locals, and the theatrical trailer, which isn't much of a special feature at all. I would assume that another disc has to be on the way -- at the very least, to add in Gondry's own Sweded trailer for the film.

Check out James Rocchi's review | Buy the DVD

New DVD Pick of the Week: 'Jumper'

Filed under: Action », Sci-Fi & Fantasy », New Releases », DVD Reviews », New on DVD », Home Entertainment »

Jumper
By now we now the rundown of Jumper -- there are some cool-looking scenes, a funky premise, and some haphazard filmmaking that doesn't allow the film to live up to its potential. After a sluggish start in North America, the film brought in a sweet box office take overseas, and now we're getting a collection of DVDs.

Hayden Christensen stars as a young man with one sweet "genetic anomaly" -- he can teleport. However, it's not all zipping to and fro and enjoying life, because there's a long and tumultuous war being fought between the others like him, and those who are set on killing them.

If this is your cup of tea, there are three options: the single disc, the double disc, and the Blu-ray edition -- and each has a collection of features. The single-disc release offers a commentary by Doug Liman, writer/producer Simon Kinberg, and producer Lucas Foster, a featurette on adapting the novel, another featurette on the teleporting, and "Previz: Future Concepts." The two-disc adds the following to the mix: two more featurettes, a special on the graphic novel, a digital copy, and a bunch of deleted scenes. Finally, the blu-ray option includes all of the above goodies in that fancy, blu-ray way, plus a PIP called "Jumping Around the World."

For more on Jumper, check out Moviefone's 12 Questions with Rachel Bilson.

Check out Scott's Review
| Buy the One-Disc, Two-Disc, Blu-Ray

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