Each week DVDs come out. Some of them are worth your time and money and some aren't. Some of them are movies I've seen, and some of them aren't. Regardless, I give you my opinion on the big releases of the week. If the releases sound like something you want to buy, just click the link to go to amazon.com and you'll support Cinema Blend with a few pennies. Take it or leave it, here's the DVD Blend.
Hide and Seek
Robert DeNiro takes on the thriller/horror genre along with Dakota Fanning, the definition of a precocious child. I don’t know about you, but frankly I’d like to see DeNiro’s return to the serious gangster flick. His comedies just haven’t been fantastic and he doesn’t come across as vulnerable enough to be threatened by supernatural forces. Leave the screaming horror roles to Jennifer Connolly (who’s upcoming Dark Waters also seems to include a child talking to an imaginary friend) and go back to playing “legitimate businessmen”. Proving movies like this are less passion projects and more studio projects, the DVD includes four (FOUR!) alternate endings for the movie. Guess they just couldn’t get it right the first couple of times...
Click to puchase Hide and Seek (Widescreen)
Click to puchase Hide and Seek (Full Screen)
In My Country
With Juliete Binoche and Samuel L. Jackson, this movie about the consequences of Apartheid really should have done better. Instead it was overshadowed (and appropriately so) by the superior Hotel Rwanda which did a better job of conveying the atrocities in Africa. I’m a bit baffled about the story idea to put a white person as the native African and the black man as the outsider. Maybe seeing the movie as a whole would put a better spin on things, but after Rwanda I just had no interest in watching this. Hopefully DVD will give it a second chance, although I have the feeling it’ll even be haunted by Rwanda’s presence there too.
Click to puchase In My Country
Prozac Nation
Christina Ricci grows up in this movie based on Elizabeth Wurtzel’s novel. As everyone knows from the movies, the first year away at college is a year filled with sex, drugs, and alcohol for all former good little girls. Prozac Nation actually tries to put a more serious face on the first year away from home with something a little more common: depression. As a book Prozac Nation is highly recommended as an accurate, in depth look at how depression can affect a person. Of course, the book covers very internal subjects a lot of the time, which don’t always translate well to film. Check back later this week to see our review and how well the movie carries the book’s message.
Click to puchase Prozac Nation
| Other titles released this week that might be worth your time: | |||
| Row 1 - Cell 0 | Cruxshadows: Shadowbox - We don’t usually mention music DVDs much around here, but I have to bring this one up. The Cruxshadows are probably one of the best known unknown bands you’ll encounter. Every year they perform their goth music at DragonCon, as well as many other concerts (apparently) around the world. This DVD features their concert performance in Leipzig, Germany as well as some of their music videos. Check it out and then pick up some of their CDs as well. | Row 1 - Cell 2 | Bride & Prejudice - Although the story of Pride & Prejudice has another version coming out later this year with Keira Knightly, Donald Sutherland, and Judi Dench, this version is worth a look. The story this time is adapted as a Bollywood musical by the director of Bend it Like Beckham. It’s zany, and just a little strange, but still a lot of fun. |
| Row 2 - Cell 0 |
| Other titles released this week that aren't worth your time: |
| Row 0 - Cell 0 |
