DVD Releases March 17 2009

From New - Hottest DVD Releases & New DVD Movie March 17 2009

The Princess Bride [Blu-ray]The Princess Bride [Blu-ray]


Directed by Rob Reiner
Average customer review:

From celebrated director Rob Reiner (When Harry Met Sally) and Oscar(r)-winning* screenwriter William Goldman (Chaplin) comes "an enchanting fantasy" (Time) filled with adventure, romance and plenty of "good-hearted fun" (Roger Ebert)! Featuring a spectacular cast thatincludes Robin Wright (Forrest Gump), Cary Elwes (Liar, Liar), Mandy Patinkin (Dick Tracy) and Billy Crystal (City Slickers), this wonderful fairy tale about a Princess named Buttercup and her beloved is "a real dream of a movie" (People)! *1969: OriginalScreenplay, Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid 1976: Adapted Screenplay, All the President's Men

Customer Reviews

Princess Bride on Blu-Ray :-)5
Very Good movie. Picture quality is much better then DVD version(which is also included). I'm very happy to add this Movie to my Growing Blu-Ray colletion. Truly a classic.

Movie 5/5 1987 Classic
Video 4.75/5 Widescreen 1.85:1
Audio 5/5 5.1 DTS-HD Master Audio
Extras 4.25/5 Good enough :-)
Tech:50GB Dual Layer: AVC@38MBPS

A worthy movie for anybody.

The Princess Bride [Blu-ray]

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Punisher: War Zone [Blu-ray]Punisher: War Zone [Blu-ray]


Directed by Lexi Alexander
Average customer review:

Punisher: War Zone cannot be adequately described as "over the top"--it's a relentless catalogue of brutal mayhem punctuated, here and there, with outrageous sentimentality. Frank Castle, a.k.a. The Punisher (Ray Stevenson, Rome) has dedicated his life to killing the kind of gangsters who murdered his family. But when he unknowingly kills an undercover FBI agent, Castle falls into a crisis of conscience and decides to lay down his guns. Unfortunately, one of the last gangsters he thought he'd killed survived, albeit horribly disfigured, and seeks revenge on the wife and daughter of that slain FBI agent--so Castle has to go one last spree of vigilante justice! But this plot summary will not prepare you for the jolting violence of Punisher: War Zone; rarely do more than a few minutes go by without startling physical savagery, particularly to people's heads, which get blown apart with numbing frequency. This violence somehow goes hand in hand with dizzyingly saccharine moments when a young girl gazes at Castle with trusting eyes, knowing in her heart that he's the only one who can protect her. The dialogue goes beyond cliche into tough guy baroque. Stevenson underplays Castle to good effect, because everyone else in the movie--including Dominic West (The Wire), Doug Hutchison (The Green Mile), and Wayne Knight (Seinfeld)--chews the scenery like it's slathered with gravy. Some viewers will find this movie revolting; others will worship it like a golden calf. You probably know where you stand. --Bret

Customer Reviews

The CRitics Got IT Wrong! This Film Is a Classic!5
The critics slagged this film of mercislessly and they got it so wrong. The fact is critics do not understand our generation. They don't understand Marvel Comics. They don't understand Marvel Knights. They don't understand what the Punisher is about.

This film is much better than Punisher 1 which was dire. This is what the Punisher is about. Mercy-less, Cold and Brutal in delivery of his brand of Justice.

Like the comics the violence is over the top, and rightly so because it adds to the brutality of the world that the Punisher lives in. If you commit a bad act then the Punisher is gonna get you back for that 10 fold, and he does.

A must add to your super heroe collection. There is no sanitised violence here. It does what it says on the tin. The Punisher punishes your senses!!



Punisher: War Zone [Blu-ray]


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ElegyElegy


From Sony Pictures
Average customer review:

There are very few men who wouldn’t eagerly sell their souls to be with Penelope Cruz (or whatever character she happens to be playing). But with Elegy, director Isabel Coixet and screenwriter Nicholas Meyer (adapting a novel by Philip Roth) pose some thorny questions: How many are willing, let alone able, to see past a woman’s beauty and embrace her true being? And when beauty fades, what then? David Kepesh (Ben Kingsley) is a successful New York author, teacher, and literature maven; a semi-celebrity due to regular TV appearances, he’s self-satisfied if not exactly smug, seemingly unconcerned about his advancing age (he’s now in his sixties, but as he tells us in voice-over, "In my head, nothing’s changed") or his strained relationship with the son (Peter Sarsgaard) who still resents him for abandoning his marriage years ago, and content with his occasional and purely sexual relationship with a middle-aged businesswoman (Patricia Clarkson). All of that changes when Consuela Castillo (Cruz) enrolls in one of his classes. More than 30 years his junior, she’s not just gorgeous but mature and smart as well. And for all his worldly cool, charm, and experience, once he’s involved with Consuela, David turns into just another possessive, jealous, obsessed ("On the nights she isn’t with me, I am deformed"), and insecure man, convinced that it’s only a matter of time before their age difference pulls them apart. It’s a given that David will see to it that his self-fulfilling prophecy comes true. But will his lies and fear of commitment prove to be his ruination, or will the tragedies that ensue help him find a path to redemption? The film’s various performers (including Dennis Hopper as David’s best pal) and overall sophisticated, grownup tone, along with Cruz’s almost impossible beauty, make Elegy consistently watchable and compelling. --Sam Graham

Customer Reviews

Intriguing but also frustrating4
Elegy starts off with renowned New York author/celebrity David Kepesh (Ben Kinglsey) fielding questions about his new book from Charlie Rose. The new book is about an early American sect of pleasure worshippers who were shut down by the dominant Puritan culture, and so we are led to assume that David is one of those aging hipsters who still mourns that other moment in American life, the 1960's, when Eden seemed more than just a myth. This assumption is further supported by the fact that David's best friend, George O'Hearn, is played by none other than aging hipster Dennis Hopper.

But first impressions are not always accurate, and the more we get to know both David and George the more we begin to realize that neither of these New York literary bigwigs is really what they seem to be. They chat every afternoon in a coffee shop but neither of them really seem able to open up to the other and though close one senses that both men have intimacy issues not just with women but with people in general. In many ways these conversations are the most interesting part of the film for it is in these apparently casual conversations between friends that each man attempts to make sense of himself and it becomes clear that neither has a handle on exactly what kind of person he is.

David is one of those New York intellectuals who does a bit of everything: he's a theatre critic, a university lecturer, a photographer, a pianist, a regular on the PBS talk & radio show circuit and he presents himself as a fiercely independent and restless loner. Even though he has been carrying on an affair with the same woman for twenty years, he is convinced that he is not the marrying type. But just what "type" he is is unclear. He is the type who sets his sites on sexy grad students when his lover is out of town. He is also careful not to get involved with these sexy grad students before the term is over but once grades have been posted he throws end-of-term cocktail parties at his apartment and it is there that he does what elder professers with or without a certain amount of celebrity often do: he seduces grad students. When he sets his sites on Consuela (Penelope Cruz) and chats her up all night he is at least honest enough to admit to himself what he really wants. But as the days go by and Consuela and David spend more and more time together he starts to question just what he does want. George tells him to enjoy it for what it is but David is never certain just exactly what "it" is.

What complicates matters is the fact that David seems confused by his own emotions. Being the in-demand scholar/celebrity/critic that he is, he is used to getting his way and being in control. But with Consuela he no longer has that sense of control over his life, and he doesn't know how to handle the fact that someone has such power over him. David is used to being around beauty in the form of art and music and theatre but not used to being around real living beauty and he is simply bewildered in Consuela's presence. This newfound vulnerability makes him more likable as a human being, but it also scares him.

Friend George, and his own conscience, tell him the affair is bound to end, but he doesn't want it to and despite his avowed sense of independence he finds that he simply cannot function without her. At a crucial moment, however, he hesitates...and he lets her slip away.

Although the premise is inviting and engaging enough, the romantic element is subdued and, yes, elegiac. David's inability to connect to other human beings is profoundly sad and moving and Kingsely does a brilliant job with the role but the character's uncertainty and ambivalence about all forms of human connectivity (along with his utter lack of humor) makes this character, and, ultimately this film, a difficult one to cozy up to. Penelope Cruz is always alluring but here she plays a quiet doe-eyed cipher who looks at her accomplished professor like a child would look up to a father. Beyond her surface beauty we are never certain just what David is connecting to and neither does David and that is what is intriguing but also frustrating about the film.

Ultimately, David finds that George (despite his status as one of New York's most important poets) has not been honest with any of the people in his life. And this makes David question whether he too has been honest with the people in his.

Its difficult to judge a film like this. It is not a particularly romantic film, but it is an interesting and moody meditation on one man's late-life transformation.

Elegy

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Quo Vadis  [Blu-ray]Quo Vadis [Blu-ray]


Directed by Anthony Mann, Mervyn LeRoy
Average customer review:

"Welcome to Nero's House of Women" greets a concubine to a slave girl, Lygia (Deborah Kerr). Later this self-same greeter reveals that she, too, like Lygia, is really a fellow Christian neophyte. And it's that mixture of tawdry Hollywood sex and a strong Christian message that makes this film an enjoyable "gentiles and gladiators" flick. Marcus Vinicius returns home after conquering the Britons to find that Rome is infected with a crazy new sect called Christians and that his beloved emperor Nero (Peter Ustinov, roly-poly and wicked) has become increasingly wacky. Marcus tries his centurion wiles on Lygia, and she's smitten, but she's also a Christian convert and begs Marcus not to force her to choose between him and her god. The Christians have a tough go of it, with martyrdom in the Coliseum as punishment for belonging to the new religion in town. Though three hours long, director Mervyn LeRoy's film always has something going on. It could help you enjoyably kill any rainy Sunday afternoon. --Keith Simanton

Customer Reviews

Quo Vadis 5
I first saw Quo Vadis when it came out in the early 1950s. It was a sensation then and continues to be so today. The cast are all excellent, and Peter Ustinov as Nero is the best ever actor to play the part. Although the film was made before wide screen, cinemascope, or any of the newer techniques, it is the story that is so well developed that pleases. Apart from the history, the film has a strong cast, director, photographer, set designer, and costumer all of whom contribute to a first class movie experience. In other words, "They just don't make them like this anymore".
It should be included in any serious movie buff's collection.


Quo Vadis [Blu-ray]

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The Robe [Blu-ray]The Robe [Blu-ray]


Directed by Henry Koster
Average customer review:

When Roman tribune Marcellus Gallio (Richard Burton) is sent to Jerusalem, one of his assignments is the crucifixion of Jesus Christ. Marcellus, a cynical and hardened man, wins the robe Jesus wore to the crucifixion while gambling with other Roman soldiers underneath the dying savior. He later becomes convinced that his hallucinations and violent outbursts are the result of a curse received from the robe, which is now in the possession of his escaped slave, Demetrius (Victor Mature), somewhere in the Middle East. He sets out to find Demetrius in order to destroy the robe and the curse and finds faith instead, converting to Christianity. This was the first movie to be filmed in CinemaScope, and won Oscars in 1953 for costume design, art direction, and set decoration. The visual aspects of the film are stunning, and it may be worth viewing for that alone; however, the script and acting leave much to be desired, and you won't find inspiration in these areas if that's what interests you. If, however, you are more interested in this film for its religious matter, the story of the conversion of the hardened Marcellus is inspiring. --James McGrath

Customer Reviews

The First CinemaScope Movie4
Unlike many religious films of the 1950s, the first CinemaScope movie, adapted from the Lloyd C. Douglas novel, does not suffer from a aura of self-importance, primarily because it has a strong dramatic story with interesting, multi-layered characters.

Richard Burton stars as the Roman centurion charged with overseeing the Crucifixion, but when he wins Christ's robe in a gambling game at the foot of the cross, he becomes "possessed".

Indeed, back in Rome, his fiance' (Jean Simmons) and the aging emperor believe that he has become mentally unbalanced and that the only cure for him is to return to Palestine, find the robe and destroy it. The outcome of this quest, however, turns out quite differently, with Burton becoming a Christian and standing against the new emperor, Caligula (a marvelous, over-the-top performance by Jay Robinson).

Henry Koster directed THE ROBE. Victor Mature and Michael Rennie co-star. Michael Ansara appears unbilled as "Judas".

Extras in the new "Special Edition" include an Introduction by Martin Scorsese, a "Making of" featurette, a short about the CinemaScope process, audio commentary by composer David Newman and film historians and much more.

© Michael B. Druxman


The Robe [Blu-ray]

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Goal 2: Living the DreamGoal 2: Living the Dream


Directed by Juame Collet-Serra
Average customer review:

Goal II: Living The Dream continues the dramatic and exciting journey of Santiago Munez (Kuno Becker), a small town kid who continues to live his dream of becoming a professional soccer player. When he is traded to Real Madrid and must deal with the trials and triumphs of playing on one of soccer s biggest stages. Also starring Rutger Hauer, Anna Friel and featuring exciting action footage with some of soccer s biggest stars including David Beckham, Zinedine Zidane and Ronaldo.

Customer Reviews

Is this day ever going to come!5
This movie is out on DVD everywhere else in the world two years ago. I am still waiting for it here in the U.S.


Goal 2: Living the Dream

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Hit Man: David Foster And Friends (Amazon Exclusive) [Blu-ray]Hit Man: David Foster And Friends (Amazon Exclusive) [Blu-ray]


Directed by not specified
Average customer review:

The spectacular one night only concert of David Foster and Friends is now available on Blu Ray disc. Spotlighting #1 hits, award winning songs and other favorites.The May 23, 2008 show at Mandalay Bay in Las Vegas was unforgettable. Now 'Hit Man: David Foster & Friends' scores a direct hit with music fans at home.

Customer Reviews

Hit Man: David Foster and Friends5
Unbelievable concert. The recording and video are just amazing with amazing guest performances. Unbelievable that some people can give this 1 star when the have no idea what the hell they're talking about!


Hit Man: David Foster And Friends (Amazon Exclusive) [Blu-ray]

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