How to Spend $20

By Eric Hughes

May 27, 2008

Who needs the Shoney's Breakfast Bar?

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Welcome to How to Spend $20, BOP's look at the latest DVDs to hit stores nationwide. This week: Sylvester Stallone prolongs his acting career by reviving a 20-years-gone Vietnam War vet, Brooke Shields has her second coming on NBC, John Cusack gets personal with Dubya and the famous Jekyll and Hyde story is retold (yet again).

PICK OF THE WEEK

For people who have a high tolerance for extreme body counts: Rambo (Special Edition)

Close your eyes a sec, and answer this question: How many people die in 1982's Rambo: First Blood, the first of four (so far) films in the Rambo franchise about a mentally unstable war vet who hunts down an abusive small town police force? One. Yes, one. Hard to believe, right? Well, of course it is when you're force-fed the 200-plus deaths in the series' gory fourth entry, Rambo, about the vet's attempt to rescue kidnaped Christian aid workers in war-torn Burma.

This is a film that broke a 20-year Rambo dry spell and revived a thought-to-be-dead franchise, much like its star Sylvester Stallone did not too long ago with 2006's Rocky Balboa. And don't think this man is done yet, either. Stallone is already scripting Rambo V. And he swears it will not be another war movie.

Disc includes: Audio commentary by Sylvester Stallone, six featurettes, deleted scenes.




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For people who missed Brooke Shields ever since she quit being Susan (and sudden): Lipstick Jungle: Season One

Making TV shows out of popular novels seems to be all the rage on the broadcast networks lately. (Well, besides shortchanging its writers so much that...well, better not get into that one). In 2006, NBC adapted H.G. Bissinger's 1990 novel, Friday Night Lights, to run as complementary programming with Sunday Night Football. A year later, ABC brought James Patterson's Women's Murder Club series to the small screen, but to little fanfare. ABC, which only broadcasted the series' original 13-episode order, officially axed the program earlier this month. And earlier this year, it was again NBC, which found moderate success in Lipstick Jungle, a series based on a novel of the same name by Candace Bushnell about the lives of three New York career women. The show's star, of course, is Brooke Shields, who carried the show just enough to afford the program a second season. Good news for NBC, the network most in need of a gigantic hit. (Because as we all know, American Gladiators will never, ever return a network to prominence).

Disc includes: Deleted scenes, previews for other NBC Universal shows like Battlestar Galactica, Law & Order and Monk.

For people who think Hilary Swank looks more like a Holly Kennedy: P.S. I Love You

It's not too often that you hear a film actually living up to its literary predecessor. Although in the case of P.S. I Love You, attracting mixed-to-negative reviews was a fairly simple task when considering the novel from which it was based. Cecilia Ahern's P.S. I Love You (2004) was called "overhyped," "predictable" and "full of stock characters." The film adaptation received similar criticism, being dubbed "lame" and "sappy." Los Angeles Times critic Carina Chocano even had this to say: "You could go see P.S. I Love You, or you could hit yourself on the head with a meat mallet." Yikes. Now, at least, you can judge for yourself, without having to fork over ten bucks for admission. (You'd better rent this one - just to be safe).

Disc includes: Additional scenes, "A Conversation with Cecelia Ahern," "Same Mistake" by James Blunt (music video), "The Name of the Game is Snaps": Learn How to Play.


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