How to Spend $20 This Week
By David Mumpower
January 27, 2005
Taking a look ahead at the week's DVD releases is always dicey for your wallet. Nearly every week, there's a disc that would fit nicely into any size collection. When it comes time to decide what to buy, there are really two determining factors: how much you love the content and the quality of the extra features on the disc.
As a result, decisions will be totally subjective. The massive unreleased studio (film and television) back-catalogue means that every week there's likely something for every film fan.
For people who enjoy the finest in European r-rated cinema: When Will I Be Loved
Neve Campbell drank a lot of wine then made out with Denise Richards in Wild Things. Now, Two Girls and a Guy director James Toback has talked her into further sexual experimentation. The film's concept sees Campbell playing a woman sold by her boyfriend into 24 hours of sexual slavery with an older rich man (who, for legal purposes, looks nothing like Robert Redford). Toback's shrewdly adult subject matter always pushes the boundaries of sexuality, but this plot smacks of Cinemax After Dark.
For people who hate Metallica as well as those who love them: Metallica: Some Kind of Monster
The documentary Some Kind of Monster is the sort of emotionally naked study which makes the genre so powerful. Rather than control every aspect like MTV comic staples the Osbournes and Simpsons do, the members of the band allow for an honest evaulation of themselves. A band as world famous as Metallica could hide behind carefully doled out footage, but instead they present a case study of ego and insecurity.
Intentionally or not, the film plays out in a fashion eerily similar to the fictional band Stillwater from Almost Famous. Tensions between the two primary members of the band cause the others to constantly look like they are on the verge of tears. Their pain stems from watching the mommy and daddy of Metallica, James Hetfield and Lars Ulrich, clash endlessly about every phase of the band's existence. The whole affair makes for one of the finest movies of 2004, and I say that as someone who is relatively indifferent to the band.
As a warning, veteran net users might have a hard time watching the film as they breathlessly await Hetfield's shouting of "Napster bad!" I know I did.
For people who are sick and tires of listening to doves cry: The Story of the Weeping Camel
This documentary follows the travails of a Mongol family trying to get a mother camel to love its foal. The movie offers a fascinating insight into a lifestyle completely foreign to western society. Equally interesting is the aspect of how our urban culture is gradually seeping into even the most far reaching corners of the globe. Farmers mine the land just as their forefathers have done for thousands of years. The difference is that they now find themselves weighing the benefits of tennis shoes and satellite television. I found the movie as dull as your average travelogue, but I know many people who were entranced by the culture shock quietly bundled with the main story.
For people who still haven't gotten over that one scene from The Gift: First Daughter
There is a trend developing this week. Former heroes of smaller networks (Neve Campbell on Fox, Katie Holmes on the WB) are getting much different roles than were once available. Campbell went the dirrrty grrl route while Holmes, having already given away the chest display in a prior film, has gone stubbornly genteel. First Daughter is a syrupy vanilla extract of celluloid, offering formulaic romantic entanglements. If the idea of the daughter of the president falling in love sounds familiar, that's because it is. The West Wing has run variations of this story for years now, and Mandy Moore offered a similar take on the role in the early 2004 release, Chasing Liberty. Both films are harmless pieces of fluff which might keep you and your loved one bundled up on the couch on a cold winter's night. Hey, it beats that meth lab you were thinking about visiting.
For Eddie Murphy: The Crying Game
I have nothing new to say about this 1992 Neil Jordan classic. I simply wanted to again point to Mr. Murphy that the "giving a stranger a ride home" story was the least believable piece of fiction in several years right up until Kevin Spacey "lost his cell phone". It also gives me an opportunity to lament the continuing absence of the A-List. There used to be a Web site that called celebrities on their missteps, and I miss it. Come back soon.
For Chris Hyde's loyal fan-base: 9 Souls
He has already described this film in much more eloquent detail than I could manage. Click here to read the review. Suffice it to say that I will be giving this one a viewing as soon as it shows up in my Blockbuster/Netflix queue.
For people who already went out and rented When Will I Be Loved based on my earlier comments but came away non-plussed with the girl/girl stuff: Head in the Clouds
Okay, it's an arthouse love triangle that is two hours and 15 minutes long. Before you give up on it, though, consider that it stars Penelope Cruz and Charlize Theron. As lovers. Think equal parts Unbearable Lightness of Being and Henry and June. That's Erotic Adventures of Hercules level entertainment right there! All kidding about the sex sells nature of the story aside, we only had Head in the Clouds here for a short time, so I missed it in theaters. It was originally positioned as an Academy Awards contender, but it wound up getting shut out of not just the majors but also the rest of the end-of-year selections. But don't despair. There will almost certainly be an Unrated (*wink, wink, nudge, nudge) DVD release at some point. Until then, I wonder what I did with that Henry and June DVD.
For People Who Can't Smell a Trap a Mile Away: Pauly Shore is Dead
I will spare you the trouble: Pauly Shore aka The Weasel is not dead. In fact, he stars in the movie. If any of you snuff film aficonados want to take the sequel into your own hands, no one would blame you.
For people with gum wrapper and a seashell seeking to build a thermonuclear reactor: MacGyver: The Complete First Season
Note: the Patty and Selma jokes were too obvious.
Everybody's favorite frosted mullet is back and squarely located on the head of one Richard Dean Anderson. The Canadian export made famous the rarest of rare American action hero: a man who outwitted the opposition using his tremendous knowledge of natural sciences along with the occasional fluke availability of the world's rarest elements. If Mr. Wizard ever decided to fight crime, it would look something like this.
If nothing else, the show is notable for its introduction of Terri Hatcher into the collective consciousness. Her buxom Penny Parker was probably intended to be the show's answer to the Daisy Dukes of the television world. Even so, the producers lucked up. Hatcher had tremendous natural chemistry with her male lead, a trait she would continue in later series with Dean Cain and James Denton.
For Nashville hockey fans missing the NHL season: Alien vs. Predator
Fang fingers!!! (My apologies to people who don't follow hockey...it's okay that none of this makes sense to you.)
Alien vs. Predator was intended to be the second in a series of franchise clashes between well known studio icons. The first film, Freddy vs. Jason, was a tremendous success. So, Paul W.S. Anderson skipped directing duties on the Resident Evil sequel in order to capitalize on this newly emerging market/genre. Alas, he dropped the ball. Completely. Despite the presence of goddess of love, Sanaa Lathan, AvP manages to underwhelm on every possible level. Widely hailed as one of the worst films of the year, the movie's main success is that it largely avoided Razzie notice. A Pyrrhic victory at best. Enjoy the money but promise to do better next time, Sanaa.
For me! Me, dammit! Me! Me! Me!: Hysteria: the Def Leppard Story
Now is the moment when this writer reveals that his favorite rock band is Def Leppard. The oft-imitated and, in the process, reduced in stature '80s hair band suffered through a string of tragedies which even Job would find excessive. A car crash took the arm of their drummer then alcohol claimed the life of their guitatist. Along the way, the group somehow managed to make two of the most financially successful records ever in Pyromania and Hysteria. They even followed up with a multi-platinum hit in Adrenalize.
Sure, they went on to a career of Wal-Mart parking lot gigs after that, but Def Leppard was at one time THE most imitated band in the world. Other hair metal acts knew whose schtick they were aping, and the majority readily admit now that in the 1980s, this was the group that impacted the industry the most (apologies to Police and U2 fans).
Hysteria tells the unlikely story of a few British kids with a dream to be rock stars. What follows is their incongruous series of serendipitous and nightmarish events which saw the band achieve their dreams while falling victim to fate. Had the 2001 film been released in theaters rather than made exclusively for VH-1, it would have finished in my top five for the year. Whether you happen to be a fan of the band or not, the re-telling of all their fortunes and misfortunes makes for very good television. The film also revived the career of Anthony Michael Hall, who leveraged this role into a starring gig on the popular cable show, The Dead Zone.
For people who like Angelina Jolie in a patch (i.e. Brad Pitt): Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow
Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow is not the home run I hoped it would be. My lofty expectations for the project were in hindsight a tad ambitious for a first time writer/director like Kerry Conran. When judged outside the crucible of predisposition, the film is a triumph of ideas and execution. Here is the first bluescreen production where the actors offer a semblance of believable interaction with their environments. Simply put, it (appropriately) feels like the future of cinema.
Of course, the charm of the project is that it's written as a stubborn throwback to a different era of cinema. Those of us over the age of 30 remember the time before cable when a Saturday night late feature was likely to include buxom space bimbos being rescued by heroic captains who refused to give in to the threat of the red planet Martians. Only later did those of us raised during this era come to appreciate the not-at-all subtle metaphors for communism, but that's a different topic for another today. Today's discussion is the retroactive charm of a film made with cutting edge tools but blanketed in 1950s science fiction sensibilities (and silliness).
Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow is a queer film in that it's an instant B Movie made on a tentpole Hollywood budget, but with a dated yet incongruously timeless feel to it. The movie is without question the most unique studio output of 2004, and it deserves a look so that the viewer may crystallize their own opinions. The only concern about buying the disc immediately is that there is sure to be at least one if not more later releases which highlight the technical accomplishments in making the film. Not the least of them is that Sky Captain co-stars legendary actor Laurence Olivier, a man who died when the director was only 22-years-old. His inclusion exemplifies how completely open to the creative process Kerry Conran was during the evolution of Sky Captain.
Even with the upgrade concerns, this is the easy choice for DVD pick of the week.
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