The H1N1 virus struck last week and delayed the publication of the December 15th edition of this column.  For a look at all the key DVDs that were released last week including The Hangover, Inglourious Basterds, The Maxx: The Complete Series, 20th Century Boys,  The Complete BBC Sherlock Holmes, and much more click here.

 

As for this week--with Christmas just around the corner, one might think that the pace of DVD releases would relent, but such is not the case, at least in the “Theatrical Releases” category, which will see the debut of three innovative indie-type films including the surprise hits District 9 and 500 Days of Summer as well as the potential DVD cult hit Extract from Mike Judge.

 

Theatrical Releases

 

Produced by Peter Jackson and directed by first timer Neill Blomkamp, District 9 (Sony, Rated “R,” Single-Disc $28.96, Two-Disc Special Edition $36.95, BD $39.95) was the surprise science fiction hit of 2009.  This modestly-budgeted ($30 million) film boasted excellent special effects and a gut-wrenching storyline about aliens marooned in South Africa--a situation that provided plenty of political parallels to apartheid.  District 9 clearly benefited from a screening at the San Diego Comic-Con that energized the largely male science fiction audience and helped make the film a hit domestically with a box office take of over $115 million.  Though its potent themes get somewhat obscured in the film’s action-packed second half, District 9 stood out in a summer largely given over to increasingly vacuous big-budget blockbusters such as Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen and G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra.  The Blu-ray and 2-Disc Special Editions include a number of interesting documentaries about the film (which itself is produced in a faux-documentary style) and these collector-oriented releases should do well with the devoted audience that the film earned during its theatrical run.

 

Equally innovative and original in its own way is 500 Days of Summer (Fox Searchlight, Rated “PG-13” $28.96, BD $39.99), which bills itself as “a story about love, but not a love story.”  In this twist on the romantic comedy genre, Tom (Joseph Gordon Leavitt) finds himself falling hard for a cute co-worker.  But his ardor is not returned by the enigmatic Summer Finn (Zooey Deschanel), who makes it clear she is not interested in the same sort of deep relationship that he wants.   The story is told from Tom’s point of view and skips back-and-forth chronologically through the year-and-one-half duration of their relationship.  Director Marc Webb not only plays fast and loose with the love affair’s chronology, he also is not afraid of slipping in bits of cinematic subjectivism that include a movie musical-type dance number and other devices that reflect Tom’s mood and feeling. 

 

The basic quandary of the film is how Summer can reject such a hip, clever, sensitive and imaginative suitor.   Do his pheromones fail to trigger her receptors?  Has she been ineradicably scarred by previous relationships?  Is there something wrong with this one-sided view of a one-sided relationship, or have the filmmakers, by depicting the inexplicable rejection of such a modern paragon of a suitor, hit upon a formula to attract the cinematic interest of those legions of E-Harmony-bound dweebs who reject the perfectly compatible, but less than perfect, available females around them in favor of the heedless headlong pursuit/stalking of the unobtainable “stunner?”  In spite of these unanswered questions, or perhaps because of them, the low budget 500 Days of Summer struck a chord with critics tired of “romcom” clichés (86% positive on RT) and performed surprisingly well at the box office ($32 million).

 

Mike Judge, creator of Beavis and Butthead, King of the Hill, Office Space, and Idiocracy, is one of the most original humorists working in American TV and film. The rooted, realistic, regional humor of King of the Hill has made it the most underrated animated TV series in the history of American television, and Judge’s 1999 film Office Space was a cri de Coeur for cubicle workers everywhere, a send-up of corporate America from the point of view of the ordinary IT worker that became a cult classic on video tape and DVD.  Unfortunately Judge’s latest film, Extract (Buena Vista, $29.99, BD $39.99) doesn’t have the same sort of built-in constituency.  Successful Beamer-driving, gated-community living, businessmen are not necessarily the top choice for heroic protagonists among those living in recession-ridden blue states.  But Judge, who took on the software industry when it was riding high in the late 1990s, has never been afraid to buck the trends.  Extract takes the side of a beleaguered entrepreneur played by Justin Bateman, whose personal and professional life are under assault from overbearing neighbors, a cute criminal drifter, a greedy TV lawyer, a bored wife, his druggy best friend, and a workforce that is afraid he will sell off the company and their jobs along with it.  Bateman makes the hapless Joel entirely sympathetic, even when he is under the influence of various chemicals supplied by his bartender/confidante played by Ben Affleck, who is not afraid to take on a supporting character role. Like King of the Hill, Extract is a realistic, character-driven comedy that lacks even the pretense of flash, but it is as solid at its core as a pillar of cement.

 

Given the success of The Proposal and The Blind Side, Sandra Bullock can probably be forgiven for All About Steve (Fox, Rated “PG-13,” $29.99, BD $39.99) a weird misfire that began production in July of 2007, but wasn’t released until September of 2009 (always a bad sign).  The film was roundly panned by the critics (only 6% positive on RT).  Even Bullock’s diehard fans would be well advised to skip this one.

 

Don’t be surprised if the direct-to-DVD release American Pie Presents: The Book of Love (Universal, Unrated, $29.98, BD $36.98) outperforms All About Steve on DVD.  Universal has mounted a major TV ad campaign for the latest installment in the teen sex series that features the hardworking Eugene Levy in yet another role he would probably rather forget except when he checks his bank statement.

 

Another new release in the direct-to-DVD category is one of those “why the heck did they decide to remake this film” efforts.  Beyond a Reasonable Doubt  (Starz, Rated “PG-13” $29.98, BD $39.98), which stars Michael Douglas, Jesse Metcalfe and Amber Tamblyn, is a remake of Fritz Lang’s 1956 newspaper-based film noir that starred Dana Andrews.  Peter Hyams directed the new version, which reportedly maintains the strong plot of the original with its potent twist, but surprise endings tend to lose their power over the decades.

 

Speaking of unnecessary remakes, this week also marks the DVD debut of actor/director Stanley Tucci’s 2008 film Blind Date (E1 Entertainment, Unrated, $26.98), a new version of the 1996 film by the late Dutch director Theo Van Gogh.

 

First Time on DVD

 

Douglas Sirk’s second American film, Summer Storm (VCI, $14.99), which was made in 1944, has finally come to DVD.  An adaptation of Chekov’s The Shooting Party, Summer Storm should probably be seen as an early example of a “period” film noir, much like Robert Siodmack’s The Suspect, which was based on the turn-of-the-century Crippen case.  In Summer Storm, a womanizing judge who has been exiled to the provinces and a decadent aristocrat are both manipulated by a sultry peasant girl played by the underrated 1940s femme fatale, Linda Darnell.  Unfortunately, due to the censorship of the Breen Office, Darnell doesn’t get to smolder quite as much as she should, but the censor’s insistence that a killer must pay for his crime is actually handled quite well by Sirk, who makes cowardice an integral and recurring part of the murderer’s character.  Sirk updated the framing story for the film to 1917 and the movie’s sympathy with the revolutionary roots of our then (1944) Soviet ally is quite evident as is the affection for Russian culture and folk music that characterizes the film’s score, which was nominated for an Oscar.  Ironically it is those lend lease-era, love-your-allies musical elements that are most tedious now, while the essence of Chekov’s psychological thriller remains compelling.  Fans of Sirk’s highly visual 1950s melodramas will see echoes of his later style in set pieces such as a marvelously realized wedding scene.

 

Anime

 

The major new anime release this week is Spice and Wolf Season 1 Complete Collection (Funimation $59.98), a 13-episode series based on a popular (2.2 million copies sold in Japan) light novel fantasy series by Isune Hasekura (Yen Press is publishing both the light novels and the seinen manga series they inspired).  In spite of its “European” setting, Spice and Wolf is a particularly Japanese sort of fantasy with a plot that focuses on trade, peddling, and economics as much as it does on the powers of the comely wolf-eared heroine.  Produced by the Imagin anime studio, Wolf and Spice Season 1 aired in Japan in 2008.  A second season debuted there last July.

 

Also due this week is the sixth and final volume of the sexy Ah My Buddha (Media Blasters, $29.99) anime from Studio Deen.  Based on a mature-rated manga series by Toshinori Sogabe, Ah My Buddha is the fan service-filled saga of a monk who transforms into a “super-monk” every time he sees a naked female, something that, as you might expect, happens rather frequently.

 

Saber Rider and the Star Sheriffs: The Complete Series (VCI, $29.99) contains the complete 52-episode 1980s series created by World Events Productions (Voltron) from the Studio Pierrot anime series, Star Musketeer Bismarck.  WEP reworked the original anime (Fireball, not Saber Rider is the prime hero of the Studio Pierrot series) and actually created six new episodes. The six-disc set, which includes 1200 minutes of animated outer space western action, is one of the best values in the anime category.

 

TV on DVD

 

The major TV on DVD release this week is Family Guy: Something, Something, Something Dark Side (Fox, $22.98, BD $29.99), an hour-long episode of the Fox animated series that parodies Star Wars Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back.  The characters from Seth MacFarlane’s Fox series take on the key roles in the Star Wars film much as they did in Blue Harvest, the first Family Guy Star Wars parody, which proved to be extremely popular on DVD.  The most prominent new character introduced in Something, Something, Something Dark Side is Boba Fett, who will be played by Peter Griffin’s arch nemesis the Giant Chicken.

 

For those who are old enough to remember when TV stations played serials from the 1930s, there is a new 70th Anniversary Edition of the original Buck Rogers Universal serial from 1939 (VCI, $29.99).  The 12-chapter serial, which was based on the Buck Rogers comic strip, featured Buster Crabbe, who had previously starred in two Flash Gordon serials as Buck, and the oily Anthony Warde as “super-racketeer” Killer Kane.  It’s all great fun, and unlike many of the 1930s released on DVD, the visual quality of VCI’s Buck Rogers is remarkably good.

 

Also due out this week are the third seasons of two teen dramas that appear on the ABC Family Channel, the teen science fiction saga, Kyle XY: The Complete and Final Third Season (Buena Vista, $39.99) and the pregnancy-themed teen drama series, The Secret Life of an American Teenager Season Three (Buena Vista, $39.99).  The fifth and final season of the comedy series Taxi (Paramount, $39.99) will also be released this week.

 

Foreign Films

 

Fans of the classic blind samurai Zatoichi movies should certainly enjoy the 2008 film Ichi (Funimation, $24.98, BD $34.98), an “R” rated period film starring the gorgeous Haruka Ayase as an outcast blind goze singer who also proves to be a very accomplished swordswoman during the numerous times that she has to defend herself throughout the film’s two-hour running time.  From its snowy opening scenes to its gruesome, but satisfying conclusion the film’s austere beauty is matched only by its well-staged sword-fighting set pieces.  The movie’s relationship to the Zatoichi saga is subtly revealed in a way that should be very satisfying to fans of the original series.

 

Documentaries

 

A full slate of documentaries of are due this week including two very different music-themed works, Phil Grabsky’s In Search of Mozart and Davis Guggenheim’s It Might Get Loud.  In Search of Mozart (Microcinema $40) is the first feature-length documentary on the life of the great composer.  The film eschews re-enactments and follows the composer’s life through by retracing the 25,000 mile of travels he made during his lifetime, using his music and his extensive correspondence to create a true portrait of a musical genius. 

 

It Might Get Loud (Sony, $27.96, BD $37.95) puts together three generations of rock guitarists including Led Zeppelin’s 60-something axeman Jimmy Paige, U2’s 48-year old The Edge (David Evans), and the 34-year-old force behind the White Stripes, Jack White. Filmmaker Davis Guggenheim (An Inconvenient Truth) is on to something here since the three guitarists, who had never really met each other before, do have markedly different approaches to the instrument, but the actual jam session is pretty mild stuff—the individual segments are better.

 

Two other new films examine very different sorts of artwork.  Ginevra’s Story: Solving the Mystery of Leonardo’s First Portrait (Microcinema, $24.99) is a 57-minute 1999 film directed by Christopher Swann that uses the latest X-ray and infrared technologies to analyze the enigmatic portrait by Da Vinci that currently resides in the National Gallery (it is the only Leonardo painting in the Western hemisphere).  Hilary Helstein’s As Seen Through These Eyes (Menemsha Films, $29.95) is an outgrowth of her work with Steven Spielberg’s Survivors of Shoah Visual History Foundation.  The film, which is narrated by Maya Angelou, documents the searing and powerful art produced by survivors of the Holocaust, a task that has even a greater importance at a time when Holocaust-deniers are increasingly bold in their shameless attempts to rewrite history.