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Go home with The Good Shepherd, Bobby or The Last King of Scotland
By Marni Weisz
April 3
Letters from Iwo Jima
Stars: Ken Watanabe, Kazunari Ninomiya
Director: Clint Eastwood (Million Dollar Baby)
Story: First Eastwood directed Flags of Our Fathers, about the six U.S. soldiers who hoisted the American flag on the island of Iwo Jima after defeating the Japanese. But then he realized he was only telling half the story so turned around and immediately made this Japanese-language film from the Japanese point of view. Watanabe stars as General Tadamichi Kuribayashi, who reluctantly leads his soldiers into a hopeless battle.
Black Christmas
Stars: Michelle Trachtenberg, Lacey Chabert
Director: Glen Morgan (Willard)
Story: This remake of the 1974 slasher pic had Christmas purists crying sacrilege. Apparently they felt Christmas cookies made with chunks of human flesh somehow sullied the sanctity of the season. Set in a sorority house over Christmas break, a group of hot young women falls prey to a psychopath. DVD Extras: deleted scenes, alternate endings, “What Have You Done? The Remaking of Black Christmas”
Charlotte’s Web
Stars: Dakota Fanning, Siobahn Fallon
Director: Gary Winick (13 Going on 30)
Story: Julia Roberts is the voice of Charlotte, a spider who weaves messages into her web in order to, literally, save Wilbur the pig’s bacon in this retelling of the E.B. White classic. DVD Extras: “Making Some Movie,” “Flicka’s Pig Tales,” “Where Are They Now?,” gag reel, deleted scenes, commentary tracks
The Good Shepherd
Stars: Matt Damon, Angelina Jolie
Director: Robert De Niro (A Bronx Tale)
Story: The birth of the CIA is chronicled via the story of Edward Wilson (Damon), an odd man who fits into the new agency perfectly thanks to his paranoid nature and penchant for secrecy. DVD Extras: deleted scenes
Volver
Stars: Penélope Cruz, Carmen Maura
Director: Pedro Almodóvar (Bad Education)
Story: After a violent incident involving her boyfriend and daughter, Raimunda (Cruz) returns from Madrid to her little village of La Mancha only to have her mother — who died in a fire — return from the dead. The story may sound heavy, but the film is actually a dramedy, with Cruz giving a spirited and entertaining performance.
April 10
Bobby
Stars: Elijah Wood, William H. Macy
Director: Emilio Estevez (Men at Work)
Story: Estevez weaves together the stories of 22 fictional characters as they interact at the Ambassador Hotel on the day Robert F. Kennedy was shot. He needed a large cast to do it, including Wood, Macy, Lindsay Lohan, Sharon Stone, Helen Hunt, Christian Slater, Harry Belafonte, Demi Moore, Ashton Kutcher and his own dad, Martin Sheen. DVD Extras: “Bobby: The Making of an American Epic,” “Eyewitness Account from the Ambassador Hotel”
Arthur and the Invisibles
Stars: Freddie Highmore, Mia Farrow
Director: Luc Besson (La Femme Nikita)
Story: From the director who brought you such violent thrillers as La Femme Nikita and The Professional comes this live-action/animated family film about little Arthur (Highmore) who goes in search of the fabled tiny creatures living in his grandmother’s backyard in order to find their treasure and save her house. DVD Extras: music video, featurettes on the voices and visual effects
April 17
Freedom Writers
Stars: Hilary Swank, Patrick Dempsey
Director: Richard LaGravenese (Living Out Loud)
Story: In the tradition of Music of the Heart and Take the Lead, Swank plays a real-life teacher — in this case a woman named Erin Gruwell — who tries to change the lives of inner-city students by showing them there are alternatives to violence. In particular, she uses journal writing, and the real-life collection of the students’ journal entries served as the jumping-off point for the film’s script. DVD Extras: deleted scenes, photo gallery, “Making a Dream,” “Freedom Writers: The Story Behind the Story”
The Last King of Scotland
Stars: Forest Whitaker, James McAvoy
Director: Kevin Macdonald (Touching the Void)
Story: Whitaker’s Oscar-winning performance is the reason to see this largely fictional account of the relationship between Ugandan dictator Idi Amin (Whitaker) and his Scottish doctor (McAvoy). Largely fictional because that doctor never existed. The rest of the narrative takes similar liberties to paint a picture of the brutal leader. DVD Extras: deleted scenes, casting session, director commentary, “Capturing Idi Amin”
April 24
The Queen
Stars: Helen Mirren, Michael Sheen
Director: Stephen Frears (High Fidelity)
Story: Bedroom chats and private phone conversations are used to recall Queen Elizabeth’s (Best Actress Mirren) steely reaction to Princess Diana’s death. Just how much of it is actually true is left for the audience to ponder. Sheen plays Prime Minister Tony Blair (Sheen), who begs Elizabeth to show more compassion.
Little Children
Stars: Kate Winslet, Patrick Wilson
Director: Todd Field (In the Bedroom)
Story: Director Field once again probes the damaged underbelly of suburban life as unsatisfied wife Sarah (Winslet) begins an extramarital affair with Brad (Wilson), who also feels trapped and bored by his relationship. Meanwhile, the community of young families in which they live is brought together by the return home of a convicted sex offender (Jackie Earle Haley).
Déjà Vu
Stars: Denzel Washington, Paula Patton
Director: Tony Scott (Domino)
Story: Washington plays agent Doug Carlin, investigating an explosion that destroyed a ship carrying hundreds of U.S. sailors in New Orleans. But when Carlin goes to the home of a victim (Patton) who may have been tied to the bomber, he hears his own voice on her answering machine. What follows involves time bending and wormholes as Carlin tries to stop the explosion from happening in the first place.
SPOTLIGHT
April 17
Notes on a Scandal ($43)
Many missed this gem in the theatres, either because of its limited release or because good word of mouth led to a lot of sell outs, so it should be a hot commodity on DVD.
Based on the novel by Zoë Heller and directed by Richard Eyre (Iris), the story is told through the eyes of Barbara (Judi Dench), a lonely teacher who’s closing in on retirement. When a vibrant, younger pottery teacher named Sheba (Cate Blanchett) comes to work at her school, Barbara sees a potential friend and sets out to make Sheba a confidante.
And Sheba has a lot to confide. Despite being married with two children, she is having an affair with one of her 15-year-old students. But when Sheba doesn’t confide enough in Barbara, the elder woman turns on her.
The DVD includes the featurettes “The Story of Two Obsessions,” “In Character: Cate Blanchett,” a director commentary, plus a bunch of interviews that first appeared on the film’s official website.
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Above: Ben Stiller in Night at the Museum. This picture: Cate Blanchett (left) and Judi Dench in Notes on a Scandal
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SPOTLIGHT
April 24
Night at the Museum ($46)
The surprise hit of last year’s holiday season, Night at the Museum stars Ben Stiller as down-and-out inventor Larry Daley. About to lose his apartment, Larry takes a job as a night watchman at New York’s Museum of Natural History.
But a lonely guy with his feet up reading the paper all night wouldn’t make much of a movie, so this museum is stricken with a curse that brings the exhibits to life after sundown. Dinosaurs play catch and cowboys fight with Spartans, putting the museum, and Larry’s job, in jeopardy. So, Larry enlists the help of reanimated Teddy Roosevelt (Robin Williams) to keep the other historical figures in check.
A two-disc Special Edition DVD sports an impressive slate of bonus features, including the DVD-ROM game “Reunite with Rexy,” an alternate opening, gag reel, deleted scenes, “Directing 101,” “Bringing the Museum to Life,” “Monkey Business,” “Building the Museum” (which, by the way, was done on a Vancouver soundstage), commentaries and more.
A single-disc not-so-special edition is also available, but priced at just three dollars less, it’s not much of a choice.