DVD Reviews - Page 4

Synopsis:

A young Kansas farm-girl is whisked away by a tornado to a magical land called Oz where she meets up with a friendly yet scatter-brained Scarecrow, a cowardly Lion and a Tinman without a heart.  All travel to see the Wizard (and try to avoid the Wicked Witch of the West) in the quest to get Dorothy back home to Kansas.

Dual Layer Single Sided

Full Screen 1.33:1

Audio: English Dolby Digital Surround 5.1, English Mono, French Mono

Subtitles: English, French, Spanish

Synopsis:

Margaret Tate (Sandra Bullock) terrorizes her publishing house co-workers with her abrasive, take-no-prisoners management style, especially her overworked assistant Andrew Paxton (Ryan Reynolds). But when Margaret is threatened with deportation to her native Canada because of an immigration technicality, the quick-thinking exec announces that she and Andrew are engaged to be married. Ambitious Andrew agrees to go along with her scheme—if there’s a long-awaited promotion in it for him. Everything is going according to Margaret’s plan, until an overzealous immigration official makes it his business to prove that the couple’s engagement is bogus. To demonstrate her commitment to her new fiancé, Margaret agrees to celebrate the 90th birthday of his colorful grandmother (Betty White) — in Alaska. The editrix’s type-A ways put her at odds with her eccentric future in-laws with hilarious consequences, until the Paxtons teach Margaret a thing or two about family.

Widescreen 2.35:1

Dual Layer Single Sided

Audio: English Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround, French, Spanish

Subtitles: French, Spanish, English

Based on the novel by Arnold Zweig.

Butcher becomes executioner for the Nazis in this long-banned classic from postwar Germany.

Germany, 1934: the Nazi authorities in a small town need an executioner to put a group of political prisoners to death, otherwise Hitler won’t visit their town. Teetjen, the town butcher, facing bankruptcy, agrees to do the dirty deed.

Adapted from the novel by German-Jewish author Arnold Zweig and co-scripted by Wolfgang Staudte, this important classic was directed by a former anti-Nazi resistance fighter, Falk Harnack. Ironically the film, which starred concentration cam survivor Erwin Geschonneck in the lead role, was withdrawn after its release because its nuanced portrait of a Nazi perpetrator was considered too sympathetic.

Bonus materials:

·         Short Film on Falk Harnack

·         Essay on Arnold Zweig

·         Biographies & Filmographies

Black and white, in German with English subtitles.

Four famed mathematicians, all strangers to one another, are invited to the remote home of a mysterious man known only as ‘Fermat’. Once there, they are locked in a room and given a series of logic puzzles that must be solved within one minute each. For each late answer, their lives become increasingly imperiled. Who is Fermat? What is their connection to each other? When will they be tested again? Where is their mysterious host watching from? Why have they been placed in this elaborate death trap? And for genius minds about to be silenced, is staying alive the ultimate enigma?

Allison Dubois (Arquette) is a strong-willed, devoted young wife and mother of three girls, who has gradually come to grips with her extraordinary ability to talk to dead people, see the future in her dreams and read people's thoughts. This season, Allison and her family's world is turned upside down after her abilities are publicly exposed, resulting in sweeping changes both professionally and personally.

The master storyteller lays bare the privileges and passions of a bygone era.

Peer into the drawing rooms of Victorian high society in these vintage adaptations of the writing of Henry James. This enchanting collection plays out the tensions and travails of late 19th-Century romance, in which English accents encounter American attitudes to powerful effect.

Follow the drama as it unfolds is six scintillating episodes. Based on DAISY MILLER, AN INTERNATIONAL EPISODE, and other beloved stories by Henry James, the series explores the delicate affairs of the heart with subtlety and strength.

DVD features include Henry James biography; cast filmographies; 4:3 full screen color; Closed Captioning.

Episodes are:
EMMA (Based on "Lord Beauprey")
BESSIE (Based on "An International Episode")
KATE (Based on "The Bench of Desolation")
DAISY (Based on "Daisy Miller")
LEONIE (Based on "Nona Vincent")
ELIZABETH (Based on "The Great Condition")

The World's Scariest Stories In One Spine-Chilling Set

Fascinating stories lie behind even the most horrifying legends. From tortured spirits who haunt otherwise idyllic locations across America, to strange rituals, horrifying apparitions and frightening phenomena, this spine-chilling 20-DVD Megaset features in-depth profiles of the world’s scariest stories. Learn, through these informative and entertaining documentaries, the truth behind the Salem witches and unexplained poltergeists. Discover the millennia-old history of Halloween and its seemingly harmless traditions. Travel to some of America’s most haunted destinations, from Savannah, Georgia, where spirits have been known to lurk in the bucolic façade, to the windy city of Chicago, Illinois where ghosts are said to prowl the shores of Lake Michigan.

Episodes include:
Hauntings; The Haunted History of Halloween; Poltergeists; Salem Witch Trials; Vampire Secrets; Haunted Houses; More Haunted Houses: Tortured Souls and Restless Spirits; Zombies; Voodoo Rituals; In Search of the Real Frankenstein; Bloodlines: The Dracula Family Tree; Exorcism: Driving Out the Devil; Witch Hunt; Exorcising the Devil; Voodoo Secrets; Haunted Tombstone; Haunted Washington, D.C.; Haunted Savannah; Haunted Hawaii; Haunted Chicago.

In 2000, a group of masked men invaded the home of a poor family in rural Colombia. They then attached a bomb encased in PVC-1 tubing around the mother’s neck and demanded 15 million pesos. The family would be told by phone where to bring the money. If the ransom were not delivered according to exact instructions, the collar bomb would be detonated. Greek/Colombian writer/director Spiros Stathoulopoulos films the story of this harrowing ordeal in one unbroken take for an unprecedented achievement in real-time suspense that stunned audiences a the Cannes Film Festival.

In Spanish with English subtitles.

There’s always a way to get something for nothing!

You may have seen America’s #1 Con Man, Todd Robbins, on Leno, Letterman, or Conan. But it’s just as likely you’ve never heard of him – because Todd is a well-known authority and practitioner of all things deceptive.

Now, for the first time, Todd reveals his cons and playful scams, showing you how easy it is to trick your way to a free drink, earn a few extra bucks at the poker table, and laugh with (and at!) your co-workers. Make friends, too, with this fun, tongue-in-cheek guide to suckering those you love – and those you’d like to know.

You’ll learn games you can’t lose, tricks they won’t figure out, and cons they’ll never see coming. With his concise, witty direction, Robbins ensures that all you’ll need to succeed is a smooth smile.

Over three hours on three DVDs: How to scam your way to free beer and other bar bets; Poker-night games and other card playing tricks; Workplace pranks and other ways to con your co-workers.

Everyone loves a good con. And now, thanks to Todd Robbins, everyone can get in on the action!

Featuring top-notch adaptations of detective stories from Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s contemporaries, The Rivals of Sherlock Holmes, Set 1 debuts on DVD from Acorn Media on September 1, 2009. Seen on public television in the 1970s, the classic anthology series casts include John Neville (The First Churchills, X-Files), Peter Vaughan (The Remains of the Day), Donald Sinden (Two’s Company), Donald Pleasence (Halloween, Blofeld in You Only Live Twice), and Jeremy Irons (Brideshead Revisited) in his first screen appearance. Offering unique insight into Victorian popular culture, intellectual preoccupations, and social ills, these 13 finely crafted mysteries are also fascinating whodunits.

Victorian London was a boon for crooks—and a bane for Scotland Yard, whose job it was to thwart crime. In the pages of fiction, the citizens of the capital often turned to private sleuths for redress. But Sherlock Holmes was not the only detective in town. Contemporary writers created an impressive cast of investigators, both amateur and professional, as colorful as the criminals they set out to catch.

Some of the detectives in this classic British series work with the police. Others achieve success in spite of them. And a few even fall under official suspicion themselves. Yet all pit their wits against the best that London’s underworld has to offer.

Britain’s top character actors take on some truly captivating sleuths: Dr. Thorndyke, early proponent of forensic investigation; blind gumshoe Max Carrados; gentleman thief Simon Carne; and Mr. Carnacki, detective of the occult.

A Thames Television Production, The Rivals of Sherlock Holmes premiered on the ITV Network in the U.K. in 1971. A second series, also 13 episodes, aired in 1973. The series won a BAFTA for best design (1971).