Library

Languages: English, Portuguese, Spanish

Subtitles: Cantonese, Chinese, English, French, Korean, Portuguese, Spanish

Sound: AC-3

Summary: Set in America during the Vietnam War, "Across the Universe" is a powerful love story set against a backdrop of political and social unrest: it's a story of soul-searching, self-doubt, and individual powerlessness cleverly conveyed through a multitude of "Beatles" songs. Like young adults all across America during the 1960's, Jude (Jim Sturgess), Lucy (Evan Rachel Wood), Max (Joe Anderson), Sadie (Dana Fuchs), Prudence (T.V. Carpio), and JoJo (Martin Luther) are in turmoil over the war; questioning their individual roles in the war effort and struggling to find a way to hold true to their beliefs while making a difference in the world. While love proves a powerful uniting force, its limitations become clear as relationships are strained and broken over individual perceptions of responsibility to cause and country. A fairly bizarre juxtaposition of extremely stylized, almost hallucinogenic scenes of swirling colors and reflections, highly choreographed dance segments, seemingly commonplace character interaction, and emotionally packed close-up footage of characters lost in contemplative song, this film imparts a good sense of the confusion and passion of the time and is at once powerful, invigorating, and disturbing. The film runs a bit long at 2-hours 11-minutes and several segments drag noticeably thanks to some incredibly slow song tempos. Warning: this production may change how you think about a favorite "Beatles" song forever. "--Tami Horiuchi "

Beyond "Across the Universe"
On Blu-ray
The Deluxe Soundtrack
"Beatles" audio CD
Stills from "Across the Universe" (click for larger image)

Languages: English, Spanish, French

Subtitles: English, French, Spanish

Sound: Dolby

Summary: As with "Star Wars", the George Lucas-produced "Indiana Jones" trilogy was not just a plaything for kids but an act of nostalgic affection toward a lost phenomenon: the cliffhanging movie serials of the past. Episodic in structure and with fate hanging in the balance about every 10 minutes, the "Jones" features tapped into Lucas's extremely profitable "Star Wars" formula of modernizing the look and feel of an old, but popular, story model. Steven Spielberg directed all three films, which are set in the late 1930s and early '40s: the comic book-like "Raiders of the Lost Ark", the spooky, "Gunga Din"-inspired "Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom", and the cautious but entertaining "Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade". Fans and critics disagree over the order of preference, some even finding the middle movie nearly repugnant in its violence. (Pro-"Temple of Doom" people, on the other hand, believe that film to be the most disarmingly creative and emotionally effective of the trio.) One thing's for sure: Harrison Ford's swaggering, two-fisted, self-effacing performance worked like a charm, and the art of cracking bullwhips was probably never quite the iconic activity it soon became after "Raiders". Supporting players and costars were very much a part of the series, too--Karen Allen, Sean Connery (as Indy's dad), Kate Capshaw, Ke Huy Quan, Amrish Puri, Denholm Elliot, River Phoenix, and John Rhys-Davies among them. Years have passed since the last film (another is supposedly in the works), but emerging film buffs can have the same fun their predecessors did picking out numerous references to Hollywood classics and B-movies of the past. "--Tom Keogh"

Languages: English, French

Subtitles: English, French, Spanish

Sound: Dolby Digital 2.0 Mono

Summary: This well-regarded cult film is a tense Kafka-esque tale concerning what happens to a likable computer guy who is in the wrong place at the wrong time in the city that never sleeps--New York. This is a New York infested with bizarre characters vividly brought to life by a once-in-a-lifetime cast. Griffin Dunne's wonderfully controlled comic performance as Paul Hackett is the glue that holds this increasingly surreal film together. Scorsese utilizes a full array of independent and underground film techniques, including special film speed manipulations, angles, and edits, deftly capturing the strange rhythms of an after-hours New York City. Many will find the jokes clever, and occasionally laugh-out-loud funny. Some, however, will find the film an excruciating series of staged circumstances setting up a sadistically cruel dark nightmare of horrors. And there are a few lines of dialogue so poorly written they remind you how unbelievable the thin story really is. But forgive the film these few lapses--overall it's a wild, surreal ride. The most offbeat character is the beehive-sporting, Monkee-obsessed neurotic played to perfection by Teri Garr. And the moment when Griffin Dunne uses his last quarter to play Peggy Lee's "Is That All There Is" and dances with Verna Bloom while an angry mob searches SoHo for him is an inspired bit of lunacy. "--Christopher J. Jarmick"

Languages: English, French, Spanish

Subtitles: English, French, Spanish

Sound: Dolby Digital 2.0 Surround

Summary: You know that old dramatic principle of suspension of disbelief? You'll have to rely on it for this box-office smash, but you won't be disappointed. Harrison Ford plays a U.S. president who single-handedly employs his rigid antiterrorism policy when a band of Russian thugs hatch a mid-flight takeover of Air Force One. Gary Oldman, who chews the scenery as the lead terrorist, will shoot a hostage at the slightest provocation. Glenn Close plays the sternly pragmatic vice president who negotiates with Oldman from her Washington seat of power. If you can believe that the aircraft's pressurized cabin can sustain hundreds of rounds of machine-gun fire, you'll buy anything in this entertaining potboiler, especially thanks to Ford's stalwart heroics and some nifty special effects. Director Wolfgang Petersen ("Das Boot") keeps the action moving so fast you won't be sweating the details. Don't forget your parachute! "--Jeff Shannon"

Languages: English, French

Subtitles: English

Sound: Dolby Digital 2.0 Mono

Summary: The quintessential movie spoof that spawned an entire genre of parody films, the original "Airplane!" still holds up as one of the brightest comedic gems of the '80s, not to mention of cinema itself (it ranked in the top 5 of "Entertainment Weekly"'s list of the 100 funniest movies ever made). The humor may be low and obvious at times, but the jokes keep coming at a rapid-fire clip and its targets--primarily the lesser lights of '70s cinema, from disco films to star-studded disaster epics--are more than worthy for send-up. If you've seen even one of the overblown "Airport" movies then you know the plot: the crew of a filled-to-capacity jetliner is wiped out and it's up to a plucky stewardess and a shell-shocked fighter pilot to land the plane. Robert Hays and Julie Hagerty are the heroes who have a history that includes a meet-cute à la "Saturday Night Fever", a surf scene right out of "From Here to Eternity", a Peace Corps trip to Africa to teach the natives the benefits of Tupperware and basketball, a war-ravaged recovery room with a G.I. who thinks he's Ethel Merman (a hilarious cameo)--and those are just the flashbacks! The jokes gleefully skirt the boundaries of bad taste (pilot Peter Graves to a juvenile cockpit visitor: "Joey, have you ever seen a grown man naked?"), with the high (low?) point being Hagerty's intimate involvement with the blow-up automatic pilot doll, but they'll have you rolling on the floor. The film launched the careers of collaborators Jim Abrahams ("Big Business"), David Zucker ("Ruthless People"), and Jerry Zucker ("Ghost"), as well as revitalized such B-movie actors as Lloyd Bridges, Peter Graves, Robert Stack, and Leslie Nielsen, who built a second career on films like this. A vital part of any video collection. "--Mark Englehart"

Languages: English

Subtitles: English, French, Spanish

Sound: Dolby Digital 5.1

Summary: Disney's 1992 animated feature is a triumph of wit and skill. The high-tech artwork and graphics look great, the characters are strong, the familiar story is nicely augmented with an interesting villain (Jafar, voiced by Jonathan Freeman), and there's an incredible hook atop the whole thing: Robin Williams's frantically hilarious vocal performance as Aladdin's genie. Even if one isn't particularly moved by the love story between the title character (Scott Weinger) and his girlfriend Jasmine (Linda Larkin), you can easily get lost in Williams's improvisational energy and the equally entertaining performances of Freeman and Gilbert Gottfried (as Jafar's parrot). "--Tom Keogh"

Languages: English

Subtitles: English, Spanish

Sound: Dolby Digital 2.0 Surround

Summary: Part tragic, part comic, this outrageous look at life in the fast lane is the Academy Award-winning musical about Bob Fosse's excessive life in show business. Played by Roy Scheider, Fosse's alter-ego drives himself over the edge and soon finds he is caught between a recurring fantasy about his death and the reality of a near-death experience. Dazzlingly presented, this electrifying story about the perils of pushing yourself too hard is filled with Fosse's legendary song-and-dance choreography.

Features:
Scene-Specific Commentary by Roy Scheider
Interviews With Roy Scheider
5 Bob Fosse Clips
Theatrical Trailer


System Requirements:
Running Time 123 Min

Format: DVD MOVIE

Languages: English

Summary: A collection of 20 different moves that will leave your opponent standing. Each move is detailed and shown at match speed and in slow motion. What appears to be complex is made easy for players of all ages and abilities. Plus, in this easy to learn system you get to see World Class players putting the moves on their opponents.

Languages: English

Sound: Dolby Digital 2.0

Summary: Remember back in the early 1980s when special-effects makeup artists were tripping over themselves to create the next big effect? "The Howling" boasted a fantastic werewolf transformation scene courtesy of makeup wizard Rob Bottin. Then along came Bottin's mentor, Rick Baker, with his own spectacular effects in this popular horror comedy directed by John Landis. "An American Werewolf in London" is more of a makeup showcase than a truly satisfying movie, but the film is effectively moody when David Naughton discovers that a wolf attack has turned him into a bloodthirsty lycanthrope. Jenny Agutter plays his love interest (watch out, he bites!), and who can forget Griffin Dunne as Naughton's best friend, an undead corpse who progressively rots away as the plot unfolds? All things considered, it's easy to see why "An American Werewolf in London" became a modern horror favorite. "--Jeff Shannon"

Languages: English

Subtitles: English

Sound: Dolby

Summary: Cast Robert De Niro and Billy Crystal together in a film and it should be a sucker's bet as to who's going to be funnier and who's going to give the more nuanced performance. Somehow, though, De Niro walks away with most of the laughs in "Analyze This", a buddy action-comedy about a mob boss (De Niro, natch) suffering from panic attacks who makes a nebbishy shrink (Crystal, natch) an offer he can't refuse--actually, it's not really an offer, it's a command. The good doctor is forced to help the gangster get in touch with his feelings. Had the brilliant TV series "The Sopranos" not underscored how thin and watery and shticky director-cowriter Harold Ramis's approach to such potentially rich material actually is, the movie--a hit in theaters and De Niro's biggest film ever--would seem more fresh and kicky. De Niro's definitely a hoot as the ever milder menace, and Crystal actually concentrates on giving a credible performance opposite the acting legend (alas, he doesn't turn his character's fear of his patient into inspired comedy, as Alan Arkin did in "Grosse Pointe Blank"). The conclusion devolves into the requisite gunplay, and Chazz Palminteri and Lisa Kudrow are criminally wasted as an opposing mob boss and Crystal's fiancée, respectively, but overall, it's breezy fun. "--David Kronke"

Languages: English

Summary: The Royal Albert Hall in London comes alive to the passionate melodies and songs from the shows of Andrew Lloyd Webber. Enjoy the magic of this night of a thousand stars.

System Requirements:
Running Time 128 Min

Format: DVD VIDEO

Languages: English

Subtitles: English, French, Spanish

Sound: Dolby Digital 5.1

Summary: "Matrix" writer-directors Larry and Andy Wachowski commissioned seven artists from Japan, America and Korea to make nine short films set in the world of their feature trilogy. Some of the top anime directors contributed to this anthology, including Yoshiaki Kawajiri ("Ninja Scroll"), Koji Morimoto ("Robot Carnival"), and Shinchiro Watanabe ("Cowboy Bebop"). Some of the films tie directly into the narrative of the live-action movies. Drawn in a style reminiscent of Jean "Moebius" Giraud, Mahiro Maeda's "The Second Renaissance" (Part I & Part II) depicts the human-machine wars that caused the enslavement of humanity and the creation of the Matrix. The duel between two flamboyantly costumed Kabuki warriors in Kawajiri's "Program" is an expanded version of the cybernetic training Neo (Keanu Reeves) undergoes in the first "Matrix" film. Watanabe evokes the look of old newspaper photographs in "A Detective Story," which falls outside the storyline of the features. Fast-paced, violent and grim, "The Animatrix" is an uneven but intriguing compilation that represents a new level in the ongoing cross-pollination between Japanese animation and American live action. (Not rated, suitable for ages 16 and older: considerable violence, violence against women, grotesque imagery, brief nudity, alcohol use) "--Charles Solomon"

Languages: English

Subtitles: English, Spanish

Sound: Dolby

Summary: I love the smell of a collector's edition in the morning. Everyone's favorite Joseph Conrad adaptation gets the fancy packaging and extras treatment with this release of "Apocalypse Now - The Complete Dossier". Both the original theatrical cut and the 2001 "Redux" version are included, with enough extras to keep one occupied on a long boat trip. Calling this the "complete" dossier is sure to raise hackles among fans who insist that Eleanor Coppola's lauded documentary, "Hearts of Darkness", which chronicled husband Francis's harrowing experience making the film, should have been included. (As of this review, "Hearts of Darkness" has yet to be released on DVD, so battered VHS copies will have to suffice.) Packaged in a cardboard "dossier" sleeve, the two-disc set includes Marlon Brando reading T.S. Eliot's poem "The Hollow Men," new production featurettes, and cast member interviews. Owners of previous editions of either of the cuts might consider how much they want all the officially sanctioned information on this edition. For newcomers to the Vietnam epic, this is an edition worth going crazy for. "--Ryan Boudinot"
Apocalypse Now
In the tradition of such obsessively driven directors as Erich von Stroheim and Werner Herzog, Francis Ford Coppola approached the production of "Apocalypse Now" as if it were his own epic mission into the heart of darkness. On location in the storm-ravaged Philippines, he quite literally went mad as the project threatened to devour him in a vortex of creative despair, but from this insanity came one of the greatest films ever made. It began as a John Milius screenplay, transposing Joseph Conrad's classic story "Heart of Darkness" into the horrors of the Vietnam War, following a battle-weary Captain Willard (Martin Sheen) on a secret upriver mission to find and execute the renegade Colonel Kurtz (Marlon Brando), who has reverted to a state of murderous and mystical insanity. The journey is fraught with danger involving wartime action on epic and intimate scales. One measure of the film's awesome visceral impact is the number of sequences, images, and lines of dialogue that have literally burned themselves into our cinematic consciousness, from the Wagnerian strike of helicopter gunships on a Vietnamese village to the brutal murder of stowaways on a peasant sampan and the unflinching fearlessness of the surfing warrior Lieutenant Colonel Kilgore (Robert Duvall), who speaks lovingly of "the smell of napalm in the morning." Like Herzog's "Aguirre: The Wrath of God", this film is the product of genius cast into a pit of hell and emerging, phoenix-like, in triumph. Coppola's obsession (effectively detailed in the riveting documentary "Hearts of Darkness", directed by Coppola's wife, Eleanor) informs every scene and every frame, and the result is a film for the ages. "--Jeff Shannon"
Apocalypse Now Redux
Digitally remastered with 49 minutes of previously unseen footage, "Apocalypse Now Redux" is the reference standard of Francis Coppola's 1979 epic. A metaphorical hallucination of the Vietnam War, the film was reconstructed by Coppola and editor Walter Murch to enrich themes and clarify the ending. On that basis "Redux" is a qualified success, more coherent than the original while inviting the same accusations of directorial excess. The restored "French plantation" sequence adds ghostly resonance to the war's absurdity, and Willard's theft of Colonel Kurtz's beloved surfboard adds welcomed humor to the film's nightmarish upriver journey. An encounter with Playboy Playmates seems superfluous compared to the enhanced interplay between Willard and his ill-fated boat crew, but compensation arrives in the hellish Kurtz compound, where Willard's mission--and the performances of Martin Sheen and Marlon Brando--reach even greater heights of insanity, thus validating "Redux" as the rightful heir to Coppola's triumphantly rampant ambition. "--Jeff Shannon"

Languages: English, Spanish

Subtitles: Spanish

Sound: Dolby

Summary: NASA's worst nightmare turned into one of the space agency's most heroic moments in 1970, when the "Apollo 13" crew was forced to hobble home in a disabled capsule after an explosion seriously damaged the moon-bound spacecraft. Tom Hanks, Kevin Bacon, and Bill Paxton play (respectively) astronauts Jim Lovell, Jack Swigert, and Fred Haise in director Ron Howard's intense, painstakingly authentic docudrama. The "Apollo 13" crew and Houston-based mission controllers race against time and heavy odds to return the damaged spacecraft safely to Earth from a distance of 205,500 miles. Using state-of-the-art special effects and ingenious filmmaking techniques, Howard and his stellar cast and crew build nail-biting tension while maintaining close fidelity to the facts. The result is a fitting tribute to the "Apollo 13" mission and one of the biggest box-office hits of 1995. "--Jeff Shannon"

Languages: English, French

Sound: Dolby Digital 2.0 Surround

Summary: The latest testosterone-saturated blow-'em-up from producer Jerry Bruckheimer and director Michael Bay ("The Rock", "Bad Boys") continues Hollywood's millennium-fueled fascination with the destruction of our planet. There's no arguing that the successful duo understands what mainstream American audiences want in their blockbuster movies--loads of loud, eye-popping special effects, rapid- fire pacing, and patriotic flag waving. Bay's protagonists--the eight crude, lewd, oversexed (but lovable, of course) oil drillers summoned to save the world from a Texas-sized meteor hurling toward the earth--are not flawless heroes, but common men with whom all can relate. In this huge Western-in-space soap opera, they're American cowboys turned astronauts. Sci-fi buffs will appreciate Bay's fetishizing of technology, even though it's apparent he doesn't understand it as anything more than flashing lights and shiny gadgets. Smartly, the duo also tries to lure the art-house crowd, raiding the local indie acting stable and populating the film with guys like Steve Buscemi, Billy Bob Thornton, Owen Wilson, and Michael Duncan, all adding needed touches of humor and charisma. When Bay applies his sledgehammer aesthetics to the action portions of the film, it's mindless fun; it's only when "Armageddon" tackles humanity that it becomes truly offensive. Not since "Mississippi Burning" have racial and cultural stereotypes been substituted for characters so blatantly--African Americans, Japanese, Chinese, Scottish, Samoans, Muslims, French ... if it's not white and American, Bay simplifies it. Or, make that white "male" America; the film features only three notable females--four if you count the meteor, who's constantly referred to as a "bitch that needs drillin'," but she's a hell of a lot more developed and unpredictable than the other women characters combined. Sure, Bay's film creates some tension and contains some visceral moments, but if he can't create any redeemable characters outside of those in space, what's the point of saving the planet? "--Dave McCoy"

Languages: English

Summary: If you don't think "Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery" (1997) is one of the funniest movies of the 1990s, maybe you should be packed into a cryogenic time chamber and sent back to the decade whence you came. Perhaps it was the 1960s--the shagadelic decade when London hipster Austin Powers scored with gorgeous chicks as a fashion photographer by day, crime-fighting international man of mystery by night. Yeah, baby, yeah! But when Powers's arch nemesis, Dr. Evil, puts himself into a deep-freeze and travels via time machine to the late 1990s, Powers must follow him and foil Evil's nefarious scheme of global domination. Mike Myers plays dual roles as Powers and Dr. Evil, with Elizabeth Hurley as his present-day sidekick and karate-kicking paramour. A hilarious spoof of '60s spy movies, this colorful comedy actually gets funnier with successive viewings, making it a perfect home video for gloomy days and randy nights. Oh, behave!
"I put the grrr in swinger, baby!" a deliciously randy Powers coos near the beginning of "The Spy Who Shagged Me" (1999), and if the imagination of Austin creator Mike Myers seems to have sagged a bit, his energy surely hasn't. This friendly, go-for-broke sequel finds our man Austin heading back to the '60s to keep perennial nemesis Dr. Evil (Myers again) from blowing up the world--and, more importantly, to get back his mojo, that man-juice that turns Austin into irresistible catnip for women, especially American spygirl Felicity Shagwell (a pretty but vacant Heather Graham). The plot may be irreverent and illogical, the jokes may be bad, and the scenes may run on too long, but it's all delivered sunnily and with tongue firmly in cheek. Myers teams Dr. Evil with a diminutive clone, Mini-Me (Verne J. Troyer), then pulls a hat trick by playing a third character, the obese and disgusting Scottish assassin Fat Bastard.
Despite symptoms of sequelitis, "Austin Powers in Goldmember" (2002) is must-see lunacy for devoted fans of the shagadelic franchise. Unfortunately, the law of diminishing returns is in full effect: for every big-name cameo and raunchy double-entendre, there's an equal share of redundant shtick, juvenile scatology, and pop-cultural spoofery. All is forgiven when the hilarity level is consistently high, and Mike Myers--returning here as randy Brit spy Austin, his nemesis Dr. Evil, the bloated Scottish henchman Fat Bastard, and new Dutch disco-villain Goldmember--thrives by favoring comedic chaos over coherent plotting. Once they've tossed Austin into the disco fever of 1975 (where he's sent to rescue his father, gamely played by Michael Caine), Myers and director Jay Roach seem vaguely adrift with old and new characters, including Verne Troyer's Mini-Me and pop star Beyoncé Knowles as Pam Grier-ish blaxpo-babe Foxxy Cleopatra. A bit tired, perhaps, but Powers hasn't lost his mojo.

Languages: English

Sound: Dolby Digital 2.0 Surround

Summary: Despite symptoms of sequelitis, "Austin Powers in Goldmember" is must-see lunacy for devoted fans of the shagadelic franchise. Unfortunately, the law of diminishing returns is in full effect: for every big-name cameo and raunchy double-entendre, there's an equal share of redundant shtick, juvenile scatology, and pop-cultural spoofery. All is forgiven when the hilarity level is consistently high, and Mike Myers--returning here as randy Brit spy Austin, his nemesis Dr. Evil, the bloated Scottish henchman Fat Bastard, and new Dutch disco-villain Goldmember--thrives by favoring comedic chaos over coherent plotting. Once they've tossed Austin into the disco fever of 1975 (where he's sent to rescue his father, gamely played by Michael Caine), Myers and director Jay Roach seem vaguely adrift with old and new characters, including Verne Troyer's Mini-Me and pop star Beyoncé Knowles as Pam Grier-ish blaxpo-babe Foxxy Cleopatra. A bit tired, perhaps, but Powers hasn't lost his mojo. "--Jeff Shannon"