Library

Languages: English, French, Spanish

Subtitles: English, French, Spanish

Sound: AC-3

Comments: The last man on earth is not alone

Summary: Will Smith stars in the third adaptation of Richard Matheson’s classic science-fiction novel about a lone human survivor in a post-apocalyptic world dominated by vampires. This new version somewhat alters Matheson’s central hook, i.e., the startling idea that an ordinary man, Robert Neville, spends his days roaming a desolated city and his nights in a house sealed off from longtime neighbors who have become bloodsucking fiends. In the new film, Smith’s Neville is a military scientist charged with finding a cure for a virus that turns people into crazed, hairless, flesh-eating zombies. Failing to complete his work in time--and after enduring a personal tragedy--Neville finds himself alone in Manhattan, his natural immunity to the virus keeping him alive. With an expressive German shepherd his only companion, Neville is a hunter-gatherer in sunlight, hiding from the mutants at night in his Washington Square town house and methodically conducting experiments in his ceaseless quest to conquer the disease.
The film’s first half almost suggests that "I Am Legend" could be one of the finest movies of 2007. Director Francis Lawrence’s extraordinary, computer-generated images of a decaying New York City reveal weeds growing through the cracks of familiar streets that are also overrun by deer and prowled by lions. It’s impossible not to be fascinated by such a realistically altered cityscape, reverting to a natural environment, through which Smith moves with a weirdly enviable freedom, offset by his wariness over whatever is lurking in the dark of bank vaults and parking garages. Lawrence and screenwriters Mark Protosevich and Akiva Goldsman wisely build suspense by withholding images of the monsters until a peak scene of horror well into the story. It must be said, however, that the computer-enhanced creatures don’t look half as interesting as they might have had the filmmakers adhered more to Matheson’s vampire-nightmare vision. "I Am Legend" is ultimately noteworthy for Smith’s remarkable performance as a man so lonely he talks to mannequins in the shops he frequents. The film’s latter half goes too far in portraying Smith’s Neville as a pitiable man with a messianic mission, but this lapse into bathos does nothing to take away from the visual and dramatic accomplishments of its first hour. "--Tom Keogh"

Languages: English, French, Spanish

Subtitles: English, French, Spanish

Sound: Dolby

Summary: As paranoid cop Del Spooner, Will Smith ("Independence Day", "Men in Black") displays both his trademark quips and some impressive pectoral muscles in "I, Robot". Only Spooner suspects that the robots that provide the near future with menial labor are going to turn on mankind--he's just not sure how. When a leading roboticist dies suspiciously, Spooner pursues a trail that may prove his suspicions. Don't expect much of a connection to Isaac Asimov's classic science fiction stories; "I, Robot", the action movie, isn't prepared for any ruminations on the significance of artificial intelligence. This likable, efficient movie won't break any new ground, but it does have an idea or two to accompany its jolts and thrills, which puts it ahead of most recent action flicks. Also featuring Bridget Moynahan ("The Sum of All Fears"), Bruce Greenwood ("The Sweet Hereafter"), and James Cromwell ("Babe", "LA Confidential"). "--Bret Fetzer"

Languages: English, Spanish, French

Subtitles: English, Spanish

Sound: Dolby

Summary: Just as "A Bug's Life" was a computer-animated comedy inspired by Akira Kurosawa's "The Seven Samurai", the funny and often enthralling "Ice Age" is a digital re-imagining of the Western "Three Godfathers". The heroes of this unofficial remake (set 20,000 years ago, during the titular Paleolithic era) are a taciturn mastodon named Manfred (voiced by Ray Romano), an annoying sloth named Sid (John Leguizamo), and a duplicitous saber-toothed tiger, Diego (Denis Leary). The unlikely team encounters a dying, human mother who relinquishes her chirpy toddler to the care of these critters. Hoping, against all odds, to return the little guy to his migrating tribe, Manfred and his associates need to establish trust among themselves, not an easy thing in a harsh world of predators, prey, and pushy glaciers. Audiences that have become accustomed to the rounded, polished, storybook look of Pixar's house brand of computer animation ("Monsters, Inc.") will find the blunt edges and chilly brilliance of "Ice Age"--evoking the harsh, dangerous environment of a frozen world--a wholly different, and equally pleasing, trip. Recommended for ages 4 and up. "--Tom Keogh"

Languages: English, Spanish, French

Subtitles: English, Spanish

Sound: Dolby

Summary: The love life of a woolly mammoth--handled with G-rated delicacy--drives this sequel to the first computer-animated romp in the age of prehistoric mammals. While the first "Ice Age" took a delightful premise and suffocated it with a formulaic plot--in which a mammoth named Manfred (voiced by Ray Romano, "Everyone Loves Raymond"), a sloth named Sid (John Leguizamo, "Moulin Rouge!"), and a sabre-tooth tiger named Diego (Denis Leary, "Rescue Me") helped an abandoned human infant return to its tribe (basically, "Three Mammals and a Baby")--the sequel takes the now-familiar setting, gives it a shapeless, episodic storyline, and yet somehow becomes pretty darn entertaining. Faced with the threat of a flood from melting ice, our heroic trio are on the run to escape from their blossoming valley. On the way, they meet a female mammoth (Queen Latifah, "Bringing Down the House") who thinks she's an opossum and get menaced by some freshly defrosted carnivo! rous fish. Add into the mix a herd of lava-worshipping mini-sloths, some Busby Berkeley-style vultures, and more ingenious slapstick featuring the acorn-crazed Scrat, and "Ice Age: The Meltdown" will amuse even jaded adults. -- "Bret Fetzer"

Beyond "Ice Age: The Meltdown"
Ice Age - Super Cool Edition
Ice Age & Ice Age 2: The Meltdown - (DVD 2-Pack)
Funtastic Adventures Collection Box Set (Ice Age / Robots / Fern Gully / Once Upon a Rainforest) Stills from "Ice Age: The Meltdown" (click for larger image)

Languages: English, French

Subtitles: Arabic, Chinese, Czech, Danish, Dutch, English, French, German, Greek, Hebrew, Hungarian, Korean, Norwegian, Polish, Portuguese, Spanish, Swedish

Sound: AC-3

Summary: With an ace up its sleeve, "Identity" does for schizophrenia what "The Silence of the Lambs" did for fava beans and a nice chianti. On the proverbial dark and stormy night, this anxiety-laced thriller offers a tasty blend of "And Then There Were None" and "Psycho", with a dash of "Sybil" for extra spice and psychosis. Things go from bad to worse when 10 unrelated travelers converge at an isolated motel and proceed to die, one by one, with no apparent connection... until they discover the common detail that's drawn them into this nightmare of relentless trauma. Even as it flunks Abnormal Psychology 101, Michael Cooney's screenplay offers meaty material for a superior ensemble cast including John Cusack and Rebecca DeMornay (who wins the Janet Leigh prize in a bitchy comeback role). Director James Mangold pivots the action around one character (played by his "Heavy" star, Pruitt Taylor Vince, in eye-twitching cuckoo mode), and half the fun of "Identity" comes from deciphering who's who, what's what, and who'll be the next to die. "--Jeff Shannon"

Languages: English, French, Spanish

Subtitles: Arabic, Cantonese, Chinese, Dutch, English, French, Korean, Spanish

Sound: AC-3

Summary: This smart, tautly directed thriller from Wolfgang Petersen is about the cat-and-mouse games between a Secret Service agent named Horrigan (Clint Eastwood) and the brilliant, psychopathic assassin (John Malkovich) who's itching to get the President in his cross hairs. The back-story--Horrigan is haunted by his inability to prevent John Kennedy's assassination (Eastwood is computer-generated into archival footage)--is more than a little hokey, but the plotting itself is smartly, even ingeniously, constructed. Petersen manages a viselike grip on the tension and Eastwood even gets to deliver an ever-more-timely lecture on the diminished nature of the office of President. Eastwood's as gruff and as infuriating to the by-the-book Powers That Be as ever, and Malkovich oozes delightful menace. Renee Russo capably costars as a colleague with whom Horrigan gets friendly. "--David Kronke"

Languages: English, French, Spanish

Subtitles: English, French, Spanish

Sound: AC-3

Summary: In career Army officer Hank Deerfield's worldview, the American military exists to bring order to the world, and honor and dignity to every one of its soldiers. As played by Tommy Lee Jones, in a layered performance that will haunt the viewer long after the film is over, Deerfield wears the Army life like he does his standard-issue white T-shirts--unconsciously making a cheap motel bed with crisp inspection-ready corners. Yet if war is hell, the purgatory for the relatives of damaged soldiers can cause far more anguish, and Paul Haggis' quietly devastating "In the Valley of Elah" tells this story through Deerfield, who is desperately trying to piece together the fate of his adored son Mike, a soldier in Iraq.
Mike's company has returned from duty, but he is missing; Hank flies from Tennessee to Fort Rudd in the Southwest, to conduct his own investigation into the disappearance. There he meets a smart but put-upon police officer (Charlize Theron, glammed-down but still showing a bit too much sexy collarbone for a cop) who also smells something off in the Army's official story of the disappearance. The two form an unlikely team, but as a friend tells Deerfield early on, "You gotta trust somebody sometime, Hank," and Mike's vanishing is Hank's tipping point.
As Hank pieces together the horrifying story of Mike's fate, the incremental pain becomes etched in Jones' ragged features, and the camera captures all of it--far more powerfully than could a million words of reportage from the front lines. Theron's performance is also strong, and Susan Sarandon is moving if underutilized as Hank's grief-stricken wife, robbed of the simple nuclear family life she so wanted. "They shouldn't send heroes to places like Iraq," says one of Mike's buddies late in the film, and it's the viewers' collective sorrow--and the film's great achievement--to feel that at the deepest human level. --"A.T. Hurley"

Languages: English, French, Spanish

Subtitles: English, French, Spanish

Sound: AC-3

Summary: In "Independence Day", a scientist played by Jeff Goldblum once actually had a fistfight with a man (Bill Pullman) who is now president of the United States. That same president, late in the film, personally flies a jet fighter to deliver a payload of missiles against an attack by extraterrestrials. "Independence Day" is the kind of movie so giddy with its own outrageousness that one doesn't even blink at such howlers in the plot. Directed by Roland Emmerich, "Independence Day" is a pastiche of conventions from flying-saucer movies from the 1940s and 1950s, replete with icky monsters and bizarre coincidences that create convenient shortcuts in the story. (Such as the way the girlfriend of one of the film's heroes--played by Will Smith--just happens to run across the president's injured wife, who are then both rescued by Smith's character who somehow runs across them in alien-ravaged Los Angeles County.) The movie is just sheer fun, aided by a cast that knows how to balance the retro requirements of the genre with a more contemporary feel. "--Tom Keogh"

Languages: English

Sound: DTS

Comments: In May, the adventure continues.

Summary: Let me be very fair by stating that this film is beautifully recreated in Blu-Ray with all the special effects and sound seemingly amplified! It's a beauty!



However, the fourth installment of "Indiana Jones" is a disappointment. The entrance scene with Indiana and his fedora in a silhouette is a nice start, but the film's plot quickly disintegrates into implausibility. Now, I do understand the Saturday `Flash Gordon' type stories where credibility is stretched for entertainment, but this film stretches and breaks. Marion is back (Karen Allen) and her entrance is so very welcome, but she soon disappears into a one-dimensional character. Indiana's new side-kick (Shia LaBeouf) misses his mark and only annoys when constantly slicking back his hair (thanks to George Lucas). John Hurt is such a great actor, it hurts to see him delegated to barely speaking, but his face tells a lot more than the dialogue around him. Cate Blanchett is thoroughly believable as the commie villain, but her character is also `dumbed-down'.



The action scenes are not as inventive as previous Indiana Jones films (remember the first 15 minutes of "Temple of Doom" from the dance number, "Anything Goes" to jumping out a three-story building to a car chase to jumping out of a plane in a raft to sliding down a snow peaked glacier to dropping off a cliff into a wild raging river and on and on...?) There is nothing like that here. There is a floating car with our heroes that goes over numerous gigantic waterfalls and no one gets hurt (only a little wet). The car chase scene on the cliff never gets too exciting and to see LaBeouf swinging on vines ala Tarzan is just TOO much to have the audience believe. Do I need to add the scene where Indy survives a nuclear blast by hiding in a refrigerator that is blown a mile away? And finally, I apologize, but the "Close Encounters" ending is fairly dramatic, but with all that torrential water gushing, mountains collapsing and the winds hurling around the characters, why don't their clothes or hair move at all? It is the most egregious CGI overlook since George Lucas ("Return Of The Jedi") had Mark Hamill fly through the redwood forest on the air-scooters and the ferns didn't move at all.



Like I said, I tried to be fair. It is still a great film compared to most that is out there. But when Lucas and Spielberg set the bar SO high with previous works, they can't top themselves and that hurts - kind of like growing up and realizing your heroes are really ordinary people. But it's still worth watching (or owning), if only for its historical significance and the beautifully filmed scenery (in Blu-Ray!!!) Get the first three in Blu-Ray as well. The difference will make the films seem like new!

Languages: English, French

Subtitles: English, French, Japanese, Korean, Spanish

Sound: AC-3

Summary: Stunning tropical scenery and gorgeous athletic movie stars may not make a movie great, but they sure don't hurt. Jared (Paul Walker, "The Fast and the Furious") dreams of finding sunken treasure and making millions, but his girlfriend Sam (Jessica Alba, "Fantastic Four, Sin City") is content with their poor but idyllic life in the Bahamas. Still, when they find artifacts from a 19th century pirate ship, she gets caught up in the excitement--until they also find a crashed plane full of smuggled cocaine. Naturally, someone's going to want that cocaine back... From there, "Into the Blue" is a surprisingly well-plotted action movie, unpredictable in its specifics if familiar in its broader outlines. Even more pleasant, the action itself stays plausible and genuinely engaging throughout. Jared seems able to hold his breath for a preternaturally long time, but aside from that the movie is meticulous about the dangers and threats the characters face and is all the stronger for it. Add to this its unabashed ogling of Alba and Walker (both of whom are astonishing physical specimens) and you have a solid romp. Also featuring Scott Caan ("Ocean's Eleven"), Tyson Beckford ("Biker Boyz"), and Josh Brolin ("Flirting With Disaster") as a slimy rival treasure hunter. "--Bret Fetzer"

Languages: English

Sound: SDDS

Comments: Do not trust anyone. Do not show emotion. Do not fall asleep.

Summary: While returning to Earth, the space-bus explodes and the fragments bring an alien virus that recodes the human DNA. In Washington, the psychiatrist Carol Bennell observes the modification of the behavior of one of her clients first, then in her former husband and finally in the population in general. Together with her friend Dr. Ben Driscoll the researcher Dr. Stephen Galeano, they discover that the extraterrestrial epidemic affects human beings while sleeping and that her son Ollie, who had chickenpox when he was a baby, is immune to the disease and may save mankind from the outbreak.

Languages: English, French

Subtitles: French, Spanish

Sound: AC-3

Summary: Walt Disney Pictures scored a surprise box-office hit with "Invincible", and the movie deserved its good reviews as a fine example of how above-average writing, direction, and casting can turn formulaic material into something special. And make no mistake, this is a formulaic movie, with its real-life story embellished with "Rocky"-like enthusiasm, and lovingly crafted with the same quality of working-class humanism that made "The Rookie" a similarly popular Disney hit. This time, the inspirational true story is that of Vince Papale, a down-on-his-luck substitute teacher in Philadelphia (played by Mark Wahlberg in a nicely understated performance) who was 30 years old, out of work, abandoned by his wife, and biding time as a bartender when he answered an open call for tryouts on the Philadelphia Eagles NFL football team in 1976. Going with his gut instinct, new coach Dick Vermeil (Greg Kinnear) rewards Papale's diligent efforts with a place on the team, and "Invincible" combines gridiron guts, low-key romance (as Papale meets his future wife-to-be, played by Elizabeth Banks) and blue-collar friendship in an underdog story that moves, with casual charm and abundant appeal, toward a rousing feel-good finish. Making good use of digital visual effects to recreate Philly's now-demolished Veterans Stadium, director Erickson Core (also serving as his own cinematographer) tackles this heartwarming assignment with intelligence and flair, spinning gold from what could have been just another routine sports movie. "--Jeff Shannon"

Languages: English, French, Spanish

Subtitles: English, French, Portuguese, Spanish

Sound: AC-3

Comments: Fully Charged.

Summary: Suit up for action with Robert Downey Jr. in the ultimate adventure movie you’ve been waiting for, "Iron Man"! When jet-setting genius-industrialist Tony Stark is captured in enemy territory, he builds a high-tech suit of armor to escape. Now, he’s on a mission to save the world as a hero who’s built, not born, to be unlike any other. Co-starring Gwyneth Paltrow, Terrence Howard and Jeff Bridges, it’s a fantastic, high-flying journey that is "hugely entertaining" (Joe Morgenstern, The Wall Street Journal).