DVD in FEBRUARY

Criss Angel - Mindfreak - The Complete Season Three
Is magic enjoying a renaissance or signaling its irrelevance to a culture fed up with image? Criss Angel, David Blain and others currently provide plenty of fodder for such discussion via their over hyped TV specials and series. But then again magic has always been about two things 1.hype 2. The ability to enjoy it. Sure these guys are skilled and I’ll admit they’re preferable to the typical Vegas schlock but none of them touch David Copperfield who has always managed to amaze more as the result of his skill than his theatrical presentation. All magicians (with the exception of Doug henning) bank on percieved arrogance as just another tool to make you look one way when you should be looking another. But this new breed seems to be genuinely able to make anything dissapear except their own hubris. You get all of season three here.

Thunderbirds 40th Anniversary Collector’s Edition Megaset

12 discs of Thunderbirds has taught me that like most fondly remembered TV shows it is best consumed in small doses. But it’s also taught me how very, very worth my time a trip down memory lane can be. Gerry Anderson’s puppet based action adventure series reached a much wider demographic than the children it was intended for primarily because it was broadcast at a time when hobbies like modeling had reached their peak. With its phenomenal miniature work and natural tie in to the zeitgeist surrounding space travel and James Bond, Thunderbirds proved to be as much a phenomena as a mere TV show. It ranks high amongst Lost in Space and Johnny Quest fans.

The Kingdom - Series Two (R1)

Lars Von Trier’s only overt attempt at TV horror still sparkles with wit, energy and enough subtext to make a Freudian choke of his cigar. The fact that it is finally available in its entirety here stateside only underscores the sad reality that it will never reach its intended conclusion. Like Twin Peaks and other weirder than thou TV fare The Kingdom is addictive in the extreme not so much because it is extreme but because its characters are amazing to watch while they deal with extremes. The American version of this show (adapted by Stephen King) started out reasonably strong although I’ve never been able to follow it to the end.

The Apartment (Collector’s Edition)

Billy Wilder on a bad day is infinitely better than most directors on their best day. If the end is less than perfect it’s still always entertaining. And while The Apartment is fluffier than Sunset Boulevard or Stalag 17 and isn’t quite as smart as Some Like It Hot, there’s no doubt it rings gloriously, comedically true. Helped by the fabulous performances of Shirley MacLlaine, Fred Mac Murray and Jack Lemmon this backhanded look at what it takes to get ahead showcases Lemmon as an executive who breaks into the good old boys network of top level management by loaning his apartment out to his bosses and their mistresses. When he falls in love with the top guys girl… well Wilder is better off exploiting that point than I’d be at explaining it. This satirizes corporate America but not quite keenly enough for my taste. You could easily see Rock Hudson and Doris Day slipping into the roles of Lemmon and MacLaine.

Two Days in Paris

This smart, often very funny and insightful romantic comedy is about the last place I would have cast Adam Goldberg the star of The Hebrew Hammer but the mans razor sharp wit serves him well in the role of an insecure husband visiting his wifes parents in Paris. As the differences between the way they look at the world surface he begins to wonder if they can reconcile the emotional gulf. The quick description would be that this is a movie for anyone who has ever wondered what would happen if a grumpier younger Woody Allen met the French Riviera. But writer/director Julie Delpy, who also plays the wife, has something deeper in mind and manages to get beyond the conventions established by the plotting and let us get into the very real disillusionment that comes from realizing just how little you know about your spouse.

The Darjeeling Limited

Oh Wes you’ve gone and made another glorious mess. The Darjeeling Limited is better than the good but sprawling Life Aquatic but it still meanders a little bit too much. Andersons main failing is as a storyteller. At his worse he can be like an arthouse George Lucas, so intent on filling the frame with odd details that he seems to lose sight of the actors he hired to stand in front of the camera. But here he’s a little more focused and helped by an outstanding cast that all get what he’s going for. Some have criticized Anderson for making the same dysfunctional family movie over and over again but I for one hope he never goes into therapy. His movies are healing for all of us dysfunctional folk out in the audience.

Cops: 20th Anniversary Edition

Bad Boy Bad Boy what you gonna do? Hopefully ignore this pop culture tragedy. Sure it’s good for few yuks but they come at the expense of everyone onscreen cops and citizens and criminals alike. This supposed exercise in helping people become aware of just what it is police have to do with is in actuality a vehicle for the worst sort of sadistic voyeurism. Feel like turning down your nose at someone, more often than not COPS will give you the opportunity t0o forget just why all those people are alchoholic, drug addicted, abusing “others” in the first place. Empathy for cops? Yeah sure. This supposedely reality based look at how cops behave is designed to show them in their best light not their real light.

Death At A Funeral

Frank Oz is a hit or miss director and Death At A Funeral is somewhere between the brilliance of What About Bob? and the forgettable The Stepford Wives. What saves Funeral from forgetfulness isn’t so much the busy screwball comedy plotting as the performances of its very gifted cast. I always love to see Peter Dinklage in anything and he has a great part here as the former secret gay lover of the deceased. A cautionary warning is given here that if watching little people be abused gets your dander up you should probably should skip this film altogether.  Another favorite of mine Alan Tudyk, best known for his turns as Hoban Washburne on Firefly and Steve The Pirate in Dodgeball, turns in a great performance as Simon, a fiancé who has unwittingly ingested a strong hallucinogenic on the way to the funeral service. The story demands that everything play out to its forgone pleasant conclusion and that places this film in the same category if not at the same quite the same classic quality as Waking Ned Devine and The Englishman Who Went Up The Hill and Came Down The Mountain.

Newhart - The Complete First Season

Simply one of the funniest series ever on television. If you don’t believe me then ask my friend Larry, his brother Daryl, and his other brother Daryl. Populated with a cast so quirky it makes Seinfeld seem sane by comparison this has aged really well and plays much better than Newharts original sitcom. The recent passing of Suzanne Pleshette (Newhart’s wife from his first TV series) and her husband Tom Poston (a regular on this series) makes the emergence of this on DVD especially poignant. Newhart is known as one of the nicest guys in comedy but this show showcased his real talent for curmudgeonly grumping his way through almost any situation.