Home Media Magazine - August 17, 2008 - (Page 22) REVIEWS I BEFORE THE RAINS Prebook 8/20; Street 9/16 Lionsgate, Romance, B.O. $1 million, $27.98 DVD, ‘PG-13’ for violent content and a scene of sexuality. Stars Linus Roache, Rahul Bose, Nandita Das, Jennifer Ehle. www.homemediamagazine.com Shot and directed by Santosh Sivan, who also shot Bride & Prejudice in 2004, Before the Rains is a beautiful film, presenting the awe-inspiring landscape of India with reverence and subtlety. The doomed love story of the British grower and his Indian housekeeper is well-crafted and poignant. Rahul Bose, who plays T.K, the grower’s right-hand man, delivers a valiant performance in conveying the turmoil his character experiences as he balances the British India of his employment with the local tribal culture of his family. In the end, he holds the moral ground for the story, illustrating that neither side can be truly just until both cultural influences are recognized. Although the characters experience great loss, Before the Rains is ultimately a story of hope and the promise of a better future even during turbulent political transitions. – Amanda McCorquodale I n Before the Rains, Linus Roache (Batman Begins, Wings of the Dove) plays a British spice grower living in India in the years before India declares its independence from Britain. He has employed men from a local village to build a road to facilitate the exporting of Indian spices. He becomes romantically involved with a married woman in the village, compromising the well-being of himself and his family, the Indians he employs as well as his love-struck mistress. Tribal laws clash with the British colonial system just as local fervor for the independence of Mother India reaches a fever pitch. I TELEVISION UNDER THE SWASTIKA Street 8/19 First Run, Documentary, $24.95 DVD, NR. I © BBC Worldwide I OPPENHEIMER Prebook 8/19; Street 9/23 BBC Video, Drama, $39.98 three-DVD set, NR. Stars Sam Waterston, Jana Sheldon, Kate Harper, Garrick Hagon, David Suchet. T he name J. Robert Oppenheimer has been etched in history as the lead scientist in the Manhattan Project to develop the atomic bomb. As with most historical figures, the impact of his accomplishments easily overwhelms the details of his personal life. Oppenheimer, a seven-part BBC miniseries from 1980, gives some context to his role in helping the United States and its allies end World War II. The program starts with Oppenheimer’s days as a theorist and professor at UC Berkeley in the 1930s and guides viewers through development of the bomb and its aftermath, including how his association with the American Communist Party threatened his career. The miniseries also explores the great emotional toll Oppenheimer’s work had on his wife, Kitty (Sheldon). In one scene that demonstrates the evolution of societal sensibilities, a pregnant, stressed-out Kitty is shown both smoking and drinking, with nary a word of protest. Oppenheimer is most interesting when dealing with the procedural aspects of creating the bomb. It’s a little scary watching the giddiness of some of the scientists over the prospect of creating these powerful weapons, excited by the challenge while pushing aside thoughts of the consequences. But the issues at the time presented a great ethical dilemma: Use the bomb to end the war as quickly as possible, or see hundreds of thousands of Americans troops die invading Japan. The real spark of the Manhattan Project is depicted as a partnership between Oppenheimer and the project’s military commander, Gen. Graves, whose no-nonsense approach keeps the scientists on task. The always-dependable Waterston is excellent in the title role, mixing charm and compassion to present a man conflicted by the contrasts in his personal and professional lives, but understanding the necessity of his job. The production values vary. Scenes filmed on location are shot on film, while video is used to depict most scenes shot on sets. The contrast in styles is a jarring distraction overcome only by the strength of the material. – John Latchem t’s been said ancient Rome erected the coliseums to pacify the masses. Nazi Germany tried television. Nearly 20 years before the “Golden Age of Television” began mollifying the American household, four hours of TV programming aired daily to select German audiences under the aegis of Nazi Party leaders. Determined to beat Great Britain and the United States to the nascent medium, Deutscher Fernseh-Rundfunk (Greater German Television) commenced in 1935 as a conduit for the Nazis to broadcast National Socialist propaganda as well as sporting events, cooking shows, cosmetic tips, gardening, manon-the-street interviews and vaudeville acts. The 1999 English-language documentary Television Under the Swastika uses footage from 285 reels of 16mm film discovered in the catacombs of the Berlin Federal Film Archive to showcase the power of TV to a then-largely indifferent consumer. The picture quality at the time was spotty, and watching TV meant visiting a parlor typically reserved for society’s elite, Nazi faithful and related VIPs. Average Germans preferred radio, movies and theater for their news and entertainment. German engineers soon improved both picture and sound quality, and the Nazi Party envisioned installing TV sets in households by 1939, the year Hitler invaded Poland, beginning World War II. This documentary showcases a variety of disturbing TV programs the Nazis hoped would engender Germans to embrace the war as a “great leveler” of societal woes and help spawn a master race. Interestingly, Joseph Goebbels, Hitler’s minister of propaganda, dismissed the concept of TV (preferring movie newsreels), and only efforts to produce entertainment for the soldiers kept the DFR operational. One of the last Nazi broadcasts was a 1944 public service announcement instructing amputees how to stay fit so they could return to the front lines. The war, and Nazi TV, ended shortly thereafter. – Erik Gruenwedel Q U I C K TAK E Dive In T hose interested in scuba diving should check out a new collection of indie DVDs under the “Dive In” brand devoted to helping curious divers explore Earth’s oceans. Ocean’s Alive: Marine Life of Fiji Islands and Ocean’s Alive: Marine Life of Catalina Island offer a lot of information about the fish and other marine life of their particular regions. The DVDs include a lot of good footage of each organism, and can be viewed as a single program or divided into the separate topics. While the narration and information will prove useful for divers hoping to identify different varieties of sea life, the footage in the complete program is good enough to serve a secondary purpose as a video aquarium. Also offered is Clam Chowder for the Scuba Diver’s Soul, a half-hour program that strings together various interviews of scuba divers relating humorous and interesting stories from their time in the water. The titles are distributed by Victory Multimedia and will be available Sept. 23 (prebook Aug. 19) at $21.95 each. – John Latchem 22 Home Media Magazine August 17–23, 2008 http://www.homemediamagazine.com
Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of Home Media Magazine - August 17, 2008 Home Media Magazine - August 17, 2008 Contents News News High-Def News Electronic Delivery News TV DVD Kidvid Reviews Pipeline Research Top 20 DVD Sellers Top 20 Rentals and Top 10 Charts Just Announced Home Media Magazine - August 17, 2008 Home Media Magazine - August 17, 2008 - Home Media Magazine - August 17, 2008 (Page Cover1) Home Media Magazine - August 17, 2008 - Home Media Magazine - August 17, 2008 (Page Cover2) Home Media Magazine - August 17, 2008 - Home Media Magazine - August 17, 2008 (Page 1) Home Media Magazine - August 17, 2008 - Home Media Magazine - August 17, 2008 (Page 2) Home Media Magazine - August 17, 2008 - Home Media Magazine - August 17, 2008 (Page 3) Home Media Magazine - August 17, 2008 - Home Media Magazine - August 17, 2008 (Page 4) Home Media Magazine - August 17, 2008 - Contents (Page 5) Home Media Magazine - August 17, 2008 - Contents (Page 6) Home Media Magazine - August 17, 2008 - Contents (Page 7) Home Media Magazine - August 17, 2008 - News (Page 8) Home Media Magazine - August 17, 2008 - News (Page 9) Home Media Magazine - August 17, 2008 - High-Def News (Page 10) Home Media Magazine - August 17, 2008 - High-Def News (Page 11) Home Media Magazine - August 17, 2008 - Electronic Delivery News (Page 12) Home Media Magazine - August 17, 2008 - Electronic Delivery News (Page 13) Home Media Magazine - August 17, 2008 - TV DVD (Page 14) Home Media Magazine - August 17, 2008 - TV DVD (Page 15) Home Media Magazine - August 17, 2008 - Kidvid (Page 16) Home Media Magazine - August 17, 2008 - Kidvid (Page 17) Home Media Magazine - August 17, 2008 - Reviews (Page 18) Home Media Magazine - August 17, 2008 - Reviews (Page 19) Home Media Magazine - August 17, 2008 - Reviews (Page 20) Home Media Magazine - August 17, 2008 - Reviews (Page 21) Home Media Magazine - August 17, 2008 - Reviews (Page 22) Home Media Magazine - August 17, 2008 - Reviews (Page 23) Home Media Magazine - August 17, 2008 - Pipeline (Page 24) Home Media Magazine - August 17, 2008 - Pipeline (Page 25) Home Media Magazine - August 17, 2008 - Top 20 DVD Sellers (Page 26) Home Media Magazine - August 17, 2008 - Top 20 DVD Sellers (Page 27) Home Media Magazine - August 17, 2008 - Top 20 Rentals and Top 10 Charts (Page 28) Home Media Magazine - August 17, 2008 - Top 20 Rentals and Top 10 Charts (Page 29) Home Media Magazine - August 17, 2008 - Just Announced (Page 30) Home Media Magazine - August 17, 2008 - Just Announced (Page 31) Home Media Magazine - August 17, 2008 - Just Announced (Page 32) Home Media Magazine - August 17, 2008 - Just Announced (Page Cover3) Home Media Magazine - August 17, 2008 - Just Announced (Page Cover4)
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