Home Media Magazine - July 6-12, 2008 - (Page 13)

www.homemediamagazine.com REVIEWS BLU-RAY SPOTLIGHT I 10,000 B.C. Warner, Adventure, B.O. $94.8 million, $35.99 Blu-ray, $28.98 DVD, ‘PG-13’ for sequences of intense action and violence. Stars Steven Strait, Camilla Belle, Affif Ben Badra. F I IMPACT POINT Street 7/8 Sony Pictures, Thriller, $24.96 DVD, ‘R’ for violence, language, some sexuality and nudity. Stars Brian Austin Green, Melissa Keller, Kayla Ewell, Linden Ashby. T V heartthrob Green (“Beverly Hills 90210,” “Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles”) stars as a psychopath who stalks a beach volleyball player in this hybrid of sports drama and thriller from director Hayley Cloake (The House of Usher). Green poses as a prominent sports columnist to seduce upand-coming star Kelly Reyes (Keller of Drop Dead Sexy). But Reyes catches on to the ruse after she discovers that her one-time lover is an impostor and a possible suspect in her rival’s death. The next couple of weeks are a nightmare, as the young woman prepares for the biggest game of her career while being followed by her crazy, clever crush. Impact Point is an entertaining distraction, as it contains a few twists and a decent performance from Green as the lovelorn psy- cho. It’s like Sleeping with the Enemy in a bikini. The downside to that is Cloake’s attention on stunning leading ladies Keller and Ewell (Senior Skip Day). By constantly focusing on taut buttocks, firm midriffs, and other jiggly action during game and training scenes, she steers the movie into cheesy erotic thriller territory and sets women’s volleyball back a good 20 years. Then again, what some viewers consider a detriment, others could find a welcome development. Still, this can’t be what the AVP, the pro beach volleyball association, had in mind when it agreed to be featured in the film. A blah collection of extras, including Keller and Ewell talking about their volleyball training for the film, round out the DVD. – Pete Croatto or those who missed its muchhyped but short-lived theatrical run, 10,000 B.C. follows the quest of D’Leh (Strait) as he faces off against the Warlord (Ben Badra) to rescue the beautiful Evolet (Belle). The film is set in an alternate universe that blends prehistoric creatures with science-fiction and really bad 1980s metal hair. As a home entertainment experience, 10,000 B.C. moves along at a fast clip and focuses more on action than dialogue, which is a good thing. The film looks amazing in HD in this 1080p/VC-1 encode (2.40:1) transfer, at least when its exotic locations are featured. When it comes to some of the sets and the CGI, especially when there’s a lot of movement, the HD actually accentuates a shoddy job by the filmmakers. I CHRONICLE OF AN ESCAPE Prebook 7/8; Street 8/19 Genius, Thriller, B.O. $0.002 million, $24.95 DVD, ‘R’ for brutality and torture, nudity and language. In Spanish with English subtitles. U more interesting tale. Majors and Greene are sturdy and likeable, and Tyson is appropriately slimy and menacing. Young Holly physically fits the role well, but doesn’t always have the gravitas required. Ladd is another story as the shrill grandmother, whose overblown Southern accent rivals Paula Deen’s syrupy twang. Tonya S. Holly (mother of the lead) wrote, directed and produced the film. As a first effort, it shows promise, but it also shows the need for some other hands to be involved — particularly during the writing process — and hopefully that will happen for Holly’s next film. – Laura Tiffany tterly gripping and intense, Chronicle of an Escape grabs the viewer’s attention from the start and does not let go for a second. Based on a true story of a suspected militant’s arrest, incarceration, brutal torture and eventual freedom in 1970s Buenos Aires, it is impossible to look at the events of 30 years ago and not imagine that the same sort of inhumane behavior is going on around the world in any number of contemporary political hotspots. The film is in equal parts deeply disturbing and incredibly provocative, often simultaneously, and it achieves an oddly effective overall position in the world of cinema, the must-see that might be too hard to watch for many. The film focuses on soccer player Claudio Tamburrini (Rodrigo de la Serna) whose family is brutally interrogated in their home while he practices. Suspected of being involved with an underground liberal activist movement, Claudio is kidnapped on his way home, bound, blindfolded by plainclothes military thugs and taken to an abandoned house that is being used as a secret government processing facility. Tragically, he is not alone in his captivity; dozens of others suspected of anti-establishment activities are being held there, subjected to atrocities that are extremely painful to even think about, much less watch in a movie. Eventually, Claudio and three others managed to escape with nothing but the slimmest threads of dignity on their backs. The screenplay was based on their testimonies. Director Adrián Caetano has fashioned a taut political thriller that impressively speaks to the past as a way of commenting on the present. Stylish but not overbearing, the film is often shot with tight, claustrophobic angles that depict the prisoner’s confines and sense of sensory depravation and shaky handheld cinematography that helps to set the unstable, anxious mood of the piece. – David Greenberg Q U I C K TA K E Flair for the Gold WWE Films and Genius Products are giving fans a chance to relive the memories of one of the greatest professional wrestlers in history with the July 8 release of Nature Boy Ric Flair: The Definitive Collection. The $34.95 three-DVD set offers a comprehensive documentary of Flair looking back at his career, punctuated by interviews with his friends and colleagues. Coincidentally, Flair spends a lot of time praising his stints in the WWE while heavily criticizing his time in rival WCW. The match selection leaves one wondering how the set can be called “definitive,” when many of Flair’s greatest matches, which are available on earlier DVD releases, are not included here. However, the DVD includes his final match, at Wrestlemania XXIV with Shawn Michaels, and his complete farewell speech. His hall-of-fame induction can be found on the Wrestlemania XXIV DVD set. – John Latchem In the audio department, Warner offers both a Dolby TrueHD 5.1 Surround track and a standard Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround. Considering the cacophony of battles and creatures in this film, the dialogue comes out crystal clear. (Unfortunately, said dialogue is so ludicrous you wouldn’t mind missing it.) The excellent sound also points out how wrong the film’s musical score by Harold Kloswer and Thomas Wander is for the on-screen action. Warner has built a solid reputation with delivering exclusive bonus materials for many of its BD releases. Strangely, the two exclusive featurettes for this film are available only in standard-definition. “A Wild and Wooly Ride” (13 minutes) features Emmerich and his special-effects team explaining how they made the film’s CGI creations. “Inspiring an Epic” (13 minutes) includes interviews with Emmerich and Fingerprints of the Gods author Graham Hancock, whose book served as the catalyst for this movie (although Emmerich took much creative freedom with his script). Rounding out the extras that are available also on the DVD release are about 14 minutes of deleted scenes that are boring, with the exception of the three-minute alternate tiger pit sequence, and a lackluster alternate ending. There’s also a digital copy of the film available for iPods or Windows Media with a code on the inside of the BD case. – John Gaudiosi July 6–12, 2008 Home Media Magazine 13 http://www.homemediamagazine.com

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of Home Media Magazine - July 6-12, 2008

Home Media Magazine - July 6-12, 2008 Contents News TV DVD Reviews Pipeline Research Top 20 DVD Sellers Top 20 Rentals and Top 10 Charts Just Announced

Home Media Magazine - July 6-12, 2008

For optimal viewing of this digital publication, please enable JavaScript and then refresh the page. If you would like to try to load the digital publication without using Flash Player detection, please click here.