Although the superhero comic book has been a duopoly since the early 1960s, only DC's flagship characters, Superman and Batman (who originated in the late 1930s), have established themselves as big-screen franchises. Until now--this is the first runaway hit film version of the alternative superhero X-Men universe created for Marvel Comics by Stan Lee, Jack Kirby and others. It's a rare comic-book movie that doesn't fall over its cape introducing all the characters, and this is the exception. X-Men drops us into a world that is closer to our own than Batman's Gotham City, but it's still home to super-powered goodies and baddies. Opening in high seriousness with paranormal activity in a WW2 concentration camp and a senatorial inquiry into the growing "mutant problem", Bryan Singer's film sets up a complex background with economy and establishes vivid, strange characters well before we get to the fun. There's Halle Berry flying and summoning snowstorms, James Marsden zapping people with his "optic beams", Rebecca Romijn-Stamos shape-shifting her blue naked form and Ray Park lashing out with his Toad-tongue. The big conflict is between Patrick Stewart's Professor X and Ian McKellen's Magneto, super-powerful mutants who disagree about their relationship with ordinary humans, but the characters we're meant to identify with are Hugh Jackman's Wolverine and Anna Paquin's Rogue. There are in-jokes enough to keep comics fans engaged, but it feels more like a science-fiction movie than a superhero picture. --Kim Newman On the DVD: X-Men 1.5's two-disc set offers little more than the original X-Men release. The six extended scenes which can be incorporated into the feature on Disc 1 were already available on the initial DVD version (though they're cleaned up a bit here), and when played within the film's original cut they seem disjointed and tacked on, adding very little to the overall story. Disc 2, meanwhile, will have little appeal to any but the most diehard of fans. The X-Men 2 Sneak Peak, the X-Men 2 trailer, the Daredevil trailer and the Activision Wolverine's Revenge trailer are little more than adverts. The four-part documentary, meanwhile, is impressively interactive (with multi-angle segments and two play modes), but unfortunately it's also a bit dull and self-congratulatory. --Robert Burrow
Summer Catch combines sports movie with teen romance across class boundaries and sticks in some less than effective bawdy comedy to make up the weight. Playing in a local summer baseball league is the last chance at a professional sports career Ryan (Freddie Prinz Jr) has after he gave up an earlier chance in order to attend his mother's funeral. The threats to his success include the rivalry of other young players, the temptation to just have fun offered by teammate Brubaker (Matthew Lillard) and his growing feelings for Tenley (Jessica Biel). Ryan also has his own demon--an obsession with failure. Occasional outcroppings of psychobabble and melodrama stop this ever finding a satisfactory tone of its own--the scenes on the baseball diamond are often the most interesting. The scenes of sexual comedy largely waste such interesting young actors as Marc Blucas, Christian Kane and Brittany Murphy, all of whom do what they can with unprepossessing material. This is a film for Freddie Prinz Jr fans more than anyone else. On the DVD: Summer Catch on DVD offers a collection of deleted scenes that indicate just how much more uncertain the film's tone was before editing; the commentary by actors Prinz and Biel and director Mike Tollin shows that they at least all had a fairly good time making it. The visual aspect ratio is widescreen anamorphic 1.85:1 and the DVD has Dolby 5:1 digital sound. --Roz Kaveney
Runaway Away Jury: The stakes are extremely high in an explosive trial when the widow of a gun massacre victim represented by attorney Wendell Rohr (Dustin Hoffman) sues the gun's powerful manufacturer. Now with millions of dollars in the balance 12 jurors must decide if the gun maker was negligent. However unscrupulous jury consultant Rankin Fitch (Gene Hackman) believes the verdict is too important to be left in the hands of a jury and will spare no expense to ensure the chosen jury remain sympathetic to his client. Tension mounts and tables are turned as it comes to light that the jury is being manipulated by one of its own Nicholas Easter (John Cusack) with the aid of a beautiful woman (Rachel Weisz) on the outside to swing the verdict in the direction of the highest bidder... Class Action: Lawyer Jebediah Ward devoted to defending victims of large corporations and the State is fighting for compensation for the victims of automobile accidents involving defective cars. However it turns out that the manufacturer in his latest case is being defended by none other than Ward's daughter... Family Business: Connery Hoffman and Broderick star as three generations of a family formerly linked to organized crime. Grandfather Jesse has been in and out of jail and his son Vito has decided to leave a life of crime in order to become a respectable family man but when grandson Adam comes up with a can't-miss heist plan the intergenerational sparks begin to fly.
From the first kiss to the last breath... On a weekend rendezvous in Budapest a couple find themselves in a precarious situation after they participate in a threesome sexual affair. Through the mail they receive pictures of the event threatening blackmail while they quickly find themselves on a deadly journey through the Eastern European world of pornography to find and destroy the evidence...
Based on the life of serial killer Jeffrey Dahmer this is the story of the man who turned his dark fantasies into reality.... Jeffrey Lionel Dahmer was vilified when authorities discovered his murders he had dismembered and tried to consume the bodies of 17 young men in Milwaukee. This DVD takes you into the demented world of this lonely factory worker and examines the ways his personal pains led to the most destructive extremities of human cruelty.
Titles Comprise: The Christmas Miracle All I Want For Christmas Stalking Santa
Not much is going right for meek misfit Willard Stiles. He's constantly screamed at by his overbearing mother, ruthlessly bullied by the boss who stole his father's business and mercilessly laughed at by his co-workers. Willard eventually turns to a colony of rats for friendship and with training they will soon do anything for their new friend. It's time for Willard to get even. Special Features: New 4K scan of the original camera negative Audio commentary with Actor Bruce Davison Interview with Actor Bruce Davison Theatrical trailer TV spot Radio spots Stills gallery
X-Men: Born into a world filled with prejudice are children who possess extraordinary and dangerous powers - the result of unique genetic mutations. Cyclops unleashes bolts of energy from his eyes. Storm can manipulate the weather at will. Rogue absorbs the life force of anyone she touches. But under the tutelage of Professor Xavier (Patrick Stewart) these and other outcasts learn to harness their powers for the good of mankind. Now they must protect those who fear them as the nefarious Magneto (Ian McKellen) who believes humans and mutants can never co-exist unveils his sinister plan for the future... X-Men 2: The X-Men have to band together to find a mutant assassin who has made an attempt on the President's life while the Mutant Academy at Westchester is attacked by military forces prompting some uncomfortable home truths for Wolverine...
X-Men 2 picks up almost directly where X-Men left off: misguided super-villain Magneto (Ian McKellen) is still a prisoner of the US government, heroic bad-boy Wolverine (Hugh Jackman) is up in Canada investigating his mysterious origin, and the events at Liberty Island (which occurred at the conclusion of X-Men) have prompted a rethink in official policy towards mutants--the proposed Mutant Registration Act has been shelved by US Congress. Into this scenario pops wealthy former army commander William Stryker, a man with the President's ear and a personal vendetta against all mutant-kind in general, and the X-Men's leader Professor X (Patrick Stewart) in particular. Once he sets his plans in motion, the X-Men must team-up with their former enemies Magneto and Mystique (Rebecca Romjin-Stamos), as well as some new allies (including Alan Cumming's gregarious, blue-skinned German mutant, Nightcrawler). The phenomenal global success of X-Men meant that director Bryan Singer had even more money to spend on its sequel, and it shows. Not only is the script better (there's significantly less cheesy dialogue than the original), but the action and effects are also even more stupendous--from Nightcrawler's teleportation sequence through the White House to a thrilling aerial dogfight featuring mutants-vs-missiles to a military assault on the X-Men's school/headquarters to the final showdown at Stryker's sub-Arctic headquarters. Yet at no point do the effects overtake the film or the characters. Moreso than the original, this is an ensemble piece, allowing each character in its even-bigger cast at least one moment in the spotlight (in fact, the cast credits don't even run until the end of the film). And that, perhaps, is part of its problem (though it's a slight one): with so much going on, and nary a recap of what's come before, it's a film that could prove baffling to anyone who missed the first instalment. But that's just a minor quibble--X-Men 2 is that rare thing, a sequel that's actually superior to its predecessor. --Robert Burrow
Set in the midst of a steamy red light district this compelling drama focuses on China Blue a stunningly beautiful fashion designer by day and a prostitute keenly adept at playing erotic power games by night.
Evil invades a children's spiritual retreat.
Out of the atrocities of the Holocaust came personal stories of survival fathomable only to those who lived them. The Emmy Award - winning OUT OF THE ASHES tells the incredible true story of Dr Gisella Perl who survived the Auschwitz death camp only to encounter fresh horrors when she fled to a new life in America. During immigration proceedings a terrible secret came to light: at Auschwitz she has been forced to work for the notorious Nazi doctor Josef Mengele. A vital question needed answering: in a personal trial of conscience and fate just what had Gisella done to survive?
Runaway Jury: The stakes are extremely high in an explosive trial when the widow of a gun massacre victim represented by attorney Wendell Rohr (Dustin Hoffman) sues the gun's powerful manufacturer. Now with millions of dollars in the balance 12 jurors must decide if the gun maker was negligent. However unscrupulous jury consultant Rankin Fitch (Gene Hackman) believes the verdict is too important to be left in the hands of a jury and will spare no expense to ensure the chosen jury remain sympathetic to his client. Tension mounts and tables are turned as it comes to light that the jury is being manipulated by one of its own Nicholas Easter (John Cusack) with the aid of a beautiful woman (Rachel Weisz) on the outside to swing the verdict in the direction of the highest bidder... Class Action: Lawyer Jebediah Ward devoted to defending victims of large corporations and the State is fighting for compensation for the victims of automobile accidents involving defective cars. However it turns out that the manufacturer in his latest case is being defended by none other than Ward's daughter...
This faithful adaptation of Anna Sewells childrens classic tells the adventures of a young boy and a spirited horse. Beginning life on a country estate the young colt Beauty is given away to cruel squire Sam Greene when he takes possession of the farm on which he lived.The horse then starts on an adventurous journey where he experiences the best and worst in human nature before finally being reunited with the boy who was his first friend. This is a classic and beautiful adaptation which the whole family will enjoy.
X-Men 2 picks up almost directly where X-Men left off: misguided super-villain Magneto (Ian McKellen) is still a prisoner of the US government, heroic bad-boy Wolverine (Hugh Jackman) is up in Canada investigating his mysterious origin, and the events at Liberty Island (which occurred at the conclusion of X-Men) have prompted a rethink in official policy towards mutants--the proposed Mutant Registration Act has been shelved by US Congress. Into this scenario pops wealthy former army commander William Stryker, a man with the President's ear and a personal vendetta against all mutant-kind in general, and the X-Men's leader Professor X (Patrick Stewart) in particular. Once he sets his plans in motion, the X-Men must team-up with their former enemies Magneto and Mystique (Rebecca Romjin-Stamos), as well as some new allies (including Alan Cumming's gregarious, blue-skinned German mutant, Nightcrawler). The phenomenal global success of X-Men meant that director Bryan Singer had even more money to spend on its sequel, and it shows. Not only is the script better (there's significantly less cheesy dialogue than the original), but the action and effects are also even more stupendous--from Nightcrawler's teleportation sequence through the White House to a thrilling aerial dogfight featuring mutants-vs-missiles to a military assault on the X-Men's school/headquarters to the final showdown at Stryker's sub-Arctic headquarters. Yet at no point do the effects overtake the film or the characters. Moreso than the original, this is an ensemble piece, allowing each character in its even-bigger cast at least one moment in the spotlight (in fact, the cast credits don't even run until the end of the film). And that, perhaps, is part of its problem (though it's a slight one): with so much going on, and nary a recap of what's come before, it's a film that could prove baffling to anyone who missed the first instalment. But that's just a minor quibble--X-Men 2 is that rare thing, a sequel that's actually superior to its predecessor. --Robert Burrow
Based on a play by Miguel Pinero Short Eyes is made up of a series of appalling episodes in prison in which inmate Bruce Davison is depraved by fellow inmates. Their reason for this is that he is a short eyes the prison slang for a man who sodomizes little boys. Despite their own notorious past they believe Bruce to be the scum of the earth and proceed to treat him accordingly.
Grace Guthrie has devoted her life's work as editor and chief of the prestigious magazine 'Grace' and is horrified when returning from vacation to find the business subject to a $21 million hostile take over by a publisher of pornographic magazines. Faced with the realization that the new publisher would probably destroy the quality of the magazine and her life's work Grace is given 30 days to match the purchase price. As one potential investor after another falls through Grace s
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