Billy Elliot: Inside every one of us is a special talent waiting to come out. The trick is finding it. Starring Julie Walters and newcomer Jamie Bell the film (based on a real-life story) follows the progress of little Billy Elliot a motherless 11 year-old from a poor Durham pit village. When young Billy chooses ballet classes over boxing lessons his life is changed forever. He decides to keep the lessons secret from his father a coal miner but when his ballet instructor persuades him to try out for the Royal Ballet School in London Billy must make the choice between family responsibilities and his dreams... Billy Elliot received plenty of recognition at the Academy Awards picking up nominations for Best Supporting Actress Best Director and Best Screenplay. (Dir. Stephen Daldry 2000) Steel Magnolia's: A beautiful bittersweet comedy set in deep south Louisiana 'Steel Magnolias' unites talents of America's finest actresses as six very special friends bonded together by mutual triumphs and tragedies. Despite their differences beautiful Shelby (Julia Roberts) her strong-willed mother M'Lynn (Sally Field) beauty parlour owner Truvy (Dolly Parton) elegant wealthy widow Clairee (Olympia Dukakis) sharp tongued Ouiser (Shirley MacLaine) and mousey newcomer Anelle (Daryl Hannah) enjoy a friendship that spans the boundaries of age and status. Sharing each other's strength and loyalty they face their greatest fears and highest hopes with dry wit and a self-deprecating style... (Dir. Herbert Ross 1989) Erin Brockovich: She brought a small town to its feet and a huge corporation to its knees. A research assistant (Roberts) helps an attorney (Finney) in a lawsuit against a large utility company blamed for causing an outbreak of cancer and other illnesses in a small community. (Dir. Steven Soderbergh 2000)
Scott Barnes is an alcoholic turned social worker hellbent on saving a young boy named Tommy from self-destructing when he finds out he has begun selling crack cocaine in an organisation run by Carlos. Posing as a drug dealer to infiltrate their ranks Scott soon discovers that Tommy isn't the only victim; hundreds of children have been abducted and freeing them all is going to take a miracle!
Small quirky comedy thrillers such as Drowning Mona are one of the things that American cinema does best and far too rarely. Peter Steinfeld's appealing script attracted a solid cast of stars under the direction of newcomer Nick Gomez (whose previous work includes episodes of The Sopranos). It seems that someone has cut Mona's brake cables and she drove to her death by drowning. Bette Midler's Mona manages to make it entirely plausible that almost everyone might have wanted to kill her: from her son's business partner Eddie (Casey Affleck) to her husband's mistress Rona (Jamie Lee Curtis). The local police chief (Danny DeVito), already burdened with subordinates who refer to running away from danger as "securing the perimeter" and the impending marriage of his daughter (Neve Campbell) to the sweet but unreliable Eddie, has to make sense of the farrago of lies and half-truths which is all anyone will tell him. This is an ingenious tightly plotted film which is never too busy to scatter odd little gags at its margins; it's a tall tale, whose complicated telling is half the fun. On the DVD The DVD comes with the theatrical trailer, a director's commentary, interviews with the stars and four deleted scenes. The picture is 1.85:1 anamorphic and the sound is Dolby Surround. --Roz Kaveney
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