OnVideo MAY Video Reviews

OnVideo MAY Video Reviews

ALL THE PRETTY HORSES
"Death of the West" saga set in 1949 about the trials and tribulations of a pair of erstwhile cowboys -- Matt Damon, whose family ranch has been sold by his mother, and pal Henry Thomas -- who travel South of the border in search of romance, adventure and meaning in their lives. What they find is hard work on a rancho owned by wealthy scion Ruben Blades, unrequited love and a Mexican jail. But they do get the horses. Billy Bob Thornton's first directorial outing since "Sling Blade."
Director: Billy Bob Thornton. Stars: Matt Damon, Henry Thomas, Lucas Black, Penelope Cruz, Ruben Blades, Sam Shepard, Bruce Dern. CC, (MPAA rating: PG-13, 112 min.), Western Drama, 2000, Box office gross: $15.527 million, (Columbia TriStar), No VHS SRP, Priced for rental, Available: 5/1, DVD: Day & Date. Buy or preorder this title at up to 40% discount

ANTITRUST
Letdown of a thriller about a young computer geek (Ryan Phillippe) recruited from his garage start-up company by a multibillion dollar evil empire of a software giant company. Ostensibly hired to help NURV go online with a massive satellite communications system, he's the unwitting pawn in a game of deceit and treachery lead by the guru-like company leader (Tim Robbins), who will stop at nothing, including stealing computer secrets and committing murder, to make his company the biggest and best in the world. When he uncovers the secret mandate of NURV, the computer whiz embarks on a high-tech mission to destroy his new boss. A promising premise bogged down by improbability and a pat storyline.
Director: Peter Howitt. Stars: Ryan Phillippe, Rachael Leigh Cook, Claire Forlani, Tim Robbins, Douglas McFerran, Richard Roundtree, Tygh Runyan, Yee Jee Tso. CC, (MPAA rating: PG-13, 109 min.), Thriller, 2001, Box office gross: $10.965 million, (MGM), No VHS SRP, Priced for rental, Available: 5/15, DVD: Day & Date. Buy or preorder this title at up to 40% discount

BEFORE NIGHT FALLS
Impressionistic bio-drama by the director of "Basquiat." Javier Bardem stars as Reinaldo Arenas, a gay Cuban poet who runs up against the censorship of the Castro regime. When his books are published abroad illegally, he becomes a target of the government's anti-homosexual stance and is thrown into prison. He finally gets a chance to come to America -- as part of the 1980 Mariel boat lift. Arriving in New York, he tries to make his way but, eventually, suffering from AIDS, he takes his life in 1990. A sad, depressing but humanistically rewarding film. And Johnny Depp puts in an outrageous performance.
Director: Julian Schnabel. Stars: Javier Bardem, Oliver Martinez, Andrea Di Stefano, Johnny Depp, Sean Penn, Michael Wincott. CC, (MPAA rating: NR, 125 min.), Bio Drama, 2000, Box office gross: $1.398 million, (New Line), No VHS SRP, Priced for rental, Available: 5/22, DVD: Day & Date. Buy or preorder this title at up to 40% discount

BEST IN SHOW
Funny ensemble mockumentary on dog shows and neurotic dog-lovers. Directed by and starring Christopher Guest, and written by Guest and Eugene Levy, the film follows five story lines as four couples and a single man head out (separately) for a big dog show in Philadelphia. There's hilarity all around as everyone has their own weird bits and problems -- a dog with its own shrink, a telepathic bloodhound, overzealous yuppies, a housewife with a colorful on-the-road sexual history -- and it all dovetails -- with other crazy characters, including a hotel manager, a Kennel Club president, and a TV broadcast team -- in Philly for the show.
Director: Christopher Guest. Stars: Christopher Guest, Parker Posey, Michael Hitchcock, Eugene Levy, Catherine O'Hara, Michael McKean. CC, (MPAA rating: PG-13, 90 min.), Comedy, 2000, Box office gross: $17.402 million, (Warner), No VHS SRP, Priced for rental, Available: 5/15, DVD: Day & Date. Buy or preorder this title at up to 40% discount

DUETS
Off-beat comedy about six strangers pursuing their dreams via karaoke contests around the country. It's a kind of singing road trip as the six -- from different backgrounds and with different problems -- separately work their way from state to state until they all converge on a major karaoke contest in Omaha. Included is a karaoke hustler (Huey Lewis), a salesman who discovers uppers and karaoke at the same time (Paul Giamatti), an escaped con with the voice of an angel (Andre Braugher), a dumped-upon cabbie (Scott Speedman), a singing waitress (Maria Bello)and Gwyneth Paltrow as Lewis' Vegas showgirl daughter.
Director: Bruce Paltrow. Stars: Gwyneth Paltrow, Huey Lewis, Paul Giamatti, Andre Braugher, Scott Speedman, Maria Bello. CC, (MPAA rating: R, 112 min.), Comedy Drama, 2000, Box office gross: $4.734 million, (Buena Vista), No VHS SRP, Priced for rental, Available: 5/8, DVD: Day & Date. Buy or preorder this title at up to 40% discount

EMPEROR'S NEW GROOVE, THE
Thoroughly enjoyable animated adventure about the arrogant ruler of a South American kingdom who's turned into a llama by his devious advisor and her hunky henchman. The ruler -- who selfishly once had it all -- must form an unlikely alliance with a peasant to find a way to become human (literally and figuratively) again to regain his throne. Fast-paced action and comedy will delight kids and adults alike -- while imparting a good lesson about the virtues of kindness and understanding.
Director: Mark Dindal. Stars: Voices of David Spade, John Goodman, Eartha Kitt, Patrick Warburton, Wendie Malick. CC, (MPAA rating: G, 78 min.), Animated, 2000, Box office gross: $83.498 million, (Disney), $26.99 VHS SRP, Available: 5/1, DVD: Day & Date. Buy or preorder this title at up to 40% discount

HOUSE OF MIRTH, THE
Literary film based on the novel by Edith Wharton has a wonderful ensemble cast, headed up by Gillian Anderson (who sheds her "X-Files" skin here to make an excellent acting turn), exploring the treacherous world of New York high society in the early 20th century. Anderson plays Lily Bart, a ravishing socialite whose position in the rarified social world begins to dissolve when she makes all the wrong choices, in particular giving up love for wealth, getting involved with a married man and being falsely accused of having an affair with him.
Director: Terence Davies. Stars: Gillian Anderson, Dan Aykroyd, Terry Kinney, Laura Linney, Eric Stoltz, Elizabeth McGovern, Anthony LaPaglia. CC, (MPAA rating: PG-13, 140 min.), Drama, 2000, Box office gross: $1.902 million, (Columbia TriStar), No VHS SRP, Priced for rental, Available: 5/29, DVD: Day & Date. Buy or preorder this title at up to 40% discount

MISS CONGENIALITY
Comedy Actioner about a scrappy FBI agent forced to go undercover as a contestant in the Miss United States beauty pageant in order to capture a terrorist. Highlight of the film is the transformation of Bullock -- as the agent -- from a ramshackle female version of Dirty Harry to a beauty queen.
Director: Donald Petrie. Stars: Sandra Bullock, Michael Caine, Benjamin Bratt, Candice Bergen, William Shatner, Ernie Hudson. CC, (MPAA rating: PG-13, 109 min.), Action Comedy, 2000, Box office gross: $97.690 million, (Warner), $22.98 VHS SRP, Available: 5/1, DVD: Day & Date. Buy or preorder this title at up to 40% discount

PAY IT FORWARD
Heartstring-tugger about three fragile lives: a sensitive seventh-grader (Haley Joel Osment), his working-class alcoholic mother (Helen Hunt), and the boy's new social studies teacher (Kevin Spacey), who hides his emotionally scarred psyche behind his strong outer facade. Given a year-long assignment to do something about the world around him, the boy comes up with the idea of doing something good for others with the stipulation being that each person will in turn do something good for three others: Pay It Forward, not pay it back. And that includes setting his mom up with his teacher. Will mom and teach pay it forward? Director Mimi Leder (just off "Deep Impact") here gives us plenty of sentimental wallop.
Director: Mimi Leder. Stars: Kevin Spacey, Helen Hunt, Haley Joel Osment, James Caviezel, Jon Bon Jovi, Angie Dickinson. CC, (MPAA rating: PG-13, 122 min.), Drama, 2000, Box office gross: $32.980 million, (Warner Bros.), No VHS SRP, Priced for rental, Available: 5/15, DVD: Day & Date. Buy or preorder this title at up to 40% discount

QUILLS
Geoffrey Rush is brilliant as the Marquis de Sade, the literary sexual adventurer whose exploits led him to be imprisoned in the Charenton Asylum for the criminally insane. Here we find de Sade, laboring mightily to purge his evil thoughts by putting them on paper, under the not-so-watchful eyes of a liberal priest (Joaquin Phoenix). Despite his incarceration, de Sade's explicit writings are published -- snuggled out by a willing chambermaid -- Kate Winslet -- until the Emperor Napoleon cracks down and sends in the rather nasty doctor Royer-Collard (Michael Caine) to create efficient (and gruesome) ways to silence the writer. A sensual, erotic drama about literary and sexual freedom.
Director: Philip Kaufman. Stars: Geoffrey Rush, Kate Winslet, Joaquin Phoenix, Michael Caine. CC, (MPAA rating: R, 124 min.), Drama, 2000, Box office gross: $6.471 million, (Fox), No VHS SRP, Priced for rental, Available: 5/8, DVD: Day & Date. Buy or preorder this title at up to 40% discount

REQUIEM FOR A DREAM
A disjointing and disorienting movie about addiction -- to hard drugs, pills and TV -- by the director of 1998's weird and wild "Pi." Here the camera becomes a subjective tool in chronicling the downfall of several main characters -- a retired housewife (Ellen Burstyn) emotionally hooked on a TV game show and diet pills, her addict son (Jared Leto), his girlfriend (Jennifer Connelly) and best friend (Marlon Wayans), all junkies. Using extreme closeups, split screens, super fast and slow motion, and cross-cutting, director Darren Aronofsky looks at things frightfully through the eyes of the addicts, allowing us to see their world, literally, as drugs come on or wear off. It's a harrowing, filmic rush for the eyes and the mind.
Director: Darren Aronofsky. Stars: Ellen Burstyn, Jared Leto, Jennifer Connelly, Marlon Wayans, Christopher McDonald, Louise Lasser. CC, (MPAA rating: NR, 102 min.), Drama, 2000, Box office gross: $3.000 million, (Artisan), No VHS SRP, Priced for rental, Available: 5/22, DVD: Day & Date. Buy or preorder this title at up to 40% discount

SHADOW OF THE VAMPIRE
Delightful take on the vampire horror genre has screenwriter Steven Katz and director E. Elias Merhige recreating the history of the making of F.W. Murnau's classic 1922 silent-era vampire saga "Nosferatu" with a brilliant conceit: In his search for realism, Murnau (John Malkovich) casts a real vampire (Willem Dafoe) as the film's lead. In order to entice the undead actor, the director promises him the neck of the beautiful leading lady (Catherine McCormack), but the vampire's thirst gets the better of him (and the production). Ah, the price one pays for art.
Director: E. Elias Merhige. Stars: John Malkovich, Willem Dafoe, Udo Kier, Cary Elwes, Catherine McCormack, Eddie Izzard. CC, (MPAA rating: R, 90 min.), Horror, 2000, Box office gross: $7.032 million, (Lions Gate), No VHS SRP, Priced for rental, Available: 5/29, DVD: Day & Date. Buy or preorder this title at up to 40% discount

TRAFFIC
Academy-award winning film, based on the British Channel 4 miniseries "Traffik," focuses in on the U.S.-Mexico drug trade and the implications it holds for our culture -- social, political, psychological and physical -- through three disparate but overlapping narratives. In Baja Calif., a Mexican lawman (Benicio Del Toro) and his partner struggle against the power of the Mexican cartel. In Ohio, a nominee for U.S. drug czar (Michael Douglas) must come to grips with his daughter's experiments with dope. In San Diego, two DEA agents (Don Cheadle and Luis Guzman) arrest a wealthy businessman (Steven Bauer) in front of his wife (Catherine Zeta-Jones); unbeknownst to her, his drug connections provided his family with its flourishing and sophisticated lifestyle. Admittedly enjoyable to watch, Soderbergh's opus is hampered by pretensions to art (the Mexican sequences are all tinged in dusty, yellow hues) and unrealistic situations (particularly Douglas' trek into the ghetto).
Director: Steven Soderbergh. Stars: Michael Douglas, Don Cheadle, Benicio Del Toro, Luis Guzman, Dennis Quaid, Catherine Zeta-Jones, Steven Bauer, Erika Christensen, Amy Irving. CC, (MPAA rating: R, 147 min.), Drama, 2000, Box office gross: $71.000 million, (USA), No VHS SRP, Priced for rental, Available: 5/29, DVD: Day & Date. Buy or preorder this title at up to 40% discount

VERTICAL LIMIT
Effects-laden mountain climbing adventure has Chris O'Donnell as an ex-mountain climber (he gave it up to be a nature photographer when he caused the death of his father while on a climb with his sister) who's called back into action to save his sister and a financial tycoon stranded in an icy cavern near the top of the 28,000 foot high K2 mountain in Pakistan. Heading up a rescue team of eccentrics, and loaded with nitroglycerin (to blast the cavern and create better special effects), the likeable young man has his work cut out for him: How to get to the top before he loses most of his crew to accidents and explosions and before the stunts and effects wear down the viewer.
Director: Martin Campbell. Stars: Chris O'Donnell, Bill Paxton, Robin Tunney, Scott Glenn, Isabella Scorupco. CC, (MPAA rating: PG-13, 124 min.), Action, 2000, Box office gross: $68.322 million, (Columbia TriStar), No VHS SRP, Priced for rental, Available: 5/22, DVD: Day & Date. Buy or preorder this title at up to 40% discount

WHAT WOMEN WANT
Quick-witted comedy about a fast-living, womanizing, insensitive ad exec (Mel Gibson) who considers himself to be God's gift to women who finds that -- due to a freak accident with a hair blower and a wet bathtub -- he can read the minds of the women around him (including his new female boss, his daughter and even a French poodle). At first oppressed by the thoughts he hears in his head, he discovers that his new malady is really a gift, and he uses it to his advantage -- first to take a tumble in the sack with a frightened coffee shop clerk, then to manipulate his boss to steal a major account from her. Despite his male chauvinism, he begins to discover major truths about the needs of others, transforming him for the better: In the end he learns to be more sensitive to women, becoming a more considerate lover/father/worker. Although much of the humor here arises from the disparity between Gibson's image of himself and what he "hears" women thinking about him, the true fun in watching the film comes from Gibson's metamorphosis from creep to hero.
Director: Nancy Meyers. Stars: Mel Gibson, Helen Hunt, Marisa Tomei, Lauren Holly, Ashley Johnson, Mark Feuerstein, Delta Burke. CC, (MPAA rating: PG-13, 127 min.), Romantic Comedy, 2000, Box office gross: $175.625 million, (Paramount), No VHS SRP, Priced for rental, Available: 5/8, DVD: Day & Date. Buy or preorder this title at up to 40% discount

All DVDs are screened on a reference system consisting of a Rotel RDV-1080 DVD Audio/Video Player, a Rotel RSX-972 Surround Sound Receiver, and Phase Technology 1.1 (front), 33.1 (center), and 50 (rear) speakers and Power 10 subwoofer.

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April 15, 2001