Recently Released DVDs

Tuesday, June 30, 2009 12:00 AM

The following is a list of recently released DVDs. All capsule reviews have been taken from The Washington Post's Weekend section.

June 30

"Jonas Brothers: The Concert Experience" (G, 76 minutes): Youngsters who adore the Jonas Brothers will have fun at this movie. It contains virtually nothing offensive, unless parents are bothered by the mildly sensual style of dance the Jonas boys do onstage or the hilariously Freudian foam spray they aim at their audience in one silly concert bit. For parents, here a critic's opinion, for what it's worth: The film is a contrived and commercial bit of nothing. Even the supposedly "candid" moments backstage or in hotel rooms come off as awkwardly staged, with the brothers unable even to fake spontaneity. Contains nothing objectionable. DVD Extras: 2-D extended movie with two additional performances; two additional bonus songs; featurette; Digital Copy of extended movie in 2-D.

"Street Fighter: The Legend of Chun-Li" (PG-13, 96 minutes): Though it's based on the arcade video game, this movie aims for a marginally coherent, humanized tale of good vs. evil in the martial arts genre. It is only semi-successful and too often a bore. One good thing: Kristin Kreuk (of TV's "Smallville"), who is effortlessly charming as Chun-Li, a young woman adept at martial arts. Chun-Li remembers her father's violent kidnapping. A mysterious scroll points to the man who took him, so Chun-Li studies with Gen (Robin Shou), a martial arts master, who goes with her to Bangkok in search of the evil Bison (Neal McDonough) and his enforcer. Contains violence and sensuality. DVD Extras: Contains both rated and unrated versions of the film; cast commentary; deleted scenes; featurettes.

"Tokyo!" (UR, 110 minutes): The city of Tokyo is the most obvious link between the three short films that make up this feature-length triptych. The first chapter, "Interior Design," begins with the arrival of a young couple into the world of crowded streets, heartless landlords and entry-level jobs. The comic yet nightmarish second installment, "Merde," takes us under the streets, where a psychopathic man takes refuge when he's not terrorizing the social world above. The final installment, "Shaking Tokyo," shows us a society of recluses, in retreat from the stress and strain of urban life. If there are thematic connections, they are abstract. All three films deal with things hidden, or disappearing, or suppressed. If you can't find real connections between its disparate stories, you can always make them up yourself. But if that kind of film frustrates you, think twice before booking a ticket to this destination. Contains mild violence. In Japanese with English subtitles.

"Two Lovers" (R, 108 minutes): In James Gray's quiet, unadorned romantic drama, Joaquin Phoenix is his old, clean-shaven self as Leonard Kraditor, a troubled young man who has moved back in with his parents in Brighton Beach. Torn between a gorgeous if unstable shiksa goddess (Gwyneth Paltrow) and the nice Jewish girl (Vinessa Shaw) his mom and dad are clearly crazy about, Leonard ultimately has to decide which self to express: the romantic but doomed artist or the settled but thwarted family man. Movies have visited this terrain before, from "The Graduate" to last year's wonderful "Momma's Man." But the film has its pleasures, too, even if Paltrow seems wildly out of place in a drama committed to adamantly un-starry realism. The movie's chief value is to preserve Phoenix at the height of his wary physical grace, which recalls a young Marlon Brando. Contains profanity, sexuality and brief drug use.

Also on DVD June 30: "12 Rounds," "Do the Right Thing: 20th Anniversary," "Eastbound & Down: Season 1," "The Human Contract," "Entourage: Season 5," "Monk: Season 5," "Stargate Atlantis: Season 5."

June 23

"Confessions of a Shopaholic" (PG, 112 minutes): Is Rebecca Bloomwood the embodiment of irresponsible consumership? Absolutely, which makes the timing of the film either genius or fatal, but two things weigh in its favor: One is Isla Fisher. The other is that the film is oblivious to its own gravitas. Rebecca is the Lucy Ricardo of profligate spending. She desperately wants to work for the fashion rag, Alette magazine, run by the semi-satanic Alette Naylor (Kristin Scott Thomas). An opening has arisen at a sister mag, a personal-finance journal edited by the dashing and secretly wealthy Luke Brandon (Hugh Dancy), and Rebecca lands the job. The film touches all the rom-com bases: the romance between Luke and Rebecca; Rebecca's friendship with her roommate Suze (the wonderful Krysten Ritter). And lots of comedy filler, including the digressions involving Rebecca's parents (Joan Cusack and John Goodman). And 12-step shopaholic meetings. Rebecca may owe everybody for everything, but Fisher definitely owns the movie. Contains vulgarity and adult themes.

"The Pink Panther 2" (PG, 90 minutes): Maybe one could expect a little bit more from a film that co-stars Jeremy Irons, Emily Mortimer, Andy Garcia, Alfred Molina and Lily Tomlin. Each of those blue-chip performers is criminally wasted in this sequel to the 2006 update of the old Peter Sellers comedies, which plays like a series of disconnected skits in a cut-rate "Saturday Night Live." Even Steve Martin's talents as a physical comedian are underused, except for a wonderful set piece early in the film where his character, Jacques Clouseau, gets to juggle a cascade of bottles as they fall from a teetering wine rack. Sure, it's dumb humor. But it's also, at times, mean. Clouseau calls one of his fellow detectives, a Japanese computer whiz played by Yuki Matsuzaki, "my little yellow friend." I know, we're not meant to laugh at the victim, but at Clouseau's bigotry, which is supposed to be just another example of his comic ineptitude. My only question is this: In the context of these by-the-book pratfalls, is it funny enough? Contains slapstick violence and brief suggestive humor.

"Waltz With Bashir" (R, 90 minutes): Directed by Ari Folman, the film tells the story of the September 1982 massacres at Sabra and Shatila. Twenty years after the massacres, Folman has blocked the war from his memory. Only when his friend Boaz tells him about a recurring dream does Folman start to ask himself questions. Was he at Sabra and Shatila? Why can't he remember? What is meant by the memories he does have? And are they his? Craftily, the details of Sabra and Shatila unfold, via interviews Folman does with his old army buddies, who are rendered, like Folman, animated, via the process known as rotoscoping, which transforms photographic footage into cartoon and reduces us to something basic and primal. The film is a thinking person's horror movie, about real horror and horrifying echoes, and the dark that coils around Sabra and Shatila. And around the hearts of men. Contains disturbing images of atrocities, strong violence, brief nudity and a scene of graphic sexual content. DVD Extras: Commentary with director Ari Folman; featurettes.

Also on DVD June 23: "Backwoods," "Bob Funk," "Legends of the Bog," "Table for Three," "Tom and Jerry: The Chuck Jones Collection," "Zombie High," "The Pianist (Blu-ray)."

June 16

"Friday the 13th" (R, 97 minutes): A group of hot friends stumbles into Camp Crystal Lake, where 29 years ago a young boy (Jason) drowned, which prompted his mother to kill the counselors, which prompted a sole survivor to decapitate her, which prompted Jason to return from the dead to continue the vengeful spree, which prompted an endless movie franchise, blah, blah, blah. The friends are murdered in horrible ways. One girl survives but is imprisoned by Jason. The story jumps forward a month. The captured girl's brother comes poking around Crystal Lake. While posting fliers for his missing sister, he hooks up with a group of hot friends heading to a cabin. The same fate awaits. The movie has a couple of half-laughs, zero scares, only one moment of artistically inventive slaughter and just two scenes of marginal titillation. Contains strong bloody violence, graphic sexual content, language and drugs. DVD Extras: Featurette; deleted scenes

Also on DVD June 16: "The Cell 2," "Dr. Strangelove (Blu-ray)," "Ghostbusters (Blu-ray)," "Morning Light," "Spaceballs (Blu-ray)," "The Three Stooges Collection Vol. 6," "Burn Notice: Season 2," "Family Guy: Vol. 7," Lost: Seasons 1&2 (Blu-ray)," "John Adams (Blu-ray)."

June 9

"Crossing Over" (R, 113 minutes): Wayne Kramer's multi-linear immigration story recalls other similarly tangled roundelays such as "Crash" and "Babel" that dealt with the same subjects far more deftly. Harrison Ford plays Max Brogan, an Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent under whose gruff, scarred exterior beats a bleeding heart of gold. Ray Liotta, Ashley Judd and Jim Sturgess also appear, as an immigration official, a lawyer and a musician on the prowl for a green card, respectively. At once didactic and exploitative (Kramer makes lurid use of explosive sex and violence), the film isn't just offensive, it's redundant. The themes of tradition, assimilation, post-9/11 paranoia, bureaucratic injustice and inter-cultural tension have been portrayed more authentically in such recent films as "Under the Same Moon," "Persepolis," "The Visitor" and "Gran Torino." Contains pervasive profanity, strong violence, sexuality and nudity.

"Fired Up" (PG-13, 89 minutes): The pushing-30 Nicholas D'Agosto and 31-year-old Eric Christian Olsen seem a bit long in the tooth to be donning the antic mask of the sexually irrepressible high school jock in this arduous cheerleader comedy geared toward those too green to know that cheerleader comedies went out long before the last pompom shake of "Bring It On." That cunning Kirsten Dunst frolic is watched with reverence by the cheerleaders-in-training at Southern Illinois University, where ex-footballers Shawn and Nick have insinuated themselves in hopes of fulfilling their wildest carnal dreams. The bodacious babes who make up the camp's majority know just what the guys are up to, but they inevitably give in because the fellas are single-minded, straight and cute. Will Gluck directs with frantic, go-for-broke pacing, which is what you do when your reserves of wit are bankrupt. Contains crude and sexual content, partial nudity, language and teen partying. DVD Extras: Featurettes; gag reel.

"Gran Torino" (R, 116 minutes): Clint Eastwood delivers a breathtaking performance in a by turns appalling and hilarious role that recalls great ghosts of Eastwood vigilante thrillers past. Playing Korean War vet Walt Kowalski, Eastwood spits, swears and seethes as a man who watches the world change from the front stoop of his Detroit house. Surrounded by Hmong immigrants he persists in calling "slants," "slopes" and "gooks," at least Walt is an equal-opportunity bomb-thrower. He has an epithet for everyone, even growling and glaring at his grandchildren. (He does love his dog and the restored 1972 Gran Torino in his driveway.) If it weren't for Eastwood's amusingly self-conscious performance, Walt would be insufferable, but the film is full of surprises, especially when the old coot befriends a Hmong family next door. If you can survive the F-bombs and the near-constant ethnic invective, "Gran Torino" is not to be missed, if only as the gutsy, thoroughly unexpected valedictory of an icon fully willing to spend every bit of his considerable capital. Contains pervasive profanity and violence. DVD Extras: Featurettes.

"The International" (R, 116 minutes): Clive Owen plays Interpol agent Lou Salinger, a gruff, obsessed loner who for years has been on the trail of a corrupt bank. Now he's working with the Manhattan district attorney's office, specifically a comely assistant D.A. named Ella Whitman, played in an unobjectionable if undistinguished performance by Naomi Watts. Directed by Tom Tykwer ("Run Lola Run") with sober forthrightness, the film is in many ways a throwback to the monochrome urban thrillers of the 1970s, with the added and topical twist of having a diabolical financial institution at its center. Garbled at times, the movie still hums along with attractive, smooth efficiency. The compulsively watchable Owen makes for an ideal leading man of both action and angst. The film's eye-popping set piece, a shootout at the Guggenheim Museum, is an extravagantly choreographed valentine to philistines everywhere. Contains violence and profanity. DVD Extras: Commentary with director Tom Tykwer and writer Eric Singer; deleted scenes; featurettes.

"Nobel Son" (R, 110 minutes): Eli Michaelson, who has just won the Nobel Prize for chemistry, is a garden-variety narcissist and egomaniac, cruel to his family and friends, and predatory with his female students. When son Barkley, who studies cannibalism, is kidnapped, dark figures and secrets from Eli's past emerge, rearranging the family chessboard and driving even poor Barkley (perhaps) to practice what he studies. It's all wildly implausible and occasionally fun, but it could be so much better if director Randall Miller had thrown in a little more character development and excised a half-dozen crazy plot twists. We see where this might have gone when Eli (Alan Rickman) and his wife, Sarah (Mary Steenburgen), interact for a few, normal, human minutes in a car, coming back from the Nobel ceremony. But then a gruesome package arrives, and the movie lurches back to roller-coaster mode. Contains violent, gruesome images, language and sexuality. DVD Extras: Audio commentary with director/producer Randall Miller, writer/producer Jody Savin, musician Paul Oakenfold, cinematographer Mike Ozier and actors Brian Greenberg and Eliza Dushku; deleted scenes with optional director commentary; alternate ending.

Also on DVD June 9: "Fatal Attraction (Blu-ray)," "In Love We Trust," "Iron Maiden: Flight 666," "Reaper: Season 2," "The Shield: Season 7," "Spinning Into Butter." "Strike," "Woodstock: 3 Days of Peace & Music -- 40th Anniversary Ultimate Collector's Edition."

June 2

"Defiance" (R, 137 minutes): Edward Zwick's often-stirring movie dramatizes the true story of Zus and Tuvia Bielski (Liev Schreiber and Daniel Craig), Jewish brothers who eluded their Nazi captors during World War II in what is now Belarus. With a younger brother, Zus and Tuvia helped their fellow Jews escape the German SS and their collaborators by hiding in a forest and joining forces with the Red Army. Zwick has perfected the art of marrying bombastic action, aestheticized violence and historical import, and he marshals all three effectively to bring this little-known and amazing story to life. Craig and Schreiber are terrific as the slightly thuggish Bielskis, and they're joined by an able supporting cast that includes Jamie Bell and the wonderful Mia Wasikowska. Here, viewers are treated not only to the cathartic pleasures of watching a band of Jewish outlaws gun down their Nazi oppressors, but also to the ambiguous truth that for righteousness to prevail, it helps to have a little larceny in your heart. Contains violence and profanity. In Russian, Yiddish and English with subtitles. DVD Extras: Commentary by director Edward Zwick; featurettes; trailers.

"He's Just Not That Into You" (PG-13, 132 minutes): As the protagonists rehearse the movie's core philosophical questions, they wind up making a text of the subtext that lies just under the surface of most romantic comedies: romantic complaint. Gigi (Ginnifer Goodwin) throws herself headlong into every relationship she's in. After an encounter with a real estate agent named Conor (Kevin Connolly), she waits for the callback that's clearly never going to come. Janine (Jennifer Connolly) has a husband, Ben (Bradley Cooper), who is distant when they talk about what color to paint a room, while Beth (Jennifer Aniston) has a boyfriend, Neil (Ben Affleck), who refuses to get married. Restaurant manager Alex (Justin Long) befriends Gigi and talks her through the messages that men routinely send women and that women routinely ignore. The film isn't a movie as much as a destination; it's the movie equivalent of a quick mani-pedi, with pleasures that go just about as deep, and last just about as long. Contains sexual content and brief strong profanity. DVD Extras: Additional scenes with optional commentary by director Ken Kwapis.

"Revolutionary Road" (R, 119 minutes): Sam Mendes's dirge-like adaptation of the 1961 novel by Richard Yates exerts an undeniable pull as its beautiful, doomed protagonists navigate the ennui of adult life in 1950s suburbia. Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslet play Frank and April Wheeler, who are leading lives of not-very-quiet desperation. Frank, who works for a business machine company in Manhattan, seems slowly to be becoming his late father. April, who stays at home with the couple's two children, is clearly miserable. Frank and April make fitful, furtive attempts to be happy: Frank pursues an affair, while April hits on the idea of moving to Paris. The entire psychological arc of the film can be discerned in Winslet's face, while DiCaprio still seems too boyish, too insubstantial, to be playing a man coping with the realities of adulthood. It is a hard movie to love. Plenty of people will appreciate the hopelessness, but they might wish for a little less emptiness. Contains profanity, sexuality and nudity. DVD Extras: Commentary by director Sam Mendes and screenwriter Justin Haythe; featurette; deleted scenes with optional commentary.

Also on DVD June 2: "Air Force One (Blu-ray)," "Army Wives: Season 2," "Delirious: 25th Anniversary Edition"'; "Prison Break: Season 4," "Razortooth," "Spring Breakdown," "Rugrats: Seasons 1&2," "Weeds: Season 4."

May 26

"New In Town" (PG, 96 minutes): There's nothing novel about this overly familiar farce, a creaky rom-com-cum-fish-out-of-water tale about a tightly wound corporate executive (Renée Zellweger) who finds herself temporarily reassigned from sunny Miami to small-town Minnesota in the dead of winter. Throughout much of the movie, the actress's face appears botoxed into a frozen mask of misery, which melts only after meeting truck-drivin', beer-drinkin', plaid-wearin' hottie Ted (Harry Connick Jr.). But first Ted and Lucy have to act as though they hate each other. That is, until the handsome widower and single dad (all together now: awww) happens to have the opportunity to rescue the career-obsessed singleton when her car gets stuck in a blizzard, making her reevaluate her big-city priorities in the face of true love and a near-death experience. The real America, my foot. As Lucy remarks at one point, this whole endeavor looks like the world's coldest theme park. Contains a bit of crude language and suggestive material.

Also on DVD May 26: "Children of Men (Blu-ray)," "The Devil's Tomb," "Falling Down," "Field of Dreams (Blu-ray)," "Forever Strong," "Inside Man (Blu-ray)," "Killshot," "Law & Order: SVU: Season 9," "Princess of Nebraska," "Powder Blue," "The Ramen Girl," "True Romance."

May 19

"Fanboys" (PG-13, 90 minutes): Three years after graduating from high school, Eric (Sam Huntington), Hutch (Dan Fogler), Windows (Jay Baruchel) and Linus (Chris Marquette) are still living with their folks and working at dead-end jobs. When a terminal illness strikes one of the four and they fear he won't make it until the official release of "Star Wars: Episode I -- The Phantom Menace," they decide to drive from Ohio to George Lucas's Skywalker Ranch in California. There, they'll break in and watch a rough cut of the movie that they've been yearning for and dreaming about for years. Stops along the way include the birthplace of Capt. James T. Kirk, a gay biker bar, a snack of peyote-laced guacamole and the obligatory stopover in Las Vegas. Director Kyle Newman doesn't capture the sense of landscape and movement that a good road movie needs, and two slapstick chase scenes are lethargic. The Force is not strong with this one. Contains strong language, sexual humor and drug use. DVD Extras: Deleted scenes; commentary by cast and producers.

"My Bloody Valentine 3-D" (R, 101 minutes): No cartoon cuddliness in this hand-drips-blood-in-your-lap exploitation picture that lacks the subtlety or horror foreplay of the original. Editor-turned-director Patrick Lussier treats the multi-writer script as an afterthought and jumps straight into the mayhem as he re-creates the mining disaster that gave us the miner-mass murderer Harry Warden "10 years before." A brisk opening shows us the mine owner's son Tom (Jensen Ackles), whose blunder caused a cave-in; the single comatose miner rescued six days later; and the awful realization that his fellow victims didn't die of asphyxiation or the crush of earth. They were killed by a guy who didn't want them using up his oxygen. The plot staggers from absurd to ridiculous, and we don't have enough time with any character to wish them well in the face of certain death. But if horror in general is the last great communal movie experience, 3D just heightens the shared fun. Contains brutal horror, violence, grisly images, strong sexuality, graphic nudity and language. DVD Extras: Contains both 2D and 3D versions; 4 pairs of 3D glasses included; SE includes commentary, deleted scenes, gag reel and featurettes.

"Paul Blart: Mall Cop" (PG, 90 minutes): Even though this film was co-produced by Adam Sandler, it never sinks to scatological humor. That's pretty much where the accolades end for this mediocre, unmemorable comedy, one with such obviously humble intentions that busting on it is a bit like harassing the junior high school outcast who just wants to eat his tater tots in peace. Kevin James plays an overweight mall security officer named Paul Blart. On a particularly unfortunate Black Friday, a posse of thieves assumes control of the mall and starts to take hostages. Will the man who can't even break up a catfight at Victoria's Secret step up when it really counts? James gamely pratfalls and stumbles through all 90 minutes of these proceedings, but his clumsy somersaults and silly Segway maneuvers elicit few giggles. More intriguing is Raini Rodriguez, a 15-year-old actress who conveys a believable sweetness as Blart's daughter and, with luck, will score a better part in a better movie someday. Contains violence, mildly crude and suggestive humor and language. DVD Extras: Commentary with Kevin James and producer Todd Garner; deleted scenes; featurettes.

"Valkyrie" (PG-13, 120 minutes): Expectations for Tom Cruise's history-based thriller about Claus von Stauffenberg's July 20, 1944, attempt to assassinate Adolf Hitler, were low. And against all expectations he has fashioned a successful if not exceptional film. Von Stauffenberg's disillusionment with Hitler, and Hitler's disastrous two-front war, leads him to quickly take leadership of one of the more determined circles of anti-Hitler conspirators. Von Stauffenberg was not only untroubled by Hitler's nationalism and early aggression, he helped further it as a loyal soldier. It was only later, when he learned more about the master he served with military punctiliousness, that he saw the light. All of that is left out of the film. The film is so austere, so strangely inhuman in its depiction of heroism, that you can't help but admire it as an entertainment juggernaut, and fret about it, too, for its celebration of a very limited ideal of human behavior. Contains violence and strong language. DVD Extras: Commentary by Tom Cruise, Bryan Singer, and writer Christopher McQuarrie; commentary by writers Christopher McQuarrie and Nathan Alexander; featurettes.

Also on DVD May 19: "24: Season 7," "Driven to Kill," "The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance (Centennial Collection)," "Monsters, Inc. (Blu-ray)," "Outlander," "Pufnstuf," "True Blood: The Complete First Season."

May 12

"Passengers" (PG-13, 100 minutes): Anne Hathaway plays a grief and post-traumatic-stress counselor working with survivors of a plane crash in this dry, ineffective psychological thriller. Despite a strong cast, the film's dreary pacing and clumsily revealed mystery are more annoying than thrilling. Claire (Hathaway) comes to suspect the airline is hiding facts about the accident and thinks she's being followed. She falls, quite unethically, for one survivor/patient (Patrick Wilson) and gets unsought advice from a nosy neighbor (Dianne Wiest). The reenactment of the crash is chilling but not graphic. Contains scary images and sexuality. DVD Extras: Director commentary; deleted scenes; featurettes.

"Taken" (PG-13, 94 minutes): The story of an ex-CIA spook (Liam Neeson) who trains his deadly skills on the Albanian slavers who have kidnapped his daughter, the film delivers action, car chases, gunfights and just enough queasy exploitation to make you feel bad about yourself afterward. Bryan Mills retired from his CIA job to be closer to his daughter, 17-year-old Kim (Maggie Grace), who lives in California with her mother (Famke Janssen). Kim wants to spend the summer in Europe despite the qualms of her dad, who sees danger around every corner. Needless to say, Bryan is right: Kim is nabbed less than an hour after landing at Charles de Gaulle airport, and it falls to her father to rescue her from the sex-slavery ring that plans to sell her to a sheik. The film is perhaps best viewed as a cautionary tale for nervous fathers as Neeson tears through the Parisian underworld. Its message: Dads, don't let your little girls go anywhere or do anything, ever. Contains violence, disturbing thematic material, sexual content, drug references and language. DVD Extras: Extended cut; audio commentary with director Pierre Morel, writer Robert Mark Kamen, and cinematographers Michel Abramowicz and Michel Julienne; featurettes.

"Underworld: Rise of the Lycans" (R, 92 minutes): An impressive cast of British actors lends Shakespearean importance to this dark and hilariously grandiose vampires vs. werewolves saga. High-school-age fans of gothic horror ought to be entertained. Intended as a prequel to "Underworld" and "Underworld: Evolution," the film is set in medieval times. Viktor (Bill Nighy), king of the vampires, has problems: Werewolves are multiplying in the forest, and his daughter (Rhona Mitra) is having a thing with the human-werewolf slave Lucian (Michael Sheen). Lucian leads a slave rebellion. The violence is more stylized than graphic. There are impalements, throat cuttings, skull crushings and a semi-explicit sexual situation with partial nudity. Contains bloody violence and sexuality. DVD Extras: Director commentary; featurettes; music video.

Also on DVD May 12: "633 Squadron," "Along Came Jones," "Bruce Lee Ultimate Collection," "Die Hard: The Ultimate Collection," "Fargo (Blu-ray)," "The Grudge 3," "Star Trek - The Motion Picture Trilogy," "Personal Effects," "S. Darko," "Taking Chance."

May 5

"Chandni Chowk to China" (PG-13, 154 minutes): Sidhu, a loser from the Dehli neighborhood of Chandni Chowk, travels East, fooled into believing he's the reincarnation of a great Chinese warrior. Overmatched in a battle with a local crime boss, he transforms himself into a kung fu expert. With his long, handsome face, Akshay Kumar resembles Sacha Baron Cohen, and he plays Sidhu like a more pathetic Borat, bumbling through a land he knows nothing about. Warner Bros., presumably hoping to piggyback on the success of "Slumdog Millionaire," is giving the film the widest U.S. release for a Bollywood film. But be warned: the Bollywood-lite of "Slumdog" is no preparation for the toll 2 1/2 hours of this film can take on a person. Interspersed with amazing sequences are stretches of amateurishness, wretched excess, stupidity, tedium and flat-out weirdness that will likely have you grimacing a lot of the time, but grinning more frequently than you might expect. Contains violence, adult situations and language. In Hindi and Cantonese with subtitles.

"The Curious Case of Benjamin Button" (PG-13, 165 minutes): Brad Pitt plays the title character, who is born in 1918 as an elderly man, then ages backward through the cataclysmic changes of the 20th century. Button is a naif, passively moving through a world and meeting colorful characters who continually amaze him and -- what else -- teach him how to live. Meanwhile, he nurtures a lifelong love for Daisy, played by Cate Blanchett at her most ethereally beautiful. Much of the narrative tension derives from watching Pitt drastically alter his appearance, going from a wizened, hunched "E.T."-like creature to a young man at the height of ripe handsomeness. The movie, directed with a firm hand by David Fincher, is often astonishingly beautiful, but in a way that's the problem: You wonder what visionaries such as Tim Burton or Michel Gondry might have done with the material. It plays too safe when it should be letting its freak flag fly. Contains brief war violence, sexual content, profanity and smoking. DVD Extras: Two-disc Edition contains commentary with director David Fincher; four-part making-of documentary.

"Last Chance Harvey" (PG-13, 99 minutes): This quiet romantic comedy takes a cinematic chestnut (two meet fleetingly, spend time together and embark on a tentative romance until fate intervenes) and somehow infuses it with a sense of rue and regret that makes it seem new. Dustin Hoffman plays the title character, a New York-based jingle writer who travels to London for his daughter's wedding. It's obvious almost immediately that Harvey is close to washed-up professionally. But once he gets to London, it becomes increasingly clear that he's on the outs personally as well. He's even shot down by his own daughter, who chooses her stepfather to give her away. But when he meets Kate (Emma Thompson), a mutual recognition of souls transpires, and the two wind up spending a day walking London's lively South Bank. Thompson and Hoffman develop an easy, unforced chemistry, resulting in a touching portrait of that rarity in the movies: a recognizably human couple with recognizably human problems and quirks. Contains brief strong profanity. DVD Extras: Commentary with writer/director Joel Hopkins, Hoffman and Thompson; featurette.

"Wendy and Lucy" (R, 80 minutes): A deliberately spartan tone poem of need and desperation, the film stars Michelle Williams in a role that is one long moment. Wendy is trying to make her way from Indiana to Alaska, because she has a vague promise of work in a fish-packing plant. When her Honda breaks down, she's faced with repair bills she can't pay. Wendy steals food for her dog, Lucy, and she becomes the victim of a self-righteous store employee: "If a person can't afford dog food, they shouldn't have a dog!" Wendy later searches desperately for Lucy, who disappeared while she was under arrest. Williams's performance is nuanced, moving and well worth any awards she gets. But Wendy is also anonymous. We are provided almost nothing about her background. She could be anyone, her circumstances anyone's. Which is writer Kelly Reichardt's point. We get the whole point. We just don't get the whole woman, despite a performance that puts flesh on words and pictures. Contains vulgarity.

Also on DVD May 5: "Bones: Season 2," "Enchanted April," "Ferris Bueller's Day Off (Blu-ray)," "Higher Ground," "Grin Without A Cat," "Incendiary," "Ivanhoe," "Momma's Man," "Smother," "Under the Bombs."

April 28

"Bride Wars" (PG, 90 minutes): Predictable, lazy and as overprocessed as Kate Hudson's hair, this thoroughly joyless movie also possesses a deep nasty streak, making it loathsome when it might have been merely annoying. Hudson plays Liv, a high-powered Manhattan lawyer who with her childhood friend Emma (Anne Hathaway) has always dreamed of getting married at New York's Plaza Hotel in June. When Liv and Emma get engaged around the same time, they book back-to-back Saturdays, only to discover ... oh, what's the point? You've seen the trailer. Sexist, mean-spirited and unforgivably unfunny, the film seems to have been manufactured chiefly as a vehicle for its two stars, who wobble through it with grim determination. Fresh from her art-house triumph in "Rachel Getting Married," Hathaway is back to her dewy, deer-in-the-klieg-lights stare. But it's Hudson who meets with the most indignity here, coming across as brassy, coarse and hardened. Forget "Here Comes the Bride." There goes the career. Contains suggestive content, profanity and rude behavior. DVD Extras: Deleted scenes; featurette.

"Hotel for Dogs" (PG, 100 minutes): This comedy, starring perfectly pleasant up-and-comer Emma Roberts (Julia's niece), is about kids, not parents. Andi (Roberts) and Bruce (Jake T. Austin) have been parentless for three years, smuggling their dog, Friday, from foster home to foster home, always getting evicted after infractions, violations or minor criminal acts. Social worker Bernie (Don Cheadle) is so desperate that he has placed the kids with Lois and Carl Scudder (Lisa Kudrow and Kevin Dillon), married rockers who appear to have more fleas than the entire four-legged cast. Deprived of affection, guidance and decent nutrition, Andi and Bruce stumble on an abandoned hotel in downtown Los Angeles and decide to turn it into a home for unwanted pups. For all the latent social criticism of the film, it's a candy-coated romp through death and abandonment. On the upside, the movie could do something positive for the cause of homeless pets: If audiences respond the way they should, dog shelters could be emptied in a week. Contains thematic elements, language and crude humor. DVD Extras: Commentary by Thor Freudenthal, Ewan "Jack" Leslie, Emma Roberts and Jake T. Austin; deleted scenes; featurettes; photo gallery.

"JCVD" (R, 92 minutes): Playing Jean-Claude Van Damme is what Van Damme does in Mabrouk El Mechri's inventive, insightful and utterly surprising movie. Van Damme may be the idol of millions, but his career has been a roller-coaster tour of fame, substance abuse and incipient ex-fatherhood. When he dashes into a bank, there's a robbery in progress. Outside, the police and the citizenry think Van Damme has gone rogue. Although humor, violence and nervous tension are generated here, El Mechri's prank is putting an action star in a movie that debunks the mythos of action stars. With a gun to his head, Van Damme is like anybody would be. In what is a rather phenomenally naked piece of acting, Van Damme at one point delivers a soliloquy on his past life and regrets, directly into the camera, and one can shrug it off if one has no heart. It sags and it gets cute, but it's hard to resist: Here's a battered superstar who has occupied so many fantasies, but in his fantasies he's just like us. Contains vulgarity and violence. DVD Extras: Bonus footage; thatrical trailer.

"The Uninvited" (PG-13, 87 minutes): This remake of the Korean "A Tale of Two Sisters" begins with teenage Anna (Emily Browning) in a mental institution. She can't get over dreams of the fire that killed her mother 10 months before, and she's troubled by visions of a creepy red-haired girl. Even so, her kindly shrink says it's time for her to go home. There she finds that her father (David Strathairn), a famous writer, has set up housekeeping with Rachael (Elizabeth Banks), the nurse who had been tending to Mom. Anna's smart-alecky older sister, Alex (Arielle Kebbel), is just disgusted by the whole thing. Soon the girls come to suspect that Rachael killed their mother. First-time directors Thomas and Charles Guard give the action a glossy polish and a properly measured pace. They also maintain the right narrative balance. Is Anna the victim of an archetypal wicked stepmother, or is she unstable? Experienced horror fans will probably stay one step ahead of the game, but it's still a nice ride. Contains frightening images, language and sexual content. DVD Extras: Alternate Ending; deleted scenes; featurette.

Also on DVD April 28: "Gangland: Season 3," "Johnny Got His Gun," "Martyrs," "Nothing but the Truth," "Stranded," "Beethoven," "The Waltons: Season 9," "What Doesn't Kill You," and "While She Was Out."

April 21

"Frost/Nixon" (R, 122 minutes): You expect something dry, historical and probably contrived here. But you get a delicious contest of wits, brilliant acting and a surprisingly gripping narrative -- no less dramatic even though the results are a foregone conclusion. British journalist David Frost was deemed a lightweight and bet his future career on a blockbuster television special. Former president Richard Nixon wanted rehabilitation and gambled that Frost would lob him softballs. As Nixon, Frank Langella is perfection. The character is generated from the inside out not predicated on surface imitation or caricature. Frost is portrayed by Michael Sheen as a shallow playboy with a profound hollowness in his ambitious soul. The writing is so good, the acting so powerful that the film goes well beyond the courtroom drama into the territory of the classic history play. It isn't Shakespeare, but it is drama at a level one doesn't often get in movies. Contains strong language. DVD Extras: Commentary with director Ron Howard; deleted scenes; featurettes.

"Notorious" (R, 100 minutes): This biopic about the life and death of Notorious B.I.G., feels like Biggie's Wikipedia page reformatted for the big screen. A young Christopher Wallace develops a fascination with the rhymes of Kurtis Blow and the flash of street hustlers. In high school, Wallace, played by 33-year-old newcomer Jamal "Gravy" Woolard, has grown up to become a drug dealer himself, raising the domestic pressure with his protective mother, Voletta (played Angela Bassett). But the rookie actor compensates admirably on screen, channeling the rapper's imposing physicality. Woolard, a Brooklyn rapper himself, might be most convincing behind the microphone. Too bad he's rapping to such a lousy script filled with trite dialogue. As Biggie courts singer Faith Evans (Antonique Smith), she asks the rapper, "Are you a bad guy trying to be good or a good guy trying to be bad?" It's the million-dollar question "Notorious" completely fails to answer. Contains pervasive language, strong sexuality including dialogue and nudity, and drug content. DVD Extras: Special Edition contains rated and unrated versions; two feature-length commentaries; featurettes; deleted scenes.

"The Wrestler" (R, 109 minutes): As washed-up onetime ringmaster Randy "The Ram" Robinson, Mickey Rourke embodies the same tragedy of ego that afflicts his character. Rourke drags Randy's steroid-inflated corpus from battle to battle with the painful perseverance of Liza Minnelli and the weariness of a stop-lossed Marine. Following what is probably the movie's most gruesome sequence, Randy has a heart attack, and his long, slow denouement picks up reckless speed. As good as Rourke is, his performance constantly begs the question of whether the story would be worth telling without him. Marisa Tomei, as Cassidy the pole dancer, delivers a courageous performance; both Randy and Cassidy exist in fairly shadowy worlds that thrive on youth, and both are aging out. But in the broader sense, Randy is another in a long line of American screen characters who are facing the inevitable and can't ease their regrets. We feel for him. And we feel for us. Maybe that's enough. Contains violence, vulgarity, drug use, nudity, sexuality. DVD Extras: Featurettes; muisc video for Springsteen's "The Wrestler."

Also on DVD April 21: "America Betrayed,""Dallas: Season 11," "How About You," "Into the Blue 2: The Reef," "Caprica," "The Last Word," "My Own Worst Enemy: The Complete Series," "Top Gear 10."

April 14

"The Reader" (R, 123 minutes): Bernhard Schlink's highly regarded novel receives a graceful, absorbing screen adaptation by director Stephen Daldry, who conveys a technically and morally complicated story with consummate skill and smoothness. Kate Winslet and Ralph Fiennes deliver fine performances as the tortured souls at the center of this wrenching portrait of Germany reckoning with its Nazi past. But the standout here is 18-year-old German actor David Kross, whose portrayal of a teenage Michael Berg suggests a promising future. In 1958, 15-year-old Michael meets Hanna (Winslet), a 36-year-old tram worker who seduces the boy, then mysteriously disappears. Eight years later, as a law student in Heidelberg, Michael encounters Hanna again, this time in the troubling context of wartime atrocities. Traveling back and forth in time, from the 1950s and 1960s to the 1980s and 1990s, the story traces how Michael copes with the secret he and Hanna share and, by extension, the shame and silence that shrouded his country's past. Best Actress Oscar for Winslet's performance. Contains scenes of sexuality and nudity. DVD Extras: Featurettes; deleted scenes.

"The Spirit" (PG-13, 103 minutes): Frank Miller's latest film plays like a cheap "Batman" knockoff and wants to be sure everybody knows it. Denny (Gabriel Macht) is a murdered cop "reborn" as a vigilante crime fighter with supernatural healing powers. The story begins as the Spirit arrives at the place where, moments earlier, a beautiful woman (Eva Mendes) emerged Venus-like from computer-generated waters and shot a cop. The cop tears a locket from a chain around the woman's neck, which is how the Spirit discovers that his old flame and international jewel thief, Sand Saref, is back in town. He quickly realizes that the real cop-shooter is the villain, the Octopus (Samuel L. Jackson), an over-the-top caricature with a big gun collection. Macht's Spirit is cute, goofy and utterly vapid. At times, the movie resembles an incredibly expensive, and expressionistic, puppet show. Each line is an elbow to the ribs; each gesture is overplayed. Contains intense sequences of stylized violence and action, sexual content and brief nudity. DVD Extras: Commentary by Frank Miller and Deborah Del Prete; featurettes; trailer.

Also on DVD April 14: "8 Mile (Blu-ray)," "Dark Matter," "House of Saddam," "Malcolm and Eddie: Season 1," "Mean Girls (Blu-ray)," "My Best Friend's A Vampire," "The Pope's Toilet," "Splinter," "Trust Me," "Zombie Apocalypse: the Movie."

April 7

"Bedtime Stories" (PG, 99 minutes): Adam Sandler brings his immature charms to the role of Skeeter Bronson, a handyman with dreams of running the posh L.A. hotel where he changes the light bulbs. Saddled with his niece and nephew for a week and faced with the unwelcome concept of reading to the kids at bedtime, Skeeter instead makes up his own bedtime story, a tale of a medieval handyman who's allowed to compete for a chance to run the kingdom. The next day, Skeeter is shocked to learn that his hotel's owner (Richard Griffiths) is allowing him to compete for a chance to run the joint. Instantly, of course, Skeeter is back with the kids, eagerly telling a bedtime story that rewards him with a Ferrari. The movie's genial tolerability is thanks mostly to Disney's willingness to spend scads of money on its family hits. While there's a moral here about the power of storytelling, it's trapped pretty deep under layers of Sandler-worship and computer-generated booger monsters. Contains mild rude humor and mild language. DVD Extras: Featurettes; deleted scenes; bloopers.

"The Day The Earth Stood Still" (PG-13, 103 minutes): Although this remake, which stars Keanu Reeves, is likely to make audiences pine for the meta-irony of "Mystery Science Theater 3000," it's not a complete failure. Reeves is uniquely well suited for the role of Klaatu, the alien life form that warns earthlings of the coming apocalypse unless they change their ways. Helping him is astrobiologist Helen Benson (Jennifer Connelly), whose young stepson, Jacob (Jaden Smith), thinks Klaatu is the enemy. The real star of both versions of the movie, a robot named Gort, has been confiscated after trying to save Klaatu's life. The big bells and whistles don't make their presence known until the last half-hour of the film, when a swarm of malignant metallic locusts descends upon the Earth. Solemn, sober and efficient, the film gets the job done and moves on. Contains sci-fi disaster images and violence. DVD Extras: Three-disc SE contains commentary with writer David Scarpa; deleted scenes; featurettes.

"Doubt" (PG-13, 104 minutes): Meryl Streep brings her characteristic focus and wily craft to Sister Aloysius, the steely principal of a Catholic school in the Bronx, circa 1964. When a charismatic young priest named Father Flynn (Philip Seymour Hoffman) shows an interest in the newly integrated school's only black student, Sister Aloysius begins to entertain suspicions about the priest's motives. But the story comes to be about much more than just Father Flynn's guilt or innocence: power, spiritual discipline, institutional politics and corrupt hierarchical rot. Just when you begin to think you know who the cat and mouse really are, in steps Viola Davis to steal not just her scene but the entire movie from Streep. As the mother of the student in question, Davis presents "Doubt" with its most sobering and finally haunting philosophical quandaries, which give even the implacable Sister Aloysius a glimpse of life beyond her own unassailable ideals. Contains thematic material. DVD Extras: Commentary with writer/director John Patrick Shanley; featurettes.

"The Tale of Despereaux" (G, 93 minutes): The setup here is simple enough: The film's titular mouse is a big-eared outcast who has been an embarrassment since birth. He refuses to cower; instead he goes to school to learn and is treated as if he's developmentally disabled. His parents are mortified. The community is outraged. Out he goes. Lest we mislead the reader that there's something straightforward about this film, there is also Roscuro's (Dustin Hoffman) story to be told. He's something of an epicurean rodent who has come to the Land of Dor for the annual unveiling of a new soup. But when Roscuro inadvertently drops into the Queen's bowl, she drops dead. Matthew Broderick makes Despereaux sound like a white guy from the suburbs; Hoffman is terrific, just as he was earlier this year in "Kung Fu Panda." Neither, however, provides enough of a reason to care. Contains moments of peril. DVD Extras: Featurettes; games; interactive map of Dor.

"Yes Man" (PG-13, 104 minutes): Unless he had all his money in junk bonds, Jim Carrey is a very rich man. Why, then, did he make this movie? The film doesn't have a plot; it has a premise. What if someone never says no? Will his life improve by 1,000 percent? Yes. And that's it. There's no more to it than that. Open yourself up to experiences, and your life will burst into confetti and you will meet and fall in love with Zooey Deschanel, one-half of Hollywood's two-person cadre of raspy-voiced, blue-eyed brunettes who specialize in deadpan (the other being Catherine Keener). Is there anything good about the film? Yes. Terence Stamp, the lion-faced Brit, plays the self-help guru who converts Carrey into a yes man. But when it comes to "Yes Man" there is only one word. You know it, and sometimes it is worth saying. Contains crude sexual humor, language and brief nudity.

Also on DVD April 7: "Alexandra," "American High School," "American History X (Blu-ray)," "Beverly Hills 90210: Season 7," "Cleopatra: 75th Anniversary," "Donkey Punch," "Faith Like Potatoes," "I.O.U.S.A," "Last Days of the Filmore," "Operation Valkyrie," "Pre-Code Hollywood Collection," "Tango & Cash (Blu-ray)," "TCM Spotlight: Doris Day Collection," "The Wedding Singer (Blu-ray)."

March 31

"Marley & Me" (PG, 115 minutes): Based on the best-selling book by John Grogan, which chronicled his life with a large, lovable and deeply neurotic dog, the film proves the obvious: Not every book has a movie lurking in it. By the time John and Jennifer (Owen Wilson and Jennifer Aniston) and their three kids settle into a beautiful house near Philadelphia, Marley is an old dog. When the bell finally tolls for poor Marley, director David Frankel spares no manipulation to create a death scene worthy of Dickens. Grogan's column about Marley's death was essentially an apology for having made the dog an object of fun in so many previous columns; in the film, Wilson's speech elevates Marley to almost celestial status. And then there's the dog that plays Marley. If he wasn't drugged into a glassy-eyed state for the death scene, then his final weary stare into the great hunting grounds beyond can be ranked as a masterful moment in the annals of canine thespians. If you make it to this point in the film, give yourself a biscuit. Contains thematic material, suggestive content and language. DVD Extras: Deleted scenes; gag reel; Special Edition contains five additional featurettes.

"Seven Pounds" (PG-13, 113 minutes): It's difficult to gauge exactly how much to say about a film whose chief pleasure derives from the essential mystery surrounding the film's enigmatic title. What weighs seven pounds? And what does it have to do with the seven strangers sought out by the obviously troubled IRS agent Ben Thomas (Will Smith)? Early on, we see him conducting what can only be called, at best, unorthodox audits, and at worst, harassment of people who owe money to the feds. Ben comes across as part stalker, part con man, posing creepily inappropriate questions one minute and then sweet-talking the next. Hints are given, slowly, that something tragic has happened to him. Something that affected seven other people. And that now he's trying to make it right. The movie is pretty unabashed about the all-but-corny sentiment: Each of us has something to give. Contains disturbing thematic content, bloody imagery and a scene of sensuality. DVD Extras: Deleted scenes; Commentary with director Gabriele Muccino; featurettes.

"Slumdog Millionaire" (R, 121 minutes): The resourceful, unerringly grounded title character is Jamal Malik (Dev Patel), a lanky kid from the Mumbai slums whom we meet just after he wins 10 million rupees on India's own version of the "Who Wants to Be a Millionaire" TV show. Accused of cheating, Jamal is taken into custody by the Mumbai police, and he proceeds to tell them his story, a tale of one boy's decidedly unsentimental education by way of poverty, tribal strife, abandonment, exploitation, criminal gangs and star-crossed love. Director Danny Boyle has clearly found inspiration in the geography and textures of modern-day India, though with its stock characters and often outlandishly contrived plot, the film could easily be relegated to the category of cinematic stunt. But even at its most superficial, this chai-fueled fable retains its appeal, largely because of Boyle's fluency with the medium he so obviously loves. Winner of 8 Oscars, including Best Picture. Contains violence, disturbing images and profanity. DVD Extras: Commentary with director Danny Boyle and Dev Patel; Commentary with producer Christian Colson and writer Simon Beaufoy; deleted scenes; featurettes.

"Tell No One" (UR, 125 minutes): Grown-ups eager to see just a good movie, plain and simple are urged to find their way to this crafty, swift, subtly stylish thriller from French director Guillaume Canet. François Cluzet plays pediatrician Alex Beck, who is embroiled in a brutal crime and then, eight years later, becomes re-embroiled. Pursued by legal and extra-legal authorities, Alex must rely on his wits as well as the support of his sister Anne (Marina Hands) and her lover, Helene (the terrific Kristin Scott Thomas), as well as some unlikely allies in the criminal underworld of Paris's less-than-chic precincts. Canet creates a palpable sense of tension and foreboding that is sadly dissipated by the film's final, and fatally contrived, twist. But for an absorbing diversion as the dog days approach, filmgoers could do a whole lot worse. Contains profanity, violence, disturbing images and adult themes. In French with subtitles. DVD Extras: Deleted scenes; outtakes.

Also on DVD March 31: "An American in Paris (Blu-ray)," "The Butterfly Effect 3: Revelations," "Hannah Montana: Keeping It Real," "Ogre," "Ricky Gervais: Out of England," "Special," and "Time Crimes."

March 24

"Quantum of Solace" (PG-13, 106 minutes): In his breakout 2006 performance as 007 in "Casino Royale," Daniel Craig proved an able successor to the man who defined the role, Sean Connery. In its sequel, all the dash and elan of that film has been leached out, leaving Bond little more than a serial killer with Bombay Sapphire eyes and a good tux. Gone are the lush locales, libidinous sex scenes and playful puns. Gone, indeed, is all the fun. Adding insult to injury, they justify the whole enterprise in a ludicrous environmental cautionary tale about corporate control of water. Olga Kurylenko does her best in a regrettably glum role as Bond's sultry love interest; Mathieu Amalric plays the villain with the same catatonic stare he affected to far more engaging effect in "The Diving Bell and the Butterfly." Thank heaven for Judi Dench, whose M provides the film its sole quantum of peppery brio. Contains intense sequences of violence and action, and sexual content. DVD Extras: Special Edition contains featurettes; commentary.

Also on DVD March 24: "Big Stan," "The Cake Eaters," "Columbus Day," "Fling," "Gardens of the Night," "Goldfinger (Blu-ray)," "The Grudge 3," "The Matrix (Blu-ray)," "Moonraker (Blu-ray)," "Passengers," "Side Effects," and "The World Is Not Enough (Blu-ray)."

March 22

"Bolt" (PG, 96 minutes): As sprightly and determined as its fuzzy, yappy lead, this new Disney animated film works hard to be all things to all people, with mixed results. The story of Bolt, a TV-star pooch (voiced by John Travolta) who's accidentally mailed from Los Angeles to New York, the movie follows our hero (plus a cat and a daft hamster) across America in search of his owner and co-star, Penny (Miley Cyrus). But because Bolt, sheltered by his producers from the outside world, believes he truly is the superdog he plays on the tube, the film's simple dog-meets-girl, girl-loses-dog, dog-seeks-girl story jockeys for attention with some fairly sophisticated Hollywood satire, complete with a smooth-talking agent and splashy action scenes. The result is a family film with an identity crisis: "The Incredible Journey" meets "Entourage" meets "The Truman Show." Contains mild action and peril. DVD Extras: Deleted scenes; featurettes.

March 21

"Twilight" (PG-13, 120 minutes): It's easy to understand the tween- and teen-centric fascination with this film based on Stephenie Meyer's best-selling novel about the romance between a high school girl and a vampire. The love between 17-year-old Bella Swan (Kristen Stewart) and her strangely pale lab partner, Edward Cullen (Robert Pattinson), is as chaste as the relationship between any adolescent girl and, say, her Joe Jonas poster. That's because Edward, as part of a coven of self-proclaimed "vegetarian" vampires, refuses to drink human blood. Edward knows that if things were to get too hot with Bella, it might end badly for her. Lust is the elephant in the room here, and it's what gives the film its decidedly grown-up bite. That and director Catherine Hardwicke's wry humor. Of course, like any self-respecting vampire movie, it's also pretty scary. A roving band of out-of-town vampires who don't observe the Cullens' dietary restrictions shows up. One of them, James (Cam Gigandet), becomes obsessed with Bella, leading to the film's climactic showdown in a darkened, mirror-lined ballet studio. Good stuff. Contains violence and a scene of sensuality. DVD Extras: Deleted scenes; featurettes; commentary.

March 17

"Elegy" (R, 108 minutes): David Kepesh (Ben Kingsley) has it made, New York-lit style. The author of a classic art history text, he lectures at Columbia, lives in an exquisite brownstone and has a minor celebrityhood as a reviewer for the New Yorker. He prides himself on never having affairs with his current students; he waits until the next semester to make his move. But Consuela Castillo (Penélope Cruz) is different. Why? Well, because she's played by one of the world's most beautiful women, that's why. The movie then proceeds to document their career, but it does so entirely from his point of view. It doesn't care about her and, indeed, never really bothers to account for her life and her reasons for falling into a relationship with someone clearly 30 years her senior. Sadly, the film reminds me of the title of another great American writer's book: "Advertisements for Myself." Contains sexual themes. DVD Extras: Commentary with screenwriter Nicholas Meyer; featurette.

"Punisher: War Zone" (R, 107 minutes): It's hard to say exactly when my resistance broke down while watching the almost entirely joyless sequel to the 2004 film adaptation of the Marvel Comics series about tortured vigilante Frank Castle (Ray Stevenson, replacing an apparently shamefaced Tom Jane). Could it have been when Frank, who goes by the more superheroic moniker the Punisher, shoves a pencil several inches up his own nostril to loudly wrench a piece of cartilage back into alignment after suffering a broken nose while meting out one of his trademark bloodbaths? No, that happens way too early. How about when one of the villains (Dominic West) is thrown into a machine that grinds recycled glass? Nah, too predictable. Frank should have known that it would only turn the bad guy into a badly scarred master criminal bent on revenge. Anyone with a modicum of good sense will take it as a warning to stay the heck away from this literally and figuratively deadly "War Zone." Contains drug abuse, liberal profanity and a punishing level of violence.

Available March 17: "Chrysalis," "Degrassi: The Next Generation: Season 7," "JAG: Season 8," "The Princess Bride (Blu-ray)," "This is Spinal Tap (Blu-ray)," "Van Wilder: Freshman Year," "Walled In," and "Yella."

March 10

"Battle In Seattle" (R, 100 minutes): Stuart Townsend's portrayal of that city's 1999 World Trade Organization protests, suffers greatly -- as do we -- from an overdose of noblesse oblige. Woody Harrelson, Charlize Theron, Ray Liotta and Connie Nielsen are among the bigger names involved, and their characters all inhabit a world in which people are wellsprings of righteous indignation, as well as oratorical flourish. Townsend's heroes are the hard-core protesters themselves. The film presents itself as character-driven drama, and this is false advertising. There are too many characters to get a firm grasp on any of them, and there's little motivation to want to do so anyway. Contains vulgarity and violence. DVD Extras: Commentary with director Stuart Townsend; theatrical trailer; featurettes.

"The Boy in the Striped Pajamas" (PG-13, 93 minutes): The Berlin of director Mark Herman's film unrolls as an as-yet-unbombed '40s stronghold of Teutonic family values, blinkered Germans and plummy-accented, English-speaking Nazis. Few characters in film have been as relatively privileged, as morally conflicted and as willing to ignore it as Father (David Thewlis), the SS officer whose promotion will relocate him and his family from cosmopolitan Germany to the stark deathscape of a Nazi work camp. Bruno (Asa Butterfield), the young son of this benighted family, will befriend an inmate his age named Shmuel (Jack Scanlon), hence the title and leaden symbolism of this adaptation of John Boyne's novel. The film asks the metaphysical question of what life would be like for the family of a concentration camp commandant, in yet another attempt to revisit a sorrowful event in history that should never be forgotten or used for entertainment. Contains disturbing Holocaust references. DVD Extras: Commentary by director Mark Herman and author John Boyne; deleted scenes with optional commentary; featurette.

"Cadillac Records" (R, 109 minutes): There's a teeny little hole in the middle of this film, and it's right where you'll find Leonard Chess (Adrien Brody). As the founder of Chess Records, he champions the work of guitarist Muddy Waters (Jeffrey Wright), singer Etta James (Beyoncé Knowles), harmonica player Little Walter (Columbus Short), growling vocalist Howlin' Wolf (Eamonn Walker), the duckwalking Chuck Berry (Mos Def) and others, creating previously unheard-of opportunities for African American artists. But we're never given much insight into who Chess really is or why we should care about him. History is propelled forward by the film's over-reliance on such now-stale staples of musical biopics as the montage of nightclub marquees and ka-ching-ing cash registers, leaving little time in this speeding, noisy, overcrowded vehicle to take in anything other than the milestones that go whizzing past. Contains profanity, racial epithets, sex scenes, partial nudity, violence and alcohol and drug abuse. DVD Extras: Commentary with writer/director Darnell Martin; deleted scenes; featurettes.

"Happy-Go-Lucky" (R, 118 minutes): The British actress Sally Hawkins delivers a nervy, utterly captivating tour de force performance in Mike Leigh's transporting new film. Hawkins plays Poppy, a London schoolteacher with an indomitable spirit and persistently cheerful outlook on life, even when the bowl of cherries winds up being full of pits. Here, Leigh follows Poppy from the flat she shares with her beloved roommate, Zoe (the remarkable Alexis Zegerman), and driving lessons with a cranky conspiracy theorist (a brilliant Eddie Marsan) to a chance encounter with a street tramp and a flamenco class with a fiery teacher (the scene-stealing Karina Fernandez). Viewers may find themselves holding their collective breath, waiting for the inevitable shoe to drop on Poppy's indefatigable optimism. No spoilers here, except to say that the film won't break your heart -- it will make it soar. Contains profanity. DVD Extras: Audio commentary with director Mike Leigh; featurettes.

"Let The Right One In" (R, 114 minutes): This Swedish drama lurks in a cold, dark, brooding territory, inhabited by people both haunting and terrified: tweens. Chief among them: Oskar (Kare Hedebrant), the pink-skinned, white-blond, Billy Budd-ish child of a single mother, a loner and a target, whose days are tormented by a trio of very devoted schoolyard bullies. The other is Eli (Lina Leandersson), the dark-eyed waif who moves into Oskar's apartment block, goes barefoot in the snow and gives Oskar something to live for. Even though she is technically dead. Or, rather, undead. Yep: Eli is a vampire, and the film is, in the basest of terms, a horror flick, toying with the audience's existing vampire knowledge. Eli doesn't want to put the bite on anyone. For that she has Hakan (Per Ragnar), a man old enough to be her grandfather. And that leaves Oskar, whose need for love has him looking for a friend -- not on the Internet, but in the realms of the undead. Contains bloody violence, including disturbing images, brief nudity and profanity. In Swedish with subtitles. DVD Extras: Deleted scenes; making-of documentary; poster gallery.

"Milk" (R, 128 minutes): Gus Van Sant has painted a vivid, affecting portrait of Harvey Milk, who in 1978 joined the San Francisco Board of Supervisors as the first openly gay man to be elected to public office in the United States. Sean Penn virtually disappears into his character, burying any trace of native mannerism or accent and emerging as a wholly convincing New York Jewish boy made good. What makes the film extraordinary isn't just that it's a nuanced, stirring portrait of one of the 20th century's most pivotal figures but that it's also a nuanced, stirring portrait of the thousands of people he energized. Van Sant shifts his focus throughout the film from Harvey himself to the movement he so ingeniously led. That push-pull approach flawlessly suits the idea Van Sant expresses most subtly: That history isn't a straight line but an often heartbreaking two-steps-back gavotte. The point, as Harvey Milk taught so many so well, is to stay in the dance. Best Actor Oscar for Penn's performance. Contains profanity, sexual content and brief violence. DVD Extras: Deleted scenes; featurettes.

"Rachel Getting Married" (R, 113 minutes): The bravura way director Jonathan Demme juggles the hurly-burly of an upscale wedding -- made hurlier and burlier by the arrival, straight from rehab, of the title character's (Rosemarie DeWitt) high-maintenance sister Kym (Anne Hathaway, like you've never seen her) -- harks back to the darkness and emotional complexity of "The Silence of the Lambs," and the madcap energy of "Something Wild." There's a dark secret, too, but its lurking presence never feels cheap or forced. There's something very recognizable, very true about the way it has percolated up through the psyches of Rachel, a psychologist; her ringmaster father (former clown Bill Irwin); and her emotionally remote mother (Debra Winger), manifesting itself in personalities that feel fully fleshed, if damaged in different ways. Or, in the case of Kym, the way it explodes with the force of a still-active volcano. That's natural also, and all too human. Contains strong language and a brief sex scene. DVD Extras: Commentary with producer Neda Armian, screenwriter Jenny Lumet and editor Tim Squyres; commentary with Rosemarie DeWitt; deleted scenes; featurettes.

"Role Models" (R, 99 minutes): Danny and Wheeler tool around Los Angeles, in a monster truck that snorts fire, peddling an energy drink called Minotaur to school kids, as if it's an anti-drug alternative. Danny, bored with it all and losing his girlfriend, drives the truck into a statue of a horse. Such is the beginning of the film in which Danny (Paul Rudd) and Wheeler (Seann William Scott) are ordered to complete 150 hours of community service mentoring troubled teens -- or go to jail. Danny hooks up with Augie (Christopher Mintz-Plasse), a stereotypical dweebish white kid who wears a cape and is absorbed in role-playing games. Wheeler gets Ronnie (Bobb'e J. Thompson), a stereotypical black kid with a bad attitude and a potty mouth. Danny must connect with Augie, of course, in order to redeem himself and reclaim his sweetie (Elizabeth Banks), and Wheeler and Ronnie fill in the subplot. You can probably figure out how this is all going to end, but it still has more laughs than you might think. Contains crude and sexual content, strong language and nudity. DVD Extras: Contains both rated and unrated versions; commentary with director David Wain; deleted scenes and alternate takes; bloopers; featurettes.

"Synecdoche, New York" (R, 124 minutes): Caden Cotard (Philip Seymour Hoffman) is the emotional void at the center of this astonishingly good film written and directed by Charlie Kaufman. Cotard, a theater director wasting his talents in Schenectady, N.Y., is given a "genius grant" that enables him to do something big, something grand and honest. He moves to New York City, where he re-creates the daily disappointments of his existence inside a giant warehouse. As the years slip by and he fails to find lasting love or happiness in his personal life, Cotard's ever-larger, ever-more-complex theatrical version of his own existence also refuses him wisdom, consolation or perspective. The acting is magnificent, especially Hoffman's anguished, distracted, solipsistic portrayal of Cotard. Catherine Keener is both chilling and charming as Cotard's wife, a woman chased and caught by fame. It is one of the best films of the year. Of the decade, too. Contains strong language, sexual content and nudity. DVD Extras: Featurettes; Script Factory Masterclass with Charlie Kaufmam.

"Transporter 3" (PG-13, 103 minutes): Once again, our hero is Frank Martin (Jason Statham), the gruff, taciturn, really ripped driver who always delivers his cargo. The plot has something to do with a shipload of lethal toxic waste and nasty American millionaire Johnson (Robert Knepper) who wants to get rid of it. Meanwhile in Marseille, France, Frank and pal Inspector Tarconi (Francois Berléand) are fishing. After an explosive car crash, Frank and his beloved black Audi are forced to deliver a package to Budapest. Two catches: First, he has a passenger, the sullen, trashy, freckle-faced Valentina (Natalya Rudakova); second, Frank and Valentina are wearing bracelets that will blow up if they wander more than 75 feet from the Audi. Mayhem, of course, ensues. Statham handles this silly stuff with the same brooding intensity that he brought to the first films, though it seems increasingly inappropriate and irrelevant. Contains violence, sexual material, language and drug use.

Also on DVD March 10: "Ben X," "Brokeback Mountain (Blu-ray)," "Family Ties: Season 5," "Get Smart: Season 2," "Groom Lake," "Howard the Duck: Special Edition," "Seven (Blu-ray)," and "South Park: Season 12."

March 3

"Australia" (PG-13, 155 minutes): A wildly ambitious, luridly indulgent spectacle of romance, action, melodrama and historic revisionism, the film is windy, overblown, utterly preposterous and insanely entertaining. Lady Sarah Ashley (Nicole Kidman) is being driven across Faraway Downs by a mysterious, cynical cattle hand simply named the Drover (Hugh Jackman). Upon arriving at her husband's battered farmhouse near Darwin, Lady Sarah discovers that he has been killed. Although she came to Australia to coax her husband back to Britain, Lady Sarah decides to stay and drive her best cattle to Darwin, where the story shifts to a military action thriller. But even as he wraps his country in an adulatory glow, director Baz Luhrmann reserves the right to find fault, especially in the government's historic oppression of Australia's indigenous people in what is the film's most ambitious aim of all: to lay bare and heal his country's deepest primal wound. Contains violence, a scene of sensuality and brief strong language. DVD Extras: Deleted scenes; Blu-ray contains multiple featurettes.

"Beverly Hills Chihuahua" (PG, 90 minutes): In a saner world, Disney's flat-footed attempt to cash in on the Taco Bell talking-dog craze that peaked 10 years ago, would be easily dismissed as the pop-cultural detritus that it is. But -- things are just this crazy -- it's actually not that bad. Drew Barrymore voices the part of Chloe, the pampered title character who, while in the care of a feckless babysitter (Piper Perabo), is taken to Mexico and promptly gets lost. Okay, the concept for the movie is admittedly lame, but there's absolutely nothing wrong with watching a passel of adorable pooches wrinkle their brows and bark while human voices come out of their mouths. The secret weapon here is Andy Garcia's growling former K-9 German shepherd, who befriends Chloe and serves as sort of a film-noirish Rin Tin Tin. As for Barrymore's plucky little pup, she's got verve, spunk, telegenic charm -- and she's been to Mexico. She'll make someone the perfect running mate. Contains mild thematic elements. DVD Extras: Commentary with director Raja Gosnell; deleted scenes; bloopers; featurette.

"I've Loved You So Long" (PG-13, 117 minutes): It isn't very long before you're able to figure out what's eating Juliette (Kristin Scott Thomas), the haunted heroine who's reunited with little sister Léa (Elsa Zylberstein) after a 15-year separation in this film. Turns out that Juliette hasn't been away on a trip, as Léa tells her two young daughters, but in prison. The shameful reason why -- and another, even more deeply buried secret -- unspool with deliberate mystery in French writer-director Philippe Claudel's exquisitely rendered story of reconciliation and redemption. The dynamic between Juliette and Léa, who never visited her sister in prison, is the most fraught. And, in the hands of Scott Thomas and Zylberstein, the most rewarding to watch. Their characters' desire -- no, need -- to repair their fragile bond feels as achingly real as the mother lode of hidden pain that gets exposed by the work of these two great actresses. Contains mature themes and smoking. In French with English subtitles. DVD Extras: Deleted scenes with optional Commentary by director Philippe Claudel.

Also on DVD March 3: "7th Heaven: Season 8," "ER: Season 10," "Exit Speed," "The Hills: Season 4," "In the Electric Mist," "The Inauguration of Barack Obama," "Lake City," "Once (Blu-ray)," "The Silence of the Lambs (Blu-ray)," "True Confessions of a Hollywood Starlet," "Watchmen: The Complete Motion Comic," and "Wonder Woman 2009."

Feb. 24

"The Haunting of Molly Hartley" (PG-13, 87 minutes): A weak attempt at an occult thriller for teens, this movie is well enough acted but feels half-baked. Prep school senior Molly Hartley (Haley Bennett) and her dad (Jake Weber) have moved to a new town to be near Molly's mentally ill mom (Marin Hinkle), who's hospitalized. We learn early on that her delusional mother tried to kill Molly. Molly suffers from nosebleeds, panic attacks and hallucinations, and has difficult relationships with schoolmates. She's told it will pass but feels pursued by something otherworldly. A born-again Christian girl (Shanna Collins) tries to help. Contains strong thematic material, violence, terror, brief strong language and teen drinking.

"Sex Drive" (R, 109 minutes): Ian is a sex-starved Midwestern high school senior so dweebish that the object of his affection ignores him in favor of his 14-year-old kid brother. Meanwhile, his buddy -- chubby, bespectacled, confident beyond reason -- gets over with the girls like mad. This is the world of the film named for the impetus that drives teenage boys bonkers and for the road trip Ian and pals undertake so that he can meet a blond, buxom babe in Tennessee who promises to deliver him from the curse of virginity. He steals his older brother's gorgeous 1969 Pontiac GTO and off we go on your predictably raunchy teenage sexcapade. The movie is pulled along mostly by James Marsden's cheerfully over-the-top performance as Ian's homophobic older brother, but Josh Zuckerman does a nice job of keeping Ian likable. Contains strong crude sexual content, nudity, adult language, and drug and alcohol use -- all involving teens. DVD Extras: Contains both rated and unrated versions; Director commentary; featurettes.

"What Just Happened?" (R, 107 minutes): You wouldn't want to make a steady diet of inside-Hollywood satires, but Barry Levinson serves a suitably savory morsel with this finely observed and occasionally outright hilarious glimpse at the most treacherous inner workings of Tinseltown. Robert De Niro plays a veteran producer named Ben who is juggling two ex-wives, two movies with problems, a midlife crisis, a troubled teenage daughter and various agents, studio executives and apparatchiks who give him no end of tsoris. Written by real-life producer Art Linson and based on his memoir, the film brims with juicy inside jokes and cameos, including Bruce Willis as the apotheosis of the temperamental star. Sometimes silly, often scathingly funny, the film finally possesses a winning mix of toughness and heart. Contains profanity, some violent images, sexual content and some drug material. DVD Extras: Commentary with director Barry Levinson and writer Art Linson; deleted scenes; featurettes.

Also on DVD Feb. 24: "Akira (Blu-ray)," "Breaking Bad: Season 1," "The French Connection (Blu-ray)," "Futurama: Into the Wild Green Yonder," "Just Shoot Me: Season 3," "The Last House on the Left," "The Librarian: Curse of the Judas Chalice," "The Matador," "My Wife and Kids: Season 1," and "Summer Heights High."

Feb. 17

"Body of Lies" (R, 128 minutes): With its urgent post-9/11 context and often brutal violence, it seems off-key to describe this film as a nifty political thriller, but that's what it is. Leonardo DiCaprio plays Roger Ferris, a crackerjack CIA operative stationed in the Middle East whose handler, Ed Hoffman (Russell Crowe), backs him up from Langley by way of a secure phone and all-knowing satellite camera. The team is searching for a powerful al-Qaeda leader who has been masterminding bombings in Europe; the search will take Ferris from Iraq to Jordan to Dubai and finally to Syria in an escalating cat-and-mouse game of deception and mushy moral middle ground. Ridley Scott's film clicks along at an engaging pace, legibly limning its multitude of characters and even throwing in a good bit of wry humor. DiCaprio, however, seems off his game. With an Eddie Munster haircut and weirdly emphatic line readings, he's stiff and uncomfortable compared with Crowe's obvious ease. Contains strong violence, including some torture, and profanity throughout. DVD Extras: Special edition features director's commentary and featurettes.

"Changeling" (R, 140 minutes): Angelina Jolie's star is apparently so incandescent that it blinded Clint Eastwood to the story mechanics that have made his films so sound. It is 1928, and Jolie's character, Christine Collins, is a Pacific Telephone & Telegraph employee in Los Angeles. One day, she finds that her young son, Walter (Gattlin Griffith), is gone. Months later, the kid is returned to Collins. Case closed. Public happy. Except that the boy isn't her son. And for insisting that this is so, Collins is committed to an insane asylum. What's MIA in "Changeling" is something to prevent it from becoming penal-system porn: Yes, Christine Collins's suffering at the hands of LAPD Captain J.J. Jones (Jeffrey Donovan), who is trying to stanch the damage to his department that the Rev. Gustav Briegleb's (John Malkovich) radio broadcasts have done, creates a great deal of righteous indignation. And far too little intrigue. Contains violence, vulgarity and adult content. DVD Extras: Two featurettes.

"Choke" (R, 92 minutes): This adaptation of a book by cult pulp novelist Chuck Palahniuk ("Fight Club"), might appeal to Palahniuk's niche of fans, but for the most part it's a grim, joyless turnoff. Sam Rockwell, who's becoming alarmingly adept at playing weaselly, chinless antiheroes, plays Victor, a compulsive womanizer, con man and Colonial theme park reenactor whose myriad life issues stem from a troubled relationship with Mommy. The survivor of a chaotic childhood, Victor is a devoted son, visiting his now-addled mother (Anjelica Huston,) in a nursing home. There he meets a gorgeous doctor (Kelly Macdonald), who manages to convince him that his early life might have been even more storied than he thinks. "Choke" is a slight, cynical bagatelle, filmed without much distinction of style. And look out for an unrecognizable cameo from Joel Grey (Gregg's father-in-law, as it happens) as one of Victor's cohorts in a sex-addiction 12-step program. Contains strong sexual content, nudity and profanity. DVD Extras: Commentary with director Clark Gregg and Rockwell; deleted scenes; multiple featurettes.

"Flash of Genius" (PG-13, 116 minutes): The true story of inventor Robert Kearns's years-long struggle to force the Detroit auto industry to admit it stole his 1963 design for the intermittent windshield wiper will appeal less to courtroom-drama fans than to stick-it-to-the-Man fans. For one thing, the courtroom drama -- a climactic lawsuit against Ford Motor Co. in which Kearns (Greg Kinnear) acts as his own attorney -- doesn't kick in until almost 90 minutes, and much human drama, have elapsed. By then, there has already been another whole movie, in which Kearns loses his job, his wife (Lauren Graham), his lawyer (Alan Alda), the affection of his kids and, nearly, his sanity. The trial, by comparison, will feel familiar to anyone who has ever watched any David take on any corporate Goliath before a court of law. This is the story of Everyman vs. the System, and we've all heard it before. It's Kearns who had his work cut out for him. Kinnear's job is a relative cakewalk. Contains crude language. DVD Extras: Director commentary; deleted scenes.

"High School Musical 3: Senior Year" (G, 110 minutes): With exuberant and terrifically danced choreography, catchy soft-rock songs and a likable cast that doesn't look too impossibly perfect, this first feature film in the series that began on Disney cable TV ought to delight fans -- especially those in the 8-to-12, or 'tween, range. In this G-rated world, teens are drug-free, chaste and never swear. Zac Efron will again set hearts aflutter as Troy, a high-school basketball star and ace singer/actor. Senior year, he's torn between making his coach/dad (Bart Johnson) happy by continuing the family tradition of going to a local Albuquerque university to play sports or following his musical gifts to a school farther away. His girlfriend, Gabriella (Vanessa Hudgens), knows she's headed to Stanford. So there are the usual senior-year fears about losing touch or making the wrong choices. Contains nothing objectionable. DVD Extras: Extended version; bloopers; deleted scenes; featurettes.

"How to Lose Friends & Alienate People" (R, 110 minutes): The film, based on an account by British journalist Toby Young of his stint working for Vanity Fair, reads like "The Devil Wears Prada" for guys. It's a sharply aimed skewering of New York media circles and their sycophantic orbit around celebrity culture. Standing in for Young, Simon Pegg plays Sidney, a loutish Englishman recruited by Sharps magazine editor Clayton Harding (Jeff Bridges) to inject some vinegar into the glossy mag's coverage of Hollywood. But Sidney ends up only annoying everyone on the magazine's staff, most notably his immediate supervisor, Alison (Kirsten Dunst). Sidney is just an idiot. Which makes Alison's initial hatred of him understandable. And her eventual softening all the more perplexing. Yes, in the end, what was good enough for the printed page -- a comic chronicle of our obsession with the shallow -- has been turned into the object of its own derision. Contains crude language, nudity, sexual references and drug content. DVD Extras: Commentary with director Robert Weide and Simon Pegg; making of featurette.

"I Served The King of England" (R, 118 minutes): An extravagant, visually stunning feast of sensory delights, Jirí Menzel's winsome comedy, set in World War II-era Prague, pirouettes along a beguiling but treacherous line between horror and whimsy. Jan Díte (Ivan Barnev) wants only one thing in life: to be a millionaire. The film chronicles with sumptuous detail his picaresque journey from pub to brothel to world-class hotel in Prague. As Jan comes up in the world, he turns a blind eye to the historic changes swirling around him. Jan narrates his story as a grown man (Oldrich Kaiser), having endured the consequences of his younger, callow self's dubious choices. His ethereal air of disconnection from the grubby realities of life begins to feel like something far more sinister as history raises the stakes. By one of the film's final scenes, it's clear that reflection, if not moral reckoning, is at hand. When it finally arrives, viewers could be forgiven for wondering if it's entirely earned. Contains sexual content and nudity. In Czech with subtitles. DVD Extras: Image gallery; theatrical trailer.

"Quarantine" (R, 89 minutes): Jennifer Carpenter, playing the too-thin, too-young, too-flirty TV reporter whose "ride along" with firefighters turns into a zombie virus nightmare, gives a performance that harks back to the Golden Age of Jamie Lee Curtis. No, the script isn't anything special, and the novelty long ago wore off for this style of moviemaking. "Quarantine" is a remake of a Spanish horror thriller about a reporter and a cameraman who get more than they bargained for when they do a story on the night shift at a fire station. An ambulance call takes them to an old apartment building. An elderly woman is sick, foaming at the mouth and covered in blood. Before they can get her out, she has bitten others, and the building is instantly sealed off, SWAT team snipers preventing anyone from leaving. One by one, the residents (Greg Germann plays a vet) and the first responders are picked off, official reassurances that "this'll all be over soon" not being very reassuring at all. Contains bloody, violent and disturbing content, terror and strong language. DVD Extras: Four featurettes.

"Religulous" (R, 101 minutes): Several of Bill Maher's ideas about religion will make you laugh out loud in the television host's globe-trotting, full-frontal assault on the three major Western faiths. But one of the rules of satire is that you can't mock things you don't understand, and the film starts developing fault lines when it becomes clear that Maher's view of religious faith is based on a sophomoric reading of the Scriptures. "You're smart people," he tells guys at a truck stop chapel, when it is clear he thinks them anything but. He can't get into a serious theological conversation because he's busy baiting the guy who plays Jesus at an Orlando theme park called the Holy Land Experience. "Grow up," Maher admonishes viewers at the close. It might be good advice for him to follow -- so long as he can bring his sense of humor along. Contains crude language and sexual material. DVD Extras: Commentary with Maher and director Larry Charles; deleted scenes.

Also on DVD Feb. 17: "Feast 3: The Happy Finish," "Gandhi (Blu-ray)," "Kramer Vs Kramer (Blu-ray)," "Law & Order: Special Victims Units: Season 8," "The Midnight Meat Train," "Murder She Wrote: Season 9," "One Long Night," "Palo Alto, CA," "Passion of the Christ (Blu-ray)," and "Still Waiting..."

Feb. 10

"Blindness" (R, 120 minutes): In this arresting, often riveting film that is fascinating to look at but not nearly so interesting to watch, a man at a stoplight suddenly and without reason goes blind. It spreads to an instant epidemic, inspiring panic. The infected are quarantined in a deserted mental hospital; everyone inside is blind except the doctor's wife, who mysteriously remains immune. The casting is strong, with Julianne Moore as the doctor's wife, Mark Ruffalo as the doctor and Gael García Bernal ("The Motorcycle Diaries") as the most vicious man among the quarantined. It's a beautiful car that never quite cranks up. Humanity devolves into degradation and exploitation. This sets up, in both book and film, a struggle between the decent and the depraved, and it works much better in the novel. Contains violence, including sexual assaults; language; sexuality; and nudity.

"Frozen River" (R, 97 minutes): As Ray Eddy, a single mother of two living in a trailer in Upstate New York, Melissa Leo delivers a tough, utterly mesmerizing performance as a woman whose desperation to do right by her kids sends her on a journey all the more astonishing for being so believable. Abandoned by her husband, a compulsive gambler, and ignored for a promotion at the dollar store where she works, Ray crosses paths with Lila (Misty Upham), who lives on the nearby Mohawk reservation. To earn quick money, Lila persuades Ray to drive illegal immigrants across a frozen river. It comes as no shock when events spiral out of the women's control. Leo and Upham effortlessly convey the subtleties of their characters' tentative friendship. Contains profanity. DVD Extras: Commentary with writer/director Courtney Hunt and producer Heather Rae.

"Miracle at St. Anna" (R, 155 minutes): This highly anticipated Spike Lee film follows four "Buffalo Soldiers" who find themselves in a remote Italian village surrounded by German troops: Staff Sgt. Stamps (Derek Luke), the upright stalwart who believes America is capable of change; Sgt. Cummings (Michael Ealy), the smooth-talking Lothario who harbors a far angrier pessimism; Cpl. Negron (Laz Alonso), who as a Puerto Rican doesn't consider himself part of the racial conversation; and Pfc. Train (Omar Benson Miller), a dimwitted gentle giant who has adopted a quiet Italian orphan named Angelo (Matteo Sciabordi) and who carries with him a piece of statuary that he's convinced makes him invisible and all-powerful. Overwrought, overproduced, overbusy and overlong, the film finally suffers from the worst filmmaking sin of all: the failure of trust, in the story and the audience. And no miracle can overcome that. Contains strong war violence, profanity, sexual content and nudity.

"Nights in Rodanthe" (PG-13, 97 minutes): The romance between a guilt-wracked surgeon (Richard Gere) and a dumped wife (Diane Lane), who fall into each other's arms during a storm, is utterly and completely unsupported by anything that happens in the film based on the novel by Nicholas Sparks. Oh, there's some hooey, of course, about how Lane's Adrienne makes Gere's Paul "want to be a better person." That's an admirable goal, considering that, up until his magical transformation, he's not very nice. Still, he is Richard Gere, at his most attractively crinkly and twinkly eyed here. What really sells this three-hanky tear-jerker by first-time feature-film director George C. Wolfe -- and there were a lot of women buying it during a recent screening -- is Lane's steely and vulnerable performance. Like Tinker Bell, she almost made me believe in fairies. Almost. Contains crude language and scenes of pre- and post-coital cuddling. DVD Extras: Music video; featurettes.

"Soul Men" (R, 98 minutes): There is some pleasure to be had in watching -- and listening to -- Samuel L. Jackson and the late Bernie Mac sing and dance. Playing Louis Hinds and Floyd Henderson, a pair of washed-up backup singers who come out of retirement to perform in a tribute concert for their recently deceased former band leader (John Legend), the two veterans, who reportedly did their own moves and vocals, look and sound good in an array of matching suits left over from the golden age of doo-wop. Unfortunately, not good enough to make up for the unnecessary proliferation of Viagra humor, rectal-exam jokes and comedy at the expense of women, as the two now-estranged bandmates bicker with and swear at each other during a road trip from California to New York's Apollo Theater. You don't expect serious in a Bernie Mac movie, but whatever happened to a little dignity? Contains prolific obscenity, crude humor, partial nudity, sex scenes, drug dealing and comic violence. DVD Extras: Director commentary; behind-the-scenes; Bernie Mac at The Apollo.

"W." (PG-13, 131 minutes): The through line of Oliver Stone's new biopic of President Bush is the recurring Oedipal struggle between the titular Bush "Junior" (played in a squinty-eyed, set-jawed impersonation by Josh Brolin) and his far more accomplished father, George H.W. Bush (James Cromwell). Stone brackets his subject's unlikely rise by his decision to invade Iraq: That decision comes to pass in a series of sinister and amusing meetings with his war cabinet and Vice President Cheney. Played by Richard Dreyfuss, Cheney emerges as a quietly diabolical eminence grise. It's a glib, facile portrayal of what is doubtlessly a far more complicated relationship. Overall, the film is a scattershot attempt at stylized portraiture that plays like a half-baked editorial cartoon. Contains profanity, including sexual references, some alcohol abuse and brief disturbing war images. DVD Extras: Featurettes; deleted scenes; audio commentary with director Oliver Stone.

Also on DVD Feb. 10: "Against the Dark," "The Boondock Saints (Blu-ray)," "Clint Eastwood: American Icon Collection," "Dragon Ball Z: Season 8," "Lodger," "Melrose Place: Season 5, Volume 1," "My Name Is Bruce," " "Pretty Woman (Blu-ray)," "Raging Bull (Blu-ray)," and "Tim and Eric Awesome Show, Great Job!: Season 2."

Feb. 3

"Madagascar: Escape 2 Africa" (PG, 89 minutes): Visually captivating, this sequel to the 2005 hit about zoo animals on the lam suffers from a plethora of subplots and suggestive humor aimed at viewers in the upper range of its PG-rated demographic. This is, after all, a movie that opens with a shamelessly crowd-pleasing shot of four boogieing animal tushies. Those ample posteriors belong to Alex the lion (Ben Stiller), Marty the zebra (Chris Rock), Melman the giraffe (David Schwimmer) and Gloria the hippo (Jada Pinkett Smith), who are on their way back home to the Central Park Zoo when their plane crashes into the African veld. Regrettably, the film continues the trend of making pop-cultural references aimed at adults. It's all very meta, which probably accounts for why one child was overheard pronouncing the movie "boring." Still, she wouldn't budge until the catchy "I Like to Move It" song had faded. Never underestimate the entertainment value of the boogieing tushie. Contains mild crude humor. DVD Extras: Filmmaker commentary; games.

"Nick & Norah's Infinite Playlist" (PG-13, 90 minutes): This infectious night-in-the-life romantic comedy stars Michael Cera and Kat Dennings as the title characters, high school students who share rarified tastes in music but wildly different temperaments. Nick, the only straight member of a queercore band, still harbors feelings for his pop tart of an ex-girlfriend; Norah, who crosses paths with Nick while they're both looking for a secret show on Manhattan's Lower East Side, can't hide her disdain. As the two make their way through the smiles of a New York night -- contending with a drunken best friend, a skeevy sort-of ex-boyfriend and constant comment from a gay men's Greek chorus -- they bicker, confide, criticize and ultimately find true love. The film possesses an inescapable, winsome appeal: It's an alt.romance, dedicated to the B-side of love. Contains teen drinking, sexuality, profanity and crude behavior. DVD Extras: Digital copy of film; deleted scenes; outtakes; featurettes; multiple commentaries.

"Noah's Arc: Jumping the Broom" (R, 101 minutes): The story takes place over a single wintry weekend on Martha's Vineyard, where a tightly knit group of friends has gathered to celebrate the nuptials of Noah (Darryl Stevens) and Wade (Jensen Atwood). It goes without saying that jealousies, misunderstandings and comic hissy fits -- mostly courtesy of Alex (Rodney Chester), the group's ad hoc wedding planner and an over-the-top treat -- will ensue. And that all loose ends will be tidily tied up into a big romantic bow by the closing credits. But before then, many a conversation will be had over food, wine and the requisite hot tub about love, freedom, commitment, relationships (both sexual and non) and fidelity. At times, it isn't quite clear whom exactly this film is geared to. While much of the naughty humor is clearly tailored to fans of the gay series, the film frequently sinks to a kind of humorless preachiness. Contains crude language, partial nudity and sexual references. DVD Extras: Featurettes; cast photo shoot; deleted scenes.

"The Secret Life of Bees" (PG-13, 110 minutes): Against the backdrop of the civil rights struggle in mid-1960s South Carolina, this anachronistic tale of female empowerment, redemption and racial tolerance is a tale of the Old South, seen through the lens of today's social consciousness. Lily (Dakota Fanning) has run away from her abusive father (Paul Bettany) with household servant Rosaleen (Jennifer Hudson), a fugitive from a bigot who has threatened to kill Rosaleen for sassing him while trying to register to vote. What a pair they make, traveling through the deep South at the height of black-white tension. Soon, Lily and Rosaleen hit Tiburon, the magical town Lily has chosen to escape to. Once there, they are taken in by August Boatwright (Queen Latifah), a kindly earth mother and honey magnate who lives with her sisters June (Alicia Keys) and May (Sophie Okonedo) in a Pepto-Bismol-colored house. Through it all, Fanning more than keeps up with the big girls. Contains brief, crude language, some violence and disturbing thematic elements. DVD Extras: Director's extended cut featuring never-before-seen footage; deleted scenes; multiple commentaries.

"Zack and Miri Make a Porno" (R, 102 minutes): You'll look at this story of a bone-cold winter in Pittsburgh, where a schlub named Zack (Seth Rogen) has a lifelong babe of a friend and roommate named Miri (Elizabeth Banks) and wonder why this nice girl isn't somewhere else. Times are hard, and the electricity gets cut off at home. So Miri agrees to have sex on tape with Zack, a coffee-shop clerk, to gin up some cash. It won't take much to recognize that Rogen is reprising his standard role: a nonthreatening loser with a good heart. He's after sex, but not without some sense that love might actually exist and be worthwhile. Despite the crude humor, standard plot and one gross-out scene, you will laugh out loud more than you should have, perhaps because everyone on screen seems to be having so much fun and because the movie wants its couple to find each other. Contains strong, crude sexual content, including dialogue, graphic nudity and pervasive language. DVD Extras: Full length documentary; deleted scenes; promo videos; blooper reel.

Also on DVD Feb. 3: "Bottle Shock," "Yentl (Two-Disc Directors Cut)," "Oliver and Company (20th Anniv. Edition)," "Friday the 13th - Part 3-D," "Natalie Wood Collection," "Columbo: Mystery Movie Collection 1990," "Rent: Filmed Live on Broadway," "Mystery Science Theater 3000," "Diary Of A Tired Black Man," "Everybody Wants to Be Italian," "Hounddog," "Space Buddies."

Jan. 27

"Lakeview Terrace" (PG-13, 110 minutes): The perky interracial couple at the heart of the movie, Chris and Lisa Mattson (Patrick Wilson and Kerry Washington) don't generate sparks of their own. But saving the party is their flame-throwing cop next door, Abel Turner (Samuel L. Jackson). It's your standard-issue tale of an eccentric neighbor who gets weird, menacing, scary and then downright nasty. The twist here is that the ever-so-reasonable couple being picked on is a white husband and a black wife. Their tormentor is not a white racist, but an angry black man. Chris is a grocery store executive of some sort who went to school at Berkeley. Lisa is from Oakland, a daddy's girl, privileged and pouty. Chris, shockingly, is intimidated by the big black guy next door. It isn't a bad popcorn movie, but its cardboard-cutout romance is not nearly as fresh as it thinks it is. Contains intense thematic material, violence, sexuality, language and drug references.

" Pride and Glory" (R, 125 minutes): Edward Norton plays a New York police officer named Ray Tierney, who is asked to investigate a possible case of internal corruption and begins to butt heads with his brother Frank (Noah Emmerich) and brother-in-law Jimmy (Colin Farrell). The film, directed by Gavin O'Connor, riffs on every thin-blue-line tale of loyalty and betrayal ever made, most recently James Gray's "We Own the Night." But it also throws in some melodramatic chestnuts, from alcoholism to divorce to cancer. The film reaches for a tone of grim realism, but viewers won't believe a word of it; the pulp is too highly pitched, the emotions too hysterical and, finally, the entire enterprise, which supposedly celebrates honor in a cynical world, succumbs to rank cynicism itself. To wit: There's a special circle of hell with the filmmakers' names on it for a scene involving Farrell, a baby and an ironing board. Contains strong violence, pervasive profanity and brief drug content. DVD Extras: Featurettes.

"The Rocker" (PG-13, 102 minutes): Rainn Wilson plays Robert "Fish" Fishman, a drummer fired by the group Vesuvius when a music exec decides his own wannabe son is a better skins-pounder. Vesuvius goes on to greatness, and Fish goes on to bitter nothingness. The disappointed Fish, with all his options spent, takes up residence in his sister's attic in working-class Cleveland, where he can see the lights of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame through the dormer. He's asked to sub as drummer in a garage band on prom night -- he's 20 years older than his bandmates, and don't you just know it, they turn out to have a great sound. But the big flaw is the miscasting of Wilson; the kids he bosses around here never give him much of a fight. And basically that's the movie right there: Its whole trick is Wilson vs. the kids, and it just doesn't work. You can't even call it bad; it's just negligible. Contains drug and sexual references, nudity and profanity. DVD Extras: Digital copy for portable media players, commentary by director and cast, deleted scenes, gag reel, featurettes; also available on Blu-ray.

" RocknRolla" (R, 114 minutes): Guy Ritchie's latest effort is as hyperkinetic as it is hyperverbal; funny, violent and fixated on the kind of imaginary underworld in which a junkie rock star (Toby Kebbell) waxes poetic about the meaning of life as encapsulated in a pack of cigarettes. It's all about the allure of glamour and beauty on the outside; death and decay on the inside. That pretty much sums up the movie, too. Mostly, it centers on a deal between Lenny (Tom Wilkinson) and Russian mobster/developer Uri (Karel Rodin). Uri owes Lenny 7 million euros to grease the wheels of commerce and zoning. In exchange, Lenny gets to borrow Uri's "lucky painting," a canvas we never see but which changes hands so many times I lost track. You'll recognize Thandie Newton, Jeremy Piven and Ludacris , but it's the actors you have never heard of who lend this stylish criminal enterprise what little substance it possesses. Contains obscenity, violence, drug use and sex. DVD Extras: Director's commentary.

"Vicky Cristina Barcelona" (PG-13, 96 minutes): Life is still meaningless, but this time we get the message from the luscious lips and half-mast eyes of Spain's two best (and best-looking) actors, Javier Bardem and Penélope Cruz, who play Juan Antonio and Maria Elena, two divorced painters who have driven each other to attempted homicide. Their explosive relationship is reignited by Scarlett Johansson, who enters their lives as Cristina, an American spending her summer in Barcelona. When Juan Antonio invites two women to a weekend outside of Barcelona, Vicky (Rebecca Hall) balks at the stranger's boldness. Cristina is smitten by it. Both friends are charmed and fall for him. Maria Elena fractures the narrative hypotenuse of the love triangle. Through elegantly drawn characters and fine performances, the film gets at a big philosophical theme without worrying about punch lines or wringing hands. Contains adult content, sexuality and smoking.

Also on DVD Jan. 27: "Cheers: The Final Season"; "E.R.: The Complete Tenth Season"; "The Girls Next Door: Season Four"; "Goodbye, Mr. Chips"; "Open Season 2"; "Sidney Poitier Collection"; and "You're a Good Sport, Charlie Brown."

Jan. 20

" The Children of Huang Shi" (R, 114 minutes): Fact, in the movies, is a lot like a license. It allows a director like Roger Spottiswoode, whose film is based on the real-life adventures of George Hogg, to forgo a lot of rudimentary construction of character to get to the nut of the story: Hogg's arrival as a reporter in 1937 Nanjing, his narrow escape from the invasionary Japanese and his eventual journey to the edges of the Gobi desert, where he set up a school after dragging 60 Chinese orphans over a treacherous mountain range. Jonathan Rhys Meyers, who plays Hogg, has never quite found the right role for his arresting good looks and what seems to be a simmering crockpot of pathos waiting to be loosed from his soul. This isn't it. Really, though, the best thing about the film is the cinematography by Zhao Xiaoding, which is so distracting because it so out-classes the rest of the movie. Contains violence. DVD Extras: Featurettes.

" City of Ember" (PG, 95 minutes): The seemingly doomed city of Ember was built to last 200 years, and it's year 241. It's run by a mayor (Bill Murray) who is corrupt and not very bright. Doon Harrow (Harry Treadaway), the only son of an eccentric inventor (Tim Robbins), and Lina Mayfleet (Saoirse Ronan) want to save the city. Lina discovers a mysterious box left behind by the Builders, the almost mythical ancestors who exist now only in portraits. The box has a map and "Instructions for Egress," which starts to sound like a great idea when they discover what's hidden in Room 351, but it becomes clear the mayor doesn't really want anyone to egress anywhere. Doon and Lina will have to save themselves to save their city. There are adults they can trust and those they can't, and scary things in the dark that aren't just shadows. It's not an entirely convincing trip, but it is the sort of satisfying movie you wish they would make more often. Contains mild peril.

" Henry Poole Is Here" (PG, 100 minutes): Can't a man drink himself to death in lonely isolation anymore? Apparently not, if you're Henry Poole and you move into a neighborhood filled with mystical busybodies and trespassing do-gooders. Starring Luke Wilson as the title character, the film might have cleaved to its opening gambit and followed the course of an irascible drunk coaxed on the wagon by wacky neighbors. But alas, the film tries to do more and does it badly. You can't watch the film without suspecting that some minority of the creative team held out for "quirky, funny, smart" while the majority steamrolled forward with "irascible drunk with wacky neighbors." Neither side won, and nobody stepped in to erase signs of the stalemate, which results in very odd shifts of tone. The film takes a few surprise turns on this cruel journey. But a few smart turns in a forest of stupid doesn't make a film smart. Contains adult themes and some strong language. DVD Extras: Featurettes; filmmakers' commentary, music videos; also available on Blu-ray.

" Igor" (PG, 86 minutes): Attempting to do with horror stereotypes and cliches what "Shrek" did with fairy tales, the film has clever moments but doesn't come close to the polished animation, wit and originality of the big green guy. In the realm of Malaria, every mad scientist has his Igor, whose job description is limited to lisping "Yes, Master." But one Igor (voice of John Cusack) dreams of bettering his station by designing his own evil inventions. When his boss falls victim to an experiment gone awry, Igor creates the ultimate monster, a huge robot for Malaria's upcoming Evil Science Fair. The sarcastic humor will probably go over the heads of the youngest viewers. Contains mild violence and scary images. DVD Extras: Deleted scenes, bloopers, featurettes; also available on Blu-ray.

Also on DVD Jan. 20: "The Adventures of Walter and Ping Ping"; Boogeyman 3"; "Center Stage: Turn it Up"; "Chris Rock: Kill the Messenger"; Cold Prey"; "George Wallace"; "Jonathon Creek: Season 3"; "MI-5: Vol. 6"; "Moonlight: The Complete Series"; "The Powerpuff Girls: 10th Anniversary Collection: The Complete Series"; "The Rockford Files: Season Six"; and "Vacancy 2: The First Cut."

Jan. 13

" Appaloosa" (R, 114 minutes): It's unashamedly old-school, but an off-beat, literate sense of humor keeps the film from becoming too weighty or self-absorbed. The premise is familiar: Freelance lawmen Virgil Cole (Ed Harris) and Everett Hitch (Viggo Mortensen) go to the little town of Appaloosa in the New Mexico Territory in 1882 in search of work. Bad guy Randall Bragg (Jeremy Irons) has just murdered the sheriff and two of his deputies. The frightened townspeople want things set right. After swift negotiations over the scope of their duties, Cole and Hitch take the job and go after Bragg's gang. Enter the widow Mrs. French (Renée Zellweger), who attracts both men. No one needs to be a serious student of westerns or of buddy films to predict where the story is going. Harris and Mortensen may not have the combined star power to push the film to the level of popularity of last year's "3:10 to Yuma," but the film is every bit as enjoyable, and, for traditionalists, more measured. Contains violence, strong language and brief nudity.

" Brick Lane" (PG-13, 100 minutes): Set in the Bangladeshi immigrant community of London's East End known as Banglatown, the film is the story of Nazneen (Tannishtha Chatterjee), a young woman who seeks refuge from an unhappy arranged marriage in the arms of Karim (Christopher Simpson), a man much younger and hunkier than her portly middle-aged husband Chanu (Satish Kaushik). But this is ultimately Nazneen's story, not his. Karim is little more than a catalyst for changes that will take place within Nazneen's heart. What's more, her marriage to Chanu turns out not to be the loveless prison the movie initially leads us to believe it is. Things are more complicated than that, much to the film's credit. No, its message isn't that everyone gets a second crack at true love. Rather, it's this: Your happiness isn't something you look for in others, but in yourself. Contains a couple of scenes of nongraphic lovemaking and a rude word or two. DVD Extras: Featurettes, filmmakers' commentary.

" Swing Vote" (PG-13, 119 minutes): Kevin Costner, you thought, what have you wrought upon us now? In the film, one guy decides the outcome of a presidential election. He doesn't know or care about politics, but the candidates stoop to new lows to court him. Bud, oblivious and unshaven, laughs merrily through it all. The movie asks its audience to suspend disbelief on one thing: its entire premise. Bud, so used to being a nobody, gets caught up in the attention paid to him by the two candidates, Democrat Donald Greenleaf (an unmemorable Dennis Hopper) and Republican President Andrew Boone (Kelsey Grammer, who still can't manage to be funny without being neurotic). Though it manages to avoid the one-liners and cheap gags that political comedies of the past have relied on, Costner still lays it on thick, flailing and grunting in his role as a dumb, drunk redneck. Oh, and the ending bites. Contains strong language.

" Tyler Perry's The Family That Preys" (PG-13, 111 minutes): Charlotte Cartwright (Kathy Bates), a construction-company magnate, is friends across class and color lines with Alice Pratt (Alfre Woodard), a hardworking cafe owner. They're both single moms and matriarchs at this point, natch, and each have their hands full with their now adult children. Charlotte's only son, William (Cole Hauser), is an ungrateful little snot who expects to be promoted at the company because Mom owns the joint. He's also a husband with a wandering eye who offers a "position" to the ambitious (and hot!) Andrea Pratt (Sanaa Lathan), Alice's daughter. Problem is, Andrea's married to the good-hearted but not so bright Chris (Rockmond Dunbar), who works construction on the Big Man's site and dreams of setting up his own little company. Woodard imbues Alice with such heart, warmth and genuine affection that it is likely you will leave the theater remembering her smile, which is a lovely thing. Contains thematic material, sexual references and brief violence.

Also on DVD Jan. 13: "Balls Out: Gary the Tennis Coach"; "Ben 10 Alien Force: Season One, Vol. 2"; "Dallas: The Complete Tenth Season"; "Fireman Sam: Saves the Day"; "Hit and Run (aka Bumper)"; "The Last Enemy"; "Little Britain, U.S.A."; "Lovejoy: The Complete Season Four"; "Reba: Season 5"; "Saxondale: Seasons One and Two"; Skins: Vol. 1"; "'Til Death: The Complete Second Season"; "Underworld/Underworld: Evolution Double Feature"; "Walker, Texas Ranger: The Complete Sixth Season"; and "Without a Paddle: Nature's Calling."

Jan. 6

" Babylon A.D." (PG-13, 90 minutes): Somewhere in this mess is a thriller, but it got lost in the translation from a French novel. The film is in English, but not in any coherent way. Vin Diesel stars as a mercenary named Toorop in this futuristic yarn spun in a war-ravaged world. He lives in Russia, having lost his U.S. citizenship. He's offered big money by a gangster (Gérard Depardieu) to transport a young woman named Aurora (Mélanie Thierry) and her guardian (Michelle Yeoh) from a convent in Central Asia to New York. Aurora is a spiritual prodigy for a new religion. They are pursued by forces who try to kill them or abduct Aurora. There are a number of impressive visuals, and Diesel, as usual, is fun to watch, but the film is a train wreck. Contains violence, profanity and sexuality. DVD Extras: Featurettes and still gallery; also available, with more extras, on Blu-ray.

" Bangkok Dangerous" (R, 100 minutes): Nicolas Cage, with weird hair and eyeliner, plays a loner hit man in this remake of the 1999 Thai film of the same title, again directed by the Pang brothers. The hit man tells us in an early voice-over that he prides himself on having no personal life. Uh-oh. In Bangkok to do hits for a local mob boss, he hires a 20-something pickpocket (Shahkrit Yamnarm) to do errands and lets himself grow fond of the guy. Next, he falls in love with a deaf cashier (Charlie Young) at a pharmacy. This lowering of defenses brings trouble. With minimalist dialogue and sharp action sequences, the movie holds our interest, but its heavily noirish style risks self-parody. Contains violence, language and sexuality.

" Disaster Movie" (PG-13, 90 minutes): This is the latest juvenile attempt by writer-directors Jason Friedberg and Aaron Seltzer to milk laughs out of the formulas used in their "Scary Movie," "Date Movie" and "Epic Movie." The thread that tries to bind together all of the short comedy ideas has all-American Will (Matt Lanter) trying to get to his girlfriend (Vanessa Minnillo) when the end of the world starts. He's joined on his quest by Calvin (G. Thang), who has less acting abilities than a coma patient. Why would anyone pay to see material they have been able to watch for free for years? A built-in audience exists for this franchise. This is a movie for anyone who gets the giggles from watching Amy Winehouse burp repeatedly or breaks into laughter when seeing a singing chipmunk bite a man's crotch. Contains crude and sexual content, profanity, drug references and comic violence.

" The Grocer's Son " (Unrated, 96 minutes): When his father is hospitalized after a heart attack, Antoine Sforza (Nicolas Cazalé) reluctantly agrees to return to Provence to help his mother run the family business. Antoine left for Paris 10 years before under angry, difficult circumstances, and the family wounds haven't healed. More to the point, his neighbor Claire (Clotilde Hesme) needs a quiet place to study for her college entrance exams. She's 26 and worries that she's too old to go back to school. While his mother minds their small grocery store and Claire hits the books, Antoine drives a delivery truck on regular rounds to the elderly residents of the surrounding countryside. The film flows along at a languid summer pace. At times the beautiful bucolic landscapes are too bucolic, but those are relatively minor flaws in a f ilm that sticks close to its characters and plays fair with them throughout. Contains strong language, fleeting nudity and mature situations. In French with English subtitles.

" Pineapple Express" (R, 113 minutes): One-man comedy juggernaut Judd Apatow's latest production stars co-writer Seth Rogen as loser Dale Denton, a process-server with a girlfriend who's still in high school and a lifestyle that revolves around two things: getting wasted and staying wasted. When Dale witnesses a brutal crime, he runs straight to his dealer, Saul (James Franco), and soon the two are on the lam from corrupt police, a coldblooded drug kingpin and members of a ruthless Asian gang. Franco delivers a funny, sweet, thoroughly disarming performance as a naive Peter Pan of a dealer who might have been invented by Voltaire. Supporting player Danny R. McBride gives as good as he gets in a sidesplitting fight scene. By the bloody, hyper-violent finale, though, the film has gone the way of so many movies this summer: the sadistic Grand Guignol. Contains pervasive profanity, drug use, sexual references and violence. DVD Extras: Extended and alternate scenes, gag reel, featurettes, director's and actor's commentary; also available, with more extras, in a two-disc set and on Blu-ray.

" Righteous Kill" (R, 100 minutes): What director Jon Avnet wants to get at is what all good veteran-cop movies get at: the acidic erosion of a good man's soul from long years of dealing with malice and murder and unpunished cruelty. When Turk (Robert De Niro) and Rooster (Al Pacino) investigate the brutal murder of a young girl by a thug who skates on the indictment because of false testimony, Turk, a simmering pot of hostility, plants a gun on the child killer and sends him away to someplace cheerful like Attica. Doing the wrong thing for the right reason: your standard moral complication. But now a vigilante serial killer is ramping justice up a notch. Someone is out there blowing away the scumbag pimps, the smirking rapists and the child molesters who are eluding prosecution. There has to be a twist in these kinds of things, and there is, although this one is not particularly twisted. Contains violence, pervasive language, some sexuality and brief drug use. DVD Extras: Featurettes, filmmaker's commentary; also available on Blu-ray.

" The Wackness" (R, 95 minutes): It's the summer of 1994 in Manhattan, and recent high school graduate and weed man Luke Shapiro (Josh Peck) is approaching the season with anxiety. His constantly fighting parents are teetering on the brink of financial ruin; Stephanie (Olivia Thirlby), the girl he's crushing on, barely knows he exists; and his only confidant is drug-addled psychiatrist Dr. Squires (Ben Kingsley), who happens to be Stephanie's stepfather -- and Luke's best client. Levine does a good job setting up the atmosphere in New York at the dawn of Giuliani Time, thanks especially to a soundtrack dominated by such hip-hop godfathers as Nas and Notorious B.I.G. He doesn't do quite as effective a job with his characters, who never quite manage to earn our sympathies. The dopest thing about "The Wackness" is Thirlby, who, after supporting turns in "Juno" and "Snow Angels," is quickly becoming reason enough to see any film she's in. Contains pervasive drug use, profanity and some sexuality. DVD Extras: Deleted scenes, featurettes, filmmaker's commentary; also available on Blu-ray.

Also on DVD Jan. 6: "Barney: Once Upon a Dino Tale"; "Battlestar Galactica: Season 4.0"; "Behind Enemy Lines: Columbia"; "Bob the Builder: Race to the Finish"; "Doctor Who: The War Machines"; "Dogtown: New Beginnings"; "The Films of Michael Powell"; "Frisky Dingo"; "The Plot to Kill Hitler"; "Tripping the Rift: The Complete Third Season"; "The Waltons: The Complete Eighth Season."

Dec. 27

" The Duchess" (PG-13, 110 minutes): Directed by Saul Dibb, the film shows that if Dibb knows nothing else, he knows what he's got in star Keira Knightley. She's a beautiful, heroic and engaging Georgiana, the soon-to-be wife of the fairly abominable Duke of Devonshire (Ralph Fiennes), who wants nothing more than a son to carry on his name. Her naivete is painful, even more so in retrospect, after the Duke proves himself a brute. Everyone loves Georgiana, or will, except maybe women who are pregnant, or have been: By the end of the film she has given birth to four children, and she still looks like Keira Knightley. Contains sexual content, fleeting nudity. DVD Extras: Featurettes; also available on Blu-ray.

" Eagle Eye" (PG-13, 118 minutes): We used to have bad guys to play the menacing "them" in the paranoid conspiracy thriller. Nazis. Reds. Rogue CIA operatives. Pod people. Corporate goons. Now we have technology. The hapless target of this espionage is Jerry Shaw (Shia LaBeouf), the slacker twin brother of a talented military officer and the prodigal son of a well-to-do family. Shortly after his wunderkind brother dies in a car wreck, Jerry finds his bank account suddenly filled with $750,000. His cell rings, and a disembodied female voice tells him the FBI is going to kick in the door in a few seconds. In New York, divorced mom Rachel Holloman (Michelle Monaghan) gets the same call. Director D.J. Caruso works hard to twist the paranoid-conspiracy-thriller motif. He brings in Billy Bob Thornton and Rosario Dawson as investigators who rely on good old human smarts to figure out what the heck is going on in the cyber-chase. Contains intense action, violence and language. DVD Extras: Deleted scenes, featurette; also available, with more extras, on a two-disc Special Edition and on Blu-ray.

" Ghost Town" (PG-13, 103 minutes): British comic genius Ricky Gervais plays Bertram Pincus, a misanthropic dentist who develops the ability to see dead people. One of the first ghosts he encounters is Frank (Greg Kinnear), who along with a squad of spirits needs Pincus to finish some of his earthly business. The deal: Frank will call off the rest of the otherworldly supplicants if Pincus successfully stops Frank's widow, Gwen (Téa Leoni), from remarrying. Often resembling a "Sixth Sense" with humor, Pincus embarks on a journey of self-discovery, with Gervais channeling the same clueless self-absorption that made his BBC shows "The Office" and "Extras" such hits. But the best part of the movie is watching Gervais and Leoni delight in each other in scenes that burst with spontaneity and genuine warmth. Contains strong profanity, sexual humor and drug references. DVD Extras: Featurettes, director's commentary; also available on Blu-ray.

Also on DVD Dec. 27: "Baghead."

Dec. 30

" Surfer, Dude" (R, 88 minutes): There are those (cynics! half-wits!) who will say that the whole point of "Surfer, Dude," is not the artistic expression of the wave-riding ethos, but only a crude marketing vehicle for Matthew McConaughey's shirtless chest. But no, no, the creative merit of this film is profound and obvious: Willie Nelson as a pot-smoking goat farmer. Willie keeps his shirt on, thank heavens, which is about the only mercy you'll get until the lights come up. The plot: Shirtless Steve is cruising the globe for left-breaking curls, only to find that his sponsors have sold out to the evil Eddie Zarno (Jeffrey Nordling), a surfer dude gone corporate. Zarno wants Steve to star in a sleazy reality television show with other surfers, as well as have him ride cyber waves for a video game. Poverty is the other option. Steve's ganja-blowing manager (Woody Harrelson) is all for the deal, but a cute East Coast television exec (Alexie Gilmore) thinks Steve is right to blow it all off, brah. Director S.R. Bindler had a documentary cult fave with "Hands on a Hardbody," featuring a contest to win a pickup, about a decade ago, but there's none of that magic here. You can stick around for the only funny line, which involves a breakfast burrito, but the smart surfer would head for the hills and Willie's goat ranch. Contains pervasive drug use, strong language and nudity.

" Towelhead" (R, 124 minutes): Alan Ball's smart but visually troubling adaptation of Alicia Erian's 2005 novel of the same name portrays a young Lebanese American girl growing up in a soulless Houston suburb. A little goes a long way in portraying a 13-year-old's physical awakening, particularly when much of it has to do with Mr. Vuoso (Aaron Eckhart), a married Army reservist next door who at one point asks her to strip for him. Such is life for Jesira (newcomer Summer Bishil), who is sent to live with her dad after her mother blames her for a twisted escapade that involves her mother's boyfriend shaving Jesira's just-developing body hair. Dad is Rifat Maroun (Peter Macdissi), a NASA engineer so tightly wound he wears a tie around the house. But the story is that we're watching a child be exploited, ignored or abused. It's jarring, which might be the best single word for this dark little foray into teen sex in the suburbs. Contains strong disturbing sexual content and abuse involving a young teen, and language.

Also on DVD Dec. 30: "An American Carol"; "Dona Flor and Her Two Husbands"; "42 Ways to Kill Hitler"; "Nip/Tuck: The Complete Fifth Season"; "Nip/Tuck: Season Five, Part 1"; "Surfer Dude"; "10 Items or Less: The Complete First and Second Seasons"; "The Tudors: Season Two"; and "Woman on the Beach."

Dec. 21

" Burn After Reading" (R, 96 minutes): CIA analyst Osborne Cox (John Malkovich) is told that he is being demoted and transferred, in part because he has a drinking problem. Outraged, he quits, retreats to his posh Georgetown rowhouse to have a drink and tell his wife (Tilda Swinton), who is throwing a party for Sandy and Harry Pfarrer (Elizabeth Marvel and George Clooney). Harry is having an affair with Mrs. Cox. Osborne, a yacht-owning Princeton alum who's convinced he's the smartest guy in town, reacts to his career crisis by dictating his memoirs. These wind up at Hardbodies Gym and in the hands of dense personal trainer Chad Feldheimer (Brad Pitt) and his upbeat colleague Linda Litzke (Frances McDormand), who demand a little from Cox for the return of his classified material. Oh, the high-octane cast works hard. But there's nothing to suggest anybody off camera tried that hard, which is fatal to a Coen brothers outing. Contains pervasive language, sexual content and violence. DVD Extras: Featurettes; also available in widescreen and on Blu-Ray, which has extra BD live scene sharing featurette.

" Death Race" (R, 89 minutes): It might not be possible to make a film with less plot and more action without catalyzing some drastic change in the whole form, like adding that disastrous last dollop of butter to a delicate French sauce. If a movie could drag its knuckles on the ground, this one would leave eight little tracks in the sand. The film, starring Jason Statham as an ex-con, is supposedly based on the 1975 cult favorite "Death Race 2000," which involved a savage cross-country road rally in heavily armored cars. Although some critics detected elements of satire and political commentary in the original, all of that has been successfully eliminated from the current model. It isn't so much a movie as a superheated, highly conductive miracle substance for the pure transmission of masculine aggression and misogyny. Contains strong violence and language. DVD Extras: Featurettes, director's commentary.

" Hamlet 2" (R, 92 minutes): This dazzling little comedy seems, at first glance, to be having a lot of fun with the stock figures of the high school musical and inspirational teacher flicks. But Noah Sapperstein, a diminutive, ninth-grade drama critic played by Shea Pepe, quotes the French literary critic Roland Barthes and all but begs you to take the film seriously as social commentary. Sapperstein's devastating reviews target Dana Marschz (Steve Coogan), a hapless man-child and talentless actor spinning out the tail end of his high school drama fantasies into incipient middle age. He will save the drama program, save his own job and expand minds by staging a grand musical extravaganza: an acid-trip version of "Hamlet." Marschz's musical is a lot of self-indulgent piffle, and that's the point: Something is rotten in the Denmark of arts education, and it may well be bad art. Contains language including sexual references, nudity and drug content. DVD Extras: Featurettes, commentary, deleted scenes; also available on Blu-ray.

" The Women" (PG-13, 114 minutes): This remake of George Cukor's sparkling 1939 all-female comedy set in New York City falls flat at every turn. Given its cast, which includes Meg Ryan, Annette Bening, Eva Mendes, Cloris Leachman and Bette Midler, this is nothing short of amazing. Ryan plays Mary Haines, the girl next door living in blissful ignorance of her husband's infidelity. Bening stars as Mary's best friend, Sylvia Fowler, Rosalind Russell's role in Cukor's film. Bening has been given the broadest, sitcom laugh lines. But she doesn't go for laughs. She wants to be loved. Surprisingly, it is Candice Bergen, as Mary's mother, who brings depth and humanity to the film. In the end, director Diane English just wants to make a nice chick flick with some sassy lines. Genuine nastiness has been eliminated, while not-very-funny banter is retained. Contains sex-related material and drug use. DVD Extras: Deleted scenes, featurettes; also available on Blu-ray.

Also on DVD Dec. 21: "Crime 360: The Complete Season One"; "The Elder Son"; "Emergency!: Season Five"; "Gangland: The Complete Season Two"; "Goldilocks & The Three Bears"; "Ice Road Truckers: The Complete Season Two"; "Jurassic Fight Club: The Complete Season One"; "The Little Mermaid II: Return to the Sea, Special Edition"; "Mr. Bean: The Ultimate Collection"; "Old School: Blu-ray"; "Petticoat Junction: Official Season One"; "Poor Little Rich Girl"; "Same Old Song"; "Swingtown: Season One"; "The Wedding Director"; and "Will Shakespeare."

Dec. 16

" Mamma Mia!" (PG-13, 103 minutes): The brassy, bawdy musical presents itself as a piece of clever counter-programming to this summer's surfeit of pounding, effects-driven comic-book movies. But filmgoers eager to sample its sunny, synth-pop pleasures are likely to feel just as bludgeoned: in this case by an Abba-bomb wrapped in a huge turquoise-colored feather boa. That's not to say that fun isn't to be had; Meryl Streep plays Donna Sheridan, mother of Sophie (Amanda Seyfried), who is about to get married. Sophie has invited three men to the wedding who might be her biological father: Bill Anderson (Stellan Skarsgard), Sam Carmichael (Pierce Brosnan) and Harry Bright (Colin Firth). Streep is a wonderment, belting her way to another winning performance. But those rare moments seem completely at odds with the film's worship of all things synthetic. Contains sex-related comments. DVD Extras: Featurettes, deleted scenes, audio commentary; also available, with more extras, in wide- and full-screen version, a 2-disc special edition, and on Blu-ray.

" The Mummy: The Tomb of the Dragon Emperor" (PG-13, 113 minutes): Tiresome and messy, director Rob Cohen waters the film down to globs of plot, strung between shapeless action sequences and humorless repartee. Archaeologist/tomb-raider Rick O'Connell (Brendan Fraser) and his adventurer-writer wife, Evelyn (Maria Bello), live in bored retirement in 1946 England. They're thrilled when the government asks them to deliver a priceless gem to a Shanghai museum. Meanwhile, their son, Alex (Luke Ford), has dropped out of college and gone on a dig in China, discovering the emperor's mummy encased in a huge terra cotta sculpture. We learn in a long prologue that it was a sorceress (Michelle Yeoh) who put the emperor and his men under a spell. The family reunites and squabbles in Shanghai, and, of course, the emperor reanimates, shape-shifts and leads them on a chase from Shanghai to Shangri-La. Whatever. The prologue was the best part. Contains violence. DVD Extras: Director's commentary, deleted scenes, featurettes; also available on Blu-ray and as a 2-disc deluxe edition.

" Traitor" (PG-13, 114 minutes): Once again there are terrorists in our midst, and once again they are Muslims, hiding in sleeper cells, waiting to cause mayhem. Heroic action is needed. To save us from the terrorists? More pressing, to save us from such films as this longwinded thriller, starring Don Cheadle as a conflicted Muslim who is either an undercover U.S. operative, a ruthless killer or both. Cheadle stars as former U.S. Special Operations officer Samir Horn, who has infiltrated the world of Islamic terror so well that the FBI is unaware that he is (probably) working for the United States. Lead agents Roy Clayton (Guy Pearce) and Max Archer (Neal McDonough) chase Horn around the world, engaging in contrived discussions about terrorism and Islam. Is there an A for effort in terrorism films? Hardly. Contains intense violent sequences, thematic material and brief language. DVD Extras: Director's commentary, featurettes; also available on Blu-ray.

Also on DVD Dec. 16: "Crime 360: The Complete Season One"; "The Elder Son"; "Emergency!: Season Five"; "Gangland: The Complete Season Two"; "Generation Kill"; "The House Bunny"; "Ice Road Truckers: The Complete Season Two"; "Jurassic Fight Club: The Complete Season One"; "The Little Mermaid II: Return to the Sea, Special Edition"; "Mr. Bean: The Ultimate Collection"; "Old School: Blu-Ray"; "Petticoat Junction: Official Season One"; "Poor Little Rich Girl"; "Same Old Song"; "Swingtown: Season One"; and "Will Shakespeare."

Dec. 9

" The Dark Knight" (PG-13, 152 minutes): Heath Ledger's performance is a subtle, nuanced piece of acting so powerful it banishes all memories of the handsome Aussie behind it. He's supple of body and expressive with only his eyes, and his voice has undulations of irony and mockery and psychopathology. But when the Joker is absent, the film loses most of its energy and becomes nothing but a pretty-boy face-off between Christian Bale (Batman) and Aaron Eckhart. Maggie Gyllenhaal as Batman's lost heart, Rebecca Dawes, is perhaps too ironic for the Batman world; with those perpetually knowing eyes suggesting that she always gets it, she doesn't really fit. The effects and stunts are first-rate, although for big bangs, the opening bank robbery is probably the most powerfully done. Though Batty and Laugher do go at it, the big fight is not nearly as mythic as it should have been, giving the movie an ending that feels more anti- than climactic. Contains violence. DVD Extras: available Blu-ray and 2-disc Blu-ray limited edition with featurettes, director's commentary, IMAX scenes and other extras.

" Dr. Seuss' Horton Hears a Who!" (G, 88 minutes): A computer-animated feature that strikes an amiable balance between honoring the text and the dictates of contemporary animation, the film is as good as one could hope for in this era of post-literate impatience. It does honor the book's flavor and spirit with a bright, funny treatment. Voice performers Jim Carrey (as Horton) and Steve Carell (the Mayor) play their roles just right, without making the movie about them. In the McCarthy era in which the book was written, people saw pointed commentary in its depiction of the fascistic qualities in the people of Who-ville (who refuse to believe there is a world beyond the mini speck of dust on which they live). In a subtle but effective way, the movie sounds a central message: We shouldn't be tone deaf to other people's realities. All in all, it's a sweet, guileless experience for young viewers and even their adult chaperons. Contains nothing objectionable except one mild profanity. DVD Extras: Directors'/producer commentary, actors' commentary, featurettes, "Surviving Sid" animated short; also available, with more extras, on 2-disc special edition gift set, limited edition gift set, and on Blu-ray.

" Man on Wire" (PG-13, 94 minutes): This documentary opens with a grainy black-and-white reenactment of the events of Aug. 7, 1974, when French high-wire artist Philippe Petit and a group of friends famously pulled off a coup at the newly built World Trade Center. The participants narrate what's happening on-screen, and the story takes on the taut urgency of a thriller. Then suddenly, the film inserts a jarring color shot of Ground Zero. But wait: It's a photo of the construction zone from 1966, when building on the two towers began. Thus does the film work its singular form of revisionism, in an era whose iconic imagery is of the towers coming down, in presenting the radical image of the towers going up. "Man on Wire" tells a gripping, affecting story but also a deeply cathartic one, as a place of loss and grief is transformed, briefly, into a place of transcendence and lyricism. Contains sexuality, nudity and drug references. DVD Extras: Interview with Philippe Peiti.

Also on DVD Dec. 9: "A Hole in a Fence"; "Anamorph"; "Another Gay Sequel: Uncut Theatrical Version"; "Blue Blood (aka If I Didn't Care)"; "Change My Life"; "Deadwood: Complete Series"; "Dona Flor and Her Two Husbands"; "Dragon Ball GT: Season One"; "Dumb and Dumber: Blu-Ray"; "Elephant Tales"; "Europa: Criterion Collection"; "Happy Days: The Fourth Season"; "I Am Legend: Ultimate Collector's Edition"; "Jet Li's Fearless"; "Lost: The Complete Fourth Season"; "The Mask: Blu-Ray"; "McLeod's Daughters: The Complete Seventh Season"; "Murnau, Borzage and Fox"; "Peter and the Wolf: Animated"; "The Philadelphia Phillies 2008 World Series Collector's Edition"; "Sex and the City The Movie: The Wedding Edition"; "The Shuttered Room/It!"; "Three Short Movies by Werner Herzog"; "Total Western"; "Warner Bros. Horror Double Features"; and "The Wire: The Complete Series."

Dec. 2

" The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian" (PG, 137 minutes): Those plucky Pevensie children make an impressive if somewhat repetitive return in this second installment. Wicked King Miraz (Sergio Castellitto) has driven the Narnians of old underground and set out to murder Narnia's rightful ruler, the young and handsome Prince Caspian (Ben Barnes). Once again, the four young crusaders do battle with the forces of evil, and once again they prove that a ragtag team can overcome swords and catapults through the sheer force of goodness. The Pevensies still make for terrific tween protagonists, and Aslan, the majestic mythical lion voiced by Liam Neeson, is still a breathtaking manifestation of the Cat Upstairs. Contains epic battle action and violence. DVD Extras: Also available on Blu-ray and in a three-disc Collector's Edition.

" Fly Me to the Moon" (G, 90 minutes): The first animated movie created specifically for the 3-D format, "Fly" boasts knock-your-socks-off visuals. If only the story lived up to the special effects. Nat, IQ and Scooter (voices of Trevor Gagnon, Philip Daniel Bolden and David Gore) are juvenile houseflies with big dreams, fueled largely by the tall tales of Nat's grandfather (Christopher Lloyd), who rode with Amelia Earhart during her solo transatlantic flight. Boys being boys -- even when they're the size of raisins -- they sneak onto the 1969 spacecraft carrying Neil Armstrong and crew to the moon. Needless to say, something goes wrong. Despite some Cold War humor, the formulaic film is aimed squarely at the youngest of young children. The stakes, like the story, never lift off more than a few feet from the ground. It's too bad, really, when the 3-D technology is actually good enough to make you feel like you've flown to the moon and back. Contains mild bathroom humor. DVD Extras: Featurettes, available in 2D and 3D versions of the movie, the latter comes with two pairs of 3D glasses.

" The Longshots" (PG, 94 minutes): Jasmine Plummer (Keke Palmer) lives in the little town of Minden, Ill., and has no interest in sports. Her father is absent, and so she needs adult supervision when her mother (Tasha Smith) takes on extra hours at the diner. Jasmine's disreputable uncle Curtis (Ice Cube) is enlisted to look after her in the afternoon. When he realizes that she has a natural throwing arm and that the local Pop Warner football team is in desperate need of a quarterback, he pushes her to try out. The rest of the story follows the familiar formula closely but not slavishly. The film works so well because the sports elements are the least important. And in a time when so many movies throw in so much casual profanity, it's heartening to see one where the characters are able to express themselves honestly and forcefully without cursing. That attitude earns the film a solid recommendation for all audiences. Contains mild language and brief rude humor. DVD Extras: Deleted scenes, featurettes; also available on Blu-ray.

" Step Brothers" (R, 93 minutes): Brennan Huff (Will Ferrell) and Dale Doback (John C. Reilly) are capital-L losers who live with their single parents. Brennan, younger son of accomplished businesswoman Nancy Huff (Mary Steenburgen), and Dale, only son of Dr. Robert Doback (the great Richard Jenkins), can hardly get out of bed, and when they do it's only to make a beeline to the couch in front of the TV. Nancy and Robert meet, fall in love and a few weeks later get married. Thus Dale and Brennan meet and immediately hate each other. The movie is produced by Judd Apatow, and it displays some of his comedy trademarks. Chief among these is a reliance on profanity from unusual sources for laughs. The director of the madness is Ferrell's old "Saturday Night Live" buddy Adam McKay, who also guided "Talladega Nights" and "Anchorman" to box office loot. Whatever, it works in spades. Contains crude and sexual content and pervasive profanity. DVD Extras: Cast commentary, featurettes; also available, with more extras, on 1- and 2-disc unrated editions, 2-disc special edition set with both rated/unrated version, and on Blu-ray.

" The X-Files: I Want to Believe"(PG-13, 104 minutes): A taut, well-acted, not very scary, not very hard to figure out serial-killer mystery, the film revolves around the dysfunctional world of former FBI agents Mulder and Scully (David Duchovny and Gillian Anderson). It doesn't have the original show's elaborately embroidered conspiracy theories. Other than a few old-fashioned camera moves, it has no special effects. It doesn't have ghosts, chupacabras , alien honeybees or mysterious helicopters, even though creator-director Chris Carter and co-conspirator Frank Spotnitz do alight upon a new, au courant kind of creepazoid: priests. The paranormal gives way to normal. With simple sanity and a refreshing lack of flash, Mulder and Scully capably lay out the dull evidence: Our big summer movies are part of a plot to trash our minds. I want to believe Mulder and Scully are correct. Violence, some gore, creepiness, adult themes. DVD Extras: Director's commentary, featurettes, theatrical trailers; includes both theatrical and unrated extended cut; also available, with more extras, in a 3-disc 'Ultimate X-Phile' edition, and on Blu-ray.

Also on DVD Dec. 2: "Assault on Precinct 13: Restored Collector's Edition, Blu-Ray"; "Austin Powers Collection: Shagadelic Edition Loaded With Extra Mojo"; "Bam Margera Presents: Where the #$&% is Santa?"; "Cannon: Season One, Vol. 2"; "Casablanca: Ultimate Collector's Edition"; "The Day the Earth Stood Still: Special Edition"; "A Galaxy Far, Far Away: Special Edition"; "Growing Up: 5 DVD Gift Set"; "Hey There, It's Yogi Bear"; "I Claudius & Epic That Never Was: Four Piece Set"; "Jake and the Fat Man: Season One, Vol. 2"; "Law & Order: Season Six"; "Lower Learning"; "The Man Called Flinstone"; "Metalocalypse: Season Two"; "Perry Mason: Season Three, Vol. 2"; "Rise of the Footsoldier"; "Saturday Night Live: Season Four"; "The Shawshank Redemption: Blu-Ray"; "Teenage Angst"; "The X Files: Fight the Future"; and "White Dog: Criterion Edition."

Nov. 25

" Fred Claus" (PG, 120 minutes): Vince Vaughn plays Fred, the glum older brother of Santa (Paul Giamatti). Since Christmas is approaching, Fred is turning morose and acting out. The season recalls his unhappy childhood where his younger brother was the apple of his parents' and later the world's eye. He loathes (but loves) his little brother, but when he gets in a scrape, he has no problem appealing to Santa for a quick job to raise some extra cash. Vaughn's con-man jive doesn't get much play in this one; he spends most of his time as a bitter creep, and the writing isn't sharp enough to make the hipster-at-the-North-Pole theme pay off in any meaningful way. Contains mild violence. DVD Extras: Director's commentary, deleted scenes; also available on Blu-ray with more extras.

" Hancock" (PG-13, 82 minutes): Will Smith plays a superhero assisted in the miraculous by cutting-edge special effects and by the specialest effect of them all, Charlize Theron. It begins with Hancock awaking on a park bench in Los Angeles, another grizzled, soused, unwashed member of that city's homeless. Then he shoots skyward like an Atlas headed for Moscow. Quickly he diverts to a law enforcement crisis, a running gunfight on the freeway. He saves the day with a drunk's finesse, and rather than being feted, he reconfirms that Angelenos have tired of his man-of-steel thing, so he quickly finds relief in alcohol and the nearest park bench. So what is a despised superhero to do? Hire a PR man (Jason Bateman). It's kind of amusing, but then the movie takes quite possibly the strangest turn in movie history. It changes course, tone, concern and story issue, and never recovers. Contains intense sequences of sci-fi action, strong violence and language. DVD Extras: Featurettes, director's commentary; also in one- and two-disc unrated special edition, with more extras, and on Blu-ray.

" Meet Dave" (PG, 91 minutes): The film features a rather clever premise, ideally suited to the gifts of its star, Eddie Murphy: physical comedy and mimicry. Murphy plays two roles here. One, the Captain, is a two-inch-high alien in charge of a tiny crew of interstellar explorers. Dave is the name of the crew's ship -- a human-size robot modeled on the Captain -- which has just crashed into New York's Liberty Island. "Meet Dave" chronicles the exploits of Dave as he meets and tries to blend in with the locals; meanwhile, each of his "human" functions is being controlled inside his body by one of the Captain's tiny crew. There are moments that make the most of Murphy's assets here, but not nearly enough of them; for the most part, the film features him moving with unblinking passivity through the urban landscape, uttering things like "My colon is impacted" with robotic flatness. You'll no doubt forget Dave within minutes, but at least he came in peace. Contains bawdy and suggestive humor, action and some profanity. DVD Extras: Trailers, featurettes, deleted scenes; also available on Blu-ray.

" Space Chimps" (G, 81 minutes): It's not that there aren't moments of banana-peel-worthy levity in this chimpoverished Fox product (yes, it's very big on the ape puns). But in the evolution of this summer's animated comedies, "Chimps" is the missing link no one was looking for. Our hairy hero, Ham III (voice of Andy Samberg) is drafted into a PR-heavy government mission, in which a crew of space apes must track down a $5 billion, intergalactic probe that has disappeared into a wormhole. Teamed with Luna (Cheryl Hines) and Titan (Patrick Warburton), they land on the planet Malgor, where the power-mad Zartog (Jeff Daniels) has grabbed the sought-after Infinity space probe and is using its movable claws to subjugate his planet-mates. When Titan is taken prisoner, he uses Zartog's hunger for rule against him. This might not be the movie's only moral, but it's certainly the most pointed. Contains nothing objectionable. DVD Extras: Featurettes; also available on Blu-ray.

Also on DVD Nov. 25: "24: Redemption"; "Artic Exposure With Nigel Marven"; "Beverly Hills, 90210: Season Six"; "Bottle Rocket: Criterion Collection"; "Chungking Express: Criterion Collection"; "A Colbert Christmas: The Greatest Gift of All"; "George Carlin: It's Bad for Ya'"; "Gomer Pile, U.S.M.C.: The Final Season"; "The Line"; "The Mod Squad: Season Two, Vol. 1"; "Pink Panther Ultimate Collection"; "The Price of Sugar"; "The Ron Howard Spotlight Collection"; "The Spy Who Came in From the Cold: Criterion Collection"; and "Superman: Doomsday"

Nov. 18

" Encounters at the End of the World" (G, 99 minutes): Documentary provocateur Werner Herzog takes us on an enjoyably caustic journey to the heart of Antarctica with his customary fusion of mystical mission and pithy skepticism. It's as much fun to anticipate what he's going to say as it is to appreciate the snowy landscapes, belching volcanoes and mustachioed seals before his lens. As in his previous films, Herzog uncovers a small population of visionary goofballs and dreamers, here at the McMurdo research station on Ross Island. There's forklift driver and "philosopher" Stefan Pashov revealing his very personal connection with Homer's "Odyssey." And glaciologist Douglas MacAyeal recounting his dreams of vast, moving icebergs. What makes their accounts so fascinating isn't the content. It's our awareness of the man behind the camera, his brain ticking in Herzogian overdrive. And he immerses us in his surrealistic vision of the world -- an absorbing adventure in itself. Contains nothing objectionable. DVD Extras: Filmmakers' commentary, deleted scenes, still galleries.

" Gonzo" (R, 120 minutes): A wallow in all things Thompson, the Rolling Stone reporter who introduced a form of participatory, crazed, possibly booze- and hallucinogenic-driven reportage called "gonzo." The film is undone by an issue that challenges all biographical documentaries. It can show only what's already there, and there's a lot more on some issues than others. The film is largely for true believers and has a good time -- and gives a good time -- re-creating some of its subject's amusingly outlandish stunts as well as his defiantly unprofessional behavior. It seems to celebrate him more for his attitude, his fashionably leftist politics, his fame and his friendships than for any meaningful accomplishment. Contains drug and sexual content, nudity and profanity. DVD Extras:

" Priceless" (PG-13, 104 minutes): The irrepressibly effervescent Audrey Tautou plays a modern courtesan. Moving from sugar daddy to sugar daddy, her existence amounts to a barter economy, and the girl likes her clothes and her fancy hotel rooms. She mistakes hotel waiter Jean (Gad Elmaleh) for another wealthy prospect and we're off and away on a continuing Gallic farce of misunderstandings. He's so flattered, he pretends she's right -- while also trying to fulfill his obligations as a waiter. The routines may have been done a thousand times, but somehow they seem funny all over again. Contains sexual content, including nudity. In French with subtitles. DVD Extras: Available on Blu-ray.

" Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants 2" (PG-13, 117 minutes): For all its flaws and its flagrant flaunting of credulity, the film has four very good things going for it: Alexis Bledel (Lena), America Ferrera (Carmen), Blake Lively (Bridget) and Amber Tamblyn (Tibby). The film has four distinct storylines, held loosely together by the peripatetic pants, which get FedExed around the globe. Along the way, the friends deal with Issues and, thanks to the talent and humor of its young stars, you don't mind that everything gets wrapped up a little too neatly by the end. In an age of panty-free drama queens, the Sisterhood is a robustly energetic force that propels the viewer along, leapfrogging over improbable plot devices and clunky dialogue. It's refreshing to see young women portrayed as something other than the hot chicks in the latest blockbuster. Contains mature material and sensuality (in other words, somebody loses her virginity -- tastefully, of course). DVD Extras: Featurettes, additional scenes, gag reel; also available on Blu-ray.

" Tropic Thunder" (R, 111 minutes): In this rude, crude, over-the-top satire about rude, crude, over-the-top action movies, Ben Stiller makes an ambitious and surprisingly effective bid to skewer Hollywood's darker excesses. The movie-within-the-movie, the eponymous "Tropic Thunder," is an adaptation of a Vietnam War memoir by Four Leaf Tayback (Nick Nolte). He's played by Tugg Speedman (Stiller), whose most critically acclaimed performance so far has been as a developmentally challenged farm boy in "Simple Jack." Speedman's co-star is five-time Oscar winner Kirk Lazarus (Robert Downey, Jr.) who has undergone a "pigmentation augmentation operation" to play his African American character. The actors get dumped in the middle of the Southeast Asian jungle by their director (Steve Coogan) to get more authentic performances. The film has had its share of controversy, but with luck, the satire won't prove too subtle for a movie whose modest ambition is nonetheless executed with giddy, boneheaded flair. Contains pervasive profanity including sexual references, violent content and drug material. DVD Extras: Commentaries, featurettes, deleted scenes, alternate ending, and more; also available on Blu-ray.

" WALL-E" (G, 97 minutes): Set in a future where Earth has become covered in trash and swept by dust storms and where the only wildlife is the cockroach, "WALL·E" refers to our hero: a Waste Allocation Load Lifter, Earth class. He has been left behind to toil endlessly in the shadow of the planet's rubbish skyline. Meanwhile, humankind has been traveling through space for 700 years waiting for Earth to regenerate. Thanks to the constant attention of robots, the human race has been reduced to morbid obesity, sloth and interactive video screens. This is not the Enchanted Forest. It's too plausible for that. "WALL·E" is really an art film. It is besotted with its own technology, its own art -- almost to the point that it allows technology to sublimate the story. It is a jewel of a film in conception, execution and message. Contains nothing objectionable. DVD Extras: Animated shorts, deleted scenes, featurettes, director's commentary; also available on Blu-ray.

Also on DVD Nov. 18: "Bones: Season Three, Totally Decomposed Edition"; "Burke's Law: Season One, Vol. 2"; "Butch Jamie"; "Charmed: The Complete Series"; "Doctor Who: The Complete Fourth Series"; "Forgotten Noir and Crime: Collection 4"; "Hanna Montana: Season One"; "Hawaii Five-O: Season Five"; "Heather's 20th High School Reunion: Limited Edition Locker Set"; "Jeff Dunham's Very Special Christmas Special"; "The Last Klezmer"; "McHale's Navy: Season Four"; "Mister Lonely"; "Monty Python Holy Trinity"; "Night Gallery: Season Two"; "The Odd Couple: The Final Season"; "Sponge Bob Square Pants: Season Five, Vol. 2"; "Star Trek: The Original Series, Season Three Remastered"; "300: Limited Collector's Edition"; "Up The Yangtze"; "The Wedding Director"; "The Who at Kilburn: 1977"; and "Zombie Diaries"

Nov. 11

" Hellboy II: The Golden Army" (PG-13, 110 minutes): Fans will be gratified by Guillermo del Toro's affectionate sequel to his 2004 film "Hellboy," in which he introduced the screen's most lovable anti-superhero, a giant the color of boiled lobster with Chiclet teeth and a really bad attitude. The great Ron Perlman is back as the cigar-smoking, chocolate-addicted lug, who again is joined in his exploits by his equally funny and flawed cohorts: the gentle, blue-gilled Abe Sapien (Doug Jones) and Liz Sherman (Selma Blair), now Hellboy's girlfriend and still prone to literally fiery outbursts. The enterprise reeks of authenticity, and is shot through with the franchise's signature goofiness, sarcasm and good heart. As he has done in all his movies, del Toro creates unforgettable images, filled with color, texture, lyricism and horror. Contains sci-fi action, violence and profanity. DVD Extras: : Director's and actors' commentary, featurettes, deleted scenes; available in single-disc DVD, three-disc Special Edition DVD and two-disc Blu-ray versions with more extras.

" The Perfect Holiday" (PG, 96 minutes): This is being billed as a Christmas movie featuring Queen Latifah, but it features only enough of its nominal star to avoid being sued by bait-and-switched filmgoers. The film's real stars, Gabrielle Union and Morris Chestnut, instead bring every ounce of charm they have to bear on a hopelessly wan romantic comedy. Union plays Nancy, who is in the throes of divorcing a hip-hop impresario (Charles Q. Murphy). Chestnut plays Benjamin, a struggling songwriter. The machinery is set in motion to get Nancy and Benjamin together in a script that hasn't been written as much as stamped out like so many cheap Christmas knickknacks that will be on the clearance shelf come Dec. 26. Contains brief profanity and suggestive humor. DVD Extras: Filmmakers' commentary, featurettes.

" Star Wars: The Clone Wars" (PG, 98 minutes): The ossification of "Star Wars" continues with this animated sub-chapter of George Lucas's cynically plundered saga that unfolds with all the entertainment value of watching somebody else play a video game. Lucas fulfills his lifelong dream of completely dehumanizing his space opera, replacing it with a digitally animated style that is somewhere between cartoons, Christmas specials and panoramic paintings on the side of a van. One thing is definitely intact from the most recent prequel episodes: From the first frame, all but the learned geeks in the audience won't know what the heck is going on. Obi-Wan Kenobi and Anakin Skywalker are in the midst of the legendary and pointless Clone Wars, the battles of which seem to transpire on either Planet Marriott Airport or Planet Phallic Symbol. Zap! Pow! What's? Boom! Happening? I'd go on explaining the plot, but you'd think I was high. In a summer of stoner movies, "Clone Wars" fits right in. Space violence, momentary smoking, mind-numbing levels of "Star Wars." DVD Extras: Featurettes, filmmakers' commentary; also available on Blu-ray.

" This Christmas" (PG-13, 117 minutes): The Whitfields are by any standards prosperous, and they can look with pride on what their progeny has accomplished. But such happiness is based on a compact by which each member agrees to avoid certain subjects. The movie chronicles a holiday season in which the subjects, at last, are not avoided. The result is a big, gushy, emotional, secret-driven, family-obsessive casserole, perhaps facile in some of its resolutions, but so full of good heart and love -- the real kind, which is scratchy, awkward, difficult to express and doesn't conquer all -- that the movie is difficult to resist. ) Contains sexual innuendo and dramatic intensity. DVD Extras: Actors' and filmmakers' commentary, deleted scenes, featurettes, "This Christmas" music video featuring Chris Brown; also available on Blu-ray.

Also on DVD Nov. 11: "Beer For My Horses"; "Blood and Bones"; "The Boys in The Band"; "The Cosby Show: 25th Anniversary Commemorative Edition"; "Dragon Ball Z: Season Seven"; "Father Knows best: Season Two"; "Garbage Warrior"; "I Dream of Jeannie: The Complete Series"; "JFK Ultimate Collector's Edition"; "Love Songs"; "M Squad: The Complete Series"; "Mister Foe"; "Planet B-Boy"; "Quo Vadis: 2-disc Special Edition"; "Raw Feed Horror Collection"; "Roman Holiday: Centennial Collection"; "Sabrina: Centennial Collection"; "Scooby-Doo: Funland of Freak Frights"; "Scrubs: The Complete Seventh Season"; "Seventh Heaven: Season Seven"; "Son of the Beach: Season Two"; "The Sopranos: The Complete Series"; "Still Life"; "Sukiyaki Western Django"; "Walt Disney Treasures Wave VIII"; "Warner Bros. Home Front"; and "Warner Bros. Holiday Collections Vols. 1 and 2"

Nov. 4

" Get Smart" (PG-13, 110 minutes): Based on the cult TV comedy hit of the '60s, the film is slick and smooth and ticks along primarily on the excellent chemistry between Steve Carell and Anne Hathaway in the famed Don Adams-Barbara Feldon roles as Agent 86 and his far-more-capable female partner, 99, in the employ of spy agency CONTROL. Dwayne Johnson has a nice turn as a good-natured uber-agent 23, who casually beats the stuffing out of everyone, then smiles broadly and says, "Let's go to lunch." Was there a plot? I can hardly remember. Oh, yes, now it's coming back, something stolen from Bond, in which the nefarious KAOS organization is stockpiling nuclear weapons to extort billions from the West. As I say: darned funny! Weightless as froth, forgettable as dew, but pretty darned funny. (PG-13, 110 minutes) Contains rude humor, action violence and crude language. DVD Extras: Alternate scenes, gag reel, digital copy, featurettes.

" Kung Fu Panda" (PG, 90 minutes): At a brisk and appropriate 88 minutes, this computer-animated DreamWorks film is infectious and inspiring. Jack Black as panda Po and is the vocal embodiment of the lazy dreamer. Dustin Hoffman is terrific as martial arts master Shifu, who is alternately wise, worldly, irritated and mournful over the traitorous defection to the dark side of his once prize pupil Tai Lung (Ian McShane). To deflect Tai Lung's inevitable attempt to seize the legendary Dragon Scroll, Shifu has assembled the Furious Five: Tigress (Angelina Jolie), Crane (David Cross), Monkey (Jackie Chan!), Mantis (Seth Rogen) and Viper (Lucy Liu). There's not much for the supporting players to do; it is the "Po Show," the triumph of the adorable over the malevolent. As such, it is not a documentary. It is, however, a really good time. Contains animated martial arts action. Available Sunday, Nov. 9. DVD Extras: Featurettes, trailers, DreamWorks musical clips, DVD-ROM with more extras; available as a "Pandamonium Double Pack" with the direct-to-video sequel, "Secrets of the Furious Five" (with the voices of Jack Black and Dustin Hoffman reprising their roles) and also available on Blu-ray.

" Transsiberian" (R, 111 minutes): In frozen Vladivostok, Russia, a drug deal has resulted in a particularly gruesome murder and a significant amount of missing heroin and euros. Police detective Grinko (Sir Ben Kingsley) conducts a perfunctory, enigmatic investigation. In Beijing, Roy (Woody Harrelson) and his wife, Jessie (Emily Mortimer), are finishing up work with a church mission and are about to board the Trans-Siberian Railway for Moscow. Because this is a suspense film of the old school, you know things are going to turn nasty. That's where writer-director Brad Anderson shines. The story won't pass the most rigorous logic tests, but it doesn't insult your intelligence either. All in all, the film is an excellent, if modest, alternative for moviegoers who have been blockbustered into submission this summer. Contains graphic violence and brief nudity. DVD Extras: Movie trailers; also available on Blu-ray.

" When Did You Last See Your Father?" (PG-13, 95 minutes): The latest to have a crack at the toughest of all nuts -- the twisted thing between sons and dads -- is director Anand Tucker in this film, which examines the subject with an A-level English cast including Jim Broadbent, Colin Firth and Juliet Stevenson. The setting is Dad's last few days. But the real location of the film is son Blake's memory, which ranges over the years, recollecting moments of tenderness, rage, disappointment and fulfillment. Drawn from a memoir by Blake Morrison, the screenplay's stream-of-consciousness quality replicates a mind in tumble as memories rush in and out. As the boy grown to man contemplates the dying geezer in the sheets before him, he tries to reach his own summing up and, of course, can't: It's just too messy. Yet the movie is slick and treacly and goes nowhere that hasn't been gone before. Contains sexual situations, adult themes and brief strong language. DVD Extras: Director's commentary, deleted scenes.

Also on DVD Nov. 4: "A Christmas Story 25th Anniversary Ultimate Collector's Edition"; "Alvin and the Chipmunks: Special Edition"; "Barbie in A Christmas Carol"; "J.A.G.: The Seventh Season"; "Batman: The Complete Animated Series"; "The Chrismas Toy"; "Creatures of the Deep"; "Dear Me, A Blogger's Tale"; "The Films of Budd Boetticher Box Set"; "Futurama: Bender's Game"; "Get Smart: The Complete Series Gift Set"; "Moscow Zero"; "Pee-wee's Big Adventure"; "Planet of the Apes 40th Anniversary Collection"; "Primeval: The Complete Series 1 and 2"; "Project Runway: The Complete Fourth Season"; "Reaper: Season One"; "Shrek the Halls"; "Spin City: The Complete First Season"; "Star Wars Prequel Trilogy"; "Termination Point"; "What We Do is Secret"; and "The Wild Wild West: The Complete Series."

Oct. 28

" Journey to the Center of the Earth" (PG, 92 minutes): The latest iteration of the Jules Verne classic uses modern cinematic technology with verve and ingenuity. College geologist Trevor Anderson (Brendan Fraser) and his 13-year-old nephew, Sean (Josh Hutcherson), find themselves on an impromptu trip to Iceland, where a volcano is showing unusual activity. With the help of a gorgeous mountain climber named Hannah (Anita Briem), they get to their desired destination, only to be shunted into an abandoned mine during a thunderstorm. From there, they're hurled farther downward until they reach the titular center of the Earth. The film is terrific family entertainment, an action comedy on a par with "Night at the Museum" and "National Treasure." Granted, there are scenes of frightening peril. But any fear is quickly dispelled by the film's light sense of humor, abetted by Fraser's warm, easygoing style. Contains intense adventure action and scary moments. DVD Extras: Commentary, featurettes; also available on Blu-ray.

" Kit Kittredge: An American Girl" (G, 96 minutes): Set in 1934 Cincinnati, the Kittredges are solidly ensconced in their suburban home, secure and warm and full of love for one another. Perky 9-year-old Kit (Abigail Breslin) is trying to "break into print" at the downtown Cincinnati Register. We watch as the Depression erodes the sanctity of the Kittredges' middle-class security. Dad (Chris O'Donnell) loses his car dealership and can't find work; gradually the family makes the decision to take in boarders, and Dad hits the road. In what seems like 10 minutes Mom (Julia Ormond) and the kid are sharing the abode with zanies, wackos and crazies! The movie deserves some kind of award for obviousness as it telegraphs every development, traffics in stereotypes and cliches, and merrily appends 21st-century political correctness onto the 20th century's hardest and grimiest decade. The tweener girls for whom it is aimed deserve better. Contains mild intensity. DVD Extras: Movie trailers, free digital download of the film, DVD-ROM; also available on Blu-ray.

Also on DVD Oct. 28: "Abbot and Costello: The Complete Universal Pictures Collection"; "Affairs of The Heart: Series One"; "Dark Shadows: The Beginning, Vol. 6"; "The Donna Reed Show: Season One"; "The Flintstones: The Complete Series"; "The 4400: The Complete Series"; "Freaks and Geeks: Yearbook Addition"; "Girlfriends: Season Five"; "The L-Word: Season 5"; "The Little Rascals: The Complete Collection"; "Mystery Science Theater 3000: 20th Anniversary Edition"; "National Lampoon's Animal House" 30th Anniversary Edition"; "Newsradio: The Complete Series"; "Poultrygeist: Night of the Chicken Dead"; "The Prince and Me 3: A Royal Honeymoon"; "Red"; "Sanford and Son: The Complete Series"; "Tuya's Marriage"; and "War and Remembrance: The Complete Epic Mini-Series."