DVD Picks: The Social Network, Alpha and Omega, Dances with Wolves
January 27, 2011
DVD Picks – January 14, 2011
Raleigh News & Observer
Glenn McDonald
The Social Network
Drama; rated PG-13 for sexual content, drug and alcohol use and language; also available on Blu-ray
The Gist: Director David Fincher (“Fight Club”) teams with writer Aaron Sorkin (“The West Wing”) to detail the creation of Facebook, maybe the most influential (insidious?) social phenomenon of a generation.
The Lowdown: One of the year’s Oscar frontrunners, “The Social Network” is a marvel of modern movie-making. A fictionalized account of the creation of Facebook, the film stars Jesse Eisenberg as Mark Zuckerberg, the brilliant and damaged Harvard student who more or less invented social networking as we now know it.
Sorkin’s screenplay features his patented brand of impossibly eloquent dialogue, and director Fincher keeps everything moving along at the pace of a contemporary thriller. The movie is most interesting, however, in its ideas and implications. “The Social Network” might appear to be another morality play about ambition and greed, but what it’s really concerned with is the dramatic flux of modern communication in the digital age.
After all the noisy interpersonal drama plays out, you’re left feeling a strange unease. Fincher has threaded his themes of deception and authenticity throughout, and these are the anxieties that linger.
The Extras: Two separate commentary tracks with all the major players, plus five more mini-docs on technical aspects of the film.
The Bottom Line: A very intelligent drama with a lot on its mind, “Network” also works as a fast and furious thriller.
Double Secret Bonus Tip: Actress Rooney Mara has been cast as Lisbeth Salander in the upcoming remake of “Girl with the Dragon Tattoo.”
DVD Picks: Catfish, The Last Exorcism, Case 39, Dinner for Schmucks
January 27, 2011
DVD Picks – January 7, 2011
Raleigh News & Observer
Pick of the Week
Catfish
Documentary; Rated PG-13 for some sexual references; also available on Blu-ray
The Gist: A New York City photographer gets involved, via Facebook, with a family in rural Michigan. But when he shows up for a visit, nothing is as it seems.
The Lowdown: “Catfish” generated a ton of buzz and conjecture when it first hit theaters. It’s being sold as a legitimate documentary – filmmaker Ariel Schulman just happened to be documenting his brother’s online intrigues when everything went haywire. But some passages seem just too coincidental to be real, while others are too real to be fiction. Avoid all spoilers with this one.
As with recent projects like Joaquin Phoenix’s “I’m Still Here” and the Banksy doc “Exit Through the Gift Shop,” it’s possible that all the ambiguity is part of the intent. In any case, “Catfish” is the first film I’ve seen that truly engages with the emotional core of the social network phenomenon. It takes as a given that technology is changing fundamental notions of identity. Then it digs deeper, into the really creepy stuff.
The Extras: An exhaustive Q&A with the filmmakers, with questions submitted from curious fans.
The Bottom Line: “The Internet is this place where reality and deception meet,” says director Schulman. “And new things sprout out of that.”
Double Secret Bonus Tip: After viewing the bonus materials and researching online – rather obsessively, too – I’m convinced that “Catfish” is for real.
DVD Picks: Goats, Riverboats and Rock Stars
March 26, 2010
Raleigh News & Observer
March 26, 2010
The Men Who Stare at Goats
PICK OF THE WEEK
Comedy; rated R for language, some drug content and brief nudity; also available on Blu-ray
The Gist: Greenhorn reporter Bob Wilton (Ewan McGregor) stumbles across a top secret government psi ops program in Iraq, learning “the way of the Jedi” from the likes of George Clooney, Jeff Bridges and Kevin Spacey.
The Lowdown: This very funny and slyly satirical comedy from director Grant Heslov is a real pleasure, and drew all that top-shelf acting talent for a reason. Intriguingly, the film is based on actual events. As the fascinating DVD extras reveal, the “New Earth Army” – an experiment exploring possible military applications of New Age psychic phenomena – really did exist. “Goats” can be enjoyed on one level as a dextrous madcap comedy, and on another as a kind of gonzo satire of military culture and the madness of war.
Eurotrash Swirl
March 22, 2010
Sequel to the 2004 original, “District 13: Ultimatum” is the latest from the prolific writer and producer Luc Besson, who cranks out high-gloss Eurotrash action pictures with admirable efficiency. Set in the near-future slums of Paris, the film concerns the infamous District 13, a slum so dangerous the cops have walled it off and surrendered authority to the locals.
Things get complicated when corrupt officials decide D-13 should be leveled entirely. And so honorable cop Damien Tomaso (Cyril Raffaelli) and local roughneck Leito (David Belle) must once again team up to save D-13, fight the cops and the drug lords, and basically run like crazy in highly choreographed chase scenes.
DVD Picks: Aviatices, Satanic Cults and LeBron James
February 11, 2010
‘Amelia,” starring Hilary Swank as famed aviatrix Amelia Earhart, is a perfectly serviceable, standard-issue Hollywood biopic that hits all the requisite notes and risks little. It’s an enjoyable movie experience and, at under two hours, admirably restrained in length. I only wish the movie, like its heroine, had a little more guts.
It’s a problem of form, really. “Amelia” is done about as well as this type of movie can be done – but that’s the problem. The celebrity biopic has become Hollywood’s most tired and predictable genre. If you recall, we were tipped to this problem in 2007 with the very funny mock-biopic “Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story.” “Walk” tackled the subgenre of the musical biopic, but its cautionary lessons can very easily be extrapolated – and, evidently, ignored. Read the rest of this entry »
