A family find themselves on a desolate, seemingly endless country road on Christmas Eve in this unnerving slice of surreal horror.
Bad Boys: When $100 million of seized heroin is stolen from the Miami Police lock-up, Detectives Lowrey and Burnett, Miami's most mismatched cops, are called upon to solve the case before the FBI close their department. Julie is their only lead to the case, but will only speak to Lowrey. As Lowrey is not around when she calls, Burnett impersonates his cool slick partner. A hilarious role reversal begins .. Bad Boys II: The action and comedy never stop when superstars Martin Lawrence and Will Smith reunite as out-of-control trash-talking buddy cops. Bullets fly, cars crash, and laughs explode as they pursue a whacked-out drug lord from the streets of Miami to the barrios of Cuba. But the real fireworks result when Lawrence discovers that playboy Smith is secretly romancing his sexy sister, Gabrielle Union (Bring it On). Director Michael Bay (Transformers) and producer Jerry Bruckheimer (Pirates of the Caribbean, Black Hawk Down) deliver a high-speed, high-octane blockbuster that will blow you away. Bad Boys For Life: The Bad Boys Mike Lowrey (Will Smith) and Marcus Burnett (Martin Lawrence) are back together for one last ride in the highly anticipated Bad Boys for Life.
Hook is Steven Spielberg's most spectacular film of the 90s. It is also seriously underrated, arguably the equal of ET, (1982) and Close Encounters of the Third Kind, (1977). An unofficial sequel to J.M. Barrie's Peter Pan, Hook adopts the startling premise of what happened after "the boy who never grew up", grew up. Robin Williams, in his career best performance, is the corporate suit forced to remember he once was "The Pan", returning to Neverland to battle nefarious Captain Hook (a splendid Dustin Hoffman), for his children's love. This is a ravishingly beautiful, stunningly designed film, at once highly imaginative and with a genuinely magical atmosphere which ranges from exquisite, delicate fantasy to slapstick tomfoolery. There is fine support from Maggie Smith, Julia Roberts and Bob Hoskins, and John Williams' rapturously romantic score is yet another career high. Slated upon release, and dubbed a flop though it grossed $200 million, Hook reacted against the "greed is good" 80s by upholding family values and responsibility while evoking a genuine sense of wonder. Only the somewhat pantomime final showdown disappoints, but alongside Legend, (1985)and Labyrinth, (1986), Hook is ripe for reassessment as a fantasy classic. The DVD transfer is superb and the disc, though not packed with additional features, has some interesting extras. --Gary S. Dalkin
From director Michael Bay (Transformers, Armageddon) comes a thrill ride of explosive action from beginning to end. One hundred million dollars' worth of confiscated drugs has just been jacked from police custody. Once the career bust of Detectives Mike Lowrey (Will Smith) and Marcus Burnett (Martin Lawrence), the missing drugs now threaten to shut down the Narcotics Division of the Miami Police Department. When the drug investigation turns deadly, the murderers kidnap the only witness, a beautiful police informant (Téa Leoni) and close friend of the boys. Experience all of the humour, thrills and action like never before with this edition now fully remastered in 4K. BAD BOYS Bonus Features on Blu-ray Include: Audio Commentary by Director Michael Bay Putting the Boom & Bang in the Bad Boys, Featurette Three Music Videos Original Theatrical Trailers
The true life story of Muhammad Ali (Will Smith), the world champion boxer who both ignited and mirrored the conflicts of the 60s & 70s and became one of the most admired fighters in the world.
Two Pints Of Lager & A Packet Of Crisps: Series 8
The second of Francis Ford Coppola's films based on the popular juvenile novels of S.E. Hinton (the first being The Outsiders), Rumble Fish split critics into opposite camps: those who admired the film for its heavily stylised indulgence, and those who hated it for the very same reason. Whatever the response, it's clearly the work of a maverick director who isn't afraid to push the limits of his innovative talent. Filmed almost entirely in black and white with an occasional dash of color for symbolic effect, this tale of alienated youth centers on gang leader Rusty James (Matt Dillon) and his band of punk pals. Rusty's got a girlfriend (Diane Lane), an older brother named Motorcycle Boy (Mickey Rourke), and a drunken father (Dennis Hopper) who've all given up trying to straighten him out. He's best at making trouble, and he pursues that skill with an enthusiastic flair that eventually catches up with him. But it's not the whacked-out story here that matters--it's the uninhibited verve of Coppola's visual approach, which includes everything from time-lapse clouds to the kind of smoky streets and alleyways that could only exist in the movies. The supporting cast includes a host of fresh faces who went on to thriving careers, including Nicolas Cage, Christopher Penn, Vincent Spano, Laurence Fishburne, and musician Tom Waits. --Jeff Shannon
Soul Food is the kind of movie that seems to have been blessed throughout its low-budget production and it has got a quality of warmth and charm that fits perfectly with its authentic drama about a large African-American family in Chicago. Twenty-eight-year-old writer-director George Tillman Jr. drew autobiographical inspiration from his upbringing in Milwaukee, and on a well-spent $6.5 million budget he succeeded where similar films (including Waiting to Exhale and How Stella Got Her Groove Back) fell short: he depicts his many characters with such depth and sympathy that, by the time they have weathered several family crises, we've come to care and feel for them and the powerful ties that bind them together. As seen through the eyes of Tillman's young alter ego Ahmad (Brandon Hammond), the film primarily focuses on the rivalries and affections that rise and fall among Ahmad's mother (Vivica A. Fox) and her two sisters (Vanessa L. Williams and Nia Long). Through them, and through the weekly Sunday dinners cooked with love by their mother, Big Mama (Irma P. Hall), we witness marital bliss and distress, infidelity, success, failure ... in short, the spices of life both bitter and sweet. But when Big Mama falls into a diabetic coma, Ahmad watches as his family begins to fall apart without the stability and love that Big Mama provided with every Sunday meal. Tillman's touch can be overly nostalgic, melodramatic and cloyingly sentimental, but never so much that the movie loses its firm grip on reality. As a universal portrait of family life, Soul Food ranks among the very best films of its kind--believable, funny, emotional and always approaching its characters (well-played by a uniformly excellent cast) with a generous spirit of forgiveness and understanding. As satisfying as one of Big Mama's delicious dinners, Soul Food is the kind of movie that keeps you coming back for more. --Jeff Shannon
From Kathryn Bigelow, the Academy Award® winning director of THE HURT LOCKER and ZERO DARK THIRTY, DETROIT tells the gripping story of one of the darkest moments during the civil unrest that rocked Detroit in the summer of 67.
Bob Gold is a cop. A good cop. But tonight he will betray his friends disgrace the force and commit an act of violence because he believes it is the only right thing to do... Cop Bobby Gold and his partner Tim Sullivan accidentally discover the murder of an elderly Jewish shopkeeper. What seems like a simple robbery gone wrong leads the investigation to Zionist vigilantes and an anti-Jewish conspiracy. Gold must then confront his loyalties to the force and question his own ethni
Best of enemies. Deadliest of friends. They are fast friends and worse foes. One is Billy the Kid (Kris Kristofferson) a law unto himself. The other is the law: Sheriff Pat Garrett (James Coburn) who once rode with Billy. Set to a bristling score by Bob Dylan (who also plays Billy's sidekick Alias) and with a `Who's Who' of iconic Western players Sam Peckinpah's saga of one of the West's great legends is now restored to its intended glory. For the first time since it left
Though he gets solo above-the-title billing, Will Hay was no more a solo comedian than Groucho Marx--and Oh, Mr Porter!, one of his finest vehicles, finds him congenially teamed with sidekicks Moore Marriott and Graham Moffatt in one of the British cinema's greatest comedy gangs. Hay's William Porter, an inept railway worker, is shunted off to the dead-end job of stationmaster in Buggleskelly, Northern Ireland, arriving as the latest in a long line of doomed souls who have left their presentation clocks on the mantelpiece of the dilapidated office. The delight of the film is in the interplay between Hay and Marriott, the single-toothed dotty old-timer, and Moffatt, the chubby smart kid, as they fail the most basic requirements of their jobs but come up trumps when investigating the ghost of One-Eyed Joe and his haunted mill, discovering a branch line being used by cross-border gun-smugglers who are defeated in a spirited final chase. There's some slapstick with an escape from the mill in a high wind and the last ride of the venerable locomotive Gladstone, but Hay works best with character comedy, pompously reprimanding his subordinates for dodges he proceeds to pull himself, reacting to every ominous line with a perfect double-take and blithely surviving the chaos his character causes wherever he goes. --Kim Newman
Philadelphia wasn't the first movie about AIDS (it followed such worthy independent films as Parting Glances and Longtime Companion), but it was the first Hollywood studio picture to take AIDS as its primary subject. In that sense, Philadelphia is a historically important film. As such, it's worth remembering that director Jonathan Demme (Melvin and Howard, Something Wild, The Silence of the Lambs) wasn't interested in preaching to the converted; he set out to make a film that would connect with a mainstream audience. And he succeeded. Philadelphia was not only a hit, it also won Oscars for Bruce Springsteen's haunting "The Streets of Philadelphia," and for Tom Hanks as the gay lawyer Andrew Beckett who is unjustly fired by his firm because he has AIDS. Denzel Washington is another lawyer (functioning as the mainstream-audience surrogate) who reluctantly takes Beckett's case and learns to overcome his misconceptions about the disease, about those who contract it, and about gay people in general. The combined warmth and humanism of Hanks and Demme were absolutely essential to making this picture a success. The cast also features Jason Robards, Antonio Banderas (as Beckett's lover), Joanne Woodward, and Robert Ridgely, and, of course, those Demme regulars Charles Napier, Tracey Walter and Roger Corman. --Jim Emerson
Coincidence throws Mij the otter and Graham Merrill (Bill Travers) the computer worker together on a busy London street in Ring of Bright Water. What transpires from this chance meeting is an epiphany that leads to the complete upheaval of Graham's life. Evicted from his city flat thanks to the antics of his newly acquired, mischievous otter, Graham embarks on a train journey to the Scottish Highlands. Suffice it to say that trying to smuggle Mij onboard as a "diving terrier" is not successful. When the pair finally arrives in Scotland, they fall in love with the countryside and a dilapidated cottage by the sea. Fate introduces Graham to the town's animal-loving doctor (Virginia McKenna), and an enduring friendship and romance are forged. The photography of both the Scottish Highlands and the antics of Mij the otter in this 1969 movie are truly wonderful--it might just make you reconsider your current digs and friendships. The story (based on Gavin Maxwell's book of the same name) is somewhat formulaic and dated by its romanticism, but enjoyable nonetheless. Slip into an ideal world of simple happiness and celebrate the cyclical nature of life, if only for 106 minutes. --Tami Horiuchi, Amazon.com
Will Smith & Tommy Lee Jones return as Agents J and K in the third installment of the sci-fi action comedy. Also starring Josh Brolin.
Two Pints of Lager and a Packet of Crisps is the smuttier, stupider sitcom descendent of Men Behaving Badly, but lacks that show's charm and intelligence. The series tells the story of five twentysomethings--the loveable Johnny (The Royle Family's Ralf Little), his libidinous sidekick Gaz (Will Mellor), their long-suffering girlfriends Janet (Sheridan Smith) and Donna (Natalie Casey), and a token comedy-weirdo Louise (Kathryn Drysdale)--doing their best to fathom life's hardships through endless discussions about sex, booze and relationships. In trying to appeal to a "yoof" audience through the use of recognisable, everyday settings, Two Pints... eschews the tradition of focusing on a "situation" almost entirely; essentially consisting of a string of scenes in which the characters sit trading witless banter in a pub, then in a lounge, then in a kitchen and then in the pub again. As a result it can't punch in the same league as more sophisticated, dramatically satisfying and, frankly, funnier sitcoms such as The Office, Spaced or Black Books and feels more like a weak excuse for a series of toilet gags. On these terms, however, it is amusing if juvenile entertainment. In particular, Little's performance as Johnny, a confused child trapped in a man's body, provides both humour and a likable centre to the show. On the DVD: Two Pints of Lager and a Packet of Crisps on DVD has the complete first two series with has episode selection, scene selection and subtitles but no special features --Paul Philpott
Bruce Willis plays a Special-Ops commander who leads his team into the jungle of Nigeria to rescue a doctor (Monica Belluci) who will only go with them if they also agree to rescue 70 refugees.
Will Smith stars in this sci-fi action thriller suggested by the classic short story collection by Isaac Asimov, and brought to the big screen by visionary director Alex Proyas ("The Crow").
Robert Clayton Dean (Will Smith) is a lawyer with a wife and family whose happily normal life is turned upside down after a chance meeting with a college buddy (Jason Lee) at a lingerie shop. Unbeknownst to the lawyer, he's just been burdened with a videotape of a congressman's assassination. Hot on the tail of this tape is a ruthless group of National Security Agents commanded by a belligerently ambitious fed named Reynolds (Jon Voight). Using surveillance from satellites, bugs and other sophisticated snooping devices, the NSA infiltrates every facet of Dean's existence, tracing each physical and digital footprint he leaves. Driven by acute paranoia, Dean enlists the help of a clandestine former NSA operative named Brill (Gene Hackman) and Enemy of the State kicks into high-intensity hyperdrive. Teaming up once again with producer Jerry Bruckheimer, Top Gun director Tony Scott demonstrates his glossy style with clever cinematography and breakneck pacing. Will Smith proves that there's more to his success than a brash sense of humour, giving a versatile performance that plausibly illustrates a man cracking under the strain of paranoid turmoil. Hackman steals the show by essentially reprising his role from The Conversation--just imagine his memorable character Harry Caul some 20 years later. Most of all, the film's depiction of high-tech surveillance is highly convincing and dramatically compelling, making this a cautionary tale with more substance than you'd normally expect from a Scott-Bruckheimer action extravaganza. --Jeremy Storey
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