Defiance

Three ferociously committed actors fill the roles of the Bielski brothers, Jewish partisans who escaped into the forests of Eastern Europe during the Second World War. Daniel Craig (taking a break from 007 duty) is Tuvia, the leader of a group of refugees who eventually number over a thousand; Liev Schreiber is Zus, the antagonistic warrior; and Jamie Bell is Asael, a peacemaker no less devoted to the survival of the community. The three performers give life to director Edward Zwick's account of this little-known chapter of Jewish resistance to the Holocaust, which otherwise plays more like a history lesson than a full-blooded movie. The film's best achievement is its strong location work, in Lithuania--as the community makes its home in the forest, the landscape becomes an important player in the drama at hand, and the changing of the seasons is charted with bone-chilling detail. Schreiber manages to get a little wry humor into this otherwise sober enterprise, and Daniel Craig creates an unusual character: a sort of anti-Bond, a hero whose body is all too fallible and whose decision-making is sometimes hesitant or morally compromised. It's a rare hero in a World War II movie that tends to withdraw from scenes rather than stride into them, but that's what Craig does. More than likely, the movie's main achievement will be sending the curious to read the histories of the Bielski brothers and why they matter in the chronicles of the Holocaust. --Robert Horton

The Tudors - The Complete Second Season

Power, sex, delusion and tragedy were hallmarks of The Tudors: The Complete First Season, and they are all the more so in The Complete Second Season. The story of Britain's King Henry VIII (Jonathan Rhys Meyers), The Tudors is a dynamic history of a kingdom whose role on the 16th century world stage seems largely defined by Henry's narcissistic whims. Season two is very much taken up with Henry's determination to break free of papal authority in Rome and establish himself as head of England's church--all because he seeks to divorce Queen Catherine (Maria Doyle Kennedy) and marry Anne Boleyn (Natalie Dormer). Meanwhile, poor Catherine is kept locked away from court, unable to see her daughter Mary (Sarah Bolger) but refusing to relinquish her throne despite such punishment. As for Anne, she enjoys Henry's passion and commitment, but only to a point. When Henry marries her (in a union not recognized by Rome nor many British subjects) and she does not produce a male heir, his fickle attentions begin to wander, and a grand power play by Anne's father, Thomas Boleyn (Nick Dunning) begins to unravel. In time, Henry's focus shifts to soon-to-be third wife Jane Seymour (Anita Briem), whom the king sees as a symbol of his own redemption after the complications of his love life to date. Toward the end of The Complete Second Season, all the hints that Henry's lack of scruples is leading to a full-scale psychological breakdown begin to show, manifest in his many cruelties and--at the last minute--a clear sign of his notorious gluttony to come. Other stories woven into the colorful, lustful, intrigue-driven season two concern the fate of Henry's one-time mentor Sir Thomas More (Jeremy Northam), who refuses to cooperate with Henry's attempted separation from the Catholic faith and pays dearly for it. The pope himself (Peter O'Toole) turns up in sometimes near-comical responses to the king's intransigence, and the untimely fate of many interesting characters during Henry's wrathful sweep of his court proves a shocking development mid-season. All the actors are first-rate, even down to the smallest roles, and the show's spare but compelling use of nudity and sex scenes makes The Tudors powerful adult entertainment. --Tom Keogh

Green Lantern: First Flight

Green Lantern: First Flight is an awesome film. It doesn't waste a lot of time on the origin (which takes place in the first few minutes) and heads straight to the action. Some people might see this as detrimental, but I like how the DC animated projects a lot of the time will just assume that you know the basics of what is going on. It saves a lot of time and allows the movie to start getting to the point.

First off, I was surprised at how brutal some of the violence was for this cartoon. I know that these releases are not necessarily tailor-made for children, but this is no JLU episode. People are impaled, shot, torn through walls into the vacuum of space, and there is pretty much non-stop fighting through most of the 120 minutes. I don't have any problem with that, but it might not be to everyone's liking.

Plot-wise, it's not Shakespeare, but we are talking about an action cartoon here. There is a hero, a villain and lots of cool use of the Green Lantern rings. Those were the only prerequisites I was looking for going in to this thing, and I was not disappointed.

The voice cast did a great job as well. If there is one thing that DC always does right, it is casting their voices. Michael Madsen as Kilowog was my personal favorite. Too bad he didn't have more voice time.

This might possibly be my favorite DVD project of theirs, which is saying a lot considering the fantastic Wonder Woman, New Frontier, and Gotham Knight DVD films. I sincerely hope they continue putting out quality releases like this one.

Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix

Lord Voldemort has returned, but few want to believe it. In fact, the Ministry of Magic is doing everything it can to keep the wizarding world from knowing the truth - including appointing Ministry official Dolores Umbridge as the new Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher at Hogwarts. When Professor Umbridge refuses to train her students in practical defensive magic, a select group of students decides to learn on their own. With Harry Potter as their leader, these students (who call themselves "Dumbledore's Army") meet secretly in a hidden room at Hogwarts to hone their wizarding skills in preparation for battle with the Dark Lord and his Death Eaters. . New adventure - more dangerous , more thrilling than ever - is yours in this enthralling film version of the fifth novel in J.K. Rowling's Harry Potter series. A terrifying showdown between good and evil awaits. Prepare for battle!
Alas! The fifth Harry Potter film has arrived. The time is long past that this can be considered a simple "children's" series--though children and adults alike will enjoy it immensely. Starting off from the dark and tragic ending of the fourth film, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix begins in a somber and angst-filled tone that carries through the entire 138 minutes (the shortest of any HP movie despite being adapted from the longest book). Hopes of winning the Quidditch Cup have been replaced by woes like government corruption, distorted media spin, and the casualties of war. As the themes have matured, so have the primary characters' acting abilities. Ron (Rupert Grint), Hermione (Emma Watson), and especially Harry (Daniel Radcliffe) are more convincing than ever--in roles that are more demanding.

Harry is deeply traumatized from having witnessed Cedric Diggory's murder, but he will soon find that this was just another chapter in the continuing loss he will endure. Lord Voldemort (Ralph Fiennes) has returned and, in an attempt to conceal this catastrophe from the wizarding public, the Ministry of Magic has teamed up with the wizard newspaper The Daily Prophet to smear young Potter and wise Dumbledore (Michael Gambon)--seemingly the only two people in the public eye who believe the Dark Lord has returned. With no one else to stand against the wicked Death Eaters, the Hogwarts headmaster is forced to revive his secret anti-Voldemort society, the Order of the Phoenix. This welcomes back characters like Mad-Eye Moody (Brendan Gleeson), kind Remus Lupin (David Thewlis), fatherly Sirius Black (Gary Oldman), and insidious Severus Snape (Alan Rickman), and introduces a short list of intriguing new faces. In the meantime, a semi-psychotic bureaucrat from the Ministry (brilliantly portrayed by Imelda Staunton) has seized power at Hogwarts, and Harry is forced to form a secret society of his own--lest the other young wizards at his school be left ill-equipped to defend themselves in the looming war between good and evil. In addition, Harry is filled with an inexplicable rage that only his Godfather Sirius seems to be able to understand.
This film, though not as frightening as its predecessor, earns its PG-13 rating mostly because of the ever-darkening tone. As always, the loyal fans of J.K. Rowling's books will suffer huge cuts from the original plot and character developments, but make no mistake: this is a good movie. --Jordan Thompson

 

Coraline

A dark and creepy film about family relationships directed by Henry Selick of Nightmare Before Christmas and James and the Giant Peach fame, Coraline is based on the haunting book Coraline by Neil Gaiman. The first stop-motion feature shot in stereoscopic 3-D, Coraline features big-headed, stick-bodied animated characters with huge eyes and demonic grins set against menacing backgrounds and an undercurrent of spooky music. Coraline is a teenager who has just moved to an old house in the middle of nowhere with her writer parents and she is bored, bored, bored. Her only companions are an annoyingly talkative boy Wybie (short for Why Born), some eccentric neighbors from the theater and circus, and a strange, button-eyed doll with a marked resemblance to Coraline which Wybie found in an old trunk of his grandmother's. When Coraline finds an old door hidden behind an armoire and papered over with wallpaper, she convinces her mother to unlock it, only to find a wall of bricks. When Coraline revisits the door later that night, the bricks magically disappear and she discovers a strange pathway to another world where everything is just what she wishes for. In stark contrast to the real world where Coraline's parents just don't have time for her, her "Other Mother" and "Other Father" in this alternate world are the perfect loving, attentive parents who anticipate her every need and desire. Initially comforted and quite happy in this new world, suspicion that things may not be quite as they seem grows inside Coraline and her disquiet is furthered by the mute "Other Wybie" and a strange-talking cat that seems to move between both worlds. Eventually, Coraline discovers some dark secrets about her "other parents" and the seemingly perfect "other world," but it may be too late for her to escape back to the real world. Teri Hatcher is especially effective in her dual (voice) role as Mom and "Other Mom" and Dakota Fanning also gives a great performance as Coraline. Coraline is a disturbing, intriguing film that both captivates and frightens. (Ages 11 and older) --Tami Horiuchi

Watchmen

The extended director's cut restores 24 minutes of connective tissue to the 162-minute film, most significantly the last scene of Hollis Mason, the first Nite Owl. Other elements help restore and fill in details that had been in the graphic novel. Fans of the film will be glad for the extra footage but there's nothing momentous that will change anyone's basic like or dislike of the film.
By far the most interesting Blu-ray feature (in addition to the great picture and DTS-HD Master Audio sound) is the Maximum Movie Mode, which incorporates several features into the viewing experience. Director Zack Snyder periodically appears on screen in front of two large monitors, one continuing to play the movie and the other displaying special-effects shots or scenes from the graphic novel. Snyder talks about how he shot the film and points out details in a variety of scenes: the opening with the Comedian, Dr. Manhattan's lab, the Nite Owl ship, Mars, Antarctica, and the ending (and why it was changed for the movie). This feature is much more interesting than an audio commentary or a standard picture-in-picture commentary so it'd be nice if it had been done for more scenes. Also appearing in Maximum Movie Mode is a timeline contrasting events in the Watchmen world with the "real world," occasional picture-in-picture comments by cast and crew, still galleries, and a series of 11 "focus points" that allow you to exit the film to watch these three-minute featurettes (sets, costumes, the Minutemen, etc.). Worthy of mention is how easy the Maximum Movie Mode material is to find: Snyder's footage and the focus points are very visible (even in fast-forward), and you can also access the focus points directly from the main menu.

Everybody's favorite graphic novel comes to the screen (after years of rumors and false starts), less a roaring work of adaptation than a respectful and faithful take on a radical original. Watchmen is set in the mid-1980s, a time of increased nuclear tension between the United States and the Soviet Union, as Richard Nixon is enjoying his fifth term as president and the world's superheroes have been forcibly retired. (As you can probably tell, the mix of authentic history and alternate reality is heady.) Things begin with a bang: the mysterious high-rise murder of the Comedian (Jeffrey Dean Morgan), a masked hero with a checkered past, puts the rest of the retired superhero community on alert. The credits sequence, a series of tableaux that wittily catches us up on crime-fighting backstory, actually turns out to be the high point of the movie. Thereafter we meet the other caped and hooded avengers: the furious Rorschach (Jackie Earle Haley), the inexplicably naked Dr. Manhattan (Billy Crudup, amidst much blue-skinned, genital-swinging digital work), Silk Spectre II (Malin Akerman), Nite Owl II (Patrick Wilson), and Ozymandias (Matthew Goode). The corkscrewing storytelling, which worked well in the comic book, gives the movie the strange sense of never quite getting in gear, even as some of the episodes are arresting. Director Zack Snyder (300) doesn't try to approximate the electric impact of the original (written by Alan Moore--who declined to be credited on the movie--and illustrated by Dave Gibbons) but retains careful fidelity to his source material. That doesn't feel right, even with the generally enjoyable roll-out of anecdotes. Even less forgivable is the blah acting, excepting Jeffrey Dean Morgan (lusty) and Patrick Wilson (mellow). Watchmen certainly fills the eyes, although less so the ears: the song choices are regrettable, especially during an embarrassing mid-air coupling between Nite Owl II and Silk Spectre II as they unite their--ah--Roman numerals. In the end it feels as though a huge work of transcription has been successfully completed, which isn't the same as making a full-blooded movie experience. --Robert Horton