DVD Releases: April 20, 2005


	House of Flying Daggers US/Canada Gross - $11.0 million The Hot Button: She is in the early morning of her movie career, the first slivers of light breaking the day. A hooker in her first high-profile performance seen in America and now a lioness of a mother, fighting for survival with Don Cheadle in Hotel Rwanda... The literal English translation of the Chinese title is "Ambushed From Ten Directions".

	Birth US/Canada Gross - $5.01 million There's almost nothing creepier than watching a pint-size actor impersonate an adult, especially when the kid is also required to seduce someone at least twice his age (pre-pubescent girls are mostly spared this ordeal). In Birth, young Cameron Bright's Sean is required to share a bath with Nicole Kidman's Anna, who believes the 10-year-old is the reincarnation of her dead husband. Beyond that particular adolescent wet dream, Birth is a somber mood piece that is neither scary nor particularly revealing in its investigation of paranormal phenomenon. This is in sharp contrast to Jonathan Glazer's madly kinetic feature debut, Sexy Beast. That said, Kidman gives a credible performance in a difficult role. The rest of the cast (Lauren Bacall, Anne Heche, Danny Huston and Peter Stormare, among them) appears to have been embalmed in pre-production. -- Gary Dretzka Pride, Unprejudiced: There's an old critical canard resounding down the overstuffed corridors of Jonathan Glazer's glacial, insupportably pretentious follow-up to the quirksome, inspired Sexy von Beast: only a gifted director could make a movie so serenely, egregiously awful and bad.

	Errol Flynn Collection Doris Day Collection Shirley Temple: Little Darling Pack Warners' The Errol Flynn Signature Collection puts all of the great swashbuckler's charismatic appeal and dynamic athleticism on full display, in a new-to-DVD collection of action-adventures and classic westerns. In addition to restored versions of Captain Blood, The Private Lives of Elizabeth and Essex, The Sea Hawk, They Died with Their Boots On and Dodge City are several historical featurettes and a feature-length biographical documentary. Anyone who's ever wondered what it meant to be, In like Flynn, will find the answer in this neat boxed set. The package also includes vintage cartoons, newsreels and trailers. If only he had lived long enough to play Johnny Depp's grandpa -- or Keith Richards' dad -- in the sequel to Pirates of the Caribbean. Also from Warners is The Doris Day Collection, which includes Billy Rose's Jumbo, Calamity Jane, The Glass Bottom Boat, Love Me or Leave Me, Lullaby of Broadway, The Pajama Game, Please Don't Eat the Daisies and Young Man with a Horn. The titles showcase the great range of the long-retired Day, an actress best remembered for a series of wink-wink/nod-nod romantic comedies from the early '60s, and a famously G-rated public persona. The bubbly blond was a fine singer, though, and an effective dramatic actor, too. Among the greats on display, as well, are Jimmy Durante, James Cagney, Lauren Bacall, Rod Taylor (another top box-office draw of the '60s), Kirk Douglas and Howard Keel. Paramount is also sending out DVD versions of Teacher's Pet and With Six You Get Eggroll, in which Day co-starred with Clark Gable and Brian Keith. Not to be undone, Universal has brought out its Shirley Temple: Little Darling Pack, with Little Miss Marker, Now and Forever and, for the first time on video, the short, Runt Page. Inspired by a Damon Runyon yarn, Little Miss Marker is the redemptive story of a small child, left as an IOU at a race track by her destitute father. As played by Temple, the tot charms the pants off a motley crew of hard-boiled gamblers. In Now and Forever, she plays the rediscovered daughter of a Gary Cooper, who, with the help of Carole Lombard, is trying to put himself back on the straight-and-narrow. Fixing other people's lives is what Temple's characters (and dimples) did best. -- Gary Dretzka

The TV Collections: Miracles, The Waltons, ER, Survivor Nowadays, it isn't only hit and cult-favorite TV series that can enjoy a productive life on DVD. Even failed series are being embraced by the new technology. The latest example is Miracles, a supernatural series ABC killed after only 6 of its 13 episodes aired in 2003. In it, Skeet Ulrich played an investigator of modern miracles who teams up with a more academic detective of the occult (Angus Macfadyen) and a sexy former cop (Maria Ramirez). Ostensibly, the target of their curiosity was some sort of apocalyptical menace, or another, but the real enemy turned out to be Saddam Hussein, as the war in Iraq interrupted the show's mid-season run, destroying whatever momentum it might have enjoyed. This boxed set includes all 13 episodes, as well as deleted scenes, commentary and an interview with the series' creator, Richard Hatem. Put it on a shelf alongside such TV-to-DVD fare as The X-Files, Millennium, Joan of Arcadia (coming May 10) and The 4400. This week's other new TV-to-DVD packages include, The Waltons: The Complete Second Season, ER: The Complete Third Season and the complete season of Survivor: The Australian Outback. -- Gary Dretzka

Iggy Pop: Live San Fran 1981 Whether Iggy Pop's primal rock-'n'-roll mien is being used to sell vacation cruises in commercials or dominate the stage in a San Francisco dive, it is a stunningly effective invention. Even wearing a mini-skirt, garter belt and stockings -- as Iggy does, in the otherwise primitive DVD, Iggy Pop: Live San Fran 1981 -- he's the living embodiment of the American rock dream and punk aesthetic. Given the kind of evidence on display in this and other MVD in-concert, shot in Paris and Detroit, it's disheartening to realize Iggy has yet to be inducted into Hall of Fame in Cleveland, where Billy Joel, the Lovin' Spoonful and Bobby Darin already are ensconced. His influence on several generations of rockers, and ability to survive 40 years in the fast lane, should qualify him for Pop-culture sainthood. Also new from the eclectic music label, MVD, are two high-profile additions to its extremely valuable Stars of Jazz Collection: Duke Ellington: Big Band Feeling and Miles Davis: Cool Jazz Sound. Accompanying the masters on these discs are all-stars casts of many of the most noteworthy soloists and sidemen in jazz history. -- Gary Dretzka

Devils on the Doorstep Recent headlines from China indicate that many in the People's Republic have yet to forgive their Japanese neighbors, for atrocities committed before and during World War II … apparently, for which the former oppressors resolutely refuse to issue any more apologies. Jiang Wen's Devils on the Doorstep, which won the Grand Jury Prize at the 2000 Cannes Film Festival before being banned back home, in China, revisits the northern front in the waning days of the war. The dark comedy describes what happens in one rural community, near the Great Wall, when its citizens are inserted into an extended showdown between Japanese occupiers and Chinese insurgents, who, previously, had viewed the troops as a buffoonish, if unwelcome nuisance. -- Gary Dretzka

Li'l Abner It's entirely possible that tens of thousands of American teenagers attend Sadie Hawkins Day dances each year without having the vaguest clue of its comic-strip origins. It was, of course, the creation of the late Al Capp, whose Li'l Abner was the Doonesbury of its day. This delightful Paramount release captures in brilliant Technicolor all the cornpone charm of the Broadway musical inspired by the denizens of Dogpatch, as well as the memorable songs created by the great lyricist Johnny Mercer and Gene de Paul. Melvin Frank's stagy adaptation couldn't possibly be any sillier, but there's no denying its goofy appeal. It's wonderful to Stubby Kaye in one of his signature performances, as Marryin' Sam, and sultry guest appearances by Julie Newmar (Stupefyin' Jones) and Stella Stevens (Appassionatta Von Climax). As was typical with Capp's work in the funny papers, the musical could be enjoyed as much for its wacky characters as its thinly disguised political satire. -- Gary Dretzka

A Fond Kiss In their award-winning A Fond Kiss, the consistently provocative Ken Loach and his frequent writing partner, Paul Laverty, describe the turmoil that ensues when a second-generation Pakistani goes against tradition, by falling in love with a blond who teaches at the parochial school his sister attends. There's more than enough intolerance and insensitivity to go around in A Fond Kiss, but most of it derives from parents and priests, who, when it comes to morality, believe God speaks through them. This makes A Fond Kiss sound far more unpleasant than it is. In addition to a lot of hurtful bickering, Loach invests much humor, warmth and vulnerability into his star-crossed lovers, and it makes them exceedingly vulnerable, likable and sympathetic. As a bonus, by Loach's usual standards, the movie's also atypically sexy. -- Gary Dretzka

Fade To Black As parties for soon-to-be-aborted retirements go, Jay-Z's Madison Square Garden soiree of November, 2003, was a doozey. As documented in the in-concert DVD Fade to Black, the event attracted a star-studded roster of hip-hop stars, including Missy Elliott, Foxy Brown, Pharell, Ghostface Killah, Kanye West, Mary J. Blige, Beanie Sigel, Memphis Bleek, R. Kelly and Beyonce. Twenty cameras were used to capture the fury of the sold-out show, which coincided with the release of Jay-Z's The Black Album. The DVD also captures many backstage and in-studio moments, as well as home movies and a deleted scene. Fellow hip-hop artist Method Man takes a slightly different tack in his direct-to-DVD directorial debut, The Strip Game. The Wu-Tang Clan mainstay joins friends Warren G, Redman, Scarface, Ghostface Killah, Cartoon and Travis Barker in an up-close-and-personal documentation of the trials, tribulations and triumphs of strippers. Any resemblance between The Strip Game and Snoop Dogg's Doggy Style video, of course, is purely coincidental. -- Gary Dretzka

MCN's 2004 DVD Year In Review
Doug Pratt's Ten Best - Multiplatter And Single Platter
Digital Nation: Gary Dretzka's Best DVDs of the Year
Ray Pride's Five Best DVDs And Five Best Boxed Sets