DVD new releases today - April 22nd, 2008
Charlie Wilson’s War (6/10): Tom Hanks and Philip Seymour Hoffman should be able to make anything cool, especially a cool story with a good director like this. This is quite funny, and quite smart, just not nearly deep enough.
Cloverfield (8/10): If you combined Blair Witch with Godzilla, it wouldn’t seem like a very good idea. But it is. Cloverfield kicks ass. Rent it.
The Savages: Could be the best movie released today. Philip Seymour Hoffman and Laura Linney in a family comedy that got a little bit of Oscar love.
Resurrecting The Champ (6/10): Samuel L. Jackson’s best performance since Pulp Fiction is almost wasted in a decent, but forgettable movie about a down-and-out homeless former boxer.
Starting Out In The Evening: An aging novellist is slipping into obscurity, but when he meets a graduate student who wants to use his work as part of her grad thesis, he must confront his demons. Or something. Could be OK.
Wonder Pets Rescue The Beetles (3/10): A show for tiny kids where a duck, a hamster and a turtle rescue some baby animals. Including mop-topped beetles in a yellow submarine.
Shrooms: A horror movie where some kids take mushrooms, and then have to figure out what horrors are real and which ones are mushroom-induced. Whee!
PTU: Police Tactical Unit (4/10): Johnnie To has made many movies that were far better. This is a movie about cops with no regard for human rights plying their violent and unethical trade in China. They’re heroes!
Boot Camp (3/10): Mila Kunis (That 70s Show, Forgetting Sarah Marshall) is sent to a rehab house that appears to be an idyllic island paradise, but turns out to be a horrible prison where torture and brainwashing are de rigeur. At least she gets naked.
Laverne and Shirley Complete 4th Season (4/10): I guess the first three seasons were profitable enough for Paramount to release the fourth as well. God only knows why.
Punk Love: Like a Bonnie and Clyde, or a Badlands, on a much smaller scale. Two punks in love commit petty crimes to get by as they travel, then things go wrong, and they have only their love to keep them toge…whatever.