New Releases for March 30th

Compared to last week, this is a pretty light bunch of movies, but some great stuff's coming out regardless, including a great Criterion set of Pedro Costa films including Ossos, In Vanda’s Room, and Colossal Youth, the excellent Oscar nominated An Education and the tons of fun Sherlock Holmes all drop today.

Check out all the trailers below and plan accordingly (get here early) if you're looking to get your hands on anything.

Afghan Star


Alvin & the Chipmunks 2: The Squeakquel


Baader Meinhoff Complex


Did You Hear About the Morgans


An Education


High Kick Girl


Letters From Fontainhas: Three Films By Pedro Costa (Criterion)
Ossos


In Vanya's Room


Colossal Youth


Sherlock Holmes


Under the Sea

selected new relases for 3/23

today we have tons, TONS I SAY, of excellent new releases that are bound to excite and intrigue madison's film-loving masses. in all seriousness, the scuttlebutt around the store is that this is the heftiest bunch of flicks we've ever had in the history of four star.

if you have a blu-ray player (see how i made the text BLUE?), prepare for us to make your week with a bunch of new and old criterions as well as some other high-def surprises (african queen!) coming at you from the new release wall.

point your interweb browsers over to the four star site for a more complete listing of the good stuff we have coming out starting at midnight tonight.

sorry for any formatting issues. the NEW and IMPROVED blogger interface leaves a LOT to be desired.

African Queen (BOGART! HEPBURN! Both standard AND BLU versions)

Bigger than Life (Criterion!)

Blind Side (Oscar best-pic nominated, best actress WINNING! Pretty sure we have the Blu of this too, but no guarantees)

Brothers (Maguire! Gyllennhaal! Portman! THREE BEAUTIFUL PEOPLE!)

Days of Heaven (TERRENCE MALIK IN STUNNING BLU-RAY!)

Fantastic Mr. Fox (Wes Anderson! Stop-Motion! Also in Blu!)

Hachi (the TRAILER ALONE for this movie made people I know cry)

Mad Men: Season 3 (You've heard of this show, right?)

Men Who Stare at Goats (George Clooney! With a MUSTACHE! Also: Jedi jokes with Ewan McGregor! HAR! Also in Blu!)

Sanjuro (Kurosawa! Blu! ALSO note Yojimbo Blu below)

Seraphine

Son of Man

Taxidermia (Look at that poster and TRY to not want to know what's up with this movie!)

Toy Story (PIXAR Blu!)

Toy Story 2 (MORE PIXAR Blu!)

Yell for Cadel (Heads-up bike lovers!)

Yesterday was a Lie (Tons of little festival related olive branches(is that what they are?) all over the box for this one)

Yojimbo (More Kurosawa! Sanjuro's older brother! Blu!)

Zombies of Mass Destruction (Zombies! Mass Destruction!)

Notable selections from the upcoming March 16th new releases.

Dillinger Is Dead -Directed by Marco Ferreri

For Ferreri film was very much used as a continuation, or perhaps an advancement, of the theater of the absurd. 'Dilliger is Dead' happens to be one of the most meritorious of all art-house films but was somehow rarely ever screened and could have been forgotten if Criterion hadn't come along to save it. In my opinion this is the most exciting dvd they've put out all year.



Broken Embraces- Pedro Almodovar:

My favorite Almodovar in years and perhaps his most entertaining one ever, it covers some familiar territory for him but he handles the subject matter perfectly this time around. As with most of his previous work this is a film buffs wet dream with references from Hitchcock to Michael Powell with some Almodovar himself in between. Plus Penelope Cruz stars in it and I firmly believe she is one of the best actresses alive.



Fernando Arrabal Collection

Sometimes the best new releases are the ones we don't even have on our release list. Often they are customer requests and sometimes they are requested by the employees themselves. For those who aren't in the know, Fernando Arrabal, is a Spanis director, poet, playwright & novelist. His cohort, Alejandro Jodorowsky, is more well known but they founded the Panic movement together along with Roland Topor. Arrabal's own play 'Fando y Lis' was actually adapted into Jodorowsky's first movie. We already had 'I Walk Like A Crazy Horse' & 'Viva Muerte' in the store but this collection rounds out what work of his is available on dvd, most notably 'Car Cemetery' which was based on his own play. Also included is 'The Emperor of Peru' starring Mickey Rooney and a collection of his short films featuring 'Borges, Life of a Poet,' 'Farewell Babylon,' & 'Arrabal Panik Cineast.'

new release picks: march 9th

boondock saints 2



if you're gonna be renting this (and a lot of you are), then PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE also rent overnight, the documentary about the up and down life of director troy duffy and the making of the first boondock saints movie.

capitalism: a love story



like a lot of people, i have some complex feelings about michael moore, and have less and less patience with his showboating antics, but dang if he isn't able to dig up some excellent illustrative narratives and weave them into a well-paced, consistently engaging documentary.

pirate radio (aka the boat that rocked)



this one's worth it for the soundtrack alone, and that it will make you think back to philip seymore hoffman as lester bangs in almost famous.

precious



i haven't seen this, and personally have very little interest to see it, but i can bet that there are a ton of people who are gonna keep this from being readily available for at least a couple of weeks. i'd say pick it up if only to see mildly mustachioed mariah carey make amends for her role in glitter.

up in the air



this was a really great film (my personal pick of the week), and i'm really happy with the way that jason reitman (juno, thank you for smoking) is shaping up as a director. george clooney is excellent in this, as is the rest of the cast, including danny mcbride in a subtle turn as the pyramid scheming brother in law. just an out and out great little film.

new release picks: march 2nd

Beaches of Agnes



excellent documentary about one of the most ingenious filmmakers, as made by said filmmaker. it's perfectly fitting since so much of agnes varda's work as been semi, if not outright, autobiographical. if, like many people, you enjoy the visual whimsy of directors like michel gondry or terry gilliam, this is highly recommended.

Ponyo on a Cliff by the Sea



this has quickly become one of my favorite miyazaki films. that phrase alone "miyazaki film" should have you ready to go on this thing, but if you need any more prodding, it's a crazy japanese riff on the little mermaid story, and is visually stunning as well as out and out weird. even weirder than spirited away in many ways.

Tell Them Anything You Want

i don't know what happened with this, but it should have been a bonus feature on a beefed up where the wild things are dvd, cause that disc is kinda weak extras wise. anyway, this is yet another great release from adam yauch's oscilloscope laboratories, which has been batting a thousand as far as i can see.

what you see is what you get here: spike jonze interviews maurice sendak over the course of making where the wild things are, talking about everything from sendak's childhood to his obsession with death stemming from an experience with the lindbergh baby. great little documentary that highlights the deep friendship that has developed between spike and maurice. be sure to check the extra with james gandolfini reading the night kitchen.

This Emotional Life



know right now that this three disc set is hefty, clocking in at 6 hours. it's truly engrossing though and absurdly informative, using some exceptional first person narratives and clinical studies (lots of them originating from UW, oddly enough) to illustrate its points. also, the bits of interviews with chevy chase will forever change how you see the man.

Where the Wild Things Are



this is the big one of the week (other than 2012 i guess). much has been said about how this movie nailed the childhood experience, but i think it's worth noting that it also, perhaps more notably, gets the ways that children perceive adult emotions right too. excellent film that, like it or not, is quite thought provoking.

all these, and more are available for rent after 12pm on monday night/tuesday morning. that midnight thing always trips me up.

new release picks

celestial navigations: short films of al jarnow



i'm pretty sure i was the one who requested this one, but it's truly a stunning labor of love that deserves your attention. this is the first dvd put together and released by the numero group, a smallish record label based out of chicago that focuses on reissuing small long forgotten funk, soul and r&b groups, and it's a real doozy. you've likely seen some of jarnow's surreal stop-motion animation works that were commissioned by sesame street, but the wealth of amazing work on here, especially the half hour documentary, is really stunning and i can't recommend it highly enough.

dead snow



ZOMBIE NAZIS! NAZI ZOMBIES! i think i'm one of the only people at four star that outright loved this film. we've had a couple of off region discs in for a while, but they've consistently been rented, so here's your chance to get your hands on some of the gory fun.

the informant!



i don't understand how this film garnered not a single oscar nomination, and should have absolutely bumped the blind side off the best picture list. damon got nominated for invictus (where he's likely to lose), but should have been nominated for this (where he'd be a strong contender). if you were unawares, this frighteningly non-fiction film was based on a segment of this american life that i highly recommend, if only to compare its seriousness with the humor of the movie.

keep your eyes peeled for someone crashing the red carpet wearing a shirt that reads "soderbergh was ROBBED" cause that's gonna be me.

the full list of other new releases can be found at the four star video heaven website, and, as always, new releases are available monday night at midnight.

you're my tenderoni

the NSFW red-band trailer to the new kevin smith flick looks pretty awesome, but i'm basing my feelings mainly on the nut-shot to a 10 year old. bruce and tracy morgan look pretty good, even if this is undoubtedly tracy's flick. this'll be the first of kevin's movies to be based on a script he didn't write, and i'm still unsure if that's gonna be a good thing or a bad thing.

as much as i love kevin smith, i keep wondering more and more why, especially after re-watching zach and miri, but regardless, i got high hopes for this one.

final note: there's something to be said for a trailer that neither tips its hand plot wise, nor shows you every one of the funniest parts.

make way for tomorrow

orson welles has said that leo mccarey's 1937 film make way for tomorrow was the saddest movie ever made.

if this is indeed true, then criterion tapping cartoonist seth to do the design work was a stroke of genius.

be sure to look for it on the new release wall on feb 23d.

his soul is still dancing

maybe i live a somewhat movie glutted life, but the press surrounding the distribution troubles of films like antichrist, big fan, and terry gillaim's imaginarium of doctor parnassus was pretty ubiquitous.

the two biggest casualties of this studio nearsightedness though are werner herzog's my son my son, what have ye done, and the "i's not a sequel or a remake" bad lieutenant: port of call new orleans.

these are both art house fare for the most part, but bad lieutenant potentially had some legs on it, what with the ridiculous amount of free press that the ever-quotable herzog tends to drum up, and the CRAZY trailer that didn't end up running in front of anything i saw in a theater this year:



i'm optimistically skeptical (skeptically optimistic?) about whether or not this is going to be awesome, but how can i make that determination without it even screening anywhere around here? did everyone think it was going to be as bad as the poster made it look? where you at, sundance cinemas?

the other herzog flick to come out last year looks just as interesting, but lacks the "nicholas cage be CRAZY" angle promised by port of call NO.



here's to hoping these get some screen time here in madison. i'd like to use the four star new release wall as a means of seeing these a second time instead of a first.

new releases: highlights

there's an astounding set of films coming out this week. so much oscar heat and films of the year contenders are gonna be jockeying for position on the new arrivals wall come midnight this monday.

BIG FAN


IN THE LOOP


HURT LOCKER


MOON


DEPARTURES