New Releases for Tuesday, April 10, 2012

Posted Apr 10, 2012 by John Allman

Updated Apr 10, 2012 at 07:58 PM

What’s new in stores and on video shelves this week:

The Darkest Hour
Genre: Sci-Fi
Directed by: Chris Gorak
Run time: 89 minutes
Rating: PG-13
Format: Blu-Ray

The Lowdown: I’m completely over this annoying trend of genre movies being heralded as coming “From one of the producers of…” or “From two of the guys who went to school with the guy who wrote…”

It’s a cheap marketing ploy that’s supposed to generate confidence that if you liked Movie A, then you’re going to love this new flick because some of the same people were involved.

What it really means, sadly, is that they’ve gift-wrapped a steaming pile of crap and they’re trying to pass it off as something special, hoping that the good will you felt about that other movie will carry over.

Such is the case with “The Darkest Hour,” which is described this way on its official website: “A new thriller presented by the visionary director of WANTED.”

That visionary director would be Timur Bekmambetov, and yes, he’s done some pretty incredible work, but he should be embarrassed to have his name associated with “The Darkest Hour.”

For one, it takes a cool idea – aliens invade Earth, only this time you get to see the invasion from an exotic locale that rarely gets used, ie Moscow, Russia.

But unlike “Chernaya Molniya,” released as “Black Lightning” in the U.S. on video-on-demand, which Bekmambetov also produced, and which was actually an enjoyable Russian superhero origin story that made excellent use of its Moscow backdrop, “The Darkest Hour” does nothing with the fantastic scenery of Moscow other than treat it like any other major metropolitan area in an alien invasion/apocalyptic disaster flick.

In short, Moscow gets blowed up real good but you could substitute Des Moines, Iowa and no one would know the difference.

Another major stumbling block, and there are plenty, is the fact that the aliens in “The Darkest Hour” are cloaked inside electromagnetic force fields (I think), which renders them invisible to the naked eye. That’s right – they’re invisible, minus one scene where I think a rejected alien design from “Independence Day” is faintly visible inside its pulsing orb of energy, but it happens so fast that you can’t get a real good look at the creature.

Another major stumbling block is the casting, which parachutes two annoying American entrepreneurs into Moscow for a failed business deal that should have netted them millions. The ease with which these two idiots give up on their million-dollar deal is laughable. But that’s understandable because the Americans are Max Minghella (he of zero charisma) and Emile Hirsch, who pole vaults well ahead of Shia LeBeouf to the top of the list of douchey young actors you can’t stand to watch. I actually was rooting for the invisible aliens to kill them both before the film was halfway through.

Why? Well, I’m glad you asked, so I’ll tell you.

“The Darkest Hour” is that it’s the type of bad sci-fi film where a character suddenly makes a major breakthrough about the threat they’re facing and you know that there’s absolutely no way they are smart enough to have come to that reasonable conclusion (other than someone had to have the epiphany or else the movie would just end with the aliens winning and subletting whole continents as vacation resorts for other extraterrestrial species.)

The last major gripe with “The Darkest Hour” is the disrespect with which it treats genre fans. How many times do we have to watch an alien invasion movie where the main heroes, outgunned and seconds from certain death, suddenly stumble across something that helps turn the tide?

In this case, the Americans find a group of Russian militia guys who just happen to speak English and immediately agree to help a bunch of stupid foreigners whom they would completely disregard in real life.

And, of course, Hirsch gets to be the hero and he gets to make incredibly stupid pronouncements about leading the resistance and taking the Earth back one country at a time.

That’s actually how “The Darkest Hour” ends, with Hirsch informing everyone, that he has discovered the key to fighting back against the invisible aliens and their electromagnetic force fields.

The hubris of the film, to actually position itself for a sequel, is worse than offensive. It’s hysterical given how bad this first film is.

The Stuff You Care About:
Hot chicks – Yeah, but the hotness is overshadowed by the ridiculousness.
Nudity – No.
Gore – No.
Drug use – No.
Bad Guys/Killers – Invisible aliens from outer space.
Buy/Rent – Neither.
Blu-Ray Bonus Features – Director’s commentary, deleted scenes, featurette and a new, short film, “The Darkest Hour: Survivors.”
On the Web – http://www.darkesthourmovie.com/

Also Available:

The Iron Lady

Into The Abyss

True Story of a Woman in Jail: Sex Hell

The Terror Experiment

Debauchery

Adam-12: The Final Season

Hidden

Sleeping Beauty

The Witches of Oz

Marvel Knights: Astonishing X-Men - Dangerous

Doctor Who: The Daemons

Doctor Who: Carnival of Monsters (Special Edition)

Bounce

Kate & Leopold

Laverne and Shirley: The Complete Fifth Season

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New Releases for Tuesday, April 3, 2012

Posted Apr 7, 2012 by John Allman

Updated Apr 7, 2012 at 10:44 AM

What’s new in stores and on video shelves this week:

Torchwood: Miracle Day
Genre: Sci-Fi/TV
Created by: Russell T. Davies
Run time: 450 minutes
Rating: Unrated
Format: Blu-Ray

The Lowdown: It’s high praise, but well-earned, to say that there really is nothing on TV quite like “Torchwood.”

A spin-off of the BBC’s successful “Doctor Who” reincarnation, “Torchwood” has maintained a consistency that very few, if any, serial shows can rival.

“Torchwood” is smart TV. Wildly inventive, brazen and bold. It’s the type of show that has no qualms whatsoever killing off most of its original cast, in one episode.

The show struck out on its own in 2006, introducing the world to Capt. Jack Harkness, the dashing, time-traveling, immortal, bi-sexual rogue (played by the equally dashing John Barrowman), who leads a crack team of scientists and operatives battling all manner of bizarre alien life forms who come to Earth through a space-time rift in Cardiff, England.

After two regular seasons, show creator Russell T. Davies, the UK’s equivalent to Joss Whedon, decided to take the series in an unexpected direction, ditching the standard serialized format to pen epic 12-episode miniseries that focused on a single storyline.

The first, “Children of Earth,” where an alien race returns to collect on a brokered deal for 12 children, offerings to the alien race, in exchange for life on Earth to continue as normal. Heady stuff for a silly sci-fi show about aliens, which is what makes “Torchwood” so special.

“Miracle Day” is the second miniseries, and the first to move the Torchwood team to the United States, allowing for a host of American writers, namely Jane Espenson, one of the brilliant minds behind some of the best episodes of “Buffy the Vampire Slayer,” to put her unique voice and spin on the adventures of Capt. Jack and Gwen Cooper and her fiancé Rhys.

“Miracle Day” presents a fascinating quandary: What if, one day, no one died. And then the next day, no one died. What if death became obsolete, regardless of disease, violence, even dismemberment? How would the world respond to such a phenomenon, and who would stand to capitalize?

Davies & Co. have a field day imagining all the ramifications, from government response to medical futility to religious explanations to the enormous stress and strain that would be imposed on the world’s resources. The miniseries, wisely, begins with a convicted child molester and killer being put to death, only to survive, and even such things as life in prison begin to take on a whole new context.

By moving the Torchwood team, operating with no official sanction, to the U.S., and forcing Capt. Jack and Gwen to try to work to solve the mystery while narrowly avoiding the CIA and other government agencies, the series becomes a thrilling cat and mouse game, where every decision has far-reaching consequences.

Then the show introduces an even more fantastic element: What if a shadowy, sinister cabal had actually caused people to stop dying in order to create a new world order, and what if that cabal was using Jack’s blood, his immortal essence, to make it happen?

The cabal has a name, PhiCorp, and it exudes all the telltale signs of some of the world’s worst conglomerates. It controls everything from the media to public policy to health control. PhiCorp’s agents and allies are everywhere, and could be anyone.

In true Torchwood fashion, the miniseries concludes with a few unexpected twists. There are shocking, unexpected deaths. The deep bond between Jack and Gwen is tested in ways previously unheard of. And an even bigger conspiracy is hinted at, something that we, as fans, can only hope that the series will delve into in the next miniseries.

The Stuff You Care About:
Hot chicks – Yes.
Nudity – Yes.
Gore – Moderate.
Drug use – No.
Bad Guys/Killers – PhiCorp. Think Rupert Murdoch’s empire, only scarier.
Buy/Rent – Buy it.
On the Web – http://www.starz.com/originals/torchwood/Pages/title.aspx?src=starz_mktg&med=referral&cmp=torchwood&cid327

Also Available:

Alien Opponent – Remember those cheesy sci-fi movies from the 1980s that always featured a cadre of second-rung celebrities battling some extraterrestrial or paranormal menace? That’s basically “Alien Opponent,” only with “Rowdy” Roddy Piper and Jason London. It’s trashy and fun but not nearly as trashy or fun as it could have been.

Enter Nowhere – Remember that bad SyFy Channel movie about the girl who was really dead but didn’t know it and she spent 80 minutes running around in some dream-nightmare purgatory? This is that movie, except with three main characters.

We Bought a Zoo – Remember when Cameron Crowe made kickass movies that resonated with you, like “Say Anthing” or “Singles” or “Almost Famous”?

Bob: The Complete Series – Remember when the best Bob Newhart show ended with a dream? This is not that Bob Newhart show.

Madonna: Truth or Dare – Remember when Madonna wasn’t desperate to be adored? When she just was sexy and didn’t have to try? This is the time capsule you want to open then.

Girls Just Want to Have Fun – Remember when movies didn’t have to be about anything other than a televised dance competition and leg warmers? This is the 1980s cult classic for you.

Designing Women: The Complete Sixth Season – Remember when the TV producers got rid of Delta Burke because of her weight and “Designing Women” stopped being funny? This is the season for you.

Tyrannosaur – A deeply moving drama from actor/director Paddy Considine.

War Horse – Steven Spielberg takes the hit play to the screen and shows war through the eyes of a creature that cannot speak.

Chasing Madoff – A fictional take on the Bernie Madoff financial scandal.

Angels Crest – Fans of “The Vampire Diaries” take note: Joseph Morgan, Klaus himself, co-stars in this small-town thriller about a bad decision that wrecks an entire town.

4 Film Collections: Nicole Kidman, Renee Zellweger, Gwyneth Paltrow – Four films each from three of our most beloved actresses. If only such clunkers as “New in Town” and “Bounce” weren’t included.

Not To Be Overlooked:

Thou Shalt Not Kill…Except (Synapse Films, 83 minutes, Unrated, Blu-Ray): Pick up this cult classic for the creative team responsible, which includes Sam Raimi and Bruce Campbell, but stay for the Special Feature extra, “Stryker’s War,” the 40-minute Super 8mm short film starring Campbell that inspired the feature-length film.

Mystery Science Theater 3000: The Wild World of Batwoman and Girl in Gold Boots (Shout! Factory, 164 minutes, Unrated, DVD): Two stand-alone MST3K titles from the 1960s, both awful below-B-grade cult films, given the loving tribute by Mike, Tom Servo and Crow T. Robot.

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New Releases for Tuesday, March 27, 2012

Posted Mar 31, 2012 by John Allman

Updated Mar 31, 2012 at 11:41 AM

What’s new in stores and on video shelves this week:

Strip Nude for Your Killer
Genre: Italian Giallo
Directed by: Andrea Bianchi
Run time: 98 minutes
Rating: Unrated
Format: Blu-Ray

The Lowdown: The inside cover of the new Blu-Ray packaging for “Strip Nude for Your Killer” pretty much says it all about the latest “cult classic,” a very loose interpretation, to be upgraded to high definition by Blue Underground.

It features a full-color publicity shot of a topless starlet, her bosom heaving, right behind the cradle that holds the disc.

“Strip Nude” is pulpy 1970s exploitation at its best – part slasher, part soft-core porn – filtered through the non-discriminating story structure of an Italian giallo. 

Director Andrea Bianchi is best known for the 1981 zombie camp classic, “Burial Ground,” which could be found in every horror section at every Mom-n-Pop VHS rental store in the early 80s.

But “Strip Nude,” which came out in 1975, is probably his best work, and that’s not saying much. The plot concerns a group of professionals in the fashion modeling industry who start dying in connection to a fashion model who dies prior to the credits while having an abortion. And every victim is forced to disrobe – strip naked! – just before they are killed.

This is not Masterpiece Theater. This is an aging blonde fashion icon seducing a new starlet by having her cavort half-naked around a set. This is spontaneous nudity for no reason other than the director shouted ‘And…’Boobs!’ at the start of the scene.

This isn’t even on the level of Dario Argento’s worst effort. It follows a specific formula – victim appears on screen, they have a brief moment’s peace and then suddenly, a slim, leather-clad, helmet-wearing motorcycle rider materializes and slices said victim into pieces. Every major character or creepy supporting extra is teased as possibly being the killer, with the killer’s true identity withheld until the final frame.

“Strip Nude” is a questionable choice for Blu-Ray upgrade, if only because there seem to be so many more-deserving, legitimate camp and cult classic films out there that might make a better argument for mass-market distribution. But as a sleazy Italian sex-slasher, it’s a definite guilty pleasure, the kind of movie that I used to seek out greedily when I was 12 years old and scouring the shelves at the local pick-a-flick for some lurid, trashy entertainment.

The Stuff You Care About:
Hot chicks – Hot, voluptuous 1970s babes.
Nudity – Gratuitous
Gore – Yes
Drug use – No
Bad Guys/Killers – The man, or woman, hmmm, in the all-black leather motorcycle outfit.
Buy/Rent – Buy it.
Blu-Ray Bonus Features – International and Italian theatrical trailers, interviews, poster and still gallery.

Also Available:

Chipwrecked: Alvin and the Chipmunks

In the Land of Blood and Honey

Eureka: Season 4.5

Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close

A Dangerous Method

Breaking Wind

BBC High Definition Natural History Collection: Planet Earth, Wild China, Galapagos, Ganges

The Heir Apparent: Largo Winch

Roger Corman Presents: Camel Spiders

Die

The Broken Tower

The Gruesome Death of Tommy Pistol

Betty White: Champion for Animals

Mystery Science Theater 3000: XXIII – King Dinosaur, The Castle of Fu Manchu, Code Name: Diamond Head and Last of the Wild Horses

Cat Dog: Season 1, Part 2

Not To Be Overlooked:

Game of Thrones: The Complete First Season

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New Releases for Tuesday, March 20, 2012

Posted Mar 25, 2012 by John Allman

Updated Mar 25, 2012 at 12:51 PM

What’s new in stores and on video shelves this week:

The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo
Genre: Thriller/Remake
Directed by: David Fincher
Run time: 158 minutes
Rating: R
Format: Blu-Ray

The Lowdown: The Chicken and the Egg.

From one comes the other, and vice versa – a perpetual circle of life that produces a very distinct end result, sustenance for all mankind.

We don’t think about the egg when we eat the chicken. The egg just exists. We don’t stand in the kitchen having an internal argument about which one came first. We don’t make comparisons. We crack the egg, we cook it, we enjoy it and move on.

If only the same rules applied to movies, which can be a lot like the chicken and the egg when multiple versions populate the video shelf.

It’s not that someone has tinkered with a beloved property. A lot of remakes today are mid-level B-grade flicks that only rabid fans coveted.

In fact, I’m usually all for a different interpretation. All I ask is that the director do something, anything to make it his or her own.

That doesn’t always happen. Look at Gus Van Sant’s odd take on “Psycho,” which is essentially a shot for shot redo with different actors.

Other directors make slight or major deviations, breaking from the former by taking a wholly different approach to a single scene, revising the ending or excising huge chunks of narrative altogether.

Usually, moves that get remade are ones that have steeped into the collective conscience for many, many years. In the past decade, however, remake fever has gripped Hollywood at an unhealthy pace, driving studio executives to remake movies that weren’t that great the first time.

And, in the past five years particularly, the trend has been for successful, subtitled foreign films to get remade quickly for American audiences. Horror has been the go-to genre to suffer the most remakes in this regard, as directors ran through more than a dozen Japanese thrillers, only to find a handful of middling hits.

Two recent remakes that stand out, however, both arrived in the past two years.

“Let Me In” is a captivating second look at “Let the Right One In,” an incredibly innovative and shocking Swedish vampire film. There are a lot of similarities, but director Matt Reeves makes just enough tweaks to distinguish his version from Tomas Alfredson’s original.

And then there is David Fincher’s “The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo,” which arrives 33 months after Niels Arden Oplev’s Swedish version.

It’s nearly impossible to watch Fincher’s version without comparing it to Oplev’s original. It’s damn distracting, honestly, to the point that I wished there had never been a Swedish version, or at least that I had yet to see it.

It’s not that GWTDT is such a stunning work of art that there should be only one definitive film. It’s not even that the main character, the bisexual computer hacking, chain smoking, avenging angel Lisbeth Salander, is so iconic, you can only have one actress play her.  (Both Noomi Rapace and Rooney Mara approach her in different ways, creating very distinguishable, highly engrossing portrayals.)

Maybe it’s because the two films are so similar that you wish you could splice together an Ultimate GWTDT film by using the best bits from both. Somewhere, someone, I’m sure, is already hard at work on that task. And honestly, I would watch it.

But that’s the quandary that keeps you from completely losing yourself in a very fine, very edgy, very adult film from one of the best directors working today.

Fincher’s version ranks up there with his other dark, serial killer entries, “Se7en” and “Zodiac,” but it fails to match the meatiness of either of those exemplary thrillers.

He does a lot of things better than Oplev, starting with an unbelievably cool title sequence that comes off like the opening credits to a fetishized James Bond(age)  adventure. The score by Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross is superb, dark and dangerously haunting.

The sexual deviancy is amped up, but Fincher wisely doesn’t try to outdo Oplev, and he actually downplays two of the three rape scenes, saving his best dirty bits for Salander’s revenge on her court-appointed overseer.

To be fair, it should be noted that Mara’s performance is brilliant and brave. She bares everything and makes it work, and within 15 minutes of her being on screen, you forget about Rapace.

Daniel Craig actually detracts from your enjoyment of Mikael Blomkvist. He has become one of those actors who is difficult to separate from the character he is most associated with, in this case 007. In my opinion, Michael Nyqvist’s performance is much better.

And the central mystery that propels GWTDT is still complex enough to withstand a return visit. Fincher uses his unique style to great effect during the investigative scenes, particularly when Salander is sharing with Blomkvist a series of crime scene photos from previous victims.

So what’s the final verdict? Is it worth your time to watch another version of a story that you already know with characters you already love?

Yes, it is. Definitely.

Just be prepared to feel a little frustration at points when your brain flickers back to a previous memory of certain scenes. It’s a vexing sensation of déjà vu that doesn’t cripple your enjoyment, but it definitely makes you work hard to push past the past and feel something new.

The Stuff You Care About:
Hot chicks – Rooney Mara, smoking hot as Lisbeth Salander
Nudity – Yes, gratuitous
Gore – Minimal
Drug use – No
Bad Guys/Killers – If you’ve read the book, you know. If not, you have to watch.
Buy/Rent – Buy it.
Blu-Ray Bonus Features – Director’s commentary; The Vanger Archives, a four-plus hour, multi-part documentary; Interactive main title featurette with commentary.
On the Web – http://www.dragontattoo.com/site/

A Lonely Place to Die (IFC, 99 minutes, Unrated, Blu-Ray): Director Julian Gilbey’s survival thriller “A Lonely Place to Die” takes two played-out genres, the kidnap for ransom and the stalked in the woods thrillers, and tries mightily to make something new and fresh.

Gilbey is mostly successful, aided in large part by the reigning go-to B-movie heroine, Melissa George, whose very physical performance keeps “Lonely” crackling even when it lags.

The basic plot is nothing new – Five friends set out on an adrenaline-junkie excursion to scale a mountain. They discover a young girl buried alive in the forest. And suddenly one or more unseen antagonists are chasing them down the mountain, hunting them like prey.

Gilbey manages to shock his audience with unexpected deaths that rely more on surprise than gory special effects. He keeps a tight lid on answers to basic questions, like who are the hunters and why did they bury a young girl alive and what’s with the armed security detail sent with the bag man to pay the ransom to get the girl back.

And he makes spectacular use of the natural world, staging several intense, white-knuckle set pieces on a sheer cliff face where one wrong move spells instant death.

The last 30 minutes becomes a little formulaic, but an unexpectedly dark ending recaptures the rebel spirit that Gilbey seems to have been trying to maintain throughout. It’s an appropriate, if not completely satisfying, close to a well-made survival thriller that doesn’t necessarily rise to the top of the genre, but still manages to kick the crap out of standard Hollywood fare like “Cliffhanger.”

Battle Royale: The Complete Collection (Anchor Bay, 369 minutes, Unrated, Blu-Ray): There have been a lot of comparisons made between “Battle Royale,” one of the original Japanese thrillers, and “The Hunger Games,” one of the most anticipated films of 2012.

Both films focus on high-school age young adults who are forced by their respective governments to fight each other to the death. And both were based on popular fiction novels.

But that’s really where the comparison ends.

“Battle Royale,” released in 2000, heralded the arrival of J-Horror as a legitimate sub-genre. It was shocking and controversial and got banned in several countries despite being a huge commercial success in Japan.

Director Kinji Fukasaku’s vision of the future doesn’t focus on the whys or the hows. He isn’t interested in showing a dystopian future where society celebrates such violence by tuning in to watch young people destroy each other, a la Roger Corman’s pulpy “Death Race 2000.”

Fukasaku instead focuses more on how the game changes its participants, freeing some to unleash the killer barely contained inside, while showing others at their weakest, unable or unwilling to comprehend or accept what has happened, and dying spectacular deaths as a result.

“Battle Royale” is basically “Lord of the Flies” on acid. Some of the students are indistinguishable. Others stand out for their bloodthirsty acceptance of the kill-or-be-killed rules that are established with brutal, blunt efficiency by one of the group’s teachers. An early scene, after the students have woken on an island with electronic collars affixed to their necks, shows a student who refuses to participate being knifed and then blown up by the teacher. The demonstration is meant to show that the collars are actually explosive devices. It’s effective and chilling.

Anchor Bay has pulled out all the stops in finally releasing “Battle Royale,” and its slightly lesser sequel, “Battle Royale II: Requiem,” as a complete collection on Blu-Ray. The stylish collectible boxed set comes with three versions of the two films, both the director’s and theatrical cuts of the first film, and the director’s cut of the sequel. There are a host of special features, including behind-the-scenes documentaries, audition and rehearsal footage, press junkets and more.

This one is a must-buy first day.

“Battle Royale,” along with “Audition” and “Ringu,” remain the gold standard of high-concept, envelope-pushing, thought-provoking Japanese genre filmmaking.

Also Available:

Splintered

Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy

Carnage

Roadie

Hop

The Muppets

The Sitter

Snow White: A Deadly Summer

National Lampoon’s The Legend of Awesomest Maximus

Hey Arnold! Season 2

Jane by Design: The Complete First Season

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New Releases for Tuesday, March 13, 2012

Posted Mar 25, 2012 by John Allman

Updated Mar 25, 2012 at 12:43 PM

What’s new in stores and on video shelves this week:

The Killing: The Complete First Season
Genre: TV/Crime Procedural
Created by: Veena Sud
Run time: 587 minutes
Rating: Unrated
Format: Blu-Ray

The Lowdown: “The Killing” doesn’t reinvent the police procedural by making broad-stroke, sweeping changes to the classic who-done-it formula.

Instead, it focuses an inordinate amount of time on the small, quiet details that often get overlooked, but which serve as the building blocks and load-bearing walls to hold a complex narrative upright.

The stunning AMC original, adapted from the hit Danish TV show “Forbrydelsen,” also is so smart that it doesn’t belittle its audience by showing conversations that are solely designed to progress the plot. You know what I mean – that scene in a movie where the main characters have been driving for three hours but only start to talk about the main issue at hand once they arrive at their destination, thereby ensuring the viewer gets to hear the conversation.

“The Killing” deftly juggles a trio of storylines, each one embarking on a twisty narrative that defies expectation or prediction.

There’s the main homicide investigation of 17-year-old Rosie Larsen, which thrusts Det. Sarah Linden (the remarkable Mireille Enos) and newly transferred (and sober) Det. Stephen Holder into a case that consumes their every waking minute. Linden was supposed to be retiring the day that Larsen’s body was found. Her fiancé has already left Seattle for California, but she can’t break away. The toll that the case takes on her personal life is gut-wrenching.

There’s the saga of the Larsen family, former criminal turned respectable businessman Stan (Brent Sexton) and his wife Mitch (Michelle Forbes), as they deal with the devastation of losing a child and all the formalities that come with burying a loved one. I don’t know that I’ve ever witnessed a more realistic depiction of a family struggling with grief.

And, finally, there is City Councilman Darren Richmond, who is a heated campaign for mayor against an unscrupulous incumbent. Rosie Larsen’s body was found, bound, in the trunk of one of Richmond’s campaign cars.

Any of these narratives would make compelling TV, but combined, they create an unbelievably rich tapestry of human behavior that most prime-time serials can’t match.

And the season finale that supposedly alienated a lot of fans who felt cheated because it didn’t wrap everything up in a nice, tidy package? Personally, I think the ending was perfect. It set the stage for an explosive second season, and did everything you want most in establishing an effective, head-scratching cliff hanger that you absolutely do not see coming.

Do yourself a favor and rush out to buy or rent the first season before the second season begins April 1. I guarantee once you get through the Pilot, you will be hooked.

The Stuff You Care About:
Hot chicks – Yes.
Nudity – No.
Gore – Crime scene gore.
Drug use – Yes
Bad Guys/Killers – Unknown, for now.
Buy/Rent – Buy it.
Blu-Ray Bonus Features – Audio commentaries, an Extended Version of the season finale, deleted scenes, gag reel and a featurette.
On the Web – http://www.amctv.com/shows/the-killing

The Descendants (Fox, 115 minutes, R, Blu-Ray): When is a film damn-near perfect? When everything works – when every detail fits into place, every emotion feels real, every action and reaction seems genuine, organic.

Alexander Payne made a near-perfect film with “The Descendants,” and while it may not have won Best Picture at the Oscars, it’s still one of the most satisfying experiences you will have with a movie all year.

A lot has been made about George Clooney’s lauded turn as a detached father who is forced to confront his own shortcomings while juggling a wife on life support, two daughters coming unraveled and a billion-dollar real estate deal that could forever change Hawaii.

No pressure, right?

Clooney is perfect for the role of Matt King. He reeks of desperation as an absentee dad who suddenly finds himself responsible for his two daughters, college student Alexandra (Shailene Woodley in a performance that should vault her into the A-list of young, serious actors) and her much younger sister Scottie (a remarkably adept Amara Miller, more than holding her own with Clooney).

“The Descendants” chronicles Matt’s personal growth as both a parent and a man, particularly how he deals with a dark secret that his wife kept hidden but his older daughter uncovered.

This is Payne’s best film since “Election,” and as with that movie, Payne’s confident pacing, his whip-smart script, which carefully measures its best lines for maximum effect, and his astute observations on how people really act in times of grief and turmoil, provide a bountiful feast for movie lovers seeking substance instead of flashy style.

Wizards (Fox, 82 minutes, PG, Blu-Ray): Ralph Bakshi’s 1977 love letter to J.R.R. Tolkien borrows heavily from Tolkien’s own Lord of the Rings trilogy, but it has a lot more on its mind than just mimicking a classic.

The 35th anniversary collector’s edition, complete with a color booklet, rejected marketing materials and a handsome hardbound case, shows that Bakshi was trying to make a statement about war, about oppression and about power by melding an animated tale of wizards, fairies and fantastic creatures with archival footage of Hitler leading Nazi Germany’s run-up to WWII.

Whether it works depends on your appreciation for different styles of animation, particularly rudimentary drawings and crude, vintage artwork (both of which I happen to like), and whether you can detach yourself from today’s photo-realistic motion-capture and advanced Pixar technology.

Personally, Elinore the fairy sorceress remains one of the hottest cartoon creations ever, up there with Jessica Rabbit and Little Annie Fanny. Avatar the wizard – yep, there’s that word that James Cameron supposedly made up – is like a sarcastic, lecherous Yosemite Sam. And Weehawk the elf warrior is basically Bakshi testing out ideas for “Fire and Ice,” the third and final chapter of his fantasy trilogy, which included 1978’s “The Lord of the Rings.”

This is a must-own disc for fans.

Melancholia (Magnet/Magnolia, 136 minutes, R, Blu-Ray): I’ve decided I’m not smart enough to appreciate Lars von Trier’s films.

It’s not that I’m stupid. I just don’t fully get the entire avant-garde filmmaking movement that von Trier founded, and has expounded upon, during his controversial and often frustrating career.

For one, von Trier isn’t the easiest guy to champion, what with his profiency for spouting off about stupid crap like an affinity for Nazi Germany.

For another, his films, even ones like “Antichrist,” that BVB: Blood, Violence and Babes should celebrate for its affinity for shocking imagery and graphic horror, can be nearly impenetrable.

“Melancholia” falls very much into this camp.

It’s an apocalyptic, end of the world thriller disguised as a talk-heavy, atmospheric, philosophical treaty on love, life and happiness. The world literally explodes in the first 15 minutes, and the rest of the film depicts the lead-up to this terrible, yet hauntingly beautiful, catastrophe.

Honestly, I made it through about 70 minutes. Granted, that 70 minutes included some of the most visually striking images I’d ever seen in a film, but I couldn’t get past the gloomy claustrophobia of it all.

This is particularly a film made for high definition. The lush cinematography, the smooth hand-held camera work, the startlingly quiet moments of supreme heartbreak. It just leaps off the screen in a way that few films could even comprehend.

And von Trier extracts a masterful, moving, brilliantly fearless performance from Kirsten Dunst, finally revealing the A-list-caliber acting that defined her early work (Interview with a Vampire, The Virgin Suicides). She reveals her soul, bares her body and goes darker than any contemporary actress of her generation likely would be capable.

But at what point do you watch a movie to marvel at its technical prowess instead of just for the pure enjoyment of watching a great film?

That’s the frustrating question at the heart of “Melancholia.” Film purists will champion von Trier for bucking convention and making the antithesis of an apocalyptic disaster flick. Others might want something, anything more – not the ridiculous asteroid-hopping of “Armageddon,” but something exciting and fresh.

Whether von Trier can ever deliver on that promise remains to be seen.

The Adventures of Tintin (Paramount, 107 minutes, PG, Blu-Ray): “The Adventures of Tintin” is quite possibly the most unlikely surprise of this week’s new releases.

This is a film that I had no desire at all to see when it was released in theaters, a motion-capture, animated adventure based on a Belgian artist’s comic strip creation from the 1920s.

But, you know what? “Tintin” is a blast. It’s exciting, funny and thrilling in ways that most live-action adventure movies no longer know how to be.

The motion-capture is undistinguishable at points, the photo realism no longer creepy, but instead vibrant and alive.

And you can literally feel the energy coming off director Steven Spielberg, an energy that’s been sorely lacking of late in many of his recent movies. This is Spielberg at his best, the man-child wunderkind playing with a new toybox and allowing his imagination to run wild.

There are homages to Indiana Jones, to Jaws, to all the awesome Amblin Entertainment family films of the 1980s.

And the central mystery is a solid one, a search for a long-lost scroll that would reveal the location of a king’s ransom in treasure, that offers enough twists and surprises to keep you guessing through its final act.

Young Adult (Paramount, 94 minutes, R, Blu-Ray): “Young Adult” is not nearly as funny as I expected it to be, but what it lacks in overt humor, it more than makes up for with squirm-inducing discomfort.

In fact, I can’t remember the last film that made me so uncomfortable.

The collaboration between Jason Reitman, Diablo Cody and Charlize Theron is deep, dark and thorny. Theron is revelatory, playing against type and gender, embodying all the typical awkward male qualities, only funneling them through the POV of a gorgeous, leggy, alcohol-fueled female sociopath.

You know who else rocks in “Young Adult”? Patton Oswalt. He owns his character, the every-man schlub who just happens to have been crippled in high school during a brutal, misguided hate crime and then walked over or ignored by his female classmates like Theron.

The plot is pretty straight-forward, even if the story mines deeper dirt than you’re expecting: Theron is Mavis Gary, the former high school knockout who fled her small Minnesota hometown for the bright lights of Minneapolis. Mavis is a ghost writer for a once-popular Young Adult literary series.

She’s a full-fledged alcoholic, prone to jumping into bed with whomever is available, when she receives an email from her high school/college beau announcing the birth of his first child.

Mavis does what any crazy, 38-year-old woman, scrabbling to find some foothold, any foothold on her life, would do. She decides that the birth announcement is fate telling her to go home and reclaim the man she’s meant to be with – regardless of his wife, or newborn child.

The situations that arise from this decision create some the best awkward moments in recent memory. You can’t bring yourself to hate Mavis, you actually pity her, but you also want to scream and shake her and throw yourself in front of her to block what you know is coming.

“Young Adult” is smart, subversive and full of wicked one-liners that only someone like Diablo Cody could write. And the ending is damn near perfect.

Also Available:

Happy Feet Two

@suicide room

Screwball: The Ted Whitfield Story

Bellissima

La Terra Trema 

The Tribe: Series One, Part One

Tennessee Tuxedo and His Tales: The Complete Collection

The History of the World in Two Hours

Titanic: The Complete Story

Neverland

Ghost Hunters International: Season 2, Part 1

The Three Musketeers

My Week with Marilyn

Wallace and Gromit: World of Invention

House of Pleasures

Women on the 6th Floor

Breakout Kings: The Complete First Season

Come Fly With Me: Season One

Doctor Who: The Face of Evil

Doctor Who: The Tomb of the Cybermen Special Edition

Doctor Who: The Three Doctors Special Edition

Doctor Who: The Robots of Death Special Edition

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