With the recent deep freeze that has stricken much of the country, now’s the perfect time to curl up in front of the television and watch a DVD. And don’t think the studios don’t know it.
DVD of the Week: The cream of this week’s DVD releases looks to be the snazzy new Criterion edition of Gregory Nava’s breakthrough film El Norte. This lovely mini-epic about a pair of Guatemalan refugees venturing north to America, Nava’s film told a too-common story that hadn’t been successfully dramatized in movies before. Shooting the film largely on the fly, Nava and his wife/collaborator Anna Thomas helped to kick-start the American independent film movement by redefining the sorts of movies could be made with limited means. Both the standard edition and the Blu-Ray edition include a new commentary track by Nava, interviews with Nava, Thomas, and the film’s principal actors, Nava’s 1972 student film The Journal of Diego Rodriguez Silva, and more. At a time when “Sundance movies” have practically become a formula unto themselves, El Norte is a reminder that independent film can be more than just a cliché.
Also this week in classics is Criterion’s standard-format edition of Douglas Sirk’s Magnificent Obsession, which also includes a remastered version of the 1935 John M. Stahl original. Or if you like your weepies more contemporary, there’s always The Notebook Limited Edition Gift Set (Warner, also Blu-Ray).
This week’s slate of recent releases coming to DVD is headlined Saw V (Lionsgate, also Blu-Ray), the latest entry in a series that will surely continue as long as there are people willing to come up with convoluted ways to kill off characters. Also this week: Mark Wahlberg in the video game adaptation Max Payne (Fox, also Blu-Ray), the story of Heisman winner Ernie Davis in The Express (Universal, also Blu-Ray), the family films Igor (MGM, also Blu-Ray) and City of Ember (Fox), Jonathan Rhys-Meyers in the “a white man shall free them” drama The Children of Huang Shi (Sony), the cult-ready musical gorefest Repo!: The Genetic Opera (Lionsgate, also Blu-Ray), and the direct-to-DVD horror movie Amusement (Warner, also Blu-Ray).
In TV on DVD, this week brings The Rockford Files Season 6 (Universal), Emergency! Season 5 (Universal), and Moonlight: The Complete Series (Warner).
Finally, this week’s Blu-Ray only titles is highlighted by the enduring classic This Is Spinal Tap (MGM), in an edition that boasts all of the extras from MGM’s standard-format edition. Also this week: Jennifer Garner in 13 Going on 30 (Sony), Denzel Washington’s Antwone Fisher (Fox), Tony Scott’s Domino (Warner) (for my money, the most underappreciated movie of the decade so far), Alexander Payne’s Election (Paramount), Steve Martin making an ass of himself in The Pink Panther (Sony), and Richard Gere and Diane Lane in Unfaithful (Fox).