Off the top, I want to state my one big complaint with The Michael Moore Collection, out November 2nd from Alliance Films.  And that is simply that it doesn’t include the one film that put Moore on the map, the one big success that generated the rest of his succes.  that of course is the magnificent documentary Roger And Me.  But then, you can go buy that one for like eight bucks on DVD these days, and place it next to this collection on your shelf.  So do that.

  The Big One (*******7/10)

Year:  1997
Genre:  Documentary
Country:  United States
Language:  English
Starring:  Michael Moore
Archival appearances and interview subjects:  Bill Clinton, Steve Forbes, Garrison Keillor, Phil Knight, Studs Terkel, Rick Nielsen, dozens of others
Director:  Michael Moore
Run time:  91 minutes

     The Big One is not really a follow-up to Roger & Me, nor is it a documentary like the others in Michael Moore’s canon.  It follows him on his book tour as he goes across the country talking to people who are recently out of work, people who are trying to unionize and people who are generally pissed off at the way they are being treated by huge corporations.  In a sense, it’s a movie about companies that lay off massive amounts of workers while recording record profits.

     But really, it’s just a series of vignettes from a series of towns.  Sometimes it’s Moore speaking, sometimes he’s trying to get in to confront a CEO at a big company, sometimes he’s just jamming with Rick Nielsen of Cheap Trick.  He plays pranks on his handlers.  He jokes with Phil Knight of Nike while trying to convince him to visit his sweat shops in Indonesia.  And he bites the Random House hand that feeds him.  All of it is entertaining, all of it is interesting, but there’s no gigantic statement like those in his other films.

  Bowling For Columbine (**********10/10)

Year:  2002
Genre:  Documentary
Country:  United States
Language:  English
Starring:  Michael Moore
Archival appearances and interview subjects:  George W. Bush, George H. W. Bush, Charlton Heston, Matt Stone, Trey Parker, Marilyn Manson, Dick Clark, Dick Cheney, Chris Rock, Bill Clinton, dozens of others
Director:  Michael Moore
Run time:  120 minutes

     I have a small personal connection to Bowling For Columbine.  There’s a scene where Michael Moore interviews the mayor of Sarnia, just down the road from Windsor and Detroit.  He’s trying to figure out how so many people are killed with guns every year in Detroit, but just across the river in Canada it almost never happens.  During that interview, you can see a little model replica of the Bluenose II, our famous Canadian sailing ship, in the mayor’s office.  I was one of the people who presented the mayor with that replica, while touring Canada with the Bluenose II.  So…that’s neat.  For me.  Probably not for you.

     Anyway, Bowling For Columbine was the movie that solidified Moore as a voice for a country, for a generation and for a cause.  It also was the movie that made him public enemy #1 for a certain right-wing faction of doubters, an animosity that was further fueled and amped-up by his follow-up, Fahrenheit 9/11. 

     This is a documentary that, every time I see it, makes me laugh.  The opening scene, where Moore goes into a bank and walks out with a gun is hilarious.  And scary.  Many other moments in the movie are very funny, and many are very sad.  The security camera footage of the Columbine school attacks never fails to make me cry.  Same goes for the scene of the airplanes flying into the World Trade Centre.  So I laugh, and I cry, and I watch this movie at least once a year.  And it remains as good as ever.

  Fahrenheit 9/11 (**********10/10)

Year:  2004
Genre:  Documentary
Country:  United States
Language:  English
Starring:  Michael Moore
Archival appearances:  George W. Bush, Bill Clinton, Britney Spears, Ben Affleck, Stevie Wonder, Al Gore, Condoleeza Rice, Donald Rumsfeld, George H. W. Bush, Ricky Martin, Saddam Hussein, Osama Bin Laden, Dick Cheney, dozens of others
Director:  Michael Moore
Run time:  122 minutes

     The ultimate indictment of the Bush-Cheney administration, Fahrenheit 9/11 explores the relationship between the Bush family and the Bin Laden family, the relationship between the military and big business, and the relationship between the attacks of 9/11 and the invasion of Iraq.  And of course many other details that are shocking and terribly sad.  If Michael Moore wasn’t already a lightning rod before this movie came out, he became the ultimate polarizing celebrity figure in America once it was released.

     This is the one Moore movie you hear those who hate him reference the most.  This is the proof, they say, that he fudges facts and presents a biased view and that he just hates conservatives and that’s his entire raison d’etre.  Whenever you hear someone say that, ask them one question – have they actually seen the movie?  More often than not, they haven’t.  The logic is usually quite simple.  I refuse to watch anything by that left-wing nutjob!  He’s so awful, I wouldn’t stoop to it!  So…how do you know?

     The truth is, Moore deals in facts.  Yes, they are presented in a certain way, to create a certain opinion.  But they are, nonetheless, facts.  And the facts he presents in Fahrenheit 9/11 are, in no uncertain terms, earthshattering.  No matter how you want to spin them.

  Sicko (*********9/10)

Year:  2007
Genre:  Documentary
Country:  United States
Language:  English
Starring:  Michael Moore
Archival appearances:  George W. Bush, Bill Clinton, Richard Nixon, Hillary Clinton, Billy Crystal, dozens of others
Director:  Michael Moore
Run time:  123 minutes

     Sicko is Michael Moore’s take on the American health care system.  A system which, at the time the movie was made, was broken and disastrous.  Since the movie was released, the Americans have engaged in a massive, knock-down drag-out health care debate that resulted in some serious changes to their system.  Not the monumental, system-altering changes Moore advocates in Sicko, but there has been a start.

     I can’t say how much influence the film had on the debate, or on the health care reform itself.  I could suspect that in the end, it did more to polarize the debate than anything.  Republicans, after all, would be hung in effigy by their base if they were seen to be supporting anything that Michael Moore advocates.  But the film itself changed the minds of millions of people.  And it presented the problems, and the solutions, to the Americans’ health care crisis in a simple, easy to understand and entertaining way.  And what more do you want from a documentary?

  Capitalism: A Love Story (**********10/10)

Year:  2009
Genre:  Documentary
Country:  United States
Language:  English
Starring:  Michael Moore, Wallace Shawn, people of America
Archival appearances:  George W. Bush, Ronald Reagan, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, Bill Clinton, Jimmy Carter, Barack Obama, Barney Frank, Henry Paulson, Timothy Geithner, dozens of others
Director:  Michael Moore
Run time:  120 minutes

     Capitalism: A Love Story is Michael Moore’s finest work.  This is the best film he has ever made.  It is as sad and contemplative as Bowling For Columbine, as angry as Fahrenheit 9/11, and as political as Sicko.  But more than anything, this film is his breakout hit, Roger and Me, writ large.  That movie was done on a small scale – one man trying to get some answers from the boss of GM as Moore’s hometown of Flint, Michigan sputtered and died.  Capitalism takes that same concept and applies it on a much, much larger scale that encompasses all of America, its financial system, and the philosphy of capitalism itself.

     In fact, Capitalism uses some footage from Roger And Me, and Moore returns to several themes from that classic film.  He goes to the GM headquarters again – of course he is turned away once more, 20 years later – but this time he is not going after the big guys.  This time he might actually have some advice for the auto maker, and he just wants to get his advice to the people who need it most.  And of course, at this time, GM is one of the companies which need it the most.

     I have seen a lot of people (Moore himself included) talking about this film before it opened.  And they have all said that it is an indictment of capitalism as a flawed and evil system.  Yes and no.  I didn’t get the sense that Moore wants the entire system of capitalism to be torn down.  I think it’s more of a lament for the old days, and a sad look at the way “capitalism” has become something entirely different than it was one hundred, or seventy, or even thirty years ago.  I certainly think Moore wants the current system to be torn down.  And I think he’s right.  But I don’t necessarily think that the point we’ve reached is the necessary and obvious end result of capitalism itself.

     Instead, Moore presents our current financial situation as the obvious end result of deregulation, of capitalism unrestrained, of a governmental system overrun and essentially taken over by capitalist financial entities who, in many cases, hold more power than the president.  As Moore (and most other people) sees it, this all began with Ronald Reagan in the 80s, as he tore down the regulations that kept banks and Wall Street and others under wraps. 

     Moore doesn’t attempt to explain the financial collapse of the past year.  Well, he does make an attempt, but it’s a pretty half assed one.  Instead, he makes it clear that we’re not supposed to understand.  We’re not supposed to understand credit default swaps and derivatives and all these other terms that have been thrown around all over the news.  It’s like the theory of relativity.  Everyone’s heard of it, 2% of the world has a basic knowledge of what it means and how it works, but there are only about six people alive who really, truly, understand what it’s all about.

     Capitalism features a few of the stunts that made Moore famous.  But it appears that his heart really isn’t into it.  Even that works for this movie though, as he pulls up an armoured car to a series of banks asking for the bailout money back on behalf of the taxpayers.  He wanders about, as though in a daze, making a half-hearted attempt to convince various security guards that he is there to make a citizens’ arrest of the bank CEOs.  More than anything else, in this movie Moore seems to feel as defeated as the rest of his country.  He hates the way things have turned out.  He hates the fact that there is a company that deals only in buying foreclosed homes dirt cheap and selling them at a massive profit.  He hates the fact that major corporations take out life insurance on their employees, without telling them, and then cash in when those employees die.

     Moore hates all of this.  But what is he to do?  The forces that created the climate that created the meltdown are still as strong as ever, living off all that bailout money and laughing all the way to the bank.  The policies which make the richest 1% of Americans worth more than the poorest 95% combined still exist, and the gap is widening every day.  In fact, the richest of the rich are making absolutely certain that this gap widens.  But not just by making more money.  It actually makes them richer when the poor get poorer.  So that’s in their best interests as well. 

     The movie turns around in tone when Moore makes an excellent point – the reason that this gap has been allowed to exist for so many years, and that people have still bought into the system that created that discrepancy, is that people have always thought “that could be me”.  You know, I live in the land of capitalism, the free market, and opportunity.  And that means that even I, a lowly working-class American, could someday be as rich as the guys who run Goldman Sachs.  However, with the recent meltdown of the financial sector, Americans are starting to realize that this carrot on the stick was never really there.  No, in fact.  They can’t ever become that rich.  They will never get there, and they aren’t meant to.

     So Moore talks to some people who have risen up to fight the system.  Workers who barricaded themselves in a window and door shop until the Bank of America paid them what they were owed.  Familes who forced their way back into their empty, abandoned, foreclosed homes and refused to leave.  This is all very good.  It’s hopeful and impassioned and ferocious.  Just like Moore’s movie.  At the end of the movie though, he suggests that all of the people in the theatre (and now, with the DVD release, in their living rooms) rise up as well.  He tells them not to take this any more.  And although Canada is nowhere near as bad as the U.S., this certainly applies to us as well.  I just have no idea how to do that.  What is it I can do to buy out of this system?  How do I fight the system until it comes to get me too?  I would like a few more ideas on that front.  Because after watching Capitalism, I am ready.  I’m totally ready to rise up, and be a part of the solution.  I just need someone to tell me how.

Year:  1997, 1998
Genre:  TV series, Crime, Action
Country:  Canada
Language:  English
Starring:  Cameron Daddo, Carrie Anne Moss, Christina Cox, Jacqueline Torres, Jason Blicker
Eye candy:  Moss, Cox, Torres
Producers:  Jay Firestone, Stephen Downing
DVD distributor:  Alliance Films   

     At the beginning of Season Two of FX, on DVD October 26th from Alliance Films, the cop who starred in the first season is killed.  This is done so they can replace him with a hot babe cop who will take his place.  And THAT is being done because this show needed more hot babes.  Anything to make it at least a little bit interesting.

     Here’s the thing though.  My DVD remote was screwing up, so I couldn’t move around in the menus, and therefore couldn’t access the play-all function on these DVDs, so I could only watch the first episode on each disc of Season Two.  Also, because of the way the DVDs slide around inside the package, two of them were damaged and the episodes wouldn’t play.  Alliance has this new way of packaging TV series, that they’ve been using for about six months, and every time I get a TV series from them, at least one of the discs is screwed up because they’re all over the place by the time the thing gets opened.

     So I managed to watch only three episodes of season two.  One was the first one which introduced the new hottie, and the other two were about stuff blowing up and people disguised as other people.  All three were boring.  At least this series stars Christina Cox, one of my all-time favourites.  There were no pictures of the DVD online anywhere, because I guess no one else cared about it.  So I included a picture of Christina Cox.  At least I like her, if not her series.

Year:  2001, 2002
Genre:  Sci-Fi, TV series
Country:  Canada
Language:  English
Starring:  Robert Leeshock, Von Flores, Anita La Selva, Jane Heitmeyer, Kevin Kilner, Melinda Deines, Guylaine St-Onge, Alan Van Sprang, Helen Taylor
Eye candy:  Heitmeyer, St-Onge, Deines, Taylor, La Selva
Creator:  Gene Roddenberry
Run time:  15 hours, 46 minutes
DVD distributor:  Alliance Films

     Season Five of Earth: Final Conflict is the best one yet.  Which means that it’s passable.  The Taelon aliens are basically gone after Season Four, so they have to be replaced by aliens called Atavus.  The Atavus are bent on destroying all of humanity, so the “conflict” part of the show is pretty cut and dried.

     The Atavus, you see, are animalistic aliens.  You can tell because they punctuate every sentence with guttural sounds and growls.  That’s also how you can tell they’re evil.  They apparently want to have sex with everyone, all the time, and they demonstrate this by licking their lips and looking women up and down a lot.  At least they don’t talk like the Taelons, with that faux-soothing obnoxious voice. 

     As well as replacing aliens, the show also replaced its male lead, again, in the fifth season.  This time, it’s Dean McDermott, in his pre-Tori Spelling days.  Really, they keep replacing these actors because Jane Heitmeyer gets tired of making out with just one guy.  It’s in her contract.  But at the end of the season it looks like they’re going back to the guy who was the star of season four.  It doesn’t really matter either way.  This show is still not very good.  But it appears to be getting better.  Oh.  Never mind.  It’s over.

Year:  2009
Genre:  Action, Crime, Thriller
Countries:  Sweden, Denmark, Germany
Language:   Swedish w/ English subtitles
Starring:  Noomi Rapace, Michael Nyqvist, Annika Hallin, Lena Endre, Per Oscarsson, Peter Andersson, Jacob Eriksson, Sofia Ledarp, Yasmine Garbi, Johan Kylen, Tanja Lorentzon, Hans Christian Thulin, Ralph Carlsson, Georgi Staykov, Michalis Koutsogiannakis
Director:  Daniel Alfredson
Run time:  130 minutes
DVD distributor:  Alliance Films

     I don’t mind that there is little action in The Girl Who Played With Fire.  And even though I read the books, and remember them well, I didn’t mind that the film spent a lot of time explaining the things I already knew.  What I DID mind, however, is that a two-hour-plus movie, which spends most of its time explaining things, doesn’t take any time to explain the plot of this movie.  It gives us an extensive back story on the title star of the series, Lisbeth Salander.  We learn a lot about her origin and her childhood and her life up to this point.  But – we don’t really learn what the hell is going on NOW.  In THIS movie.

     Of course, I do know.  Because I read the books.  So throughout the film, I was pausing to fill in the gaps for my wife, as the movie was doing a piss-poor job of doing that itself.  The movie starts out with a young man coming to visit crusading journalist Mikael Blomkvist (Michael Nyqvist) at his Millenium magazine, promising a story on humna trafficking, murder, and girls forced into prostitution that will blow the lid off a vast conspiracy and implicate many prominent Swedish citizens in the police, in government and elsewhere.

     Soon, that young writer is murdered, and all signs point to Lisbeth Salander as the murderer.  Well, her fingerprints on the murder weapon point to her.  But nothing else shows any connection at all between her and the victims.  The police, nonetheless, launch a massive nationwide manhunt for the heroine of the film, who now hides out in a lavish penthouse thanks to her ill-gotten gains at the end of the first movie.  A boxer shows up…then goes away.  There’s a huge guy beating people up.  There’s a lesbian relationship that crops up…then goes away.

     The biggest problem with the movie is that every major revelation, including the exposure of former Russian spy Alexander Zalachenko (a major character in the back story of Lisbeth Salander), is not connected in any way to the central story.  OK, here’s Zalachenko, and this is who he is and who he used to be…but what does that have to do with the trafficking of girls for the purposes of prostitution?  Why does his giant blonde henchman deal with bikers and carry drugs around?  What does this have to do with that?

     It was helpful to me to watch this with my wife.  She hasn’t read the books, and so when I thought the movie might be getting confusing, she would confirm that yes, indeed, something made no sense.  I could give her the pertinent details thanks to the books that I had read, but she had a really hard time with this second movie without that added benefit.  I think the third movie in this trilogy will be better, since it’s a little more straightforward, plot-wise.  And Noomi Rapace is sensational as always as Lisbeth Salander.  But this second movie is pretty weak in comparison to the first.

Year:  2009
Genre:  Documentary
Country:  Iceland
Language:  English (dubbed voice – originally in Icelandic)
Narrator:  Kate Winslett
Interview subject of note:  Temple Grandin
Director:  Fridrik Thor Fridriksson
Run time:  103 minutes
DVD distributor:  First Run Features

     When my step-son was diagnosed with Asperger’s Syndrome, the first thing we did was order a bunch of books about it and read them.  We also consulted a number of doctors and specialists about the condition, trying to learn more about Asperger’s and about our son.  I would say that’s probably what any parent would do in the same situation.  what I would not say is that doing this research was an act of “courage”.

     And really, this is pretty much what Margret Ericsdottir is doing in A Mother’s Courage: Talking Back To Autism, on DVD October 26th from First Run Features.  She’s looking for answers and information about autism, after her son is diagnosed with the condition.  (Autism and Asperger’s are not the same thing, but both fall under the umbrella term ”autism spectrum disorders”.)  She visits specialists and doctors and autism spokespeople (most notably Temple Grandin, who was herself the subject of a terrific recent film).  But really, she’s just gathering information, like any parent would do.

     So I’ll just get my complaints out of the way first.  “Courage” is a pretty big stretch, and makes for a self-serving movie title.  And the soundtrack (some great tunes by Sigur Ros) is invasive.  OK.  Done complaining.  The rest of the documentary was fascinating to me, but I think only because I have a personal connection to autism and autism-related disorders.  I found that I learned a lot that I hadn’t discovered through my own research, and I have even begun implementing some of the techniques I saw in the movie.

     (For example – I find that my stepson now focuses more on his homework, and finishes much faster, when I associate a noise with a word he’s supposed to study for his French dictation.)

     I found the interview with Temple Grandin to be particularly interesting, although most of what she said is widely available information on autism – for example, kids who have a particular sensitivity to texture, or to noise, or to something else – but she’s a terrific and compelling spokesperson for the condition. 

     All this being said, I don’t think people who aren’t connected in some way with autism will get much out of the film.  It shows the struggle families go through trying to connect with their kids, and the difficulties they have in getting an accurate diagnosis and proper treatment.  But mostly, it’s the kind of movie where the biggest impact it will have will be to serve as a comfort for families who are equally conflicted, knowing they are not alone.  In this regard, the impact of A Mother’s Courage is huge.

Year:  1984
Genre:  Action, Kung-fu
Country:  Hong Kong
Language:  Mandarin w/ English subtitles, English dubbing
Starring:  Gordon Liu, Chang Chan-Peng, Chia Yung, Ching Chu, Alexander Fu-Sheng, Lily Li, Kara Hui, Ching-Ching Yeung, Lung Wei Wang
Directors:  Lau Kar-Leung, Liu Chia-Leung
Run time:  97 minutes
DVD distributor:  Alliance Films

     There’s a really interesting story behind 8 Diagram Pole Fighter, out October 26th from Alliance Films in their ongoing Shaw Brothers re-release series.  The off-camera story explains a lot of the movie, and I needed to do some research to find out why the movie was structured so strangely.  This movie supposedly has a kernel of truth to it, in that it is based on the historic massacre of the Yang family by the double-crossing Mongol general Pan Mai.

     Only two male members of the Yang clan survive the ambush, both of whom are referred to only by their numbers.  Fifth Brother (Gordon Liu of the Kill Bill movies) and Sixth Brother (Alexander Fu-Sheng) return from the massacre demented, out of their minds crazy.  Fifth Brother comes home, attacks his family in his delerium, then takes off.  Then Sixth Brother returns as well, attacking his family in his delerium, but he stays.  Then two simultaneous stories are told.

     Sixth Brother remains at home, insane, while his sisters and mother try to come to grips with the tragedy.  Fifth Brother goes off wandering, eventually bursting into a monastery and demanding to become a monk.  The monks will not accept him, because the hatred and violence in his heart are clearly at odds with their Buddhist pacifism.  But he stays anyway, shaving his own head and forcing his way into the monks’ training sessions, even though he is unwelcome.

     This should really be the story of Fifth Brother, his transformation and his quest for revenge.  But here’s where the outside story comes in.  Alexander Fu-Sheng, who played Sixth Brother, actually died during the production of the movie.  So the focus had to be shifted from Sixth Brother to Fifth Brother, and Gordon Liu did all the things Fu-Sheng was supposed to do.  The movie is pretty seamless, given that huge development in the middle, and although it creates a continuity issue or two, that’s nothing new in a mid-80s kung-fu flick.

     The best thing about these films is usually the cheesiness.  And that is abundant here, also.  I get the pole fighter bit.  (Other names for this movie include Invincible Pole Fighter, Magnificent Pole Fighters, Cudgel Fighter and of course many more.)  But the 8 diagrams?  No mention of anything in the movie that has to do with eight diagrams and pole fighting.  The English dubbing and the English subtitles don’t match up in any way, so if you watch with both on at the same time, it’s like you’re watching two entirely different movies.  Which, in a sense, you are.

     But despite all the glorious cheese, it’s the fights themselves that set 8 Diagram Pole Fighter apart from many other Shaw Brothers classics from the same era.  Liu and Fu-Sheng are over-the-top and silly when they’re acting crazy, but Liu more than makes up for it with his pole fighting skills and his vengeful demeanor.  The fight I included in the video at the beginning of this review is a great one, but the one that opens the movie, where the Yang family is massacred, is even better.  This one is a real classic.

Year:  2003, 2004
Genre:  Sci-Fi, TV series
Country:  United States
Language:  English
Starring:  Kevin Sorbo, Laura Bertram, Lisa Ryder, Keith Hamilton Cobb, Gordon Michael Woolvett, Lexa Doig, Steve Bacic
Eye candy:  Bertram, Ryder, Doig
Creator:  Gene Roddenberry
Run time:  15 hours, 46 minutes
DVD distributor:  Alliance Films

     I have discovered, after four seasons, the one thing that bugs me most about Andromeda.  Season Four comes to DVD October 19th from Alliance Films.  With other sci-fi shows, like Star Trek, not every episode was earth-shattering.  And by that I mean, not every episode actually involved the potential shattering of the Earth.  Star Trek had episodes that dealt with saving just one person, or maybe one small colony on one small planet.  Sure, some of the threats were bigger, but not every episode can involve the fate of the entire universe.

     However, on Andromeda, there seems to be a decided lack of imagination when it comes to finding ideas for episodes.  Every single one involves the fate of the Entire Commonwealth!  Sometimes the Entire Universe!  It’s usually one wingnut guy, who has managed to get his hands on some kind of super-weapon, who threatens to take down the Entire Commonwealth!  Sometimes it’s a shadowy conspiracy involving three or four guys and their super-weapon who threaten to take down the Entire Commonwealth!

     It seems to me that if the Commonwealth, the governing body of the entire universe, is so shaky that one lone maniac with a weapon can destroy it, it isn’t doing a very good job of governing.  And if the only person in the entire universe who can save the Commonwealth from one week to the next is Kevin Sorbo…I think they have really, really big problems.  Not that I have anything less than the utmost confidence in Kevin Sorbo, but shouldn’t there be a crisis team in place that takes all that weight of just the one guy?

     Hercules aside, though, the Andromeda team appears to have real troubles solving the Commonwealth-threatening crises.  They fight amongst themselves.  They whine a lot.  They question everything and everybody.  Even the totally hot twin babes who come aboard!  Why would anyone, ever, question totally hot twin babes?  Well, they came through it all OK, and saved the universe again.  I just kinda wish there would be one episode where instead of the universe, they saved a kitten from a tree.  Or something.

Years:  2009, 2010
Genre:  Drama, Paranormal, TV series
Country:  United States
Language:  English
Starring:  Camryn Manheim, Christoph Sanders, Jamie Kennedy, Connor Gibbs, David Conrad, Jennifer Love Hewitt’s boobs
Eye candy:  Jennifer Love Hewitt, Jennifer Love Hewitt, Jennifer Love Hewitt, Jennifer Love Hewitt
Guest star of note (kinda):  George Wendt (in the final episode)
Creator:  John Gray
Run time:  16 hours, 55 minutes
DVD distributor:  Paramount Home Entertainment

     I know it isn’t from this season.  But I included the Jennifer Love Hewitt striptease clip for…obvious reasons.  It really encapsulates the show for me.  The reason I fnid this show compulsively watchable is that Jennifer Love Hewitt is pretty close to the hottest woman alive.  And the reason the show bothers me is that although it recognizes her obvious hotness (through cleavage-revealing shirts and such) it tries to pretend otherwise (by keeping her obnoxiously over-clothed during a pole dance routine).

     And that’s kind of how the entire final (fifth) season goes.  Every time there’s a touch of darkness, and a hint that things could go horribly wrong, the show cops out.  The whole fifth season deals with “shadows” that sneak into people living and dead.  They possess both ghosts and people, briefly, for some nefarious purpose.  What nefarious purpose, exactly?  The destruction of mankind?  The destruction of heaven in the afterlife?  The ascension of Justin Bieber?  It’s never really clear at all what they want, or why they are doing anything.  Just – they’re evil, OK?  And they mean harm. 

     The “shadows” seem to want something with Miranda’s young son Aidan.  There is a ghost named Carl, a “watcher” who keeps showing up with cryptic warnings.  There is an army of creepy, spooky ghost children in horror-movie masks.  And there are “shinies”.  Which seem to be the opposite of the “shadows”.  I think.  Anyway, all this leads up to the final episode, which could be dark, could be brutal, and could be really shocking.  It’s a war, you see, between the light and the dark, the fate of…something…hangs in the balance and oh.  It’s over.  Everyone’s happy, everyone wins.

     That was the thing about Ghost Whisperer, before it was cancelled.  It had many decent ideas.  Germs of ideas.  Then copped out before anything got too intense, or too crazy.  It knew enough to show lots of Love-Hewitt-boob.  But not enough to celebrate the boob.    It knew that her hotness was the biggest selling point of the show, but it still had to pretend that it wasn’t.  You know, to make sure no one was turned off.  But when you try to avoid displeasing everyone, you please far fewer people.  And you get canceled.

Year:  2010
Genre:  Sports, TV series
Country:  United States
Language:  English
Featuring:  Alistair Overeem, Brett Rogers, Robbie Lawler, Babalu Sobral, Fedor Emelianenko, Fabricio Werdum, Cris Cyborg, Jan Finney
Run time:  5 hours, 33 minutes
DVD distributor:  Paramount Home Entertainment

     Midway through the second disc of the Strikeforce MMA set (out October 12th from Paramount Home Entertainment), Showtime TV takes a break midway through a fight to interview one of the female superstars of Strikeforce.  Cris Cyborg is the middleweight womens’ champion.  Her husband, Evangelista Cyborg, is going to be fighting in an upcoming bout on this same card.  A few things bothered me about this.  First of all, this is a DVD.  You can cut out all the excessive stuff – interviews and back stories and pre-fight analysis, and get right to the actual fight.  It would be very easy to do. 

     Second, her name (and her husband’s name) is Cyborg.  They have clearly changed it from something else, because nobody, ever, has been actually named Cyborg.  Furthermore – what this means is that the husband, Evangelista Cyborg, decided that rather than go by his real name, he was going to nickname himself after the T-1000 in Terminator 2.  Or maybe he’s channeling Winona Ryder in Alien Resurrection.  Either way, I hate nicknames like this in sports, because it makes everyone in the sport seem like a Hooters waitress or a stripper.  I can go to Hooters and get chicken wings from Diamond and beer from Vanilla while I watch Cyborg take on Wolverine in the cage.  Guh.  The most irritating thing of all?  Cris Cyborg took her husband’s name.  Not his real name, his nickname.  They are now the Cyborg family.

     Susannah Collins is the sideline reporter for Strikeforce MMA, a hot chick who is there simply to provide some hot chickery, and while she is pretty good at her job, this was one of the worst interviews I have ever seen.  The fact is, Cris Cyborg barely speaks English.  At all.  She knows only one phrase – “training hard”.  So while Collins asks her about her husband’s upcoming match, she just says “training hard”.  Does your husband come to you for training advice?  “Yes, training hard”.  What do you think of his chances?  “No, training hard.”  You have a fight coming up against a really tough opponent named…something or other…as she rises through the ranks of Strikeforce, how do you rate her as a fighter going into your match?  “Oh, very much training hard.”  The interview goes on.  And on.  And ON!  Just pull the plug here!  Or, don’t included it on the DVD – it makes for some very boring viewing!

     But that’s the way of the Strikeforce MMA DVD.  It’s just three events, exactly as broadcast on Showtime.  One event in San Jose, one in St. Louis, and one in Los Angeles.  The title fights are between Alistair Overeem and Brett Rogers, then Robbie Lawler and Babalu Sobral, then Fedor Emelianenko and Fabricio Werdum.  I assume those names are known to fight fanatics, but I had heard of only two – Emelianenko and Lawler.  Even then, I was only vaguely interested in their fights.  I don’t mind watching great fights, but that’s all I want – show me the highlights.  Show me the best fights.  I really, really don’t care about the undercards to the title bouts, and I care even less about interviews with random people or shots of Herschel Walker in the crowd.

     This, I feel, is the beauty of sports on DVD.  I have a ton of boxing DVDs, because then I can sit down and watch the classic fights, over and over, without commercial interruptions or delays between rounds.  I know how Ali-Frazier II is going to end, but I will watch the entire thing anyway.  I’ve seen the Thrilla in Manilla maybe forty times.  But I wouldn’t be putting it on if I had to skip over the interview with Zsa Zsa Gabor at ringside between the third and fourth round.  So for fanatics of mixed martial arts, who simply have to have the Lawler-Sobral fight on DVD, I can see them rushing out to get this.  But for the rest of us, with only a passing interest in MMA, there is just too much filler, and not enough great fights, to keep my interest.

Year:  2010
Genre:  Comedy
Country:  Canada
Language:  English
Starring:  David Lawrence, Paul Spence, Terra Hazelton, Andrew Sparacino
Director:  Michael Dowse
Run time:  85 minutes

     I write this review coming from the perspective of a huge Fubar fan.  I loved the first movie – a chaotic Canadian mockumentary that brought a whole new vocabulary to certain members of my generation.  Give’r!  Shotgunning beers became a bit of a rage for a while, and “turn down the suck” was a very popular thing to yell at local band shows.  And Fubar deserved that cult status, because it was good.  And actually good, not so-bad-it’s-good, like so many other cult movies.

     But, like so many other indie, low-budget cult hits, the expected follow-up sequel is a gigantic disappointment.  As was the case with Boondock Saints II, Blair Witch II, and so many others, Fubar II is just awful.  Everything that made the first film great is gone, replaced by retreads of everything these producers thought made the first movie great.  Let me explain that a little.

     Fubar was fantastic for several reasons.  But foremost because it was a “mockumentary” that really worked.  One where the subjects of the “documentary” that was being made actually acknowledged the camera, engaged with the man behind the camera, and made the entire thing totally plausible.  It stretches the realism of normal mockumentaries when the subjects act as though the camera doesn’t exist.  No real person would react that way.

     So, in Fubar, we got Terry and Dean (David Lawrence and Paul Spence) drinking their faces off, falling over, smashing things and generally acting like idiots while contributing phrases like “Tron funkin blow” to Canadian pop culture.  It was plausible that this film-maker was actually following these guys around, and there were actually moments where even the most cynical movie watcher had to ask – wait, is this actually real?  Maybe this isn’t a mockumentary, after all.  Maybe Deaner and Terry are REAL losers.

     Of course, it was a mockumentary, but even once you knew that for sure, there was still a great possibility that when Terry and Dean were shit-face drunk and falling over, so were Lawrence and Spence, the actors playing them.  And that when Dean was diagnosed with ball-cancer, that might have been a real-life event inserted into the movie.  Who knows, with a movie like this, how much is staged and how much just happened in the course of shooting the thing?

     And then we get Fubar II.  A movie that has the same mockumentary format as the first, without any of the explanation or acknowledgement.  That has the same drunken shenanigans, but none of the realism or charm.  Fubar was a gleefully erratic experience that delivered one unexpected moment after another.  Fubar II is just a movie.  A straight-ahead movie with a straight-ahead narrative that just happens to be about the same characters and shot in the same format.

     Dean and Terry are evicted from their place in Calgary, and move up to Fort MacMurray to strike it rich working in the boom town for Tron (Andrew Sparacino).  Tron has developed a serious drug habit, but hides it at work.  Terry gets a girlfriend who is a giant dirtbag, and who has slept with everyone.  Terry works hard at his job to provide presents for his new girlfriend.  Dean slacks off and gets yelled at.  Terry and Dean have a falling out over the girlfriend, and then everything is resolved with a Christmas miracle (by far the best moment, actually) at the end of the film.

     This would have been a bad movie with any actors playing Terry and Dean.  Not that Lawrence and Spence are bad.  They certainly embody Dean and Terry, and I wouldn’t want anyone else in those parts.  But in Fubar II, I was suddenly aware that they were actors.  It was easy to lose myself in the first one, and imagine I was watching real people.  This time around, I’m just watching actors, who are making a movie, and it’s a movie about unpleasant people and irritating circumstances.  And that’s it.  And that’s not great.

Year:  2010
Genre:  Kids, Animation, Fantasy
Country:  United States
Language:  English
Starring (voices):  Jay Baruchel, Gerard Butler, America Ferrara, Jonah Hill, Christopher Mintz-Plasse, Craig Ferguson, Kristen Wiig, TJ Miller
Directors:  Chris Sanders, Dean DeBlois
Run time:  98 minutes
DVD distributor:  Paramount Home Entertainment

     The best thing about How To Train Your Dragon is the way it looks.  Most kids’ movies are blindingly bright, full of colourful distractions and unnecessarily cute characters.  Sometimes this really works – as with Despicable Me earlier this year, or Wall-E recently.  And sometimes it just means that the movie is flashy and bright and devoid of substance.

     How To Train Your Dragon is the first kids’ movie I can remember in a long time, and maybe the only animated one, that features large portions lit only with torches.  There are many dark scenes where the torch light is the only way to make out what’s going on, and it’s actually very surprising.  Surprisingly good, that is.  Especially if, like me, you have kids and must watch every single childrens movie ever made.

     Aside from the look of the film, it’s pretty generic.  Young Hiccup (Jay Baruchel) lives in a Viking village besieged by dragons.  His father Stoick (Gerard Butler) is a heroic, powerful dragon killer, as are most of the men in the village.  But Hiccup is not very strong, and not very big, and he isn’t allowed to go hunt the dragons with the others.  So he’s sad, and he’ll never be heroic or tough or brave enough to impress the lovely young Astrid (America Ferrara).

     So it’s one of those kids movies where a young boy sets out to prove his manhood, then manages to do so (in this case by using his wits to capture a member of the most elusive of the dragon species).  Then he finds he doesn’t have the same taste for blood and vengeance that seems to fuel the rest of his tribe (he can’t kill the helpless trapped dragon).  Then he secretly explores this other side of his life (he helps the dragon learn to fly again) and discovers that this, in fact, is his path to manhood.

     It’s a pretty tried-and-true kids’ movie formula.  It hits all the right notes, covers all the bases, and manages to be reasonably charming and well-written.  The voice actors are all wonderful (with the unfortunate exception of Baruchel, who just seems utterly out of place throughout the film), and the movie is paced so well that it actually seems quite a bit shorter than its 98 minute run time. 

     But again, it’s the look of the film that separates it from other, extremely similar kids’ movies.  So when it comes to DVD and Blu-Ray October 15th from Paramount Home Entertainment, it may well be worth the upgrade to Blu-Ray.  In fact, it may be one of the only kids’ movies actually worth that upgrade.

Year:  2010
Genre:  Documentary, Sports
Country:  United States
Language:  English
Director:  Ken Burns, Lynne Novick
Run time:  4 hours
DVD distributor:  Paramount Home Entertainment

     Some documentaries transcend their genre, like Michael Moore’s Bowling For Columbine, Fahrenheit 9/11 and Capitalism: A Love Story.  And some documentaries transcend thir medium itself.  Ken Burns has made two of them – his Civil War and Baseball are both bigger than movies, bigger than television.  And their box sets are bigger than my dining room table.  Baseball was an 18 1/2 hour documentary series that I purchased many years ago.  It has its own shelf in my living room.

     Actually – I’m going to go off on a bit of a tangent here.  About ten years ago or so, I discovered that if I worked at a local CD store, I could get discounts on CDs and DVDs, and could special order anything I could find.  I took the job there for one reason – Ken Burns’ Baseball.  At the time, the box set cost a heck of a lot of money, and if I worked at this store, I could save almost $100 with the discount.  And I did.  And I saved.  And the first thing I bought was the PBS Ken Burns Baseball box.

     I love Civil War, and I love Burns’ Jazz series, but for me the ultimate achievement is Baseball.  At almost 19 hours, it’s impossible to imagine a more complete documentary, examining every facet of America’s National Pastime.  But what makes the documentary remarkable, a staggering achievment, is that it remains fascinating and brilliant and thoroughly entertaining through every minute of the 19 hours!  Imagine anything else that comprehensive that can be that interesting through such a long run time.  Betcha can’t.

     Now, almost 20 years later, Burns adds a four hour, two-part bonus to his magnum opus.  The Tenth Inning, on DVD and Blu-Ray October 5th, is split into two parts – 1990-2000, which details the achievements of international superstars like Seattle’s Ichiro, the ongoing greatness of Ken Griffey Jr., the lockout, and of course the dramatic 1998 home run chase between Mark McGwire and Sammy Sosa.  Which, of course, leads to a comprehensive and fascinating look at the steroid era.  Because everything Burns does is comprehensive and fascinating.

     The second part, 2000-2010, is even more interesting.  The aftermath of the historic home run chase and the investigations into steroids.  The mercurial and controversial career of Barry Bonds.  And the relationship that baseball has with world events, such as 9/11.  And of course, my personal favourite moment – the incredible 2004 comeback from 0-3 by my Boston Red Sox as they took out the Yankees and won their first World Series since 1918.

     The interview subjects are fascinating, and a long list of sportswriters and players are involved.  One of them is Keith Olbermann, who I included in the preview clip up at the top of this review.  Why, you may ask, was that the clip I included?  Well, it was the only one I could find.  See, Major League Baseball is very tight with their baseball clips.  You can find them only on mlb.com, or on DVDs.  Like The Tenth Inning.  And so you should.  In Blu-Ray if you have it, because no sport looks as awe-inspiring in high definition as baseball.

     A must for fans of the game, and a no-question must-have for those of us who already own the original box set, The Tenth Inning is so remarkable that being a baseball fan isn’t necessary, at all, to enjoy it.  I have been talking about this series for a week now, and I have met many people who say they were never baseball fans, but got totally sucked in by this documentary when it was on television.  It’s the gold standard for box sets, documentaries, television and movies in general.  And The 10th Inning is a perfect addition to the perfect series.  So…get it, is what I’m saying.

     District 13 (*********9/10)

Year:  2004
Genre:  Action, Crime
Country:  France
Language:  French, w/ English subtitles
Starring:  Cyril Raffaelli, David Belle, Tony D’Amario, Bibi Naceri
Eye candy:  Dany Verissimo
Director:  Pierre Morel
Producer:  Luc Besson
Run time:  81 minutes
DVD distributor:  Alliance Films

     Every now and then, a movie comes along that really changes the game in the action genre.  Remember the first time you saw Ong-Bak?  Wait…you didn’t see Ong-Bak?  GO SEE IT.  OK, here’s one you probably DID see – Casino Royale.  Remember the first scene in that movie, where Daniel Craig chases that ludicrously nimble guy up and around the scaffolding, through the air and up the sides of walls and all that?  That sequence would never have happened were it not for District 13.

     This movie is decently acted, has a decent script and a decent concept.  A tough guy from a project in the middle of the Paris of the future teams up with the one good cop on the force to take down some really bad guys and save some other slightly less bad guys.  The whole ghetto (District B13) is walled off from the rest of the city, and is on full lockdown.  A nuclear bomb has been stolen and placed in the middle of the district, set to go off in a few hours.  Only Damien (Cyril Raffaelli) and Leito (David Belle) can save the day.

     Sounds a little preposterous, doesn’t it?  Well…yes.  It is a little preposterous.  But then, this movie is not awesome because of the story.  Or because of the dialogue or the script or the acting.  It’s the action, and only the action, that makes District 13 a revelation.  Parkour, or “free-running”, is a French activity that is alternately referred to as either a sport or a martial art.  In District 13 it doesn’t matter at all how you define it.  It’s just really damn cool.

     The idea behind parkour is that participants try to move around in an urban environment as efficiently as possible.  They jump, climb, vault, roll, and leap over and around and under and through whatever obstacles might be in their path, attempting to continue moving forward in as straight a line as possible.  This creates an incredible fluidity in the movie’s chase scenes that is, frankly, breathtaking. 

     Raffaelli is an experienced stuntman and martial artist, while Belle is the actual founder of parkour.  They have a terrific chemistry together, but really the film is more about what they can do in tight spaces, how they can go up walls and swing around ropes and go from one balcony to the next without the slightest hesitation.  No description I give can really do it justice.  Just watch the scene I included on the video above.  Then imagine a whole movie of THAT.  And tell me it isn’t awesome.

     District 13: Ultimatum (*********9/10)

Year:  2009
Genre:  Action, Crime
Country:  France
Language:  French, w/ English subtitles
Starring:  Cyril Raffaelli, David Belle, Philippe Torreton, Daniel Duval, Elodie Yung
Eye candy:  Yung
Director:  Patrick Alessandrin
Producer:  Luc Besson
Run time:  100 minutes
DVD distributor:  Alliance Films

     Both District 13 and District 13: Ultimatum are already out on DVD.  You may already have both.  If not, though, you should most definitely pick up the double feature being released October 12th by Alliance Films.  These are two of the most incredible, breathtaking, adrenaline-pumping action movies ever.

     District 13, in the six years since its release, has deservedly become a cult classic.  Ultimatum will likely get there too, very soon.  It might actually be better than the first.  It has more action, and less story.  And as I said in my review of the first film, the story is pretty much irrelevant.  It’s the action that matters – and more action is therefore better action.  But both movies are great.  So get them both.

Year:  2010
Genre:  Comedy, Cartoon, TV series
Country:  United States
Language:  English
Starring:  Matt Oberg, Kurt Metzger, Natasha Leggero, Randy Pearlstein, Michael-Leon Wooley, Larry Murphy
Developer:  David M. Stern
Box set distributor:  Paramount Home Entertainment

     The DVD box for Volume One of Ugly Americans, out October 5th from Paramount Home Entertainment, has a quote saying this is the “best Comedy Central cartoon show since South Park!”  That’s probably true.  But the gap between this one and South Park remains substantial.  I like Ugly Americans, and I was happy to watch the entire DVD, but it certainly isn’t as memorable as A Little Box Of Butters, out this week.

     This show is certainly filthy and full of swearing and all that stuff that college kids like.  It’s good, in that the filthiness and crass talk isn’t an end in itself.  This show realizes that just saying “boobs” and “anus” isn’t funny – it has to be in context.  And so it is.  Violent sex, creepy people eating other people, werewolves and zombies and drunken wizards and vampires and aliens and Mark (Matt Oberg), the one normal human being in the middle of it all.

     Now, I must say that it gets a little tiring.  There’s a lot of funny stuff that can come out of a relationship between a regular person and a soul-eating demon.  Or the roommate relationship between that human and a brain-eating zombie.  Even the power dynamic between the sexy demon Callie Maggotbone (Mark’s boss and on-again off-again girlfriend) and her boss Twayne Boneraper, also a demon.  And some funny stuff comes courtesy of Twayne’s disdain (actually more like loathing) for the Social Services department he oversees.

     But it’s strange how quickly the show runs out of steam, at least for me.  By the end of this single disc, I was becoming disinterested.  There are only so many ways for the story to go – a werewolf rips a guy’s arm off, then they both try to resolve their anger issues in therapy.  Callie goes through some changes and becomes almost a rapist as she goes after Mark.  And Randall the zombie tries to hide the fact that he is a zombie from his parents.  And then…basically the same stuff again.  I really did like this first volume, but I suspect my interest will wane with a second one.

Year:  2010
Genre:  Kids, Cartoon, TV series
Country:  United States
Language:  English
Starring:  Tom McGrath, Jeff Glen Bennett, John DiMaggio, Danny Jacobs, James Patrick Stewart, Andy Richter, Mary Scheer, Tara Strong, Nicole Sullivan
Eye candy:  Nicole Sullivan (Marlene, if you will)
Director:  Bret Haaland
Run time: 120 minutes
DVD distributor:  Paramount Home Entertainment

     The Penguins of Madagascar remains, at all times, compulsively watchable.  The Penguins are reliably militaristic and oblivious, like the security guards I used to work with who thought they were cops.  The supporting cast is as ludicrous as ever, the idiotic King Julien and his lemur underlings up to their usual egocentric shenanigans and Marlene the otter remaining for the most part a bemused and skeptical observer.

     The new DVD, I Was A Penguin Zombie, derives its title from the first episode, where Skipper breaks his wing.  Thanks to some misunderstandings and an apparently debilitating ointment, the other penguins believe him to be dead.  So when Skipper escapes from the hospital and comes back to the penguin enclosure, the others reach the only logical conclusion – he’s a zombie, and must be captured.

     The other episodes (including a spooky noise in the sewer, a creepy lemur robot, a haunted car, a freakishly large and strong Mort) are all in the same vein – spooky, horror-ish shows, inasmuch as Penguins of Madagascar ever delved into horror.  They’re all good, and there is actually a much greater variety on this DVD than on previous Penguins DVDs, because of the theme.  I Was A Penguin Zombie comes to DVD October 5th from Paramount Home Entertainment.