MCN DVD Reviews: February 24, 2009

The Wrap Up ...

What Just Happened?

	..The MCN Reviews Vault
	..The MCN Critics Roundup

If any two people in Hollywood should have been capable of combining their talents on a scathing satire of the industry’s creative malaise, veteran multi-hyphenates Art Linson and Barry Levinson surely would be among the most likely candidates. Both men have found ways to be successful working within the system, while also witnessing a tremendous wasting of time, money and talent.

What Just Happened? was based on the second collection of anecdotes, memories and mythology, gathered while producing such hits as Fight Club, Fast Times at Ridgemont High, Melvin and Howard and The Untouchables. Among other accomplishments, Levinson directed Diner, Good Morning, Vietnam, Rain Man and Bugsy. He also directed Wag the Dog, a dark comedy that located the nexus of Hollywood and Washington, then lampooned the phonies and hypocrites who treat war and politics as if they were just another show.

Sadly, What Just Happened? explains more about Linson’s personal dance with the devil than the unfettered greed at the heart of a system of corrupts anyone who buys into it. Among the pictures that did the same earlier and better: Robert Altman’s The Player, HBO’s Entourage, George Huang’s Swimming With Sharks, Fox-TV’s Action, Ben Stiller’s Tropic Thunder, Elia Kazan’s The Last Tycoon and Bud Schulberg’s What Makes Sammy Run?

In What Just Happened? Robert De Niro does a nice job depicting a hands-on producer attempting to juggle three rather large balls simultaneously. Threatening his position on the A-list are a tempestuous auteur, his ex-wives and an engagingly pompous Bruce Willis. Each of these parallel storylines is intermittently hilarious. When viewed as a self-pitying whole, however, it quickly becomes obvious that the producer’s greatest anxiety would be as traumatizing as a week in Tahiti for 99 percent of other Americans. De Niro and Willis are joined in this impossible mission by Sean Penn, Michael Wincott, Robin Wright Penn, Catherine Keener, John Turturro and Stanley Tucci. I’m guessing they all owed Linson and/or Levinson a favor. The bonus features include Levinson and Linsom’s commentary, deleted scenes, casting sessions and Making of ‘What Just Happened’: From Book to Script to Screen. - Gary Dretzka

The French Connection 1&2: Blu-ray
Vanishing Point: Blu-ray

It’s impossible for anyone whose awareness of movies about crime and corruption doesn’t extend beyond, say, the mid-1970s to understand how much an impact The French Connection had on the next generation of police procedurals and chase scenes. By changing the rules that governed how police were depicted on screen, director William Friedkin ignored the dictate that ethically challenged cops had to pay dearly for their bending of the rules. This applied to chase scenes, as well.

The box-office success of French Connection meant that cops involved in lengthy pursuits no longer would be required to go out of their way to avoid pedestrians or unsuspecting motorists. The line between cops and criminals was blurred nearly to the point of invisibility. None of this would be possible, though, if Gene Hackman hadn’t created a narcotics detective as compelling as "Popeye Doyle", or, two months later, as Clint Eastwood did with “Dirty Harry” Callahan.

As the new Blu-ray editions of both segments of the French Connection saga attest, Friedkin and John Frankenheimer’s vision holds up extremely well, even though nearly 35 years have passed since the sequel was released (and drug kingpins spoke French and Italian, instead of Spanish). The two-disc Blu-ray edition adds much commentary, including that of the real-life cops involved in the bust, Eddie Egan and Sonny Grosso; several behind-the-scenes featurettes; deleted scenes; trivia; a BBC documentary; and D-Box motion-control systems.

Less well-known but nearly as influential, Vanishing Point became a popular success not only among mainstream moviegoers, but also with the arthouse crowd. In it, Barry Newman played a former race driver who bets he can drive a new Dodge Challenger from Denver to San Francisco in 15 hours. Thanks to minute-to-minute coverage provided by a chatty black deejay, the hopped-up driver is able to elude Highway Patrol cruisers and win the sympathy of residents of the towns through which he passed. To many viewers, Newman’s Kowalski represented the rebellious spirit of the early 1970s, while his quest was seen both as existential and mythic. The explosive climax mirrored that of Easy Rider, in that the protagonists of each film were punished for their flouting of the rules of straight society.

Less contemplative audiences could easily appreciate Vanishing Point, simply for its pedal-to-the-medal action, though. The western landscapes captured by John A. Alonzo’s cameras look terrific in Blu-ray, as well. Watch Vanishing Point back-to-back with the Criterion Collection edition of Two-Lane Blacktop and you’ll understand why male Boomers are so nostalgic for the days when gasoline cost 30 cents a gallon and Detroit wasn’t afraid to build muscles into their cars. - Gary Dretzka

Extreme Movie: Unrated
Sex Drive: Unrated and Cream-Filled
Strictly Sexual: A Love Story

After watching Extreme Movie and Sex Drive, I would have guessed that the occasionally quite funny and observant former would have gotten the theatrical release ahead of the sophomoric (freshmanic?) latter. Adam and Andrew Epstein’s Extreme Movie is a sketch comedy cut from the same cloth as The Groove Tube, Amazon Women on the Moon and The Kentucky Fried Movie, albeit not as consistently funny. Among its better known stars are Michael Cera, Frankie Munoz, Jamie Kennedy and Denise Boutte. The writing crew is populated with several “SNL” regulars, including Andy Samberg. The gags, which accompany the missteps in one young geek’s quest for sexual conquest, range from downright distasteful to perversely inspired. As such, it should appeal to the 17-year-old boy in most male viewers.

Sex Drive, which actually was reviewed by mainstream critics, substitutes wall-to-wall vulgarity and mindless horseplay for wit and empathy. In it, a recent high school graduate falls for a blond Internet pipedream and decides she’s the perfect person to break his cherry. After stealing his brother’s muscle car, the kid embarks on a road trip with a more cocksure dweeb and a pretty young gal he considers more of a buddy than someone with whom he could fall in love. Along the way, the teens encounter several people who best could be described as human roadkill. While passing through Amish country, they also befriend a bearded fellow (Seth Green) in a carriage and a bunch of his wild and horny co-religionists. For someone committed to old-fashioned horsepower, Green’s character is remarkably attuned to the needs of gear-heads and careless drivers. It’s a high point in a movie dominated by lows. The unrated version piles on the beyond-gratuitous nudity and scatological references.

Strictly Sexual is that rare R-rated movie with a provocative title that suffers from too little nudity. Oh, there’s plenty of sex and naughty pillow talk. When it comes to T&A, however, it seems as if the filmmakers were hoping to score a PG-13. There was more skin in The Little Mermaid. When we meet them, the exceedingly horny Donna (Amber Benson) and Christi Ann (Kristen Kerr) are checking out patrons of a bar known as a hangout for male hustlers. They find willing companions in a pair of handsome construction workers, Joe (Johann Urb) and Stanny (Stevie Long), who, while unemployed, would hate to be confused with the other hustlers. In fact, the men are shocked and embarrassed when the wealthier of the two women prepares to pay them $1,000 for their services.

After coming to their senses, the penniless hunks agree to move into the pool house and serve as on-call lovers. (This happens all the time, doesn’t it?) While one of the women is insatiable, the other is sexually inept. Naturally, as love and commitment begin to rear their ugly little heads, the personalities of the participants begin to change dramatically. If this were played more for laughs than dramatic effect, director Joel Viertel might have been able to get away with his outlandish conceits. As entertaining as it is to watch Christie Ann make the transition from novice to raging sybarite, Stanny is such a boorish jerk that it’s difficult to believe any woman, no matter how desperate, would find him appealing for more than one drunken night. - Gary Dretzka

Pirates 2: Stagnetti's Revenge: Rated R

By now, the phenomenal success of Digital Playground’s XXX-rated Pirates franchise has been well-documented. Director/writer/producer Joone took a huge leap of financial faith in 2005, when he elected not only to film and release the first installment in hi-def, but to spend millions of dollars on more than 300 special effects shots, an original music score and location shooting. This, at a time when the vast majority of porn producers thrived making low- to no-budget “gonzo” fare, whose special effects were limited to fake boobs and shaved genitals. The experiment proved so successful that MTI Home Video decided to distribute a legitimately R-rated version, based on the marquee power of Jesse Jane, Carmen Luvana and Teagan Presley. The sequel, Pirates II: Stagnetti’s Revenge, also has proven to be a blockbuster and a R-rated of it now is available, as well.

This time, Jane and Evan Stone are surrounded by such porn A-listers as Stoya, Katsuni, Riley Steele, Gabriella Fox, Bella Donna, Sasha Grey, Jenna Haze, Brianna Love and Shay Jordan. No expenses were spared this time around, either. Adults who enjoyed Disney’s Pirates of the Caribbean– and will admit to being curious, at least, about porn – will appreciate how much hard work went into this parody. Needless to say, the preferred way to view Pirates II is on Blu-ray, a format that truly does extend the experience here. Besides 5.1 Dolby Surround Sound, the set adds bloopers and optional Spanish subtitles. A word of caution for fans of hard-core action: the sex and nudity in Pirates 2 is tame, even by Cinemax standards.- Gary Dretzka

In Europe: Coleman Hawkins
Live in Berlin & Stockholm: Count Basie
The Best of G.G. Allin & the Murder Junkies

Forty years ago, the names of great jazz musicians – living and dead – were as familiar to mainstream audiences as those of the foremost practitioners of classical music and Broadway musicals. The same sorts of listeners, today, would be hard-pressed to come up with a top-10 list of contemporary jazz musicians. Blame it on America’s obsession with teeny-bopper acts and other stadium-fillers; non-existent marketing campaigns; lack of interest on the part of bookers for late-night talk shows; and the disappearance of genre-specific radio stations and nightclubs. Ironically, European and Japanese audiences have always seemed more attuned to contemporary jazz than their American counterparts. MVD’s recent live-in-Europe DVD series has packaged vintage performances by some of the top acts of the glory years (for the lucky ones, anyway).

This Coleman Hawkins set is comprised of footage shot in London, Paris and Brussels from 1962-66. It also includes bonus tracks from a short film, taped in New York in 1961. For much of the last century, the two most prominent jazz and swing orchestras were led by Duke Ellington and Count Basie. The new MVD set was recorded in Berlin and Paris, and featured performances by Eddie "Lockjaw" Davis, Richard Boone, Bobby Plater and Marshall Royal. Also newly available are “Buck Clayton All Stars: Brussels 1961 & London 1965” and “Sonny Stitt & J.J. Johnson Sextet: We Remember Bird, Berlin & London 1964.” Great stuff.

Meanwhile, the eclectic music-and-video distribution company takes us from the sublime to the ridiculous with its collection of blood-and-guts performances by GG Allin & the Murder Junkies. Allin is to hard-rock music what Mickey Rourke – who he resembles, on the cover photo -- was to the pro wrestling in The Wrestler. For many in the punk scene, Allin has replaced the late James Brown as the hardest working man in show business. - Gary Dretzka

The Boondock Saints: Blu-ray

The mythic stature of Troy Duffy's ultra-violent cult phenomenon, The Boondock Saints, gets another boost with the release of a Blu-ray edition. For the uninitiated, the 1999 vigilante blood fest describes the Old West justice administered by two Boston brothers (Sean Patrick Flanery, Norman Reedus), who consider it their God-appointed duty to rid the world of mobsters and other scumbags. No one in the neighborhood seems particularly upset by the elimination of such bad citizens. Heck, even the FBI agent assigned to their case - for no good reason -- is mostly ambivalent to their crusade. That's pretty much the limit of the narrative.

Tony Montana and Mark Brian Smith's fascinating 2003 documentary, Overnight, revealed the outrageous behind-the-scenes machinations that led, first, to Duffy getting a pile of money (and a real L.A. tavern) to finish the $15 million project and, second, to the onetime bartender's colossal fallout with Miramax execs. In addition to the theatrical version of the film, the Blu-ray package includes a director's cut of the film, outtakes, deleted scenes, a copy of the script and interactive features. A sequel to The Boondock Saints is expected to be released later this year. . - Gary Dretzka

On the Other Hand, Death: A Donald Strachey Mystery
Out at the Wedding
Ready? OK!
Mulligans
Whirlwind

One of the staples of the Here! premium television network, which focuses on the LGBT community, has been original movies featuring gay P.I. Donald Strachey. Based on a series of mysteries by Richard Stevenson, Strachey’s clients typically are the victims of religious charlatans, blackmailers, greedy capitalists and various other homophobes. In On the Other Hand, Death, it’s Strachey’s job to determine whether the home of lesbian couple is being targeted by anti-gay vandals or simply a developer trying to scare them out of their longtime digs. Chad Allen returns as the semi-hard-boiled private dick, while Margot Kidder and Gabrielle Rose do a nice job as the “elderly” lesbian couple under siege. (When, pray tell, did Kidder become elderly?) Sebastian Spence returns as Strachey’s life partner, Timothy Callahan.

Logo/Paramount’s Out at the Wedding describes what can happen when a few “little white lies” throw the delicate equilibrium of a family wedding out of balance. Here, the fibs include whoppers pertaining to sexual orientation and the rubbing out of a lesbian’s entire family history. The farcical behavior in this festival favorite is played for very broad laughs by director Lee Friedlander (Girl Play). Spun off theatrically from a popular Logo series, Noah's Arc: Jumping the Broom travels to Martha’s Vineyard for another dissertation on gay marriage. Also from Logo comes the second season of Rick & Steve: The Happiest Gay Couple in All the World, which included, among other things, a gay parody of Wizard of Oz and the discovery of San Francisco’s secret Straight Underground. The set adds seven bonus shorts, interviews and “more gay crap.”

Wolfe Video, which has been promoting gay cinema before being gay was cool (or mainstream), has recently released several interesting titles. Mulligans twists a familiar storyline by having a straight college jock bring home on vacation a friend who’s gay and an artist. (I would have preferred the other way around.) His presence becomes the catalyst for the dad’s long-delayed exit from the closet. Among the cast members are Charlie David (Dante’s Cove), Dan Payne (Watchman), Derek Baynham and Thea Gill (Queer as Folk), as the perplexed mom.

In James Vasquez’ closely observed comedy Ready? OK!, a single mom is forced to deal with her young son’s obsession with things generally reserved for girls: dresses, dolls and cheer-leading. Carrie Preston (True Blood) plays the concerned mother, whose first instinct is to direct him into more masculine pursuits. Lost star Michael Emerson is among those who try to convince her there’s nothing wrong with her otherwise happy and enthusiastic child.

The publicity material wants us to consider Whirlwind in the same breath as Sex and the City. That’s because it involves a closely knit group of gay men in New York who enjoy discussing the same sorts of things as Carrie Bradshaw & Co. The introduction of a hot young newcomer to the mix causes turmoil among the longtime friends.- Gary Dretzka

Operation Filmmaker

This intriguing and frequently perplexing documentary demonstrates in microcosm what might have happened if Hollywood liberals had been put in charge of Iraq’s recovery from the American invasion. Director Nina Davenport’s focus is on a 25-year-old Iraqi film student, who, after being interviewed by MTV, was asked by Liev Schreiber to come to Prague and work as a crew member on Everything Is Illuminated. Like any fish abruptly taken from his watery home, Muthana Mohmed found it difficult to make the transition from war-torn Baghdad to the cushy trailer caravans and craft services of Hollywood-East.

By the time he adjusted to the whole new scene, his crisis-junky handlers had already written him off as ungrateful and lethargic. What Mohmed hadn’t expected when he was given the opportunity by Schreiber was that he would be expected to kiss the ass of everyone who threw him a bone, and devote his every waking hour to the production. Unaware of the fact that most American film students would kill to be in a position to deliver soy-milk lattes and other vegan treats to a producer, Mohmed reacted like any self-respecting adult in the real world might. Stunned disbelief soon evolved into bitterness, disappointment and alienation from the folks with titles and personalized chairs.

After Schreiber and other members of the team appeared to lose interest in him, Mohmed took his frustration out on Davenport, who finally balked at his demands for money and space. He simply couldn’t understand why Davenport, who had been brought in by Schreiber and was being backed by the BBC, shouldn’t willingly divide the spoils with her subject. While it’s true that Mohmed was a bit of a conman and an unrepentant mama’s boy, we’re also shown how difficult it was for him to survive on very little money in Prague and London … as would any student his age that literally is dropped into a world a million miles away from the one he left. As such, he became a different sort of victim of Operation Iraqi Freedom.

Davenport built his dilemma into her documentary as commentary on the war, which was just starting to get ugly. Unfortunately, she didn’t know when to take a step back from her project, and admit that Mohmed wasn’t ready for prime time. Like Bush/Cheney/Rumsfeld, none of Schreiber’s team had bothered to plan an exit strategy for Mohmed, who, when he wasn’t roaming the tortured streets of Baghdad, was leading the life of a pampered middle-class kid. It wasn’t until he latched onto the crew of an action film being shot outside Prague that he found an ally, Dwayne “the Rock” Johnson, who actually walked the walk. The resultant documentary is as agonizing to watch as it is fascinating. The bonus features include deleted scenes and an interview with the filmmaker.- Gary Dretzka

Dead Like Me: Life After Death
Wild at Heart: Series One
Christopher Titus: Love is Evol
Crime 360: The Complete Season 1
Sputnik Mania
Primal Fear
D.E.A. Detroit: Season One
Gym Teacher

One of the tougher acts for producers of television series to pull off is the resurrection of a popular show years after the airing of its final episode. Not all series go out in a blaze of glory, as did such long-running hits as Cheers, Seinfeld and The Fugitive. Some just end, never to be heard from again. One of the ancillary benefits of the TV-to-DVD trend has been the availability of unaired episodes of shows cancelled before they could find an audience, thus offering closure to short-changed fans. Dead Like Me was one of the shows that signaled Showtime's intention to go toe-to-toe with HBO in the domain of original programming. Critics liked the show, but Showtime's marketing team wasn't yet up to the task of drawing attention to the network's crown jewels.

Today, Dead Like Me might have had a shot at television immortality. The feature-length sequel, Life After Death, attempts to comfort fans made unhappy by the show's early demise. In it, George Lass (Ellen Muth) and her fellow reapers get a new boss, who wants his team members to grease the skids for people making the transition from life to death, without wasting time on explaining how they got there. The loosening of guidelines causes some reapers to fall back into old habits, and others to adopt new ones. Life After Death was released theatrically last month in Canada, but arrives here on DVD. It includes a pair of featurettes, commentary and a trailer for the new season of The Riches.

If the title, Wild at Heart, sounds familiar, it's only because it served as the inspiration for the short-lived CW series, Life Is Wild. The Brit original, which lasted three seasons longer than the American knock-off, followed the family of veterinarian Danny Trevanion to their new digs at a South African game preserve. As the vet administers to animals and humans on the savannah, the stitched-together family struggles to overcome past tragedies and make a new life together.

Divorce hits some people harder than others. For comedians, it can be a blessing and a curse. Sam Kinison channeled his pain into a primal scream at once hilarious and frightening to behold. It was a staple of his act. Christopher Titus also wears his pain and disgust on his sleeve, and, while not nearly as outrageous as Kinison in full dudgeon (would that even be possible?), the material is consistently funny and capably delivered. The DVD adds quite a bit more than was shown on TV on Valentine's Day, of all holidays.

The History Channel's Primal Fear takes common fears and phobias, and examines them through the prism of science and history. It describes how countless generations of human beings have dealt with their terror of being buried alive, bitten by a snake or becoming the victim of a seemingly random act of violence. It also explains how reactions to near-death experiences have changed and evolved. History also has sent out Sputnik Mania, a two-disc set that re-creates the hysteria, paranoia and fear that accompanied news that the Soviet Union had beaten the U.S. into space. Anyone who lived through that period will get a rush of nostalgia, while their kids and grandkids will learn how chilly things got during the Cold War.

Fans of shows about the forensic sciences will enjoy Crime 360, A&E's attempt to compete with such popular series as CSI and Bones. The show uses advanced CGI technology, 3-D laser scanning and 360-degree photography to demonstrate how crimes are solved in the real world. Spike's D.E.A.: Detroit tags along as an elite squad of undercover agents tackle drug-related crimes in one of the world's most unsafe cities.

David Alan Grier, Amy Sedaris and Christopher Meloni plays the adults, to Nathan Kress' super geek, in this inspirational Nick movie about overcoming obstacles while going for the gold. Meloni plays a former Olympian whose job it is to create a championship team out of thin air.

Other new TV-to-DVD titles are The Beverly Hillbillies: The Official Third Season and Sabrina the Teenage Witch: The Fifth Season. - Gary Dretzka

Cyclops
Imprint
Red Sands

In his delightfully profane acceptance speech at the Independent Spirit Awards, Mickey Rourke urged his peers in the movie industry to give Eric Roberts the same opportunity to resurrect his career as he had in The Wrestler. His portrayal of the corrupt Emperor Tiberius, in the made-for-cable Cyclops, probably won’t have that effect. Still, Roberts’ name carries some weight with audiences who remember him from such movies and TV shows as Runaway Train, Star 80, Less Than Perfect and Pope of Greenwich Village, in which he co-starred with Rourke. In the Sci-Fi Channel movie, the Cyclops is a land-based creature who preys on travelers on the trade routes. Tiberius orders his general, Marcus, to capture him, mostly for the amusement of Colosseum audiences. Cyclops, being product of Roger and Julie Corman, has a far more polished veneer than other such cable movies.

After screenings at several obscure film festivals in 2007, the paranormal thriller Imprint has finally arrived on DVD. What distinguishes Michael Linn’s ghost story from several thousand others is its largely Native American cast and unique setting, the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation, in South Dakota. Tonantzin Carmelo plays prosecutor, who, after returning to the rez to visit her father, starts hearing the voices of her long-missing brother and a Lakota boy she helped convict of murder.

As if the Taliban weren’t a formidable enough enemy, the soldiers in Red Sands are required to come to grips with supernatural forces unleashed after they foolishly use an ancient statue for target practice. Stranger things have happened, right? The movie benefits from being shot partially in Kabul and Morocco. Among the actors are Shane West (ER), Aldis Hodge (Leverage) and Leonard Roberts (Lost). - Gary Dretzka

WWE: Legends of Wrestling Collection

Had he been an actual flesh-and-blood wrestler, Randy “The Ram” Robinson (Mickey Rourke) probably would have been immortalized in a WWE “Legends” collection, which would be sold in video stores, arenas and via the Internet. Instead, the much-pummeled warhorse was required to sign photographs in exchange for videos during autograph sessions at the local VFW post. In the real world, Marisa Tomei’s hot-body stripper, Cassidy, might have joined the ranks of the WWE Divas and been featured in a Playboy pictorial.

Among those WWE stars who Robinson might have encountered in the ring are Ric Flair, Lex Luger, Jerry "The King" Lawler, Dusty Rhodes, Jim Ross and Junkyard Dog, all of whose accomplishments are duly recorded in the new Legends of Wrestling Collection. The set includes episodes of the popular “Legends” roundtable sessions first shown on WWE's on-demand channel. The sets adds footage from matches in which the stars participated.

Also on tap this month: “The WWE: The Best of Saturday Night's Main Event,” “Armageddon 2008” and “WWE: Royal Rumble 2009.” - Gary Dretzka

Painted Lady
Enemy at the Door Set 1
The Librarian: Curse of the Judas Chalice
Futurama: Into the Wild Green Yonder
Canterbury's Law
Touch the Top of the World
The Spy Collection Megaset
The Brain
Einstein: The Real Story of the Man Behind the Theory
Conspiracy?
Jacked! Auto Theft Task Force: Season One

Any time Helen Mirren’s name appears under the banner of a “Masterpiece Theatre” production, it behooves lovers of quality television to pay attention. In Painted Lady, which appeared between the fifth and sixth installments of Prime Suspect, Mirren played a character very much like police detective Jane Tennison … if the hard-bitten cop had spent a good portion of her youth as a drug-addicted blues singer. Looking very much like Marianne Faithful, Mirren’s Maggie Sheridan is living in a cottage on the country estate of Sir Charles Stafford, and his debt-ridden son, Sebastian.

One night, while Sheridan is luxuriating in the bath with a long-haired male friend, rock music blaring, burglars break into the art-cluttered mansion. When the elder Stafford intruded on their plundering of his art collection, he was shot to death. As the police investigation continues, Sheridan figures out what’s missing and who some of the likely candidates might be. Her independent quest for justice takes her from Dublin and London, where her sister and brother-in-law are in the art game, to the ritzy galleries and auction houses of Manhattan.

In the mini-series’ weakest conceit, Sheridan manages to convince several otherwise savvy art traders that she’s a Polish countess with unlimited financial resources. Although they dress differently, art dealers and art thieves have lots of things in common, including a willingness to commit murder in the defense of a sweet score. The complex storyline will best be appreciated by those who know the difference between Caravaggio and Earl Sheib, but anyone looking for a gritty, superbly acted whodunit will find a gem in Painted Lady.

Also from England, the 1978 series Enemy at the Door describes how residents of the Channel Islands coped with nearly five years of German occupation during World War II. For most Americans, it’s a chapter in the war’s history that’s been largely ignored, if only because the islands’ strategic value wasn’t worth the carnage that might have resulted from liberation. Indeed, German soldiers remained on the islands – much closer to France than England – well after D-Day. As such, the 70,000 residents relied on their own resources to make it through the war and avoid prison, forced labor or concentration camps. Their moral dilemmas provided much of the fodder for the drama that plays out in Enemy at the Door.

The Librarian: Curse of the Judas Chalice represents the third in what could prove to be a series of original movies made for the TNT cable network and, of course, DVD distribution. In it, Noah Wyle returns as an Indiana Jones-inspired “librarian,” who battles various supernatural forces while in pursuit of ancient artifacts for his secret museum. Wyle is joined by series regulars Jane Curtin and Bob Newhart, as well as rising hottie Stana Katic (Quantum of Solace, The Spirit). The bayou country around New Orleans makes for a perfect setting for vampire intrigue.

Into The Wild Green Yonder is the fourth and final installment in a series of original Futurama movies. In something of a departure from recent tradition, the quartet of animated sci-fi satires – Bender's Big Score, The Beast With a Billion Backs, Bender's Game– are expected to be retrofitted for use by Fox-TV as 22-minute episodes in a virtual fifth season of Matt Groening’s Futurama… in effect, TV-to-DVD-back-to-TV.

Wild Green Yonder follows Fry, Bender, Leela and the rest of the Planet Express crew on another mission to save the universe … but, first, a visit to New Mars Vegas, where all sorts of strange and crazy things happen to the characters. Tagging along this time are Penn Jillette, Snoop Dogg, Phil Hendrie and Seth MacFarlane. The Blu-ray edition sparkles with brightness and clarity, and several bonus features not available on the DVD version.

Despite the presence of Julianna Margulies and Aiden Quinn, Canterbury’s Law failed to break the six-episode barrier while given a shot last spring on Fox-TV. I’m only guessing here, but, by then, audiences probably had seen enough drop-dead gorgeous defense attorneys, of both genders, find ways to clear seemingly guilty people of crimes they didn’t commit. In this case, the series’ failure to draw flies wasn’t the fault of the actors or production team.

In the A&E movie, Touch the Top of the World, Peter Facinelli portrays Erik Weihenmayer, an outdoorsman whose blindness couldn’t prevent him from reaching the summit of Mount Everest. As much an inspirational biopic as a great adventure, the film explains how a boy -- diagnosed with a rare eye disease at age 3 -- overcame his handicap to accomplish seemingly impossible feats.

The 14-disc Spy Collection Megaset is comprised of selections from four popular gadget-and-intrigue series from Britain that ran in syndication from 1967 to 1974 on various networks around the world, including NBC, ABC and CBS. They include The Persuaders, in which Roger Moore and Tony Curtis were crime-solving playboys; the delightful Patrick McGoohan classic, The Prisoner; The Champions, whose crime fighters have special powers bestowed by a lost Tibetan civilization;The Protectors, in which Robert Vaughan played a dapper London private eye.

Other comprehensive “Megaset” packages from A&E/History: The Universe: Collector's Edition Megaset, The Founding of America Megaset and History Presents: The ’60s Megaset. The extras and comprehensive packaging make any redundancy palatable.

A&E/History also is bringing out The Brain, a fascinating examination of the complexities and capabilities of the human computer. It uses simple analogies, actual case studies and CGI to illustrate how the brain works under different circumstances and environments. If scientists are able to successfully clone anything, besides sheep and dogs, they might give Albert Einstein a shot. The Real Story of the Man Behind the Theory introduces us to a genius whose achievements and humanity literally changed the world, yet may be better known by the masses for his hair than his accomplishments.

The question mark at the end of the title, Conspiracy?, pretty much sums up what’s going on in this 13-part A&E/History series. (Why, for that matter, 13 parts?) Among the usual suspects being rounded up here are the death of Princess Diana, the crash of TWA Flight 800, flying saucers in Roswell and Jack Ruby’s role in the assassination of JFK.

The reality-based series, Jacked! Auto Theft Task Force, follows a team of English cops known as the Wolf Pack as they try to nail car thieves before, after and during the commission of their crimes. Like most such shows, the police work can be exciting and boring in equal measure, while the crooks can be clever or stupid. Naturally, the cops are always on their best behavior while the cameras are rolling.

Also making the trek from TV to DVD are the fascinating Cities of the Underworld: The Complete Season Two, during which we go below the surface of a nuclear test site, the Yucatan, Soviet military bases, Washington and Vietnam’s battlefields; Just Shoot Me: The Complete 3rd Season, Girlfriends: The Sixth Season and The Red Green Show: 2001 Season. - Gary Dretzka