VIDEO PARADISO UPCOMING NEW RELEASES FOR SALE AND RENT 04.29.08
With well-crafted stories and high-quality production values, THE YOUNG INDIANA JONES CHRONICLES was a rarity on TV when it premiered in 1992. Focusing on preadolescent and teenage versions of the Indian Jones character, the series follows the future archaeologist's adventures as he travels the world, rubbing shoulders with some of history's famed figures. From witnessing the birth of the Middle East to paying his dues in the early days of Tinseltown, the show is gently educational as it charts young Indy intersecting, often dangerously, with historical events. Produced under the watchful eye of creator George Lucas, these seven feature-length episodes chronicle teenage Indiana (Sean Patrick Flanery) getting himself in all sorts of tight situations, and feature guest stars like Anne Heche, Jane Krakowski, and Jeffrey Wright.
It made headlines when tobacco heiress Doris Duke died, leaving her Irish butler in charge of her billion-dollar estate. Insider squabbles and a string of lawsuits followed, but the relationship between the two people from opposite worlds remained a mystery. Inspired by their intriguing true story, this original HBO production imagines the evolving relationship between Doris and her butler, Bernard Lafferty, with Susan Sarandon and Ralph Fiennes in the title roles. Over six years the film traces Bernard and Doris slowly growing closer together and nourishing a love that surpasses the obstacles of alcoholism, wealth, and the pain of the past.
Celebrated painter and filmmaker Julian Schnabel's third feature finds him reaching new artistic heights with this audacious and personal biopic, based on the best-selling memoir of the same name. The film tells the remarkable tale of Jean-Dominique Bauby (Mathieu Amalric), the world-renowned editor of French ELLE magazine, who suffered a stroke and was paralyzed by the inexplicable "locked in" syndrome at the age of 43. Bauby's only way of communicating with the outside world was by blinking with one eye, and after several dedicated helpers--a string of impossibly beautiful women (Emmanuelle Seigner, Marie-Josee Croze, Olatz Lopez Garamendia, Anne Consigny)--helped him to speak through this seemingly irrelevant gesture, he began to produce the words that would form his memoir. Along the way, as he swam in and out of consciousness, memories from his past swelled into the present, resulting in a cinematic experience that is at once heartbreaking and hopeful. Schnabel somehow manages to convey Bauby's internal life with remarkable clarity, employing first-person perspective, striking cinematography (by the always great Janusz Kaminski), and Amalric's pained, life-affirming monologues. The result is a wholly original experience, a painful and tender portrait of a life that is made all the more exhilarating because of its close proximity to death.
THE GOLDEN COMPASS is an adaptation of the first book in the beloved but controversial fantasy series by Phillip Pullman. The story opens with Lyra Belacqua (Dakota Blue Richards) an orphan girl who lives in an alternate world that is similar to earth, but where people's souls exist outside of their bodies in animal form. The people are ruled by a shadowy and oppressive council known as the Magisterium, which is doing it's best to keep everyone from getting information about what is called "Dust." Lyra's Uncle Asriel (Daniel Craig) has been researching Dust, and he has seen to it that Lyra is given safe shelter at Jordan College. But when the visiting Mrs. Coulter (Nicole Kidman) arrives, she asks Lyra to accompany her on a trip to the North to meet the Panserbjorne, a race of armored bears. Before Lyra leaves, the Headmaster gives her a golden compass, a device which only she can read, and from which she can intuit the truth. Lyra leaves with Mrs. Coulter, but when she learns that her friends have been kidnapped by "Gobblers," she heads out to find them, and soon joins forces with the nomadic Gyptians, some witches, and an armored bear called Iorek Byrnison (voice by Ian McKellen). Lyra finds her friends, and so discovers the evil plans the Magisterium has cooked up for the world's children. By the film's end, she has vowed to track down her Uncle Asriel, and to discover the true power of Dust. Hollywood had a tricky time of taming this tale, as Pullman's books portray religion - the Catholic Church in particular - in a less than flattering light. The film version carefully steers clear of these themes, and instead puts its enormous budget into creating visually stunning effects. While fans of the books may find fault with this streamlined version, children are sure to revel in the many talking animals and whimsical airships.
