February Video Releases

February 5

The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford

Jesse James was one of the country’s first bona fide celebrities. To those he robbed and terrorized, and to the families of those he admittedly killed, he may have been just a criminal, but in the sensational newspaper articles and dime novels chronicling the James Gang throughout the 1870s, Jesse was the object of awe and admiration. He was a Robin Hood, they suggested, targeting railroad owners and banks that exploited poor farmers. He was a man with a tragic cause, a wronged and wounded Confederate soldier striking back against the Union that had ruined his life. Most importantly, to an increasingly buttoned-down and citified population leading ordinary lives, he was the last frontiersman — a symbol of freedom and the American spirit, a charismatic rebel who flouted the law and lived by his own rules. But who was Jesse James, really — behind the folklore and the selling of newspapers? And who was Robert Ford, just 19 and a member of Jesse’s inner circle, who was able to bring down such a formidable figure when lawmen across 10 states had tried and failed? Director: Andrew Dominik. Stars: Brad Pitt, Casey Affleck, Sam Shepard, Mary-Louise Parker, Jeremy Renner, Paul Schneider, Sam Rockwell, Zooey Deschanel. 2007, CC, MPAA rating: R, 160 min., Western, Warner.

The Brave One

For Erica Bain, the streets of New York are both her home and her livelihood. She shares the sounds and the stories of her beloved city with her radio audience as the host of the show “Street Walk.” At night, she goes home to the love of her life, her fiance David Kirmani. But everything Erica knows and loves is ripped from her on one terrible night when she and David are ambushed in a random, vicious attack that leaves David dead and Erica close to it. Though Erica’s broken body heals, deeper wounds remain — the devastation of losing David and, even more overwhelming, a suffocating fear that haunts her every step. The city streets she had once loved to roam, even places that had been warm and familiar, now feel strange and threatening. When the fear finally becomes too much to bear, Erica makes a fateful decision to arm herself against it. Director: Neil Jordan. Stars: Jodie Foster, Terrence Howard, Nicky Katt, Naveen Andrews, Mary Steenburgen. 2007, CC, MPAA rating: R, 122 min., Thriller, Warner.

Across the Universe

A love story set in the 1960s, against the turbulent backdrop of anti-war protests, mind exploration and rock ‘n roll, Julie Taymor’s “Across the Universe” moves from the dockyards of Liverpool to the creative psychedelia of Greenwich Village, from the riot-torn streets of Detroit to the killing fields of Vietnam. The star-crossed lovers, Jude and Lucy along with a small group of friends and musicians are swept up in the emerging anti-war and counterculture movements, with “Dr. Robert” and “Mr. Kite” as their guides. As forces beyond their control tear the young lovers apart, Jude and Lucy ultimately strive against all odds to find their own way back to each other. Also features cameos by Salma Hayek and Joe Cocker. The film is set against a backdrop of 33 Beatles’ songs. Director: Julie Taymor. Stars: Evan Rachel Wood, Jim Sturgess, Joe Anderson, Dana Fuchs, Martin Luther, T.V. Carpio, Eddie Izzard, Bono. 2007, CC, MPAA rating: PG-13, 133 min., Sony.

The Jane Austin Book Club

As five women and one enigmatic man meet to discuss the works of Jane Austen, they find their love lives playing out in a 21st century version of her novels. Sylvia is shocked when her husband Daniel leaves her after 20 plus years and three children. Jocelyn, her unmarried best friend, distracts herself from her unacknowledged loneliness by breeding dogs. Prudie is a young French teacher, in possession of a worthy husband yet distracted by persistent fantasies about sex with another man. The many-times married Bernadette develops a yearning for one more chance at happiness. Beautiful, risk-taking Allegra, Sylvia and Daniel’s lesbian daughter, has quit talking to her lover. And Grigg, a young science fiction fan and computer whiz, seems both horribly out of place and obliviously at ease as the only man to be invited into the book circle. Director: Robin Swicord. Stars: Kathy Baker, Maria Bello, Emily Blunt, Amy Brenneman, Maggie Grace, Hugh Dancy, Jimmy Smits. 2007, CC, MPAA rating: PG-13, 106 min., Romantic Drama, Sony.

2 Days in Paris

A Parisian getaway becomes anything but romantic for a high-strung New York couple: Marion is a French photographer and Jack is an American interior designer who attempt to re-infuse their relationship with romance by taking a vacation in Europe. After a less than idyllic vacation in Italy, they stop off in Paris for two days. But in the City of Lights, Jack has to deal with a new language, a crazily unfamiliar culture, meeting Marion’s sexually frank and permissive family, and a bevy of flirtatious ex-boyfriends. Jack and Marion begin to see each other in a different, less appealing light as the cultural divide between them grows. Will these two days in Paris be Jack and Marion’s last days as a couple, or will they be the beginning of a new, richer life together? Director: Julie Delpy. Stars: Julie Delpy, Adam Goldberg. 2007, CC, MPAA rating: R, 100 min., Comedy Drama, Fox.

Feast of Love

In a coffee shop in a tight-knit Oregon community, a local professor and writer, Harry Stevenson, witnesses love and attraction as he whips up mischief among the town’s residents. Among young and old, among both parents and lovers, among the sweet and the savage, among humans and even animals, Harry watches in awe as love mystifies, wounds, devastates, inspires, makes unreasonable demands and profoundly shapes the lives of everyone around him — including himself. Director: Robert Benton. Stars: Morgan Freeman, Greg Kinnear, Radha Mitchell, Jane Alexander, Alexa Davalos, Toby Hemingway, Selma Blair, Stana Katic, Billy Burke, Fred Ward, Erika Marozsan. 2007, CC, MPAA rating: R, 102 min., Romantic Drama, MGM.

Releasing February 12

No Reservations

Master chef Kate Armstrong lives her life like she runs her kitchen at trendy Manhattan eatery 22 Bleecker — with a no-nonsense intensity that both captivates and intimidates everyone around her. Kate’s perfectionist nature is put to the test when she “inherits” her 9-year-old niece Zoe, while contending with a brash new sous-chef who joins her staff. High-spirited and freewheeling, Nick Palmer couldn’t be more different from Kate, yet the chemistry between them is undeniable. As the weeks progress, Kate is not sure what steams her more — that Nick’s talent scores big points with 22 Bleecker’s owner, Paula and its discriminating clientele, or that his easygoing charm quickly wins over the shy Zoe, who finds it easier to open up to him than to her aunt. Rivalry becomes romance, but Kate will have to learn to express herself beyond the realm of her kitchen if she wants to connect with Zoe and find true happiness with Nick. Director: Scott Hicks. Stars: Catherine Zeta-Jones, Aaron Eckhart, Abigail Breslin, Patricia Clarkson, Jenny Wade, Bob Balaban. 2007, CC, MPAA rating: PG, 103 min., Romantic Comedy, Warner.

In the Shadow of the Moon

Documentary vividly communicates the daring and the danger, the pride and the passion, of an extraordinary era in American history. Between 1968 and 1972, the world watched in awe each time an American spacecraft voyaged to the Moon. Only 12 American men walked upon its surface and they remain the only human beings to have stood on another world. Now for the first, and very possibly the last, time, “In the Shadow of the Moon” combines archival material from the original NASA film footage, much of it never before seen, with interviews with the surviving astronauts, including Jim Lovell, Dave Scott, John Young, Gene Cernan, Mike Collins, Buzz Aldrin, Alan Bean, Edgar Mitchell, Charlie Duke and Harrison Schmitt. The astronauts emerge as eloquent, witty, emotional and very human. Director: David Sington. 2007, CC, MPAA rating: PG, 110 min., Documentary, ThinkFilm.

Becoming Jane

Imaginative tale in the spirit of Jane Austen that places young Jane herself at the center of a witty, enchanting romance not unlike those that would later captivate millions in her celebrated works of literature. The film spins the few known facts surrounding Austen’s real-life flirtation with the Irish lawyer Tom Lefroy into a tale about the kind of personal passion and social complications that could have inspired Austen to become the ingenious and utterly timeless observer of human relationships and romance that she soon did. The story playfully references the characters and themes that wend their way through her six novels.The film boldly imagines what might have happened if a youthful Jane Austen fell in love. Director: Julian Jarrold. Stars: Anne Hathaway, James McAvoy, Maggie Smith, Julie Walters. 2007, CC, MPAA rating: PG, 120 min., Bio-Drama, Miramax.

Gone Baby Gone

Based on the novel by Dennis Lehane, tells the story of two private investigators hunting for an abducted 4-year-old girl in the seamiest side of Boston’s underworld. Director: Ben Affleck. Stars: Casey Affleck, Michelle Monaghan, Morgan Freeman, Ed Harris, Amy Ryan, Amy Madigan, John Ashton. 2007, CC, MPAA rating: R, 114 min., Mystery Thriller, Miramax.

We Own the Night

Bobby Green is the popular manager of El Caribe, the legendary Russian-owned nightclub in Brooklyn’s Brighton Beach. For Bobby, every night is a party as he greets friends and customers or dances with his beautiful Puerto Rican girlfriend, Amada Juarez, in a haze of cigarette smoke and disco music. But it’s 1988, and New York City’s drug trade is escalating. He has changed his last name and concealed his connection to a long line of prominent New York police officers. Bobby tries to keep his distance from a Russian gangster operating out of the nightclub — a gangster also targeted by his brother, Joseph Grusinsky, an up-and-coming NYPD officer, and his father, Burt Grusinsky, the legendary deputy chief of police. Director: James Gray. Stars: Joaquin Phoenix, Mark Wahlberg, Robert Duvall, Eva Mendes, Tony Musante. 2007, CC, MPAA rating: R, 117 min., Thriller, Sony.

Martian Child

Comic drama stars John Cusack as a recently widowed science fiction writer who adopts a young boy who claims to be from Mars. But the new father ignores some sage advice about the perils of parenthood from his sister and gets more than he bargained for when a series of strange occurrences lead him to believe the child’s claim may be true. Based on an award-winning short story by sci-fi luminary David Gerrold. Director: Menno Meyjes. Stars: John Cusack, Amanda Peet, Bobby Coleman, Sophie Okonedo, Joan Cusack, Oliver Platt, Bobby Coleman. 2007, CC, MPAA rating: PG, 108 min., Family, New Line.

Releasing February 19

Rendition

A multi-layered story line interweaves the tale of an Egyptian-born chemical engineer whose family emigrated to the States in the mid 1980s and who is shipped off for interrogation after he is deemed a political prisoner in our post-9/11 world; the story of a CIA analyst based in Cairo who finds his world spinning out of control after he witnesses the man’s interrogation by the Egyptian secret police; and the pregnant American wife of the kidnapped man whose attempts to get the U.S. government to help her falls on deaf ears. Director: Gavin Hood. Stars: Reese Witherspoon, Jake Gyllenhaal, Meryl Streep, Alan Arkin, Peter Sarsgaard, Christian Martin. 2007, CC, MPAA rating: R, 120 min., Thriller, New Line.

Releasing February 26

The Darjeeling Limited

Three American brothers who have not spoken to each other in a year set off on a train voyage across India with a plan to find themselves and bond with each other — to become brothers again like they used to be. Their “spiritual quest”, however, veers rapidly off-course, and they eventually find themselves stranded alone in the middle of the desert with eleven suitcases, a printer, and a laminating machine. At this moment, a new, unplanned journey suddenly begins. Director: Wes Anderson. Stars: Owen Wilson, Adrien Brody, Jason Schwartzman, Amara Karan, Wallace Wolodarsky, Waris Ahluwalia , Barbet Schroeder, Camilla Rutherford, Bill Murray, Anjelica Huston. 2007, CC, MPAA rating: R, 91 min., Comedy, Fox.

30 Days of Night

Producer Sam Raimi brings audiences the terrifying thriller “30 Days of Night,” set in the isolated town of Barrow, Alaska, in the extreme northern hemisphere, which is plunged into complete darkness annually for an entire month. When most of the inhabitants head south for the winter, a mysterious group of strangers appear: bloodthirsty vampires, ready to take advantage of the uninterrupted darkness to feed on the town’s residents. As the night wears on, Barrow’s Sheriff Eben, his estranged wife Stella, and an ever-shrinking group of survivors must do anything they can to last until daylight. Director: David Slade. Stars: Josh Hartnett, Melissa George, Danny Huston, Ben Foster, Manu Bennett. 2007, CC, MPAA rating: R, 113 min., Horror, Sony.