Full of incident and introducing a slate of new characters, including Alan Cummings' edge-of-camp Nightcrawler, this workmanlike sequel plays less thrillingly second time round on a small screen. In addition to the expected commentaries, the second disc has more info about the film's making, the comic's history and what Ian McKellen had for tea on Day 28 of shooting than even a diehard fan could possibly want.
In January 2002, Brian Wilson and a nine-piece band, including The Wondermints and Carl Wilson-alike Jeffrey Foskett, performed The Beach Boys' 1966 album Pet Sounds in its entirety, and in sequence, over six nights at London's Royal Festival Hall. And now the best of those concerts have been remixed and remastered in 5.1 surround sound. This means you can now own the original LP in mono and stereo, the Pet Sounds Sessions box set, the Pet Sounds Live CD from 2002, and the Pet Sounds Live DVD!
The controversial director of Kissed, Lynne Stopkewich, throws the fearlessly versatile Molly Parker into another harrowing role. Here she's running a seedy Nowheresville motel, selling her body to guests and drifters. She wants out, and the latest stranger may have the ticket. But in this director's world, nothing's tender and most things are brutal. Mesmeric and coldly Lynch-like.
Greenaway has more than once been known to disappear up his own aesthetics, but this collection of his short films plays to his strengths, tolerating little tedium. Disc One includes six films exploring his constant themes, from A Walk Through H (numbers, maps, the afterlife) to Windows (37 people fall through windows to their deaths). Disc Two features the obsessive Vertical Features Remake and The Falls (92 mini-biogs), and is—if you're in the mood—monumental like video art pioneer Bill Viola.
In June 1988, Depeche Mode took their stadium techno roadshow to ground-breaking heights by filling the 65,000-capacity Pasadena Rose Bowl near LA. Captured by the legendary rock-doc maestro DA Pennebaker and his long-term partner Chris Hegedus, the show became a fine concert film, incorporating reality TV-style coverage of fans travelling to the gig. Repackaged with extra footage, audio commentaries and updated interviews, it's a handsome historical record of Wagnerian electro-pop and hair gel abuse.
OPENS NOVEMBER 14, CERT 15, 102 MINS
Ann (Sarah Polley) is 23 and works as a night cleaner. She lives in a trailer home in her mother's backyard, along with two young daughters and an unemployed husband. She also, it turns out, has inoperable cancer, and a matter of months to live. And while on paper that might sound like Terms Of Endearment on a budget, this beautifully judged Canadian picture (produced by Pedro and Agustin Almodóvar) couldn't be further from the mawkishness of a Hollywood weepy.
What lifts the film is the powerful, dignified performance from Polley.
