2011

Two critically acclaimed entries into the 2011 Oscar race make their way to DVD and Blu-ray, but one is significantly more successful than the other in the drama department.

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Two big awards-season movies from last year are out on home video this week.

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The Greek mythology action movie Immortals and George Clooney’s The Descendants grossed about $80 million each at the box office. Both are new out on Blu-ray and DVD.

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Two smaller releases are new out on DVD that may appeal to niche audiences. One has a local slant, while the other is a sci-fi story that was ahead of its time.

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‘Jack and Jill’ might have been silly fun, like so many of Sandler’s films. Instead it will just leave you pondering how it all went so wrong.

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Originally entitled ‘Bail Enforcers,’ the low-budget Canadian action film ‘Bounty Hunters’ stars former WWE wrestler Trish Stratus as Jules, a bounty hunter who works part-time at a strip club (I swear I’m not making this up).

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‘London Boulevard’ is a British gangster film written and directed by William Monahan, and ‘The Skin I Live In’ is a bizarre and truly disturbing movie from Pedro Almodóvar.

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Asghar Farhadi’s nimble characterizations are painted with all different shades and the story unfolds naturally and realistically. That’s one reason he was the only screenwriter to be nominated this year for a script written in an entirely different language.

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Out on Blu-ray and DVD now are two of the best movies of last year whose names you didn’t hear at the Oscars. Despite Michael Shannon’s powerhouse lead performance in the psychological suspense drama ‘Take Shelter,’ he was somehow left out of the Best Actor race. ‘Martha Marcy May Marlene’ is also anchored by an incredibly soulful performance not nominated for an Oscar.

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Lilly Scourtis Ayers’ film ‘Last Fast Ride: The Life, Love, and Death of a Punk Goddess,’ premiered at the 2011 Slamdance Festival and is out now on DVD, but it’s difficult to see who the interested parties might be.

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It’s not a stellar week for home video, but you could do worse than these two slight but entertaining movies, out now on Blu-ray and DVD.

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Directed by French filmmaker Michel Hazanavicius, The Artist may look like an art film, but it’s anything but. It’s a good, old-fashioned, formulaic, Hollywood romantic comedy rise-and-fall story told with a modern sensibility and easily accessible by mainstream audiences.

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In ‘Pina,’ director Wim Wenders creates a visually impressive and emotional driven showcase of choreographer Pina Bausch’s work, and allows the dance and the visuals to speak for themselves.

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‘Shut Up Little Man!’ is a bit of personal entertainment that, due to popular dissemination via cassettes (audio and video) in the pre-Internet age, grows beyond its beginnings between friends into a global phenomenon.

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Out on DVD and Blu-ray this week is ‘Drive,’ one of the best and most surprising movies of 2011, and ‘To Kill A Mockingbird,’ digitally remastered and fully restored from its original 35mm film in a 50th Anniversary presentation.

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