Kickboxer 2 (DVD)
Still unable to withstand his defeat from the first time around, Tong Po and his managers turn to drastic measures to goad David Sloan into the ring for a rematch.R"
Director: Albert Pyun
ACTORS: Sasha Mitchell, Peter Boyle, Sherrie Rose, Jean-Claude Van Damme
Behind the Sun (DVD)
BEHIND THE SUN takes place in 1910, in the small town of Stream-of-Souls, Brazil, where two families have been engaged in a long battle for control of what appears to be nearly barren land. The Breves clan--mother, father, 20-year-old Tonio, and little Pacu (called the kid), are a poor family struggling to make it with their small sugarcane mill that has outlived its usefulness. In front of their house, a bloodied shirt swings in the breeze, the sun slowly fading the red stain surrounding a hole. When the bloodstain turns yellow, Tonio sets out to hunt down the Ferreira brother who killed the eldest Breves child, Inacio. The chase scene through the forest is stunningly shot by cinematographer Waler Carvalho. After Tonio accomplishes his mission, it becomes his turn to wait for the bloodied Ferreira shirt to turn yellow, after which the next-in-line Ferreira brother will come after him.
Walter Salles, whose previous film was the touching CENTRAL STATION, has brilliantly adapted Ismaol Kadari`s book BROKEN APRIL, moving the blood feud to Brazil from Albania. The futility of the family battle is made clear through beautiful shots of the vast desert landscape that physically separates the two families as their next generation perishes one by one. Rodrigo Santoro, a captivating cross between Keanu Reeves and Edward Burns, is excellent as Tonio, who tries to seek peace and love before his time is up, but the film belongs to young Ravi Ramos Vasconcelos, who, as Pacu--the kid--narrates the film and is the centerpoint of the story. It is through his eyes that the story is told, and the result is both magnificent and horrific.PG-13"
Director: Walter Salles
ACTORS: Josi Dumont, Rodrigo Santoro, Rita Assemany, Luis Carlos Vasconcelos, Ravi Ramos Lacerda
Blackball (DVD)
Todd Bridges (TV`s Different Strokes ) stars and co-directs this action-filled drama which also stars Stoney Jackson, Lisa Wu Sweat, and Scott Valentine. When a wealthy racist real estate developer discovers that his recently deceased wife left him with a mulatto child who is not his, he is unsure whether he should raise the child. He must overcome his racist beliefs and his conflicted feelings for his straying wife.NR"
ACTORS: Stoney Jackson, Todd Bridges, Scott Valentine
The Journey of August King (DVD)
A young widower (Jason Patric) comes across a beautiful runaway slave (Thandie Newton) in the woods of North Carolina in 1815, and rather than let her cruel owner catch, punish, and possibly kill her, he decides to risk his own life to help her reach freedom in the North. The film is a beautifully rendered tale of two strangers coming together in a time of crisis.R"
Director: John Duigan
ACTORS: Jason Patric, Thandie Newton, Larry Drake, Sam Waterston, Sara-Jane Wylde
Changi (DVD)
Sixty years after World War II, six Australian veterans reunite and bring up memories of horror and torture at the hands of the Japanese in a prisoner-of-war camp.NR"
