Jimmy Zip (DVD)
Jimmy Zip is a troubled teenager with an unfortunate love for playing with fire. Travelling to the big city, he winds up getting working for a drug dealer, sinking further into a life of crime. After Jimmy accidentally sets off a few too many fireworks he meets Horace, an artist with Tourette`s Syndrome. Horace begins to help Jimmy channel his energies into something productive, but crime will always return to challenge the best plans.R"
Director: Robert McGinley
ACTORS: Brendan Fletcher, Adrienne Frantz, Chris Mulkey, Robert Gossett
Topaz (DVD) Subtitled Spanish and French Alfred Hitchcock adapted this political thriller from Leon Uris`s dense, complex spy novel, loosely based on actual events in the life of French spy Philippe de Vosjoli. The title, TOPAZ, refers not to the ...
Alfred Hitchcock adapted this political thriller from Leon Uris`s dense, complex spy novel, loosely based on actual events in the life of French spy Philippe de Vosjoli. The title, TOPAZ, refers not to the stone but to the Topaz Group, a nefarious band of French spies. Traveling through Cuba, Denmark, New York, and Virginia, among other locations, Hitchcock`s tale tells of a Soviet scientist`s defection that sparks an international furor extending way beyond the act itself. The story begins with American CIA agent Michael Nordstrom (John Forsythe), who is instrumental in uncovering Russian plans to place missiles in Cuba. For confirmation he turns to French agent Andre Devereaux (Frederick Stafford), who travels to Cuba to gather information. In the process, he discovers evidence of a shocking betrayal. The conclusion of the film is one of four endings Hitchcock filmed. This was one of two cold war-themed films directed by Hitchcock at the urging of his studio, the other being TORN CURTAIN.
NR"
Director: Alfred Hitchcock
ACTORS: John Forsythe, Philippe Noiret, Michel Piccoli, Frederick Stafford, John Vernon
3 Ninjas Kick Back (DVD)
In this installment of the saga, boy ninjas Rocky, Colt, and Tum-Tum travel to Japan with their grandfather to help him deliver a ceremonial dagger at a ninja tournament. Unfortunately, the trio`s martial arts skills will be put to the test by a trio of bumbling thieves a handfull of opposing ninjas!PG"
Director: Charles T. Kanganis
ACTORS: Sean Fox, Max Elliott Slade, Evan Bonifant, Victor Wong, Donal Logue
The Deep End (DVD)
Tilda Swinton is riveting as Margaret Hall, a conscientious mom raising a family in Lake Tahoe who is entangled in a web of blackmail. While she frets over transporting her kids to ballet and baseball practice, she worries that her teenage son, Beau (Jonathan Tucker), is involved in a sleazy nightclub life in nearby Nevada. Margaret`s husband is a Naval officer who is often away at sea, so she is alone in rearing her family. When Beau gets into a car accident with his gay lover, Darby (Joshua Lucas), after a night of partying in Reno, Margaret takes matters into her own hands and tells Darby to stay away from her son. A few days later Darby shockingly turns up dead next to her boathouse. Shortly thereafter, mysterious Alek (Goran Visnjic of the television series ER) comes to Margaret`s door armed with an incriminating video of her son and Darby and threatens to go to the police if she doesn`t pay him $50,000. The film`s mystery and tension mount as the plot twists and turns--in one scene Tilda Swinton`s captivating eyes frantically look on as the strangely tormented Goran Visnjic performs CPR in an emergency worthy of ER.
Directors David Siegel and Scott McGehee, famous for their inventive first feature, SUTURE, trade idiosyncrasy for atmosphere using Giles Nuttgens`s fluid cinematography--which oozes with mystery in cool blues and refracted light--to set the frightening and suspenseful mood of THE DEEP END.R"
Director: Scott McGehee|David Siegel
ACTORS: Tilda Swinton, Goran Visnjic, Jonathan Tucker, Raymond J. Barry, Peter Donat
Love in the Afternoon (DVD)
Another May-December romantic comedy from Wilder starring Audrey Hepburn, this one pairs her with Gary Cooper in the City of Lights. Ariane Chavasse (Hepburn) is the daughter of a private detective (Maurice Chevalier), who has been hired by Mr. X, (John McGiver), a suspicious husband, to find out who his wife (Lise Bourdin) is seeing on the side. When he discovers the woman in the grip of millionaire playboy Frank Flannagan (Gary Cooper), he informs the predictably livid husband who loudly announces his intention to kill the interloper while Ariane is eavesdropping. She rushes off to warn Flannagan of his impending demise, which begins a series of afternoon meetings where she adopts the pose of a jaded lover and woman of the world. Intially amused by the ingenue`s charade, the middle-aged roue gradually becomes interested in the young woman, and after she disappears, becomes obsessed with finding her. After he unwittingly tells the story to the girl`s father in a steam room, the detective agrees to help Flannagan find her. Wilder`s sophisticated romantic fable, shot in spectacular Parisian locations, including the Opera and the elegant Chateau de Vitry, is nearly stolen by Chevalier as the protective pere.NR"
Director: Billy Wilder
ACTORS: Gary Cooper, Audrey Hepburn, Maurice Chevalier, John McGiver
