| Hi, Friends! |
We know many of you have been waiting to see the 10 Finalists for our Logo Contest, so we’ve included a slideshow of them for you.
And did you know you can get *1 FREE catalog movie rental, when you cast your vote for the new Video Station Logo?
What Movies Came Out This Week?
- THE REAPING
- PLANET TERROR
- LIGHTS IN THE DUSK
- TRANSFORMERS
- A MIGHTY HEART
- THE HOAX
- THE INVISIBLE
- CASSHERN
This week, we are also announcing the winner of our T-shirt raffle. Read on to find out who won!
| THE REAPING |
 The Reaping: Reviewed by Dave Horror/ThrillerRated R You’d figure Hilary Swank might want to avoid making another piece of genre junk after sci-fi dud The Core cooled her first post-Oscar career. And yet, after winning a second Oscar, she’s at it again, albeit with better results, starring in this cheesy yet entertaining signs-of-the-apocalypse horror flick. Not as good as The Omen but way better than more recent biblical garbage like Stigmata or Heath Ledger’s The Order. Swank plays a former Christian missionary who now runs around debunking religious phenomena, proving the science behind so-called miracles. Faster than you can say oh-my-God she’s off to a small Louisiana town where the 10 biblical plagues seem to be occurring. We’re talking a river turned to blood, dead cows, frogs falling from the sky and lots and lots of locusts. Not to mention the death of first-born children. Having Swank around certainly injects a measure of credibility to the overheated proceedings. But somehow she just doesn’t fit. Doesn’t matter. Because this is not a serious Ed Harris-Third Miracle tour de force, even though it wants to be. No, it’s a full-on special effects feast on the order of 1988′s trashy The Seventh Sign. Fine with me. Critics may whine, but I prefer my apocalyptic thrillers served with plenty of cheese. |
| PLANET TERROR |
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Action/Horror/Sci-Fi/Thriller Unrated Gee, I thought I was tired of flesh eating zombie-like creature movies. Robert Rodriguez says I’m wrong. G is for Gritty, Grainy, Goofy, Gross, and Gargantuan effects. G is for Great cast and Great fun. G is for Grindhouse: pick up Death Proof and do the double feature. |
| LIGHTS IN THE DUSK |
 Lights in the Dusk (Laitakaupungin valot)- Reviewed by Bruce Action Adventure/ComedyUnrated Lights in the Dusk is Aki Kaurismaki’s final installment in his “Loser Trilogy,” with the previous one being Video Station favorite The Man Without A Past. With Lights, Kaurismaki continues working his favorite themes of loneliness and innocence. The noirish plot involves a night watchman who is completely taken advantage of by a femme fatale straight out of Hitchcock or Lang, to the point of being sent up the river for two years, while innocent of any wrongdoing. Where Kaurismaki’s interests lie, however, like the great directors of Hollywood past, whom he adores, are not so much in the mechanics of plot generation as in the visual and stylistic modes by which he can evoke the subtlest of human behaviors. The long takes and gorgeous cinematic compositions feel almost guiltily luxuriant. |
| TRANSFORMERS |
 Transformers – reviewed by Sheri Action/Adventure/Comedy/Sci-Fi/ThrillerRated PG-13 What a fun movie. Although I am generally not a fan of the comics turned action adventure movies and I am completely unfamiliar with the story (sorry I wasn’t a boy growing up in the 80′s), I couldn’t help but love this film. Shia LaBeouf (Holes, Disturbia, Guide to Recognizing Your Saints and the upcoming Indiana Jones movie) really shines as the kid who, in buying his first car, gets a lot more than he bargained for. This story is taken directly from the comics, Autobots versus Decepticons, with many of the original characters (so I am told). Michael Bay (of Bad Boys, Armageddon, The Rock and Pearl Harbor fame) has infused this movie with so much character that you can’t help but get all wrapped up in it. It’s smart and beyond the fact that there are cars turning themselves into robots that are here to save the world, it’s rather believable. Having not watched a single episode, I can’t say how accurate it is to the original, so there may be some differences. However the great thing about the movie was you didn’t have to have any understanding of the original comics to be able to follow the story. The CGI graphics are amazing and fit seamlessly in the film. And the supporting cast is good. My only criticism is that the final battle was a bit hard to watch, not meaning violent, but it was moving so fast I lost track of who was who, or should I say what was what.Wish I could put another adjective in but Transformers was just plain fun! |
| A MIGHTY HEART |
 A Mighty Heart – Reviewed by Joyce Drama/History/Thriller
Rated R Many people already know what happened to Wall Street Journal journalist Daniel Pearl in Pakistan. Knowing the grisly outcome seems to detract somewhat from the suspenseful element in A Mighty Heart, but the movie is more the telling of the story of his wife, Mariane Pearl, and her attempts to uncover her husband’s whereabouts when he disappears. We see the various people who were part of the investigation, the many elements of the search, and how pregnant Mariane deals with the unbearable stress and burden of her husband’s disappearance. We’re carried on this film journey by director Michael Winterbottom (Road to Guantanamo, 24 Hour Party People) who creates a semi-documentary feel by the hand-held camera work and interspersing of actual news reports. Angelina Jolie was asked by Mariane to portray her in the movie, and A Mighty Heart provides a vehicle for the kind of nuanced and authentic performance that Jolie has proved she is capable of. We see much of visual interest in the footage of Pakistan and perhaps gain perspective on the kidnappers’ motivation. Whether Winterbottom’s documentary style creates a certain distance, or Mariane’s unrelenting strength feels incongruent, connecting with this film on an emotional level is a challenge, but the story is still important to tell and the movie worthwhile to see. |
| THE HOAX |
 The Hoax – Reviewed by Bruce Comedy/Drama
Rated R |
| THE INVISIBLE |
The Invisible – Reviewed by Dave Drama/Fantasy/Mystery/Thriller Rated PG-13 Fans of both the CW network and creepy fright flicks like The Others and The Sixth Sense should enjoy this moody love child of Ghost and The O.C. Look elsewhere if you liked Hostel or were turned on by the torture in Turistas. The only thing being tortured here is the soul of a sensitive golden-boy teen (Justin Chatwin) and the conscience of a bruised-on-the-inside-hottie (Margarita Levieva) with a horrible home life. She beats Mr. Sensitive to a pulp one night and leaves him for dead. He clings to life and wanders around in limbo trying to tell people where he is and what happened. Okay, yeah, a la Dawson’s Creek, the so-called teens here are white and pretty, don’t actually talk like teens and are played by twentysomethings who happen to look under voting age. But the compelling central mystery (will authorities find Chatwin in time) more than compensates. And, even better, first-time director David Goyer uses no special effects in telling his tale. Make no mind that director Richard Donner accomplished the same thing in 2003 with the sci-fi Timeline. His movie sucked. This one doesn’t. |
| CASSHERN |
Casshern – Reviewed by Dave Action/Adventure/Sci-Fi/Drama Not Rated If anything out there could give CGI-heavy behemoth 300 a real run for its money it would be this 2004 live-action anime. Because the visuals first-time director Kazuaki Kiriya features in his flick are absolutely, positively, amazingly, eye-poppingly STUNNING. Astonishing. Dazzling. What else can I say? My jaw dropped to the floor more than once. The time and energy spent rendering such visually rich backgrounds and perfectly exaggerated action must have been staggering. But, whew! What a payoff. Add to that a pretty cool-sounding premise. It’s the future in a different timeline. A 50-year war has just ended. Disease and pollution run rampant. Thanks to a greedy corporation’s funding a geneticist has nearly perfected a process of regenerating human beings. Said geneticist’s son joins what’s left of the war effort. He dies. By accident the process is perfected. So dad rejuvenates son. Also back from the dead are the corpses on which dad used to experiment. Said corpses decide to wipe out humans. Anime fans will likely have no problem following the sometimes operatic twists and turns. This non-fan admittedly became confused more than once but grasped just enough of the details to never be completely lost. I’ll tell ya, though. When your eyes soak in the sight of the title hero blazing up the side of a building to avoid gunfire, then racing back down to take out I don’t know how many gigantic military robots, why it’s happening will become moot. Really and seriously. Fellow eye-candy spectaculars like Sin City and Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow should bow at this flick’s fantastic-looking feet. (A LITTLE BACKGROUND: It’s based on a same-named anime from 1973, and was produced in relatively the same time period as Sky Captain, Sin City and the French-made Immortal. And like those other films, it was shot with actors performing in front of blue and/or green screens so CGI could be added later. It cost roughly $6 million in American dollars to make.) |
| TV on DVD: this week’s new releases from Television Series |
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Medium – Season 3
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And last but not least…
We wanted to take a moment to thank all of The Video Station Logo Contest partners. Please support these Boulder companies:
Thanks, also, to all of you! And don’t forget to vote
Looking forward to seeing you in the store, when you pick up your new releases.
Enjoy,
Your Friends,
at The Video Station