DVD Digest for May 19, 2009

Paul Clark — Tue, 19 May 2009 14:00:00 GMT

This week, the same old stuff you always get from DVD Digest. Also, a new Steven Seagal movie!

For some people reading this column, the news that the recent releases Valkyrie (MGM, also Blu-Ray), Paul Blart: Mall Cop (Sony, also Blu-Ray), and My Bloody Valentine 3D (Lionsgate, also Blu-Ray) will be more important than anything else. But we’re looking out for the rest of you as well. And if none of these titles quicken your pulse- and I perfectly understand if they don’t- there’s always the latest from movie-star-turned-musician-turned-energy-drink-magnate (take that, Billy Bob Thornton!) Steven Seagal, Driven to Kill (Fox, also Blu-Ray). On the other side of things, the artsy and fartsy out there should be salivating over the release of John Gianvito’s excellent Profit Motive and the Whispering Wind (E1 Entertainment). In other words, something for everybody!

And what would a DVD Digest be without the classics section, for those of you who aren’t all uptight about black-and-white, subtitles, Academy ratio, and long-dead movie stars. Devotees of the Criterion Collection no doubt already know about the dynamic duo of DVDs hitting streets today. First, Peter Yates' great Boston crime drama The Friends of Eddie Coyle (Criterion) makes its long-awaited DVD debut. Or if you’re in the mood for something more, uh, Eastern, check out Pigs, Pimps & Prostitutes: 3 Films by Shohei Imamura (Criterion)- includes The Insect Woman, Pigs and Battleships, Intentions of Murder. Fans of old Hollywood would be advised to pick up two John Wayne favorites, El Dorado Centennial Edition (Paramount) and The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance Centennial Edition (Paramount). And by some happy coincidence, today’s release of Fritz Lang’s Nazi-hunting thriller Man Hunt (Fox) is timed perfectly with the release of the aforementioned Valkyrie. Funny how that worked out, dontcha find?

Fans of TV on DVD should find something to enjoy among this week’s releases, which include the ever-popular 24 Season 7 (Fox, also Blu-Ray), Alan Ball’s vampire saga True Blood (HBO, also Blu-Ray), and the no-longer-surprising-in-its-awesomeness Friday Night Lights Season 3 (Universal).

Finally, if you’ve a Blu-Ray player, you’re in luck! Today’s a big one for Blu-Ray only releases, highlighted by the Batman 20th Anniversary Blu-Ray Book (Warner), which includes a Batmobile full of extras, documentaries, and other cool stuff. For the kids, A Bug’s Life (Disney) hits stores to capitalize on the upcoming Pixar release Up, while those who are looking forward to the latest Terminator blockbuster will no doubt pick up Terminator 2 Skynet Edition (Lionsgate). The political drama Lions for Lambs (Fox) is coming out for fans of political speechifying. Finally, Paramount’s got a whole slew of new Blu-Ray only releases hitting stores today, including Three Days of the Condor, Changing Lanes, Enemy at the Gates, Paycheck, and The Machinist.

Tribeca Film Festival Review: "Profit Motive and the Whispering Wind"

Phil Nugent — Wed, 30 Apr 2008 13:30:00 GMT

Profit Motive and the Whispering Wind nicely sums up the excitement and frustration of the film festival experience. Inspired by the work of Howard Zinn but outreaching him in poetic resonance, this 58-minute film by John Gianvito is a thrilling, one-of-a-kind picture, and by all rights ought to be the election-year movie of 2008. What's frustrating about it is simply the possibility that it may not be widely seen (though the first three minutes have already made their way to YouTube; watching it can give you a taste of Gianvito's method but little sense of how powerful it is in its total cumulative effect). A noble and beautiful piece of work, it amounts to a chronological history tour of the American progressive tradition, as represented in tributes to the dead: gravestones and death markers for such figures as Crazy Horse, Frederick Douglass, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, Eugene V. Debs, Medgar Evers, I. F. Stone, Dorothy Day, Cesar Chavez, and on and on, as well as those killed in various clashes between striking workers and police. These images are intercut with nature photography, and the effect seems to be to suggest an ongoing, organic connection between some extraordinary lives and the physical environment these people were a part of. Ironically, despite its having been shot in so many graveyards, it gives you a deep, restorative sense of the continuing relevance of the American past. The movie only stumbles when Gianvito gives in to the temptation to make his point explicit with a climactic montage of contemporary political activists in the streets and a few bars of Paul Robeson singing "Joe Hill". The movie doesn't need these visual and aural cliches, and in this context, the sound of Robeson's voice is far less eloquent than the birds chirping and the tree leaves and bushes rustling in the breeze. Among the many striking quotes chisled in stone or set into plaques here, one stands out: the words of the martyred labor activist August Spies, who said, "The day will come when our silence will be more important than the voices you are throttling today." Profit Motive and the Whispering Wind makes you feel that these voices will never really be silent.

An interview with the director is featured here.

The Screengrab : profit motive and the whispering wind

DVD Digest for May 19, 2009

Tribeca Film Festival Review: "Profit Motive and the Whispering Wind"