Week of June 28

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Swords and Guns

After adapting two comic books for the screen, Zack Snyder made his own live action graphic novel with Sucker Punch, where a girl (Emily Browning) committed to an asylum retreats into an odd burlesque fantasy where her doctor (Carla Gugino) is a madame and the head orderly (Oscar Isaac) is a sadistic director. Her plan for escape takes her and her fellow inmates (Abbie Cornish, Jena Malone, Vanessa Hudgens, and Jamie Chung) into a series of fantasy adventures, fighting steampunk Nazi zombies, dragons, and giant samurai, gathering the real world tools to win the girls' actual escape. With Scott Glenn. On DVD and Blu-Ray.

After Yang (Jang Dong Gun) establishes himself as the greatest swordsman in the world, he turns his back on his people and his legacy in The Warrior's Way when he refuses to kill the last surviving member of his rival's clan: a baby. Arriving with the child in America in the old west, he finds a place in a desolate town run by Eight Ball (Tony Cox) and his carnival folk, and befriends a cowgirl (Kate Bosworth) with tragic past and the town drunk (Geoffrey Rush)... but the town is preyed upon by the Colonel (Danny Huston) and his gang of masked outlaws. Yang has to defend his new home, but waging war means his former clan will soon find him, and the town will have both swordsmen and gunfighters loose on its streets. On DVD and Blu-Ray.

Behmen (Nicolas Cage) and Felson (Ron Perlman) are 14th century knights who desert the Crusades, questioning the killing they've done in by church's orders in Season of the Witch. Caught as deserters, they're ordered to escort a priest (Stephen Campbell Moore) and a young girl (Claire Foy) to a remote abbey-- they girl is accused of witchcraft, and if the monks in the abbey can "cure" her, they believe it will end the plague that has ravaged europe. Accompanied by a knight (Stephen Graham) and an unscrupulous guide (Ulrich Thomsen), Behmen and Felson fight strange, supernatural occurrences to get them all to their destination, but if the girl is not a witch, will they allow another innocent's death? On DVD and Blu-Ray.

The Norwegian Max Manus: Man of War is a World War II action movie about a soldier who returns from battling the Soviets to find his homeland occupied by the Germans. Max Manus joins the underground resistance and begins a campaign against the invaders that make him a person of interest with the Gestapo. As his own personal war escalates and the body count on both sides grows, Max has to face the consequences of waging war, as it affects his friends as well as his enemies.

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Actual Events

Young Jesco White (Edward Hogg) was always a problem child, discovering solvents and gas-huffing at an early age, until his father (Muse Watson) teaches him mountain dancing in White Lightnin'. At his best when he's dancing, on the road with musicians, he always felt the pull of his darker urges. As the story's told from Jesco's point of view, he recounts his time on stage, meeting the woman of his dreams (Carrie Fisher), and his lapses into bouts of substance abuse, violence, and crises of faith.

Standing up to the Soviets by hiring Jewish musicians, conductor Andrei Fillipov's greatest orchestral performance was interrupted by the Communist Party and his career was destroyed in The Concert-- thirty years later, Andrei is still working at the same Moscow orchestra... as a janitor. When he happens across the news of a concert's cancellation in Paris, Andrei sees what may be his last chance and tries to reassemble his orchestra, who haven't aged particularly well. Worse, his last-minute show insists upon an untested violinist (Melanie Laurent) who's never played the piece before, but the orchestra may play again, and recapture the show they never got to play three decades ago.

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Fairy Tale

Wealthy and arrogant Kyle (Alex Pettyfer) usually treats people badly in Beastly, but when he singles out a witch (Mary-Kate Olsen) masquerading as a high school student, she gives him the Beauty and the Beast curse: he becomes ugly, twisted, and scarred, and will remain that way unless he can find someone to love him. Beginning to feel something for Vanessa Hudgens, Kyle may have found his salvation, but the road to redemption is difficult as he learns to exist without good looks, but strives not to be ugly. With Neil Patrick Harris. On DVD and Blu-Ray.

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Dramas

A long walk through Barney's (Paul Giamatti) memories of his life, Barney's Version, from his idealistic youth to old age. Spanning three wives (Rachelle Lefevre, Minnie Driver, and Rosamund Pike), Barney's fiercely opinionated and politically incorrect, and his life is a chaotic mix of drinking, smoking, and womanizing, but his stories range from his relationship with his father (Dustin Hoffman), his son (Jake Hoffman), his inexplicably missing friend (Scott Speedman), and the detective (Mark Addy) that believes Barney's responsible. On DVD and Blu-Ray.

The Peruvian Undertow is the story of Miguel, a young fisherman with a beautiful wife and a baby on the way. Miguel's seemingly idyllic life is haunted by his secret love of Santiago, a painter treated poorly by the rest of the village for being gay. Miguel must face the consequences of being true to himself, and make his own difficult decisions.

Traveling to Lebanon, PA from Philadelphia, Will (Josh Hopkins) arrives in the small town to settle his father's affairs, but the small town starts to become a part of his life. As Will becomes involved with dramas and relations of the family across the street and begins to fall in love with a married schoolteacher (Samantha Mathis), he begins to shirk his high-power city life for the simpler world that his father embraced in his later years. With Mary Beth Hurt.

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Documented

Filmmaker David Bond tries to remove himself from public data gathering in the documentary Erasing David. David hires private investigators to find him, and begins to scrub himself from public records. Amazed at how much data about himself is publicly available, he adapts to the information provided to the world by his Internet Service Provider, his Facebook account, his cell phone, and his car's registration. As he tries to disappear, he keeps finding new, subtle ways he's left a trail.

A recording of his standup performance, comedian Aziz Ansari's Intimate Moments for a Sensual Evening is a live comedy show filmed in Los Angeles.

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New this week to Reckless Video's TV New Releases is the first season of Rizzoli & Isles, a procedural centered around driven Boston Police Detective Jane Rizzoli (Angie Harmon) and socially awkward forensic expert Dr. Maura Isles (Sasha Alexander) as they try to track down a serial killer.

Week of June 21

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Reclamation

An American traveling abroad for business, Dr. Martin Harris (Liam Neeson) wakes up in a German hospital after a car accident to find everything's been taken from him, even his identity, in Unknown. When he finds his wife (January Jones) she doesn't recognize him, and she's with a man who claims to be the "real" Dr. Harris (Aiden Quinn) and has the paperwork and identification to prove it. Aided by a former East German secret police agent (Bruno Ganz), Martin must find the only person who remembers him, the taxi driver (Diane Kruger) from his accident, and unravel the mystery that has stolen his life. On DVD and Blu-Ray.

A movie centered on the popular Roman Ninth Legion, The Eagle stars Channing Tatum as Centurion Marcus Flavius Aquila, the son of the Ninth's standard bearer, whose family lives with the shame of having lost the legion's bronze eagle. Discharged from the military after an unfortunate battle, Marcus concocts a plan to reclaim his family's honor: he and his slave (Jamie Bell) will travel into the enemy-controlled lands in the north of Britain and return with the Ninth's eagle... but in enemy lands, his slave is in familiar territory, and Marcus himself is surrounded by enemies. With Mark Strong. On DVD and Blu-Ray.

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Fate

David Norris (Matt Damon) reconnects with Elise (Emily Blunt) on a bus months after their chance meeting and first kiss in The Adjustment Bureau, but they were never supposed to meet again. As the strange, supernatural agents (including Anthony Mackie and John Slattery) of the Bureau slightly rig human lives to take certain paths, they never intended for these two to meet, but David stands up against fate and the omnipresent Adjustment Bureau to be with, and stay with, Elise... though he may have worse problems than the anger of the bureau, as pursuing the woman he loves and stepping away from his written destiny could derail both of their fates. Based on a story by Philip K. Dick. On DVD and Blu-Ray.

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Comedies

"I get that this is killer material for a novel: Sensitive white guy learns life lessons by taking in small black child... You can't just keep him. He's not a goldfish."

Josh Randor's indie comedy Happythankyoumoreplease stars Randor as Sam, a slacker writer who unofficially adopts Rasheen, a foster child who follows him home and refuses to leave. In Sam's orbit are his best friend (Malin Akerman) with terrible taste in men, his cousin (Zoe Kazan) and her boyfriend (Pablo Schreiber) who are considering leaving New York for Los Angeles, and the beautiful waitress (Kate Mara) who tests his fear of commitment. On DVD and Blu-Ray.


Innocent, small-town insurance agent Tim Lippe (Ed Helms) has to fly to a regional conference in Miguel Arteta's Cedar Rapids. Tim needs to win the prestigious Two Diamonds Award for his hometown insurance company and his good nature seems a perfect way to win the favor of the morals-obsessed head of the convention (Kurtwood Smith), but he falls in with a group of insurance agents (John C. Reilly, Anne Heche, and Isiah Whitlock Jr) who show the naive Tim what wild antics the big city has to offer... and though he thinks his innocence hangs in the balance, Tim learns that the morals in Cedar Rapids aren't as easy to understand as he thought. On DVD and Blu-Ray.

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Family

Kenji is a high school student with a gift for math in Summer Wars, by the director of The Girl Who Leapt Through Time. He gets taken by his classmate, Natsuki, to her family's estate for her grandmother's 90th birthday... but when an internet virus causes global mayhem with Kenji's name, he finds himself surrounded by a huge clan with a proud military ancestry, and they band together to combat a threat that no one else in the world can face.

Greg (Zachary Gordon) and his best friend Rowley (Robert Capron) are beginning seventh grade in Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Rodrick Rules, but they're still the "undersized weaklings" they were in the first movie. To make matters worse, Greg's mother (Rachel Harris) has decided to curb the antics at home by introducing a system of "Mom Bucks," which puts him in direct competition with his brother, Rodrick (Devon Bostick). On DVD and Blu-Ray.

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The documentary film Living in Emergency: Doctors without Borders recounts the stories of the doctors who travel to war-torn nations to provide emergency care. Taking place in Congo and Nigeria, doctors struggle with the intense workload and the challenges of the field.

Two new documentaries from PBS' Secrets of the Dead series are China's Terra Cotta Warriors, exploring the recently unearthed 8,000 individual statues of the army of China's first emporer from 2200 BC, and Lost in the Amazon, recounting famed explorer Percey Fawcett's 1925 expedition to the Amazon, ending in his still-unsolved disappearance. Narrated by Liev Schreiber.

New this week in Reckless Video's TV New Releases are the 6th season of Kyra Sedgwick in the procedural The Closer, as well as the final season of the supernatural crime drama Medium with Patricia Arquette, as well as the first season of Louis C.K's standup, documentary, sitcom hybrid Louie.

Also new are seasons two, three, and four of the BBC period drama Lark Rise to Candleford, and the Masterpiece Theater drama The Cazalets with Hugh Bonneville.

Week of June 14

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Warriors

Staff Sergeant Michael Nantz (Aaron Eckhart), a combat weary Marine, is about to retire when the United States is attacked in Battle: Los Angeles. Thrown into a new platoon with an inexperienced lieutenant (Ramon Rodriguez), Nantz and his men charge into war torn Los Angeles to face an enemy they don't yet understand: aliens. As the Marines go in to rescue a group of civilians before an air strike levels the area, they have to fight for their lives against invaders that could destroy the earth. On DVD and Blu-Ray.

The Thai Kingdom of War is a historical drama about King Naresuan of Siam, and his ascent in the 1500s. Rising from his youth studying under a Buddhist monk to the beginning of his military career, Naresuan becomes a formidable leader and, through his exploits, founds the kingdom of Siam.

Donnie Yen puts on a mask and fights for justice in Legend of the Fist: The Return of Chen Zhen. Set in the 30s, Chen Zhen stands against the looming Japanese invasion of China, rooting out spies and foiling assassination attempts. With a list of anti-Japanese activists made public and all of its members in danger, Chen Zhen has to don a mask, save the marked men, and retaliate against their attackers. With Qi Shu and Anthony Wong Chau-Sang. On DVD and Blu-Ray.

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Comedies

Owen Wilson is married with three kids in the Farrelly Brothers' Hall Pass, but he and his friend (Jason Sudeikis) spend most of their time bantering about other women. Fed up, their wives (Jenna Fischer and Christina Applegate) come up with a plan to cure them: they're given a week off from marriage, a "Hall Pass," where the boys can do whatever they want... but it's been a while since they've been single, and their week of freedom might not be what they were expecting. On DVD and Blu-Ray.

Composed of stunts, pranks, and gags not included in Jackass 3, Jackass 3.5 puts together the scenes shot but not included in the film's official release.

FBI Agent Malcolm Turner (Martin Lawrence) dons his fat suit for the third time in Big Mommas: Like Father, Like Son. When his stepson (Brandon T. Jackson) witnesses a murder and has to hide by posing as a girl, Malcolm resurrects his old alter ego, Big Momma, to watch over his stepson and conduct an undercover investigation.

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Valerie's (Amanda Seyfried) life is torn between the boy she's loved since childhood and an arranged marriage to someone she barely knows in Catherine Hardwicke's Red Riding Hood, but her worries increase when a werewolf starts terrorizing her village. The villagers hire a famous witchhunter (Gary Oldman) to hunt the big bad wolf, but his certainty that the werewolf is actually one of the townsfolk makes everyone a suspect, and tracking the wolf draws unwanted attention to the one girl the wolf seems obsessed with: Valerie. With Billy Burke. On DVD and Blu-Ray.

Based on actual events, Kill the Irishman follows Danny Green (Ray Stevenson) through the criminal underground of Cleveland in the 1970s. Green's refusal to back down from a fight and survive multiple attempts on his life led him through several careers, running a union, collecting for a loan shark (Christopher Walken) and eventually teaming up with a gangster (Vincent D'Onofrio) to run his own businesses without paying a percentage to the mob... which leads to frequent attempts to kill Danny Green. With Val Kilmer. On DVD and Blu-Ray.

14-year-old Filipa's coming of age is complicated by her parents' failing marriage in the Brazilian Adrift. Her relationship with her father (Vincent Cassel) changes when she sees him with a beautiful American (Camilla Belle) and spies on their liaisons... inspiring Filipa to rebel in dangerous ways.

Theo (Chris Messina) is a wedding photographer and part-time "stalker for hire" in Monogamy when a new client hires him to secretly photograph her sex life. Nervous about his impending marriage to Rashida Jones, Theo becomes obsessed with his voyeuristic new client, forcing him to confront uncomfortable truths about his own love life.

Vincent Dooly is determined to win the Thomas Alva Edison Award for Young Inventors in the mockumentary The Mother of Invention. He's never won before, but now that Vincent's 25, it's the last year he's eligible to win an Eddy. Vincent's convinced that winning an Eddy will turn his life around, but he has to compete with multiple Eddy winner Martin Wooderson (Jimmi Simpson)... who never loses.

Narrated by Ellen Page, Vanishing of the Bees is a documentary about Colony Collapse Disorder, a little-understood phenomenon related to the sudden disappearance of honey bees around the world.

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New this week to Reckless Video's TV New Releases are the first seasons of the supernatural mystery series Haven and the police drama The Glades. Also new is the BBC's Fortunes of War with Kenneth Branagh and Emma Thompson, and the complete anime sci-fi action series Neon Genesis Evangelion.

Week of June 7

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Western Traditions

True Grit
Now & Then

When 14-year-old Mattie Ross' father is killed by Tom Chaney (Josh Brolin), one of his hired hands, she travels to settle his affairs in Joel & Ethan Coen's True Grit, but she stays to see her father avenged. Mattie hires surly and drunken marshall Rooster Cogburn (Jeff Bridges) to bring Chaney to justice, though Texas Ranger LaBeouf (Matt Damon) wants to collect the reward for Chaney in his home state... their paths cross repeatedly as they track their man, who's joined Lucky Ned Pepper's (Barry Pepper) gang. Mattie and her lawmen hunt their outlaws through wild and untamed country, each with their own goals and unsure of one another, but they all intend to see their job done. On DVD and Blu-Ray.

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Couples

Mike Leigh's newest slice-of-life film about class and family in Britain is Another Year, where Tom and Gerri Hepple (Jim Broadbent and Ruth Sheen) continue their happy marriage into their senior years. The story of their relationship is simple and blissful, but their stability makes them the support system for all their less predictable friends... such as Gerri's emotionally messy co-worker (Lesley Manville). On DVD and Blu-Ray.

Adam Sandler plays a successful L.A. plastic surgeon who pretends to be unhappily married to attract women in Just Go with It. Though he meets Palmer, a beautiful middle school teacher, honestly, she discovers his fake wedding ring-- now he has to rope his best friend (Jennifer Aniston) into pretending to be his estranged wife and reassuring Palmer... but as fast as as you can say "Three's Company," the comic misunderstanding spirals out of control. On DVD and Blu-Ray.

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Obsessed with the Wrong Woman

Young Eun-Yi is hired as a nanny for a wealthy husband and his pregnant wife in the Korean The Housemaid, but introducing a young woman into the household tempts the husband to begin an affair. As the domestic situation slowly falls apart, the rights and wrongs of the family begin to reveal themselves, and Eun-Yi's choices narrow as she's forced into an impossible position.

William Vincent (James Franco) he returns to New York after years in exile to reclaim the woman he loves in Shadows and Lies. Four years ago, Vincent assumed a new identity and restarted his life as a small time crook when a stranger (Martin Donovan) approached him and offered him a job: he would work for The Boss (Josh Lucas). Threatened with death if he ever returned, Vincent comes back for Julianne Nicholson, The Boss' favorite call girl, and the reason for his exile. On DVD and Blu-Ray.

Told in flashback from the point of view of superstar matador Manuel Rodriguez Sanchez (Adrien Brody), A Matador's Mistress follows Manolete's ascent in the bullfighting ring and his passionate affair with actress Lupe Sino (Penelope Cruz). Set during the 1940s, the film plays out the all-consuming romance that led to Sanchez's last fight. On DVD and Blu-Ray.

Erik (Ricky Mabe) pursues his girlfriend to a Live Action Role Playing weekend in The Wild Hunt. Erik has no interest in role playing, but his brother Bjorn (Mark Antony Krupa) leads a tribe of Vikings in the games and helps him get in. Unfortunately, Erik's girlfriend (Kaniehtiio Horn) is with the leader of the Celts (Trevor Hayes), and the play competition of the games begins to mix with the mens' real competition over a woman, until the rules start to blur and the battles are no longer safe.

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Down Under

In an ensemble crime comedy centered around crime lord Terence Fink, the Australian Pros & Ex Cons follows an irreverent series of coincidences that crosses a handful of slackers, a pair of hackers trying to electronically rob a bank, and four hired killers (including Sam Worthington). As the heists, cons, and hits get in each others' way, there's no telling who'll be left standing in the end.

Based on a true story, In Her Skin begins with the parents of Rachel Barber (Guy Pearce and Miranda Otto) searching for their daughter when she doesn't come home from dance class. Their story merges with the life of Caroline Reid (Ruth Bradley), a disturbed young woman who envies everything about Rachel's life, and the tragedy that progresses as Caroline loses touch with reality. With Sam Neill and Rebecca Gibney.

A master diver (Richard Roxburgh) and his team, along with his son and his financiers (Ioan Gruffudd and Alice Parkinson), get trapped in an underwater cave system in Papua New Guinea in Sanctum. With limited supplies and diving gear, they can't go back the way they came, and the only way out is to explore the underground caverns and search for a new exit. On DVD and Blu-Ray.

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GTX, a company in a down turn, begins to downsize in The Company Men, as the company president (Craig T. Nelson) starts laying people off. Hotshot salesman Bobby Walker (Ben Affleck) is unemployed in the first round and struggles to find new work to support his wife (Rosemarie DeWitt) and son, as the senior members (Tommy Lee Jones and Chris Cooper) question the firings while the president purchases extravagant new office space. With businesses struggling, nothing is certain, and the company men have to compromise to stay afloat. On DVD and Blu-Ray.

A documentary about the influential comedian, American: The Bill Hicks Story interviews friends and family throughout Hicks' life, beginning with his early days writing and performing while still in school. Continuing with his early attempts for stardom in Los Angeles and struggles with addiction to finding his voice and becoming an icon with comedy, the film combines interviews and performance footage to realize a portrait of Bill Hicks.

A tire wakes up in the desert, discovers it can kill, and heads into town on a rampage in Rubber. For some reason, it decides not to kill Roxane Mesquida, who becomes part of the tire's story as the local police (led by Stephen Spinella) try to stop the killing spree. The movie warns to audience early that all movies contain elements that aren't explained or make no sense... and it goes on to continue to confound expectations, providing an audience within the film and a running commentary about the events as they unfold. On DVD and Blu-Ray.

A privileged teenager (Sasha Jackson) runs away to surf her mother's old stomping grounds in South Africa in Blue Crush 2: No Limits. Quickly befriending a local surfer (Elizabeth Mathis), she proves herself on the waves, wins the love of a local boy, and makes a rival/enemy in the local circles as she tries to find herself in a new place.

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New this week to Reckless Video's TV New Releases is the 3rd season of the critically acclaimed Breaking Bad, as Walter White (Bryan Cranston) continues to work towards providing for his family with the help of Jesse Pinkman (Aaron Paul), a local, small-time drug dealer.

Also new is the 4th season of Burn Notice, as Michael Westen (Jeffery Donovan) finances tracking the people who ruined his life by solving cases in Miami with his trigger-happy ex-girlfriend (Gabrielle Anwar) and his former special ops buddy (Bruce Campbell), as well as the 2nd season of White Collar, which commissions a former white collar crook (Matt Bomer) to assist with FBI agents on his particular area of expertise.

Reckless has just acquired the debut seasons of The Big C, about Cathy Jamison's (Laura Linney) struggles with cancer as she tries to keep her suburban life in tact, and Pretty Little Liars, where four friends (including Troian Bellisario, Ashley Benson, and Lucy Hale) begin receiving threatening notes from an anonymous adversary after the leader of their clique (Sasha Pieterse) goes missing.

Finally, we have the newest release by DC Comics, Green Lantern: Emerald Knights, setting up a story that inhabits the universe of the upcoming summer live action movie.