House on Haunted Hill
- Condition: New
- Format: DVD
- Closed-captioned; Color; DVD; Widescreen; NTSC
Bruckheimer, the action genius behind the likes of the Pirates of the Caribbean, Con Air, The Rock, Armageddon, and many more, here teams with visual effects maestro Hoyt Yeatman, who writes and directs. The combo is potent, and the fact that they str! eamed their blow-'em-up vision through a film about tiny roden! ts savin g the world makes the whole confection a hilarious family-friendly experience as well as a satisfying action adventure. The premise isn't earth-shattering: oddball, unexpected heroes are called on to save the day (Men in Black, Underdog, etc.). But the lowly guinea pig has been long overdue to get its moment in the spotlight. And now the free world knows whom it can really trust. The film mixes the animated heroes with real-life actors, including the sardonic British character actor Bill Nighy, who plays an evil mogul out to take over and/or destroy the world. The U.S. government, it turns out, has been nurturing a special squad for occasions just such as this. It's just that it's been nurturing them in small pens with wood shavings on the floor and running wheels for exercise. Will Arnett, deadpan and spot-on, plays the human agent who has the unenviable task of wrangling the guinea pig G-Force, and is a deft foil for the bad guys as well as for the mini-h! eroes.
But the true powerhouse acting belongs to those giving voices to the guinea pig agents, including Sam Rockwell, Penélope Cruz, Steve Buscemi, and, as the voice of a domesticated layabout, Jon Favreau. The film's standout, though, is Tracy Morgan, whose Agent Blaster is bellicose, fearless, and as full of malapropisms as Morgan's character on 30 Rock. (In fact, the viewer keeps half-expecting Blaster to turn to Cruz's female agent, Juarez, and yell "Liz Lemon!") G-Force is full of belly laughs for kids, as well as their action-film-fan parents. --A.T. Hurley
Stills from G-Force (Click for larger image)
The DVD Workouts
Each of the 12 highly diverse and intense DVD workouts focuses on either a specific set of muscle groups or a unique training technique.
P90X Fitness Guide
This is your road map and your plan of attack for using P90X. Learn guidelines for getting started and essential tips for how to make the most of the program. The fitness guide provides you tips to reduce your chance of injury; a fit test; recommended supplements and equipment; detailed instructions for stretching, warming up, and performing exercises; and guidelines to help you select which P90X phase to complete, whether Classic, Doubles, or Lean! .
The Nutrition Plan
Following the P90X nutrition plan is just as vital to your overall success as any of the extreme workouts in this program. Specifically designed to work in tandem with the P90X workout routines, this three-phase eating plan recommends the perfect combination of foods to satisfy your body's energy needs every step of the way. P90X is not about quick fixes or miracle diets. It's about selecting the healthy foods that you want to eat, and determining the portion amounts that will provide your body with the right amount of fuel to excel during exercise. The P90X nutrition plan offers three phases. Phase 1 is the Fat Shredder, a high-protein-based diet designed to help you strengthen your muscles while simultaneously and rapidly shedding fat from your body. Phase 2 is the Energy Booster, a balanced mix of carbohydrates and proteins with a lower amount of fat to achieve additional energy for performance. And Phase 3 is the Endurance Maximizer, a! n athletic diet of complex carbohydrates, lean proteins, and l! ower fat , with the emphasis on more carbohydrates. You'll need this combination of foods as fuel to get the most out of your final few weeks and truly be in the best shape of your life.
Tools to Keep You Motivated
What's in the Box?
12 DVD workouts, nutrition plan, fitness guide How to Bring It DVD, a calendar to track your progress
House has ! always t ackled fascinating cases and that continues this season, though the symptoms aren't overly dramatic by House standards. The team tries to save a man whose family history indicates that he will die of a heart attack before he turns 40. They try to help a brilliant scientist whose depression and addictions make him feel he's better suited for a simpler life as a courier. And Wilson (Robert Sean Leonard) may once again be grappling with cancer. It's a credit to this show that while it features such a strong lead character, the costars don't get shafted in the process. Wilson is one of the show's most charming characters and, by default, has become House's best friend. The two of them share a home and bicker like an old married couple. When a woman they both are attracted to mistakenly assumes that they're a complicated gay couple, we can't help but laugh. But Wilson's love life is made difficult by the return of his ex-wife and House doesn't want to see his friend hurt a! gain. He can abuse Wilson, but he doesn't want her to do the same.
House's boss Cuddy (Lisa Edelstein) has her own issues, juggling a harried personal life and the complications that come with trying to keep House in line. Chase (Jesse Spencer) falls under scrutiny this season after treating a controversial politician who he fears will murder innocent civilians. He finds himself struggling with the Hippocratic oath to treat all patients--even the ones he finds distasteful--to the best of his ability. And of the main characters on the show, one will be fired, another will profess their love for a colleague, and three of them will look for love via a speed-dating service. Yes, the story lines are all over the place, but then again, so is House. --Jae-Ha Kim
Mamoru Oshii directs with a staccato rhythm, alternating sequences of rapid-fire action (car chases, gun battles, explosions) ! with static dialogue scenes that allow the characters to sort out the vaguely mystical and rather convoluted plot. Kusanagi's final quote from I Corinthians suggests that electronic evolution may compliment and eventually supplant organic evolution. The minor nudity, profanity, and considerable violence would earn Ghost in the Shell at least a PG rating. --Charles SolomonThe skillful blending of drawn animation and computer-generated imagery excited anime fans when this science fiction mystery was released in 1995: many enthusiasts believe Ghost suggests what the future of anime will be, at least in the short term. The film is set in the not-too-distant future, when an unnamed government uses lifelike cyborgs or "enhanced" humans for undercover work. One of the key cyborgs is The Major, Motoko Kusanagi, who resembles a cross between The Terminator and a Playboy centerfold. She finds herself caught up in a tangled web of espionage and counterespionage as! she searches for the mysterious superhacker known as "The Pup! pet Mast er."
Mamoru Oshii directs with a staccato rhythm, alternating sequences of rapid-fire action (car chases, gun battles, explosions) with static dialogue scenes that allow the characters to sort out the vaguely mystical and rather convoluted plot. Kusanagi's final quote from I Corinthians suggests that electronic evolution may compliment and eventually supplant organic evolution. The minor nudity, profanity, and considerable violence would earn Ghost in the Shell at least a PG rating. --Charles SolomonThe Smash First Season Anime Extravaganza in one complete set.
Major Motoko Kusanagi is a beautiful but deadly cyborg that is squad leader of Section 9; the Japanese government's clandestine unit assigned to battle terrorism and cyber warfare. Surrounded by an expertly trained team, Motoko faces her ultimate challenge- the Laughing Man- a terrorist who orchestrated a kidnapping and extortion plot many years ago and has suddenly reappeared. In order to! discover the identity of this enigmatic criminal, Motoko and Section 9 are drawn into a deadly labyrinth and they'll have to use all their expertise to survive. This acclaimed anime series from Production I.G (Kill Bill) and features the amazing music if Yoko Kanno (Cowboy Behop) with stories by Kenji Kamiyama (Blood, Jin-Roh) and Dai Soto (Eureka SeveN).Studio: Starz/sphe Release Date: 09/15/2009 Run time: 660 minutes
DVD Features:
Alternate endings
Audio Commentary
DVD ROM Features
Documentaries
Featurette
Other
On the DVD
As befits a horror franchise heavily invested in the idea of "fate," the Final Destination 3 disc carries a "Choose Their Fate" option. In other words, you can watch the movie with occasional choices offered; click on one of two alternatives, and see that version play out. This won't give you the power to let one character live or die; it's more like deciding whether somebody honks her horn twice in a scene, calls heads or tails on a coin flip, or pushes the thermostat to 72 degrees or 76. Not exactly life-changing, but it's kind of fun.
The bonus disc includes a 90-minute "making of" feature called Kill Shot, which covers the produc! tion of the movie in exhausting detail (honest detail, too: filmmakers James Wong and Glen Morgan are funny and blunt about the business they're in, including a section on how the original ending was scrapped in favor of a bloodier finale). It's everything you'd want to know about this movie--but who needs to know this much? A 7-minute cartoon, "It's All Around You," is an amusing meditation on bad luck and laws of probability, while a 25-minute featurette called Dead Teenager Movie spins off from Roger Ebert's theory about the rigid formula of a certain kind of horror film (Ebert weighs in on the subject himself). A few experts opine on the traditions of teenagers dying in horror films; some of them don't seem to be aware that the formula pre-dated the first Texas Chainsaw Massacre. Audio commentaries, special effects sidebars, and trailers fill out this needlessly authoritative disc. --Robert Horton