Saturday, December 31, 2011

The Fantasticks: The Complete Illustrated Text Plus the Official Fantasticks Scrapbook and History of the Musical

Beverly Hills Chihuahua

  • Get ready for a hilarious fun-filled adventure starring Chloe (voiced by Drew Barrymore), a diamond-clad ultra-pampered Beverly Hills Chihuahua who gets lost while on vacation in Mexico. Papi (voiced by George Lopez), an amusing Chihuahua who's crazy about Chloe, springs into action and heads south of the border to rescue her, while Chloe gets help from Delgado (voiced by Andy Garcia), her newfoun
Get ready for a hilarious fun-filled adventure starring Chloe (voiced by Drew Barrymore), a diamond-clad ultra-pampered Beverly Hills Chihuahua who gets lost while on vacation in Mexico. Papi (voiced by George Lopez), an amusing Chihuahua who's crazy about Chloe, springs into action and heads south of the border to rescue her, while Chloe gets help from Delgado (voiced by Andy Garcia), her newfound friend and self-appointed protector. Beverly Hills Chihuahua from Walt Disney Pictures is a h! eartwarming and outrageously funny tale proving once again that good things do come in small packages. It's a real treat for the whole family. This DVD has fullscreen or widescreen capabilities.

Bonus Features:
*Deleted scenes with introductsion by director Raja Gosnell
*Blooper scooper
*Legend of the chihuahua
*Feature audio commentary by director Raja Gosness (Widescreen version only)
Beverly Hills Chihuahua finds director Raja Gosnell back on the talking-dog beat (following his live-action Scooby-Doo and Scooby-Doo 2: Monsters Unleased), this time in an ambitious, tongue-in-cheek comedy with a fun cast of onscreen and vocal actors. Piper Perabo plays Rachel, niece of a Beverly Hills eccentric (Jamie Lee Curtis) who spends much of her fortune pampering Chloe (voiced by Drew Barrymore), a spoiled Chihuahua used to pacing through this world with booties on her paws. Chloe gets dog-napped while ! Rachel takes a vacation in Mexico, and finds protection from a! misfit German Shepherd named Delgado (Andy Garcia), who has a painful secret in his past. The two get into and out of a lot of scrapes, trying to stay ahead of a vicious dog (Edward James Olmos) working for the head of an illegal dogfight gambling syndicate. Computer effects turn the film's many four-legged characters into talking critters capable of leaping onto train boxcars and leading the heroine into the Indiana Jones-like ancestral home of the chihuahua breed. The comedy is crisp and kid-friendly, the story of Chloe rise out of silliness into canine authenticity, plus the film's surprising ambitiousness, are all very winning. --Tom Keogh


Stills from Beverly Hills Chihuahua (Click for larger image)












Virtua Fighter 5

  • Two New Characters, El Blaze and Eileen, round out the cast of 17 dynamic fighters. El Blaze is a Mexican wrestling champion that uses the Lucha Libre fighting style, and Eileen, originally from China, uses Kou Ken (Monkey Kung Fu style) which she learned
  • Stunning highly-detailed 3D fi ghting environments inspired by locations around the world allow players to challenge their opponents in unique types of arenas.
  • New offensive move lets players move around their opponent from the side and back allowing players to be more strategic with their battle.
  • Customize characters with the enhanced attachment system and customization engine giving players more fl exibility than ever before when creating their characters.
  • Next-Gen presentation includes HD resolution (widescreen) and Dolby® Digital 5.1CH sound.
Small-town boy Shawn MacArthur (Channing Tatum, G.I. Joe: The R! ise of Cobra, Public Enemies) knows firsthand that every day in New York City is a struggle to survive. So when scam artist Harvey Boarden (Terrence Howard, Iron Man, Hustle and Flow) gives him a chance to be something more in the brutal underground world of bare-knuckle street-fighting, Shawn decides that he has something worth fighting for and puts everything on the line to win. Every knockout brings him closer to the life he’s always wanted, but also traps him in a dangerous web he can’t escape.The last thing you might expect from a movie called Fighting is excellent acting, but that’s what you’ll get. A scam artist named Harvey (Terrence Howard) sees a young would-be hustler named Shawn (Channing Tatum, Step Up, Stop-Loss) in a street scuffle and lures him into a no-rules fighting circuit. Shawn’s relentless drive to win leads him to unexpected success, but when he gets put into a big fight with a professional boxer, Harvey asks Shawn to take a dive. The plot ! sounds like a thousand boxing movies, but the difference is al! l in the texture. Fighting takes place in a very real New York City, with cramped, make-shift apartments, cluttered streets, and seedy nightclubs. Scenes get knocked sideways by odd bits of life and character quirks that feel organic, not shoehorned in by some clever screenwriter. There’s a marvelous scene where Shawn is trying to woo the Puerto Rican waitress he’s smitten with (Zulay Henao, Feel the Noise), but they keep getting interrupted by her suspicious mother--which sounds like a rom-com cliche, but is completely transformed by the wonderfully human interplay among the actors. Howard has always had a magnetic talent, but Tatum reveals an engaging vulnerability that contrasts nicely with his big-slab-of-beefcake look. The movie hearkens back to 1970s classics like Midnight Cowboy and Dog Day Afternoon, and though it doesn’t achieve the same emotional heights, it’s reaching in the right direction. Writer/director Dito Montiel (whose previous film, A Guide to Recognizing! Your Saints, also featured Tatum) promises to make some truly memorable movies. --Bret Fetzer

Stills from Fighting (Click for larger image)
Small-town boy Shawn MacArthur (Channing Tatum, G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra, Public Enemies) knows firsthand that every day in New York City is a struggle to survive. So when scam artist Harvey Boarden (Terrence Howard, Iron Man, Hustle and Flow) gives him a chance to be something more in the brutal underground world of bare-knuckle street-fighting, Shawn decides that he has something worth fighting for! and puts everything on the line to win. Every knockout brings! him clo ser to the life he’s always wanted, but also traps him in a dangerous web he can’t escape.The last thing you might expect from a movie called Fighting is excellent acting, but that’s what you’ll get. A scam artist named Harvey (Terrence Howard) sees a young would-be hustler named Shawn (Channing Tatum, Step Up, Stop-Loss) in a street scuffle and lures him into a no-rules fighting circuit. Shawn’s relentless drive to win leads him to unexpected success, but when he gets put into a big fight with a professional boxer, Harvey asks Shawn to take a dive. The plot sounds like a thousand boxing movies, but the difference is all in the texture. Fighting takes place in a very real New York City, with cramped, make-shift apartments, cluttered streets, and seedy nightclubs. Scenes get knocked sideways by odd bits of life and character quirks that feel organic, not shoehorned in by some clever screenwriter. There’s a marvelous scene where Shawn is trying to woo the Puerto Ri! can waitress he’s smitten with (Zulay Henao, Feel the Noise), but they keep getting interrupted by her suspicious mother--which sounds like a rom-com cliche, but is completely transformed by the wonderfully human interplay among the actors. Howard has always had a magnetic talent, but Tatum reveals an engaging vulnerability that contrasts nicely with his big-slab-of-beefcake look. The movie hearkens back to 1970s classics like Midnight Cowboy and Dog Day Afternoon, and though it doesn’t achieve the same emotional heights, it’s reaching in the right direction. Writer/director Dito Montiel (whose previous film, A Guide to Recognizing Your Saints, also featured Tatum) promises to make some truly memorable movies. --Bret Fetzer

Stills from Fighting (Click for larger image)
Virtua Fighter returns with the next release in the series. Virtua Fighter 5 includes new features like enhanced gameplay mechanics, added characters, new fighting styles, and redesigned environments.

A Bug's Life (Two-Disc Collector's Edition)

  • Journey inside the miniature world of bugs for bigger-than-life fun and adventure under every leaf! Crawling with imaginative characters, hilarious laughs, and colorful animation, Disney and Pixar's A BUG'S LIFE will "delight everyone -- young, old, or six-legged" ("People" magazine). On behalf of "oppressed bugs everywhere" an inventive ant named Flik hires "warrior bugs" to defend his co
In an anthill with millions of inhabitants, Z 4195 is a worker ant. Feeling insignificant in a conformity system, he accidentally meets beautiful Princess Bala, who has a similar problem on the other end of the social scale. In order to meet her again, Z switches sides with his soldier friend Weaver - only to become a hero in the course of events. By this he unwillingly crosses the sinister plans of ambitious General Mandible (Bala's fiancé, by the way), who wants to divide the ant society into a superior,! strong race (soldiers) and an inferior, to-be-eliminated race (the workers). But Z and Bala, both unaware of the dangerous situation, try to leave the oppressive system by heading for Insectopia, a place where food paves the streets. --Written by Julian ReischlWoody Allen as a worker ant with an inferiority complex? Sylvester Stallone as an affable soldier ant who discovers that digging tunnels is cool? The animation playground we all knew so well is turning into a theme park full of in-jokes for grownups. Antz explores age-old topics (one person--err, insect--can make a difference, individuality and social responsibility must exist side by side, war is hell) with comic asides and Woody Allen's funniest quips this side of PG (adults will chuckle at the socialist slogans bandied about as he campaigns for workers' rights). Sharon Stone voices the rebellious princess with a fun-loving streak that doesn't quite overcome her royal bearing and court training, but she can ! learn. Gene Hackman is all teeth (ants have teeth?) and menaci! ng grins as the Army general plotting insect-icide. This bug's-eye view of life on Earth gives Allen's neurotic nonconformist an epic adventure of microscopic proportions: a devastating war with a termite colony, an odyssey to the fabled land of plenty (a picnic ground), and a race to save his fellow workers from certain death. Other voices include Anne Bancroft as the Queen, Christopher Walken, Jennifer Lopez, Danny Glover, Dan Aykroyd, Jane Curtin, and John Mahoney. The computer animation isn't exactly realistic but feels as solid and contoured as puppet animation with the smoothness and slickness of traditional cel cartoons, and the character designs and animation offer a marvelous range of expressions. The PG rating includes a gritty battle sequence that may frighten youngsters. --Sean AxmakerAntz -- The Alliance Book 4Earth, that shining beacon of human magnificence, of human achievement, the very birthplace of mankind itself, now falls in line for Antz invasion.
I want to thank my readers. I know I'm not the best writer in the world but I strive to tell a good story. I do write a few run on sentences, I'll admit, but it's to pack as much information into each line as possible. To keep the story moving along. The story is why the reader is here. My greatest achievement is when people tell me they couldn't put my book down. They couldn't stop turning the pages because they wanted to know what was going to happen next. All the way through the book. That's my greatest achievement.

You may expect to see the next installment of this series in December (this December). All further installments will be full length, as Winter is here and I will have the time to write full time.
Thank you and enjoy.Earth, that shining beacon of human magnificence, of human achievement, the very birthplace of mankind itself, now falls in line for Antz invasion.

I want to thank my readers. I know I'm not the best writer in the w! orld but I strive to tell a good story. I do write a few run o! n senten ces, I'll admit, but it's to pack as much information into each line as possible. To keep the story moving along. The story is why the reader is here. My greatest achievement is when people tell me they couldn't put my book down. They couldn't stop turning the pages because they wanted to know what was going to happen next. All the way through the book. That's my greatest achievement.

You may expect to see the next installment of this series in December (this December). All further installments will be full length, as Winter is here and I will have the time to write full time.
Thank you and enjoy.Woody Allen as a worker ant with an inferiority complex? Sylvester Stallone as an affable soldier ant who discovers that digging tunnels is cool? The animation playground we all knew so well is turning into a theme park full of in-jokes for grownups. Antz explores age-old topics (one person--err, insect--can make a difference, individuality and social responsibilit! y must exist side by side, war is hell) with comic asides and Woody Allen's funniest quips this side of PG (adults will chuckle at the socialist slogans bandied about as he campaigns for workers' rights). Sharon Stone voices the rebellious princess with a fun-loving streak that doesn't quite overcome her royal bearing and court training, but she can learn. Gene Hackman is all teeth (ants have teeth?) and menacing grins as the Army general plotting insect-icide. This bug's-eye view of life on Earth gives Allen's neurotic nonconformist an epic adventure of microscopic proportions: a devastating war with a termite colony, an odyssey to the fabled land of plenty (a picnic ground), and a race to save his fellow workers from certain death. Other voices include Anne Bancroft as the Queen, Christopher Walken, Jennifer Lopez, Danny Glover, Dan Aykroyd, Jane Curtin, and John Mahoney. The computer animation isn't exactly realistic but feels as solid and contoured as puppet animation w! ith the smoothness and slickness of traditional cel cartoons, ! and the character designs and animation offer a marvelous range of expressions. The PG rating includes a gritty battle sequence that may frighten youngsters. --Sean AxmakerBook Two of the Antz series finds mankind being swept from his own worlds, put to flight and scattered like cosmic dust. The Fleet has been routed. They can't stand toe to toe with the enemy. The only hope is that mankind can hold her worlds, but they will have to be held from the ground, and they were on their own. It has been a long time since man has been hunted by anything other than his own fellow men, but the instincts were still there.Book Two of the Antz series finds mankind being swept from his own worlds, put to flight and scattered like cosmic dust. The Fleet has been routed. They can't stand toe to toe with the enemy. The only hope is that mankind can hold her worlds, but they will have to be held from the ground, and they were on their own. It has been a long time since man has been hunted by a! nything other than his own fellow men, but the instincts were still there.Woody Allen as a worker ant with an inferiority complex? Sylvester Stallone as an affable soldier ant who discovers that digging tunnels is cool? The animation playground we all knew so well is turning into a theme park full of in-jokes for grownups. Antz explores age-old topics (one person--err, insect--can make a difference, individuality and social responsibility must exist side by side, war is hell) with comic asides and Woody Allen's funniest quips this side of PG (adults will chuckle at the socialist slogans bandied about as he campaigns for workers' rights). Sharon Stone voices the rebellious princess with a fun-loving streak that doesn't quite overcome her royal bearing and court training, but she can learn. Gene Hackman is all teeth (ants have teeth?) and menacing grins as the Army general plotting insect-icide. This bug's-eye view of life on Earth gives Allen's neurotic nonconformist ! an epic adventure of microscopic proportions: a devastating wa! r with a termite colony, an odyssey to the fabled land of plenty (a picnic ground), and a race to save his fellow workers from certain death. Other voices include Anne Bancroft as the Queen, Christopher Walken, Jennifer Lopez, Danny Glover, Dan Aykroyd, Jane Curtin, and John Mahoney. The computer animation isn't exactly realistic but feels as solid and contoured as puppet animation with the smoothness and slickness of traditional cel cartoons, and the character designs and animation offer a marvelous range of expressions. The PG rating includes a gritty battle sequence that may frighten youngsters. --Sean AxmakerA funny children's (& adult) cartoon movie.Woody Allen as a worker ant with an inferiority complex? Sylvester Stallone as an affable soldier ant who discovers that digging tunnels is cool? The animation playground we all knew so well is turning into a theme park full of in-jokes for grownups. Antz explores age-old topics (one person--err, insect--can make a dif! ference, individuality and social responsibility must exist side by side, war is hell) with comic asides and Woody Allen's funniest quips this side of PG (adults will chuckle at the socialist slogans bandied about as he campaigns for workers' rights). Sharon Stone voices the rebellious princess with a fun-loving streak that doesn't quite overcome her royal bearing and court training, but she can learn. Gene Hackman is all teeth (ants have teeth?) and menacing grins as the Army general plotting insect-icide. This bug's-eye view of life on Earth gives Allen's neurotic nonconformist an epic adventure of microscopic proportions: a devastating war with a termite colony, an odyssey to the fabled land of plenty (a picnic ground), and a race to save his fellow workers from certain death. Other voices include Anne Bancroft as the Queen, Christopher Walken, Jennifer Lopez, Danny Glover, Dan Aykroyd, Jane Curtin, and John Mahoney. The computer animation isn't exactly realistic but fee! ls as solid and contoured as puppet animation with the smoothn! ess and slickness of traditional cel cartoons, and the character designs and animation offer a marvelous range of expressions. The PG rating includes a gritty battle sequence that may frighten youngsters. --Sean AxmakerAntz Four - The Alliance
61,000 words (nearly twice the length of Book 3).Antz Four - The Alliance
61,000 words (nearly twice the length of Book 3).Journey inside the world of bugs in this epic of miniature proportions. Crawling with imaginative characters, hilarious laughs, and colorful animation, Walt Disney Pictures Presentation of A Pixar Animation Studios Film, A BUG'S LIFE, will "delight everyone -- young, old, or six-legged." (People Magazine) In this 2-disc set you'll step behind the scenes for a look at the innovation and teamwork that resulted in this ingenious film. Loaded with bonus features â€" including animation not seen in theaters, abandoned sequences, and multiple surprises â€" A BUG'S LIFE COLLECTOR'S EDITION offers something for ever! yone from families to film lovers!There was such a magic on the screen in 1995 when the people at Pixar came up with the first fully computer-animated film, Toy Story. Their second feature film, A Bug's Life, may miss the bull's-eye but Pixar's target is so lofty, it's hard to find the film anything less than irresistible.

Brighter and more colorful than the other animated insect movie of 1998 (Antz), A Bug's Life is the sweetly told story of Flik (voiced by David Foley), an ant searching for better ways to be a bug. His colony unfortunately revolves around feeding and fearing the local grasshoppers (lead by Hopper, voiced with gleeful menace by Kevin Spacey). When Flik accidentally destroys the seasonal food supply for the grasshoppers he decides to look for help ("We need bigger bugs!"). The ants, led by Princess Atta (Julia Louis-Dreyfus), are eager to dispose of the troublesome Flik. Yet he finds help--a hearty bunch of bug warrio! rs--and brings them back to the colony. Unfortunately they are! just tr aveling performers afraid of conflict.

As with Toy Story, the ensemble of creatures and voices is remarkable and often inspired. Highlights include wiseacre comedian Denis Leary as an un-ladylike ladybug, Joe Ranft as the German-accented caterpillar, David Hyde Pierce as a stick bug, and Michael McShane as a pair of unintelligible pillbugs. The scene-stealer is Atta's squeaky-voiced sister, baby Dot (Hayden Panettiere), who has a big sweet spot for Flik.

More gentle and kid-friendly than Antz, A Bug Life's still has some good suspense and a wonderful demise of the villain. However, the film--a giant worldwide hit--will be remembered for its most creative touch: "outtakes" over the end credits à la many live-action comedy films. These dozen or so scenes (both "editions" of outtakes are contained here) are brilliant and deserve a special place in film history right along with 1998's other most talked-about sequence: the opening Normandy in! vasion in Saving Private Ryan.

The video also contains Pixar's delightful Oscar-winning short, Geri's Game. Box art varies. --Doug Thomas