This Week’s DVD, Blu-ray and Cinema Offerings

It’s been slim pickings here at AATM review-wise for the last few weeks. Kick-Ass wasn’t screened for Utah-based critics and both Date Night and The Losers were screened during the day, which for two working-class stiffs like me and Dan is next to impossible to attend. At any rate and all excuses aside, here’s what you can look forward to this week:

Opening in theaters on April 23:

The Losers (PG-13)

You can read Dan’s commentary on the poster here and my critique of The Losers trailer here.

The Back-up Plan (PG-13)

Watch the Super Bowl spot and read my commentary on J-Lo’s new romantic comedy here.

If you want to skip the box office lines, you can buy movie tickets in advance at Fandango.com. Plus shopping with our affiliate partners always helps AATM. It hasn’t bought me a Porsche Cayenne, but it has bought me and Dan a couple of value meals at McDonald’s.

As for DVD and Blu-ray, it’s a fairly beefy release week, with Avatar, Crazy Heart, The Lovely Bones and The Young Victoria hitting store shelves in both formats. This week also features a Blu-ray catalog release of Minority Report. You can purchase any of these titles from our affiliate partner Amazon.com below. Personally, I’d hold off on Avatar until an extended, special feature-rich version comes out (probably fall/winter 2010).

Vince Horiuchi is Wrong Again, This Time About Rings Blu-ray

Back in November I wrote a memo to Salt Lake Tribune columnist Vince Horiuchi and flipped him the middle finger for crapping on J.J. Abrams’ Star Trek. Much like Tyler Riggs, Mr. Horiuchi thumbed his nose at Abrams’ re-imagining and essentially said the new film spit a juicy Romulanian loogie at the “intelligent” Trek films of yore. Horiuchi was wrong back in November and he’s wrong again in April with his Viagra moment over the recently released Lord of the Rings trilogy on Blu-ray. Yes, Horiuchi, who most likely got the Rings Blu-ray discs for free, gives the set an A and says the following:

His Oscar-winning trilogy has never looked more crisp or sounded as thunderous (provided you have the HD television and high-definition receiver to play it). Each movie comes with the same extra features from an earlier DVD release and doesn’t take advantage of Blu-ray’s interactive technologies. This version isn’t better than “extended editions” of the movies, yet fans definitely will call this set “precioussssss.”

$69 bucks for better picture and better sound? Something tells me the only folks who might not feel ripped off by Horiuchi’s push to buy are those with a Hobbit cloak and prosthetic hairy feet tucked away in their closets of nerd crap. Take my advice: Wait until 2011 for the director’s cut/extended editions. Don’t buy these half-assed versions and reward Peter Jackson and New Line for their double-dipping treachery. Shame on Horiuchi for propagating this travashamockery. Something tells me he’ll be signing the praises of the meager Avatar Blu-ray on April 22, too.

Avatar on Blu-ray and DVD April 22!

If you were of the 12 people in America who didn’t see Avatar in theaters and didn’t help fill James Cameron’s wallet with $732 million, then you can pre-order your DVD or Blu-ray copy of Avatar today from Amazon.com. It was announced yesterday the all-time highest grossing domestic and worldwide movie will hit stores on April 22 – which, by no coincidence, is Earth Day.

However, if you want special features, pretty menus and all the bells and whistles, you’ll probably want to wait for November. According to SlashFilm.com, this April 22 release is bare bones and a meatier multi-disc product will most likely hit stores in November, although probably not in 3D. I’m sure we’ll hear more details about this and the re-release of Avatar when James Cameron speaks to the press on March 23. Word on the street is the re-release will be an extended cut.

I’m crossing my fingers we’ll see an extended connect-the-hairy-ponytail-usb ports scene in the jellyfish Lite-Brite tree. I don’t know about you, but after two viewings of the nearly three-hour movie, those 12-foot Na’vi chicks were lookin’ kinda hot.

Click to order below:

Twihards, Behold! New Moon DVD and Blu-ray Coming in March!

Didn’t get enough of Jacob’s six pack abs or Edward’s hairy Milk Dud vampire nipples back in November? Well don’t fret, friend! The Twilight Saga: New Moon is hitting store shelves on DVD and Blu-ray on March 20, 2010! That’ll be a nice bridge for the Twihards who are fidgeting and antsy, either during class or while folding laundry, at the long gulf between the bleak month of January and June 30, 2010, when The Twilight Saga: Eclipse hits cinemas.

The Twilight Saga: New Moon DVD and Blu-ray will feature audio commentary from director, Chris Weitz and editor Peter Lambert, as well as a six part documentary, rehearsal footage, three music videos and a leaked sex tape with Kristen Stewart and Robert Pattinson. Okay, the last one was a lie, but wouldn’t that be cool? No, you’re right, I didn’t think so either.

Star Trek Gets a Plot Hole Filled

It was decades ago– in Hollywood release schedule years– when Star Trek lens flared its way to theaters back in May. There’s no question the resuscitation attempt worked– the movie delivered fun to audiences and a whole lot of loot for Paramount. But despite the good times had with a bombastic score and the return of busty green alien chicks that would later shoot exploding arrows, one question remained: what the hell was the villain Nero doing for the 20 years between meeting the exploding Kirk Sr. and the fat-handed Kirk Jr.?

Word on the street suggested a whole scene had been cut which explained the gap and also introduced Star Trek‘s cranial villains, the Klingons. Well, word on the street was right and the scene will appear on the upcoming DVD/Blu Ray release. Spike TV, home to the we want to be all things to dudes that wash their drawers in Axe and subscribe to Maxim/FHM for the articles, has scored an embeddable clip of the scene. An embeddable clip you can both view and enjoy below.

Star Trek hits shelves November 17.

What We See On Blu-ray Echoes in Eternity

Blu-Ray nerd alert:

For fans of Ridley Scott’s 2000 Best Picture winner Gladiator, tomorrow (September 1st) is a big day. The hubbub? Gladiator is coming to the superclean and supersexy Blu-ray format. Second, Gladiator is being released under Paramount’s new “my better is better than your better” imprint the Sapphire Series. Promising only Paramount’s most celebrated movies with the candy-coated, eyeball busting sound and image quality, the Sapphire Series also makes its debut tomorrow with both Gladiator and Braveheart.

And while Braveheart is winning some seriously effusive praise, the better and more visually sumptuous of the two, Gladiator… not so much. Early rumblings of disappointment began last week when some retailers broke the street date clause and sold the discs early. Apparently, the transfer uses the 2000 DVD transfer, complete with edge enhancement and a few other artificial digital “enhancements”. While subtle on a regular TV, these digital manipulations create white edges and “halos” around objects on larger, high definition TVs. DNR (Digital Noise Reduction) has since been added to the mix in an effort to subdue the edge enhancement. Unfortunately, DNR is notorious for erasing detail and making skin tones look waxy-weird (The Last Starfighter‘s or Star Trek‘s recent Blu-ray transfer is a good example).

So… Ruh-roh.

Digital Bits has a great write up about the whole tempest in a teapot if you’re interested or were thinking about making the purchase. As a sucker for day and date release, I’ll probably be holding out. I love me some Gladiator, but if I’m paying for a double-disc, super-quality Sapphire Series Blu-Ray, I expect the image to be reference quality. As is, I may snag Braveheart and hold off until we find out if Paramount’s doing anything to fix the rough presentation.

Rent This: Valkyrie

It’s Tuesday, which means the shelves of your local digital entertainment purveyor are freshly stocked with the latest DVD/Blu Ray releases– aka- a great way to spend yourself into the poorhouse.

One of the larger releases today (besides the eyeball impalation-fest My Bloody Valentine) is Valkyrie. Riddled with delays and production anxiety over Tom Cruise cooties and Bryan Singer’s post-Superman Returns fallout, the film had a modest run in spite of the drama and saw moderate success. However, I know quite a few people stayed away from this one.

Mistake.

Valkyrie plays itself out as a fantastically streamlined political thriller that, despite the knowledge of an inevitable ending, succeeds in delivering a well-acted, tense and exciting 120 minutes, even with the nit-picked Tom Cruise English accent*.

If you’re unfamiliar with the story- in the waning end-year of WW II, a group of German military men and politicians met to plan Hitler’s assassination and subsequent coup in an effort to win back Germany and avoid a humiliating WW I-style drubbing that was feared part of an inevitable German defeat. As a result, Operation Valkyrie was set in motion, a duplicitous scheme to topple Hitler and turn an SS emergency plan for power consolidation in on itself. With a powerhouse cast of fantastic character actors including Kenneth Branagh, Bill Nighy, Tom Wilkinson, Terrence Stamp and even Eddie Izzard, Valkyrie is the type of film unfortunately maligned by way of exterior forces as opposed to its actual merit, of which Valkyrie has plenty.

Since Valkyrie is a true story, history’s told you how it all played out — however, the details and heartbreak of getting there are no less exciting.

If you haven’t seen this one, make sure you rent it pronto.

* I’m not sure why the accent was ever an issue, considering the rest of the cast spoke with English accents… in English. Both of which, incidentally, are not German.

Lord of the Rings Trilogy on Blu-ray in 2009?

I love Blu-ray. I really do. So much I’d marry it if I could. I also love Peter Jackson’s “Lord of the Rings” movies, even more that Captain Flannel Von Chubneck’s “Star Wars” sextuplets. So what to my wondering eyes did I see on MovieWeb.com today? They reference a story taken from Digital Bits.com that states Amazon.com is taking pre-orders for “The Lord of the Rings: The Motion Picture Trilogy” on Blu-ray, supposedly releasing this December. According to the source, the suggested retail price is $100, with Amazon charging $70.

The news of LOTR possibly coming to Blu-ray in 2009 makes me salivate and sweat with joy. However, I will never understand pre-orders. Honestly, I can’t remember the last time I went to find a newly released Blu-ray or DVD and the salesperson said, “Sorry, man. We’re all sold out.” If anything, there are always too many, which begs the question, why do I buy it right out of the gate when I can get it cheaper down the road?

In honor of this speculative nugget of joy today, I give you an alternate ending to “The Lord of the Rings: Return of the King” that should make you feel sassy and excited the rest of the day.

Snow White Punches Slow Adopters in the Face… Kind Of

Disney may have the happiest slice of Anaheim real estate on earth (hear, hear!), a family-friendly empire always willing to shovel cash into its coffers and a surefire marketing machine that prints its own license to make money, but Disney’s also got some serious, swinging chutzpah. If they want you to take a permanent ride on their heavily subsidized bandwagon of Blu-Ray technology, by Walt’s ghost, you’re gonna do it.

Take Snow White for example. Disney animation’s first feature length film–and guaranteed inducer of toddler nightmares– is being kicked out of the vault and into heart and home the first week of October. But only on Blu-Ray, suckers! The DVD debuts around Thanksgiving seven weeks later.

Of course, you may already have Snow White on DVD from its last re-release back in 2001.  Pish-posh to that. Disney is taking steps to let you know you can’t stop progress: Snow White 2.0 is sure to have an even better transfer, even better special features, a newer, sparkling-er sound mix and even comes with a DVD version. I.e.- if you want the new bells and whistles Snow White without that pesky seven week wait, you’ll be picking up the Blu-Ray.

There’s no fighting it.  Blu-Ray is in your future and Disney’s making it happen. Submit your will to fate, buy that Blu-Ray player and let the big screen HDTV you got last Christmas finally live up to its potential.

Walt won’t find peace until you do.