Griffiths, Rachel

Six Feet Under: The Complete First Season

From Alan Ball the Oscar(r) winning writer of "American Beauty" comes a series that digs where others fear to tread. When a bus kills Nathaniel Fisher owner of the Fisher & Sons Funeral Home in Los Angeles the tragedy casts a pall on the homecoming of his prodigal son Nate. Together with with mother Ruth brother David and sister Claire they must address the family business and the many more personal matters that arise when your life is Six Feet Under.Running Time: 780 min.Format: DVD MOVIE Genre: DRAMA UPC: 026359913228 Manufacturer No: 99132

The Fishers are your typical dysfunctional family. Ruth (Frances Conroy) is the stern matriarch who has trouble expressing emotion and snaps at the slightest problem. Daughter Claire (Lauren Ambrose) is an underachiever who cultivates a moody, mysterious loner image in high school (she's indulging in illegal substances too). Brother David (Michael C. Hall) works in the family business, and is uptight beyond belief (he's indulging in a secret homosexual relationship too). Elder brother Nate (Peter Krause) is the black sheep, who, eschewing responsibility, fled to Seattle but got lured back. And Dad (Richard Jenkins) watches it all bemusedly. Did we mention Dad's dead? Oh, and that the Fisher family business is a funeral home? It might sound off-putting, but coming from the mind of Alan Ball, the man who strip-mined suburban life to find the mordant wit underneath in American Beauty, Six Feet Under is a trenchant, stylish spin on standard family dysfunction.

This HBO series initially aspired to fits of Twin Peaks-like whimsy, with each episode starting with a death more outlandish than the previous, but soon settled into a comfortable groove that harkened back to the most familiar of TV family dramas (in fact, it's almost a mirror image of '70s drama Family, down to the three sibling archetypes). Of course, its HBO roots allowed it ample leeway with sex, drug usage, profanity, and violence. While the writing strove to be a little too clever, the overall look and tone of the show remained solid and sometimes profound (sometimes absurd too, but usually with good reason). Krause and Hall, as initially warring brothers who come to a wary understanding, are solid anchors, but it's the women in the cast who do the most phenomenal work. Conroy infuses her almost stereotypical mom with an obstinate but ultimately accepting heart, and Ambrose's Claire is by far the show's most appealing character. And stealing scenes left and right is Rachel Griffith's Brenda, a mystery woman with an outlandish backstory who meets Nate on a plane, has sex with him at the airport, and infiltrates his life. Like Brenda herself, Six Feet Under is fascinating--and highly addictive. --Mark Englehart

Comanche Moon

Texas Rangers Woodrow Call and Augustus McCrae pursue three outlaws Comanche war chief Buffalo Hump Comanche horse thief Kicking Wolf and a Mexican bandit king. Now in their middle years they also struggle with their personal lives Gus with Clara Forsythe the love of his life and Call with Maggie Tilton the young prostitute who loves him. Meanwhile their partners-in-arms Deets Jake Spoon and Pea Eye Parker help the Rangers protect the advancing western frontier from the defiant Comanches who are determined to defend their land and way of life. Prequel to Lonsome Dove and based upon the novel by Larry McMurtySystem Requirements:Run Time: 284 Mins.Format: DVD MOVIE Genre: TELEVISION/MADE FOR TV MOVIES UPC: 043396226470 Manufacturer No: 22647

It's billed as "the second chapter in the Lonesome Dove saga," but Comanche Moon is actually a prequel to that much-loved 1989 miniseries. And while there's no doubt that it has some very big boots to fill, this three-part (on two DVDs, including bonus features) production is rarely less than eminently watchable and entertaining. Continuity is a positive factor: Larry McMurtry, who wrote the novel on which it's based, also co-wrote the screenplay, and Lonesome Dove director Simon Wincer returns as well. As for the cast, it's certainly not as star-studded as its predecessor, but Steve Zahn (as Gus McCrae), Karl Urban (Woodrow Call), Linda Cardellini (Clara Allen), and the others manage to suggest the characterizations brought to the screen by Robert Duvall, Tommy Lee Jones, and Anjelica Huston, respectively, without mimicking them. Of course, there are new faces on hand as well, principally Val Kilmer (looking a mite chubby, perhaps due to all the scenery he chews in his portrayal of Texas Rangers Captain Inish Scull) and Rachel Griffiths (as Scull's horny wife).

As the tale begins in 1858, Call and McCrae, some years away from becoming the cattlemen depicted in Lonesome Dove, are Rangers serving under the educated and eccentric Scull as they work to protect the territory against marauding Comanches, led by the stern, vengeful Buffalo Hump (Wes Studi) and his crazed son, Blue Duck (Adam Beach). When Scull's horse is stolen by one of the Indians, he sets out to retrieve the beast, promoting both Call and McRae to Captain, and the rest of the story revolves primarily around them; in fact, although there's a reasonable amount of action (including the Comanche raid on Austin that opens Part Two), Comanche Moon is much less plot-dependent than character-driven, and it is Call (tough, taciturn, and totally clueless when it comes to the fair sex) and best friend McRae (an open-hearted, self-described jester) who are the most engaging of the bunch as they navigate the deep waters of their work and love lives (McRae with Clara and Call with the prostitute Maggie Tilton, played by Elizabeth Banks). McMurtry and co-writer Diana Ossana's dialogue manages to be at once plain and poetic, colorful and poignant, and regardless of what's actually happening onscreen, the miniseries has a light, often whimsical charm that separates it from most Westerns made for big and small screen alike. Extras include a "making of" featurette and more. --Sam Graham

Stills from Comanche Moon (click for larger image)

Beyond Comanche Moon

Broken Trail

3:10 to Yuma

Cat Ballou

Six Feet Under - The Complete Fifth Season

One of TV's most acclaimed drama series the Emmy- and Golden Globe-winning Six Feet Under concludes its groundbreaking five season run. Each of the main characters will come to embrace the cycle of life - birth death and re-birth - in ways that are both unique and interconnected. Everything. Everyone. Everywhere. Ends.Running Time: 780 min.Format: DVD MOVIE Genre: DRAMA UPC: 026359314421 Manufacturer No: 93144

So much anticipation pools up around the concluding episode of this concluding season that you might be tempted to head straight for said finale, titled "Everyone's Waiting" (and it's so rich you'll find yourself drawn to repeated viewings). But if you can avoid that impulse, it's worth following the full build-up of one crisis after another to get the real payoff. On an episode-by-episode basis, Six Feet Under's fifth season has a decidedly uneven quality, shifting in tone far more drastically, say, than the intensely dark season 4. Character traits that have already been developed at length begin to seem annoyingly repetitious--Nate's (Peter Krause) self-centered frustration and furious lashings out, Billy's (Jeremy Sisto) resurgent psychosis--like leitmotifs run amuck. But this season also benefits from the knowledge we've developed, over the years, of the Fisher family and their loved ones, so that what they end up facing has a real emotional wallop, sometimes jump-starting the drama just where it seems to be in danger of churning itself into circles.

It's hardly a spoiler to mention that 6fu's final season, though bookended by the promise of new beginnings (a wedding in episode 1 to a departure for new prospects in the 12th episode), centers around loss and a pivotal death. The scripts contain more than an occasional sense of inconsequential filler, while some of the recurring thematics seem forced (we see David continue to cope with the scars from his abduction in the previous episode via over-obvious imagery of facing his "inner demons"). Other issues receive especially compelling treatment, above all Brenda's (Rachel Griffiths) desire to have a child and David and Keith's (Mathew St. Patrick) choice to adopt. But the real strength of this season lies in several gripping performances. Ruth (Frances Conroy) touches off a complex series of reactions, simultaneously sympathetic and judgmental, transcending the tendency to appear as a neurotic caricature. The super-talented Lauren Ambrose brings off Claire's emerging self-awareness and maturity with moving touches (she's also got some of the funniest moments as she takes on a stint as a temp in scenes that call to mind the hysterics of The Office). Griffiths' Brenda for her part undergoes a parallel maturing process. And as George's daughter Maggie, Tina Holmes adds a welcome tone of contrast.

6fu, of course, has always been about the paradoxes of finality. But anyone who has developed an attachment to the show's unique tone and creative sensibility will have a tough time saying goodbye. Alan Ball outdoes himself with his script (and direction) for the finale, "Everyone's Waiting," seeding it with echoes from the pilot episode that will enchant aficionados. And the famous fast-forward visions coursing through Claire's imagination as she heads down the highway give the perfect seal to this set of characters. Extras include especially insightful commentaries, including Ball on the finale, retrospectives, and a mini-feature on 6fu's cultural impact. It's safe to say that the show leaves some pretty unforgettable impressions in its wake. --Thomas May

Six Feet Under - The Complete Second Season

When death is your business what is your life? For Nate David Ruth and Claire the world outside the Fisher & Sons Funeral Home continues to be at least as challenging-and far less predictable-as the one inside.Running Time: 780 min.Format: DVD MOVIE Genre: DRAMA UPC: 026359889226 Manufacturer No: 98892

In some ways, HBO's Six Feet Under plays kid brother to stellar BMOC The Sopranos: it's spunkier, less refined, chancier, and a bit of a punk. Nevertheless, the show set in the Southern California mortuary Fisher and Sons deserves its place in the pantheon of great television series. The initial season was a showcase for the most original characters, including tight-lipped brother David (Michael C. Hall) coming out of the closet, emotionally trippy mom Ruth (Frances Conroy), and the most complex girlfriend on the face of the planet, Brenda (Rachel Griffiths). Slowly, the major force in season 2 is the unassuming lead, Peter Krause. Part of the long line of good-looking actors who never get respect because they make it look too easy, Krause (Sports Night) finds the perfect blend of optimism with a wonderful, bittersweet anguish as Nate, the prodigal son.

The initial season's happy ending is forgotten as relationships change, the business is still under fire from the evil conglomerate Kroehner, and a lively dream sequence is just around the corner. As with the premier season, creator Alan Ball lets many others direct and write the show, but his stamp is all over it. The eccentricities of the characters are shaped, and not always suddenly. Take daughter Claire (Lauren Ambrose), who sheds her bad boyfriend only to find more complex relationships on her road to discovering her own groove. One person in the mix is Ruth's beatnik sister (Patricia Clarkson, in an Emmy-winning role), a joyous embodiment of thriving--if aging--counter culture. Another new character is Nate's old girlfriend, the granola-loving Lisa (Lili Taylor). With Brenda heading down another destructive course, Nate is at more than one crossroads by season's end. For fans who groove with the wild, serio-comedic world of the Fishers (and let's face it, many didn't), the second season goes down like a fine meal of fusion cuisine. The show shares an unfortunate family trait with its HBO big brother: although both were lavished with multiple Emmy nominations the first two seasons, both took home only token awards. But then there's always next year. --Doug Thomas

Blow (Infinifilm Edition)

Dramatization of the life of George Jung, the man who established the cocaine market in the United States.
Genre: Feature Film-Drama
Rating: R
Release Date: 14-SEP-2004
Media Type: DVD

A briskly paced hybrid of Boogie Nights and Goodfellas, Blow chronicles the three-decade rise and fall of George Jung (Johnny Depp), a normal American kid who makes a personal vow against poverty, builds a marijuana empire in the '60s, multiplies his fortune with the Colombian Medellín cocaine cartel, and blows it all with a series of police busts culminating in one final, long-term jail sentence. "Your dad's a loser," says this absentee father to his estranged but beloved daughter, and he's right: Blow is the story of a nice guy who made wrong choices all his life, almost single-handedly created the American cocaine trade, and got exactly what he deserved. As directed by Ted Demme, the film is vibrantly entertaining, painstakingly authentic... and utterly aimless in terms of overall purpose.

We can't sympathize with Jung's meteoric rise to wealth and the wild life, and Demme isn't suggesting that we should idolize a drug dealer. So what, exactly, is the point of Blow? Simply, it seems, to present Jung's story as the epitome of the coke-driven glory days, and to suggest, ever so subtly, that Jung isn't such a bad guy, after all. Anyone curious about his lifestyle will find this film amazing, and there's plenty of humor mixed with the constant threat of violence and paranoid anxiety. Demme has also populated the film with a fantastic supporting cast (although Penélope Cruz grows tiresome as Jung's hedonistic wife), and this is certainly a compelling look at the other side of Traffic. Still, one wishes that Blow had a more viable reason for being; like a wild party, it leaves you with a hangover and a vague feeling of regret. --Jeff Shannon

Six Feet Under - The Complete Fourth Season

There's a new pecking order at the Fisher & Diaz funeral home but Nate Ruth David and Claire still try to make every day above ground a good one. Death and dysfunction are par for the course in The Complete Fourth Season of Six Feet Under.Running Time: 780 min.Format: DVD MOVIE Genre: DRAMA Rating: NR UPC: 026359238420 Manufacturer No: 92384

This penultimate season of Six Feet Under continues further down the darkly disturbing path so evident in the third season. To be sure, the signature--and ultimately undefinable--blend of tragic mishap with tripped-out comic eccentricity that has stamped the series from its debut remains pervasive. It's the concentration of the mix that has changed. Leavening moments seem less organic, much as the bizarre death sequences that open each episode often turn out to be rather contrived preludes to the ensuing thematic obsessions. Which isn't to say season 4 lacks the delightfully memorable quirkiness fans have grown to expect. Recurring incidents of fecal revenge bring tensions to the surface between Ruth (Frances Conroy) and her new husband George (James Cromwell), in turn leading to young intern Arthur's resignation (Rainn Wilson's spot-on characterization is so enjoyable that his self-imposed exile from the Fisher nest early in the season is a real loss). Ruth meanwhile hooks up again briefly with the irrepressible Bettina (Kathy Bates) for an excursion south of the border.

But brooding glimpses into chaos beneath the surface provide the emotional momentum of this season, right from the opening scene, as Nate (Peter Krause) inevitably gravitates back toward Brenda (Rachel Griffiths) in the aftermath of his wife's death. As usual, writers and directors vary for each episode, but the dark eccentricities of creator Alan Ball's original characters have become more sharply focused and sustained. We seem to spend even more time viewing the world through individual points of view: Nate's roiling anger and grief or Claire's (Lauren Ambrose) newfound sexual and artistic experimentation as she learns about "grinding the corn" and attains respect as a photographer. The toxicity of relationships continues to be a preoccupation. We get the Ruth-George meltdown as well as the painful unraveling of Rico's (Freddy Rodriguez) marriage to Vanessa (Justina Machado). But the most harrowing episode follows David (Michael C. Hall) through an increasingly perilous carjacking. This nightmarish fugue, midway through, ripples out into the rest of the season, posing another threat to his tenuous relationship with Keith (Matthew St. Patrick). It sets a course for further apocalyptic imagery of environmental collapse and fallout shelters. There's little to gentle the downward slide and exposure of vulnerability, save taking refuge in the quirkiness that seems to be the Fishers' birthright. But that, as they say, is to die for. --Thomas May

Six Feet Under - The Complete Third Season

(HBO Dramatic Series) Life. Death. Guilt. Afterlife. For the Fishers the more things stay the same the more they change. Get ready to break new emotional ground with Six Feet Under: The Complete Third Season.Running Time: 780 min.Format: DVD MOVIE Genre: DRAMA Rating: NR UPC: 026359897825 Manufacturer No: 98978

No other show captures the ebb and flow of day-to-day human relationships like Six Feet Under, which chronicles the dysfunctional lives of the Fisher family, who run a funeral home in Los Angeles. Though the overt theme of the series is mortality--every episode opens with the death of someone whose body will end up on the Fishers' slab--but the third season, even moreso than the first two, explores the intertwining struggles for connection and for personal freedom. The season starts slowly but compellingly, laying out the changes in the Fishers' lives. Nate (Peter Krause, We Don't Live Here Anymore) has married and has a baby. David (Michael C. Hall) is settling into tense domesticity with his angry boyfriend. Claire (Lauren Ambrose) has launched into art school. Ruth (Frances Conroy), their mother, is reaching out for companionship from an emotionally stilted young intern, and Brenda (Rachel Griffiths, Hilary and Jackie), Nate's ex-fiancee, has apparently vanished from their lives.

But as storylines unfold across the 13 episodes, the emotional heft of the season comes from the expanded roles of the family's intimates. Federico (Freddy Rodriguez), who has leveraged his way into a partnership with the Fisher brothers, finds himself fighting to be treated as an equal at work and struggling with his wife's depression at home. Trying to sort out their relationship, David and Keith (Mathew St. Patrick) negotiate everything from therapy to threesomes. Meanwhile Lisa (Lili Taylor, I Shot Andy Warhol), Nate's unhappy wife, increasingly becomes the center of the season as her jealousy and need become unbearable. Though big events happen, the most jolting drama on Six Feet Under comes from small conflicts--miscommunications, crossed desires, habits that don't mesh. The cast, writers, and directors can, with breathtaking skill and subtlety, spin a brief conversation into a microcosm of the character's lives. By this third season, the show has taken on the richness and complexity of a great novel; it's an impressive and deeply enjoyable achievement. --Bret Fetzer

Brothers and Sisters - The Complete First Season

No Description Available
No Track Information Available
Media Type: DVD
Artist: BROTHERS & SISTERS
Title: SEASON 1
Street Release Date: 09/18/2007
Domestic
Genre: TELEVISION

Just because you're all grown up doesn't mean your family dynamics get any easier. Luckily for TV fans, the first season of Brothers and Sisters makes for addictive watching while exploring the intricacies of a family, in crisis and in repose. First, let us give thanks for the amazing Sally Field, who has literally grown up on the small screen, and who now plays the matriarch of the Walker family, though not as a power-mad dowager, but as a well-meaning, slightly naive but fiercely loyal California girl gone ever-so-slightly gray. In fact, when this show debuted in the fall of 2006, it was known as the "new Calista Flockhart show," but Field quickly became the standout in a stellar ensemble cast.

While the Walkers' problems of money and business deals may seem rarefied to some, the family pecking orders and feuds are universal and handled deftly by the writers and the actors, including Patricia Wettig, the icy former mistress of the dearly departed Walker pere (Tom Skerritt), and brothers Dave Annable and Balthazar Getty. Rachel Griffiths is a tart sisterly counterpoint to Flockhart's flighty Ann Coulter wannabe. In short, anyone with a family should be able to relate. And, perhaps, cringe a bit. --A.T. Hurley

My Best Friend's Wedding (Special Edition)

Commitment-shy Jules reluctantly realizes she is in love with her best friend Michael when he tells her that he is about to marry someone else. Jules will do anything to steal him back.
Genre: Feature Film-Comedy
Rating: PG13
Release Date: 2-SEP-2003
Media Type: DVD

One of the best romantic comedies of the 1990s, My Best Friend's Wedding not only gave Julia Roberts a delightful vehicle for her crowd-pleasing comeback, but it further distinguished itself by avoiding the conventional plotting of the genre. Julia plays a prominent Chicago restaurant critic whose best friend (Dermot Mulroney) is a former lover from her college days with whom she'd made a binding pact: if neither of them were married by the age of 28, they'd marry each other. Just when they're about to reach the deadline of their agreement, Mulroney arrives in Chicago to introduce Roberts to his seemingly perfect fiancée (Cameron Diaz) and announce their wedding in just three days. That leaves the shocked Julia with just three short days to sabotage the wedding and marry the man she now realizes she's loved all along. With potential heartbreak waiting in the wings, she'll either get what she wants or pay the price for her selfish behavior, and Ronald Bass's cleverly constructed screenplay keeps us guessing to the very end. Rupert Everett scored rave reviews for his scene-stealing performance as Robert's gay friend who goes along with her scheming (but only so far), and even as she makes her character's needy desperation disarmingly appealing, Roberts wisely allows Diaz to capitalize on her charming time in the spotlight. As the romantic outcome remains uncertain, the viewer is held in a state of giddy suspense, and director P.J. Hogan pulls off some hilarious scenes (like a restaurant full of people singing the Dionne Warwick hit "I Say a Little Prayer") that could easily have fallen flat in the hands of a less talented filmmaker. It's no surprise that this was one of the box-office smashes of 1997. --Jeff Shannon

Muriel's Wedding

Ever since the late '70s when the Australian New Wave was in full surge, Down Under directors have delivered movies that often hit you like news from another planet. Offbeat characters, weird narrative twists, and a tart mixture of laughs and catastrophe--this is the juice that fuels such flicks as Proof, The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert, Strictly Ballroom, Heavenly Creatures, and most certainly Muriel's Wedding. Directed by P.J. Hogan (who would go on to helm the Hollywood hit My Best Friend's Wedding), this little gem follows tradition by featuring an authentic misfit: Muriel (Toni Collette), a great overweight horse of a girl obsessed with getting married and the music of ABBA. Appropriately, we first meet Muriel at a wedding, all trussed up in a leopardskin number she's boosted for the occasion. When her snotty peers insist that she give up the bridal bouquet to someone who might actually get hitched, when one of the guests turns out to be a clerk in the very store where Muriel ripped off her outfit--you gotta laugh, she's such an unmitigated mess. A loser, her philandering politician father (Bill Hunter) calls her--along with his doormat wife and his other couch-potato offspring. But this movie's no exercise in geek-bashing. As Muriel takes up with feisty Rhonda (Rachel Griffiths) and moves from Porpoise Spit to the big city, her good-hearted grin and zest for life draw us in despite hilarious gaffes and mishaps. (Making out with a boy for the first time, Muriel suddenly finds herself awash in styrofoam: the oaf has unzipped the beanbag chair instead of her skin-tight leather pants.) Muriel's Wedding covers territory Hollywood would banish from a comedy--Rhonda's cancer, the suicide of Muriel's mother, a marriage of convenience to an arrogant athlete--yet, like its heroine, it never loses its sense of humor, its will to move on to whatever good thing might happen next. Everyone in the idiosyncratic cast is terrific, but it's Toni Collette's Dancing Queen who makes Muriel's Wedding a cinematic celebration you won't forget. --Kathleen Murphy

Hysterically funny, fresh, and brimming with wit, MURIEL'S WEDDING is the comedy hit celebrated by critics nationwide! No one ever paid much attention to Muriel and her humdrum small-town life, so she and her best friend, Rhonda, decide to leave it behind and head for the big city ... where they end up having the exciting adventure of their lives! What's more, soon everyone takes notice when Muriel becomes engaged to a handsome and popular sports hero! You'll love every hilarious minute as Muriel discovers that even when it seems all her dreams are coming true, the path to the altar still has plenty of surprising twists!