Napier, Marshall

The Water Horse - Legend of the Deep (Two-Disc Special Edition)

WATER HORSETHE: LEGEND OF THE DEEP - SE (DVD MOVIE)

Based on a novel by Dick King-Smith, author of The Sheep Pig (from which Babe was adapted), the touching and often spectacular The Water Horse: Legend of the Deep ingeniously presumes to explain the truth behind "Nessie," i.e., the Loch Ness Monster. The story, told in present day to a couple of American tourists by a kindly gentleman (Brian Cox) in a pub, begins with a lonely boy, Angus (Alex Etel), pining for his father, who is serving in the Royal Navy during World War II. Angus, along with his sister (Priyanka Xi) and mother (Emily Watson), live on an estate that has been billeted by soldiers in the Scottish Highlands, near Loch Ness. The troop's commander (David Morissey) has an eye for mom, suspicions about a mysterious handyman, Lewis (Ben Chaplin), who is also a war hero, and an absurd contention that the Highlands are the real frontline in the war against Germany.

Into this intriguing drama comes a completely different element, a fantastical creature of Celtic mythology that befriends Angus and is, in fact, the sea-beast who will eventually be known as the Loch Ness Monster. Trying to hide the dinosaur-like fellow, nicknamed Crusoe, Angus enlists Lewis to transfer it to the lake, where boy and serpent have extraordinary adventures together until human stupidity threatens Crusoe's existence. A true family film, there is a lot for adults to like about the grownup story in The Water Horse. Meanwhile, the wistful relationship between Angus and Crusoe--each of whom helps the other move past obstacles toward their individual destinies--will leave children feeling both happy and melancholy in the best possible sense. Directed by Jay Russell (My Dog Skip), The Water Horse is the best of a mini-genre of films about or inspired by old Nessie. --Tom Keogh

Beyond The Water Horse: Legend of the Deep

On Blu-ray

Paperback Novel

CD Soundtrack

Stills from The Water Horse: Legend of the Deep (click for larger image)

Race the Sun

Paperback Romance

Putting your best foot forward has never been so sexyor so deliciously funnyas in this "entertaining, oddball comedy" (TNT's "Rough Cuts") that proves that it's worth it to go to outrageous lengths for the one you love. While reading aloud some of her provocative prose, Sophie, a romance novelist (Gia Carides, My Big Fat Greek Wedding) meets an impressed eavesdropper (Anthony LaPaglia, "Without a Trace") who turns out to be the man of her dreams. But having been disabled since childhood,Sophie lacks the confidence to go after him, until she gets a lucky breaka broken limb that allows her to disguise her childhood infirmity by posing as the victim of a skiing mishap. But when she throws fate to the wind and starts a star-crossed affair, she learns that she isn't the only one with something to hide!

Flirting

The second part of a projected trilogy by Australian director John Duigan (the preceding film was The Year My Voice Broke), Flirting is a wonderful tale of misfit adolescents who find their independence through a forbidden, interracial relationship. Noah Taylor returns to Duigan's ongoing story as Danny, a gangly stutterer with a wry wit, few friends, and a big crush on Thandiwe (Thandie Newton), a Ugandan student whose father is in some political danger back home. Danny goes to a boys academy and Thandiwe boards at a girls school nearby. The two meet secretly and deepen their doomed affair, exploring adulthood for the first time on their own terms. Duigan is a director who can occasionally be seduced by the surface of things, but Flirting is richly layered in tones both light and ominous, youthful performances that easily alternate between childhood buoyancy and grown-up passion, and a hard-won wisdom about the mysteries of loss. An added bonus is a terrific supporting performance by Nicole Kidman. --Tom Keogh

Two star-crossed misfits risk everything to be together in this sexy and amusing coming-of-age film. Starring Noah Taylor (Vanilla Sky), Thandie Newton (Mission: Impossible 2), and Academy Award® nominee* Nicole Kidman (Moulin Rouge), Flirting is a "brilliant"(The Washington Post) story about first love that's "miles ahead of the average teenage film" (Variety)! With his slight stature, obstinate stutter and love for existentialism, Danny (Taylor) doesn't quite fit in at his rugby-dominated boys' school. But then he falls for radiant, intellectual Thandiwe (Newton)an African student ostracized by the icy clique leader (Kidman) of a nearby girls' school. Despite meddling classmates, imperious teachers and a lake separating their schools, Danny and Thandiwe's romance blossoms...until a crisis threatens to take Thandiwe away forever. *2001: Actress, Moulin Rouge

Children of the Revolution

Australia's most consistently fascinating export, Judy Davis has made a career of playing intriguingly high-strung women with a hilariously icy edge. Here, she plays the leader of Australia's Communist Party in the early 1950s whose struggles to keep the party alive are rewarded with a trip to Russia to meet Stalin himself (F. Murray Abraham). The meeting turns into a seduction, and she returns to Australia carrying Stalin's love child. So it's no surprise when her son Joe (Richard Roxburgh) grows up to be a political rabble-rouser, bringing the country to the brink of disaster. Filmed in mockumentary fashion by writer-director Peter Duncan, the film is never quite as funny as you wish it would be, but works as well as it does because of the performances by Rush and, particularly, Davis. --Marshall Fine

This outrageous comedy won outstanding critical acclaim for its wild humor and award-winning cast of stars! After a mad, passionate fling on a whirlwind trip to Moscow, party girl Joan Fraser (Judy Davis -- ABSOLUTE POWER) returns home pregnant. And when little Joe is born, everyone wonders who "Daddy" is! Soon, the ball starts rolling on a hilarious sequence of events that includes a clueless husband (Academy Award(R)-winner Jeffrey Rush, Best Actor -- SHINE), a lovesick double agent (Sam Neill -- JURASSIC PARK), and even Joseph Stalin (Academy Award(R)-winner F. Murray Abraham, Best Actor -- AMADEUS). Get ready for nonstop laughs in the madcap, all-star comedy that takes a wild look at the ultimate party animals!

Dead Heart

Bryan Brown (FX, Breaker Morant) stars in this powerful and provocative thriller as a lawman caught in the middle of a racially charged murder mystery. Interactive Menus, Production Credits, Scene Access, Trailer, Filmographies

The Navigator

Vincent Ward's mystical tale of a tiny 14th-century English hamlet during the devastation of the Black Plague mixes faith and fantasy in a compelling adventure. Ward creates a stark look with his high contrast black-and-white photography: dark huts against a snow-covered landscape and a gray sky, candles and campfires burning tiny pools of light in the midnight-black caves. The visions of young Griffin (Hamish McFarlane) break this austere style with color dreams, at first merely flashes of images, then a vivid narrative of a pilgrimage through the center of the earth. Griffin's older brother Connor (Bruce Lyons), who has just returned from the dying, diseased cities of England, leads this great journey to an alien world of metal beasts and towering ramparts (revealed as a modern New Zealand city) to make their offering to God. Ward keeps the camera tied to their experience, creating a nightmarish vision of familiar objects and locations: a busy highway, a junkyard, a remarkable run-in with a surfacing submarine. Throughout, Griffin's haunting flashes of the future taunt him with clues to a death in the party, but they don't reveal who. The Navigator defies genre, mixing fantasy and science fiction, religion and mysticism, historical realism and modern adventure, to create a compelling, beautiful, visually stunning leap of faith. --Sean Axmaker

Bad Blood

Starring Jack Thompson and Carol Burns. Bad Blood is based on the true story of Stan Graham, the New Zealander who, in the 1940s, senselessly murdered seven people in his small village of Kowhitirangi. Graham (Jack Thompson) was a regular guy -- married

In a Savage Land

13 Gantry Row