Norman, Zack

Romancing the Stone (Special Edition)

Director Robert Zemeckis (Forrest Gump, Contact) had a hit with this 1984 comedy that first teamed Michael Douglas, Kathleen Turner, and Danny DeVito. Turner steals the show from the guys, however, playing a pushy romance novelist who gets stuck among some dangerous figures in Colombia and has only a rumpled guide (Michael Douglas) as an ally. The chemistry between the stars is infectious (the trio went on to make a sequel, Jewel of the Nile, and then an interesting, dark comedy directed by DeVito, The War of the Roses). Zemeckis--whose specialty at the time was creating set pieces of raucous action (as in his Back to the Future)--keeps things hopping with lots of kinetic material. --Tom Keogh

When her sister is kidnapped by thugs searching for a priceless jewel in the Colombian jungle a romance novelist (Kathleen Turner) soon finds her own life filled with cliffhangers and danger. All alone she sets out to rescue her sister and meets up with a handsome fortune seeker (Michael Douglas) who convinces her to beat the bandits to the treasure.System Requirements:Running Time 105 Mins.Format: DVD MOVIE Genre: ACTION/ADVENTURE Rating: PG UPC: 024543266945 Manufacturer No: 2236694

Romancing the Stone

Director Robert Zemeckis (Forrest Gump, Contact) had a hit with this 1984 comedy that first teamed Michael Douglas, Kathleen Turner, and Danny DeVito. Turner steals the show from the guys, however, playing a pushy romance novelist who gets stuck among some dangerous figures in Colombia and has only a rumpled guide (Michael Douglas) as an ally. The chemistry between the stars is infectious (the trio went on to make a sequel, Jewel of the Nile, and then an interesting, dark comedy directed by DeVito, The War of the Roses). Zemeckis--whose specialty at the time was creating set pieces of raucous action (as in his Back to the Future)--keeps things hopping with lots of kinetic material. --Tom Keogh

Cadillac Man

Robin Williams is in his edgily desperate mode as a Queens car salesman whose life is in turmoil. He's fooling around with someone else's wife, his marriage is on the rocks, and he has to sell 12 cars in 12 days or he will lose his job. He's so desperate that he even tries to pitch a sale to a widow at a funeral. As if he didn't have enough problems, the crazed husband (Tim Robbins) of one of his coworkers bursts into the car show room with an automatic weapon and takes everyone hostage. His wife has been cheating on him (not with Williams) and he's ready to go postal unless he finds out who's been sleeping with her. It's up to Williams to try to keep everyone from getting killed. But as hard as Williams and Robbins work, they can't make this film more than sporadically funny--and that's only because Williams is at his most spritzingly frenetic. --Marshall Fine

Joey O'Brien is a fast-paced high-roller who wheels and deals his livelihood selling top of the line American cars. Lately Joey's life in the showroom has hit a slump and its taking everything he has to get back the old 'pitch'. Joey must give the pitch of his life when the showroom secretary's jealous husband holds the salesmen hostage.System Requirements:Starring: Robin Williams Tim Robbins Pamela Reed and Fran Drescher. Directed By: Roger Donaldson. Running Time: 97 Min. Color. This film is presented in "Widescreen" format. Copyright 2002 MGM Studios.Format: DVD MOVIE Genre: COMEDY Rating: R UPC: 027616874931 Manufacturer No: 1003344

Fingers

Harvey Keitel plays a piano virtuoso with a twisted second job - he's the muscle man who collects on his mobster father's debts. Of course this creates an internal struggle between the artist's commitments to his father and his love of music.Running Time: 91 min.Format: DVD MOVIE Genre: DRAMA UPC: 053939629927

The debut film for director-writer James Toback has developed a cult following over the years but was one of three 1978 films that put a damper on Harvey Keitel's career for more than a decade. In this overheated brew of testosterone and male sensitivity, Keitel plays the son of a fading mob boss; Dad forces him to work as a leg-breaker collecting bad debts while Mom wants him to pursue a career as a classical pianist. Isn't this how Van Cliburn got his start? Keitel rides an emotional roller coaster, torn between parental poles even as he faces the audition that could launch him on the concert circuit. Oh, and for good measure, he starts to suffer doubts about his own manhood, thanks to an encounter with ex-footballer Jim Brown. Strictly for Toback and Keitel aficionados. --Marshall Fine

Hollywood Dreams

Set in the city of angels and featuring wonderful performances by David Proval Karen Black Zack Norman Melissa Leo Keaton Simons and Sabrina Jaglom Hollywood Dreams spins the tale of a young girl fresh off the bus from Iowa (The Astonishing Tanna Frederick) who falls in love with a sexy and promising young actor (Justin Kirk) though their relationship threatens to complicate her own obsessive goal of becoming a famous actress the film perfectly captures the delightful and desperate lives of those chasing dreams in Hollywood: one day they are shuffling down a boardwalk with too many suitcases and the next they are lounging in contemporary hillside homes with a view of the city. Though neither state is permanent the more desirable one fuels the dream. The story s extraordinary execution portrays Hollywood as the fantastic and insane place that it is.System Requirements:Running Time: 100 minutesFormat: DVD MOVIE Genre: COMEDY/COMING OF AGE UPC: 684682000062 Manufacturer No: RBR002

Festival in Cannes

Filming on location in France during the 1999 Cannes Film Festival, Henry Jaglom goes behind the scenes to explore how movies get made (and unmade). He would know--he's been making them for decades now. In this one, he takes an Altman-meets-Cassavetes approach to his subject. While former actress Alice (Greta Scacchi), for instance, is trying to get her directorial debut off the ground, film icon Millie (Anouk Aimée) is trying to decide between the lead in Alice's indie and a (better-paying) cameo in the new Tom Hanks vehicle. As in The Player, Jaglom focuses on several characters and, as in many Cassavetes pictures, the dialogue feels improvised. If Festival in Cannes is less emotionally involving than 1997's Déjà Vu (arguably his best), it still provides a fine showcase for a talented cast, including Maximilian Schell as Millie's husband and Ron Silver as the producer behind the Hanks project. --Kathleen C. Fennessy

Tracks

Wherever Jack Falen goes, the war goes with him. Acclaimed actor Dennis Hopper stars in this searing psychological drama as Falen, a burnt-out Vietnam vet escorting the body of a fallen pal on a train trip home, or is he? Written and directed by Henry Jaglom (Someone To Love, New Year's Day), Tracks is a powerful showcase for Hopper's dynamic talents. His Falen is paranoid, bent with rage - the kind of character that's been the Oscar.-nominated actor's forte in Easy Rider, River's Edge, Blue Velvet and more. Journey with him across America... and into one man's private hell.

Venice Venice

For over three decades, Henry Jaglom has been traveling a cinematic path unlike any other director's: his noodling, searching, utterly un-commercial pictures (with dialogue largely improvised) are as personal as novels. Venice/Venice is vintage Jaglom, which will spell pleasure for his many fans and exasperation for nonbelievers. Jaglom plays a movie director visiting the Venice Film Festival--with footage captured during one of his visits there--whose romantic fling contrasts with his home life back in Venice, California. Jaglom's needy persona, and his unseemly tendency to linger over close-ups of his own teddy bear face, become tiresome here (he's wisely put others center-stage in subsequent films). But for all the dorm-room philosophizing, there is something dreamlike that emerges from this film as it nears its end. All the self-indulgent nattering does lead to something personal, and though the journey is something annoying, at least it's an authentic journey. --Robert Horton

A maverick film director is surprised that his most recent film has been chosen as the Official U.S. entry at the Venice Film Festival. In the midst of all the festival madness, the viewer must confront the wide divergence between things as they really are and things as they seem to be, both on-screen and off.

Sitting Ducks

Unruly but comically enterprising, Henry Jaglom's comedy Sitting Ducks is spirited, smart nonsense about a crime syndicate's bookkeeper, Simon (Michael Emil), who runs off with a pile of mob money. An essential Jaglom character, Simon is a born naif with no shortage of skewed observations about the world, crime, sex, and survival. Exhilarated, he takes off with cohort Sidney (Zack Norman) on an escape plan leading, eventually, to Latin America. Inevitably these losers complicate their lives by hooking up with a pair of sexy-neurotic exiles (Patrice Townsend, Irene Forest) who bring added dimension to thejourney. The result is a funny, twitchy, but expansive milestone in the early independent film movement, and timely proof in 1980 that the then-controversial Jaglom really was a talent worth watching. --Tom Keogh

Romancing the Stone [Region 2]

Director Robert Zemeckis (Forrest Gump, Contact) had a hit with this 1984 comedy that first teamed Michael Douglas, Kathleen Turner, and Danny DeVito. Turner steals the show from the guys, however, playing a pushy romance novelist who gets stuck among some dangerous figures in Colombia and has only a rumpled guide (Michael Douglas) as an ally. The chemistry between the stars is infectious (the trio went on to make a sequel, Jewel of the Nile, and then an interesting, dark comedy directed by DeVito, The War of the Roses). Zemeckis--whose specialty at the time was creating set pieces of raucous action (as in his Back to the Future)--keeps things hopping with lots of kinetic material. --Tom Keogh