Young, Burt

Chinatown (Special Collector's Edition)

Roman Polanski's brooding film noir exposes the darkest side of the land of sunshine, the Los Angeles of the 1930s, where power is the only currency--and the only real thing worth buying. Jack Nicholson is J.J. Gittes, a private eye in the Chandler mold, who during a routine straying-spouse investigation finds himself drawn deeper and deeper into a jigsaw puzzle of clues and corruption. The glamorous Evelyn Mulwray (a dazzling Faye Dunaway) and her titanic father, Noah Cross (John Huston), are at the black-hole center of this tale of treachery, incest, and political bribery. The crackling, hard-bitten script by Robert Towne won a well-deserved Oscar, and the muted color cinematography makes the goings-on seem both bleak and impossibly vibrant. Polanski himself has a brief, memorable cameo as the thug who tangles with Nicholson's nose. One of the greatest, most completely satisfying crime films of all time. --Anne Hurley

Landmark movie in the film noir tradition, Roman Polanski's Chinatown stands as a true screen classic. Jack Nicholson is private eye Jake Gittes, living off the murky moral climate of sunbaked, pre-war Southern California. Hired by a beautiful socialite (Faye Dunaway) to investigate her husband's extra-marital affair, Gittes is swept into a maelstrom of double dealings and deadly deceits, uncovering a web of personal and political scandals that come crashing together for one, unforgettable night in...Chinatown. Co-starring film legend John Huston and featuring an Academy Award®-winning script by Robert Towne, Chinatown captures a lost era in a masterfully woven movie that remains a timeless gem.

Once Upon a Time in America (Two-Disc Special Edition)

This movie has a checkered history, having been chopped from its original 227-minute director's cut to 139 minutes for its U.S. release. This longer edition benefits from having the complete story (the short version has huge gaps) about turn-of-the-century Jewish immigrants in America finding their way into lives of crime, as told in flashback by an aging Jewish gangster named Noodles (Robert De Niro). On the other hand, it's almost four hours long, and this sometimes-indulgent Sergio Leone film is no Godfather. Still, it is notable for the contrast between Leone's elegiac take on the gangster film and his occasional explosive action, as well as for the mix of the stoic, inexpressive De Niro and the hyperactive James Woods as his lifelong friend and rival. --Marshall Fine

Ten years in planning Sergio Leone's epic Once upon a Time in America portrays 50 years of riveting underworld history and offers rich roles to a remarkable cast. Robert De Niro and James Woods play lifelong Lower East Side pals whose wary partnership unravels in death and mystery. Strong support comes from Tuesday Weld Joe Pesci Jennifer Connelly Elizabeth McGovern and the young actors playing the central characters as ghetto kids. To see this film (offered for the first time in the full version 1984 Cannes Film Festival audiences cheered) is "to be swept away by the assurance and vitality of a great director making his final statement in a medium he adored" (Kenneth Turan Los Angeles Times).Running Time: 229 min.Format: DVD MOVIE Genre: DRAMA Rating: R UPC: 085393190927 Manufacturer No: 31909

Rocky Balboa

The sixth installment of the Rocky series picks up the story of the Italian Stallion 16 years after the morose Rocky V. And sure, at his advanced age, Sylvester Stallone now looks like one of those sides of beef his character used to pound on. No matter. Somehow you buy the premise after all these years, even if it takes forever for Rocky Balboa to stop wallowing in self-pity (Adrian is dead, his old haunts are demolished) and get down to the business of drinking raw eggs and running up staircases. The business at hand is an unlikely exhibition fight with champion Mason Dixon (Antonio Tarver), which the near-sexagenarian Mr. Balboa has no business accepting. Of course, just as sure as the horns of Bill Conti's theme music are even now trumpeting through your head, the ol' Rock might have a punch or two left in him. Stallone wrote and directed, and there isn't much to say except that the movie steps in its pre-determined paces with a canny sense of what has come before (it's practically an homage to all the previous Rocky pictures, complete with fleeting flashbacks). Burt Young is around again, and Geraldine Hughes makes an appealing, rather chaste female companion for Rocky. Stallone's Rocky has gotten suspiciously articulate over the years, but he still knows how to slouch. If Stallone never forgets that, he can probably keep the franchise rolling. --Robert Horton

Stills from Rocky Balboa (click for larger image)

Beyond Rocky Balboa on Amazon.com

On Blu-ray

The Amazon.com Rocky Store

The Films of Sylvester Stallone

Rocky Balboa' examines one of America's greatest icons at a vulnerable period in his life--middle age. A former heavyweight boxing champion, known and renown throughout the world for going the distance, Rocky finds a new venture: giving back to his community. This is where he, once more, finds himself at the opposing side of opportunity, not unlike the one he has seen decades ago. Heavyweight champ Mason Dixon and his representation offer Rocky a shot for the title. For Balboa, it'll be one last hurrah he'll never forget.....but with his glory days far behind him can he withstand the inevitabilities of what's to come? A look at going full circle and wanting more, when life turns out how you least expect it and then some.

Convoy

Citizen Band radio takes to the freeways for fast-lane thrills and fly-over spills. Trucker "Rubber Duck" (Kris Kristofferson) signals the big 10-4 when he and his unsuspecting ridealong (Ali MacGraw) are chased through three states by a corrupt traffic

Rocky

Nominated* for 10 Academy Awards® and winner for Best Picture it's the film that inspired a nation! Audiences and critics alike cheered this American success story of an "everyman" triumphing over all odds. Featuring a dynamic musical score a thrilling fight sequence and four Oscar® - nominated* performances this rousing crowd-pleaser will send spirits soaring. Fighting for love glory and self-respect Rocky® scores an exultant knockout!Rocky Balboa (Sylvester Stallone) is a Philadelphia club fighter who seems to be going nowhere. But when a stroke of fate puts him in the ring with a world heavyweight champion Rocky knows that it's his one shot at the big time - a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to go the distance and come out a winner!*1976: Actor (Stallone) Actress (Talia Shire) Supporting Actor (Burgess Meredith Burt Young) Director (won) Original Screenplay Original Song Editing (won) SoundSystem Requirements: Running Time 120 MinFormat: DVD MOVIE Genre: DRAMA Rating: PG UPC: 027616915139 Manufacturer No: M108739

The only remaining evidence that Sylvester Stallone might have had a respectable career, this 1976 Oscar winner (for Best Picture, Director, and Editing) is still the quintessential ode to an underdog and one of the best boxing movies ever made. After writing the script about a two-bit boxer who gets a "million-to-one shot" against the world heavyweight champion, Stallone insisted that he star in the title role, and his equally unknown status helped to catapult him (and this rousing film) to overnight success. The story is familiar, but it has been handled with such vitality and emotional honesty that you can't help but leap and cheer for Rocky Balboa, the chump turned champ (despite his valiant defeat in the ring) who stuns the boxing world with the support of his timid girlfriend, Adrian (Talia Shire), and grizzled trainer, Mickey (Burgess Meredith). Oscar nominations went to all the lead actors (including Burt Young as Adrian's hot-tempered brother), but four sequels could never top the universal appeal of this low-budget crowd pleaser. --Jeff Shannon

Rocky V

The "Italian Stallion" rediscovers his roots in this exciting thrill-packed drama that reunites Sylvester Stallone with the Oscar®-winning* director of the original Rocky®.Upon returning home from his latest triumph Rocky Balboa (Stallone) learns that all his money has been lost by an unscrupulous financial advisor. To make matters worse his fight-related injuries force his retirement from the ring. So Rocky his wife Adrian (Talia Shire) and his son Rocky Jr. (Sage Stallone) move to their old low-rent neighborhood in South Philadelphia. There the fighter must resolve the deep-rooted resentment held by his son a bitterness that grows when Rocky trains Tommy Gunn (Tommy Morrison) a young boxer who soon rises to national prominence. When Tommy turns against his mentor and publicly taunts him Rocky knows he must fight once more.System Requirements: Running Time 111 MinFormat: DVD MOVIE Genre: ACTION/ADVENTURE Rating: PG-13 UPC: 027616915184 Manufacturer No: 1007437

Back To School (Extra-Curricular Edition)

Rodney Dangerfield (Caddyshack Meet Wally Sparks) makes the grade with this laugh-riot comedy that's in a class of its own! Higher education will never be the same when co-stars Sally Kellerman Robert Downey Jr. Sam Kinison Ned Beatty and more join the maniac as he takes on the brainiacs! Thornton Melon's (Dangerfield) son is a college misfit so Thornton's lending some fatherly support...by enrolling as a fellow freshman! Who cares if the owner of the "Tall and Fat" clothing empire never finished high school? Thornton's pockets are deep enough to buy a ticket to class...and hire NASA to do his homework! But when he ticks off his professorand then steals his girlfriendThornton takes things just a little too far. Now he'll have to hit the booksinstead of his bank accountor go back to being the world's wealthiest dropout! "Dangerfield is sensational" (The Hollywood Reporter) in this howlingly funny comedy that scores an A+!Format: DVD MOVIE Genre: COMEDY Rating: PG-13 UPC: 027616083135 Manufacturer No: M108313

In the mid-1980s, standup comic Rodney Dangerfield underwent a renewed wave of popularity, finding a surprisingly enthusiastic baby-boomer audience. What else to do but make a movie that shows off Dangerfield's alternately knowing and boorish humor? This may not be on the AFI list of great films, but it delivers laughs aplenty in its story of a rough-edged tycoon who made his fortune in clothes for the stout and tall and decides to attend college in order to be closer to his son (Keith Gordon). There's not much plot, but lots of room for Dangerfield's one-line riffs. The goggle-eyed comic veteran displays surprising charm, enough to make his romance with professor Sally Kellerman believable. Look for cameos by late comedian Sam Kinison and author Kurt Vonnegut Jr. --Marshall Fine

The Pope of Greenwich Village

Picture if you will two cousins, Charlie (Mickey Rourke) and Paulie (Eric Roberts), prowling the mean streets of New York's Little Italy. Charlie is reasonably put-together, a maitre d' at a chic café who aspires to running his own restaurant someday. Paulie is an incurable flake who can't resist a temptation or a goofball scheme, couldn't tell the truth to save his soul, and keeps splashing Charlie with the street slop of his slewing trajectory through life. This includes drawing him into the circles of Mob crime, most especially Paulie's boss, that supreme sleazebag "Bedbug Eddie" (Burt Young).

Michael Cimino is said to have had a hand in this movie, though the credited director is Stuart Rosenberg--an impersonal craftsman often hired in midshoot after the star and a more volatile director had parted company. This helps account for the picture's overall lack of rhythm and its wavering between overemphatic, Ethnic-with-a-capital-E idiosyncrasy, and low-key befuddlement. Still, it has its charms, most of them deriving from a terrific cast. At the time it came out, in the summer of 1984, Rourke and Roberts were both exciting, unpredictable talents; Roberts in particular had an amazing talent for being somebody brand new--psychologically, even physically--in every film he made. But even though they're hitting on all cylinders, the boys are quietly upstaged by some redoubtable old pros: the great Kenneth McMillan, the ineffable M. Emmet Walsh, and--scoring her umpteenth Oscar® nomination as the mother of an ill-fated cop--Miss Geraldine Page. --Richard T. Jameson

Turn up the Sinatra, put on a leather jacket, and slip into a rollicking, high-voltage movie that produces tears of laughter (New York Daily News). Mickey Rourke (The Rainmaker), EricRoberts (National Security, Runaway Train) and Daryl Hannah (Kill Bill: Vol. 1, Splash) create emotion-charged characters who tingle with energy and play with conviction (The Hollywood Reporter) in this modern-day classic that's as robust and powerful as Italianespresso! In New York's Little Italy, smooth-talking hustler Charlie (Rourke) works in a restaurant and dreams of one day buying his own with his girlfriend Diane (Hannah). His wiry wheeler-dealer cousin Paulie (Roberts) waits tables, skims money off checks and is always scheming to score big. Butthey're all about to pull a scam on the wrong guyBed Bug Eddie (Burt Young, Rocky), the Mafia king of Greenwich Village! Now these small-time con men are in big-time troubletrouble so big that even their mobster uncle might not be able to save them!

Rocky IV

It was time for Sylvester Stallone to say "enough, already" to the boxing hero he plays in the popular Rocky film series, but instead Stallone kept the saga going by pushing Rocky into Rambo territory. The 1985 Rocky IV finds the Italian stallion pitted against a seemingly unbeatable Russian monster named Drago (Dolph Lundgren) who lets his wife (Stallone's then-wife, Brigitte Nielsen) do all the talking. With a mighty punch, Drago has sent Rocky's former opponent and trainer Apollo Creed to an early grave, and the boxer responds with the ultimate challenge. Even the Russians are rooting for Rocky, so it's not hard to guess how the film ends. Despite Stallone's claims to the contrary, this installment was followed by Rocky V in 1990. --Jeff Shannon

East meets West when Rocky takes on a vicious Soviet fighter who literally killed his last opponent! Sylvester Stallone writes directs and stars in this war between nations in which the only battle is fought in a boxing ring.Rocky Balboa (Stallone) proudly holds the world heavyweight boxing championship but a new challenger has stepped forward: Drago (Dolph Lundgren) a six-foot-four-inch 261-pound fighter who has the backing of the Soviet Union. This time Rocky's training regimen takes him to icy Siberia where he prepares for a globally televised match in the heart of Moscow. But nothing can truly prepare him for what he's about to face a powerfully charged fight to the finish in which he must defend not only himself but also the honor of his country!System Requirements: Running Time 91 MinFormat: DVD MOVIE Genre: ACTION/ADVENTURE Rating: PG UPC: 027616915177 Manufacturer No: 1007436

Rocky II

Beginning precisely where Rocky left off, the surprisingly effective 1979 sequel takes the saga of Rocky Balboa to its logical next step, as the palooka turned public idol and media darling returns to his "normal" life in Philadelphia with his newlywed bride Adrian (Talia Shire) and some degree of material comfort. He needs to find a job, but boxing champ Apollo Creed (Carl Weathers) is challenging Rocky to a lucrative rematch, and despite his doctor's warning against future boxing, Rocky can't resist. Defying the odds that most sequels can't live up to their originals, Rocky II doesn't pack all the punch that Rocky did, but it takes us further into the lives of its now-familiar and beloved characters, and Stallone (as director and star) gives us another rousing finale in the ring. Do you really need to know who wins? --Jeff Shannon

It's the rematch of the century as Rocky Balboa takes on Apollo Creed in this powerful follow-up to one of the most acclaimed movies in film history. Writer-director-star Sylvester Stallone succeeds in creating a powerful feel-good movie hailed as "a stunning effort in every way" (New York Post).After club fighter Rocky Balboa (Stallone) goes the distance with the world heavyweight champion boxing fans clamor for a rematch. But Rocky having sustained massive injuries in the bout announces his retirement. Though he tries to make a new life for himself Rocky realizes that he can't escape his true calling. The ring beckons once more and the "Italian Stallion" must prepare for the fight of his life.System Requirements: Running Time 119 MinFormat: DVD MOVIE Genre: DRAMA Rating: PG UPC: 027616915146 Manufacturer No: 1007433