Generation Gap

The Jazz Singer - 25th Anniversary Edition

Not much jazz spoken in this 1980 version of the Jolson classic, directed by Richard Fleischer (The Vikings) and starring a very tentative Neil Diamond as a cantor's son who would rather sing commercially than in a synagogue. The soundtrack is tedious, the portrait of L.A.'s music industry preposterous, and Diamond (despite his talents as a singer-songwriter in the real world) can't help but look like a speck on the wall in the presence of Laurence Olivier, who plays his father. --Tom Keogh

Whale Rider

A small Maori village faces a crisis when the heir to the leadership of the Ngati Konohi dies at birth and is survived only by his twin sister Pai. Although disregarded by her grandfather and shunned by the village people twelve-year-old Pai remains certain of her calling and trains herself in the ways and customs of her people. With remarkable grace Pai finds the strength to challenge her family and embraces a thousand years of tradition in order to fulfill her destiny.System Requirements:Running Time: 101 Min.Format: DVD MOVIE Genre: DRAMA Rating: PG-13 UPC: 043396022720 Manufacturer No: 02272

One of the most charming and critically acclaimed films of 2003, the New Zealand hit Whale Rider effectively combines Maori tribal tradition with the timely "girl power" of a vibrant new millennium. Despite the discouragement of her gruff and disapproving grandfather (Rawiri Paratene), who nearly disowns her because she is female and therefore traditionally disqualified from tribal leadership, 12-year-old Pai (Keisha Castle-Hughes) is convinced that she is a tribal leader, and sets about to prove it. Rather than inflate this story (from a novel by Witi Ihimaera) with artificial sentiment, writer-director Niki Caro develops very real and turbulent family relationships, intimate and yet torn by a collision between stubborn tradition and changing attitudes. The mythic whale rider--the ultimate symbol of Maori connection to nature--is also the harbinger of Pai's destiny, and the appealing Castle-Hughes gives a luminous, astonishingly powerful performance that won't leave a dry eye in the house. With its fresh take on a familiar tale, Whale Rider is definitely one from the heart. --Jeff Shannon

On Golden Pond (Special Edition)

For Norman and Ethel Thayer this summer On Golden Pond is filled with conflict and resolution. When their daughter Chelsea arrives the family is forced to renew the bonds of love and overcome the generational friction that has existed for years. Norman must find his way through his anger and fear of growing old while Chelsea struggles to rebuild their relationship. Ethel's consistent support of her "knight in shining armor" is inspirational in its simplicity. This is a movie to ponder and always keep in your heart.System Requirements:Starring: Dabney Coleman Henry Fonda Jane Fonda Katherine Hepburn William Lanteau and Doug McKeon. Directed By: Mark Rydell. Running Time: 105 Min. Color. This film is presented in "Widescreen" format. Copyright 2003 Artisan Entertainment.Format: DVD MOVIE Genre: DRAMA Rating: PG UPC: 012236147817 Manufacturer No: 14781

Writer Ernest Thompson, who came up with the original stage play of On Golden Pond and adapted it for film, is lucky to have two giants of the screen give dignity and breadth to his sometimes trite dialogue. Henry Fonda, in his last role, plays a prickly English professor at the disagreeable age of 80. Visiting his summer house by a Maine lake with his wife (Katharine Hepburn), the old man forges an unlikely bond with a lonely boy, comes to terms with his daughter (Jane Fonda), and suffers disorienting effects of mild dementia. Even playing a tired old man, Fonda is an absolute lion of a movie star, and Hepburn brings her special spirit to the part of his worried bride. The onscreen relationship between Henry and Jane Fonda naturally makes one think about their much-discussed difficulties offscreen, but that's a side benefit in a movie that is really just a celebration of simple human decency. Directed by Mark Rydell (Harry and Walter Go to New York). --Tom Keogh

Dreamkeeper

A century old storyteller and his grandson a troubled 17 year old boy embarks on a cross country journey toward self-discovery. Like Old Pete's wise tales themselves Dreamkeeper is important and illuminating storytelling for the entire family.System Requirements:Colore/Approx: 180 MinutesFormat: DVD MOVIE Genre: ACTION/ADVENTURE Rating: NR UPC: 707729144199 Manufacturer No: 14419

While it doesn't hold together as a three-hour TV drama, Dreamkeeper should prove enthralling to anyone interested in Native American myths and legends. A variety of tribal folklore provides the episodic thrust of this typical Hallmark production, which relies too heavily on digital effects--and the plodding direction of Hallmark regular Steve Barron--in telling the story of a resentful Lakota teenager (Eddie Spears) who reluctantly agrees to drive his wise old grandfather (August Schellenberg) from their South Dakota "rez" to an All-Nations Powwow in Albuquerque, New Mexico. Along the way, the tradition-bound elder serves as tribal "dreamkeeper" for his initially resistant grandson, who gradually realizes that his grandfather's stories--visualized through effects-laden reenactments involving all manner of magic and mystery--are essential in preserving the fading cultures of the Lakota and the several other tribes whose folklore depends on unbroken generations of oral tradition. While some of the lavishly dramatized tales can stand alone as authentic Native American myth-making, Dreamkeeper lacks the overall structure that could've given the stories a cumulative magical impact. Still, it's an admirable attempt to introduce neglected cultures into the television mainstream. --Jeff Shannon

A River Runs Through It

Academy Award -winning director Robert Redford captures the majesty of the Montana wilderness and the strength of the American family in this acclaimed adaptation of Norman Maclean s classic autobiography. Craig Sheffer stars as the young Norman and Brad Pitt also stars as his brother Paul an irresistible daredevil driven to challenge the world. Growing up both boys rebel against their stern minister father. While Norman channels his rebellion into writing Paul descends into the slippery path to self-destruction.System Requirements:Starring: Robert Redford Craig Sheffer Brad Pitt Tom Skerritt Brenda Blethyn and Emily Lloyd. Directed By: Robert Redford. Running Time: 124 Min. Color. This film is presented in both "Widescreen" and "Standard" formats. Copyright 1999 Columbia TriStar Home Video.Format: DVD MOVIE Genre: DRAMA Rating:  UPC: 043396039339 Manufacturer No: 03933

A lyrical and nostalgic film from director Robert Redford (Quiz Show, Ordinary People), based on the popular autobiographical novel by Norman MacLean, A River Runs Through It shows the best that modern filmmaking has to offer. The film chronicles two brothers coming of age in early-20th-century Missoula, Montana, under the stern tutelage of their minister father, played by Tom Skerritt (Top Gun). Their father instills in them a love of fly fishing, which for one brother (Brad Pitt) becomes a lifelong passion even as he sets out to become a newspaperman and struggles with his addiction to gambling. The other brother, Norman (Craig Sheffer), dreams of exploring the world outside of Missoula as he falls in love with a local girl (Emily Lloyd) who also dreams of broader horizons. Soon one brother must discover the true meaning of family loyalty when the other finds himself in deeper trouble than ever before. Redford, who also narrates the film, does a masterful job in re-creating the period and in drawing out affecting performances from his young cast. An Oscar winner for Philippe Rousselot's luminescent cinematography, this is a poignant and special film. --Robert Lane

The Virgin Suicides

In a quiet Michigan community in the mid-1970s, neighborhood boys try to piece together the lives of the five Lisbon sisters, kept isolated by their over-protective parents.
Genre: Feature Film-Drama
Rating: R
Release Date: 9-AUG-2005
Media Type: DVD

Previously criticized for her marginal acting skills, Sofia Coppola made her directorial debut with The Virgin Suicides and silenced her detractors. No amount of coaching from her director father (Francis Coppola) or husband (Spike Jonze) could have guaranteed a film this assured, and in adapting Jeffrey Eugenides's novel, Coppola demonstrates the sensitivity and emotional depth that this material demands. Surely the pain of youth and public criticism found its way into her directorial voice; in the story of four sisters who self-destruct under the steady erosion of their youthful ideals, one can clearly sense Coppola's intimate connection to the inner lives of her characters.

Played in a delicate minor key, the film is heartbreaking, mysterious, and soulfully funny, set in a Michigan suburb of the mid-1970s but timeless and universal to anyone who's been a teenager. The four surviving Lisbon sisters lost a sibling to suicide, and as its title suggests, the film will chart their mutual course to oblivion under the vigilance of repressive parents (Kathleen Turner and James Woods, perfectly cast). But The Virgin Suicides is more concerned with life in that precious interlude of adolescence, when the Lisbon girls are worshipped by the neighborhood boys, their notion of perfection epitomized by Lux (Kirsten Dunst) and her storybook love for high-school stud Trip (Josh Hartnett). Unfolding at the cusp of innocence and sexual awakening, and recalled as a memory, The Virgin Suicides is, ultimately, about the preservation of the Lisbon sisters by their own deaths--suspended in time, polished to perfection, and forever untainted by adulthood. --Jeff Shannon

Five Easy Pieces

Returning home to his father's deathbed, a gifted pianist who has been living a wasted life is forced to face issues which will change his life forever.
Genre: Feature Film-Drama
Rating: R
Release Date: 28-AUG-2001
Media Type: DVD

This subtle, existential character study of an emotionally distant outcast (Nicholson) forced to confront his past failures remains an intimate cornerstone of American '70s cinema. Written and directed with remarkable restraint by Bob Rafelson, the film is the result of a short-lived partnership between the filmmaker and Nicholson--the first was the zany formalist exercise, Head, while the equally impressive King of Marvin Gardens followed Five Easy Pieces. Quiet and full of long, controlled takes, this film draws its strength from the acutely detailed, nonjudgmental observations of its complex protagonist, Robert Dupea--an extremely crass and frustrated oil worker, and failed child pianist hiding from his past in Texas. Dupea spends his life drinking beer and sleeping with (and cheating on) his annoying but adoring Tammy Wynette-wannabe girlfriend, but when he learns that his father is dying in Washington State, he leaves. After the film transforms into a spirited road movie, and arrives at the eccentric upper-class Dupea family mansion, it becomes apparent that leaving is what Dupea does best--from his problems, fears, and those who love him. Nicholson gives a difficult yet masterful performance in an unlikable role, one that's full of ambiguity and requires violent shifts in acting style. Several sequences--such as his stopping traffic to play piano, or his famous verbal duels with a cranky waitress over a chicken-salad sandwich--are Nicholson landmarks. Yet, it's the quieter moments, when Dupea tries miserably to communicate and reconcile with his dying father, where the actor shows his real talent--and by extension, shows us the wounded little boy that lurks in the shell of the man Dupea has become. --Dave McCoy

Pump up the Volume

In the suburban hinterlands of Arizona, pirate-radio DJ Hard Harry wages a one-man war against boredom from his bedroom transmitter by night. In between great Lenny Bruce-style stream-of-consciousness rants, Harry attacks the airwaves with the likes of the Descendents, Bad Brains, and Concrete Blonde, as well as occasionally kickin' it old school with some early hip-hop. By day, though, Hard Harry is Mark Hunter, a painfully shy new kid who's anonymous to the point of being invisible at Hubert Humphrey High School. Completely misunderstood by his '60s-era parents, Mark is desperate to keep his radio alter ego separate from his day-to-day persona, especially as his radio shows draw more attention from the authorities. Fellow misfit Nora (Samantha Mathis, in her first feature role) eventually discovers Hard Harry's true identity, much to Mark's chagrin, and the two of them become torchbearers against the stifling status quo of the town as they dodge the police, the school administration, and the FCC. There are familiar high school authority archetypes (the assistant principal with clip-on tie, lemon-yellow K-Mart short-sleeved dress shirt, military flattop, and bulky key ring) and a rather strained subplot of a corrupt school administration. Mainly, though, this is a rousing teen call-to-arms that showcases Slater's talents as he developed the cynical, sarcastic neo-Jack Nicholson delivery that would become his trademark. He's at his best during his radio monologues (making them truly seem ad-libbed), and his influences become clear as he checks out a copy of How to Talk Dirty and Influence People from the library. --Jerry Renshaw

A shy teen turns on the high school crowd when he broadcasts outrageous nightly monologues on a pirate radio station. Starring Christian Slater and Samantha Mathis.

Rebel Without a Cause (Two-Disc Special Edition)

When people think of James Dean, they probably think first of the troubled teen from Rebel Without a Cause: nervous, volatile, soulful, a kid lost in a world that does not understand him. Made between his only other starring roles, in East of Eden and Giant, Rebel sums up the jangly, alienated image of Dean, but also happens to be one of the key films of the 1950s. Director Nicholas Ray takes a strikingly sympathetic look at the teenagers standing outside the white-picket-fence '50s dream of America: juvenile delinquent (that's what they called them then) Jim Stark (Dean), fast girl Judy (Natalie Wood), lost boy Plato (Sal Mineo), slick hot-rodder Buzz (Corey Allen). At the time, it was unusual for a movie to endorse the point of view of teenagers, but Ray and screenwriter Stewart Stern captured the youthful angst that was erupting at the same time in rock & roll. Dean is heartbreaking, following the method acting style of Marlon Brando but staking out a nakedly emotional honesty of his own. Going too fast, in every way, he was killed in a car crash on September 30, 1955, a month before Rebel opened. He was no longer an actor, but an icon, and Rebel is a lasting monument. --Robert Horton

In one of the most influential performances in movie history, James Dean plays the new kid in town whose loneliness, frustration and anger mirrored those of postwar teens - and still reverberate 50 years later. Natalie Wood and Sal Mineo were Academy Award nominees* for their achingly true performances. Director Nicholas Ray was also an Oscar nominee for this landmark chosen as one of the all-time Top 100 American Film by the American Film Institute.

Over the Edge

"Tomorrow's city...today" is how the planned suburban paradise of New Granada promotes itself but something has been left out of the plans. No one is paying attention to the town's teens. Jonathan Kaplan directs this hot-blooded cult classic (a 1979 London Film Festival Outstanding Film Award winner) about kids left to discover their own values and coming up with enough drugs booze and discontent to push everyone Over the Edge. Fourteen-year-old Matt Dillon makes his screen debut as the kids' charismatic doomed leader Richie. The anthemic soundtrack by Van Halen The Ramones Cheap Trick and others provide the film's rock-n-roll heart.Running Time: 95 min.System Requirements:Running Time 95 MinFormat: DVD MOVIE Genre: DRAMA Rating: PG UPC: 085393892920

Return to the pre-Internet days of 1979, when teens had KISS on their T-shirts and Led Zeppelin on their walls (wait, other than the high-waisted pants, that could be today). Richie (Matt Dillon in an electrifying debut) and Carl (Michael Kramer) are two such teens stuck in the planned community of New Granada (rural Colorado). Richie is a two-bit hood in Jackie Earle Haley (Bad News Bears) mode. Carl, his partner in mischief (breaking curfew, setting off firecrackers), comes from a more stable environment. Once a gun enters the picture, petty crime leads to tragedy and then apocalyptic revenge. Over the Edge gets the details right: the kids, the era, and their frustration with an uncomprehending adult world. At times, it almost feels like documentary, except for a few moments of high Kubrick-meets-Walter Hill drama, as when Carl gets jumped by a couple of hoods, including Vincent Spano (Baby It's You). Directed by Jonathan Kaplan (The Accused) and shot by Andrew Davis (The Fugitive), Over the Edge was unavailable for too long and deserves to find the same audience as other teen rebellion classics like co-writer Tim Hunter's River's Edge. The period-perfect soundtrack ups the ante with potent tracks from Cheap Trick, the Ramones, and the Cars. --Kathleen C. Fennessy