Film releases on DVD
Doug Jones as the Silver Surfer
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Penguin, November 1st, Hardback £10. |  |
Thursday, 04, Oct 2007 05:40
We glance over this week's film releases on DVD, including Fantastic Four 2, Flyboys and Paradise Lost.
Ioan Gruffudd and co get back in the spandex this week with the release of Fantastic Four 2: Rise of the Silver Surfer.
After defeating Julian McMahon's hilariously camp Dr Doom in the first installment, the four learn they aren't the only superheroes around when the planet-eating Galactus unleashes his gnarly henchman the Silver Surfer (voiced by Laurence Fishburne, with Doug Jones doing the character's green screen work).
Expect wise-cracking from Johnny Storm (Chris Evans), manly emoting from Ben Grimm/the Thing (Michael Chiklis) and Reed Richards (Gruffudd) being all sensible while Sue Storm (Jessica Alba).. well, she pouts a bit.
Flyboys tells the story of a little-known period of military history, as James Franco and Martin Henderson star as members of the Lafayette Escadrille.
These young Americans enlisted for the French military before the US entered the first world war and in doing so became the US' first fighter pilots.
It delivers everything you'd want from a war epic: thrilling aerial combat, a mysterious villain known only as the Black Falcon and a budding romance between a cocky Yank and a pretty local girl.
And, as it was shot with Panavision's state-of-the-art Genesis digital cameras, it looks beautiful, no matter how cliched it might be.
Previously known as Turistas, before the studio execs decided to go for the high-brow angle, rather than releasing a movie that sounds like a porno, Paradise Lost sees a group of ethnically-diverse young tourists seeking excitement in the Brazilian mountains.
Oh, how naive they are. After their bus crashes, the group (including Transformers star Josh Duhamel and ex-Home and Away cast member Melissa George) find themselves in the middle of a foreign nightmare.
Despite its pretty cast, there's enough brutal torture to satisfy the sickest of horror porn fans and with some thrilling chase scenes and ambitious - if ultimately misfiring - political subtext, it's a cut above most of the genre.
Also released this week is Hong Kong gangster movie Election 2, with the Triad violence turned up to 11 since the first film.
Current Triad chairman Lok (Simon Yam) faces competition from his godsons, while business ties with mainland China are strengthened.
And finally, fans of brilliantly ironic action can't miss The Librarian: Return to King Solomon's Mines as unlikely hero Flynn Carsen (Noah Wyle - that's right, him out of ER!) has the world's fate in his hands again.
Directed by Jonathan Frakes of Star Trek: The Next Generation fame, it's a wonderfully childish, superbly entertaining adventure.