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Military/War DVDs

300 (Two-Disc Special Edition)

Sales Rank:569
List Price: $26.98
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MPAA Rating: R (Restricted)

Format:

AC-3
Closed-captioned
Color
Dolby
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DVD-Video
Special Edition
Subtitled
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Director(s):

Actor(s):

Gerard Butler
Lena Headey
David Wenham
Dominic West
Vincent Regan

Like Sin City before it, 300 brings Frank Miller and Lynn Varley's graphic novel vividly to life. Gerard Butler (Beowulf and Grendel, The Phantom of the Opera) radiates pure power and charisma as Leonidas, the Grecian king who leads 300 of his fellow Spartans (including David Wenham of The Lord of the Rings, Michael Fassbender, and Andrew Pleavin) into a battle against the overwhelming force of Persian invaders. Their only hope is to neutralize the numerical advantage by confronting the Persians, led by King Xerxes (Rodrigo Santoro), at the narrow strait of Thermopylae.

More engaging than Troy, the tepid and somewhat similar epic of ancient Greece, 300 is also comparable to Sin City in that the actors were shot on green screen, then added to digitally created backgrounds. The effort pays off in a strikingly stylized look and huge, sweeping battle scenes. However, it's not as to-the-letter faithful to Miller's source material as Sin City was. The plot is the same, and many of the book's images are represented just about perfectly. But some extra material has been added, including new villains (who would be considered "bosses" if this were a video game, and it often feels like one) and a political subplot involving new characters and a significantly expanded role for the Queen of Sparta (Lena Headey). While this subplot by director Zack Snyder (Dawn of the Dead) and his fellow co-writers does break up the violence, most fans would probably dismiss it as filler if it didn't involve the sexy Headey. Other viewers, of course, will be turned off by the waves of spurting blood, flying body parts, and surging testosterone. (The six-pack abs are also relentless, and the movie has more and less nudity--more female, less male--than the graphic novel.) Still, as a representation of Miller's work and as an ancient-themed action flick with a modern edge, 300 delivers. --David Horiuchi

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Molly - An American Girl on the Home Front

Sales Rank:333
List Price: $19.98
Lowest New Price: $5.99
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MPAA Rating: NR (Not Rated)

Format:

AC-3
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Color
Dolby
DVD-Video
Subtitled
NTSC

Director(s):

Actor(s):

Alex Steele
Josette Halpert
Jason Spevack
Sarah Manninen
Samantha Somer Wilson

Molly, a spunky heroine in the wildly popular American Girl series of books and characters, is a typical tween living in an atypical time: 1943, the height of World War II. In An American Girl on the Home Front, Molly and her friends are dimly aware of the war and the occasional hardship it can mean, but Molly (played with grace and bravado by Maya Ritter), like most kids, really hasn't had occasion to pay attention ("She just doesn't understand rations, Mom," her sister snipes). This film follows Molly as the war begins to hit home; her father is shipped overseas and her mom (a delightful Molly Ringwald) becomes a temporary Rosie the Riveter. Molly bravely rolls with the punches, yet her life is still leavened with fun, like learning to tap dance for the local Miss Victory competition. Then a young refugee from England, Emily (Tory Green), comes to stay, and Molly's, and young viewers', consciousness is raised. As always with American Girl heroines, Molly is a great role model with strong values, but never a goody-two-shoes. The period touches, including clothes, movie-reels, and background music, are well done too. Extras include a compelling documentary, Uncle Sam Wants You... to Tap Dance, featuring an interview with Mitzy Scott, an 88-year-old former USO dancer and hostess, relaying her personal history of dancing at home and with soldiers on leave, making something personal and dear to her--dance--into the ultimate patriotic act. --A.T. Hurley

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To Kill a Mockingbird (Collector's Edition)

Sales Rank:516
List Price: $19.98
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MPAA Rating: NR (Not Rated)

Format:

Black & White
Closed-captioned
Collector's Edition
Dolby
Widescreen
NTSC

Director(s):

Actor(s):

Gregory Peck
John Megna
Frank Overton
Rosemary Murphy
Ruth White

Ranked 34 on the American Film Institute's list of the 100 Greatest American Films, To Kill a Mockingbird is quite simply one of the finest family-oriented dramas ever made. A beautiful and deeply affecting adaptation of the Pulitzer Prize-winning novel by Harper Lee, the film retains a timeless quality that transcends its historically dated subject matter (racism in the Depression-era South) and remains powerfully resonant in present-day America with its advocacy of tolerance, justice, integrity, and loving, responsible parenthood. It's tempting to call this an important "message" movie that should be required viewing for children and adults alike, but this riveting courtroom drama is anything but stodgy or pedantic. As Atticus Finch, the small-town Alabama lawyer and widower father of two, Gregory Peck gives one of his finest performances with his impassioned defense of a black man (Brock Peters) wrongfully accused of the rape and assault of a young white woman. While his children, Scout (Mary Badham) and Jem (Philip Alford), learn the realities of racial prejudice and irrational hatred, they also learn to overcome their fear of the unknown as personified by their mysterious, mostly unseen neighbor Boo Radley (Robert Duvall, in his brilliant, almost completely nonverbal screen debut). What emerges from this evocative, exquisitely filmed drama is a pure distillation of the themes of Harper Lee's enduring novel, a showcase for some of the finest American acting ever assembled in one film, and a rare quality of humanitarian artistry (including Horton Foote's splendid screenplay and Elmer Bernstein's outstanding score) that seems all but lost in the chaotic morass of modern cinema. --Jeff Shannon

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Sergeant York (Two-Disc Special Edition)

Sales Rank:544
List Price: $26.98
Lowest New Price: $10.99
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MPAA Rating: NR (Not Rated)

Format:

Black & White
Closed-captioned
Dubbed
DVD-Video
Original recording remastered
Subtitled
NTSC

Director(s):

Actor(s):

Gary Cooper
Walter Brennan
Joan Leslie
George Tobias
Stanley Ridges

Gary Cooper plays Alvin York, the real-life country lad and sharpshooter drafted to fight during World War I but blocked from killing by his pacifist sentiments. Howard Hawks makes a rousing, heroic film out of the tale, and Cooper gives one of his best performances (for which he won an Oscar). The 1941 feature seems as much a valentine to wartime America (and a not-so-subtle piece of propaganda) as anything, with Hawks capturing splendidly shot scenes of life in York's home state of Tennessee, which in turn provide a striking contrast to the battlefield. A key scene in the film, in which York is presented with an argument in favor of killing in war, is still thought provoking. --Tom Keogh

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Patton [Blu-ray]

Sales Rank:1013
List Price: $34.98
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MPAA Rating: PG (Parental Guidance Suggested)

Format:

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Director(s):

Actor(s):

Peter Barkworth
John Barrie
Michael Bates
David Bauer
Edward Binns

One of the greatest screen biographies ever produced, this monumental film runs nearly three hours, won seven Academy Awards, and gave George C. Scott the greatest role of his career. It was released in 1970 when protest against the Vietnam War still raged at home and abroad, and many critics and moviegoers struggled to reconcile current events with the movie's glorification of Gen. George S. Patton as a crazy-brave genius of World War II.

How could a movie so huge in scope and so fascinated by its subject be considered an anti-war film? The simple truth is that it's not--Patton is less about World War II than about the rise and fall of a man whose life was literally defined by war, and who felt lost and lonely without the grand-scale pursuit of an enemy. George C. Scott embodies his role so fully, so convincingly, that we can't help but be drawn to and fascinated by Patton as a man who is simultaneously bound for hell and glory. The film's opening monologue alone is a masterful display of acting and character analysis, and everything that follows is sheer brilliance on the part of Scott and director Franklin J. Schaffner.

Filmed on an epic scale at literally dozens of European locations, Patton does not embrace war as a noble pursuit, nor does it deny the reality of war as a breeding ground for heroes. Through the awesome achievement of Scott's performance and the film's grand ambition, Patton shows all the complexities of a man who accepted his role in life and (like Scott) played it to the hilt. --Jeff Shannon

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Saving Private Ryan (Special Limited Edition)

Sales Rank:600
List Price: $14.99
Lowest New Price: $7.47
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MPAA Rating: R (Restricted)

Format:

AC-3
Anamorphic
Closed-captioned
Color
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DVD-Video
Limited Edition
Special Edition
Widescreen
NTSC

Director(s):

Actor(s):

Tom Hanks
Matt Damon
Tom Sizemore
Edward Burns
Barry Pepper

When Steven Spielberg was an adolescent, his first home movie was a backyard war film. When he toured Europe with Duel in his 20s, he saw old men crumble in front of headstones at Omaha Beach. That image became the opening scene of Saving Private Ryan, his film of a mission following the D-day invasion that many have called the most realistic--and maybe the best--war film ever. With 1998 production standards, Spielberg has been able to create a stunning, unparalleled view of war as hell. We are at Omaha Beach as troops are slaughtered by Germans yet overcome the almost insurmountable odds.

A stalwart Tom Hanks plays Captain Miller, a soldier's soldier, who takes a small band of troops behind enemy lines to retrieve a private whose three brothers have recently been killed in action. It's a public relations move for the Army, but it has historical precedent dating back to the Civil War. Some critics of the film have labeled the central characters stereotypes. If that is so, this movie gives stereotypes a good name: Tom Sizemore as the deft sergeant, Edward Burns as the hotheaded Private Reiben, Barry Pepper as the religious sniper, Adam Goldberg as the lone Jew, Vin Diesel as the oversize Private Caparzo, Giovanni Ribisi as the soulful medic, and Jeremy Davies, who as a meek corporal gives the film its most memorable performance.

The movie is as heavy and realistic as Spielberg's Oscar-winning Schindler's List, but it's more kinetic. Spielberg and his ace technicians (the film won five Oscars: editing (Michael Kahn), cinematography (Janusz Kaminski), sound, sound effects, and directing) deliver battle sequences that wash over the eyes and hit the gut. The violence is extreme but never gratuitous. The final battle, a dizzying display of gusto, empathy, and chaos, leads to a profound repose. Saving Private Ryan touches us deeper than Schindler because it succinctly links the past with how we should feel today. It's the film Spielberg was destined to make. --Doug Thomas

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The Civil War - A Film by Ken Burns

Sales Rank:906
List Price: $129.99
Lowest New Price: $69.71
Lowest Used Price: $77.65
MPAA Rating: NR (Not Rated)

Format:

Box set
Color
DVD-Video
NTSC

Director(s):

Actor(s):

The most successful public-television miniseries in American history, the 11-hour Civil War didn't just captivate a nation, reteaching to us our history in narrative terms; it actually also invented a new film language taken from its creator. When people describe documentaries using the "Ken Burns approach," its style is understood: voice-over narrators reading letters and documents dramatically and stating the writer's name at their conclusion, fresh live footage of places juxtaposed with still images (photographs, paintings, maps, prints), anecdotal interviews, and romantic musical scores taken from the era he depicts. The Civil War uses all of these devices to evoke atmosphere and resurrect an event that many knew only from stale history books. While Burns is a historian, a researcher, and a documentarian, he's above all a gifted storyteller, and it's his narrative powers that give this chronicle its beauty, overwhelming emotion, and devastating horror. Using the words of old letters, eloquently read by a variety of celebrities, the stories of historians like Shelby Foote and rare, stained photos, Burns allows us not only to relearn and finally understand our history, but also to feel and experience it. --Dave McCoy

On the DVD
The DVD features on The Civil War provide a wealth of insight, creative philosophy, historical perspective, and educational enjoyment. Twelve years after its premiere broadcast, the film was given a digital facelift, sharpening image clarity, correcting color, and enriching its soundtrack with a remastered 5.1-channel mix, as demonstrated in the "Civil War Reconstruction" featurette. In interviews from 2002, producer-director Ken Burns, historian Shelby Foote, journalist George Will, author Stanley Crouch, and composer-musicians Jay Ungar and Molly Mason reflect upon The Civil War's enduring significance. And Burns's eloquent commentary--selectively included on each disc and totaling five hours--illuminates the historical importance and creative impulse behind crucial chapters of the film. Fifty-seven onscreen biography cards detail important North, South, and civilian figures, and two 1990 featurettes—"Making History" and "A Conversation with Ken Burns"--provide a more personal perspective on the creation of this extraordinary film. Useful for both personal and academic study, these features stand as a fitting supplement to one of the greatest documentaries ever produced. --Jeff Shannon

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Black Hawk Down [Blu-ray]

Sales Rank:848
List Price: $28.95
Lowest New Price: $13.99
Lowest Used Price: $13.84
MPAA Rating: R (Restricted)

Format:

Anamorphic
Color
Dolby
Subtitled
Widescreen

Director(s):

Actor(s):

Josh Hartnett
Ewan McGregor
Tom Sizemore
Eric Bana
William Fichtner

Ridley Scott's Black Hawk Down conveys the raw, chaotic urgency of ground-force battle in a worst-case scenario. With exacting detail, the film re-creates the American siege of the Somalian city of Mogadishu in October 1993, when a 45-minute mission turned into a 16-hour ordeal of bloody urban warfare. Helicopter-borne U.S. Rangers were assigned to capture key lieutenants of Somali warlord Muhammad Farrah Aidid, but when two Black Hawk choppers were felled by rocket-propelled grenades, the U.S. soldiers were forced to fend for themselves in the battle-torn streets of Mogadishu, attacked from all sides by armed Aidid supporters. Based on author Mark Bowden's bestselling account of the battle, Scott's riveting, action-packed film follows a sharp ensemble cast in some of the most authentic battle sequences ever filmed. The loss of 18 soldiers turned American opinion against further involvement in Somalia, but Black Hawk Down makes it clear that the men involved were undeniably heroic. --Jeff Shannon

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Casablanca (Two-Disc Special Edition)

Sales Rank:631
List Price: $26.98
Lowest New Price: $8.45
Lowest Used Price: $7.71
MPAA Rating: G (General Audience)

Format:

Black & White
Closed-captioned
DVD-Video
Special Edition
Subtitled
NTSC

Director(s):

Actor(s):

Humphrey Bogart
Ingrid Bergman
Paul Henreid

A truly perfect movie, the 1942 Casablanca still wows viewers today, and for good reason. Its unique story of a love triangle set against terribly high stakes in the war against a monster is sophisticated instead of outlandish, intriguing instead of garish. Humphrey Bogart plays the allegedly apolitical club owner in unoccupied French territory that is nevertheless crawling with Nazis; Ingrid Bergman is the lover who mysteriously deserted him in Paris; and Paul Heinreid is her heroic, slightly bewildered husband. Claude Rains, Sydney Greenstreet, Peter Lorre, and Conrad Veidt are among what may be the best supporting cast in the history of Hollywood films. This is certainly among the most spirited and ennobling movies ever made. --Tom Keogh

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Rescue Dawn

Sales Rank:2091
List Price: $19.98
Lowest New Price: $7.17
Lowest Used Price: $0.55
MPAA Rating: PG-13 (Parental Guidance Suggested)

Format:

AC-3
Closed-captioned
Color
Dolby
Dubbed
DVD-Video
Subtitled
Widescreen
NTSC

Director(s):

Actor(s):

Christian Bale
Steve Zahn
Jeremy Davies

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