The Devi's In The Details From Image Entertainment, Mar. 12

Image Entertainment has tabbed Mar. 12 as the DVD and Blu-ray debut date for Waymon Boone’s — the former lead singer of the rock group Splender — border drug war thriller, The Devil’s in the Details.   

With numerous music videos and a pair of award-winning short films (Daddy’s Little Girl and The Conversation) under his belt, Boone makes the move to feature films as both the director and writer on this project. 

Inspired by an actual news story, plus Boone’s own choreographed ideas for a barroom sequence/encounter that is central to the intricate twists and turns that follow, we are introduced to Iraq War veteran Tom Conrad (Joel Mathews — Bloodline).  He is trying to integrate back into the civilian world, complete with wife and child, but is having a tough go of it.

A seemingly innocent encounter at a local watering hole with an affable stranger (played with a wickedly sadistic approach by Emilio Rivera — as Marcus in the Sons of Anarchy television series, plus such films as Act of Valor, Con Air, Collateral, etc.) turns into a kidnapping and brutal torture at the hands of his new “friend,” who is actually the enforcer for a ruthless drug cartel.  

His unique combat skills are what they are after … he will bend to their will; to their needs.   Failure to help them with their drug smuggling schemes and his family will be murdered and he will simply disappear.   Not much of a choice there!

In a clever twist, it turns out that Conrad’s only hope of survival rests in the hands of his therapist, Dr. Bruce Michaels (Ray Liotta), a former Navy SEAL.  

With news headlines filled with stories of brutal drug-related murders in Mexico — beheadings, torture and the like — Boone’s first venture into the feature film arena with The Devil’s in the Details rings true.  He has assembled a solid cast, mixed in a clever script and the result is an immensely-watchable action flick that Image Entertainment will have no trouble spinning into gold during Q1’13.

To download this week's complete edition of the DVD and Blu-ray Release Report:  DVD & Blu-ray Release Report

Wolfe Video's A Perfect Ending Debuts On Feb. 5

Rebecca (Barbara Niven — Home Invasion, Summer’s Blood, Pacific Palisades, etc.) is a trophy wife.   You know the type.  The haughty, aging beauties nursing a glass a wine in an upscale restaurant … the ones engaged in casual conversations with their cardboard friends.  It’s all for show.

That’s Rebecca.  A loveless marriage, three grown — soon-to-be detached kids — and emotional walls that have been built carefully over the years as defensive measures to deny her own mistakes.  The end game will come soon, she knows it … affairs, divorce and years of being alone; her beauty gone.

That’s the set up for writer/director Nicole Conn’s A Perfect Ending, which will be making its DVD debut courtesy of Wolfe Video on Feb. 5.

Her husband (played perfectly by John Heard) is a bastard, no two ways about it.  We are not talking about a nice guy with problems on his plate that has allowed them to grow apart.  He’s an ass.  He plays the game and she’s just window dressing.  Intimacy, sex and love … those are just concepts; illusions. 

So when half jokingly one of her equally bored friends says, “I seriously think you should consider taking a lover,” it leads to some very unexpected changes in her life.  With a man, well that would be cheating, that could create problems, but with another woman, how is that really cheating?   

Jessica Clark and Barbara Niven in A Perfect Ending

A second cousin of a friend; a professional with a unique service (played by Morgan Fairchild is a funny turn) has just the perfect companion for a bored — fully vetted — housewife.   But her handpicked escort pulls in a favor (not into a middle-age woman without experience in such things) and throws in a wringer, a much younger woman for the afternoon encounter in the luxury hotel suite.

In a beautifully played sequence, the older Rebecca, fully coiffed for what could be a business meeting, suddenly gets cold feet and is ready to bolt when the exotic Paris (Jessica Clark — as Lilith in the True Blood cable series; Chantal in the Chemistry series) arrives.  It is awkward … it is therapy with a twist.

The relationship — after a few rough patches — grows and Rebecca warms; comes out of her funk.  The children notice the change … something is up with mom.   Passion in her life, but where will it lead?  In there a new end game … or, as filmmaker Nicole Conn (Elena Undone, Little Man, Claire of the Moon) has so aptly titled her film, A Perfect Ending?

Bonus extras include a behind-the-scenes featurette and a photo gallery.

To download this week's complete edition of the DVD and Blu-ray Release Report:  DVD & Blu-ray Release Report

The Eyes Of Thailand From FilmWorks Entertainment, Feb. 26

You’ve probably seen the Hollywood-produced film about humans helping animals, Dolphin Tale, starring Harry Connick, Jr., Morgan Freeman and Ashley Judd.  It was heartwarming, uplifting and based on an actual story … it did well at the box office and everyone came away from the experience feeling better about themselves.

The actors were players in a movie; they did a great job … and moved on.   Except one of them, that would be Ashley Judd, who actually uses her celebrity in support of causes related to animals that she truly believes in … which leads us to the Feb. 26 DVD release announcement this week from FilmWorks Entertainment, The Eyes of Thailand.

Narrated by Judd, this award-winning documentary from filmmaker Windy Borman is an intimate — and tear-inducing — look at the horrors experienced by elephants in Thailand who have been maimed by landmines (plus knife and gunshot wounds … broken bones, etc.) and the heroic efforts of Soraida Salwala and her Asian Elephant Hospital to nurse these noble animals back to health.

Since 1993, Salwala, her dedicated staff and The Friends of Asian Elephants (FAE) have provided treatment to over 3,000 elephants — they have become their voice; their saviors.   

The film zeroes in on two specific cases — Motala, one of Salawala’s most difficult (and rewarding) challenges (losing a leg in 1999), and the young Mosha (a seven-month old baby) — both victims of landmines.

Soraida Salwala and Motala in The Eyes of Thailand

We hear of their stories, we follow Salwala’s efforts to create elephant-sized prosthetics — a difficult challenge, since she must start from scratch and learn from trial and error — and in the process filmmaker Windy Borman is able to transcend the nuts and bolts of the operation and imbue her film with a spirit of love, kindness and hope.  Film festivals and special screenings have all yielded the same results: Rave reviews and not a dry eye in the house.

Salwala, who suffers from health issues of her own, perhaps say it best when she hopes that the day will come when she has “ … an elephant hospital without any patients.”

Bonus goodies on the DVD release of The Eyes of Thailand include bonus footage, extended interviews and a photo gallery.

To download this week's complete edition of the DVD and Blu-ray Release Report:  DVD & Blu-ray Release Report

Green Apple Entertainment's Sins Arrives On Feb. 26

On Feb. 26, Green Apple Entertainment will be teaming up familiar faces in Italian filmmaker Carlo Fusco’s blood-soaked gangland thriller, Sins.  

Two men meet on a train (filming locations in Italy), one a priest named Father Leonardo (Danny Glover) and the other, David, a blind man (played by Giovanni Martorana).  They talk and it would seem at first glance that they have little in common, but looks can be deceiving.

As the train races through the Italian countryside they share their stories and discover — through a series of flashbacks — that each man comes from an extremely violent past.  Both have blood on their hands.    

David, a member of a Sicilian crime family, is on the run from Don Mancino (an extremely violent portrayal by Michael Madsen … a “reservoir dog” unleashed, so to speak) and the kindly priest is actually the killer of a New York mobster known simply as Williams (Steven Bauer) … a mysterious woman (Anne Jeffreys), with connections to Father Leonardo sits nearby.

Giovanni Martorana and Danny Glover in a scene from Sins

A world of violence, betrayal and murder — shared by these two travelers — would seem to be on a collision course, with the journey’s end … perhaps their own.

Sins is highly reminiscent of those uber-violent gangster flicks that followed in the wake of The Godfather — The Don is Dead, The Valachi Papers and The Stone Killer to name just a few.   Green Apple Entertainment should have some “fun” with this one.

To download this week's complete edition of the DVD and Blu-ray Release Report:  DVD & Blu-ray Release Report

Sinister From Lionsgate Home Entertainment, Feb. 19

Lionsgate Home Entertainment will bring the Summit Entertainment film production of Sinister — teaming Ethan Hawke with Juliet Rylance and co-starring Clare Foley as their lovely, ever-so-sweet daughter — to market on Feb. 19 as DVD and Blu-ray product offerings … complete with UltraViolet.

The ARR comes in at 130 days and the domestic box office gross currently stands at $47.8 million.

This smart “horror mystery” from writer/director Scott Derrickson (The Day the Earth Stood Still, The Exorcism of Emily Rose) arrives on both Blu-ray and DVD with two commentary options — one with Derrickson going solo and the second teaming him with co-writer C. Robert Cargill — deleted scenes (with optional commentary from Derrickson) and a pair of featurettes — “Living in a House of Death” and “True Crime Authors.”

To download this week's complete edition of the DVD and Blu-ray Release Report:  DVD & Blu-ray Release Report

Cinema Libre's May I Be Frank On Feb. 12

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In a society that glorifies instant gratification and the easy cure for what ails you it is refreshing to take notice of — as Robert Frost so succinctly put it — those who choose to take the “one less traveled” in getting their life out of the morass of despair and back into the daylight.

Such is the story that newly-minted documentary filmmakers Cary Mosier, Ryland Engelhart and Conor Gaffney — with hands-on guidance from veteran Gregg Marks — tell in their film, May I Be Frank.   Cinema Libre has tabbed Feb. 12 as the DVD release date.   

 

Imagine that you’re a 54-year old, 290-pound schlub of a man, living a miserable life — too much booze — suffering from Hep C and other maladies of the body and spirit, who happens to wander into a Vegan restaurant.  

That sounds like the set-up for a joke, you know the kind: “A duck walks into a bar,” but in this case it is the Café Gratitude in San Francisco and it is probably the last place on earth for Frank Ferrante to be ... much less a duck.

Better a pill for this, a pill for that, some fast food and a drink or two … that would be more his style, not some yuppie bistro with veggies on the menu.

But surprise, Frank likes the place.  People are nice.  The food, ahhhh, that might take some getting use to.   But, this is where it gets good, because May I Be Frank isn’t one of those Hollywood feel-good movies, it’s a real story about a real human being — one with lots of flaws.   

Ryland Engelhart, one of the Café Gratitude servers, hits upon the simple proposal of making Frank Ferrante the subject of a month-and-half long life-changing experiment.  Eat healthy, they will film it, cheer him along and see what happens.  Frank can always go back to a pill for this … a pill for that.  

The trio of young filmmakers coach him, help him through the tough spots (it’s not easy breaking life-long habits) and take Frank to a new place, both physically and emotionally.   They have the film to prove it.  

Enter Gregg Marks, who, as the story goes, took a look at their raw footage, shot connecting sequences and edited it into the final, award-winning documentary.  May I Be Frank, might just be of the best films for your heart come this Valentine’s Day … Cinema Libre’s Feb. 12 release date is spot-on for just such a thing to happen!

To download this week's complete edition of the DVD and Blu-ray Release Report:  DVD & Blu-ray Release Report