Dark City (Director's Cut)

• Condition: New
• Format: DVD
• Color; Director's Cut; DVD; Widescreen; NTSC

Exciting stars Jennifer Jason Leigh (DOLORES CLAIBORNE), Jude Law (GATTACA), and Willem Dafoe (SPEED 2, AFFLICTION) challenge the boundaries of reality in this futuristic, critically acclaimed adventure thriller! During the first closed-door demonstration of an amazing new virtual reality game called eXistenZ, the system's brilliant designer, Allegra Geller (Leigh), is violently attacked by a crazed assassin intent on killing her and destroying her creation! Forced to flee into hiding, Allegra enlists a young assistant (Law) to help her in testing the damaged system ... by convincing him to join her inside eXistenZ! The action then explodes as their world's real-life dangers begin to merge with the fantasy of the game! If you're ready to play, it's now your turn to plug into this powerfully entertaining hi! t!Director David Cronenberg's eXistenZ is a stew of corporate espionage, virtual reality gaming, and thriller elements, marinated in Cronenberg's favorite Crock-Pot juices of technology, physiology, and sexual metaphor. Jennifer Jason Leigh is game designer Allegra Geller, responsible for the new state-of-the-art eXistenZ game system; along with PR newbie Ted Pikul (Jude Law), they take the beta version of the game for a test drive and are immersed in a dangerous alternate reality. The game isn't quite like PlayStation, though; it's a latexy pod made from the guts of mutant amphibians and plugs via an umbilical cord directly into the user's spinal column (through a BioPort). It powers up through the player's own nervous system and taps into the subconscious; with several players it networks their brains together. Geller and Pikul's adventures in the game reality uncover more espionage and an antigaming, proreality insurrection. The game world makes it increasingly di! fficult to discern between reality and the game, either throug! h the ga me's perspective or the human's. More accessible than Crash, eXistenZ is a complicated sci-fi opus, often confusing, and with an ending that leaves itself wide open for a sequel. Fans of Cronenberg's work will recognize his recurring themes and will eat this up. Others will find its shallow characterizations and near-incomprehensible plot twists a little tedious. --Jerry RenshawExciting stars Jennifer Jason Leigh (The Machinist), Jude Law (Repo Men), Willem Dafoe (Daybreakers) Ian Holm (The Aviator) and Sarah Polley (Splice) challenge the boundaries of reality in this futuristic, critically-acclaimed thriller.

During the first closed-door demonstration of an amazing new virtual reality game called eXistenZ, the system's brilliant designer, Allegra Geller (Leigh), is violently attacked by a crazed assassin intent on killing her and destroying her creation. Forced into hiding, ! Allegra enlists a young assistant (Law) to help her in testing the damaged system...by convincing him to join her inside eXistenZ. The action explodes as their world's real-life dangers begin to merge with the fantasy of the game.Director David Cronenberg's eXistenZ is a stew of corporate espionage, virtual reality gaming, and thriller elements, marinated in Cronenberg's favorite Crock-Pot juices of technology, physiology, and sexual metaphor. Jennifer Jason Leigh is game designer Allegra Geller, responsible for the new state-of-the-art eXistenZ game system; along with PR newbie Ted Pikul (Jude Law), they take the beta version of the game for a test drive and are immersed in a dangerous alternate reality. The game isn't quite like PlayStation, though; it's a latexy pod made from the guts of mutant amphibians and plugs via an umbilical cord directly into the user's spinal column (through a BioPort). It powers up through the player's own nervous system and taps into th! e subconscious; with several players it networks their brains ! together . Geller and Pikul's adventures in the game reality uncover more espionage and an antigaming, proreality insurrection. The game world makes it increasingly difficult to discern between reality and the game, either through the game's perspective or the human's. More accessible than Crash, eXistenZ is a complicated sci-fi opus, often confusing, and with an ending that leaves itself wide open for a sequel. Fans of Cronenberg's work will recognize his recurring themes and will eat this up. Others will find its shallow characterizations and near-incomprehensible plot twists a little tedious. --Jerry Renshaw13TH FLOOR - DVD MovieComputer scientist Hannon Fuller (Armin Mueller-Stahl) finds something extremely important. Knowing that he's marked for assassination, he leaves a message in the virtual reality world he's designed, hoping it will be found by colleague Douglas Hall (Craig Bierko). Hall is a suspect in Fuller's murder and indeed finds a bloody shirt in! his house, with no recollection of what he did the night before. Hall plunges headlong into Fuller's world (a re-creation of 1937 Los Angeles) to try to unravel the slaying and is soon knee-deep in confusion and trouble. What this film lacks in character depth and plot cohesiveness it makes up for in special effects and high concept. Fans of films like Blade Runner, Dark City, eXistenZ, and even the game Sim City should find this appealing. Of course, there's the question of letting the computers do all the heavy lifting in films while the humans walk through the plot (an all-too-familiar scenario in 1999), but the re-creation of '30s Los Angeles is certainly something to see, pallid script and acting or not. The Thirteenth Floor is a stylish modern-day noir that raises questions about technology versus reality, all the while wrapped up in a murder-mystery story line. --Jerry Renshaw Director David Cronenberg's eXistenZ is a stew o! f corporate espionage, virtual reality gaming, and thriller el! ements, marinated in Cronenberg's favorite Crock-Pot juices of technology, physiology, and sexual metaphor. Jennifer Jason Leigh is game designer Allegra Geller, responsible for the new state-of-the-art eXistenZ game system; along with PR newbie Ted Pikul (Jude Law), they take the beta version of the game for a test drive and are immersed in a dangerous alternate reality. The game isn't quite like PlayStation, though; it's a latexy pod made from the guts of mutant amphibians and plugs via an umbilical cord directly into the user's spinal column (through a BioPort). It powers up through the player's own nervous system and taps into the subconscious; with several players it networks their brains together. Geller and Pikul's adventures in the game reality uncover more espionage and an antigaming, proreality insurrection. The game world makes it increasingly difficult to discern between reality and the game, either through the game's perspective or the human's. More accessible than C! rash, eXistenZ is a complicated sci-fi opus, often confusing, and with an ending that leaves itself wide open for a sequel. Fans of Cronenberg's work will recognize his recurring themes and will eat this up. Others will find its shallow characterizations and near-incomprehensible plot twists a little tedious. --Jerry RenshawDirector David Cronenberg's eXistenZ is a stew of corporate espionage, virtual reality gaming, and thriller elements, marinated in Cronenberg's favorite Crock-Pot juices of technology, physiology, and sexual metaphor. Jennifer Jason Leigh is game designer Allegra Geller, responsible for the new state-of-the-art eXistenZ game system; along with PR newbie Ted Pikul (Jude Law), they take the beta version of the game for a test drive and are immersed in a dangerous alternate reality. The game isn't quite like PlayStation, though; it's a latexy pod made from the guts of mutant amphibians and plugs via an umbilical cord directly into t! he user's spinal column (through a BioPort). It powers up thro! ugh the player's own nervous system and taps into the subconscious; with several players it networks their brains together. Geller and Pikul's adventures in the game reality uncover more espionage and an antigaming, proreality insurrection. The game world makes it increasingly difficult to discern between reality and the game, either through the game's perspective or the human's. More accessible than Crash, eXistenZ is a complicated sci-fi opus, often confusing, and with an ending that leaves itself wide open for a sequel. Fans of Cronenberg's work will recognize his recurring themes and will eat this up. Others will find its shallow characterizations and near-incomprehensible plot twists a little tedious. --Jerry RenshawVIDEODROME - DVD MovieLove it or loathe it, David Cronenberg's 1983 horror film Videodrome is a movie to be reckoned with. Inviting extremes of response from disdain (critic Roger Ebert called it "one of the least entertaining films ever ! made") to academic euphoria, it's the kind of film that is simultaneously sickening and seemingly devoid of humanity, but also blessed with provocative ideas and a compelling subtext of social commentary. Giving yet another powerful and disturbing performance, James Woods stars as the operator of a low-budget cable-TV station who accidentally intercepts a mysterious cable transmission that features the apparent torture and death of women in its programming. He traces the show to its source and discovers a mysterious plot to broadcast a subliminally influential signal into the homes of millions, masterminded by a quasi-religious character named Brian O'Blivion and his overly reverent daughter. Meanwhile Woods is falling under the spell, becoming a victim of video, and losing his grip--both physically and psychologically--on the distinction between reality and television. A potent treatise on the effects of total immersion into our mass-media culture, Videodrome is als! o (to the delight of Cronenberg's loyal fans) a showcase for o! bsession s manifested in the tangible world of the flesh. It's a hallucinogenic world in which a television set seems to breathe with a life of its own, and where the body itself can become a VCR repository for disturbing imagery. Featuring bizarre makeup effects by Rick Baker and a daring performance by Deborah Harry (of Blondie fame) as Wood's sadomasochistic girlfriend, Videodrome is pure Cronenberg--unsettling, intelligent, and decidedly not for every taste. --Jeff ShannonSpider has been allowed a second chance at life after a long stay in a mental institution and sent to a halfway house under the stern watch of Mrs. Ilkenson.

Revisiting his old neighborhood reawakens memories of where his mother and his father raised him. He soon begins to uncover the real truth shifting seamlessly back and forth between the tragic events that polarized a boy's adolescence to the shell of a man enduring the surreal plausible reality of today.Internal madness is hypnotically exte! rnalized in David Cronenberg's Spider, a disturbing portrait of schizophrenia. Adapted by Patrick McGrath from his celebrated novel, this no-frills production begins when "Spider" Cleg (Ralph Fiennes, in a daring, nearly nonverbal role) returns to his childhood neighborhood in London's dreary East End, where a traumatic event from his past percolates to the surface of his still-erratic consciousness. Released from a mental institution and left to fend for himself, he pursues elusive memories while staying in a halfway house run by a stern matron (Lynn Redgrave), unable to distinguish between past, present, and psychological fabrication. The distorting influence of Spider's mind is directly reflected in Cronenberg's cunning visual strategy, presenting a shifting "reality" that's deliberately untrustworthy, until the veracity of nearly every scene is called into question. With an impressive dual-role performance by Miranda Richardson, Spider falls p! rey to its own lugubrious rhythms, but like the acclaimed 1995! indie f ilm Clean, Shaven, it's a compelling glimpse of mental illness, seen from the inside out. --Jeff ShannonStudio: Image Entertainment Release Date: 11/11/2003 Run time: 115 minutesYou are now entering Interzone, William S. Burroughs's phantasmagorical land of junk, paranoia, and crawly things. Best travel advice: "Exterminate all rational thought." In David Cronenberg's superbly shot, unnerving warp on the Burroughs novel, the novelist himself becomes a main character (played in an implacable monotone by Peter Weller), with elements from Burroughs' life--including the shooting of his wife during a "William Tell" game, and bohemian friends Kerouac and Ginsberg--added to frame the book's wild visions. This is, ironically, a somewhat rational approach to an unfilmable book (and it makes a hair-curling double bill with Barton Fink, another look at writerly madness, with both films sharing Judy Davis). Cronenberg is a natural for oozing mugwumps and typewri! ters that turn into giant bugs, of course. But in the end, this is really his own vision of the artistic process, rather than Burroughs's hallucinatory descent into hell. --Robert HortonThe critically-acclaimed triumph from visionary director Alex Proyas (I, Robot, The Crow) is back with a brand new directors cut featuring enhanced picture and sound, never-before-seen footage and three commentary tracks that take you deeper than ever before into the world of one of sci-fis most exciting and revered tales. When John Murdoch (Rufus Sewell) wakes with no memory at the scene of a grisly murder, he soon finds himself hunted by the police, a woman claiming to be his wife and a mysterious group of pale men who seem to control everything and everyone in the city. Starring Rufus Sewell (The Illusionist), Jennifer Connelly (A Beautiful Mind), William Hurt (A History of Violence) and Kiefer Sutherland (TVs 24).If you're a fan of brooding comic-book antiheroes, got a nihilistic ! jolt from The Crow (1994), and share director Alex Pro! yas's hi ghly developed preoccupation for style over substance, you might be tempted to call Dark City an instant classic of visual imagination. It's one of those films that exists in a world purely of its own making, setting its own rules and playing by them fairly, so that even its derivative elements (and there are quite a few) acquire their own specific uniqueness. Before long, however, the film becomes interesting only as a triumph of production design. And while that's certainly enough to grab your attention (Blade Runner is considered a classic, after all), it's painfully clear that Dark City has precious little heart and soul. One-dimensional characters are no match for the film's abundance of retro-futuristic style, so it's best to admire the latter on its own splendidly cinematic terms. Trivia buffs will be interested to know that the film's 50-plus sets (partially inspired by German expressionism) were built at the Fox Film Studios in Sydney, ! Australia, home base of director Alex Proyas and producer Andrew Mason. The underground world depicted in the film required the largest indoor set ever built in Australia. --Jeff Shannon

TCM Greatest Classic Films Collection: Murder Mysteries (The Maltese Falcon / The Big Sleep / Dial M for Murder / The Postman Always Rings Twice 1946)

• THE MALTESE FALCON Some high-living lowlifes want to get their sweaty hands on a bejeweled falcon. Detective Sam Spade (Humphrey Bogart) wants to find out why and who ll take the fall for his pertner s murder. Sydney Greenstreet, Mary Astor, Peter Lorre and Elisha Cook Jr. co-star in a crackling masterwork directed and written for the screen by John Huston.THE BIG SLEEP (1946) L.A. private eye Phi

First, he was bugged by the almighty burger, now Oscar®-nominated renegade filmmaker Morgan Spurlock (Super Size Me) is biting the hand that feeds him by exposing Hollywood’s dirtiest little secret: the games they play to get advertisers’ products strategically placed in movies and on television. Spurlock uses his irreverent comedic style to infiltrate corporate boardrooms and ad agency pitch meetings to show how far they will go without our even knowing it! Since the advent of recording! devices and on-demand services, consumers have been bypassing commercials like never before, so advertising agencies have stepped up their use of product placement. In The Greatest Movie Ever Sold, Morgan Spurlock (Super Size Me) renders the process transparent as he documents his attempts to get Madison Avenue to fund his film. After a flood of rejections, he takes a series of meetings with companies willing to align their brand with his--and make no mistake, Spurlock is as much a brand as Donald Trump or Outkast's Big Boi, who show up to talk about product endorsement. The director's entertaining and enlightening journey even leads him to a juice purveyor that opens its wallet for placement above the title--hence the name of the pomegranate beverage which appears on all promotional materials. As one observer puts it, "You're selling out, but not selling out." For perspective, Spurlock solicits commentary from progressive thinkers, like Ralph Nader and Noam ! Chomsky, and Hollywood types, like J.J. Abrams, who created Lost, and Quentin Tarantino, who admits that a certain all-night diner rejected his offer to appear in Reservoir Dogs. Spurlock even travels to São Paulo to take a look at their ban on outdoor ads: no billboards or messages on cabs and buses, rendering the city clean and downright dull for those accustomed to American-style marketing. The film as a whole resembles a full-length version of a Mad Men pitch meeting--but funnier. --Kathleen C. FennessyFirst, he was bugged by the almighty burger, now Oscar®-nominated renegade filmmaker Morgan Spurlock (Super Size Me) is biting the hand that feeds him by exposing Hollywood’s dirtiest little secret: the games they play to get advertisers’ products strategically placed in movies and on television. Spurlock uses his irreverent comedic style to infiltrate corporate boardrooms and ad agency pitch meetings to show how far they will go without our even knowing it! Since the advent of recording devices and ! on-demand services, consumers have been bypassing commercials like never before, so advertising agencies have stepped up their use of product placement. In The Greatest Movie Ever Sold, Morgan Spurlock (Super Size Me) renders the process transparent as he documents his attempts to get Madison Avenue to fund his film. After a flood of rejections, he takes a series of meetings with companies willing to align their brand with his--and make no mistake, Spurlock is as much a brand as Donald Trump or Outkast's Big Boi, who show up to talk about product endorsement. The director's entertaining and enlightening journey even leads him to a juice purveyor that opens its wallet for placement above the title--hence the name of the pomegranate beverage which appears on all promotional materials. As one observer puts it, "You're selling out, but not selling out." For perspective, Spurlock solicits commentary from progressive thinkers, like Ralph Nader and Noam Chomsky, and ! Hollywood types, like J.J. Abrams, who created Lost, an! d Quenti n Tarantino, who admits that a certain all-night diner rejected his offer to appear in Reservoir Dogs. Spurlock even travels to São Paulo to take a look at their ban on outdoor ads: no billboards or messages on cabs and buses, rendering the city clean and downright dull for those accustomed to American-style marketing. The film as a whole resembles a full-length version of a Mad Men pitch meeting--but funnier. --Kathleen C. FennessyOscar nominated, boundary pushing director Morgan Spurlock's POM Wonderful Presents: The Greatest Movie Ever Sold that looks with humorous insight into the world of product placement and marketing. Providing the soundtrack to this insightful and humorous documentary are a wide array of artist, including two originals tracks recorded specifically for the soundtrack, a spoken word piece from director Morgan Spurlock and a track entitled "The Greatest Song I Ever Heard" by the band OK Go, who isn't shy about their associations ! with brands and product placement.

The fascinating tale of Kubrick’s unfilmed masterpiece

Now available in an unlimited, single-volume edition!

For 40 years, Kubrick fans and film buffs have wondered about the director's mysterious unmade film on Napoleon Bonaparte. Slated for production immediately following the release of 2001: A Space Odyssey, Kubrick’s "Napoleon" was to be at once a character study and a sweeping epic, replete with grandiose battle scenes featuring thousands of extras. To write his original screenplay, Kubrick embarked on two years of intensive research; with the help of dozens of assistants and an Oxford Napoleon specialist, he amassed an unparalleled trove of research and preproduction material, including approximately 15,000 location scouting photographs and 17,000 slides of Napoleonic imagery. No stone was left unturned in Kubrick's nearly-obsessive quest to uncover every piec! e of information history had to offer about Napoleon. But ala! s, Kubri ck’s movie was not destined to be: the film studios, first M.G.M. and then United Artists, decided such an undertaking was too risky at a time when historical epics were out of fashion.

TASCHEN’s tribute to this unmade masterpiece makes Kubrick’s valiant work on "Napoleon" available to fans for the first time. Based on the original 2009 limited edition which featured ten books hidden inside of a carved out reproduction of a Napoleon history book, this publication brings all the original elements together in one volume. Herein, all of the books from the original edition are reproduced in facsimile: correspondence, costume studies, location scouting photographs, research material, script drafts, and more. Kubrick’s final draft is reproduced in its entirety.

The text book features the complete original treatment, essays examining the screenplay in historical and dramatic contexts, an essay by Jean Tulard on Napoleon in cinema, ! and a transcript of interviews Kubrick conducted with Oxford professor Felix Markham. The culmination of years of research and preparation, this unique publication offers readers a chance to experience the creative process of one of cinema’s greatest talents as well as a fascinating exploration of the enigmatic figure that was Napoleon Bonaparte.

*Includes access to searchable/downloadable online research database: Kubrick's complete picture file of nearly 17,000 Napoleonic images*

THE MALTESE FALCON Some high-living lowlifes want to get their sweaty hands on a bejeweled falcon. Detective Sam Spade (Humphrey Bogart) wants to find out why â€" and who’ll take the fall for his pertner’s murder. Sydney Greenstreet, Mary Astor, Peter Lorre and Elisha Cook Jr. co-star in a crackling masterwork directed and written for the screen by John Huston. THE BIG SLEEP (1946) L.A. private eye Philip Marlowe (Humphrey Bogart) takes on a blackmail caseâ€! ¦and wears out his gumshoes trailing murderers, nightclub rogu! es, the spoiled rich and more. Lauren Bacall joins Bogart under Howard Hawks’ brisk and atmospheric direction of an ace adaptation of Raymond Chandler’s novel. DIAL M FOR MURDER Alfred Hitchcock’s screen version of Frederick Knott’s stage hit casts Grace Kelly, Ray Milland and Robert Cummings as points of a romantic triangle. She loves Cummings; her husband Milland plots her murder. But when he dials a Mayfair exchange to set the plot in motion, his right number gets the wrong answer! THE POSTMAN ALWAYS RINGS TWICE (1946) Based on the novel by James M. Cain (Double Indemnity, Mildred Pierce), this quintessential film noir stars John Garfield and Lana Turner as illicit lovers who botch a first attempt to bump off her husband, pull it off and betray each other at trial. Amorous attractions never proved so fatal as in this steamy, stormy classic.