Movies

The Orphanage (Picturehouse)

Movie:

DVD:

The best horror film of 2007, the debut feature of Spanish director Juan Antonio Bayone, begins with the return of idealistic entrepreneur Laura (Bel??n Rueda), her doctor husband Carlos (Fernando Cayo) and young son Simon (Roger Princep) to the Spanish seaside house where Laura lived briefly as a child.

Laura, who plans to reopen the long-shuttered Good Shepherd Orphanage, is worried Simon is relying too much on his imaginary friends; she and Carlos hope he'll forget them "as soon as the real kids arrive."

Something does arrive, but not what is expected. An elderly social worker (Montserrat Carulla) pays a visit with disturbing news, leaving jangled nerves in her wake.

Then Simon's fantasies turn real, resulting in a disappearance that challenges perceptions both on and off the screen. Tension builds slowly. Bayone uses few digital tricks. But the terror will haunt you long after you press eject.

The serviceable extras include a stills gallery and three featurettes: When Laura Grew Up: Constructing The Orphanage, Horror In The Unknown: Makeup Effects and Tomas' Secret Room.

Also available on Blu-ray.

Peter Howell

P.S. I Love You (Warner Bros.)

Movie:

DVD:

If the title doesn't make it abundantly clear this is a chick flick designed to set male teeth on edge, the set-up quickly will.

When darling New York couple Holly and Gerry (Hillary Swank and Gerard Butler) are torn asunder by Gerry's brain-tumour death, the bottom falls out of Holly's world.

Until she gets a surprise letter from Gerry, one of many he arranged prior to his demise, in which he commands her to party on for the next year so as to snap out of her funk. The resourceful hubby has laid on everything from a karaoke session to an Irish vacation to get his doll back to her old self, and to maybe find a new guy, too.

Those who enjoy watching movies with a box of Kleenex handy might buy into this load of malarkey. Those less inclined to knee-jerk water works might recoil at the thought of being bossed and patronized by a spouse from beyond the grave.

You'd expect nothing less from writer/director Richard LaGravenese, the screen pen behind such heart-tuggers as The Bridges of Madison County, Beloved and The Mirror Has Two Faces.

Along for the paycheque are Kathy Bates, Lisa Kudrow, Harry Connick Jr. and Gina Gershon.

The extras pour on more treacle: additional scenes, a conversation with author Cecelia Ahern (who wrote the source novel), a James Blunt video (of course!) and a how-to demo on playing Snaps, the oh-so-cute game seen in the film.

Also available on Blu-ray.

Peter Howell

Television

Intelligence, season 1

Chris Haddock, who created Intelligence, is quoted in the promotional material for the DVD as saying that the release will "satisfy the demands of both the devoted audience and those who have heard the incredible critical reviews and fanatical word-of-mouth." That's probably overstating the case a bit.

There's nothing wrong with the show. The Wire-ish tale of Vancouver criminals versus those who monitor them is solid television with a very good cast and very nice writing. But this DVD falls into the category of fail. It's a bit like a throwback to simpler times. There are no subtitles. There are no commentaries. No inventive featurettes. We get those old-fashioned written cast bios and some character biographies that should have been banned years ago. The only real extra is a collection of some 13 (half an hour in all) no-context, random, short, behind-the-scenes docs with no "play all" option. Some focus on the director and some on the cast members, but they're all too short to offer any real insight. The best of the lot has actors Ian Tracey and John Cassini yakking about the show while visiting the craft table.

Malene Arpe

Classical

Bernstein in Rehearsal and Performance

(Medici Arts)

We're lucky that charismatic American conductor Leonard Bernstein (1918-1990) was determined to leave a rich televised and filmed legacy. And, now, more and more of it is available on DVD.

Here, we get a visit he made to the Schleswig-Holstein Music Festival in Germany in the summer of 1988.

This disc is devoted to the Symphony No. 1 by Dmitri Shostakovich (1906-1975), a composer that Bernstein deeply admired (and knew personally). We get 45 minutes of rehearsal with the young musicians attending the festival, and the 35 minutes of the full Symphony in white-tie performance.

The conductor never forgot everything he learned as a youth at the Tanglewood festival. He channelled a lot of his admittedly scattered energies into passing along his insights to young adults throughout his career.

In typical Bernstein form, we get laughs along with his sharp musical lessons during the rehearsals.

The Symphony, which has a strange, slapdash-sounding start, gets personal as well as musical context along the way.

In the end, we love the work, we admire the young artists for their flawless playing and we are left in awe of Bernstein's energy, barely diminished at age 70.

There are no extras.

John Terauds

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