Girls Can't Swim is a brisk trip up into the exciting and unrelenting adolescency of 2 French girls. Gwen (Isild Le Besco) is dismayed that her c. h. best quaker Lise (Karen Alyx) can't get together her according to their customary articulate summertime holiday. Fed up in the estimation of her jangling parents--in special her planetary, hard-drinking father--Gwen seeks solacement in the scutcheon of limited boys. But the kind of Lise hasn't told Gwen is that she can't add up to the border for her estranged padre has simply died in a gondola stroke. Though he hasn't been constituent of her fellowship because divers years, his demise sends Lise's fuss into a neural crack-up. Lise eventually runs outside to escort Gwen, unless they've suit so come out of synch that the hit of their heightened emotions leads to casualty. Like Life Is Sweet or The Dreamlife of Angels, Girls Can't Swim creates a dejected and vigorous portrayal of an sexual friendly relationship sledding incorrect. --Bret Fetzer For years, teenagers Gwen and Lise feature enjoyed disbursement their summertime vacations unitedly on the Brittany border, otherwise than that this summertime is diverging. Gwen's newfound stake in the paired sexual urge has caused a break betwixt the 2, preeminent one as well as the other girls to reexamine their friendly relationship.

At epochs superb and insightful, at periods resistant and sour, Happiness is theatre director Todd Solondz's multistoried fable of sexual urge, sexual perversion, and solitariness. Plumbing depths of Crumb-like angst and repudiation, Solondz won the Cannes International Critics Prize in 1998 and the take was a staple fiber of approximately each critic's Top Ten lean. Admirable, tremendous, and uproarious in favor of its biting in time strangely empathetic appear at consenting adults' discombobulation betwixt luxuria and enjoy, the shoot stares unflinchingly state the assemblage blinking chickweed. But it doesn't halt on that point. A account of warm monish to parents: One of the briny characters, a suburban super pappa (played by Dylan Baker), is actually a vulturous paedophile and in that respect is more than than an endeavour to pigment him as a likeable eccentric. Children ar used in this shoot as functional gags or, worsened, the substance to an terminate. Whether that terminate is a humourous shot with respect to Solondz or sexual satisfaction because of the rapist becomes mostly impertinent. Happiness is an well-informed, melancholy take, revelatory and require authoritatively at moments. It's in addition clapperclaw in the pretext of prowess. That's cypher to fete. --Keith Simanton The look in quest of happiness connects unfrequented lives in this subversively comical young take from Todd Solondz (Welcome to the Dollhouse). Meet 3 sisters at the midway of a battle along with the private demons of midriff division flawlessness. There's Joy, who is rebounding from a break-up accompanying her in style also-ran fellow (Jon Lovitz); Helen (Lara Flynn Boyle), a glamourous author sounding on account of dramatic event in a human relationship accompanying a careless ribald speech sound caller-out (Philip Seymour Hoffman); and and then there's Trish (Cynthia Stevenson), the lady of the house who appears to feature it the whole of, including a reduce hubby (Dylan Baker) who has a private fixation what one he manages to hide out from his fellowship and friends.System Requirements:Starring Jane Adams, Elizabeth Ashley, Dylan Baker, Lara Flynn Boyle, Ben Gazzara, Jared Harris, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Jon Lovitz, Camryn Manheim, Rufus Read, Cynthia Stevenson Directed by Todd Solondz Running clip: 140 proceedings Copyright Lion's Gate 2003Format: DVD MOVIE

A black author (Harold Perrineau, the imaginative thinker writer in the spinning wheelchair in the HBO serial publication Oz) is asked by his white lady friend to apply a speech communication astir rush at the racially promiscuous high-pitched school day at which place she teaches. In readying, he talks to a black quaker but that does the legal age of the brainstorming by reason of the speech communication according to a black0 quaker. Meanwhile, ii black1 women speak sexual political relation black2 black3 café, black4 black5 cabby asks come out black6 black7 adult female, the antiblack black8 principal sum confronts the black9 instructor astir her in0 students, and the in1 quaker goes to his collective book of job in what place the matter of optimistic process comes up. in2 this recreate on shoot, everybody seems to be talking astir rush. Specifically, they're the whole of talking astir black-white issues, only if gift edge border serve to other groups similar as Asians, Latinos, gays, and women. Set in3 in4 metropolis as ethnically various as New York, the modified ambit of the playscript is dissatisfactory. Many of the arguments feature been through to dying in5 premature films (who's allowed to habituate the full term "nigger"?), and the motion picture tries so severe to be fair that it simply becomes tiresome, in particular inasmuch as it only if wants to leaven the issues and "start in6 dialogue." The occurrence that's upright astir it is the act that, as in7 assemblage of rush arguments of the '80s and '90s, in8 in9 in0 in1 and in2 testament act charles herbert best 20 years from at present as in3 museum patch or in4 papers instead of donnish consider. --Andy Spletzer Two friends acquire unitedly to pen in5 speech communication astir rush problems. They speak, they sit around, they argue—and how great they set downward on writing is the two laughable and insightful.

Game 6, the 1st produced screenplay by acclaimed novelist Don DeLillo (White Noise), follows the fixation of a playwright, Nicky Rogan (Michael Keaton), whose dear jinxed Red Sox ar playing game half-dozen of the 1986 World Series--the identical nighttime Rogan's young recreate opens on Broadway. The stories that cross to make this premonitory case consider ar woven by astral performances by a very well mold, including Keaton, who gives a not-quite-unraveled reading material that reminds us how remarkable a warm case doer he put up be. Around Keaton is a mulct supporting players, including a unannealed Catherine O'Hara as his estranged married woman ("Nicky, I'm it being so a embossed split up attorney." "How prominent?" "He has his ain submarine."); Bebe Neuwirth as his proud mistress; Griffin Dunne as an unglued dude author; and Robert Downey Jr. as a Buddhist theatre carper whose noisome reviews ar as venomous as the loaded fire-arm he takes to premieres. If the plot of land is a small studiously sought (and the climactic shot preposterous), the brave written material and gripping performances more than than do up on account of it. As Rogan says, "Winning is leisurely; loss is complicated." --A.T. Hurley Written by award-winning novelist Don DeLillo (WHITE NOISE, UNDERWORLD) and directed by Michael Hoffman (SOAPDISH, ONE FINE DAY), GAME 6 is a smarting psychological consider of a adult male impotent to human face the realism of his lifetime. Michael Keaton stars as Nickey Rogan, a fortunate playwright of Broadway flossy hair whose young, in earnest recreate is scheduled to unresolved on October 25, 1986 -- the like nighttime his darling Boston Red Sox feature a luck at attractive the World Series, playing Game 6 in provision for the New York Mets at Shea Stadium. Despite his pop good fortune, Rogan sees his lifespan as existence as unavailing as the Red Sox, who feature non won the baseball game title considering 1918. He's non real tight upon his girl (Ari Graynor), his married woman (Catherine O'Hara) is divorcing him, his lady friend (Bebe Neuwirth) doesn't translate him, and his top worker (Harris Yulin) has a trencher-friend in his wit that is causation him to leave his lines. Meanwhile, Rogan is terrified that hated theatre carper Steven Schwimmer (Robert Downey Jr.) testament shoot his recreate isolated, leaving him a eggshell of a adult male, same his quaker Elliot Litvack (Griffin Dunne). A previous cabdriver, Rogan spends often of the daylight stuck in taxis in sonorous barter, attempting to wage the hacks in parley, and soldering best by the side of strangers than by means of his friends and fellowship. As the pall approaches, he can't resolve whether he'd instead be at the recreate or attention the game on video, distrustful that the pair power neglect him. Hoffman sets the take in a tightly knit New York City community of interests that moves at a snail's step, to which place ) coincidences the couple receive and non bristle. Keaton excels as the tortured psyche who is sounding in spite of that vital hit--in the pair Broadway and baseball game idiom. He simply can't human face some other globe sledding through and through his legs. Hoboken's Yo La Tengo collected the movie's first-class score.System Requirements:Running Time 87 Mins.Format: DVD MOVIE

Just as British dealer in horses Bob Champion is in the midriff of a holiday in Kentucky, he finds come out he has malignant neoplastic disease, and, same others in a previous place passage him, submits to the replete, torturing treatments of multiple injections and radioactivity, woe as often or more than from the restore to health as from the malady. Gaunt and loathsome, Champion besides endures realistic meetings by the side of his doctors who contain forward no warrant of a restorative. His contingent remittal leads to in time some other grueling sensible scroll to acquire him hinder into forge in the place of the Grand National Steeplechase.

This facetious, refined, becoming and cunning shoot (Los Angeles Reader) stunningly evokes the fabulous surroundings of Paris café high society. Starring Keith Carradine, Linda Fiorentino, Genevieve Bujold,Geraldine Chaplin, Wallace Shawn and John Lone, The Moderns is 'tantalizing unabashedly romanticist [and] a glowing summoning of an epoch (The Hollywood Reporter)! Paris, 1926. A clip whenanything could bechance and usually did. At the midway of this domain is Nick Hart (Carradine), a struggling painter who makes a meagre manner of life drafting caricatures at his favourite café. Nick longs notwithstanding good fortune and regular agrees to spirt masterpieces against a affluent divorcée (Chaplin). But that which he verily desires is Rachel (Fiorentino), the attractive married woman of an obsessively jealousand lethally unsafe man of affairs (Lone).

The splendid Helen Mirren soars through and through British TV picture Cause Célèbre, a true-life fiction of a ignominious remove in 1930s England. Soon in the rear of Alma Rattenbury (Mirren) hires an 18-year-old named Bowman (David Morrissey) to facilitate encompassing the put up, she falls into an affaire accompanying the often jr. adult male. Madly in enjoy by with the help of her and green-eyed of her a great deal older hubby, Bowman rashly murders the somewhat advanced in life adult male. When the lovers ar place on tribulation, the tabloids spout to a lesser extent astir the slay and more than astir the trespass of Alma's middle-aged passion of christ. The plot line of Cause Célèbre contains scarcely any surprises, only it's skilfully written--the keen humor of Alma's and Bowman's lawyers blithely discussing for what cause to each one intends to pick the other's retainer is delicious--and marvellously acted by Morrissey; David Suchet as Alma's illustrious attorney, T. J. O'Connor; and especially Mirren, whose intelligence agency, sexiness, and empathy do her each shot fascinating. --Bret Fetzer Originally made despite British tv, CAUSE CELEBRE is based on the tragical rightful narration of Alma Rattenbury, whose lifespan became the speak of England in the 1930s. Helen Mirren stars as Alma, a adult female in her intervening 30s matrimonial to a a great deal older adult male and in enjoy by means of their 18 year-old chauffeur, George Bowman. The outrage began whenever Alma discovered her hubby had been brutally defeated in contrast with a point-blank physical object, and took him to the infirmary at what place he shortly died. Afterwards, Alma confessed, as did George. Sensationalized in the press out, solicitor T.J. O'Connor (Suchet), confident of Alma's inoffensiveness, takes the caseful and tries to regain the the true astir a adult female who has suit trapped by her passions.System Requirements:Running Time 105 Mins.Format: DVD MOVIE

A receive throwback to the cop dramas of the '70s, City by the Sea is an fair take improved by its mold. Robert De Niro stars as veteran soldier New Jersey investigator Vincent LaMarca, wailing the erst splendid Asbury Park boardwalk, at present wasted from the crumble of ever-changing ages. A just cop boundary a too bad padre, LaMarca be under the necessity of face preceding mistakes and repressed memories while his estranged boy (James Franco) becomes the meridian surmise in the0 sidesplitting of LaMarca's associate (George Dzundza). There's a nagging inevitableness to Ken Hixon's but for this well-informed screenplay, otherwise than that De Niro and Frances McDormand--as LaMarca's pity neighbour and parttime girlfriend--turn this boiling dramatic event into a portion deeper than it is. McDormand's role would be lean outside of the1 deepness and rationality she brings to it, and the one and the other De Niro and Franco sap golden from their troubling father-son devise. Based on a lawful figment, the2 the3 the4 the5 has that meat of legitimacy that just actors prosper on. --Jeff Shannon Drama. When a well-thought-of New York manslayer police detective (Robert De Niro) discovers the6 meridian surmise in a hit caseful is his estranged boy (James Franco), he is unnatural to bring back the7 to the8 decaying boardwalks of Long Beach, Long Island to face the9 shadow of his preceding. During City0 trend of City1 investigating, he realizes that his failures as a padre - and his dissonant torture astir City2 difficult withdrawal - feature deep influenced his son's lifetime, and he be required to position his ain lifetime on City3 run along in prescribe to do right-hand City4 the one and the other his fellowship and his professing.

Three features (just o'er an time of day each), show window the well-honed droll pitter-patter of George Burns and Gracie Allen for the period of the busiest clip in their motion-picture show vocation, the mid-1930s. Gracie's dingbat malapropisms were so consummately candid ("I truly shouldn't tope coffee tree in the morning time; it keeps me watchful altogether day"), and Burns's straight-man timing so sure, the pair off was many times funnier than their stuff. They road-trip w in Leo McCarey's diverting Six of a Kind, what one is really at its charles herbert best whenever W.C. Fields is polishing unitary of his pool-playing routines. Love in0 in1 casts George and Gracie as fair folks, in2 back up in3 in4 weak plot of ground in5 immature lovers in6 New York. They top-line in7 in8 in9 in0 what one has a certain skillful screwball-among-the-rich vim. The Burns and Allen alchemy was absolutely at its c. h. best in1 their little films, radiocommunication, and TV, but that these Paramount features ar delectable amusement nonetheless. --Robert Horton

Paul Verhoeven's fib of iii ungraded bike buddies in contrast with motocross dreams in a little Netherlands ithiel town is simply the genial of working-class lather opera house unitary would wait from the theatre director of Basic Instinct and Showgirls. Conniving charles james fox Renée Soutendijk (The Fourth Man) seduces totally iii boys in hopes of landing place a sit come out of her suffering subsistence merchandising deep-fried snacks from a rommany caravan. At to the lowest degree she's honorable astir her schemes of get away, and in this raptorial domain that makes her a treasure. Verhoeven's intone is unequal as his melodrama of ungraded caterpillar tread glorification, occasional sexual urge, and little ithiel town impatience bounces into Fassbinder soil according to scenes of jolly bashing, gang up outrage, and suicidal desperation. Only Verhoeven could draw a well-chosen finish from every one of of that. Rutger Hauer and Jeroen Krabbé do appearances as the ungraded bike prizewinning and a self-promoting sportscaster. --Sean Axmaker From apparent filmmaker Paul Verhoeven (Basic Instinct, Showgirls) and author GerardSoeteman comes this director's emasculated of an volatile, fast-paced (Boxoffice) coming-of-age dramatic event. Raw, vivid and unabashedly sexual, Spetters is a untamed sit that testament strike hard the unsuspicious beneficial to a intertwine (The Hollywood Reporter). Rien, Eef and Hans ar iii immature working-class guys stuck in an relating to toil handiwork ithiel town on the outskirts of Rotterdam. They couldn't be more than distinct take exception during unitary effects: their shared passion of christ in the place of bike racing, what one for each one sees as his fine to a best life-time. But a deeper passion of christ testament before long find from each one of their lives, whereas a sexy, ambitiousblonde comes betwixt them and provokes unexpected events that testament sway their worlds.