NEW RELEASES

TOUCHBACK

Synopsis: The follow-up to the 2008 hit! The new journey begins when young adventurer Sean (Josh Hutcherson) receives a coded distress signal from a mysterious island where no island should exist... a place of strange life forms, mountains of gold, deadly volcanoes, and more than one astonishing secret. Unable to stop him from going, Sean's new stepfather (Dwayne Johnson) joins the quest. Together with a helicopter pilot (Luis Guzman) and his beautiful, strong-willed daughter (Vanessa Hudgens), they set out to find the island, rescue its lone inhabitant and escape before seismic shockwaves force the island under the sea and bury its treasures forever.

Review:
Loved this movie! The story was a bit predictable, but so what. This is a good movie to take your kids to see -- or pick up and watch at home. There are a few scary beasts about, but overall, the PG rating limits that too much. While watching the movie, I had flashes of "Jurasic Park" or the original "Mysterious Island". The visuals were terrific and while I can't say I'm a huge Dwayne Johnson fan, I absolutely love Michael Caine and he is marvelous as the ecccentric grandfather Sean goes to find.
The scenery is awesome and the story takes advantage of modern-day graphics especially well. My favorite is the bumblebee flight, but I have to admit the Nautalis is particularly fascinating.
This movie brought back some fantastic memories of reading the Jules Verne novels as well -- and I've already downloaded them to my Kindle so I can read them one more time. There aren't many movies that bring back memories of novels read and adventures of imagination.

JOYFUL NOISE
Release date: May 1, 2012
Product Description:
Joyful Noise tells the story of an unlikely partnership between two strong-minded women who are forced to work together to save a small town Gospel Choir after budget cuts threaten to shut them down. Music is a very important component to the story.

Review:
I enjoyed this movie a good deal. While it felt a little like "Sister Act" from years ago, it was a bit different. There were a number of story elements spinning around the main plot -- a small town choir going to Los Angeles for a competition. You see a bit of what is happening in small town America today -- businesses closing, homes going up in foreclosure, people having multiple jobs to keep their families together.
The music surrounding the movie is wonderful. Queen Latifah and Dolly Parton are comical as two battling sponsors of the choir, but the music that they make is marvelous.

THE FIELDS
Release Date: April 24, 2012

WHAT: THE FIELDS, an award-winning thriller starring Cloris Leachman is coming to Blu-Ray and DVD on April 24th. Brought to you by Breaking Glass Pictures (THE LIVING WAKE, 5 STAR DAY, CROPSEY), THE FIELDS follows a young boy as he discovers a terrifying secret lurking in the fields outside his Pennsylvania countryside home. The film received awards at the Erie Film Festival (Best Directors, Best Actress for Leachman), Terror Film Festival (Best Feature, Best Actress for Leachman, Best Emerging Actor for Ormond), Philadelphia Terror Film Festival (Best Picture, Best Emerging Actor for Ormond, Sound Design, Score) and the Best Picture Award at the Buffalo Niagara Film Festival.

Review:
This is one of those rare movies that you would classify as thriller, suspenseful but without the blood and gore of current movies in this category. It holds your interest as you wait for the next thing to happen. Cloris Leachman is excellent and the young actor, Joshua Ormond, is wonderful. Based on actual events, it puts you into the heart of life in a remote area of Pennsylvania.

EXTREMELY LOUD & INCREDIBLY CLOSE
Release date: March 27, 2012

SYNOPSIS:
Adapted from the acclaimed bestseller by Jonathan Safran Foer, ÒExtremely Loud & Incredibly CloseÓ is a story that unfolds from inside the young mind of Oskar Schell, an inventive eleven year-old New Yorker whose discovery of a key in his deceased fatherÕs belongings sets him off on an urgent search across the city for the lock it will open. A year after his father died in the World Trade Center on what Oskar calls ÒThe Worst Day,Ó he is determined to keep his vital connection to the man who playfully cajoled him into confronting his wildest fears.
Now, as Oskar crosses the five New York boroughs in quest of the missing lock - encountering an eclectic assortment of people who are each survivors in their own way - he begins to uncover unseen links to the father he misses, to the mother who seems so far away from him and to the whole noisy, dangerous, discombobulating world around him.

Review:
I was wondering how this movie would tackle such a sensitive subject as 9/11 and the destruction of the World Trade Center. While it has been 10 plus years, the memory is still fresh for those involved -- and even for those who lived through that tragedy. This is a marvelous movie that delves into the emotion of a young boy who lost his father that day.
The journey of Oskar Schell as he copes with his loss and tries to find the lock that can be opened by a key he found in his father's closet. The key is in an envelope with the name Black on it. Oskar comes up with a plan to find what the key opens. In the process, he meets many different kinds of people and eventually is helped by "The Renter" - a man renting a room in the building where Oskar's grandmother lives. "The Renter" - marvelously played by Max van Sydow - accompanies Oskar as he wanders New York in search of the key's owner.
Tom Hanks portrays Oskar's father; Sandra Bullock is his mom. The bond between father and son was extremely strong and somewhat unique. Oskar is older than his years -- and you join him on his journey not only to find the owner of the key, but in his struggle to come to grips with the loss of his father. He forms a new bond with his mother -- and his grandfather -- "the renter".
This is a beautifully conceived and executed movie. It is sensitive to the subject matter and the emotions attached to this event. The acting could not be better. Thomas Horn is brilliant as Oskar Schell. Sandra Bullock is amazing as Oskar's mom who is trying to deal with her own grief as she tries to understand what her son is going through.

SUPERMAN VS. THE ELITE WORLD PREMIERE

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