Susan Granger’s DVD UPDATE for week of Fri., Nov. 11:
Ridley Scott and Kevin Macdonald’s “Life in a Day” is a documentary shot on a single day by people all over the world who submitted 80,000 You Tube entries, containing deeply personal, powerful moments from Australia to Zambia and from bustling cities to some of the most remote places on Earth.
Crass, crude and vulgar, “The Change-Up” is a body-switch comedy, featuring Ryan Reynolds and Jason Bateman as lifelong friends who go on a drunken spree and, unwittingly, invoke a magical spell which allows them to inhabit each other’s bodies and live each other’s lifestyles.
Simply titled “13” is Jason Statham’s latest action-adventure about a man in desperate circumstances who steals an envelope containing instructions for a mysterious job that promises a potential fortune in an underworld Russian roulette competition. But what does it take to become the last man standing?
Eran Riklis’s Israeli dramedy “The Human Resources Manager” in Hebrew, Romanian and English chronicles how a corporate bureaucrat (Mark Ivanir) in a large Jerusalem bakery tries to assist after a lowly employee dies in a suicide bombing.
French provocateur Catherine Breillat’s “The Sleeping Beauty” is a sly, playful, subverted fairytale in the same vein as her “Bluebeard;” it’s a twisted retelling that ends far from “happily ever after.”
For classic film collectors, Marlon Brando’s “Mutiny on the Bounty” (1962) is now available on Blu-ray with alternate prologue and epilogue sequences and five vintage featurettes including “The Journey of the Bounty.”
For youngsters, Elmo makes growing up easier with “Bye, Bye Pacifier!” and “Big Kid Stories with Elma.” And the History Channel’s hit series “How the States Got Their Shapes” uncovers the history hidden in our map.
PICK OF THE WEEK: “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Part 2” concludes the series, as the now-grown wizard (Daniel Radcliffe) vanquishes his mortal enemy, Lord Voldemort (Ralph Fiennes), with the help of Hermione (Emma Watson) and Ron (Rupert Grint). And in this fun-filled fantasy, even the peripheral characters have their climactic moments. In addition, there’s “Harry Potter: The Complete 8-Film Collection,” encompassing the entire franchise with intriguing bonus features.