Susan Granger’s DVD update for week of Fri., April 19:
Celebrating the upcoming Earth Day, April 23, “One Day on Earth” is a video time-capsule, a global diary captured during the 24-hour period of October 10, 2010. The breathtaking visual feast includes different cultures, customs and languages while underscoring humanity’s essential connectedness.
Shot over three eventful years, Ben Moses’s documentary “A Whisper to a Roar” focuses on the recent and ongoing struggles for democracy in Egypt, Malaysia, Ukraine, Venezuela and Zimbabwe.
Josh Aronson’s meticulously researched and crafted “Orchestra of Exiles” tells the compelling story of Bronislaw Huberman, the world-renown Jewish violinist who fled from Nazi Germany and created the Palestine Symphony Orchestra with Arturo Toscanini as its first conductor.
For a year, Gotham Chopra followed his father, New Age spiritual guru Deepak Chopra, around the world and chronicles his travels in “Decoding Deepak.”
And James Howell’s “Pedal-Driven: A Bikeumentary” delves into the escalating conflict between passionate mountain bikers and the federal managers charged with protecting public lands.
“Vietnam: The Ten Thousand Day War,” written by Pulitzer Prize-winning CNN correspondent Peter Arnett and narrated by Richard Basehart, is the real story behind the longest, most controversial war in modern history and winner of a National Education Award for Best Documentary.
For an easygoing romance, there’s “Save the Date” in which two sisters (Lizzy Caplan, Alison Brie) view relationships differently.
“A Bottle in the Gaza Sea” is a French drama about the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, as seen through the long-distance friendship between two teenagers, while in the Czechoslovakian film “4 Some,” two ostensibly ordinary middle-aged couples indulge in wife-swapping on an almost uninhabited Caribbean island.
For family viewing, India’s animated “Delhi Safari” introduces a ragtag crew of animals who take on the human race to protest the destruction of their jungle – with voices supplied by Jane Lynch, Christopher Lloyd, Vanessa Williams, Cary Elwes, Brad Garrett and Jason Alexander.
PICK OF THE WEEK: Violence-obsessed writer/director Quentin Tarantino plays tribute to the Spaghetti Western genre with “Django Unchained,” an indulgent, action-packed, Blaxploitation/revenge fantasy, starring Jamie Foxx, Christoph Waltz and Leonardo DiCaprio.