It’s a visually spectacular film, and includes an awesome ferryboat explosion in the Mississippi River, just offshore from New Orleans. There’s also a car chase conducted simultaneously during a rainy night AND a bright, sunshiny day (this is cleverly set up and involves a machine capable of peering into the past). One feature, new to me, is labeled “Movie Showcase”—which, we’re told, provides “Instant Access To The Filmmakers’ Most Cinematic Moments That Showcase The Ultimate In High Definition Picture And Sound.” All those grandiose capital letters set up a mere three scenes, including the ferry explosion (which, surprisingly, left the ferry unharmed; in two weeks it was back on the Mississippi, and is apparently still there). This is indeed a terrific scene for high-definition: the explosion used liquid fuel, resulting in enormous orange fireballs laced with angry-looking black clouds, flinging cars and people in all directions. There are also some impressive shots from ...

  “Chain Reaction” came out in 1996, but the subject matter of the movie—a source of free energy—is as timely now as it was then. However, when first released, it didn’t make much of a splash. Despite having A-list talent, Keanu Reeves, Morgan Freeman, Brian Cox, Fred Ward, and Rachel Weisz, the movie never performed any better than a B-grade thriller. One has to assume that only that assembly of starpower has brought the movie to a Blu-ray release. Keanu Reeves stars as Eddie Kasalivich, a blue collar worker turned physics prodigy. As always Reeves plays his role with wide-eyed intensity. He wears the boots, jeans, and plaid shirt over T-shirt of the working class and rides a motorcycle, but you never forget that it’s Reeves playing a role. We learn that he dropped out of university the first time after blowing up a lab, but we never learn how that happened, why he ...

  William Bloom (Billy Crudup) has always been overshadowed by his larger-than-life father, Edward (Albert Finney), who has regaled family and friends with tall tales of his fanciful adventures for decades. When Edward finds out that he’s dying, William returns home with his wife, to care for his father and to try to find some resolution to their strained relationship. His father, finding a new audience in William’s young wife, relates the fanciful tales of his life to her. William, angry at his father for not telling him the honest truth about himself and his life, pushes him to come clean and to cease spinning wild stories. “Big Fish” is a sweet, charming film which finds director Tim Burton working with a much more personal story (his own father died prior to filming) and stretching his style a little further. As the elderly Edward Bloom relates his story, we see those sequences with Ewan McGregor ...

  Decades ago, the idea of apes evolving and supplanting the human race was a radical idea filled with all kinds of social implications. When Pierre Boulle’s 1963 novel “Planet of the Apes” was published in English, 20th Century-Fox won the movie rights, and a film appeared in 1968. It was phenomenally successful and generated a series of sequels and a TV series. It was embraced by many groups, from race relations representatives to animal activists. It seemed everyone could find a correlation to whatever they wanted to push in their own interests. A lot of viewers just liked the science fictional alternate-earth scenario that was so cool. French writer Pierre Boulle, who occasionally dabbled in science fiction, included a twist at the end that still hasn’t been shown in films or television. In the original movie, the stark image of the Statue of Liberty stands out. That image, or many like it, has shown ...

  Director Paul Verhoeven, coming off of the surprise success of “Robocop,” turned his attention to another science-fiction script, based on Philip K. Dick’s “We Can Remember It for You, Wholesale,” which had been in development hell for over a decade. Set in the future, “Total Recall” relates the story of Douglas Quaid (Arnold Schwarzenegger) a happily married construction worker, plagued by nightmares about perishing on Mars, which has been colonized. When his wife Lori (Sharon Stone) shoots down his idea of a vacation on the cold red planet, he finds an alternate way to experience Mars-- by having a faux vacation memory implanted by a company named “Rekall.” When the procedure causes Quaid to have a paranoid psychotic episode, the memory implant is halted, the “Rekall” visit wiped from his memory and he’s sent home in a cab. Quaid is almost immediately besieged by attackers sent from Mars Administrator Cohaagen (Cox) who ...