New DVD Releases: GI Joe, The Taking of Pelham 123, Will Ferrell

The slow roll of summer movies onto DVD continues this week as a trio of popcorn hits make their way onto store shelves with the release of GI Joe, The Taking of Pelham 123, and I Love You, Beth Cooper. There’s also a new doc, a Will Ferrell special, a new release of a Hitchcock classic, and the three worst DVDs of the week. What more could you ask for?

Check it all out below…

FEATURE FILMS

GI Joe: The Rise of Cobra

GI Joe is probably the worst-reviewed movie ever prior to its release. No, it’s not actually the worst-reviewed movie. No, this statement has nothing to do with actual critics. It just has everything do with the perception of the film in the weeks before its August release.

Blogs were afire, conversations rampant with talk of how this will be “the worst movie ever made” and how massive a bomb and money loser it would be. Then the movie came out, and it was kind of fun, a bit noisy, but certainly nothing close to awful, and while it didn’t set the financial world on fire, it did make a healthy enough sum to merit a sequel.

So maybe it’s time to throw out your pre-disposed bias and buy this hit on DVD. It includes two featurettes and a director’s commentary.

The Taking of Pelham 123

Starring: John Travolta and Denzel Washington

This movie did come out this year. You probably don’t remember, but it’s true. It seems impossible now, but this film is a complete afterthought. Less than that, a non-thought.

Amazing when you consider that the entire month of June filled every single commercial break with the same exact trailer that simply called this movie, “Pelham 123″. This was the trailer that featured Denzel Washington telling his wife that he could only pick up a half-gallon of milk on his way home from a terrorist ransoming (because it’s easier to get a half-gallon) and John Travolta remarking that Denzel was both taller than he thought and good-looking.

The trailer played over and over again, beyond saturation. Maybe that’s why everyone forgot the movie so quickly? The preview was on so often that it became background noise and something of a reflex to tune out.

Either way, this movie does exist and you can buy it on DVD.

Also:

• Food, Inc. – Learn More – Buy Now
• I Love You, Beth Cooper – Learn More – Buy Now

TV ON DVD

“Will Ferrell: You’re Welcome America. A Final Night with George W. Bush”

HBO is always very slow at releasing their DVDs (with wanting people to buy a subscription and all) but they’re usually worth the wait. This is not an exception – originally broadcast live from the theater in which Ferrell performed his massive hit of a one-man show, this is everything you liked about his SNL impression except with much dirtier jokes. Ah, the absence of network censors can be a beautiful thing.

More than that, Ferrell has been savaged recently for running out of funny. There isn’t a whole lot of evidence to support this (Step Brothers was immensely underrated). Basically, it’s just a negative reaction to Land of the Lost.  Meanwhile, Ferrell was busy creating this gem that had a healthy run earlier in the summer.

So if anything, this is proof that Ferrell is still funny, and if you’re a believer, you should buy the DVD.

Also:

• “Fraggle Rock”: Complete Series – Buy Now
• “Mission: Impossible”: Complete Series – Buy Now
• “The Shield”: Complete Series – Buy Now
• “Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles”: Season 7 – Buy Now

SPECIAL EDITION OF THE WEEK

North by Northwest – 50th Anniversary Edition

It seems like the archives have been cranking out a solid classic flick every week lately, and this one may be the best yet. Alfred Hitchcock’s most entertaining movie (that’s probably not debatable) gets the full-on DVD treatment with a two-disc set loaded with special features.

• Feature-Length Audio Commentary by Ernest Lehman
• The Master’s Touch: Hitchcock’s Signature Style Documentary
• North by Northwest: One for the Ages Documentary
• Behind-the-Scenes Documentary Destination Hitchcock: The Making-Of North By Northwest – Hosted By Eva Marie Saint and Featuring Martin Landau, Screenwriter Ernest Lehman, Patricia Hitchcock and Others
• Stills Gallery
• Music-Only Audio Track Showcasing Bernard Hermann’s Score
• Hitchcock Theatrical Trailers
• TV Spot

Also:

• National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation: Ultimate Collector’s Edition – Buy Now

Horrible Straight-To-DVD Release of the Week

Three terrible movies, three new DVDs. Which is the worst? Cast your vote and tell the world!

The nominees are:

Command Performance

The Case to Vote for It: Here’s the plot of this movie: Dolph Lundgren plays a drummer in a rock band, opening in Moscow for the world’s biggest pop star but oops, the star, her backing band, and her family are taken hostage by terrorists. Rather than having security, or the police or anybody remotely qualified go after these terrorists, the band’s drummer (again, this is Dolph Lundgren) is ready to take them down.  While this may sound bad in itself, bear in mind that Lundgren also wrote and directed this movie.  Frightening.

Hardwired

The Case to Vote for It: It’s been a couple weeks here in the HSTDROTW section, but we finally have a vintage straight-to-DVD scenario: Two washed-up stars cashing a paycheck in some lame thriller. In Hardwired we have Val Kilmer and Cuba Gooding, Jr. caught on two sides of a microchip implant that has the former star monitoring the latter former star. Why? Who cares?

Sand Serpants

The Case to Vote for It: There’s no summary of this movie anywhere, so there’s no plot to make fun of, but the movie is called Sand Serpents so that’s probably enough. Plus the marquee star is somebody named Jason Gedrick. In other words, this movie is relying on somebody well below Jason Patric on the “Famous Jasons” scale.

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