New on DVD, Blu-ray and Digital: X-Men, Edge of Tomorrow and Penny Dreadful
The latest installment in the long-running superhero franchise, X-Men: Days of Future Past is done about as well as these movies can be done. The story is tight, the characters are cool, and the action sequences are bananas.
Based on a famous story arc from the comics' 1980s heyday, the movie features a clever, time-twisting plot that manages to unite most the original cast with the new kids from 2011 reboot X-Men: First Class.
The story begins in a near-future dystopia, where hyper-advanced robots known as Sentinels have imprisoned all of the world's superhero mutants and their human collaborators. Wolverine, played by the always-game Hugh Jackman, must travel back in time from 2023 to 1973 and prevent the government weapons program that created the Sentinels in the first place.
Parallel plot lines ensue, with our future heroes holding off the invulnerable Sentinels while the 1970s crew fights to initiate an alternate future. A few new characters are introduced, including the super-speedster Quicksilver (Evan Peters) who completely steals the movie in a spectacular shoot-out scene. As time slows to a crawl, Quicksilver takes a leisurely stroll through the carnage, rearranging bullets and other projectiles just so. Director Bryan Singer elevates the bullet-time digital effects to a new level of awesomeness (there is no other word), then adds Jim Croce's "Time in a Bottle" for an inspired musical counterpoint.
The film's other showstopper sequences never approach this level of playful inventiveness, and the frantic climax ends on that bewildering note that seems to accompany all time-travel paradox stories. Still, it's a solid superhero movie for fans of the genre.
Also New To DVD, Blu-ray and Digital:
Edge of Tomorrow, the latest Tom Cruise sci-fi eye-popper, is basically an alien invasion movie crossed with Groundhog Day -- but that synopsis doesn't do justice to the summer blockbuster craftsmanship on display. Cruise plays a reluctant soldier who, via an agreeably goofy plot device, must relive one day of his life over and over. Unfortunately, that day is a bloody massacre at the tentacles of lethal alien invaders. Emily Blunt is utterly bad-ass as Cruise's special-ops partner, and director Doug Liman provides a watertight time-paradox story around dozens of harrowing battle scenes. Underneath all the full metal mayhem is a structurally sound sci-fi premise -- you could subtract $150 million from the budget, and it would still play.
With Penny Dreadful: Season One, the acclaimed Showtime series, you get a kind of hard-R riff on The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, including steampunk intrigue, and speculation on literary characters in the public domain like Dracula, Dr. Frankenstein and Dorian Grey. I'm rather hooked on this series -- which stars Eva Green, Timothy Dalton and Josh Hartnett -- and particularly love the gorgeous period art design on display.
Million Dollar Arm is a nice choice for any hardcore baseball fan, or anyone who has kids likely to become hardcore baseball fans. Based on a true story, the film stars Jon Hamm as a pro sports agent who finds two unlikely baseball pitching prospects in India, where the bat-and-ball sport of choice is cricket. There's plenty of Disney-movie feel-good storytelling, but also a lot of interesting specifics on how professional sports operate.
The oddball comedy-drama Obvious Child is maybe the best indie movie of 2014. Starring actual stand-up comic Jenny Slate as fictional stand-up comic Donna Stern, the film trades in dark irony and graphic sex jokes, but those are the surface gags. The really funny stuff -- the laugh-until-it-hurts material -- is just underneath.
Disney has released the Diamond Edition of the classic Sleeping Beauty, with deleted scenes and a ton of historical bonus features.
Plus:
2 Broke Girls: Season 3
American Horror Story: Season 3
Bates Motel: Season 2
Duck Dynasty: Season 6
Fargo: Season 1
The Following: Season 2
Hemlock Grove: Season 1
Houdini
Jack and the Cuckoo-Clock Heart
The Last Supper
Locked In
A Million Days to Die in the West
Mr. Peabody & Sherman
Sharknado 2: The Second One
To Be Takei
Whitey
