Blu-ray Movie Reviews

Stop me if you've heard this one. Wild animal breaks out of a New York zoo to return to the wild. Other animal friends follow to bring him back. They travel by boat to a strange, jungle environment.

The story of a well-intentioned but ultimately failed U.S. 1993 military mission in Somalia, where American Rangers and Delta Force troops tried to capture a savage warlord who was ravaging and starving his own people into submission, is not a pretty one. Nor is Black Hawk Down an easy film to watch. But while it's often gritty, depressing, and filled with violent, bloody imagery, it also paints a very positive, uplifting image of American troops and what they're willing to risk for the mission and for each other. It's hard to imagine mainstream Hollywood producing such a film today, five event-filled years after Black Hawk Down first hit the screens.

With all due respect to director Ridley Scott's other efforts, including Black Hawk Down, this medieval crusade drama may well be his finest work to date. The theatrical cut was seriously compromised when it was cut down from the director's preferred length, but this version is far more coherent.

Animated features are well represented in these early days of HD DVD and Blu-ray discs (though nothing yet from Pixar). This CGI –animated sequel to Ice Age may not have quite the audience appeal of that first adventure with Manny the Mammoth, Sid the Sloth, Diego the sabre-toothed tiger, and, not to forget, Scrat, the acorn-obsessed squirrel-rat, but it's still appealing, funny, and beautifully animated.

This action thriller may deepen the paranoid fever dreams of those who imagine that the feds are watching, listening-in on, and recording every aspect of their routine lives. But for those of us who know better, it's nevertheless an entertaining action thriller that moves along at a heady pace and is populated by a superb cast.

The first act of this lightweight horror film draws you in, starting with ancient palace intrigue and moving to turn of the (20th) century Egypt. The second act is OK, if implausible. The third is loaded with action, but also suggests the CGI artists just got a new software sandbox and just had to play in it.