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Languages: English (Dolby Digital 2.0)

Summary: Falling Skies chronicles the chaotic aftermath of an alien attack that leaves most of the world completely incapacitated. In the six months since the initial invasion, survivors band together to begin the difficult task of fighting back against the aggressive aliens. Outside of Boston, history professor Tom Mason (Wyle) helps lead a small army named 2nd Massachusetts in the battle of their lives to preserve their families and what’s left of humanity.

Languages: English (Dolby Digital 5.1)

Sound: Dolby Digital

Summary: The mystery deepens for the remaining survivors of the massive alien invasion as Falling Skies returns for its second season with mysterious new creatures. Three months have passed since former college professor, father of three and unlikely leader of the civilian resistance group Tom Mason (Noah Wyle) went willingly with the aliens on one of their ships to free his son and learn their plans. Nobody has seen or heard anything from him during this time, and his absence has taken its toll on his sons. Ben and his older brother, Hal, have stepped up as fighters but quickly clash as they both seek to secure their roles as leaders in their father's absence. Many lives have been lost since Tom left, but the survivors of the 2nd Mass still struggle on with courage and resilience. In the first season, our heroes coped with the trauma of losing their world; in this season, they take action and fight back!

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Summary: "Fantastic Four" is a light-hearted and funny take on Marvel Comics' first family of superherodom. It begins when down-on-his-luck genius Reed Richards (Ioan Gruffudd) has to enlist the financial and intellectual help of former schoolmate and rival Victor Von Doom (Julian McMahon) in order to pursue outer-space research involving human DNA. Also on the trip are Reed's best friend, Ben Grimm (Michael Chiklis); his former lover, Sue Storm (Jessica Alba), who's now Doom's employee and love interest; and her hotshot-pilot brother, Johnny Storm (Chris Evans). Things don't go as planned, of course, and the quartet becomes blessed--or is it cursed?--with superhuman powers: flexibility, brute strength, invisibility and projecting force fields, and bursting into flame. Meanwhile, Doom himself is undergoing a transformation.
Among the many entries in the comic-book-movie frenzy, "Fantastic Four" is refreshing because it doesn't take itself too seriously. Characterisation isn't too deep, and the action is a bit sparse until the final reel (like most "first" superhero movies, it has to go through the "how did we get these powers and what we will do with them?" churn). But it's a good-looking cast, and original comic-book co-creator Stan Lee makes his most significant Marvel-movie cameo yet, in a speaking role as the FF's steadfast postal carrier, Willie Lumpkin. Newcomers to superhero movies might find the idea of a family with flexibility, strength, invisibility, and force fields a retread of "The Incredibles", but Pixar's animated film was very much a tribute to the FF and other heroes of the last 40 years. The irony is that while "Fantastic Four" is an enjoyable B-grade movie, it's the tribute, "The Incredibles", that turned out to be a film for the ages.--"David Horiuchi, Amazon.com "

Comments: Box set

Summary: It's clear right from the opening episodes of its third series that "Farscape" has finally developed into a grown-up show. There's a new self-confidence and a new maturity here that's entirely welcome after the often wildly erratic tone of the second series. The production design and high-quality effects work remain true to the show's original quirky style, although both the look and the more adult-themed scripts have become progressively darker.
Season 3 is the year when the Wormhole story arc takes precedence, as the interactions between John Crichton and his nemesis Scorpius become ever more complicated (involving various different clones, real or "neural", of both antagonists). It's also the year that some major characters die, new ones are introduced and Crichton (well, one version of him anyway) and Aeryn finally consummate their relationship. Moya's crew endure a vertiginous emotional roller-coaster ride when powerful issues of love, loyalty and sacrifice loom large. They must also face their sternest challenge yet as the series' biggest story arc reaches an explosive climax aboard Scorpius' Command Carrier. Anyone who has not followed "Farscape" extremely closely from the very beginning of Series 1 will be utterly baffled by the convoluted plotting and complex character interactions. But for fans, this is the show's most rewarding year. --"Mark Walker"

Comments: Box set

Summary: The first series of "Farscape" was a revitalising tonic for TV SF. An ambitious coproduction of Jim Henson's Creature Shop, Australia's Channel 9 and Hallmark Entertainment, "Farscape" launched itself with a refreshing mix of CGI, prosthetics and state-of-the-art puppetry to take a visual leap beyond other genre shows. The witty scripts, too, peppered with double-entendres and pop-culture references, are light years away from the staid style of "Star Trek". Admittedly, the first season's basic premise is simply "Buck Rogers" updated (American astronaut John Crichton, played by Ben Browder, is catapulted to a far-flung galaxy populated by strange aliens), while the crew initially have something of "Blake's 7" about them (a motley bunch of escaped convicts pursued by a relentless foe), and ideas like the living ship are borrowed from "Babylon 5", but the "Farscape" concept has a freshness that makes it all look and feel completely original. --"Mark Walker"

Comments: Box set

Summary: The second series of "Farscape" expands upon and develops the characters introduced in the ambitious first series. John Crichton's new nemesis is the deadly Scorpius, replacing Crais, who has taken the living ship Moya's offspring on a voyage into the unknown. Moya's regular crew--Aeryn, Zhaan, Chiana, D'Argo and Rygel--remain as divided and suspicious of each other as ever, yet somehow manage to pull together at times of crisis. The writers continue to exploit the show's gift for surprising as well as emotionally convincing character development, while the CGI effects, prosthetics and state-of-the-art puppetry--courtesy of Jim Henson's Creature Shop--continue to make "Farscape" the most original-looking SF show on TV. The witty scripts, peppered with postmodern pop-culture references and movie in-jokes, are also a breath of fresh air. Despite some wildly erratic shifts in tone, this is exceptional TV science fiction that continually pushes the accepted boundaries of the genre. --"Mark Walker"

Comments: Box set

Summary: This season is where Farscape kicks off into a higher gear. My personal favourite season is season 3, but this one is a fantastic mix-up of leather, pop culture references and bodily fluids. An exceptionally well made series cut down in itx27;s prime, but at least we got Farscape: The Peacekeeper Wars which gave us a sense of closure.
Whacky, insane sci-fi for the fans who donx27;t take their TV weird shows too seriously.

Comments: Box set

Summary: Created at least in part due to popular demand, "Farscape: The Peacekeeper Wars" will provide some closure to fans who were dismayed by the demise of the popular science fiction television show in 2003 and campaigned mightily to bring it back. Indeed, this mini-series (originally broadcast over two nights on the Sci-Fi Channel) will likely appeal primarily to the "Farscape" faithful, as the somewhat convoluted storyline may prove baffling to the uninitiated.
A brief bit of backstory explains how John Crichton, an astronaut from Earth, went through a wormhole and ended up on Moya, a living spaceship, with a motley group of aliens, including D'Argo (Anthony Simcoe), Chiana (Gigi Edgley), various puppet characters (designed by the Jim Henson Company), and Aeryn (Claudia Black), Crichton's love interest, who's expecting their first child. As "The Peacekeeper Wars" begins, our heroes find themselves in the middle of a war-to-end-all-wars between the lizard-like, implacably evil Scarrans and their rivals, the Peacekeepers. Crichton is the lynchpin in all of this, as his knowledge of "wormhole technology" is coveted by all, including his old nemesis Scorpius (Wayne Pygram), who captured and tortured Crichton back in season 1 and with whom Crichton must now form an uneasy alliance against the Scarrans.
Over the course of the three-hour miniseries, we get lots of weird- and cool-looking aliens, some nice sets and special effects, plenty of battles, and lots of portentous talk about the fate of the universe--nothing especially original, but all presented with outstanding production values. There's drama and action, love and betrayal, tragedy and triumph, war and, ultimately, peace, with a suitably spectacular ending (and a nod to Stanley Kubrick's "2001: A Space Odyssey"). With a 30-minute "making of" documentary among the DVD special features, "The Peacekeeper Wars" is a fitting way to end the "Farscape" saga. "--Sam Graham"

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Languages: Deutsch, Englisch

Subtitles: Bulgarisch, Dänisch, Deutsch, Englisch, Finnisch, Französisch, Isländisch, Italienisch, Kantonesisch, Niederländisch, Norwegisch, Portugiesisch, Schwedisch, Spanisch

Sound: DTS-5.1

Summary: In "Fast & Furious Five" führen Vin Diesel und Paul Walker die All-Stars aus allen Kapiteln der explosiven und rasanten "Fast & Furious"-Reihe an.
Im neuen Teil schlägt sich Ex-Cop Brian O'Conner (Paul Walker) mit dem Ex-Häftling Dom Toretto (Vin Diesel) auf die Seite jenseits des Gesetzes. Nachdem Brian und Mia Toretto (Jordana Brewster) Dom aus der Gefangenschaft befreit haben, müssen sie auf ihrer Flucht vor den Behörden viele Landesgrenzen überqueren. In Rio de Janeiro stehen sie erneut mit dem Rücken zur Wand und sind gezwungen, ein letztes Ding zu drehen – denn nur so können sie die langersehnte Freiheit erlangen.





Während sie ein Elite-Team der besten Racer zusammenstellen, wird ihnen eines klar: Um ein für alle Mal aussteigen zu können, müssen sie sich einem korrupten Unternehmer stellen, der nichts mehr will, als sie tot zu sehen. Er ist allerdings nicht der Einzige, der hinter ihnen her ist. Dem kompromisslosen Federal Agent Luke Hobbs (Dwayne Johnson) entkommt niemand.
Als er auf Dom und Brian angesetzt wird, geht er mit seiner Spezialeinheit in die Offensive. Während seine Männer durch Brasilien jagen, merkt Hobbs bald, dass die Grenze zwischen Gut und Böse verschwimmt. So bleibt ihm nur noch sein Instinkt, um seine Beute in die Falle zu locken ... bevor ihm jemand anderes zuvorkommt. Neben den wiederkehrenden "F&F"-Helden Jordana Brewster, Chris „Ludacris” Bridges, Tyrese Gibson, Sung Kang, Gal Gadot, Matt Schulze, Tego Calderon und Don Omar wird Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson den Adrenalinspiegel auf ein neues Level anheben.

Subtitles: English, French, Spanish

Sound: DTS-HD Master Audio

Summary: Vin Diesel, Paul Walker, Dwayne Johnson and Michelle Rodriguez lead a cast of returning all-stars as the global blockbuster franchise built on speed delivers the biggest adrenaline rush yet. Hobbs (Johnson) has been tracking an organization of lethally skilled drivers, whose mastermind (Luke Evans) is aided by the love Dom (Diesel) thought was dead, Letty (Rodriguez). The only way to stop the criminal mercenaries from stealing a top secret weapon is to outmatch them at street level, so Hobbs asks for the help of Dom and his elite team. Payment for the ultimate chase? Full pardons for all of them and a chance to make their families whole again.



Soundtrack:1. "We Own It (Fast & Furious)" - 2 Chainz and Wiz Khalifa 2. "Ball" - T.I. featuring Lil Wayne 3. "Con Locura" - Sua featuring Jiggy Drama4. "HK Superstar" - (MC JC Garcia & DJ Cheeno Bernal) MC Jin featuring Daniel Wu5. "Failbait" - deadmau5 featuring Cypress Hill 6. "Bada Bing" - Benny Banks 7. "Burst! (Bart B More Remix)" - Peaches 8. "Mister Chicken" - Deluxe 9. "Roll It Up" - The Crystal Method 10."Here We Go / Quasar (Hybrid Remix)" - Hard Rock Sofa featuring Swanky Tunes11."Bandoleros" - Don Omar featuring Tego Calderón12."Rest of My Life" - Ludacris featuring Usher and David Guetta

Languages: Engels

Summary: Review Fast

Comments: Animated, Box set

Summary: A delightful undersea world unfolds in Pixar's animated adventure "Finding Nemo". When his son Nemo is captured by a scuba diver, a nervous clownfish named Marlin (voiced by Albert Brooks) sets off into the vast--and astonishingly detailed--ocean to find him. Along the way he hooks up with a scatterbrained blue tang fish named Dory (Ellen DeGeneres), who's both a help and a hindrance, sometimes at the same time. Faced with sharks, deep-sea anglers, fields of poisonous jellyfish, sea turtles, pelicans and much more, Marlin rises above his neuroses in this wonderfully funny and thrilling ride--rarely do more than 10 minutes pass without a sequence appearing that's destined to become a theme-park attraction. Pixar continues its run of impeccable artistic and economic successes ("Toy Story", "A Bug's Life", "Monsters, Inc"). Supporting voices here include Willem Dafoe, Geoffrey Rush and Allison Janney. "--Bret Fetzer"

Languages: English

Subtitles: English

Sound: Dolby Digital 2.0 Surround

Summary: Captain Malcom 'Mal' Reynolds is a former galactic war veteran who is the captain of the transport ship "Serenity", Mal his crew of hired transporters, Mal's ensign Zoe Warren, Zoe's husband, pilot Hoban 'Wash' Washburne, muscular former combat soldier Jayne Cobb, young engineer Kaylee Frye, former Alliance medical officer Simon Tamm, his teenage sister River (Both on-the-run from the Interplanetary government "The Alliance"), the beautiful "companion" Inara Serra and religious man Shepard Book do legal or illegal jobs (smuggling, protecting, guns-for-hire, robberies) as the Serenity crew travels across the outskirts of Outer Space for food, money, anything to make a living on, as The Serenity crew tries to stay under the radar of The Alliance and pulls dangerous jobs in the Alliance controlled star systems.

Comments: Box set

Summary: Much praised and much missed after its premature cancellation, "Firefly" is the first SF TV series to be conceived by Joss Whedon, creator of "Buffy" and cocreator of "Angel". Set five centuries in the future, it is a show where the mysterious personal pasts of the crew of the tramp spaceship "Serenity" continually surface. In fact, it's a Western in space where the losers in a Civil War are heading out to a barren frontier. Mal Reynolds is a man embittered by the war, yet whose love of his comrades perpetually dents his cynicism--even in the 14 episodes that exist we see him warm to the bubbly young mechanic Kaylee, the preacher Book, the idealistic doctor Simon, even to the often demented River, Simon's sister, the psychic result of malign experiments.
"Firefly" is also about adult emotional relationships, for example Kaylee's crush on Simon, the happy marriage of Mal's second officer Zoe and the pilot Wash, the disastrous erotic stalemate between Mal and the courtesan Inara. Individual episodes deal with capers going vaguely wrong, or threats narrowly circumvented; character and plot arcs were starting to emerge when the show was cancelled. Fortunately, the spin-off movie "Serenity" is planned; and in the meantime, what there is of "Firefly" is a show to marvel at, both for its tight writing and ensemble acting, and the idiocy of the executives who cancelled it.
On the DVD: "Firefly" on DVD is presented in anamorphic 1.78:1 with Dolby Surround Sound. It includes commentaries on six episodes by various writers, directors, designers and cast members as well as featurettes on the conception of the show and the design of the spaceship "Serenity", four deleted scenes, a gag reel, and Joss Whedon singing the show's theme tune, more or less. One of the things that emerges from all of this is how committed to the project everyone involved with it was, and is--unusually, you end up caring as much for the cast and crew as for the characters.

Languages: English

Summary: When I read about it I was shocked; there wasn't any plasticine used in the making of this! Could this be another slick and shallow movie that aimed at all ages?
Well, I was pleasantly surprised. The humour is still very "Aardman-ish" and it's packed with good slapstick, irony and good musical jokes! The personalities are fine, with a good villain, some fine heavies, two great leading roles and quite some slugs. If you like Wallace and Gromit you'll love this!

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Languages: English, Portuguese

Subtitles: English, Spanish, French, Portuguese, Danish, Swedish, Finnish, Norwegian

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Languages: English, French, German, Japanese, Portuguese, Spanish

Subtitles: English

Sound: AC-3

Summary: Teleportation, mind control, astral projection, invisibility, precognition, spontaneous combustion, reanimation: these are among the peripheral sciences--or "pseudo-sciences," as one skeptic puts it--examined during the first season of "Fringe", a Fox network TV drama debuting on Blu-ray with the full first season (twenty episodes) offered on five extras-laden discs. The notion that those phenomena could have a genuine scientific basis is intriguing enough. But co-creator J.J. Abrams (whose bulging resume as a director, writer, and producer includes "Lost", "Alias", and the 2009 "Star Trek" feature film) has even more on his mind. Along with the weird science, the series features a multi-agency task force investigating related acts of terrorism that may very well add up to a threat of unimaginable global proportions; people who are exactly what they appear to be (i.e., insane) and others who are anything but; plot twists galore; family drama, interpersonal relationships, corporate evil, cop chases... There's a lot in play here, and while it doesn't always hold together (and like any new series, it takes a while to hit its stride), "Fringe" is rarely boring, and never less than impressively ambitious.
The pilot introduces us to the main characters, principally FBI agent Olivia Dunham (Anna Torv, good but not great in the show's central role) and others on the task force brought in to investigate some gross goings-on aboard a jumbo jet (a "self-eradicating, airborne toxin" reduced everyone to blood and bones). Seems this is but one part of "The Pattern," a series of synchronous, similarly shocking events that unfold as the show progresses; in subsequent episodes, lots of people are killed in graphic fashion by all manner of horrors, including scary monsters (slugs as big as a football, teethed parasites that can crush your heart), a gas that freezes a busload of passengers "like insects trapped in amber," people so radioactive they can literally make your brain boil... it goes on. Helping Dunham and the rest of the force figure it all out are scientist Dr. Walter Bishop (an appealing John Noble), who's spent the past 17 years locked up in the loony bin and whose research may be responsible for some of the crimes we witness, and his son-babysitter Peter (Joshua Jackson). As for the "fringe" element, Dr. Bishop and other, less benign geniuses jump-start a dead man's brain, photograph another victim's cornea in order to access the last thing she saw before death, connect Dunham to her boyfriend so she can experience his memories of the incident that left him comatose, use high-frequency vibrations to enable bank robbers to pass through a solid vault wall, and much, much more. As for where and how all of this ends up, let's just that enquiring minds will have to hang in for the long, complicated run.
High-definition bonus features are many and varied; among the best are "Deciphering the Scene" (brief explications of key scenes in every episode) and "The Massive Undertaking" (detailing how certain special effects sequences were pulled off). Exclusively on Blu-ray are expert scene analysis and BD-Live writer-producer commentary. "--Sam Graham"

Languages: English, Portuguese

Subtitles: French, Portuguese, Spanish

Sound: AC-3

Summary: From J.J. Abrams ("Lost"), Alex Kurtzman and Roberto Orci – the team behind "Star Trek" and "Alias" – and executive producers Jeff Pinkner, J.H. Wyman and Bryan Burk, "Fringe" returns for a second thrilling season and continues to explore the unexplained phenomena and terrifying occurrences linked throughout the world – known simply as "The Pattern" – in pursuit of a larger, more shocking truth. Set in Boston, the FBI's Fringe Division formed when Special Agent Olivia Dunham (Anna Torv) enlisted the help of institutionalized "fringe" scientist Walter Bishop (John Noble) and his son, Peter (Joshua Jackson), to save her partner and lover from a mind-bending death. Through unconventional and unorthodox methods, the Fringe team imagines and tests the impossibilities while investigating unbelievable events, macabre crimes and mystifying cases involving teleportation, reanimation, genetic mutation, precognition, artificial intelligence and other fantastical theories. When the unimaginable happens, it's their job to stop it.

Summary: One of a series of revisionist Vietnam cinema released in the late 1980s, Stanley Kubrick's "Full Metal Jacket" is essentially split into two stories linked by a number of characters. The film follows new recruit Joker (Matthew Modine) and his fellow soldiers through their basic training and into combat in Vietnam. The first half is a chilling portrayal of military brutality and de-humanisation, mainly at the hands of Sgt Hartman (played at a level of staggering intensity by ex-Marine Lee Ermey), that centres around the tragic character of Private Pyle, a young man pushed to the edge of his endurance. The tone of the film is no less harsh when transported to the combat zone as we see the results of the training process in action: the young men turned into unquestioning killing machines. Joker is perhaps the one exception, a soldier with "Born to Kill" written on his helmet who also sports a peace sign on his lapel. But the film finds itself caught in the trap of many of the war movies of the time--how to create audience empathy with characters who are essentially in the wrong. It's a dilemma that "Full Metal Jacket" never really solves, although as a spectacle the film is a masterpiece. Made in the days before CGI became the norm, the battle sequences--filmed, rather bizarrely, in London's Docklands before its redevelopment--are hugely realistic and are perhaps the key moments of the movie, heightening the disorientation and fear felt by the soldiers. By offering no more than a snapshot of the Vietnam conflict (the action deals with one individual skirmish), Kubrick cleverly leaves any judgement on the war to the audience, although clearly attempting to influence them. The fate of the characters who survive is also left in the balance, but we can perhaps imagine what awaits them.
On the DVD: Part of a series of Kubrick DVD reissues, "Full Metal Jacket" has been treated to the full remastering and restoration treatment. The battle sequences have benefited the most, gaining a new audio and visual crispness and clarity that adds to their already impressive sense of realism--you can almost feel the heat searing from the screen and the explosions detonating around you. Maybe not the best war film ever made, as some may claim, but certainly one to take you right to the heart of the action. --"Phil Udell"