The Human Centipede

• HUMAN CENTIPEDE, THE (DVD MOVIE)

100% Medically accurate.
The compelling simplicity of Saw. The stylish dread of Eraserhead. The black humor of A Nightmare On Elm Street. Those are the benchmarks of horror that the outrageous Dutch film The Human Centipede matches. The plot is diabolically simple: two stranded American tourists are given shelter by a famed German doctor (a maniacally intense Dieter Laser) who made his fortune surgically separating conjoined twins. Now his mad genius is pushing the doctor to do the reverse. He tells the women that they will be surgically attached to a Japanese businessman mouth to buttocks, one after the other and thus will be born a new creature: the human centipede! Compellingly perverse, hilarious, and shockingly straightforward, Dutch director Tom Six s new film is hands-down the most memorable horror film of the year.Equal parts Cronenbergian body hor! ror, perverse fetish film, and E.C. Comics-style gross-out, The Human Centipede is Dutch director Tom Six's uniquely macabre endurance test for fans of modern fright fare. What's surprising about the picture isn't the premise--its story, about a madder-than-mad doctor (German actor Dieter Laser) who unites two American tourists (Ashley C. Williams and Ashlynn Yennie) and a Japanese counterpart (Akihiro Kitamura) in a hideous surgical procedure that creates the title monstrosity, was broadcast in detail across the Internet prior to its international theatrical screenings--but rather, the degree of reserve Six applies to depicting every excruciating detail. That's not to say that Human Centipede is a bloodless affair, but Six relies more on the physical endurance and talent of his actors to present the mortal terror of their predicament, which in turn offers a more terrifying experience for the viewer than anything dreamed up by a special effects team. The appro! ach also makes up for some of the more crassly exploitive mome! nts in t he film, like the doctor's relentless abuse of his creation, which is largely clad only in filthy underwear, and Laser's occasional overacting, which at its most heated, suggests an unholy, highly medicated hybrid of Klaus Kinski, Lance Henriksen, and the late Howard Vernon's awful Dr. Orlof. Obviously, this is not for the casual horror fan, and most definitely not for the squeamish; more hard-core types should find their nerves thoroughly rattled by the time the film reaches its darker-than-dark conclusion. A final, disturbing note: the complete title is The Human Centipede (First Sequence); a planned sequel reportedly promises a 12-segment (gulp) creation. --Paul Gaita

Be Cool

• ISBN13: 9780060777067
• Condition: Used - Very Good
• Notes: 100% Satisfaction Guarantee. Tracking provided on most orders. Buy with Confidence! Millions of books sold!

Starring an unbelievably hip all-star cast, including John Travolta, Uma Thurman, André 3000, Steven Tyler and The Rock, and bursting with the hottest music in the biz, Be Cool is the wildly hilarious tale about a gangster turned music mogul and what it takes to be number one with a bullet. When Chili Palmer (Travolta) decides to try his hand in the music industry, he romances thesultry widow (Thurman) of a recently whacked music exec, poaches a hot young singer (Christina Milian) from a rival label and discovers that the record industry is packin' a whole lot more than a tune!Be Cool takes its own advice: It's slick, Hollywood entertainment that kills two amusing hours with relative ease and comfort. Bett! er than leftovers but not as tasty as a full-course meal, this sequel to 1995's hit comedy Get Shorty (and based on Elmore Leonard's 1999 sequel novel) finds former loan shark Chili Palmer (John Travolta) itching to get out of the movie business, so he hooks up with a newly widowed music executive (Uma Thurman) to launch the career of an up-'n-coming Beyoncé-like singer (newcomer Christina Milian). A mock-black manager (Vince Vaughn), his sleazy boss (Harvey Keitel), and an upscale gangsta-rap executive (Cedric the Entertainer) all have a competing stake in the fast-rising pop diva's future, and this sets the plot rolling in a fun but rather hand-me-down fashion that lacks the savvy panache of Get Shorty but still provides plenty of lightweight humor. The Rock and Outkast's André Benjamin provide the best laughs in supporting roles that effortlessly relieve the movie from the symptoms of sequelitis. --Jeff ShannonStudio: Tcfhe/mgm Release Date: 07/05! /2011 Rating: Pg13Starring an unbelievably hip all-star cast,! includi ng John Travolta, Uma Thurman, André 3000, Steven Tyler and The Rock, and bursting with the hottest music in the biz, Be Cool is the wildly hilarious tale about a gangster turned music mogul and what it takes to be number one with a bullet. When Chili Palmer (Travolta) decides to try his hand in the music industry, he romances thesultry widow (Thurman) of a recently whacked music exec, poaches a hot young singer (Christina Milian) from a rival label and discovers that the record industry is packin' a whole lot more than a tune!Be Cool takes its own advice: It's slick, Hollywood entertainment that kills two amusing hours with relative ease and comfort. Better than leftovers but not as tasty as a full-course meal, this sequel to 1995's hit comedy Get Shorty (and based on Elmore Leonard's 1999 sequel novel) finds former loan shark Chili Palmer (John Travolta) itching to get out of the movie business, so he hooks up with a newly widowed music executive (Uma Thurm! an) to launch the career of an up-'n-coming Beyoncé-like singer (newcomer Christina Milian). A mock-black manager (Vince Vaughn), his sleazy boss (Harvey Keitel), and an upscale gangsta-rap executive (Cedric the Entertainer) all have a competing stake in the fast-rising pop diva's future, and this sets the plot rolling in a fun but rather hand-me-down fashion that lacks the savvy panache of Get Shorty but still provides plenty of lightweight humor. The Rock and Outkast's André Benjamin provide the best laughs in supporting roles that effortlessly relieve the movie from the symptoms of sequelitis. --Jeff ShannonDisc 1: GET SHORTY Disc 2: BE COOL

The sequel to Chili Palmer's hit movie Get Leo tanked and now Chili's itching for a comeback. So when a power lunch with record-label executive and former associate Tommy Athens ends in a mob hit, he soon finds himself in an unlikely alliance with organized-crime detective Darryl Holmes and the likely next ! target of Russian gangsters. But where others see danger, Chil! i Palmer sees story possibilities.

Enter Linda Moon, a singer with aspirations that go further than her current gig in a Spice Girls cover band. Chili takes over as Linda's manager, entering the world of rock stars, pop divas, and hip-hop gangstas. As he wings his way to success in the music business with his trademark cool, Chili manipulates his adversaries and advances his friends, all the while basing the plot of his new film on the action that results. Be Cool is rife with drama, jealousy, and betrayal, and all Chili needs to do is survive to make a new box-office hit.

The film Get Shorty was a success on many fronts. It introduced a new style of hip gangster that revised the stereotype of the Godfather series. It also helped relaunch the career of John Travolta. And it brought Elmore Leonard's impressive body of fiction to larger public attention. In Hollywood, such a triumph usually spawns a sequel--a film that rehashes the great jokes an! d cool scenes of the first film, but with none of the panache that initially inspired audiences.

In the beginning of Be Cool, the sequel to the novel Get Shorty, readers are reminded that Chili Palmer--like his creator--scored a huge success with a gangster film (his was entitled Get Leo). But the sequel, Get Lost, was a predictable dud. Rather than follow that sordid story, however, Leonard takes Chili into a totally new direction. He places Chili on a murder investigation (in which he is a prime suspect) and then traces Chili's entry into the music business. Meanwhile, Leonard reveals a whole new cast of fresh, funny, and flaky characters to populate Chili's world, characters like Elliot the gigantic, gay, Samoan bodyguard who lives to be on the stage. Throughout, the voice of John Travolta rings in Chili's every speech (word has it that Travolta has already been cast to reprise the role) as Leonard pokes fun at the Hollywood ! apparatus and the task of a sequel writer.

Be Cool surp asses its original because it is so self-consciously a novel about sequels, about the sometimes cowardice that limits the creativity of the American film industry. It is hard to imagine how Leonard could top the multilayered satire/crime novel/exposé. One only hopes for a sequel. Fans of Be Cool might want to check out music from The Stone Coyotes, the band that served as Leonard's model in the book. --Patrick O'Kelley

Central Station

• Portuguese with English subtitles
• Interactive Menus
• Audio Commentary by Walter Salles, Arthur Cohn, and Fernanda Montenegro
• Talent and Filmographies
• Widescreen format

Two very unlikely souls, a motherless young boy and a lonely retired school teacher become inextricably linked and form an uncommon bond as they venture from the bustling city to Brazil's remote northeast region in search of the boy's father.
Genre: Foreign Film - Portugese
Rating: R
Release Date: 13-JUL-1999
Media Type: DVDIn the opening scenes of Central Station, colorful crowds of Brazilians stream into and out of a Rio de Janeiro train, pushing through doors and windows. You're immediately pulled into the brutal vitality of a nation in motion, setting the tone for a picturesque road movie that charts Brazil's renaissance in a little boy's sear! ch for his father and an old woman's emotional reawakening. When we first meet Dora (Fernanda Montenegro), this frozen-hearted, sour-faced woman is the epitome of immobility: day after day, she sits in the train station selling her letter-writing skills to all comers, but often doesn't bother to mail these precious messages. When a woman who's paid Dora to write a pleading note to her son's long-missing dad gets run over by a bus, the child, Josue (Vinicius de Oliveira), is up for grabs. (The summary execution of a thieving street kid--in longshot--underscores the seriousness of this waif's plight.) After an abortive attempt to sell Josue for a new TV, the aspiring couch potato finds herself reluctantly propelled into an occasionally Fellini-esque odyssey through the hinterlands of Brazil's sertäo, where Dora and her sidekick find unexpected faith and family. Former documentary filmmaker Walter Salles (Foreign Land) mixes magic with realism in ! his appreciation of striking faces and places, but Central! Station is primarily fueled by the tough/tender performances of Montenegro, Brazil's Judy Dench, and de Oliveira, an airport shoeshine boy Salles cast over 1,500 other hopefuls. (Montenegro was nominated for a Best Actress Oscar, and Central Station was in the running for Best Foreign Language Film.) No cloyingly cute child-star, de Oliveira plays Josue as a bracingly idiosyncratic brat. And watching Dora's face and soul slowly, unwillingly unclench as she gets back in motion--and emotion--is potent pleasure, even if Salles's trip does dead-end in soap opera as his Brazilian pilgrim's progress winds down. --Kathleen Murphy