Get Your DVDs!

Quarantine, Frozen River and How to Lose Friends and Alienate People arrive on DVD this week.

Quarantine
Sony
$28.96
Blu-ray: $39.95

Plot: While filming a segment about firefighters for her “after-hours” TV show, a reporter (Jennifer Carpenter) tags along on an emergency call and finds herself trapped in an apartment building where a mysterious virus is turning all of the residents into cannibalistic zombies.

Opinion: The third in 2008’s loose trilogy of Blair Witch-style first-person point-of-view horror movies—the other two being Cloverfield and Diary of the Dead—Quarantine is a surprisingly effective thrill ride that provides plenty of shocks and scares during its slender 89-minute runtime.  Viewers who were turned off by Cloverfield’s shaky camerawork will be happy to hear that this film is easier to watch, although, as you might expect, the images do start bouncing around quite a bit whenever the cameraman has to run away from an infected human.  The film’s best asset is its relentless pace, which rarely gives you a chance to pause for breath.  And while a bit more detail about the virus itself would have come in handy, there’s something compelling about being in the same position as the characters instead of one step ahead of them.  I’m not about to call Quarantine an instant classic, but, all things considered, it’s a pretty damn good horror film.

Bonus Features: A commentary track from the co-writer/director and the co-writer/producer and three making-of featurettes.

Verdict: Buy It

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Frozen River
Sony Pictures Classics
$28.96
Blu-ray: $39.95

Plot: A working-class single mom (Melissa Leo) starts a sideline career smuggling immigrants across the Canadian border into New York state in order to earn enough cash to buy her family a new trailer.

Opinion: Oscar pundits were shocked earlier this year when the Academy announced Melissa Leo as one of the five finalists for the Best Actress trophy for her starring role in this micro-budgeted indie, a slot many assumed would go to an actress from a higher-profile film.  In retrospect though, her nomination isn’t that much of a surprise as this is exactly the kind of role Oscar voters (particularly from the acting branch) love to recognize.  Not only is she playing a trailer park mom (going working class is catnip for rich movie stars), she’s also doing it sans any hint of Hollywood glamour, which means no makeup or fancy accessorized outfits.  As a movie, Frozen River has its problems—a so-so screenplay and too-neat finale among them—but Leo’s performance definitely lives up to the hype.  And if enough Academy voters check the movie out on DVD, she could go home with the Oscar on Sunday night.

Bonus Features: A commentary track from the film’s director and producer.

Verdict: Rent It

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How to Lose Friends and Alienate People
MGM
$27.98

Plot: A cynical British journalist (Simon Pegg) scores a job with a high-end celeb glossy based in NYC and proceeds to cause havoc by flouting authority and insulting rising young stars.  But the opportunity to bed a hot-to-trot starlet (Megan Fox) soon makes him fall in line and join the ranks of his fellow celebrity worshippers.

Opinion: Simon Pegg is one of my favorite writers and actors working right now, but even his immense charm can’t rescue this dud.  Based on the infamous exploits of former Vanity Fair journalist (and current Top Chef judge) Toby Young, the movie purports to give viewers an all-access pass into the world of magazine publishing, but you could fit all that it knows about the industry into a two-page pamphlet.  How to Lose Friends…also suffers from an inability to decide whether it wants the audience to loath or love the main character.  We’re meant to cheer his anti-authoritarian ways, but then he goes and does something detestable, like stealing a co-worker’s handbag to hide the body of a dead dog.  Here’s hoping Pegg reunites with his Hot Fuzz/Shaun of the Dead buddies soon, because movies like this aren’t doing his career any favors.

Bonus Features: Two commentary tracks, one with Pegg and the film’s director and another with the director on his own, and a generic behind-the-scenes documentary.

Verdict: Skip It

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Also on DVD

If Quarantine has you in the mood for more horror flicks, you can check out the new gorefest The Midnight Meat Train (Lionsgate, $28.98), based on a Clive Barker story, or Feast III: The Happy Finish (The Weinstein Co., $19.97), the latest—and possibly last—installment in the lucrative monster movie franchise helmed by former Project Greenlight winner John Gulager.  It’s not a horror film, but the thought of Sam Rockwell playing a sex addict does make Choke (20th Century Fox, $27.98), adapted from Chuck “Fight Club” Palahniuk’s book, sound a little frightening.  Elsewhere, Clint Eastwood’s underrated Changeling (Universal, $29.98) features Melissa Leo’s fellow Best Actress nominee Angelina Jolie in a strong turn as a single mother desperately searching for her missing son in 1920s-era Los Angeles.  Flash of Genius (Universal, $29.98) casts Greg Kinnear as the inventor of the intermittent windshield-wiper, who devoted his life to proving that the auto industry stole his design.  In the documentary world, the mock-doc Religulous (Lionsgate, $29.95) finds comedian/armchair politician Bill Maher exploring America’s fascination with all things spiritual, while film critic-turned-filmmaker Godfrey Cheshire explores his family roots in Moving Midway (First Run Features, $24.95).