NEWDVDs

Latest releases reviewed

BORAT: CULTURAL LEARNINGS OF AMERICA FOR MAKE BENEFIT GLORIOUS NATION OF KAZAKHSTAN
Directed by Larry Charles. Starring Sacha Baron Cohen, Ken DavItian, Pamela Anderson 18 cert
****

Jam-packed with visual and verbal gags, and entirely unencumbered by such incidentals as good taste, this uproariously politically incorrect farce stars Cohen in an impishly oversized performance as a fictional Kazakhstan TV reporter on a fact-finding tour of the US. There he becomes obsessed with meeting Pamela Anderson, who plays herself. DVD extras include Sexy Drown Watch (a Baywatch spoof), Kazakh Police Warning Video and various deleted scenes.  - Michael Dwyer

THE HISTORY BOYS
Directed by Nicholas Hytner. Starring Richard Griffiths, Frances de la Tour, Stephen Campbell Moore 18 cert
****

Adapted for the screen by Alan Bennett from his stage play with the original cast intact, Hytner's film is set at a Yorkshire school in 1983, as eight boys prepare for the Oxbridge entrance exams. Bennett displays a palpable affection for his characters that is infectious in a warm, touching and often very funny film marked by acute observations on education, history, ambition and adolescence.  - Michael Dwyer

THE HOST/GWOEMUL
Directed by Bong Joon-ho. Starring Song Gang-ho, Byeon Heui-bong, Park Hae-il, Bae Du-na 15 cert
*****

A giant aquatic monster, created by the release of tainted formaldehyde into Seoul's Han River, runs amok in this agreeably odd film from South Korea. A delightfully rich gumbo containing playful farce, violence and political commentary, the picture is released in an excellent two-disc edition to which we confidently grant the highest rating.  - Donald Clarke

MARIE ANTOINETTE
Directed by Sofia Coppola. Starring Kirsten Dunst, Jason Schwartzman, Judy Davis, Rip Torn, Steve Coogan, Rose Byrne, Marianne Faithfull, Asia Argento, Danny Huston 12 cert
**

Dunst is appealing as the teen queen in Coppola's slavishly hip picture, which is preoccupied with capturing the style of the time at the expense of historical context. Far too many scenes are shot in the style of 1980s music videos, and the gimmicks run out of steam in the fluffy film's plodding second half.  - Michael Dwyer

ISOLATION
Directed by Billy O'Brien. Starring John Lynch, Essie Davis, Sean Harris, Ruth Negga, Marcel Iures, Crispin Letts, Stanley Townsend 18 cert
***

Corkonian writer-director Billy O'Brien makes an assured feature film debut with an imaginative, unsettling and timely drama dealing with genetic tampering on a remote Irish farm. Employing an effectively layered sound design, he establishes and sustains a climate of fear.  - Michael Dwyer

THE ANT BULLY
Directed by John A Davis. Voices of Julia Roberts, Nicolas Cage, Meryl Streep, Paul Giamatti, Regina King, Bruce Campbell, Ricardo Montalban, Lily Tomlin G cert
**

A young boy, hitherto a torturer of ants, shrinks to the same size as his victims and learns the usual lessons. This routine family film seems to be trying to say something about Iraq. It fails. More seriously, the animation is ugly and the jokes poor. There is a clutch of new shorts on the DVD. Donald Clarke

ALL THE KING'S MEN
Directed by Steven Zaillian. Starring Sean Penn, Jude Law, Kate Winslet, James Gandolfini, Mark Ruffalo, Patricia Clarkson, Anthony Hopkins, Kathy Baker, Frederic Forrest, Jackie Earle Haley 18 cert
*

Robert Penn Warren's novel, based on corrupt Louisiana governor Huey Long, collected a Pulitzer Prize, and Robert Rossen's 1949 screen version won three Oscars, including best picture. Zaillian's new treatment, which quickly vanished off the Oscar radar, is laboured and convoluted and does no favours for its stellar cast. - Michael Dwyer

SIXTY SIX
Directed by Paul Weiland. Starring Helena Bonham Carter, Eddie Marsan, Peter Serafinowicz, Stephen Rea 12 cert
**

Gentle coming-of-age drama in which a north London boy struggles with the unhappy news that his Bar Mitzvah is to coincide with the 1966 World Cup Final. Good performances abound and the period detail is nice, but this is a terribly predictable business. Check out one of Jack Rosenthal's BBC plays from the 1970s instead. Donald Clarke

PULSE
Directed by Jim Sonzero. Starring Kristin Bell, Ian Somerhalder, Christiana Milian, Jonathan Tucker, Rick Gonzalez, Ron 16 cert
*

Kairo, Kiyoshi Kurosawa's spooky 2001 Japanese horror movie, gets lost in translation in a dire remake, as vapid US college students fall victim to a ghostly force over the internet. Wes Craven, who worked on the screenplay, had planned to direct it before the assignment went to Sonzero, who exhibits no discernible flair for the genre. Michael Dwyer