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Baby on Board (National Entertainment Media) - This stillborn, direct-to-BluRay comedy about a whose marriage and job fall apart after she becomes pregnant wastes a decent cast: Heather Graham (wife), Jerry O'Connell (husband), Lara Flynn Boyle (her boss), Katie Finneran (her sister) and John Corbett (her brother-in-law). Michael Hamilton-Wright's script doesn't miss a cheap joke or an easy laugh, from philandering husbands and shrewish wives to misunderstandings among couples that nearly lead to divorce—until all is set straight at the end. Director Brian Herzlinger allows his actors to mug mercilessly while staging a number of crude pratfalls. Foolish from the start, Baby on Board is a cinematic miscarriage. The crisp BluRay visuals don't matter much, and the lone extra is a self-serving commentary by Herzlinger and producer Emilio Ferrari.
Burn Notice: Season Two (Fox) - The second season of this USA Network series follows the relationship of its hero, Michael (Jeffrey Donovan), and his estranged but still loyal girlfriend, Fiona (Gabrielle Anwar), as he still tries to regain his identity after being unceremoniously "burned" while a spy. Intricate plotting, gorgeous Miami locations and beautiful co-stars combine to create an entertaining show from creator Matt Nix. On BluRay, the visuals have more allure than on standard definition TV; extras include a featurette with Nix, deleted scenes, a gag reel, and audio commentaries on certain episodes.
Caravaggio (Arthaus Musik) - This two-act ballet, which premiered in Berlin last December, was inspired by the work of the master Italian painter who died in 1610 at age 38: choreographer Mauro Bigonzetti and composer Bruno Moretti blend movement based on Caravaggio’s art and life with music by his contemporary (and first great stage composer) Claudio Monteverdi, and the result, while mixed, is always intriguing. The dancers are splendid in their very physical and difficult roles, particularly leads Vladimir Malkhov and Polina Semionova. If you don't think BluRay would give appreciably more detail to watching ballet, think again; the close-ups are particularly stunning in revealing the dancers' art. Special features include backstage and rehearsal footage, along with interviews.
The Code (First Look) - A diverting if nonsensical heist movie, The Code (originally called Thick as Thieves, a clichéd but less derivative title) throws double- and triple-twists at the viewer in its story of a criminal (Morgan Freeman) who brings in a novice (Antonio Banderas) to steal two Faberge eggs from a heavily-armed New York jeweler. Subplots, dead ends, a gorgeous lawyer (Radha Mitchell) and a no-nonsense detective (Robert Forster) are crammed into 100 minutes in Mimi Leder's actioner, which begins with a taut escape on the Queens-bound 7 train and includes fun sequences that steal unabashedly from Mission: Impossible and equally silly gangster flicks. There's decent use of Manhattan, Brooklyn and Bulgarian locations, which covers crater-like plot holes; Freeman is his usual laidback self, Banderas is lost, as always, and Mitchell quite alluring. The action sequences especially stand out on BluRay, while the extras include short interviews with cast and crew, and behind-the-scenes footage.
Confessions of a Shopaholic (Buena Vista) - Isla Fischer makes a delightfully daffy heroine in this by-the-numbers romantic comedy based on Winnie Kinsella's books about an irrepressible shopper who falls in love with the up-and-coming magazine head (Hugh Dancy) who's also her boss. Shot by director P.J. Hogan in a candy-colored Manhattan where the stores have bright window decorations and look like cathedrals of capitalism, Confessions gallops along on its merry way for 105 painless minutes, and is bolstered by support from Kristen Scott Thomas, Wendie Malick and Leslie Bibb. On hi-def, the movie looks exactly as it was designed to be—an unapologetic paean to the joys of consumerism, underscored by that old standby, "girl gets boy...and everything else." Special features include a making-of featurette unique to BluRay, short clips about varying aspects of the film's production, deleted scenes and a two-minute gag reel.
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