Roadshow - November 2009 Releases

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

DEFIANCE

STUDIO:               Roadshow
RELEASE DATE:    20 October 2009
DIRECTOR:           Edward Zwick
STARRING:           Daniel Craig, Liev Schreiber, Jamie Bell
CATEGORY:          War Drama
RATING:               M Contains violence and offensive language
RRP DVD:             $34.99

Courage is the Ultimate Weapon.

During World War II, four Jewish brothers escape their Nazi-occupied homeland of Eastern Poland/West Belarus and join the Soviet partisans to combat the Nazis. The brothers eventually rescue roughly 1,200 Jews. The film tracks their struggle to evade invading German forces while still maintaining their mission to save Jewish lives.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

BOTTLESHOCK

STUDIO:               Roadshow
RELEASE DATE:    8 October 2009
DIRECTOR:           Randall Miller
STARRING:           Alan Rickman, Bill Pullman, Rachel Taylor, Eliza Dushku
CATEGORY:          Comedy
RATING:               M Contains low level offensive language
RRP DVD:             $29.99

A True Story of Love, Victory and Fermentation.

In 1976, Steven Spurrier, a sommelier in Paris, comes to the Napa Valley to take the best he can find to Paris for a blind taste test against French wine. He meets Jim Barrett, whose Chateau Montelena is mortgaged to the hilt as Jim perfects his chardonnay. There's strain in Jim's relations with his hippie son Bo and his foreman Gustavo, a Mexican farmworker's son secretly making his own wine. Plus, there's Sam, a UC Davis graduate student and free spirit, mutually attracted to both Gustavo and Bo. As Spurrier organizes the "Judgment of Paris," Jim doesn't want to participate while Bo knows it's their only chance.

DVD Special Features: "Chateau Montelena Winery" Featurette; Deleted Scenes with Optional Commentary; Feature Audio Commentary with Director Randal Miller

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

STEPTOE & SON COMPLETE COLLECTION

RELEASE DATE:    8 October 2009
STARRING:           Harry H Corbett, Wilfrid Brambell
NUMBER OF DISCS:    13
RRP DVD:             $249.99

A television classic, Steptoe and Son is the story of the love-hate relationship of a widower father and his unmarried son who run a decrepit rag-and-bone business in London. Written by Ray Galton and Alan Simpson and starring Harry H Corbett and Wilfrid Brambell as Harold and Albert Steptoe the ongoing battles between father and son struck a chord with the nation.

Packed full of quarrelsome antics and colourful repartee, this thirteen disc box set features all eight series, screened between 1962 and 1974, and both of the Christmas specials from 1973 and 1974. This definitive collection includes everyone’s favourite Steptoe episodes such as:

‘The Holiday’ (Series 1) - Albert is not happy with Harold’s choice of destination and uses his crafty ways to change his mind.

‘A Box in Town’ (Series 4) - Harold breaks out on his own. But this doesn’t stop Albert interfering in his sons love life, ironically this leads to Albert having more luck with the ladies himself, but has he got the energy…

‘Porn Yesterday’ (Series 8) – Harold picks up an old ‘What the Butler saw machine’ on his rounds and after paying his penny and having a look is shocked when he recognises the actors face…

This collection is amongst the finest of British comedy classics, full of humorous moments between father and son that everyone who loves to hate their own family can relate to and enjoy.


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

CHARLES DARWIN & THE TREE OF LIFE

RELEASE DATE:    8 October 2009
STARRING:            Sir David Attenborough
CATEGORY:          Television
RRP DVD:             $29.99

A personal insight, from the world’s favourite naturalist, into Darwin’s theory of evolution, exploring why it is more important now than ever before.

Passionate Darwinian Sir David Attenborough shares his deeply personal views on the genius of evolution in this one-hour documentary. Exploring the origin of Darwin's great idea, he makes a powerful case for the importance of the science of evolution.

Sir David reflects on this globally important idea, asking three key questions: How and why did Darwin come up with his theory? Why do we think he was right? And why is it more important now than ever before?

To find the answers, he goes on a journey through his own lifetime and back to Darwin's to track the changes in our understanding of the natural world. Since Darwin's time, major scientific discoveries have helped to underpin and strengthen the evidence for his revolutionary and controversial idea.

Sir David helps viewers appreciate the understanding of the natural world before the idea of evolution had been accepted in the 19th century. He traces Darwin's Beagle voyage and visits the home, Down House, where Darwin worried and puzzled over the origins of life.

Sir David also looks at a series of objections thrown at Darwin’s great book, “On The Origin Of Species”. He answers them by revisiting his alma mater, Cambridge University, where the DNA double helix was discovered, and by going back to his roots in Leicestershire, where a schoolboy unearthed a significant fossil – the earliest life form then known - in the 1950s. Charles Darwin and The Tree of Life, marks the 200th anniversary of Darwin’s birth (12th February, 1809) and 150th anniversary of the publication of “On The Origin Of Species” (24th November, 1859), which laid out the theory of evolution by natural selection.

Beautifully shot, and featuring sequences from several of Attenborough’s earlier series, Charles Darwin and The Tree Of Life is a labour of love for a man who has been at the forefront of natural history programming for decades. Included as a Special feature is the 50 minute documentary Darwin’s Struggle: The Evolution of the Origin of Species.


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

WHATEVER! THE SCIENCE OF TEENS

STUDIO:           ABC
RELEASE DATE:     1 October 2009
CATEGORY:           Documentary
RRP DVD:              $29.99

Why do perfectly loveable children seemingly turn into grunting aliens overnight? At last science may have the answer to every parent’s greatest mystery...

Teenagers are a uniquely human phenomenon. Other animals skip this phase altogether, developing rapidly from infancy to adulthood. And at no other time in our lives do our physical and social attributes change so dramatically.

If you believe what you read the current generation of Aussie adolescents are the wildest yet...

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

print