Mandy Moore and Zachary Levi voice the two principal heroes in Tangled, a Disney-fied retelling of the Rapunzel fairytale. As another princess tale, Tangled represents Disney again re-discovering its roots, though in execution it ran more Dreamworks than Princess and the Frog. And critics dug it. Certified Fresh at 90%, Tangled is in good company as part of a modern day Disney renaissance, with the studio?s last two animated features receiving high marks (Princess at 84%, and Bolt with 89%).
Catch Natalie Portman again in her Oscar-winning turn as a rising New York dancer whose twisted friendships with her coach (Vincent Cassel) and rival (Mila Kunis) begin to drive her insane. Exactly the kind of girl you want to take home to mama. Darren Aronofsky brought home the box office with this one, crafting his first film to cross the $100 million milestone. And Certified Fresh at 88%? It so deserved it.
The Evangelion remake movies are designed to be more accessible, but with titles like these, no wonder the uninitiated are hesitant. And then you jump into the actual content: acrobatic mechs, religious over- and undertones, big bloody battles, love triangles, and lots of emo anime boys screaming. Crazy, crazy stuff. These movies will create a teratology that retells the series proper in a new way and with a whole new ending.
Hey, pretty good week for animation fans! Cartoons went way dark in the late 1970s/early 1980s, with releases like Disney’s The Black Cauldron and Watership Down. The best film to come out of this era? Easily, The Secret of Nimh, which hits Blu-ray this week. Don Bluth takes a wonderfully bleak story about rats and human experimentation and combined it with his trademark expressive, tender animation. Also out this week: All Dogs Go to Heaven and the sequel, All Cats Go to Hell.
Yes, there is a “Miraculously Restored” on the cover. Ah, the evangelical work of patron saints of DVD restoration. The Cecil B. DeMille classic that you’ve caught here and there growing up on Easter Sundays returns to the home video market with features like a newsreel of the Ten Commandments New York premiere and commentary by an author of a Ten Commandments making-of tome.
