Let's take a look at the best new movies on DVD for July, 2007.
July 3, 2007
Blood Diamond HD DVD
Leonardo DiCaprio, Djimon Hounsou and Jennifer Connelly star in this drama directed by Edward Zwick. The story is set in 1999 Sierra Leone during a civil war. A fisherman named Solomon Vandy (Hounsou) finds and hides a large, rare diamond. Later, the smuggler Danny Archer (DiCaprio) teams up with Solomon in an attempt to retrieve the valuable stone. They are joined in their quest by journalist Maddy Bowen (Connelly), who wants to expose how the diamond business is responsible for innocent people being killed.
The Patriot (2000) Extended Cut - Blu-ray Disc
Nominated for three Oscars, the action/drama The Patriot is set in 1776 South Carolina. Mel Gibson plays Benjamin Martin, a farmer who had been a soldier in the French and Indian War. Haunted by the brutality of his past military experience, he wants nothing to do with the American Revolution. However, his son (Heath Ledger) enlists, forcing Benjamin to make the difficult decision to join in the war against Britain. The Patriot was directed by Roland Emmerich (Independence Day) and has a screenplay written by Robert Rodat (Saving Private Ryan).
July 10, 2007
After the Wedding DVD
An Academy Award nominee for Best Foreign Film, this is a Danish-language drama. Jacob (Mads Mikkelsen, who played the villain in Casino Royale) runs a financially troubled orphanage in India, not having been in his native Denmark for years. Then a rich Dane named Jorgen promises a large donation, and Jacob travels to Copenhagen to get it. While there, he attends his benefactor's daughter's wedding, and it turns out he knows Jorgen's wife. As Jacob begins to come to terms with his past, the movie captures big emotions.
July 17, 2007
Avenue Montaigne DVD
In this agreeable little French-language film, Jessica (Cécile de France) is a young woman from the provinces who goes to Paris and gets hired as a waitress in a café. Her new job commences around the time a piano concert, an art action and the opening of a play are all occurring near the café. This gives Jessica an opportunity to get to know a classical pianist, an aging businessman selling off his art collection and a TV actress who will appear in a Feydeau farce. Sydney Pollack portrays an American film director.
July 24, 2007
The Host DVD
This Korean-language horror film was directed and co-written by Bong Joon-ho. The movie focuses on the Park family, which runs a snack stand on the banks of Seoul's Han River. One fine day an ugly amphibious monster suddenly emerges from the Han and attacks the crowd there. The mutant creature grabs an adolescent member of the Park family and stashes her away to eat later. Though the government claims the rampaging monster hosts a deadly virus and imposes a quarantine, the family sets out to try to save the girl.
Zodiac DVD
Starring Jake Gyllenhaal, Mark Ruffalo and Robert Downey Jr., this docudrama tells the story of still officially unsolved northern California serial killings. The film chronicles the murders that occurred around 1969 and the investigations that took place over the next two decades or so. Key investigators include a police detective (Ruffalo), a newspaper reporter (Downey) and cartoonist-turned-author Robert Graysmith (Gyllenhaal). The movie is based on Graysmith's true crime books Zodiac and Zodiac Unmasked.
July 31, 2007
300 DVD
Based on a graphic novel, this action spectacle is about the Battle of Thermopylae in 480 B.C., which is celebrated as an example of heroic resistance against an overwhelming force. Xerxes (Rodrigo Santoro) leads a huge Persian army numbering perhaps 200,000 in an attempt to conquer Greece, and at one point comes to a mountain pass defended by a mere 300 men from Sparta under Leonidas (Gerard Butler). The 300 can only slow the Persian advance, but they buy time for the Greeks to regroup and win the war.
Hot Fuzz DVD
This entertaining action comedy is a British send-up of police movies. Nicholas Angel (Simon Pegg) is a by-the-book London top cop who gets reassigned to the sleepy village of Sandford, where he becomes partners with bumbling sidekick Danny Butterman (Nick Frost). At first there's not much policing that needs doing, except for dealing with a few minor small town incidents. Then some villagers are murdered, and Nicholas must spring into action. Danny is thrilled as gun battles and car chases come to quaint Sandford.
