New Release Tuesday !

Well, it's Tuesday again and time for another round of new releases. There are many good releases this week and a few gaming tidbits.

Birth : Nicole Kidman stars in this somewhat slow but entertaining reincarnation story.

House Of Flying Daggers : My #1 pick of the week. Director Zhang Yimou, who gave us the visually stunning Hero does it again with this movie. This is more of a moving oil painting than a movie. The use of setting and color is just amazing, and add in the outrageously beautiful Ziyi Zhang (Crouching Tiger,Hidden Dragon and Hero) and this is a must-see movie experience.

Meet The Fockers : The mis-adventures of Gaylord Focker continue. This time we are introduced to his parents who are played by Dustin Hoffman and Barbara Streisand. The DVD contains 2 versions of the movie (theatrical and extended) with 65 Bloopers and over 20 Deleted scenes. A very entertaining sequel to Meet The Parents.

Primer : Here is my #2 pick of the week. This movie was the Grand Jury Winner at the Sundance Film Festival. Directed by Shane Carruth on a whopping buget of $7,000.00. Shane shows us that a amazing movie does not have to cost millions. This is a thinking-mans time-travel movie and will cause many a discussion between viewers after its done, much like the original Donnie Darko.

XXX Uncensored Unrated Director's Cut : Well, if that isn't a mouth full. This is more of a promotional tool for the release of the new XXX:State of the Union movie than a new look at this movie. Don't get me wrong, I loved the first movie, call it a guilty pleasure. But this 2-disc set only adds 8 minutes of additional scenes and over half the special features are about the new movie. There is a short on disc 2 entitled "The Death of Xander" which bridges the story gap between the two movies. You have Vin playing a bad-boy James bond and Asia Argento attempting to act,,come on, how can you go wrong.

Miracles-The Complete Series : This TV series aired during the 2002-2003 season and was cancelled after 6 episodes. It was almost a carbon copy of the X-Files with more a a slant toward spiritually oriented stories. The main character worked for the Catholic Church and investigated miracles. The 4-disc dvd collections features the 6 original episodes plus the remaining 7 that where never broadcast.

Riding The Bullet : Another Stephen King made for tv movie comes to dvd. This adaptation of King's first ebook was directed by Mick Garris who helmed the great adaptation of the Stand. This was a good book, but sure didn't make a good movie.

On the gaming front the major news this week was the release of the long awaited HALO 2 auto-update for XBOX live. This update corrects glitches and cheats that where present in the initial release. Also the new map downloads have been slated for a Monday April 25 release.

Unreal Championship 2:The Liandri Conflict : This XBOX release finally gives us a sequel to the first Unreal. With updated graphics and a new melee system this looks to be a great game and will be a monster on XBOX Live.