DVD OF THE WEEK

TAXI TO THE DARK SIDE ****
Dir: Alex Gibney

It's documentary time again with the release of this year's Best Documentary Oscar winner. And powerful, sobering stuff it is too. Those tired of the more recent form of histrionic documentary entertainment popularised by Michael Moore will be relieved to hear that here we have a piece of work that is intelligent, impartial, and not relying on stunts or gimmicks.
Taxi To The Dark Side uses as its starting (and finishing) point the detainment of a taxi driver in Bagram prison in Afghanistan. Within five days he was dead, beaten to death by American soldiers. The documentary then expands the story to connect Bagram with Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq and the starting point for the new 'Bush doctrine”, Guantanamo Bay. It soberly lays out – with full documentation – the steps taken by the Bush administration, particularly Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, and now-disgraced Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, to circumvent the Geneva Convention and the American constitution, changing military operating procedure to allow for practices regarded worldwide as torture. It carefully points out that, bottom line, torture doesn't work, and makes a good case that in other eras many of the administration could fairly have been charged as war criminals.
This is strong stuff, carefully balancing smaller personal stories with the big picture and interviewing many of the soldiers involved in Abu Ghraib and Bagram. It exposes the charade of Guantanamo and looks at how this has trashed America moral authority in world matters. Amongst the few who emerge well is John McCain, who openly fought the Bush regime's duplicitous manoeuvrings.
This is an important film and may end up being a significant historical document of a brief time when morality was suspended along with the law of habeas corpus to serve the ends of an aggressively misguided administration.

I was never a big fan of Sex and the City but even I was happy to ‘lax out to the bubbly exploits of New York's fab female foursome. So it came as some surprise that Sex and the City: The Movie (**) is quite as tedious as it is. It turns out that there really was nothing much of interest to add to the TV series, but even in creating a feature length version in which the women – now older and duller – continue to wrestle with love and commitment the makers have played this so safe that the risqué pleasures of the series' once-transgressive humour are muted into a dull and rather clumsy rom-com. There are, of course, many elegant dresses on display and many 'to die for” shoes, handbags and general accessories. That's either a promise or a threat, depending on your tastes.

Ever since The Sixth Sense M Night Shyamalan's directorial career seems to have been in a downward spiral. The Village was pretty dire and last outing The Lady in the Water simply awful. Things don't improve much with The Happening (**). It certainly has a striking opening, as random groups of Americans simultaneously commit suicide, but from then on it becomes a War of the Worlds retread with Mark Walberg and Zooey Deschanel running blandly from one dangerous situation to another. Sadly there are no aliens to liven things up. It turns out that the trees did it. Of course.

Spanish horror sensation [Rec] (****) arrives here on DVD just as its American remake (Contagious) hits cinemas. And it's quite a bundle of bloody fun. Taking its style from first-person monster movie Cloverfield, [Rec] is presented entirely through the lense of a documentary crew following a night in the life of local firemen. The first call-out takes them to an apartment where Bad Things Happen. Not to put too fine a point on it the place is soon sealed off and swarming with zombies. Many deaths ensue and, while breaking no new ground [Rec] turns its tricks with style.

A bunch of Las Vegas losers are the focus of Even Money (***), their stories interconnecting as they follow their addictions and bad habits to various unhappy endings. Kim Bassinger is a gambling-addicted author and mother destroying her marriage. Danny Devito is a washed up magician looking for a comeback. Forrest Whittaker has got in too deep betting on his brother's basketball team. All are circled by vicious loan shark Tim Roth and cop Kesley Grammar. There are plot twists but primarily this is a well-observed and reasonably involving character drama.