United Kingdom released, PAL/Region 2 DVD: LANGUAGES: French ( Dolby Digital 2.0 ), French ( Dolby Digital 5.1 ), English ( Subtitles ), WIDESCREEN (2.35:1), SPECIAL FEATURES: Cast/Crew Interview(s), Interactive Menu, Scene Access, SYNOPSIS: An underground lair serves as the point of inspiration for this deeply whimsical fantasy comedy (with echoes of Jodorowsky's RAINBOW THIEF) from French cause celebre Jean-Pierre Jeunet (AMELIE). The locale is post-9/11 Europe. As arms dealers go head to head with one another in a series of violent skirmishes -- suggesting that an apocalyptic cataclysm may be lingering on the horizon -- the unfortunate Bazil (Dany Boon) still reels from the long-ago death of his father from a roadside bomb, an event that left him orphaned as a boy. Now employed in a low-paying job as a video-store clerk, and still trying to determine how he fits into the scheme of things, he gets hit by a stray bullet from a drive-by shooting and promptly lands in the hospital. Upon release, he finds himself broke and unemployed. Hope soon crops up, however, in the form of Placard (Jean-Pierre Marielle), an ex-convict living in a scrap dump with a motley group of social outcasts SCREENED/AWARDED AT: Ceasar Awards, ...Micmacs (2009) ( Micmacs à tire-larigot )

The beauty of the South American landscape and of Gael Garcia Bernal ( Y Tu Mama Tambien , Bad Education ) gives The Motorcycle Diaries a charisma that is decidedly apolitical. But this portrait of the young Che Guevara (later to become a militant revolutionary) is half buddy-movie, half social commentary--and while that may seem an unholy hybrid, under the guidance of Brazillian director Walter Salles ( Central Station ) the movie is quietly passionate. Guevara and his friend Alberto Granado (Rodrigo de la Serna, a lusty and engaging actor) set off from Buenos Aires, hoping to circumnavigate the continent on a leaky motorcycle. They end up travelling more by foot, hitchhiking, and raft, but their experience of the land and the people affects them profoundly. No movie could affect an audience the same way, but The Motorcycle Diaries gives a soulful glimpse of an awakening social conscience, and that's worth experiencing. --Bret Fetzer

<a name="review">Nicolas Philibert's mighty documentary about a single-class school in central France is as simple, fundamental and carefully constructed as a child's first lesson. Filmed with noticeable care, <em>Etre et Avoir</em> follows teacher Georges Lopez as he conducts his students (aged four to 12) through a year of primary-school studies, instructing them with the same unwavering patience whether they're taking dictation or sledging through the wilds. Philibert's technique--natural lighting, wide-angled close-ups and a compressed audio track that picks out a chorus of whispering--reconnects us to a child's view of the classroom, an enchanted world of table-top discoveries and minor miracles in which the teacher is often just a distant voice and a pair of demonstrating hands. To the cynical eye, there might be a touch of la France profonde in the film's admiration for Lopez and his apple-cheeked pupils--while the school's rural setting, with its stately agricultural rhythms, is a far cry from the troubled Parisian suburbs of 2008's <em>The Class</em>. Nonetheless, Philibert lays social politics aside to show young minds trying their teeth on life's larger concepts--whether it's Marie, a well-behaved four-year-old, politely retreating from a scary discussion about ghosts, or Jojo, her wide-eyed classmate, struggling to name the farthest number that can be counted. Impressively, these kids are never obviously aware of the cameras, proving the film-maker's maxim that you have to first withdraw in order to get up close. <em>--Leo Batchelor</em>

An epic on the grandest scale, Luchino Visconti's The Leopard (Il gattopardo) re-creates, with nostalgia, drama, and opulence, the tumultuous years of Italy's Risorgimento, when the aristocracy lost its grip and the middle classes rose and formed a unified, democratic Italy. Burt Lancaster (The Killers, Birdman of Alcatraz; Lawman; Zulu Dawn; Local Hero) stars as the aging Prince of Salina watching his culture and fortune wane in the face of a new generation, represented by Alain Delon (Texas across the River, Girl on a Motorcycle; Le samouraï; Borsalino; Swann in Love) and Claudia Cardinale (8 1/2, The Red Tent; Once Upon a Time in the West; Escape to Athena; Fitzcarraldo).

<a name="review">Like an ice-cold shower, Michael Haneke's solemn and sobering films are more often good for the soul than a guaranteed pleasure. While not as confrontational as his previous film <em>Funny Games</em>, Haneke's <em>The White Ribbon</em>--an account of sinister events in a rural German village in 1913--offers no compromises to the audience, but creates an unsolvable, unsettling riddle meant as a remedy to the disposable violence of conventional cinema. The morality of the village is safeguarded by three powerful disciplinarians: a doctor, a pastor and a baron, each privately abusive in different ways. Their order is threatened by a series of local incidents ranging from apparent accidents to acts of callous sabotage and vicious cruelty. The village's creepy-looking children are somehow involved; in 20 years, the narrator reflects, the same kids will participate in the rise of Nazi Germany, and a link is implied between the rise of fascism and a generation's moral hypocrisy and authoritarianism. But nothing is confirmed and no-one is accused. Neither is the audience off the hook: we're complicit in the generalized evil at the heart of <em>The White Ribbon</em> for expecting the kind of palatable violence that's carried out by unambiguous villains. Haneke gives us no such consolation. To borrow Al Pacino's great lines from <em>Scarface</em>: we're not allowed to point our fingers and say 'that's the bad guy', however much we need to. <em>--Leo Batchelor</em>

United Kingdom released, PAL/Region 2 DVD: LANGUAGES: English ( Dolby Digital 5.1 ), Italian ( Dolby Digital 5.1 ), Russian ( Dolby Digital 5.1 ), Spanish ( Dolby Digital 5.1 ), English ( Subtitles ), WIDESCREEN (2.35:1), SPECIAL FEATURES: Interactive Menu, Scene Access, SYNOPSIS: A hotel room in the centre of Rome sets the interior scene where two young women, who have just met, go on a physical journey which will touch their souls. Before they leave to go back to their respective lands, Spanish Alba (Elena Anaya, Sex and Lucía, Mesrine: Killer Instinct, Hierro) and Russian Natasha (Natasha Yarovenko) embark with their bodies and souls on an unforgettable one night stand. Room In Rome is directed by one of Spain's most recognised directors Julio Medem (Sex and Lucía, Lovers Of The Arctic Circle). ...Room in Rome (2010) ( Habitación en Roma ) ( Domatio sti Romi )