Fun flicks

Overheated? Grumpy? Looking for some cheerful film to take your mind off the heat? Try one of our new fun-themed DVDs.
Danton, starring Gerard Depardieu and Wojciech Pszoniak, retells the merry hijinks of The Terror: the post-revolutionary period in France when everyone had a date with Madame La Guillotine. Depardieu is the popular folk hero Danton, and Pszoniak is the merciless revolutionary leader Robespierre.
"Into the valley of Death rode the six hundred". The events that inspired Tennyson's famous poem are recreated on film in The Charge of the Light Brigade. Starring Trevor Howard and David Hemmings, this movie was filmed in 1968 and uses the backdrop of a Crimean War fiasco to drive home an anti-war message geared for modern audiences.
The Wages of Fear is a classic suspense film. Four men drive a cargo of nitroglycerin over treacherous mountain roads in South America. Gritty and depressing, this movie stars the charismatic Yves Montand.
One of the most tragic tales in Western literature is that of Romeo and Juliet, and in 1961 Hollywood upped the ante by changing the setting to the tenements of New York City and infusing the story with racism and gang warfare. West Side Story has some really catchy music, tho.
In one of Jack Lemmon's most acclaimed dramatic roles, he plays a public relations guy whose career is on a tear. As his social drinking becomes more frequent, he drags his wife down with him into co-dependant alcoholism. Days of Wine and Roses was one of the first Hollywood films to take a harsh, realistic look at alcohol abuse in average America.
Hmm....I don't think I was feeling blue when I ordered all these films, so I like to think it's coincidence that such a grim selection of movies comes together at one time. Ah well, ours not to reason why...