Malkovich offers brains over brawn in ‘Dancer’

Actor John Malkovich goes one for one with his directorial debut The Dancer Upstairs, due next week from 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment ($29.95 DVD, priced for rental VHS). It’s our…

Video pick of the week

A deliberately paced, subtly textured political thriller that openly evokes that genre’s acknowledged master, Costa-Gavras, with a reference to the latter’s 1973 film “State of Siege,” “The Dancer Upstairs” is set in the recent past in an unnamed Latin-American country.

Javier Bardem stars as Agustin Rejas, a lawyer turned police captain who’s determined to thwart a mysterious terrorist responsible for escalating outbreaks of lethal violence. Rejas must also contend with an obstructive military-run government whose officials harbor their own repressive agenda.

British screenwriter Nicholas Shakespeare, adapting his novel, wisely grants equal screen time to chronicling Rejas’ personal and moral journey. Beyond his difficult quest for justice, the married lawman also wrestles with his growing attraction to his daughter’s ballet teacher (Laura Morante), and Mr. Bardem perfectly captures his character’s increasingly conflicted emotions.

If the film has a flaw, it’s director Malkovich’s tendency to linger on scenes beyond the demands of point or poetry. Still, erring on the side of atmosphere is a refreshing alternative to mainstream Hollywood’s typically broad, superficial approach to this type of material.

The mostly Spanish cast members deliver their dialogue in accented English, so the disc’s subtitle option comes in handy on occasion. DVD extras include full-length audio commentary by Mr. Malkovich and Mr. Bardem, a “making-of” featurette, a Sundance Channel segment, and the original theatrical trailer.

If you like thrillers that stress brains over brawn without stinting on suspense, you won’t want to miss “The Dancer Upstairs.”

Collectors’ corner

On the indie beat, Lions Gate Home Entertainment lavishes double-disc special edition treatment on a pair of recent critical winners.

Peter Bogdanovich’s 2001 The Cat’s Meow ($24.98), an imaginative recreation of silent-film director Thomas Ince’s officially unsolved shooting death aboard William Randolph Hearst’s yacht in 1924, stars Kirsten Dunst, Edward Herrmann (as Hearst) and Eddie Izzard (as Charlie Chaplin) and arrives with director commentary, behind-the-scenes footage, a rare 1919 celebrity newsreel, a Sundance Channel “Anatomy of a Scene” and more.

Wayne Wang’s 1997 romantic drama Chinese Box ($19.98), set in Hong Kong and starring Jeremy Irons and Gong Li, likewise surfaces with a surfeit of extras and even contains director-writer Wang’s 1990 Chinese feature film “Life Is Cheap…But Toilet Paper Is Expensive.”

The label also issues Nicole Holofcener’s Lovely & Amazing, featuring Catherine Keener and Emily Mortimer as quibbling siblings, in a single disc augmented by cast and crew interviews ($24.98).

The ’A’ list

Two very different recent theatrical releases will hit homevid over the next two weeks. On Sept. 30, Warner Home Video unleashes the alien chiller Dreamcatcher ($27.95 DVD, $19.95 VHS), drawn from a Stephen King tale and starring Morgan Freeman and Tom Sizemore, in a disc replete with a King interview, additional scenes and featurettes.

Next week, Columbia/TriStar Home Entertainment contributes Caroline Link’s compelling, elegiac epic Nowhere in Africa ($26.98 DVD, priced for rental VHS), dramatizing an ex-pat German-Jewish family’s experiences in 1930s-’40s Kenya. The disc includes filmmaker’s commentary, deleted scenes, “making-of” featurettes, cast and crew interviews and more.

High school confidential

Universal Studios Home Video marks the new school year with its “High School Reunion Collection.” Leading the way are three John Hughes youth flicks from the fabled Brat Pack Era — The Breakfast Club, Sixteen Candles and Weird Science — available for $19.98 each or in a boxed set ($39.98). Phil Joanou’s 1987 comedy Three O’Clock High, starring Casey Siemaszko and Richard Tyson, also joins the DVD ranks ($19.98).

Terror trio

Wellspring Media, meanwhile, prepares for the Halloween season with a troika of fresh terror flicks ($14.98 DVD, $9.98 VHS each):

Horror-film icon Christopher Lee hosts the documentary feature In Search of Dracula, while 1959’s Terror Is a Man offers an interesting variation on H.G. Wells’ “Island of Dr. Moreau.” The 1975 Swedish-Irish co-production Terror of Frankenstein emerges as a fairly faithful adaptation of Mary Shelley’s genre-spawning novel. The titles are available now.

Phan mail

Dear Phantom: I absolutely was enthralled with “The Prisoner” series, but rarely ever see it broadcast. Is it available on VHS or DVD? Thanks.

— Rich Egan, via e-mail

A&E Home Video issued the 10-DVD The Complete Prisoner MegaSet, containing the entire 1960s cult series, plus bonus materials, a couple of years back. It’s available ($127.49) from Movies Unlimited (moviesunlimited.com), if you don’t see it locally.

• Send your video comments and queries to Phantom of the Movies, The Washington Times, 3600 New York Ave. NE, Washington, D.C. 20002 or e-mail us at: phanmedia@aol.com. Check out our Web site at www.videoscopemag.com.