Lost in Austen (Image, $27.98) — Hollywood loves to raid the big and small screens across the pond. “State of Play,” a political thriller opening today, is based on a British miniseries. Now Columbia has announced it will turn another U.K. serial, “Lost in Austen,” into a movie, with Oscar winner Sam Mendes producing.
“Lost in Austen” could actually be that rare work that improves on being remade: The miniseries, which aired last fall in Britain, is a mixed bag. Amanda (Jemima Rooper) is a Jane Austen fan who wishes her dull boyfriend were more like “Pride and Prejudice’s” Darcy. She gets to learn what he’s really like when Elizabeth Bennet (“Quantum of Solace’s” Gemma Arterton) shows up in her apartment through a portal in the bathroom and encourages her to check out Georgian England for herself. When Mr. Bingley falls in love with Amanda instead of Jane — “You make the most refreshingly elliptical conversation, Miss Price,” he says, but one suspects it’s her flattering top he really notices — she worries she’s destroying the fictional world she so loves.
Austen fans might get a little frustrated at the liberties taken and the cluelessness with which the heroine approaches the past. As a friend remarked, “If she likes manners, why doesn’t she have any?” Austen’s world is so lovingly re-created, though, it’s impossible not to keep watching. Fans of the novel will simply have to know what happens in this clever alternate world in which Amanda wonders, “Is this like the Jim Carrey thing, but period?” When the very 21st-century heroine wards off Bingley by claiming she’s a lesbian, another famous character admits her own Sapphic feelings. This isn’t your grandmother’s Austen. While Amanda initially finds Darcy as frustrating as Elizabeth did, she also finds herself falling for his many charms. She might start wondering whether she actually wants to go home.
Pride and Prejudice (A&E, $44.95 for Blu-ray) — “I’m having a weird, postmodern moment,” Amanda says in “Lost in Austen.” She somehow has persuaded Darcy to strip to his undershirt and emerge from Pemberley’s lake dripping with sexuality, as Colin Firth did as Darcy in the 1995 miniseries.
That version is the definitive adaptation and one unlikely to be bettered. It’s been gloriously restored for a two-disc Blu-ray release. The restorer notes in a featurette that he never sees any classic television on Blu-ray — but that the technology has improved in just the past six months, enabling restorers to do work they never could do before. “P&P” might be the first of a Blu-ray wave of classics.
“P&P” wasn’t just a faithful version of Austen’s novel; it changed how literary adaptations were made. It kept the tone of Austen’s novel while making it modern by showing the characters as real people. “I wanted to remind the audience of the physicality of these people. So I quite shamelessly took every opportunity to get them out of their kit whenever I could find a valid excuse for it,” screenwriter Andrew Davies laughingly says. It might be the first time a star went to the gym to prepare for a 19th-century story, as Mr. Firth did.
That comment was made in another featurette that’s new to this release. Also new is “An Impromptu Walkabout” with the actors who played Wickham and Mary, while a making-of featurette was already on an earlier release.
— Kelly Jane Torrance
Sin City (Buena Vista, $35.99). Director Robert Rodriguez introduced moviegoers to Frank Miller’s noirish comic-book universe in 2005. The movie was so reverential to its gritty, violent source material that Mr. Miller even was brought onboard as a co-director.
Well, the stylish brutality is back in a two-disc Blu-ray package. It gives viewers a stunning, high-definition look at Basin City — a place where a dame or tough guy could get a shot in the head as easily as a shot and a beer. Two cuts of the film are included, the theatrical release and an expanded version breaking out the individual stories. Nearly all the extras found in 2005’s “Recut, Extended and Unrated” DVD set are also present along with a couple of notable interactive features.
My favorite is the Cine-Explore option that’s bundled with the theatrical cut. Listen to a commentary track with Mr. Rodriguez and Mr. Miller and watch the action while pop-up windows reveal the original comic panels and the green-screen footage. It’s an excellent way to see how the movie mirrored the comics.
The less impressive “Kill ’em Good, Interactive Comic Book” offers the chance to relive and become part of the tale of “The Hard Goodbye” in its illustrated glory. Using the Blu-ray player’s controller, specifically the directional and numerical pads, the viewer takes part in a car chase, throws money at a stripper and then shoots and cleaves a bunch of thugs. The button-clicking action is more of a DVD set-top challenge than full-blown video-game experience. Other than getting to gawk at a mildly animated version of Mr. Miller’s beautiful drawings, “Kill ’em Good” is a 10-minute diversion at best.
— Joseph Szadkowski
Notorious (Fox, $34.98) The rise and fall of Christopher Wallace (aka Biggie Smalls, the Notorious B.I.G.) is a story that’s little more than a decade old yet already steeped in legend. His hardscrabble life on the streets of Brooklyn; his discovery by Sean “Puff Daddy” Combs; his battle with West Coast rival Tupac Shakur; his early death on the streets of Los Angeles. It’s all here and all told squarely from the perspective Mr. Combs finds most flattering. (He served as executive producer.)
The collector’s edition hits shelves with a plethora of extras: deleted scenes, numerous featurettes about the making of the movie and an extended director’s cut. Followers of rap’s East-West feud of the mid-’90s will find much to enjoy here.
— Sonny Bunch
Rhoda: Season One (Shout! Factory $39.99) — Valerie Harper parlayed her role as Rhoda Morgenstern, Mary Richards’ beloved BFF on CBS’ long-running “The Mary Tyler Moore Show,” into her very own Emmy-winning sitcom. “Rhoda” (1974-78) followed the adventures of the native New Yorker after she left Minnesota (and Mary) to return to the Big Apple when she meets the love of her life, the ruggedly handsome Joe Gerard (David Groh). Season one’s 25 episodes, now on DVD in a special 35th-anniversary edition, followed the courtship and also introduced the show’s other memorable characters: Rhoda’s meddlesome and manipulative mother, Ida (Nancy Walker); her needy and depressed sister, Brenda (Julie Kavner); her loving yet ineffectual father, Martin (Harold Gould); and the unseen Carlton the Doorman (voiced by Lorenzo Music). Along with the full first season, the four-disc set also includes the featurette “Remembering Rhoda: All New Look Back at the Creation and Success of Rhoda.”
— Robyn-Denise Yourse
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