Sabtu, 19 Mei 2012

2005 Dark Beginning 2 DB2-186 Heart of Clear Water / Single YuGiOh! Card in a Protective Deck Sleeve

  • Single Yu-Gi-Oh Card shipped in protective top loader and sleeve
  • English Version - Single Card - Collectible Card Game (CCG)
  • Card Condition is Near Mint or Better - Deck Protectors and Boxes Sold Separately
  • "Check with us for others Single Yu-Gi-Oh Cards, Singles and Promos!"
  • NOTE: Stock Photos are used. Contact Seller if no image or description doesn't match!
No one loses their mind instantly â€" Sanity seeps away one drop at a time. Yoshimi simply wanted a better life â€" for both herself and her daughter Ikuko. Unfortunately, such wishes may sometimes be hard to come by. The custody battle has grown embittered and hurtful, her new job is less than desirable, and Ikuko’s schoolwork has taken a turn for the worse. But, Yoshimi has something bigger to worry about. Something upstairs. Something cold and dank. Something that should have never been.Dark Wate! r is Japanese horror auteur Hideo Nakata's return to the genre after his Ring cycle made you too scared to watch television ever again. Where Ringu dealt with a supernatural force wreaking revenge via technology, this film is a much more traditional ghost story. After winning a custody battle for her daughter, single mother Yoshimi moves into what she thinks is the perfect apartment with her daughter Hitomi. No sooner have they unpacked than strange things begin to disturb their new life. A water leak from the supposedly abandoned apartment above gets bigger and bigger, a child's satchel reappears even though Yoshimi throws it away several times, and she is haunted by the image of a child wearing a yellow mackintosh who bears a striking resemblance to a young girl who disappeared several years before. The conventional narrative follows Yoshimi's increasingly desperate attempts to discover who or what force is haunting her daughter, but the story's executio! n is far from predictable. Nakata is the master of understated! suspens e: there's always a feeling of motiveless malignancy that runs like an undercurrent through his films--far more frightening than out and out shocks--and here he also practically drowns his audience in water imagery. The film is saturated; the relentless dripping in the apartment, the constant rain outside and the deliberately washed-out photography make any color, such as the yellow coat, seem incongruous and unsettling. Nakata also clears the film of unnecessary characters--this is an almost deserted Tokyo--preferring to concentrate the action on Yoshimi's rising hysteria as she struggles to understand what is happening and how to save her daughter. Granted, the special effects are somewhat unconvincing and the ending confused, but even so the result is a stylish and disquieting chiller that will do for bathtubs what his Ring films did for video recorders. --Kristen Bowditch
A Junior Library Guild Selection
Driven to the edge, a burned-out rock st! ar recalls the often traumatic events that shaped his life.By any rational measure, Alan Parker's cinematic interpretation of Pink Floyd: The Wall is a glorious failure. Glorious because its imagery is hypnotically striking, frequently resonant, and superbly photographed by the gifted cinematographer Peter Biziou. And a failure because the entire exercise is hopelessly dour, loyal to the bleak themes and psychological torment of Roger Waters's great musical opus, and yet utterly devoid of the humor that Waters certainly found in his own material. Any attempt to visualize The Wall would be fraught with artistic danger, and Parker succumbs to his own self-importance, creating a film that's as fascinating as it is flawed.

The film is, for better and worse, the fruit of three artists in conflict--Parker indulging himself, and Waters in league with designer Gerald Scarfe, whose brilliant animated sequences suggest that he should have directed and animated this ! film in its entirety. Fortunately, this clash of talent and eg! o does n ot prevent The Wall from being a mesmerizing film. Boomtown Rats frontman Bob Geldof (in his screen debut) is a fine choice to play Waters's alter ego--an alienated, "comfortably numb" rock star whose psychosis manifests itself as an emotional (and symbolically physical) wall between himself and the cold, cruel world. Weaving Waters's autobiographical details into his own jumbled vision, Parker ultimately fails to combine a narrative thread with experimental structure. It's a rich, bizarre, and often astonishing film that will continue to draw a following, but the real source of genius remains the music of Roger Waters. --Jeff Shannon

Rabu, 02 Mei 2012

Frost/Nixon [Blu-ray]

  • Condition: New
  • Format: Blu-ray
  • AC-3; Color; Dolby; DTS Surround Sound; Dubbed; Subtitled; Widescreen
From Academy Award-winning director Ron Howard comes the electrifying, untold story behind one of the most unforgettable moments in history. When disgraced President Richard Nixon agreed to an interview with jet-setting television personality, David Frost, he thought he’d found the key to saving his tarnished legacy. But, with a name to make and a reputation to overcome, Frost became one of Nixon’s most formidable adversaries and engaged the leader in a charged battle of wits that changed the face of politics forever. Featuring brilliant portrayals by Frank Langella and Michael Sheen, Frost/Nixon is the fascinating and suspenseful story of truth, accountability, secrets and lies.Sounds like a good match: a historical drama from the author of The Queen, but wit! h an American subject in the generational wheelhouse of director Ron Howard. And so Peter Morgan's Tony-winning play morphs into a Hollywood movie under the wing of the Apollo 13 guy. Morgan's subject is a curious moment of post-Watergate shakeout: British TV host David Frost's long-form interviews with ex-President Richard Nixon, conducted in 1977. It was a big ratings success at the time, justifying the somewhat controversial decision to cut an enormous check for Nixon's services. The movie adds a mockumentary note to the otherwise straightforward style, having direct-to-camera addresses from various aides to Frost and Nixon (played by the likes of Oliver Platt, Sam Rockwell, and Kevin Bacon); these basically tell us things we already glean from the rest of the movie, adding unnecessary melodrama and upping the stakes. In this curious scheme, the success of Frost's career, which could bellyflop if he doesn't get something worthwhile out of the cagey, long-winded ! Nixon, is given somewhat more weight than the actual revelatio! ns of th e interviews. Even with these questionable storytelling decisions, there's still the spectacle of two actors going at it hammer and tongs, and on that level the movie offers some heat. Michael Sheen, who played Tony Blair not only in The Queen but also in another Morgan-scripted project, The Deal, is adept at catching David Frost's blow-dried charm, as well as the determination beneath it. Frank Langella's physical performance as Nixon is superb, and he certainly can be a commanding actor, though veteran Nixon-watchers might find that he misses a certain depth of self-pity in the man. Both actors were retained from the original stage production, a rare thing in Hollywood--and probably Howard's best decision of the project. --Robert HortonFrom Academy Award-winning director Ron Howard comes the electrifying, untold story behind one of the most unforgettable moments in history. When disgraced President Richard Nixon agreed to an interview with jet-s! etting television personality, David Frost, he thought he’d found the key to saving his tarnished legacy. But, with a name to make and a reputation to overcome, Frost became one of Nixon’s most formidable adversaries and engaged the leader in a charged battle of wits that changed the face of politics forever. Featuring brilliant portrayals by Frank Langella and Michael Sheen, Frost/Nixon is the fascinating and suspenseful story of truth, accountability, secrets and lies.Sounds like a good match: a historical drama from the author of The Queen, but with an American subject in the generational wheelhouse of director Ron Howard. And so Peter Morgan's Tony-winning play morphs into a Hollywood movie under the wing of the Apollo 13 guy. Morgan's subject is a curious moment of post-Watergate shakeout: British TV host David Frost's long-form interviews with ex-President Richard Nixon, conducted in 1977. It was a big ratings success at the time, justifying th! e somewhat controversial decision to cut an enormous check for! Nixon's services. The movie adds a mockumentary note to the otherwise straightforward style, having direct-to-camera addresses from various aides to Frost and Nixon (played by the likes of Oliver Platt, Sam Rockwell, and Kevin Bacon); these basically tell us things we already glean from the rest of the movie, adding unnecessary melodrama and upping the stakes. In this curious scheme, the success of Frost's career, which could bellyflop if he doesn't get something worthwhile out of the cagey, long-winded Nixon, is given somewhat more weight than the actual revelations of the interviews. Even with these questionable storytelling decisions, there's still the spectacle of two actors going at it hammer and tongs, and on that level the movie offers some heat. Michael Sheen, who played Tony Blair not only in The Queen but also in another Morgan-scripted project, The Deal, is adept at catching David Frost's blow-dried charm, as well as the determination beneath it. Frank ! Langella's physical performance as Nixon is superb, and he certainly can be a commanding actor, though veteran Nixon-watchers might find that he misses a certain depth of self-pity in the man. Both actors were retained from the original stage production, a rare thing in Hollywood--and probably Howard's best decision of the project. --Robert Horton

Sabtu, 14 April 2012

Freddy vs. Jason [Blu-ray]

  • The slicer versus the slasher? Two titans of terror going at it mano-a-machete? They re gonna kill each other a lot! The horror (and wicked fun) begins when Freddy realizes he can t haunt dreams because folks no longer fear him. So he enlists Jason to do a little killing on his behalf on Elm Street. Presto, the fear is back and so is Freddy. One problem: Jason isn t about to stop offing people. An
It's the battle everyone's been DYING to see! Teenagers find themselves caught in the middle of a battle between two legendary boogeymen: Jason Voorhees and Freddy Krueger. Who will win in the bloodiest and goriest showdown in history?

DVD Features:
3D Animated Menus
Alternate endings:Alternate opening and Ending
Audio Commentary:Commentary with Director Ronny Yu, Actors Robert Englund (FREDDY) & Ken Kirzinger (JASON)
Comparison Scenes
DVD ROM ! Features
Deleted Scenes:18 Deleted Scenes with optional commentary from Director Ronnie Yu and Executive Producer Douglas Curtis
Documentaries:--Behind the scenes coverage of the films development - including screenwriting, set design, make up, stunts and principle photography --Visual effects exploration
Featurette
Full Screen Version:Both fullscreen and Widescreen on one disc
Interviews
Music Video:Ill Nino "How Can I Live"
Storyboards
TV Spot:Lots of TV spots
Theatrical Trailer

After 11 years in development hell and screenplay drafts by 13 different writers, the long-awaited smackdown of Freddy vs. Jason finally arrives. After making their respective debuts in Friday the 13th (1980) and A Nightmare on Elm Street (1984), the hockey-masked killer Jason Voorhees (Ken Kirzinger, replacing long-time Jason performer Kane Hodder) and razor-gloved Freddy Kr! ueger (Robert Englund) square off in a slasher-franchise combo! -deal th at only their most devoted fans will appreciate; turns out this is a lightweight match in which nobody wins. It's an average entry in the histories of these horror icons, comparable to half of their previous sequels, and Bride of Chucky director Ronny Yu satisfies purists with plenty of gushing blood and mayhem when Freddy recruits Jason to slice 'n' dice the ill-fated teens who've forgotten Freddy's once-formidable reign of terror. While it logically connects the gruesome legacies of Nightmare's Elm Street and Friday's Camp Crystal Lake, this horror hybrid is shockingly uninspired. It briefly peaks when Freddy gives the unconscious Jason a dream-world pummeling, but their ultimate showdown's a draw. In the immortal words of Peggy Lee, is that all there is? --Jeff ShannonThe slicer versus the slasher? The horror (and wicked fun) begins when Freddy realizes he can't haunt dreams because folks no longer fear him. So he enlists Jason to do a little k! illing on his behalf on Elm Street. Presto, the fear is back - and so is Freddy. One problem: Jason isn't about to stop offing people. And another: Freddy isn't about to let Jason rule Elm Street. This means war. Freddy vs. Jason. Winner kills all.After 11 years in development hell and screenplay drafts by 13 different writers, the long-awaited smackdown of Freddy vs. Jason finally arrives. After making their respective debuts in Friday the 13th (1980) and A Nightmare on Elm Street (1984), the hockey-masked killer Jason Voorhees (Ken Kirzinger, replacing long-time Jason performer Kane Hodder) and razor-gloved Freddy Krueger (Robert Englund) square off in a slasher-franchise combo-deal that only their most devoted fans will appreciate; turns out this is a lightweight match in which nobody wins. It's an average entry in the histories of these horror icons, comparable to half of their previous sequels, and Bride of Chucky director Ronny Yu satisfies! purists with plenty of gushing blood and mayhem when Freddy r! ecruits Jason to slice 'n' dice the ill-fated teens who've forgotten Freddy's once-formidable reign of terror. While it logically connects the gruesome legacies of Nightmare's Elm Street and Friday's Camp Crystal Lake, this horror hybrid is shockingly uninspired. It briefly peaks when Freddy gives the unconscious Jason a dream-world pummeling, but their ultimate showdown's a draw. In the immortal words of Peggy Lee, is that all there is? --Jeff Shannon

Sabtu, 24 Maret 2012

Sexy Hair Big Sexy Hair What a Tease-4.2 oz.

Minggu, 11 Maret 2012

17-DVD Complete American Sign Language DVD Set Including Teacher's DVD & Workbook - NEW

  • Excellent for everyone learning and teaching American Sign Language
  • Over hundreds of words, sentences, idioms and grammar lessons
  • Learn from three ASL professors
  • Bonus chapters
  • Number 1 Sign Language educational program in the World

{Directed by Oscar winner Vanessa Roth}
{Inspired by the New York Times bestseller "Teachers Have It Easy"}
{Produced by Best-Selling Author Dave Eggers ("A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius").}
{Endorsed by Teacher's Unions representing millions of teachers.}
{Seen as the answer to "Waiting for Superman" and "The Lottery".}
{Opened in theatres with an $8000+ per screen average in first week and rave reviews.}
{Microsoft's Partners in Learning has launched a community screening tour in more than 400 cities and towns across the country.}

As the debate over America's public scho! ols rages on, the one thing everyone agrees on is the need for great teachers. Yet while research has shown that teachers are the most important in-school factor in a child's success, America's educators are so underpaid that almost two-thirds must work a second job in order to make a living.

Chronicling the stories of four teachers in different areas of the country, American Teacher reveals the frustrating realities of today's teachers, the difficulty of attracting talented new educators, and why so many of our best teachers leave the profession altogether. Can we re-value teaching and turn it into a prestigious, financially attractive and desirable profession? With almost half of American teachers leaving the field in the next ten years, now is the time to find out.

From the Academy Award-winning Director of An Inconvenient Truth comes the groundbreaking feature film that provides an engaging and inspiring look at public education in the United States. ! Waiting For “Superman” has helped launch a moveme! nt to ac hieve a real and lasting change through the compelling stories of five unforgettable students such as Emily, a Silicon Valley eighth-grader who is afraid of being labeled as unfit for college and Francisco, a Bronx first-grader whose mom will do anything to give him a shot at a better life. Waiting For “Superman” will leave a lasting and powerful impression that you will want to share with your friends and family.The remaining 12 episodes from the debut season--including "Love and the Medium/Love and the Bed/Love and the High School Flop-Out," "Love and the Fighting Couple/Love and the Pick-Up/Love and the Proposal," "Love and the Nervous Executive/Love and the Great Catch/Love and the Hitchhiker," "Love and Las Vegas/Love and the Good Samaritan/Love and the Marriage Counselor," and "Love and the Singles Apartment/Love and the Minister"--are available in a three-disc set. 10 1/3 hrs. total. Standard; Soundtrack: English Dolby Digital mono. **12 episodes on 3 dis! cs. 10 1/3 hrs.**Frustrated newlyweds and bickering marrieds, lecherous executives and bodacious secretaries, uptight squares and free-spirited hippies, suspicious wives and nervous husbands, inexperienced teens and swinging seniors. They’re all part and parcel of Love, American Style, the era-defining anthology series that offered a comedic look at the so-called "new morality." Rebounding after studio-imposed DVD-interruptus, this three-disc set contains the 12 episodes that complete Season One. Each contains two or three playlets. Unlike The Love Boat, all are played for laughs: A honeymooning groom accidentally locks himself in an antique store’s chastity belt; A bachelor pretends to have a wife and children to seduce a coworker who only dates married men; A harried man discovers his favorite restaurant has gone topless just as his wife surprises him for lunch. One intriguing story is "Love and the High School Flop-Out," whose story about an awkw! ard teen who has the house to himself while his parents are ou! t of tow n anticipates Risky Business, complete with friends who suggest he rent out the house for an "orgy." Love plays it completely straight. In one story, a newlywed complains her husband seems to be losing interest in her, prompting her mother to inquire if he is "strange." In another, an interior decorator in love with a mobster’s daughter is dismissed by him as a "petunia" until he dispatches the thug’s henchmen ("The fact that I have taste and a certain flair for color and design doesn’t make me any less of a man," he argues). And in another, two bickering male business partners visit a marriage counselor to sort out their troubles. Of course, what really makes this show such a star-spangled affair is each episode’s roster of character actors, TV Land cult faves, and future stars. Burt Reynolds already has his smirk going as a soldier whose wife has written a scandalous bestseller in "Love and the Banned Book." An 18-year-old Kurt Russell portrays a high! school student poised to lose his virginity in "Love and the First-Nighters." Love American Style is hip enough to reference Alice B. Toklas, Bonnie & Clyde, Rosemary’s Baby and Federico Fellini, but its chauvinistic attitudes now make the once-naughty show seem almost endearingly quaint. Still, to watch "Love and the Nervous Executive," which pairs prissy Paul Lynde with va-voom "Mighty Carson Arts Players" bombshell Carol Wayne, or "Love and the Big Night" with Tony Randall and Julie "Catwoman" Newmar, is to fall in Love all over again. --Donald LiebensonThe first 12 episodes from the debut season--including "Love and a Couple of Couples/Love and the Hustler/Love and the Pill," "Love and the Modern Wife/Love and the Phonies/Love and the Single Couple," "Love and the Legal Agreement/Love and the Militant/Love and Who?," "Love and the Burglar/Love and the Roommate/Love and the Wild Party," and "Love and the Comedy Team/Love and the Divo! rce Sale/Love and the Mountain Cabin"--are available in a thre! e-disc s et. 10 1/3 hrs. total. Standard; Soundtrack: English Dolby Digital mono. **12 episodes on 3 discs. 10 1/3 hrs.**This set is designed for all American Sign Language teachers, instructors and beginner to advanced ASL students! For the first time ever, you now can launch your American Sign Language learning experience with a huge complete ASL DVD Set with teaching materials! Complete your studies with our 16-DVD ASL collection set, including a brand new Sign Language 101 DVD and an Idioms & Phrases in ASL, Vol. 1 Teacher's Instructional DVD with more than 70 pages of teacher's workbook! This exclusive set includes the following 17 DVDs and a workbook: Idioms & Phrases in ASL, Vol. 1: Teacher's Instructional DVD & Workbook Set Sign Language 101: A Beginner's Guide to American Sign Language Idioms & Phrases in American Sign Language, Vol. 1 Idioms & Phrases in American Sign Language, Vol. 2 Idioms & Phrases in American Sign Language, Vol. 3 Idioms & Phrases in American Sign Language, Vol. 4 Idioms & Phrases in American Sign Language, Vol. 5 American Sign Language Interpreter Training: Receptive Skills Practice, Vol. 1 American Sign Language Interpreter Training: Expressive Skills Practice, Vol. 1 Common Expressions in American Sign Language, Vol. 1 Common Expressions in American Sign Language, Vol. 2 American Sign Language Everyday Words: Activities & Events American Sign Language Vocabulary Builder, Vol. 1 American Sign Language Vocabulary Builder, Vol. 2 American Sign Language for Kids & Adults, Vol. 1: Everyday Lessons American Sign Language for Kids & Adults, Vol. 2: Visiting the Zoo American Sign Language for Babies & Toddlers All 17 DVDs and a workbook is on sale for $ 139.95! This complete library/collection is perfect for your school, library, college, university, family, interpreters, teachers, professionals, colleagues and just about everyone!

Sabtu, 11 Februari 2012

Bride Wars

Kamis, 19 Januari 2012

The Good Guy

Rabu, 18 Januari 2012

Follow My Voice - With the Music of Hedwig

  • One record producer, the creators of Hedwig and the Angry Inch and top indie rock artists come together to create a tribute album benefiting the Hetrick-Martin Institute, home of the Harvey Milk High School-the first accredited high school in the country for LGBTQ youth. Follow My Voice: With the Music of Hedwig weaves the compelling, courageous stories of four students at this controversial sc
One record producer, the creators of Hedwig and the Angry Inch and top indie rock artists come together to create a tribute album benefiting the Hetrick-Martin Institute, home of the Harvey Milk High School-the first accredited high school in the country for LGBTQ youth.

Follow My Voice: With the Music of Hedwig weaves the compelling, courageous stories of four students at this controversial school with a unique chronicle of the yearlong creation of Wig in a Box, the album whose songs poi! gnantly echo these teens struggles and aspirations. Audiences around the world became instant Hed Heads as Hedwig, like everyone who was ever young, questions TheOrigin of Love, dreams of a Sugar Daddy, feels like a Freak and curses a Wicked Little Town.

Meanwhile, the little known Harvey Milk School for at-risk youth, operating for 20 years in New York City s East Village quickly became the subject of international news when it received accreditation and financial support from NYC. A furious controversy over public funding ignite passionate self-determination from the kids and a deeper commitment from the artists who them-selves know what it s like to be outside the mainstream.

Through a dramatic and vibrant combination of verité documentation, student video diaries, and rare in-studio scenes of artists recording tracks, Follow My Voice offers a powerful look at this unlikely intersection of youth, gender and rock. Includes Yoko Ono, Rufus Wainwr! ight, Cyndi Lauper, Ben Folds, The Breeders, Yo La Tengo, John! Cameron Mitchell, They Might Be Giants and more.

Happily N'ever After (Widescreen Edition)

  • Actors: George Carlin, John Di Maggio, Andy Dick, Sarah Michelle Gellar, Lisa Kaplan.
  • Format: AC-3, Animated, Closed-captioned, Color, Dolby, Dubbed, DVD, Subtitled, Widescreen, NTSC.
  • Language: English. Subtitles: English, Spanish.
  • Region: Region 1 (U.S. and Canada only).
  • Rated PG. Run Time: 87 minutes.
Once upon a time will n'ever be the same again. Sleeping Beauty, Rapunzel, and Jack from the Beanstalk are all about to live happily ever after when the balance between good and evil gets thrown out of whack. It's up to Cinderella - aka Ella (Sarah Michelle Gellar) - to save the day by taking on her power-hungry stepmother, Frieda (Sigourney Weaver). But this time, Ella will have to do it without her Prince Charming (Patrick Warburton) as she joins forces with an unlikely army of dwarves, faries, and the Wizard's bumbling assistants, Mambo (Andy Dick) and Munk (! Wallace Shawn). Your favorite fairy tales are turned upside down in this funny, fast-paced adventure that teaches the lesson that - no matter who you are - you have the power to affect how your story turns out!With the success of Shrek, more irreverent animated fairy tales (like Hoodwinked) were inevitable. Unfortunately, the original blockbuster set the bar so high--for characterization, humor, and heart--that other such 'toons are sure to seem redundant. Neither as clever nor as intricately rendered as the tale of the great green ogre, Happily N'Ever After is no exception. That said, small children may find it easier to follow, i.e. no Matrix references. As with the live-action Ella Enchanted, the CGI-animated story revolves around a downtrodden lass named Ella (Sarah Michelle Gellar). Her full name, naturally, is Cinderella. The man of her dreams is pea-brained Prince Humperdink (Patrick Warburton). Little does she know that royal dishwasher R! ick (Freddie Prinze Jr., Gellar's real-life husband) has his e! ye on he r. When the Wizard (George Carlin) goes off on a golfing vacation, he leaves bumbling assistants Munk (Wallace Shawn) and Mambo (Andy Dick) in charge. In no time at all, they get into a scuffle, and Ella's evil stepmother, Frieda (Sigourney Weaver), swoops in to take control of Fairy Tale Land. Her first order of business: Let the bad guys win. Consequently, Sleeping Beauty continues to doze, the Seven Dwarves wind up in jail, etc. Ella joins forces with Rick to set things right. Along the way, she realizes that the lowly lad has more princely qualities than the actual prince, and Frieda's reign turns out to be shorter than intended. It's not a bad idea, but the movie drags and the tunes are unmemorable. --Kathleen C. Fennessy

Summer Heights High

  • In this hilarious series set in a real Australian high school, actor/comedian Chris Lilley stars as three different characters: a vain drama teacher, a self-absorbed boy, and a haughty female exchange student. Hysterical, absurd and frequently shocking, Summer Heights High reveals a world where small issues become huge, social groups are critical, young minds are molded, hopes are shattered and dr

From the author of The Works: Anatomy of a City comes a gorgeous graphic tour through the inner workings of skyscrapers.

The skyscraper is perhaps the most recognizable icon of the modern urban landscape. Providing offices, homes, restaurants, and shopping to thousands of inhabitants, modern skyscrapers function as small cities- with infrastructure not unlike that hidden beneath our streets. Clean water is provided to floors thousands of feet in the sky; elevators ! move people swiftly and safely throughout the building; and telecom networks allow virtual meetings with people on other continents. How are these services-considered essential, but largely taken for granted- possible in such a complex structure? What does it really take to sustain human life at such enormous heights?

Exploring the interconnected systems that make life livable in the sky is the task of Kate Ascher's stunningly illustrated The Heights: Anatomy of a Skyscraper. Ascher examines skyscrapers from around the world to learn how these incredible structures operate. Just how do skyscrapers sway in the wind, and why exactly is that a good idea? How can a modern elevator be as fast as an airplane? Why are skyscrapers in Asia safer than those in the United States? Have new safeguards been designed to protect skyscrapers from terrorism?

What happens when the power goes out in a building so tall? Why are all modern skyscrapers seemingly made! of glass, and how can that be safe? How do skyscrapers age, ! and how can they be maintained over decades of habitation? No detail is too small, no difficulty too big to escape Ascher's encyclopedic eye.

Along the way, The Heights introduces the reader to every type of person involved in designing, building, and maintaining a skyscraper: the designers who calculate how weight and weather will affect their structures, the workers who dig the foundations and raise the lightning rods, the crews who clean the windows and maintain the air ducts, and the firefighters-whose special equipment allows blazes to be fought at unprecedented heights.

More than a technical survey, Ascher's work is a triumphant ode to the most monumental aspect of modern civilization. Saturated with vivid illustrations and unforgettable anecdotes, The Heights is the ultimate guide to the way things work in the skyscraper.


A Look Inside The Heights


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Five New Yorkers must make decisions overnight that will affect their futures.
Genre: Feature Film-Drama
Rating: R
Release Date: 2-MAY-2006
Media Type: DVDWith wit and sympathy, Heights traces the crossed paths and messy lives of New York theater people, journalists, and artists. At the middle of everything is Isabel (Elizabeth Banks, The Sisters), a struggling photographer whose mother, Diana (Glenn Close, Dangerous Liaisons), is the grand dame of the theater world. Isabel's fiance, Jonathan (James Marsden, X-Men), is being pursued by a writer for Vanity Fair about his relationship with a lionized photographer. Meanwhile, Diana, though married, casts her eye on a young actor named Alec (Jesse Bradford, Happy Endings), who lives in the same building as Isabel... This only begins to unravel the tangle, but a clever script, clean direction, and ! nicely pitched performances keep Heights from tripping over its own plot lines or sagging into soap opera. Close, in particular, has a blast doing an uncanny Meryl Streep impression, and deft supporting performances by Isabella Rosselini (Blue Velvet), Eric Bogosian (Talk Radio), George Segal (California Split), and musician Rufus Wainwright keep the edges of the stories lively. Heights doesn't achieve the emotional fullness of the best of Robert Altman's ensemble movies, but it stakes a claim in that cinematic territory. --Bret FetzerThis is a beautifully designed, 6"x9" large edition of Emily Brontë's classic WUTHERING HEIGHTS.This book was converted from its physical edition to the digital format by a community of volunteers. You may find it for free on the web. Purchase of the Kindle edition includes wireless delivery.This book was converted from its physical edition to the digital format by a community of volunteers. You may! find it for free on the web. Purchase of the Kindle edition i! ncludes wireless delivery.A "devilishly delightful" (Bookpage) new novel from an Academy Award-nominated screenwriter and the author of What's Eating Gilbert Grape.

Tim and Kate Welch are seemingly the last middle-class family in the exclusive neighborhood of Brooklyn Heights, NewYork. Tim is a popular history teacher, and an ordinary guy. Kate is not ordinary, but she aspires to be. Brought up by a hippie mother, Kate stays home with their two young sons trying to be the responsible parent she never had. But their neat and tidy world is turned upside down when Anna Brody- beautiful, wealthy, and impulsive-moves into the most expensive brownstone in Brooklyn, and draws Kate and Tim into her world.Kindle Description:Now updated with an Active Table of Contents.
Wuthering Heights is a gothic novel, and the only novel by Emily Brontë. It was first published in 1847 under the pseudonym Ellis Bell, and a posthumous second edition was edited by her sis! ter Charlotte.

The name of the novel comes from the Yorkshire manor on the moors on which the story centres (as an adjective; wuthering is a Yorkshire word referring to turbulent weather). The narrative tells the tale of the all-encompassing and passionate, yet thwarted, love between Heathcliff and Catherine Earnshaw, and how this unresolved passion eventually destroys them and many around them.

Now considered a classic of English literature, Wuthering Heights met with mixed reviews by critics when it first appeared, mainly because of the narrative's stark depiction of mental and physical cruelty. Though Charlotte Brontë's Jane Eyre was initially considered the best of the Brontë sisters' works, many subsequent critics of Wuthering Heights argued that its originality and achievement made it superior. Wuthering Heights has also given rise to many adaptations and inspired works, including films, radio, television dramatisations, a musical by Bernard J.! Taylor, ballet, opera, and song.Kindle Description:Now update! d with a n Active Table of Contents.
Wuthering Heights is a gothic novel, and the only novel by Emily Brontë. It was first published in 1847 under the pseudonym Ellis Bell, and a posthumous second edition was edited by her sister Charlotte.

The name of the novel comes from the Yorkshire manor on the moors on which the story centres (as an adjective; wuthering is a Yorkshire word referring to turbulent weather). The narrative tells the tale of the all-encompassing and passionate, yet thwarted, love between Heathcliff and Catherine Earnshaw, and how this unresolved passion eventually destroys them and many around them.

Now considered a classic of English literature, Wuthering Heights met with mixed reviews by critics when it first appeared, mainly because of the narrative's stark depiction of mental and physical cruelty. Though Charlotte Brontë's Jane Eyre was initially considered the best of the Brontë sisters' works, many subsequent critics of Wuthering Heights ar! gued that its originality and achievement made it superior. Wuthering Heights has also given rise to many adaptations and inspired works, including films, radio, television dramatisations, a musical by Bernard J. Taylor, ballet, opera, and song.In this hilarious series set in a real Australian high school, actor/comedian Chris Lilley stars as three different characters: a vain drama teacher, a self-absorbed boy, and a haughty female exchange student. Hysterical, absurd and frequently shocking, Summer Heights High reveals a world where small issues become huge, social groups are critical, young minds are molded, hopes are shattered and dreams are realized.

DVD Features:
Deleted Scenes
Outtakes

Australian writer/performer Chris Lilley specializes in the comedy of narcissism. All three of his characters in the mockumentary series Summer Heights High are blindly, maddeningly self-absorbed: Mr. G, a drama teacher who writes and direct! s his own musicals; Ja'mie, a preening 16-year-old from a weal! thy priv ate school who views her year at public school as purgatory; and Jonah, a Tongan juvenile delinquent who's been previously expelled from two other schools. The series' 8 episodes follow these three as they seek to find some form of fame and adulation.Mr. G struggles to create a musical about a student who recently died of a drug overdose... only it becomes increasingly about a heroic drama teacher whose dog dies in an accident; Ja'mie desperately wants to stage a formal dance and will lie, bribe, and manipulate to do it; and Jonah wants to do breakdancing with his posse, but he's simply incapable of keeping himself from insulting his teachers and getting into fights with other students. While Mr. G and Ja'mie are blinkered monsters, Jonah verges on tragic, as he stumbles towards increasing self-destruction. The thoroughness of Lilley's creations is impressive, as the comedian loses himself fully in these characters. Still, some viewers may find them more aggravating than fun! ny; just a hint of self-awareness might have made them a little easier to spend time with. But for anyone who connects with Lilley's humor, Summer Heights High will be a feast of juicy, unfiltered, rampaging egomania. --Bret Fetzer



Stills from Summer Heights High (Click for larger image)






 


EDtv : Widescreen Edition

  • Widescreen
Video store clerk Ed agrees to have his life filmed by a camera crew for a TV network.
Genre: Feature Film-Comedy
Rating: PG13
Release Date: 4-MAR-2003
Media Type: DVDThe third entry of 1998-99's cinematic TV trilogy kind of got lost in the shuffle following The Truman Show, an art film masquerading as a blockbuster, and Pleasantville, a heartfelt feel-good movie masquerading as a special-effects extravaganza. EDtv is nothing more than it appears: a scruffy comedy about fame and its discontents. Matthew McConaughey stars as Ed, a white-trash rube who gets his own dawn-to-midnight TV series in which every aspect of his life, no matter how sordid or dull or embarrassing, becomes mass entertainment (it inverts Truman by having the protagonist invite the pervasive cameras). Predictably, fame makes him miserable and, un! surprisingly, he finds a way out of his predicament. Albert Brooks covered this same territory in the funnier Real Life, and it's probably not the best idea for a load of comfy celebs to preach to us about how difficult fame is. But the film is cannily cast, including a number of performers who themselves have fallen victim to stupid media tricks (McConaughey, Ellen DeGeneres as the network executive, Elizabeth Hurley as a vamp hitching her star to Ed's, and Woody Harrelson as Ed's even dumber brother). Structurally, the movie is a mess. It looks as if the filmmakers had the choice between making a fully realized, two-and-a-half-hour-long movie that no one would sit through or one that clocks in under two hours but has a lot of plot holes; they opted for the latter (Hurley's character disappears, practically without comment). Still, there are enough laughs to keep things moving, and as a shaggy dog tale it's decent fun. --David KronkeThe third entry of 1998-99! 's cinematic TV trilogy kind of got lost in the shuffle follow! ing T he Truman Show, an art film masquerading as a blockbuster, and Pleasantville, a heartfelt feel-good movie masquerading as a special-effects extravaganza. EDtv is nothing more than it appears: a scruffy comedy about fame and its discontents. Matthew McConaughey stars as Ed, a white-trash rube who gets his own dawn-to-midnight TV series in which every aspect of his life, no matter how sordid or dull or embarrassing, becomes mass entertainment (it inverts Truman by having the protagonist invite the pervasive cameras). Predictably, fame makes him miserable and, unsurprisingly, he finds a way out of his predicament. Albert Brooks covered this same territory in the funnier Real Life, and it's probably not the best idea for a load of comfy celebs to preach to us about how difficult fame is. But the film is cannily cast, including a number of performers who themselves have fallen victim to stupid media tricks (McConaughey, Ellen DeGeneres as the netwo! rk executive, Elizabeth Hurley as a vamp hitching her star to Ed's, and Woody Harrelson as Ed's even dumber brother). Structurally, the movie is a mess. It looks as if the filmmakers had the choice between making a fully realized, two-and-a-half-hour-long movie that no one would sit through or one that clocks in under two hours but has a lot of plot holes; they opted for the latter (Hurley's character disappears, practically without comment). Still, there are enough laughs to keep things moving, and as a shaggy dog tale it's decent fun. --David KronkeIt's the unforgettable story of a nobody...that everybody's watching! Matthew McConaughey and Jenna Elfman star in this hilarious romantic comedy Joel Siegel of Good Morning America calls "Big-Laugh Funny."

Ed Pekurny (McConaughey) is just a regular guy who feels he has nothing to lose by agreeing to be a star of a new reality-based TV show. Almost overnight, the program becomes a hit, and suddenly this goofy but ! engaging video clerk is a national celebrity! Everything's fab! ulous... until Ed falls head-over-heels for Shari (Elfman), the girlfriend of his brother Ray (Woody Harrelson). Suddenly their most private moments become public entertainment - and the ratings go through the roof - as millions of fans tune in to watch a real soap opera filled with comedy and romance.

Superbly directed by Ron Howard and featuring a stellar supporting cast including Elizabeth Hurley, Sally Kirkland, Martin Landau, Ellen DeGeneres, Rob Reiner and Dennis Hopper, EDtv is an outrageous look at instant fame, overnight success, and sharing your life with a few million of your closest fans.The third entry of 1998-99's cinematic TV trilogy kind of got lost in the shuffle following The Truman Show, an art film masquerading as a blockbuster, and Pleasantville, a heartfelt feel-good movie masquerading as a special-effects extravaganza. EDtv is nothing more than it appears: a scruffy comedy about fame and its discontents. Matthew McConaughey stars as ! Ed, a white-trash rube who gets his own dawn-to-midnight TV series in which every aspect of his life, no matter how sordid or dull or embarrassing, becomes mass entertainment (it inverts Truman by having the protagonist invite the pervasive cameras). Predictably, fame makes him miserable and, unsurprisingly, he finds a way out of his predicament. Albert Brooks covered this same territory in the funnier Real Life, and it's probably not the best idea for a load of comfy celebs to preach to us about how difficult fame is. But the film is cannily cast, including a number of performers who themselves have fallen victim to stupid media tricks (McConaughey, Ellen DeGeneres as the network executive, Elizabeth Hurley as a vamp hitching her star to Ed's, and Woody Harrelson as Ed's even dumber brother). Structurally, the movie is a mess. It looks as if the filmmakers had the choice between making a fully realized, two-and-a-half-hour-long movie that no one would sit thr! ough or one that clocks in under two hours but has a lot of pl! ot holes ; they opted for the latter (Hurley's character disappears, practically without comment). Still, there are enough laughs to keep things moving, and as a shaggy dog tale it's decent fun. --David Kronkedvd

Selasa, 17 Januari 2012

Big Shot's Funeral : Widescreen Edition

  • Widescreen
World famous film director Don Tyler is surrounded by hundreds of costumed extras in China's fantastic Forbidden City when a creative drought hits and he has no idea where to the camera. Tossed off the picture by his studio boss, Tyler's depression is only relieved by his unlikely friendship with down-on-his-luck cameraman YoYo.

Knowing he's not well, Tyler asks his friend to plan a "comedy funeral" for him where people leave feeling happy, as they do at Chinese funerals of the elderly. When Tyler eventually falls into a coma, YoYo begins the task of granting Tyler's last wish.

However, when the costs of his spectacular funeral spin wildly out of control, can YoYo hold it all together by selling prime ad space at this unique event to be televised around the world? And more importantly for YoYo, can he convince Tyler's lovely assistant Lucy that he isn't just selling Tyler out! to the highest bidder?

That's the world of BIG SHOT'S FUNERAL: a zany, satiric comedy capturing the dizzy excitement and whirlwind change of modern-day China.Eastern religion collides with Western capitalism in Big Shot's Funeral, a satirical comedy about a cameraman named Yoyo (Ge You) hired to shoot a making-of documentary about a world-famous director (Donald Sutherland), who's creating a sequel to Bertolucci's The Last Emperor. When the director has a stroke and goes into a coma, the director's assistant Lucy (Rosamund Kwan) commissions Yoyo to organize the director's funeral. At a loss, Yoyo asks for help from a friend who promotes concerts--and before long the funeral has turned into a vast media spectacle with product placement running amok, so absurd that when the director recovers, he refuses to let Lucy stop the funeral because he's so enchanted. Big Shot's Funeral entertainingly mixes sweetness and dark humor as it interlaces a! romance between Yoyo and Lucy with the escalating madness of! the fun eral. --Bret FetzerEastern religion collides with Western capitalism in Big Shot's Funeral, a satirical comedy about a cameraman named Yoyo (Ge You) hired to shoot a making-of documentary about a world-famous director (Donald Sutherland), who's creating a sequel to Bertolucci's The Last Emperor. When the director has a stroke and goes into a coma, the director's assistant Lucy (Rosamund Kwan) commissions Yoyo to organize the director's funeral. At a loss, Yoyo asks for help from a friend who promotes concerts--and before long the funeral has turned into a vast media spectacle with product placement running amok, so absurd that when the director recovers, he refuses to let Lucy stop the funeral because he's so enchanted. Big Shot's Funeral entertainingly mixes sweetness and dark humor as it interlaces a romance between Yoyo and Lucy with the escalating madness of the funeral. --Bret FetzerDVD-Eastern religion collides with Wester! n capitalism in Big Shot's Funeral, a satirical comedy about a cameraman named Yoyo (Ge You) hired to shoot a making-of documentary about a world-famous director (Donald Sutherland), who's creating a sequel to Bertolucci's The Last Emperor. When the director has a stroke and goes into a coma, the director's assistant Lucy (Rosamund Kwan) commissions Yoyo to organize the director's funeral. At a loss, Yoyo asks for help from a friend who promotes concerts--and before long the funeral has turned into a vast media spectacle with product placement running amok, so absurd that when the director recovers, he refuses to let Lucy stop the funeral because he's so enchanted. Big Shot's Funeral entertainingly mixes sweetness and dark humor as it interlaces a romance between Yoyo and Lucy with the escalating madness of the funeral. --Bret Fetzer

Creation [Blu-Ray]

  • UK Import
  • Region-Free
  • Blu-ray
From director Jon Amiel ("The Singing Detective," ENTRAPMENT) and writer John Collee (MASTER AND COMMANDER: THE FAR SIDE OF THE WORLD) comes CREATION. A psychological, heart-wrenching love story starring Paul Bettany (A BEAUTIFUL MIND, MASTER AND COMMANDER: THE FAR SIDE OF THE WORLD) as Charles Darwin, the film is based on “Annie’s Box,” a biography penned by Darwin’s great-great-grandson Randal Keynes using personal letters and diaries of the Darwin family. We take a unique and inside look at Darwin, his family and his love for his deeply religious wife, played by Jennifer Connelly (A BEAUTIFUL MIND, REQUIEM FOR A DREAM), as, torn between faith and science, Darwin struggles to finish his legendary book “On the Origin of Species,” which goes on to become the foundation for evolutionary biology. The film co-stars Toby Jones (FROST/NIX! ON, INFAMOUS) and Jeremy Northam (GOSFORD PARK, AMISTAD), and was produced by Jeremy Thomas (THE LAST EMPEROR, SEXY BEAST) at Recorded Picture Company with BBC Films and Ocean Pictures.More than 150 years after its publication, Charles Darwin's On the Origin of Species and its theory of natural selection remain the subject of much debate; the divide between those who accept Darwin's ideas as incontrovertible science and those who consider them blasphemous may be wider now than ever. Released in 2009, director Jon Amiel's Creation goes right to the heart of the matter--indeed, right to the heart of Darwin himself. As portrayed by Paul Bettany, the Darwin who has returned to England following his voyage aboard HMS Beagle is a man for whom "deeply conflicted" is a barely adequate description. Well aware his theory is "perhaps the most powerful idea ever to occur to a human mind," he is caught between the scientists who insist that he has "killed God" and t! he religious conservatives, including his wife Emma (Jennifer ! Connelly ), who counter that his very soul will be in peril if he finishes and publishes his book. What's more, he is haunted, sometimes literally, by the death of his favorite child, Annie (seen in frequent flashbacks), and its effect on his marriage--in fact, it is this personal angle that dominates the film. But while the toll his work has taken on his health, his faith, his family, and his very sanity is obvious, he also knows that it is far too important to ignore. Creation is not a documentary; liberties have been taken, and there are multiple sequences, including Darwin's nightmarish fever dreams, that are clearly the invention of the filmmakers. But Bettany and Connelly, who are a real-life couple, are both superb; the cinematography is gorgeous; and various scenes illustrating the notion of "survival of the fittest" in nature are riveting (there won't be a dry eye in the house when Darwin tells his dying daughter about the fate of an orangutan captured in Borneo). And! while the tone of the film would seem to favor science over religion, the DVD includes numerous bonus features in which both sides have their say. This one is not to be missed. --Sam Graham

Stills from Creation (Click for larger image)



A sweeping novel of politics, war, philosophy, and adventureâ€"in a restored edition, featuring never-before-published material from Gore Vidal’s original manuscriptâ€"Creation offers a captivating grand tour of the ancient world.
Cyrus Spitama, grandson of the prophet Zoroaster and lifelong friend of Xerxes, spent most of his life as Persian ambassador for the great king Darius. He traveled to India, where he discussed nirvana with Buddha, and to the warring states of Cathay, where he learned of Tao from Master Li and fished on the riverbank with Confucius. Now blind and aged in Athensâ€"the Athens of Pericles, Sophocles, Thucydides, Herodotus, and Socratesâ€"Cyrus recounts his days as he strives to resolve the fundamental questions that have guided his life’s journeys: how the universe was created, and why evil was created with good. In revisiting the fifth century b! .c.â€"one of the most spectacular periods in historyâ€"Gore Vidal illuminates the ideas that have shaped civilizations for millennia.
In 445 B.C., Cyrus Spitama, the grandson of the prophet Zoroaster, is the Persian ambassador to the city of Athens. He has a rather caustic appreciation of his situation: "I am blind. But I am not deaf. Because of the incompleteness of my misfortune, I was obliged yesterday to listen for nearly six hours to a self-styled historian whose account of what the Athenians like to call 'the Persian Wars' was nonsense of a sort that were I less old and more privileged, I would have risen to my seat at the Odeon and scandalized all Athens by answering him." Having thus dismissed Herodotus, Cyrus then dictates his life story to his nephew, Democritus, with similar disdain for the Greeks--whom we in the modern world have come to view as the progenitors of civilization, but whom Cyrus considers to be bad-smelling rabble.

Of co! urse, Cyrus Spitama speaks with a very modern, ironic voice s! upplied to him by Gore Vidal--and the political intrigues in which Cyrus finds himself immersed are likewise familiar territory for fans of Vidal's historical fiction. But the narrator's delightfully wicked observations are the icing on a narrative of truly epic scope--out of his desire to understand the origins of the world, Cyrus undertakes journeys to India, where he encounters disciples of the Buddha, and China, where he engages Confucius in philosophical conversation while the great sage fishes by the riverside. Creation offers insights into classical history laced with scintillating wit and narrative brio. Real-life couple Paul Bettany and Jennifer Connelly star as Charles Darwin and his wife in this biographical drama. Set before the publication of "On The Origin Of Species", 'Creation' finds Darwin grieving over the death of his daughter and feeling far away from his wife.More than 150 years after its publication, Charles Darwin's On the Origin of Species! and its theory of natural selection remain the subject of much debate; the divide between those who accept Darwin's ideas as incontrovertible science and those who consider them blasphemous may be wider now than ever. Released in 2009, director Jon Amiel's Creation goes right to the heart of the matter--indeed, right to the heart of Darwin himself. As portrayed by Paul Bettany, the Darwin who has returned to England following his voyage aboard HMS Beagle is a man for whom "deeply conflicted" is a barely adequate description. Well aware his theory is "perhaps the most powerful idea ever to occur to a human mind," he is caught between the scientists who insist that he has "killed God" and the religious conservatives, including his wife Emma (Jennifer Connelly), who counter that his very soul will be in peril if he finishes and publishes his book. What's more, he is haunted, sometimes literally, by the death of his favorite child, Annie (seen in frequent fla! shbacks), and its effect on his marriage--in fact, it is this ! personal angle that dominates the film. But while the toll his work has taken on his health, his faith, his family, and his very sanity is obvious, he also knows that it is far too important to ignore. Creation is not a documentary; liberties have been taken, and there are multiple sequences, including Darwin's nightmarish fever dreams, that are clearly the invention of the filmmakers. But Bettany and Connelly, who are a real-life couple, are both superb; the cinematography is gorgeous; and various scenes illustrating the notion of "survival of the fittest" in nature are riveting (there won't be a dry eye in the house when Darwin tells his dying daughter about the fate of an orangutan captured in Borneo). And while the tone of the film would seem to favor science over religion, the DVD includes numerous bonus features in which both sides have their say. This one is not to be missed. --Sam Graham

Stills from Creation (Click f! or larger image)





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