NEW RELEASES - January 17 HIGHLIGHTS

Junebug (2005).

"Director Phil Morrison upends the cliché premise that all liberals are good and tolerant and that all conservatives are rigid and bad," wrote Steve Ramos as he compiled a 2005 top ten list for the Cincinnati CityBeat. "In a country defined by Red and Blue states, Junebug reminds us that tolerance goes both ways."

And there's a lot of buzz for Amy Adams nabbing at least a nomination for her performance, if not a full head-to-golden-toe Oscar.

Lord of War (2005).

"I was always just interested in arms trafficking because there is so much attention on drug trafficking, but this is so much more devastating," writer and director Andrew Niccol told Sean Axmaker in an interview in September. Following the "social science fiction" of Gattaca, The Truman Show and S1m0ne, Niccol turns to the here and now in Lord of War. Starring Nicolas Cage: "He does make the Devil charming," Niccol says.

Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room (2004).

This'll get you riled up. It opens with a shot of Enron HQ as Tom Waits rumbles on the soundtrack, "What's he building in there?" Peeling away the walls layer by layer, writer-director Alex Gibney (who wrote and produced The Trials of Henry Kissinger) reveals that Enron chairman Kenneth Lay and CEO Jeff Skilling were actually building a whole lotta nothing. But, taking advantage of their ties to the Bushoids, they were selling it at a mighty steep price. A price to be paid eventually, of course, by the tens of thousands of employees who saw their futures evaporate into the very thin air Enron actually considered buying and selling at one point.

Based on the book by Fortune reporters Bethany McLean and Peter Elkind.

Gendernauts (1999).

Monika Treut's doc "might have been called 'Sexual Ambiguity in San Francisco'," suggests A.O. Scott in the New York Times. "Treut, a chirpy, sympathetic presence whose curiosity is always balanced by tact, introduces us to a few Bay Area residents who defy assimilation to the usual categories: gay or straight, male or female." Featuring commentary from Annie Sprinkle and Sandy Stone.

Space Ameoba (1971).

"Director Inoshiro Honda was the cornerstone of and is largely responsible for the creation of Japanese fantasy cinema (or at least its pop culture equivalent)," writes the Sci-Fi, Horror and Fantasy Film Review of what is now, of course, a party flick. This one's "been made on a real penny-pinching budget. The effects are laughable with patently obvious rubber creations that have unmoving eyes, which are replaced by animated cartoon tentacles when the creature has to pick up extras in medium shot. The giant squid is one of the most ridiculous of all Japanese monsters and the final tag-team wrestling match is hilarious."

Industrial Strength Keaton (2005).

Lots and lots and lots of Buster Keaton, including the shorts The Playhouse (1921; with a new score from The Paragon Ragtime Orchestra), Character Studies (mid-1920s; featuring cameos by Roscoe "Fatty" Arbuckle, Jackie Coogan, Douglas Fairbanks, Harold Lloyd and Rudolph Valentino) and Parlor, Bedroom and Bath (1931).

There are also promotional films - Seein' Stars (1922), The Voice of Hollywood (1929), Hollywood on Parade (1933) and An Old Spanish Custom (1935) - industrial films, live TV appearances and classic commercials for Alka Seltzer (1958), Northwest Orient Airlines (1958), Simon Pure Beer (1958), Shamrock Oil (1959), Milky Way (1961), Pure Oil (1965), Country Club Malt Liquor (1958), Ford Econoline (1963) and Jeep (1960).

Samurai Champloo Volume 7 (2005).

"There are few anime series that fulfulls all three elements of anime (art, music and story) in such a way that makes it great," writes razornails. "This is one of those series."

Gantz Volume 10: Endgame (2000).

"The simple fact [is] that Gantz is a revelation in science fiction anime and a revolution in the post-Y2K-Anime community," writes LucidThawt. "Should be reason enough for any anime-film fan to watch, or any indy-film fan for that matter!"

Browse the New Releases Archive for more recent arrivals.