Thursday, December 1, 2011

The Great Debaters

  • Denzel Washington directs and stars in this uplifting drama based on a true story about a small East Texas all-black college in 1935 that rises to the top of the nation's debate teams in a duel against Harvard. A poet and debating coach at Wiley College, Professor Melvin Tolson (Washington) sees debating as "a blood sport" and recruits the meanest and brightest, including troubled Henr
JAMAL WALLAS IS A 16-YEAR-OLD BASKETBALL STAR WITH A SECRET PASSION FOR WRITING. WILLIAM FORRESTER IS A FAMOUS, RECLUSIVE NOVELIST WHO IS ANGRY AT THE WORLD. AFTER AN UNEXPECTED MEETING, FORRESTER BECOMES JAMAL'S UNLIKELY MENTOR AND BOTH MEN LEARN LESSONS FROM EACH OTHER ABOUT THE IMPORTANCE OF FRIENDSHIPFinding Forrester could have been a shallow variant of The Karate Kid, congratulating itself for featuring a 16-year-old black kid from the South Bronx who's a brilliant scholar-athlete. Instea! d, director Gus Van Sant plays it matter-of-fact and totally real, casting a nonactor (Rob Brown) as Jamal, a basketball player and gifted student whose writing talent is nurtured by a famously reclusive author. William Forrester (Sean Connery) became a literary icon four decades earlier with a Pulitzer-winning novel, then disappeared (like J.D. Salinger) into his dark, book-filled apartment, agoraphobic and withdrawn from publishing, but as passionate as ever about writing. On a dare, Jamal sneaks into Forrester's musty sanctuary, and what might have been a condescending cliché--homeboy rescued by wiser white mentor--turns into an inspiring meeting of minds, with mutual respect and intelligence erasing boundaries of culture and generation.

Comparisons to Van Sant's Good Will Hunting are inevitable, but Finding Forrester is more honest and less prone to touchy-feely sentiment, as in the way Jamal and a private-school classmate (Anna Paquin) develop a mutua! l attraction that remains almost entirely unspoken. The film t! akes a c onventional turn when Jamal must defend his integrity (with Forrester's help) in a writing contest judged by a skeptical teacher (F. Murray Abraham), but this ethical subplot is a credible catalyst for Forrester's most dramatic display of friendship. It's one of many fine moments for Connery and Brown (a screen natural), in a memorable film that transcends issues of race to embrace the joy of learning. --Jeff Shannondvd Widescreen EditionFinding Forrester could have been a shallow variant of The Karate Kid, congratulating itself for featuring a 16-year-old black kid from the South Bronx who's a brilliant scholar-athlete. Instead, director Gus Van Sant plays it matter-of-fact and totally real, casting a nonactor (Rob Brown) as Jamal, a basketball player and gifted student whose writing talent is nurtured by a famously reclusive author. William Forrester (Sean Connery) became a literary icon four decades earlier with a Pulitzer-winning novel, then disappe! ared (like J.D. Salinger) into his dark, book-filled apartment, agoraphobic and withdrawn from publishing, but as passionate as ever about writing. On a dare, Jamal sneaks into Forrester's musty sanctuary, and what might have been a condescending cliché--homeboy rescued by wiser white mentor--turns into an inspiring meeting of minds, with mutual respect and intelligence erasing boundaries of culture and generation.

Comparisons to Van Sant's Good Will Hunting are inevitable, but Finding Forrester is more honest and less prone to touchy-feely sentiment, as in the way Jamal and a private-school classmate (Anna Paquin) develop a mutual attraction that remains almost entirely unspoken. The film takes a conventional turn when Jamal must defend his integrity (with Forrester's help) in a writing contest judged by a skeptical teacher (F. Murray Abraham), but this ethical subplot is a credible catalyst for Forrester's most dramatic display of friendship. It's one of! many fine moments for Connery and Brown (a screen natural), i! n a memo rable film that transcends issues of race to embrace the joy of learning. --Jeff ShannonDirector Gus Van Sant brings to the screen this moving story of a grizzled recluse and an inner-city teenager brought together by their shared passion for writing. Like Van Sant's Oscar-nominated GOOD WILL HUNTING, FINDING FORRESTER earnestly explores the struggles of a youthful genius whose position in society (underprivileged kid from the wrong side of the tracks) makes him seem destined for failure until he forms a relationship with a gifted but introverted mentor who helps him see the light.The youthful genius is a talented urban basketball player named Jamal Wallace (Rob Brown), who in his spare time reads everything he can get his hands on, secretly scribbling prose and poetry into a composition pad. The introverted mentor is William Forrester (Sean Connery), who took the literary world by storm with his debut novel, AVALON RISING, 50 years earlier but now spends whole days s! hut inside his Bronx apartment looking out the window onto a basketball court where Jamal hangs out. Buoyed by excellent performances from Connery and newcomer Brown, FINDING FORRESTER paints a compelling, alluring portrait of friendship while offering intriguing insights into the heart and soul of the dedicated writer.In this emotionally uplifting drama a dedicated teacher gives his students the gift of inspiration. Studio: Buena Vista Home Video Release Date: 05/11/2007 Starring: Robin Williams Run time: 128 minutes Rating: PgRobin Williams stars as an English teacher who doesn't fit into the conservative prep school where he teaches, but whose charisma and love of poetry inspires several boys to revive a secret society with a bohemian bent. The script is well meaning but a little trite, though director Peter Weir (The Truman Show) adds layers of emotional depth in scenes of conflict between the kids and adults. (A subplot involving one father's terrible press! ure on his son--played by Robert Sean Leonard--to drop his int! erest in theater reaches heartbreaking proportions.) Williams is given plenty of latitude to work in his brand of improvisational humor, though it is all well-woven into his character's style of instruction. --Tom Keogh Robin Williams stars as an English teacher who doesn't fit into the conservative prep school where he teaches, but whose charisma and love of poetry inspires several boys to revive a secret society with a bohemian bent. The script is well meaning but a little trite, though director Peter Weir (The Truman Show) adds layers of emotional depth in scenes of conflict between the kids and adults. (A subplot involving one father's terrible pressure on his son--played by Robert Sean Leonard--to drop his interest in theater reaches heartbreaking proportions.) Williams is given plenty of latitude to work in his brand of improvisational humor, though it is all well-woven into his character's style of instruction. --Tom KeoghTwo-time Academy Award® winner D! enzel Washington (American Gangster) directs and stars with Academy Award® winner Forest Whitaker (Last King of Scotland) in this important and deeply inspiring page from the not-so-distant past (Richard Roeper, At the Movies with Ebert and Roeper). Inspired by a true story, Washington shines as a brilliant but politically radical debate team coach who uses the power of words to transform a group of underdog African American college students into an historical powerhouse that took on the Harvard elite. DVD Special Features:

Deleted Scenes
The Great Debaters: An Historical Perspective. That's What My Baby Likes; Music Video.
My Soul Is A Witness; Music Video
Theatrical Trailer
Sneak Peeks: Grace is Gone, Cassandra's Dream, I'm Not There, Hunting PartyInspired by real events, the fascinating The Great Debaters reveals one of the seeds of the Civil Rights Movement in its story of Melvin B. Tolson (Denzel Washington in a captivating performance) ! and his champion 1935 debate club from the all-African-America! n Wiley College in Texas. Tolson, a Wiley professor, labor organizer, modernist poet, and much else, runs a rigorous debate program at the school, selecting four students as his team in ’35, among them the future founder of the Congress of Racial Equality, James Farmer Jr. (Denzel Whitaker). Washington, who directed The Great Debaters from a script by Robert Eisele (The Dale Earnhardt Story), anchors the story with the team’s measurable progress, but the film is also about the state of race relations in America at the height of the Great Depression. With lynchings of black men and women a common form of entertainment and black subjugation for many rural whites, the idea of talented and highly intelligent African-American young people learning to think on their feet during debates would seem almost a hopeless endeavor. But that’s not the way Tolson sees it, as his students serve themselves and the cause of racial equality in America with energetic arguments in fav! or of progressive government and non-violence as a viable social movement. There are some startling moments in this movie, particularly the sight of a man found lynched and burned to death, and an extraordinary moment in which we see black sharecroppers and white farmers engaged with Tolson in arguments about unionizing together. Forest Whitaker is outstanding as Farmer’s emotionally-reserved father, also a Wiley professor. This is the kind of film where one hopes two great actors such as the elder Whitaker and Washington will have a scene together, and when it comes it’s as powerful as one might hope. --Tom Keogh

ABO Gear Happy Habitat for Indoor Cats

Dave Chappelle's Block Party - 27x40 Original Poster

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A MIX OF DAVE CHAPELLE'S SKETCH COMEDY & MUSICAL INTERLUDES ASHE TAKES ON AN UNFORGETTABLE JOURNEY TO THROW THE DECADES MOSTOUTRAGEOUS PARTY.Few movies, documentary or otherwise, capture the relaxed exuberance of Dave Chappelle's Block Party. This is Chappelle's first project since his show on Comedy Central received so much popular and critical attention that he apparently had a psychological meltdown and fled to Africa to escape. You can still see a hint of weariness and wariness in his eyes--but even more you can see his relief to be launching a project that bears no expectations. Funded by his own money and free to all who attended, Chappelle set up a secret concert location in Brooklyn and pulled together a musical lineup of stellar acts, including Erykah Badu, Kanye West, Mos Def, Jill! Scott, Common, the Roots, Dead Prez, and the reunion of the Fugees, all of whom give vibrant performances. But Block Party doesn't just capture the show; at least a third of the movie is Chappelle wandering around Brooklyn or the Ohio neighborhood where he lives and interacting with the people he meets, many of whom he gives free tickets for the show. These scenes, combined with footage of the performers rehearsing or just gassing around before the show, offer a sense that for Chappelle performing is just an extension of his everyday life; that he takes just as much pleasure from goofing around with one person as he does goofing around in front of hundreds or thousands. Putting together this event becomes a unique self-portrait as well as an experience that rejuvenated Chappelle. If you surrender to the vitality of the show and Chappelle's loose comic jazz, you may find it rejuvenating too. --Bret FetzerA real crowd-pleaser, Dave Chappelle's Block Party sound! track spotlights comedy superstar Dave Chappelle in all-new fr! eestyle standup material, and also one-time-only performances by Mos Def, Erykah Badu, Common, Dead Prez, Jill Scott, Talib Kweli and The Roots, among others. The soundtrack captures the unprecedented combination of comedy and music was recorded on location, as Mr. Chappelle threw a party in downtown Brooklyn, inviting local residents to experience these exclusive performances by the most progressive cutting edge urban artists in the music scene today. Geffen. 2006.Don't you wish you were Dave Chappelle? The guy is funny as hell--and rich and famous for it. What's more, he's socially conscious and has impeccable taste in music. Thanks to Michel Gondry's triumphant, uplifting film, we got to see Chappelle live out his personal fantasy--a "block party" in Brooklyn's Bed-Stuy 'hood. The comedian handpicked his favorite hip-hop and R&B artists to participate, and the roster includes some of the most significant names of the past 10 years of "urban" music, including the Roots, Mos Def, T! alib Kweli, Jill Scott, Erykah Badu, and Common. Unfortunately, the CD omits the Fugees reunion that formed the climax of the film and it also leaves out a stirring performance by Kanye West, the biggest rap star of the day. That said, the music that is here is often scintillating, especially by Badu and Scott, who kill with their own tracks and spice up many of the rap tracks to boot. The one new cut (not in the film), Blackstar's "Born & Raised," keeps the quality high. Not surprisingly, the soundtrack simply can't reconstruct the positive vibrations and powerful messages of the movie, but it's still a worthwhile document of the magic that happened on a rainy September 2004 day at the corner of Downing and Quincy. --Marc Greilsamer

Dave Chappelle (Actor), Bilal Lil Cease (Actor) | Rated: R | Format: DVD

  • Rated: R
  • # DVD Release Date: May 22, 2007
  • # Run Time: 103 minutes
Few movies, documentary or otherwise, capture the relaxed ex! uberance of Dave Chappelle's Block Party. This is Chapp! elle's f irst project since his show on Comedy Central received so much popular and critical attention that he apparently had a psychological meltdown and fled to Africa to escape. You can still see a hint of weariness and wariness in his eyes--but even more you can see his relief to be launching a project that bears no expectations. Funded by his own money and free to all who attended, Chappelle set up a secret concert location in Brooklyn and pulled together a musical lineup of stellar acts, including Erykah Badu, Kanye West, Mos Def, Jill Scott, Common, the Roots, Dead Prez, and the reunion of the Fugees, all of whom give vibrant performances. But Block Party doesn't just capture the show; at least a third of the movie is Chappelle wandering around Brooklyn or the Ohio neighborhood where he lives and interacting with the people he meets, many of whom he gives free tickets for the show. These scenes, combined with footage of the performers rehearsing or just gassing around b! efore the show, offer a sense that for Chappelle performing is just an extension of his everyday life; that he takes just as much pleasure from goofing around with one person as he does goofing around in front of hundreds or thousands. Putting together this event becomes a unique self-portrait as well as an experience that rejuvenated Chappelle. If you surrender to the vitality of the show and Chappelle's loose comic jazz, you may find it rejuvenating too. --Bret Fetzer27x40 Original Poster

10 Things I Hate About You

  • A cool cast of young stars is just one of the things you ll love about this hilarious comedy hit! On the first day at his new school, Cameron (Joseph Gordon Levitt Halloween: H20, TV s 3rd Rock From The Sun) instantly falls for Bianca (Larisa Oleynik The Baby-Sitters Club), the gorgeous girl of his dreams! The only problem is that Bianca is forbidden to date.until her ill-tempered, completely un-
Ellie, a free-spirited and headstrong young woman is left in charge of a residential home over the Christmas holidays. Her youth and inexperience bring her into bitter conflict with the four grumpy old residents. HOW ABOUT YOU deals with the hilarious antics of this uncivilized group, an unlikely romance, and the gradual solidarity that develops between the residents and Ellie, in this critically acclaimed heartwarming and irresistible film.Greenwich Village newlyweds Jamie and Paul Buchman (Academy ! Award winner Helen Hunt and Paul Reiser) reach new heights of hilarity and neurosis in the third season of this Emmy Award-winning comedy series. With lovable characters in both achingly real and hilariously unreal situations, this smartly written sitcom showcases a Manhattan couple trying their hardest to keep love alive in the midst of all the mad, mad, mad, mad, madness that modern marriage can bring!Four years after Mad About You's complete second season was released on DVD (and two years after a highlights collection seemed to signal the end of season-by-season releases), the complete third season of everyone's favorite neurotic couple is finally on DVD. If Paul (Paul Reiser) and Jamie (Helen Hunt) Buchman don't drive each other nuts, they'll do it to their British neighbors, or the whole building, such as when an attempt to steal cable TV goes awry ("Pandora's Box"). Not to mention their whole crazy cast of characters, including Jamie's useless sister Lisa (A! nne Ramsay), Paul's shifty cousin Ira (John Pankow), Paul's pa! rents (C ynthia Harris and Louis Zorich), Jamie's parents (Theresa Fuller and John Carlin, replaced in later years by the stunt casting of Carol Burnett and Carol O'Connor), the building super (Jerry Adler), Jamie's best friend Fran (Leila Kenzie), and supremely clueless waitress Ursula (Lisa Kudrow). Some of the episodes had appeared on the highlights collection, such as the zany Thanksgiving dinner ("Giblets for Murray"), Paul's reality TV show in which he turns the camera on Jamie and himself ("Our Fifteen Minutes"), and Carl Reiner's appearance as a TV legend ("The Alan Brady Show"). But others are finally seeing the DVD daylight, including "The Ride Home," in which Paul and Jamie take a cab ride and recount, from different perspectives, how Fran's birthday party turned into a disaster involving guest stars Wendie Malick and Eric Stoltz. In the two-part "Mad About You," they flash back to the preparation for their wedding, and Paul flashes back to birthdays from hell in "Cake ! Fear." Cyndi Lauper returns as Ira's ex-wife (a guest appearance for which she won an Emmy, as did Reiner) in "Money Changes Everything" and Stoltz turns Jamie into a comic-book character ("My Boyfriend's Back"). Then in the two-part season finale, they're transported It's a Wonderful Life-style into a world in which they'd never met ("Up in Smoke").

Does it matter that the set has no bonus features? Maybe not so much. The bells and whistles of the Mad About You Collection were nice, but they don't compare to having a complete season's worth of episodes on DVD. We want Paul and Jamie, with their hilarious and touching quirks and chemistry, just as we watched them on TV. That's all we're saying. --David HoriuchiA cool cast of young stars is just one of the things you'll love about this hilarious comedy hit! On the first day at his new school, Cameron (Joseph Gordon-Levitt -- HALLOWEEN: H2O, TV's "3RD Rock From The Sun") instantly falls for! Bianca (Larisa Oleynik -- THE BABY SITTERS CLUB), the gorgeou! s girl o f his dreams. The only problem is that Bianca is forbidden to date ... until her ill-tempered, completely un-dateable older sister Kat (Julia Stiles -- THE BOURNE IDENTITY, SAVE THE LAST DANCE) goes out too! In an attempt to solve his problem, Cameron singles out the only guy who could possibly be a match for Kat: a mysterious bad-boy (Heath Ledger -- A KNIGHT'S TALE, THE PATRIOT) with a nasty reputation of his own! Also featuring a hip soundtrack -- this witty comedy is a wildly entertaining look at exactly how far some guys will go to get a date!It's, like, Shakespeare, man! This good-natured and likeable update of The Taming of the Shrew takes the basics of Shakespeare's farce about a surly wench and the man who tries to win her and transfers it to modern-day Padua High School. Kat Stratford (Julia Stiles) is a sullen, forbidding riot grrrl who has a blistering word for everyone; her sunny younger sister Bianca (Larisa Oleynik) is poised for high school stardom. Th! e problem: overprotective and paranoid Papa Stratford (a dryly funny Larry Miller) won't let Bianca date until boy-hating Kat does, which is to say never. When Bianca's pining suitor Cameron (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) gets wind of this, he hires the mysterious, brooding Patrick Verona (Heath Ledger) to loosen Kat up. Of course, what starts out as a paying gig turns to true love as Patrick discovers that underneath her brittle exterior, Kat is a regular babe. The script, by Karen McCullah Lutz and Kirsten Smith, is sitcom-funny with peppy one-liners and lots of smart teenspeak; however, its cleverness and imagination doesn't really extend beyond its characters' Renaissance names and occasional snippets of real Shakespearean dialogue. What makes the movie energetic and winning is the formula that helped make She's All That such a big hit: two high-wattage stars who look great and can really act. Ledger is a hunk of promise with a quick grin and charming Aussie accent, and ! Stiles mines Kat's bitterness and anger to depths usually unkn! own in t een films; her recitation of her English class sonnet (from which the film takes its title) is funny, heartbreaking, and hopelessly romantic. The imperious Allison Janney (Primary Colors) nearly steals the film as a no-nonsense guidance counselor secretly writing a trashy romance novel. --Mark Englehart

Schrade Old Timer Cave Bear Knife 5" Lockback

Hitman Blood Money

  • Blood Money system - The cleaner the hit, the more money you receive -- spend it on equipment, weapon upgrades, information and bribing witnesses to reduce your notoriety
  • Improved AI makes the game more challenging -- guards will follow blood trails, investigate suspicious items and behavior
  • Agent 47 has a number of new moves and can now climb, hide, scale ledges and automatically pass low obstacles
  • Customizable weapons - Modify for sound, rate of fire, damage, reload speed, accuracy and zoom
  • New gameplay techniques - Distract enemies, make your kills look like accidents, dispose of bodies in various ways, use human shields & plant decoy weapons
HITMAN - DVD MovieIt’s hard not to feel like one has entered a certain dimension of video-game logic while watching Hitman, a lightly enjoyable action-suspense movie indeed based on a popular and bloody game ab! out a mysterious hired gun with a bar-code tattoo on his bald head and a number (47) in lieu of a name. Living like a chaste monk while slipping past borders to kill his targets, 47 (Timothy Olyphant of Deadwood) moves like a determined shark and speaks softly to his contact at the enigmatic "the Organization," which raises cast-off children to become well-paid assassins. Fruitlessly pursued by an Interpol cop (Dougray Scott) who can never get sovereign governments to cooperate, 47 has no trouble slipping in and out of countries to ply his trade. Until, that is, he’s set up to take a fall in Russia by shooting a national leader who is promptly replaced by a lookalike double. Suddenly on the run, 47 has to retrace his steps and formulate a lethal plan for extricating himself from a trap. Caught in the chaos is the lovely Nika (Olga Kurylenko), forced into sex slavery by 47’s new enemies and the one person who seems uniquely qualified to break through 47’s many p! ersonal barriers. Directed by France’s Xavier Gens, Hitma! n fe atures loads of bloody mayhem and unabashed moments of pulp absurdity, such as a scene in which 47 and three other Organization killers agree to fight one another respectfully, then proceed to pulverize each other with swords and fists. As fodder for gamers, however, Hitman is packed with visuals and dramatic moments that seem so odd on the big screen until one realizes they are basically placemarkers for the video-game edition. --Tom Keogh

Beyond Hitman


Hitman Video Games

Hitman Books and Game Guides

More from Timothy Olyphant



Stills from Hitman







Disc 1: Widescreen Feature **Forced Trailers - Alien vs. Predator: Requi! em, Hitman Teaser Trailer, Hitman Theatrical Trailer

**In ! the Cros shairs Featurette **Digital Hits Featurette **Instruments of Destruction Featurette **Para-Ordnance P18.9 Featurette **Blaser R93 LRS2 Featurette **M16 Featurette **FN F2000 Featurette **Micro Uzi Featurette **M240 Featurette **Settling the Score Featurette

**Deleted Scenes - Ovie's Pool Scene, Hospital Scene, A Different Train Platform, Udre's Death

**Alternate Ending **Gag Reel

Disc 2: Digital Copy **Portable Digital Copy of HitmanIt’s hard not to feel like one has entered a certain dimension of video-game logic while watching Hitman, a lightly enjoyable action-suspense movie indeed based on a popular and bloody game about a mysterious hired gun with a bar-code tattoo on his bald head and a number (47) in lieu of a name. Living like a chaste monk while slipping past borders to kill his targets, 47 (Timothy Olyphant of Deadwood) moves like a determined shark and speaks softly to his contact at the enigmatic "the Organization," which raises cast-! off children to become well-paid assassins. Fruitlessly pursued by an Interpol cop (Dougray Scott) who can never get sovereign governments to cooperate, 47 has no trouble slipping in and out of countries to ply his trade. Until, that is, he’s set up to take a fall in Russia by shooting a national leader who is promptly replaced by a lookalike double. Suddenly on the run, 47 has to retrace his steps and formulate a lethal plan for extricating himself from a trap. Caught in the chaos is the lovely Nika (Olga Kurylenko), forced into sex slavery by 47’s new enemies and the one person who seems uniquely qualified to break through 47’s many personal barriers. Directed by France’s Xavier Gens, Hitman features loads of bloody mayhem and unabashed moments of pulp absurdity, such as a scene in which 47 and three other Organization killers agree to fight one another respectfully, then proceed to pulverize each other with swords and fists. As fodder for gamers, however, ! Hitman is packed with visuals and dramatic moments that! seem so odd on the big screen until one realizes they are basically placemarkers for the video-game edition. --Tom Keogh

Beyond Hitman


Hitman Video Games

Hitman Books and Game Guides

More Action and Adventure on Blu-ray



Stills from Hitman







Martin Scorsese's The Departed barely touched on his story. Now radio talk-show sensation, crime reporter, and Boston Herald columnist Howie Carr takes us into the heart of the life of Johnny Martorano.
 
For two decades, Martorano struck fear into anyone even remotely connected to his world. His partnership with Whitey Bulger and the infamous Winter Hill Gang ! led to twenty murders... for which Johnny would serve twelve y! ears in prison. Carr also looks at the politicians and FBI agents who aided Johnny and Whitey, and at the flamboyant city of Boston, which Martorano so ruthlessly ruled.
 
A plethora of paradoxes, Johnny Martorano was Mr. Mom by day and man-about-town by night. Surrounded by fast-living politicians, sports celebrities, and showbiz entertainers, Johnny was charismatically colorful--as charming as he was frightening. After all, he was, in the end... a hitman.
 
 
 
Hitman: Blood Money brings back the world's greatest assassin, Agent 47. A series of hits have eliminated a number of assassins from the ICA, Agent 47's contract killing firm. Sensing that he may be the next target, he travels to America where he attempts to carry on with business as usual. That means killing -- a lot of it. New to the world of getting paid for killing? Prepare to become a hitman with an all-new training mode Pathfinder engine provides im! proved tracking and movement with realistic enemy behavior and interaction Soundtrack by BAFTA-winning composer Jesper Kyd

Closing Escrow

Fallout

  • ISBN13: 9781416950097
  • Condition: New
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This is a story about a monster. Not a dragon or a mythological beast, but a very real, very destructive monster--crystal meth--that takes hold of seventeen-year-old Kristina Snow and transforms her into her reckless alter-ego Bree. Based on her own daughter's addiction to crystal meth, Ellen Hopkins' novel-in-verse is a vivid, transfixing look into teenage drug use. Told in Kristina's voice, it provides a realistic portrayal of the tortured logic of an addict.Ellen Hopkins's semi-autobiographical verse novel, Crank, reads like a Go Ask Alice for the 21st century. In it, she chronicles the turbulent and often disturbing relationship between Kristina, a character based on her own daughter,! and the "monster," the highly addictive drug crystal meth, or "crank." Kristina is introduced to the drug while visiting her largely absent and ne'er-do-well father. While under the influence of the monster, Kristina discovers her sexy alter-ego, Bree: "there is no perfect daughter, / no gifted high school junior, / no Kristina Georgia Snow. / There is only Bree." Bree will do all the things good girl Kristina won't, including attracting the attention of dangerous boys who can provide her with a steady flow of crank. Soon, her grades plummet, her relationships with family and friends deteriorate, and she needs more and more of the monster just to get through the day. Kristina hits her lowest point when she is raped by one of her drug dealers and becomes pregnant as a result. Her decision to keep the baby slows her drug use, but doesn't stop it, and the author leaves the reader with the distinct impression that Kristina/Bree may never be free from her addiction. In the auth! or's note, Hopkins warns "nothing in this story is impossible,! " but wh en Kristina's controlled, high-powered mother allows her teenage daughter to visit her biological father (a nearly homeless known drug user), the story feels unbelievable. Still, the descriptions of crystal meth use and its consequences are powerful, and will horrify and transfix older teenage readers, just as Alice did over 20 years ago. --Jennifer HubertThere are a thousand ways to raise your adrenaline, and today hit many Chev Chelios (Jason Statham) will need every one! He has one hour to settle the score and say good-bye to his girl and go out with a little style! The only question is, will he stay alive long enough to see it happen?Action anti-hero Jason Statham is competing with himself to make the most relentless, non-stop action flick imaginable. In Crank, Statham stars as a hit man named Chev Chelios who's been poisoned by some Chinese toxin; the only way to stave it off is to keep his adrenalin flowing, which requires him to drive at top speed! s through crowded traffic, start fights in bars, and run pell-mell down hospital corridors while wearing one of those humiliating smocks that tie in the back. In other words, Crank is high-end pop-trash, filled with many preposterous/ingenious stunts and over-the-top performances (Dwight Yoakam, Sling Blade, is downright droll as a doctor offering Chev assistance), marred by an unpleasant attitude towards women (Amy Smart, Outside Providence, will not look back on this as one of her signature roles). This is a movie for the audience who enjoyed Transporter and Transporter 2 but wanted Statham's perpetual scowl to become a kind of theatrical mask, a perpetual signifier of intensity that begs--nay, demands--that everything around it rise to a mutual level of absurdity. Fans of Luc Besson (Leon/The Professional, District 13) will find Crank to be simpatico. --Bret FetzerThe heart-wrenching bestselling Crank trilogy! shows that addiction is never just one person’s problem. C rank

Kristina is the perfect daughter: gifted high school junior, quiet, never any trouble. Then she meets the monster: crank. And what begins as a wild ride turns into a struggle for her mind, her soulâ€"her life.

Glass

Crank. Glass. Ice. Crystal. Whatever you call it, it’s all the same: a monster. Kristina thinks she can control it. Now with a baby to care for, she is determined to be the one deciding when and how much, the one calling the shots. But the monster is strong, and before she knows it, Kristina is back in its grip . . . and it won’t let go.

Fallout

Nineteen years after Kristina met the monsterâ€"crankâ€"her three children are reeling from the consequences of her decisions. Instead of one big, happy family, they are desperate tangle of scattered lives united by anger, doubt, and fear. There is more of Kristina in her children than they would ever like to believe. But when the thread that ties them together b! rings them face-to-face, they’ll discover something powerful in each other and in themselvesâ€"the trust, the hope, the courage to begin to break the cycle.Hunter, Autumn, and Summerâ€"three of Kristina Snow’s five childrenâ€"live in different homes, with different guardians and different last names. They share only a predisposition for addiction and a host of troubled feelings toward the mother who barely knows them, a mother who has been riding with the monster, crank, for twenty years.

Hunter is nineteen, angry, getting by in college with a job at a radio station, a girlfriend he loves in the only way he knows how, and the occasional party. He's struggling to understand why his mother left him, when he unexpectedly meets his rapist father, and things get even more complicated. Autumn lives with her single aunt and alcoholic grandfather. When her aunt gets married, and the only family she’s ever known crumbles, Autumn’s compulsive habits lead her to drink. And ! the consequences of her decisions suggest that there’s more ! of Krist ina in her than she’d like to believe. Summer doesn’t know about Hunter, Autumn, or their two youngest brothers, Donald and David. To her, family is only abuse at the hands of her father’s girlfriends and a slew of foster parents. Doubt and loneliness overwhelm her, and she, too, teeters on the edge of her mother’s notorious legacy. As each searches for real love and true family, they find themselves pulled toward the one person who links them togetherâ€"Kristina, Bree, mother, addict. But it is in each other, and in themselves, that they find the trust, the courage, the hope to break the cycle.

Told in three voices and punctuated by news articles chronicling the family’s story, FALLOUT is the stunning conclusion to the trilogy begun by CRANK and GLASS, and a testament to the harsh reality that addiction is never just one person’s problem.