Jim Sheridan's bittersweet West Side story
After giving Americans a tour of his native Ireland in such films as "My Left Foot," director Jim Sheridan turns his gaze in our direction with the intimate, poignant drama "In America" (2003). Loosely based on Sheridan's own early experiences in the United States, the film follows well-meaning hipster family man Johnny (Paddy Considine) as he slips into the country with his wife, Sarah (Samantha Morton), and their two daughters (sisters Sarah and Emma Bolger). Johnny is trying to live his dream of making it as an actor in New York, but for these have-nots, the dream begins in a tenement in Hell's Kitchen where they scratch out a precarious, fingers-crossed existence. Not that they've had it easy up to this point, as Johnny and Sarah continue to struggle with the death of their young son some time earlier. They receive an unexpectedly empathetic assist from neighbor Mateo (Djimon Hounsou), an artist who rages like a madman behind his ominously closed door, but who turns out to have a soft side, and considerable heartbreak of his own.
Morton and Hounsou, who were both nominated for Oscars, do nice work, as do the two girls, who are just the right dose of precocious. But Considine shines brightest with his quiet desperation. When he tries to reassert himself as a provider -- by gambling the rent money on a carnival doll, or hauling home an ancient air conditioner -- the situation can turn from amusing to excruciating in a blink.
Extras: Commentary by Sheridan, production featurette. (Fox, $27.98; also on VHS)
"EASY RIDERS, RAGING BULLS" (2003) Documentary filmmaker Kenneth Bowser sets himself the sizable task of wrangling author Peter Biskind's book about the electric creativity and hedonistic excess of '70s Hollywood into a two-hour feature, and he acquits himself fairly well. The film doesn't take aim at scandal quite as aggressively as the book did, but it effectively puts faces to some less familiar names, among them influential "Easy Rider" producer Bert Schneider.
As in the book, there's the odd anecdote that smacks of obvious exaggeration. But there's also straightforward material that makes a powerful impression -- notably director Roman Polanski's distraught press conference shortly after wife Sharon Tate's murder. And then there's the just-for-fun stuff, such as a young George Lucas playing eager beaver on one of Francis Coppola's sets, or a reminder about how "The Godfather" opened on a then-unheard of 400 screens. How times have changed.
Extras: Bonus interview disc. (Shout! Factory, $24.98)
"THE FOG OF WAR" (2003) It's a good week for documentaries, as the latest from filmmaker Errol Morris also arrives on DVD. Morris's portrait of former Kennedy and Johnson defense secretary Robert McNamara is fascinating in a way that seems almost effortless -- there's no narration, just the octogenarian McNamara offering insights on America's handling of Vietnam, the Cuban missile crisis, and the World War II firebombing of Japan.
As a government figure who built his career in part on an expert grasp of statistics, McNamara talks of casualties in a way that's alternately detached and contrite; he's tearful only in recalling Kennedy's assassination, but nevertheless concedes that he and others probably conducted themselves like war criminals in the way they attacked Japan. For all the chilling information McNamara spills, he knows how to deliver it with a flair. "Cold War?" he asks. "Hell, it was a hot war!"
Extras: Additional scenes. (Columbia, $26.96; also on VHS)
"SCARY MOVIE 3" (2003) Keenen Ivory Wayans hands the director's reins to spoof veteran David Zucker ("The Naked Gun") for this inevitable sequel. Returning lead Anna Faris's new gig as a news reporter is her opening to investigate both a killer video and mysterious crop circles. (Sound familiar?) Aside from an amusing Michael Jackson gag that the trailers gave away, this isn't as funny as it of course bills itself to be -- but Zucker does have a way with tossing off silly yuks that don't quite stoop to Wayans's shock-and-raw tactics.
Extras: Bloopers and outtakes, commentary by Zucker. (Dimension, $29.99; also on VHS)
