VideoView - UPI Arts & Entertainment

What's new on the home video scene...

Movies

"The Deep End" -- Tilda Swinton plays a desperate mother trying to protect her family from murder and blackmail in this evocative, visually rewarding thriller. Swinton plays Margaret Hill, a loving but lonely Lake Tahoe mother and housewife whose Navy husband is at sea much of the time. She manages to take care of their home and children in fine style but has just learned that her eldest, 17-year-old Beau (Jonathan Tucker) has fallen in with a dangerous crowd. At the movie's outset, she's in a Reno gay club ordering her son's lover (Josh Lucas) to stay away but he ignores her and comes calling. The next morning, while trying to appear outwardly calm as usual, Margaret is busily hiding a body, getting deeply involved in some nasty business and fending off menacing strangers who are demanding a lot of money, which she is trying frantically to raise. Not everything is believable but Swinton is terrific. 2001. 101 minutes. Fox Home Entertainment. Rated R (some violence and language, strong sex scene).

"Domestic Disturbance" -- Frank (John Travolta) is a devoted divorced dad, seemingly happy that his ex-wife Susan (Terri Polo) is getting married again (why she's an "ex" is never fully explained) in this familiar yet engaging family-in-peril thriller. Their son Danny (Matt O'Leary), however, is not happy with the prospect of a new dad, certainly not Rick (Vince Vaughn), a wealthy, popular new man in town with an obvious mean streak that apparently only the boy sees. Guys like this always have a secret, lurid past and that past gushes to the present when he kills someone with Danny watching. The boy tells his father and the cops but admits to lying about it all to protect Frank from Rick, who's now beginning to show his true creepy colors, setting up the good dad-bad dad showdown we've been expecting. 2001. 89 minutes. Paramount Home Entertainment. Rated PG-13 (violence, brief sexuality, language).

"Texas Rangers" -- Early days of the legendary lawmen who patrolled a vast, wild area after the Civil War are played out here pretty much as a routine, predictable but entertaining shoot-'em-up with a solid if stolid cast of mostly young actors. Leander McNelly (Dylan McDermott), a stern, no-nonsense taskmaster, forms the first band of Rangers to go after a gang of cutthroats terrorizing the territory, the same bunch who kidnapped his wife and children years before. Among his recruits are a pair also with revenge on their minds (James Van Der Beek and Ashton Kitchner) who grow from green to mean very quickly and the bad guys don't stand a chance. 2001. 92 minutes. Dimension Home Video. Rated PG-13 (Western violence).

"Black Knight" -- Martin Lawrence can be very funny and at times is here, too, but not often enough. Basically, it's a tale of a new knight in the 'hood, an urban takeoff on "A Connecticut Yankee In King Arthur's Court." Lawrence plays Jamal, a worker at a South L.A. medieval themed amusement park who falls in the moat and is suddenly transported back to 14th century England. There he gets embroiled in a revolution aimed at putting the rightful ruler on the throne, using his street smarts to good advantage baffling all with his language and feisty attitude. Mostly for Lawrence fans. 2001. 95 minutes. Fox Home Entertainment. Rated PG-13 (language, crude sexual humor, battle violence).

"High Heels and Low Lifes" -- Minnie Driver and Mary McCormack play a ditzy duo who hatch a hairbrained scheme to rob the robbers in this far-fetched British crime caper comedy. Driver's Shannon, a London nurse, and McCormack's Frances, a struggling actress, dream up their plan when they overhear a huge bank heist being planned on a radio scanner. Through fool-hardy luck they manage to blackmail the thieves out of a big hunk of dough only to be double crossed, triggering a most uncharacteristic response. 2001. Touchstone Home Entertainment. Rated R (language, some violence and nudity).

VIDBITS

Coming up next: the Coen Brothers' "The Man Who Wasn't There," the spirited war thriller "Behind Enemy Lines" with Gene Hackman and Owen Wilson and "My First Mister," the Albert Brooks comedy-drama about a troubled relationship... "Training Day" featuring Denzel Washington's Oscar-winning portrayal of a rogue cop is still the No. 1 video movie rental...

New on DVD: "Fatal Attraction," quite a daring thriller when released in 1987, about a married man's one-night stand that comes back to haunt him and his family, and still packing a wallop. It makes its DVD debut April 16 in widescreen format with, among its extras, new interviews with stars Michael Douglas, Glenn Close and Anne Archer...

Disney's "Peter Pan" sequel "Return To Never Land" is due on video Aug. 20, with more adventures of Peter, Wendy, Captain Hook and Tinker Bell... "The Last Waltz," Martin Scorsese's landmark concert film about the final appearance of The Band currently making the moviehouse run, makes an auspicious DVD debut on May 7...

New in stores: the DVD debut of Gumby, the still popular animated TV clay character of the '50s and '60s that first appeared on the old "Howdy Doody Show" in 1966, including 110 shorts in all and a host of extras for fans... And, for more nostalgia for older former kids, or just plain fun, there's "Flash Gordon: The Peril From Planet Mongo," a feature-length version of chapters 7-12 of the famous 1940 Buster Crabbe serial, the "Star Wars" of its day...

Whether it's gunfights or girlfights, fists, swords or feet, "Ultimate Fights" covers all. FlixMix has compiled some of the best fights on film, 16 in all, featuring clips from "Gladiator," "First Blood," "Blade," "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon," "Scarface" and many others... . Extras include instructions on how to stage your own fight scene...