Latest DVDs, CDs, books: Jan. 10
A look at some of the DVDs, CDs and books hitting stores this week.
DVDS
“Moneyball” (PG-13): After losing his star players to free agency, the general manager of the cash-strapped Oakland A’s (Brad Pitt) teams with an Ivy League economics whiz (Jonah Hill) to revolutionize baseball.
Elsewhere , Robert De Niro, Clive Owen and Jason Statham team up for the revenge thriller “Killer Elite” (R), while in “What’s Your Number?” (R), a quirky woman (Anna Faris) recruits her hunky neighbor (Chris Evans) to help her figure out which of her exes might have been Mr. Right. Vera Farmiga makes her directorial debut with “Higher Ground” (R), about an evangelical Christian (played by Farmiga) who begins to question her faith. “There Be Dragons” (PG-13) finds “The Mission” director Roland Joffe focusing on a reporter (Dougray Scott) on the trail of the controversial founder (Charlie Cox) of the Roman Catholic organization Opus Dei. And in the dark comedy “Saving Private Perez” (PG-13), a Mexican drug lord (Miguel Rodarte) recruits a dirty half-dozen to help him rescue his kid brother (Juan Carlos Flores) from captivity in Iraq.
On the documentary front, “The Electric Daisy Carnival Experience” (not rated) recaptures the sights and sounds of last year’s music extravaganza at Las Vegas Motor Speedway. Topping today’s TV-to-DVD transfers (unrated unless otherwise noted): “Boardwalk Empire: The Complete First Season,” “Columbo: Mystery Movie Collection 1994-2003,” “Primeval: Volume Three,” “Dennis the Menace: Season Four,” “Hawaii Five-O: The 12th and Final Season,” “An Idiot Abroad” and “Pacific Blue: The Complete Series” (PG-13).
CDS
Snow Patrol, “Fallen Empires”: We’re not going to say that Ireland’s Snow Patrol is a tad on the boring side or anything, it’s just that …
Whoa, dozed off there for a second.
Sorry about that.
Anyway, if you’re into middle-of-the-road alt-rock (stifling yawn), then let it Snow, let it Snow, let it Snow.
Also in stores: David Crowder Band, “Give Us Rest or (a requiem mass in c [the happiest of all keys])”; Charlie Haden & Hank Jones, “Come Sunday”; The Little Willies, “For the Good Times”; Nightwish, “Imaginaerum”; O’Brother, “Garden Window”; Red Wanting Blue, “From the Vanishing Point”; SafetySuit, “These Times”; and Yo Gotti, “Live From the Kitchen.”
BOOKS
“Gideon’s Corpse” by Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child: After a nuclear scientist goes crazy and a plume of radiation is discovered above New York City, Gideon Crew has 10 days to track a mysterious terrorist cell and prevent a major U.S. city from being destroyed.
In another series continuation, lawman Charlie Hood must team with rival Bradley Smith to save the woman they love, who has been kidnapped by the leader of a Mexican drug cartel, in T. Jefferson Parker’s “The Jaguar.”
Also hitting shelves this week: “Believing the Lie” by Elizabeth George; “Elizabeth the Queen: The Life of a Modern Monarch” by Sally Bedell Smith; “The Fault in Our Stars” by John Green; “Fifth Victim: A Charlie Fox Thriller” by Zoe Sharp; “Four Feet Tall and Rising: A Memoir” by Shorty Rossi; “The House at Sea’s End” by Elly Griffiths; “I Got This: How I Changed My Ways and Lost What Weighed Me Down” by Jennifer Hudson; “Lunatics” by Dave Barry; “More Room in a Broken Heart: The True Adventures of Carly Simon” by Stephen Davis; “The Serial Killer Whisperer: How One Man’s Tragedy Helped Unlock the Deadliest Secrets of the World’s Most Terrifying Killers” by Pete Earley; and “The Underside of Joy” by Sere Prince Halverson.