New DVD, Blu-ray and digital highlights for the week of February 21-27, 2022

SALT LAKE CITY (KUTV) — Sometimes a great film gets overlooked for absolutely no good reason. One of my favorite films of 2021 is "C'mon C'mon" from director Mike Mills and starring Joaquin Phoenix, Gaby Hoffman, and newcomer Woody Norman. It's not scheduled for a physical release until April, but you can buy it digitally now.

Digital

• C'mon C'mon - Johnny (Joaquin Phoenix), a radio journalist, volunteers to watch the son (Woody Norman) of his estranged sister (Gaby Hoffmann) while she sees to the mental health of the boy's father. Johnny isn't entirely prepared or qualified to be a substitute parent. He's her only option. Director/writer Mike Mills has once again crafted a beautiful, heart wrenching, and still hopeful drama that will change the way you see the world.
  
  
• A Journal for Jordan - Directed by Denzel Washington and starring Michael B Jordan, "A Journal for Jordan" is based on the true story of Sgt. Charles Monroe King who wrote a journal intended to guide his son through life if King were to be killed in combat. King was killed in action in Baghdad.

New on DVD and Blu-ray

• House of Gucci -WhenPatrizia Reggiani (Lady Gaga) marries into the legendary Gucci family, she sends shockwaves throughout the fashion industry as she manipulates her husband Maurizio Gucci (Adam Driver)and her new in-laws into changing the way the family business runs. Everything goes well until Maurizio decides he's no longer interested in Patrizia as aa wife or business partner. Directed by Ridley Scott and co-starring Al Pacino, Jeremy Irons, Jared Leto, and Salma Hayek, "House of Gucci" features some strong performances and a runtime that desperately needed to be trimmed back.

• The 355 - When a doomsdaydevice capable of shutting down any electronic system is about to be sold to a terrorist organization a mismatched group of female agents from various countries come together to save the world. The film stars Jessica Chastain, Lupita Nyong’o, Diane Kruger,Penelope Cruz,andBingbing Fan shows up towards the end of the film. I had hoped for a "Mission: Impossible" or "Oceans 11" vibe but directorSimon Kinberg's film isn't smart enough of fun enough to be a gender-swapped Expendablesfilm. [Full Review]
  
  
• American Underdog - The story of Kurt Warner the most unlikely Super Bowl MVP in the history of the NFL. That's not really hyperbole. Zachary Levi stars as Warner and Anna Paquin co-stars as the Hall of Fame quarterback's wife.
  
  
• The King's Man - With the fate of the world in the balance, Orlando Oxford (Ralph Fiennes) forms a secret organization known as “The King’s Men” to neutralize a shadow organization intent on pushing the world into war. This prequel to "Kingsman: The Secret Service" is better than its sequel, "Kingsman: The Golden Circle," but still left me wondering what it was that I enjoyed about the first film. [Full Review]
  
  
• Shattered - Cameron Monaghan and Lilly Krug star in this pulpy B-movie that channels the psychotic elements of "Fatal Attraction" and "Misery" with diminishing results. Might just be good enough for those looking for something exploitive and trashy.

Catalog

• Alligator - Shout! Factory brings this odd 1980 horror film about a baby alligator that mutates into a massive beast after eating the corpses of laboratory animals. Seeing as this is rated R, I didn't see the film as a child and somehow it has slipped past my attention until now. One of the better Post-Jaws films to slaughter its way through the cinemas.
  
  
• Boat People - Three years after the Vietnam War, a photojournalist travels to the country to document its cultural rebirth. Instead he finds a bleak hopelessness. A culture drowning in its poverty and repression. Released in 1982, director Ann Hui ("A Simple Life") was on the forefront of Hong Kong's New Wave movement.
  
  
• Deadly Games - A obscure slasher from 1982 that sees ayoung woman brutally attacked by a masked killer. Believing that the killer is either the town's policeman or the man who runs the movie theater, the woman sets a trap to discover her attacker's identity.
  
  
• The Green Mile 4K UHD - In 1999 Frank Darabont followed up his critically acclaimed "The Shawshank Redemption" with "The Green Mile," another film based on a Stephen King story. Tom Hanks stars as a prison guard who witnesses a man convicted of killing two little girls perform miracle healings. Warner Bros. has given the film a 4K UHD upgrade with a new 2160p transfer.
  
  
• Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy 4K UHD - Tomas Alfredson's adaptation of John Le Carre's classic spy novel starsGary Oldman, Kathy Burke, Benedict Cumberbatch, David Dencik, and Colin Firth. Set in 1970s England the film focuses on former MI6agent George Smiley (Oldman) who is brought out of retirement to discover the identity of a Russian mole within the organization. One of the best slow-burn thrillers you'll ever find. The original TV mini series from 1979 with Alec Guinness is also worth tracking down.
  
  
• Escape from L.A. 4K UHD - John Carpenter reteams with Kurt Russell in this follow up to the classic "Escape from New York." It's a race against time as Snake Plissken (Russell) is sent into a lawless district in Los Angeles to retrieve a doomsday device. Think what you will of the film itself, this new 4K UHD is so much of an improvement of the decade-old Blu-ray (Paramount's, not the 2020 Shout! Factory re-release) that it makes the old version feel like a bootleg copy. Wow.
  
  
• Lies and Deceit: Five Films by Claude Chabrol -The set includes "Cop au Vin," "Inspector Lavardin," "Madame Bovary," "Betty," and "Torment." Here's Arrow Film's description of the set:
  Too often overlooked and undervalued, Claude Chabrol was the first of the Cahiers du Cinema critics to release a feature film and would be among the most prolific. The sneaky anarchist of the French New Wave, he embraced genre as a means of lifting the lid on human nature. Nothing is sacred and nothing is certain in the films of Claude Chabrol: anything can be corrupted, and usually will be.
  
  The hidden meanness of provincial life is at the heart of Cop Au Vin (Poulet au vinaigre), as deaths and disappearances intersect around the attempt by a corrupt syndicate of property developers to force a disabled woman and her son from their home. Actor Jean Poiret would prove so compelling as the laconic Detective Inspector Lavardin good cop/bad cop all in one that the sequel would be titled after him. Inspector Lavardin sees the titular detective investigating the murder of a wealthy and respected catholic author, renowned for his outspoken views against indecency, whose body is found naked and dead on the beach. In Madame Bovary, Chabrol directs one of his greatest collaborators, actress Isabelle Huppert, in perhaps the definitive depiction of Flaubert's classic heroine. Meanwhile Betty, adapted from the novel of the same name by Maigret author Georges Simenon, is a scathing attack on the upper-middle classes, featuring an extraordinary performance by Marie Trintignant as a woman spiraling into alcoholism, but fighting to redefine herself. Finally, in Torment (L'enfer) Chabrol picks up a project abandoned by Henri Georges Clouzot, in which a husband's jealousy and suspicion of his wife drive him to appalling extremes. Francois Cluzet and Emmanuelle Beart give career best performances as the husband and wife tearing each other apart.