From Justin to Kelly

• Widescreen

America's favorite "Idols" Justin Guarini and Kelly Clarkson make the leap to the big screen in this high-energy comedy set during spring break in Miami-where the music, dancing, and fun in the sun never stop. It's love at first splash when a shy singer (Clarkson) from Texas hooks up with a cute Pennsylvania college student (Guarini) at the ultimate beach party, but a series of mix-ups and misunderstandings may prevent their budding romance from reaching the final round!Kelly Clarkson's fresh-faced, small-town-girl charm--the charisma that led her to win the first season of American Idol--is on full display in From Justin to Kelly, a contemporary beach-party movie co-starring her former competition, Justin Guarini. The flimsy plot--Kelly and two gal pals go to the beach for spring break, where one of her friends gets jealous of Kelly and tries to ruin her budding roma! nce with Justin--is just an excuse for glossy pop musical numbers, in which Kelly, Justin, and the rest of the cast exercise their glossy throats with lots of white soul vocal stylings. The best musical numbers suggest a new kind of disco-fueled pop operetta, with everyone singing the story along; you may wish that Kelly and Justin sang their way through the entire movie, never speaking at all. Plenty of skin--from girls and boys--is on display, but the overall tone is squeaky clean. --Bret FetzerAmerica's favorite "Idols" Justin Guarini and Kelly Clarkson make the leap to the big screen in this high-energy comedy set during spring break in Miami-where the music, dancing, and fun in the sun never stop. It's love at first splash when a shy singer (Clarkson) from Texas hooks up with a cute Pennsylvania college student (Guarini) at the ultimate beach party, but a series of mix-ups and misunderstandings may prevent their budding romance from reaching the final round!Kell! y Clarkson's fresh-faced, small-town-girl charm--the charisma ! that led her to win the first season of American Idol--is on full display in From Justin to Kelly, a contemporary beach-party movie co-starring her former competition, Justin Guarini. The flimsy plot--Kelly and two gal pals go to the beach for spring break, where one of her friends gets jealous of Kelly and tries to ruin her budding romance with Justin--is just an excuse for glossy pop musical numbers, in which Kelly, Justin, and the rest of the cast exercise their glossy throats with lots of white soul vocal stylings. The best musical numbers suggest a new kind of disco-fueled pop operetta, with everyone singing the story along; you may wish that Kelly and Justin sang their way through the entire movie, never speaking at all. Plenty of skin--from girls and boys--is on display, but the overall tone is squeaky clean. --Bret FetzerDVD

Kennel-aire "A" Frame Bunny House, 29.5"L x 16.5"W x 24"H

• Arched roof gives extra room
• 2 doors for easy access; one on the top and one on the side
• Easy assembly

An Affair with a House continues to be a top seller for STC, with more than 45,000 copies in print
Shows readers how to realize their own taste and design preferences

You learn from people with great taste,” says Bunny Williams. She should know. As a novice, Williams worked for legendary decorators Sister Parish and Albert Hadley, absorbing everything she could of their peerless design sense. Striking out on her own, she rose to the top rank of the interior design profession, where she has stylishly remained for the last 30 years. Now, it’s our turn to learn from her.

Part memoir and part how-to manual, Bunny Williams’ Point of View showcases many of the drop-dead chic but always cozily comfortable residences whose interiors Williams has ! designed during her astounding career. As Williams tells it, every design decision she makes is based on a bedrock principle: “Knowing what you value is essential.” Her conviction that every person’s home should manifest their personality guides her as she creates environments that fit each client precisely, “like a couture suit.”

By showing you how to plan and then accomplish that plan for each room of your house, Williams inspires you to take account of your own valuesâ€"and to realize your personal vision of how you want to live. As she says about the book: “My point of view will help you discover yours.”

Bunny Williams is renowned for her glamorous design and atten­tion to every little detail in her clients’ homes. Using her incredible knowledge of design and decor, and drawing on her wealth of experience, Williams takes the re! ader through several homes room by room, showing creative ways! to orga nize and add personal touches. From dining rooms (place a chest of drawers near the dining table to store flatware, napkins, place mats, and votives) to lighting (place sconces on the wall at eye level to cut the glare from ceiling lights), and pets (find interesting flat-bottom bowls for waterâ€"small Chinese fish bowls or the bottom of a porcelain tureen work perfectly!), Williams empowers the reader with her practical and inspiring tips for making a house a home.

Praise for Bunny Williams' Scrapbook for Living: 

"chock full of beautiful, instructive pictures . . . many nuggets of practical advice" 
-- The New York Times 

For 28 years the world-renowned interior designer Bunny Williams has been involved in a passionate love affair with an18th-century New England manor house that she found in sad repair. From the moment she walked up the driveway and her palms began to perspire, Williams knew she wanted the affair to last fore! ver. In her sumptuous new book, An Affair with a House, the venerable decorator describes in detail how she and her husband, antiques dealer John Rosselli, rescued, nurtured, renovated, and decorated the well-worn house, giving it new life as they restored each room, resurrected the abandoned gardens, and filled this weekend home with family and friends.

Through photographs, anecdotes, how-tos, and recipes, Williams provides a rare inside look at a top decorator's retreat and explains how she approached the joys, pleasures, challenges, obstacles, and day-to-day realities of creating a beautiful, comfortable country home. An Affair with a House provides a wealth of advice on interior decor and such topics as mixing design styles, but it also addresses such practical matters as stocking the pantry and outfitting the linen closet. Beautiful photographs of the house, the gardens, and the property's rustic structures provide an intimate glimpse of the coupl! e's lifestyle and illustrate a way of life we can all apprecia! te and l earn from. P.J. Bunny finally learns that if he wants people to play with him he can't always have his own way.The Kennel-aire "A" Frame Bunny Home is designed to give your pet the ultimate in safety and comfort. Comes with durable plastic tray for easy clean-up and 4 casters for easy mobility.

American Splendor

• Actors: Paul Giamatti, Shari Springer Berman, Harvey Pekar, Chris Ambrose, Joey Krajcar.
• Format: AC-3, Anamorphic, Closed-captioned, Color, Dolby, DVD, Subtitled, Widescreen, NTSC.
• Language: English (Dolby Digital 2.0 Surround), English (Dolby Digital 5.1). Subtitles: English, Spanish, French.
• Region: Region 1 (U.S. and Canada only).
• Rated: R. Run Time: 101 minutes.

The inspiration for the award-winning movie
from HBO Films and Fine Line Features

AMERICAN SPLENDOR
The Life and Times of Harvey Pekar

Two classic comic anthologies in one volume

Stories by Harvey Pekar

Introduction by R. Crumb

Art by Kevin Brown, Gregory Budgett, Sean Carroll, Sue Cavey, R. Crumb, Gary Dumm, Val Mayerik, and Gerry Shamray

The classic collection of the comics that inspired the movie American Splendor, winner of the Gr! and Jury Prize at the 2003 Sundance Film Festival

American Splendor is the world’s first literary comic book. Cleveland native Harvey Pekar is a true American original. A V.A. hospital file clerk and comic book writer, Harvey chronicles the ordinary and mundane in stories both funny and touching. His dead-on eye for the frustrations and minutiae of the workaday world mix in a delicate balance with his insight into personal relationships. Pekar has been compared to Dreiser, Dostoevsky, and Lenny Bruce. But he is truly more than all of themâ€"he is himself.

“Mr. Pekar has . . . proven that comics can address the ambiguities of daily living, that like the finest fiction, they can hold a mirror up to life.”
â€"The New York Times

“[Pekar] has a vision that makes daily city lifeâ€"a ride on the bus, a run-in with a boss, or simply buying breadâ€"dramatic.”
â€"Chicago Sun-Times

“Simply stated, American S! plendor is the most superb literary endeavor to come off t! he stree ts of Cleveland in decades.”
â€"The Plain Dealer (Cleveland)

“Mr. Pekar lets all of life flood into his panels: the humdrum and the heroic, the gritty and the grand.”
â€"The New York Times Book Review
Based on the life and work of underground comic book writer Harvey Pekar- a prickly poet of the mundane who knows that all the strategizing in the world can't save a guy from picking the wrong supermarket checkout line.One of the most acclaimed films of 2003, American Splendor is also one of the most audaciously creative biographical movies ever made. Blending fact, fiction, and personal perspective from the comic books that inspired it, this marvelous portrait of Harvey Pekar--scowling curmudgeon, brow-beaten everyman, insightful chronicler of his own life, and frustrated file clerk at a Cleveland V.A. hospital--is an inspired amalgam of the media (comic books, TV, and film) that lifted Pekar from obscurity to the status of a pop! -cultural icon. As played by Paul Giamatti in a master-stroke of casting, we see Pekar and his understanding wife (played by Hope Davis) as underdogs in a world full of obstacles, yet also infused with subtle hope and (gasp!) heartwarming perseverance. We also see the real Pekar, and this multifaceted commingling of "reel" and "real" turns American Splendor into a uniquely cinematic celebration of Pekar's life and, by extension, the tenacity of an unlikely American hero. --Jeff Shannon

Alice in Wonderland

• Size approx 14" from head to feet
• officially licensed Disney plush doll

Tumble down the rabbit hole with Alice for a fantastical new adventure from Walt Disney Pictures and Tim Burton. Inviting and magical, Alice In Wonderland is an imaginative new twist on one of the most beloved stories of all time. Alice (Mia Wasikowska), now 19 years old, returns to the whimsical world she first entered as a child and embarks on a journey to discover her true destiny. This Wonderland is a world beyond your imagination and unlike anything you ve seen before. The extraordinary characters you ve loved come to life richer and more colorful than ever. There s the Mad Hatter (Johnny Depp), the White Queen (Anne Hathaway), the Red Queen (Helena Bonham Carter), the White Rabbit (Michael Sheen) and more. A triumphant cinematic experience Alice In Wonderland is an incredible feast for your eyes, ears and he! art that will captivate audiences of all sizes.Tim Burton was born to bring Alice in Wonderland to the big screen. Ironically, his version of the Victorian text plays more like The Wizard of Oz than a Lewis Carroll adaptation. On the day of her engagement party, the 19-year-old Alice (a nicely understated Mia Wasikowska) is lead by a white-gloved rabbit to an alternate reality that looks strangely familiar--she's been dreaming about it since she was 6 years old. Stranded in a hall of doors, she sips from a potion that makes her shrink and nibbles on a cake that makes her grow. Once she gets the balance right, she walks through the door that leads her to Tweedledum and Tweedledee (Matt Lucas), the Dormouse (Barbara Windsor), the Blue Caterpillar (Alan Rickman), and the Cheshire Cat (a delightful Stephen Fry), who inform her that only she can free them from the wrath of the Red Queen (Helena Bonham Carter channeling Bette Davis) by slaying the Jabberwocky. To pu! ll off the feat, she teams up with the Mad Hatter (Johnny Depp! in glam -rock garb), rebel bloodhound Bayard (Timothy Spall), and Red's sweet sister, the White Queen (Anne Hathaway in goth-rock makeup). While Red welcomes Alice with open arms, she plans an execution for the hat-maker when he displeases her ("Off with his head!"). Drawing from Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking-Glass, Burton creates a candy-colored action-adventure tale with a feminist twist. If it drags towards the end, his 3-D extravaganza still offers a trippy good time with a poignant aftertaste. --Kathleen C. Fennessy

Stills from Alice in Wonderland

Batman Begins [Blu-ray]

• Condition: New
• Format: Blu-ray
• AC-3; Color; Dolby; Dubbed; Subtitled; Widescreen

Batman Begins explores the origins of the Batman legend and the Dark Knight's emergence as a force for good in Gotham. In the wake of his parents' murder, disillusioned industrial heir Bruce Wayne (Christian Bale) travels the world seeking the means to fight injustice and turn fear against those who prey on the fearful. He returns to Gotham and unveils his alter-ego: Batman, a masked crusader who uses his strength, intellect and an array of high tech deceptions to fight the sinister forces that threaten the city.Batman Begins discards the previous four films in the series and recasts the Caped Crusader as a fearsome avenging angel. That's good news, because the series, which had gotten off to a rousing start under Tim Burton, had gradually dissolved into self-parody by 1997's Batman & ! Robin. As the title implies, Batman Begins tells the story anew, when Bruce Wayne (Christian Bale) flees Western civilization following the murder of his parents. He is taken in by a mysterious instructor named Ducard (Liam Neeson in another mentor role) and urged to become a ninja in the League of Shadows, but he instead returns to his native Gotham City resolved to end the mob rule that is strangling it. But are there forces even more sinister at hand?

Co-written by the team of David S. Goyer (a veteran comic book writer) and director Christopher Nolan (Memento), Batman Begins is a welcome return to the grim and gritty version of the Dark Knight, owing a great debt to the graphic novels that preceded it. It doesn't have the razzle dazzle, or the mass appeal, of Spider-Man 2 (though the Batmobile is cool), and retelling the origin means it starts slowly, like most "first" superhero movies. But it's certainly the best Bat-film since Burt! on's original, and one of the best superhero movies of its tim! e. Bale cuts a good figure as Batman, intense and dangerous but with some of the lightheartedness Michael Keaton brought to the character. Michael Caine provides much of the film's humor as the family butler, Alfred, and as the love interest, Katie Holmes (Dawson's Creek) is surprisingly believable in her first adult role. Also featuring Gary Oldman as the young police officer Jim Gordon, Morgan Freeman as a Q-like gadgets expert, and Cillian Murphy as the vile Jonathan Crane. --David Horiuchi

Breaking Upwards

• BREAKING UPWARDS (DVD MOVIE)

In a fresh modern spin on Woody Allen s Annie Hall, director Daryl Wein depicts two witty, charmingly klutsy and real New Yorkers but instead of falling in love, they re trying to fall out of love. Like Allen s best work, this film is also bursting with a brilliant cast including Emmy and Tony winner Andrea Martin (SCTV, My Big Fat Greek Wedding); Tony winner Julie White (Transformers, Monsters Vs. Aliens), and Tony nominee Pablo Schreiber (Vicky Cristina Barcelona, TV s The Wire). Daryl and Zoe (played by real-life couple Wein and Zoe Lister-Jones) still care for each other, but the zip has gone out of their romance. They decide to craft a really good breakup: instead of just saying goodbye after all, they still like each other they date four days a week and see other people for the other three days. Simple, right? Not once their mothers and friends and would-be ! lovers get in on the act. Co-written by Wein and Lister-Jones along with Peter Duchan, and based on Wein and Lister-Jones' real-life experiences, Breaking Upwards is the freshest romance in years.