Screen gems

By KAREN MARTIN SPECIAL TO THE DEMOCRAT-GAZETTE

LITTLE ROCK — Oscilloscope Laboratories has come up with this clever gift suggestion for fans of independent film: A subscription that will get the recipient the next 10 DVDs it releases. For $150, DVDs will arrive about one week before their official street dates (shipping and handling included). There’s also the ability to buy one of each previous Oscilloscope DVD from its back catalog for half price (sorry, you’ve got to pay postage on these).

What’s Oscilloscope, you wonder? It’s a film production and theatrical distribution company started in 2008 by Adam Yauch of the Beastie Boys that’s an extension of his recording studio of the same name. Among its film offerings are Kelly Reichardt’s 2008 drama Wendy and Lucy (with Michelle Williams), Yauch’s high school basketball documentary Gunnin’ for That No. 1 Spot, Carolyn Suh’s student body president campaign documentary Frontrunners, Academy-Award nominated The Garden(a documentary on Los Angeles’ 14-acre community garden from Scott Hamilton Kennedy), Nati Baratz’s Unmistaken Child (a documentary about a Tibetan monk’s search for the reincarnation of his beloved teacher), the soon-to-be-released soldier drama The Messenger (with Woody Harrelson, Ben Foster and Samantha Morton), and Michel Gondry’s personal family documentary The Thorn in the Heart.

To learn more visit oscillo scope.net.

Our thanks to Movie Style’s friend and armchair critic Sam Blair of Little Rock. He discovered The Maid in New York in mid-November and proclaimed its star, Chilean actress Catalina Saavedra, as his choice for “Most Deserving Actress Who Won’t Be Nominated” for any notable awards. He was delighted to be proved wrong when, on Nov. 30, Saavedra was named best breakthrough actor in the 19th annual Gotham In-dependent Film Awards, considered to be the unofficial beginning of the movie awards season that ends up with the Academy Awards on March 7. Other Gotham winners were:

Best feature of 2009: Kathryn Bigelow’s Iraq War drama The Hurt Locker

Best documentary: Food, Inc., produced and directed by Robert Kenner

Breakthrough director: Robert Siegel, writer/director of Big Fan.

Brigitte Bardot, who defined “sexy” in the late 1950s, is the star of a just released three-disc DVD set titled Brigitte Bardot: Classic Collection. She plays a temptress (what else?) in the Roger Vadim-directed crime thriller The Night Heaven Fell (1958, color, 95 minutes), an amateur stripper in the comedy Plucking the Daisy(1956, black-and-white, 98 minutes) and the female version of a legendary romancer in Don Juan (1973, color, 98 minutes). They're all in French with English subtitles and would make a tantalizing Christmas present for the oo-la-la-er in your life.

And for those who can’t wait for Guy Ritchie’s forthcoming Sherlock Holmes (starring Robert Downey Jr. and Jude Law), hang in there with a DVD release of four of Basil Rathbone’s classic Holmes mysteries, co-starring Nigel Bruce as Dr. Watson. Packaged in pairs, the first set offers The House of Fear (1945) and Pearl of Death (1944). The second contains The Spider Woman (1944) and The Voice of Terror (1942). All the films have been digitally restored by the UCLA Film and Television Archive. Each DVD includes the original war bond tag, studio logo and credits from the original theatrical release.

MovieStyle, Pages 37 on 12/11/2009

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