Shared Darkness

Based on Margaret and H.A. Rey’s classic series of children’s books, Curious
George breathes life into the misadventures of its inquisitive little
primate and his keeper, heretofore known only as “The Man in the Yellow Hat.”
In an age of exactingly rendered, computer-generated animated landscapes, Curious
George is a bit of a throwback. Eschewing modern convention, the movie
instead hews closely to the same storybook style of the serial narratives,
aiming for appeal through characterization and a charm offensive rather than
technological bedazzlement. This tack captures the floppy-limbed antics of
George quite well, but makes for a movie that feels a bit quaint and, even if
they’re not able to articulate it, likely slight to many children.

Much material is gently, winningly evocative of the books (George
finger-painting the white walls of a snooty society lady, Ted coming to
George’s rescue as he floats off with a bunch of balloons), but not necessarily
integral to the main story. That said, Ferrell gives a good voice performance
as the somewhat scatterbrained but innately honorable Ted, even working in a
few sly, improv asides. Generally pleasing if not quite lastingly touching, Curious
George will sate many children’s curiosity, and certainly fans of the
books, but may not be flashy enough for those weaned on the flash (and
flatulence jokes) of the breathlessly paced Shrek films.

Supplemental extras on the 1.85:1 anamorphic widescreen presentation include a whopping 15 deleted scenes that clock in at 17 minutes, as well as the music video for Jack Johnson’s “Upside Down.” There’s also a neat featurette that instructs kids on how to draw Curious George, and a five-minute featurette that includes chats with animation artists. Rounding things out are a bunch of set-top interactive games and activities, plus a “virtual coloring book” and DVD-ROM content. B
(Movie) B- (Disc)

If there were an organization called the National Association for the Advancement of Multi-Ethnic Music Video Hootchies, they would surely find great investment and reward in The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift, given that it would gainfully employ so much of their membership.

ass-slapping and ogling of micro-skirts ensues — as much as a PG-13 rating will allow, at any rate. If both completely conforming to audience expectation (for the randy party base) and finding new ways to tweak and/or subvert it are the two sometimes at-odds goals for genre cash-dashes of this ilk, Tokyo Drift arguably “succeeds” only in the first regard: staffed by a small army of sound mixers, sound editors, rotoscope artists and digital effects compositors, it’s a movie every bit as loud as one might imagine.

The story centers on Sean Boswell (Friday Night Lights’ Lucas Black), a headstrong Texas kid whose toothy grin always seems to get him in trouble with the jock boyfriends of every girl with which he flirts. Naturally Sean’s got a jones for racing, too, but his latest escapade ranks as a third strike, which causes that aforementioned floozy of a mother of his to ship Sean off to Japan to live with his estranged father, a career military man. Now a gaijin twice over, Sean hooks up with Army brat Twinkie (Bow Wow), and discovers the world of drift racing — comprised of hairpin turns and switchbacks born both of Tokyo’s cramped urban confines and winding mountain roads.

Sean disrespects the reigning king of this scene, D.K. (Brian Tee), by, yes, chatting up his girlfriend Neela (newcomer Nathalie Kelley, above with Black). D.K. is the nephew of Kamata (Sonny Chiba), an underworld crime boss, but Sean doesn’t back down, accepting a race in which he borrows a car from Han (Sung Kang), D.K.’s friend and associate. Unfamiliar with drifting, Sean loses, wrecking the car in the process. Indebted to Han, he begins accompanying him on errands, winning over his trust and establishing a rapport with him. After Sean defends Twinkie from one of D.K.’s thugs and bests the same goon in a race, D.K. becomes even more furious (though not necessarily faster), setting up a final stakes race confrontation on a steep mountain descent.

While Black has some twangy charisma, he’s given precious little with which to work. Cellular scribe Chris Morgan’s screenplay is an exercise in pure functionality; two elementary school kids sitting next to me at a screening kept themselves busy between mouthfuls of popcorn and soda by predicting the call-and-response of dialogue. Combining CGI with practical stunt work, director Justin Lin (Better Luck Tomorrow, Annapolis) brings a small measure of flash to some of the movie’s race sequences, but the spatial relationships so crucial to their understanding and emotional investment are lacking, and the gauzy nighttime setting of the penultimate showdown blunts its impact.

The film’s locale is somewhat novel, and Black — who’s all growed up and filled out from his Sling Blade days — is certainly a serviceable guide. Still, I can’t think of a particularly compelling reason to see The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift, though if an eager moviegoer does they’ll surely be rewarded with ample portions of the colorfully expected. Supplemental bonus features for this 2.35:1 anamorphic widescreen presentation kick off with a genial audio commentary track from Lin in which he points up the differences and compromises involved in making the leap from indie filmmaking to studio fare. From there, it’s on to a collection of deleted scenes, and then a half dozen featurettes that give ample track time to both the effects work and staging involved in the race sequences (more than 19 dozen customized stunt cars) as well as the phenomenon of drift racing in more general strokes. There’s even a look at real-life drift king Keiichi Tsuchiya. A music video rounds things out, along with complementary preview trailers. C (Movie) B (Disc)

A friend of mine once amusingly proposed a festival of wholly
mediocre films — think of the most entirely passable yet still utterly
forgettable movies possible, like Intersection,
movies with absolutely no kitsch value — and we proceeded to kill a beer or two
coming up with the perfectly nondescript lineup. Since then I’ve on occasion thought
up other bizarre, commercially nonviable festival lineups (movies in which the
leads hooked up off screen, films with multiple Arquettes, a retrospective of
Daniel Baldwin), and it occurred to recently me while watching British import Johnny Was that it could be programmed
alongside Johnny Suede, Johnny Mnemonic, Johnny English, Johnny West
and Johnny Skidmarks to create a whole
festival of rotten Johnnies.

that
bad, but Johnny Was is certainly no
great shakes, despite its wildly eclectic cast. Penned by Brendan Foley and
directed by Mark Hammond, the film is set in the bare-knuckle London
burgh of Brixton, where the titular ex-thug (darkly charismatic toughie Vinnie
Jones, above right) is trying to escape his violent past. Johnny’s poorly chosen place of idyllic
settling, though, is a flat sandwiched between a crime den run by a Jamaican
gangster (Eriq LaSalle) and pirate radio station operated by a Rastafarian
deejay (former boxer Lennox Lewis, above left). When Johnny’s ex-partner (Patrick Bergin,
awakened from sleeping with the enemy), freshly escaped from prison, comes
knocking on his door, looking to pull Johnny back into his old ways and finish derailing
the Irish peace process, Johnny must try to play both sides in an effort to
stay alive and protect the ones he loves.

Johnny Was belongs
easily to the modernist tradition of grubby, mashed-up British urban crime tales that
have trailed in the wake of Guy Ritchie’s one-two debut punch of Lock, Stock & Two Smoking Barrels
and Snatch. Thing is, it’s not quite
as colorful and fleet of foot. The cast has enough intrigue value — Samantha
Mumba also costars as Rita, Johnny’s new flame, and rocker Roger Daltry plays
Jimmy, his former boss — to make for some interesting clashes, but Foley’s
script telegraphs its intentions, Hammond shoots with a small frame, and the
action sequences are less than thrilling. For more forgiving fans of this oeuvre,
there are a few delights to be found within, but for general audiences there’s
little of essentiality. The film is presented in 1.78:1 widescreen, with an
English language 5.1 Dolby digital audio track and optional Spanish subtitles.
The only supplemental extras are a clutch of preview trailers for other First
Look home video releases. C- (Movie) C- (Disc)

John Travolta makes no winking cameos in the gaming horror flick Stay Alive,
and it’s probably for the best. Shot on location outside the swampy
environs of New Orleans, and cast with a passel of young, on-hiatus TV
stars, the movie scores some middling points for its conceit, and the
manner in which it attempts to blend big screen narrative with teens’
burgeoning appetites for the interactive and participatory thrills that
videogames provide. But in the end it amounts to just trading one set
of familiar clichés for another, although this unrated version — which
runs around 15 minutes longer than the PG-13-rated theatrical cut,
which rung up $23 million at the box office this March and April —
plays a bit better and more well-rounded.

The story? The real world and the world of devoted gaming gruesomely
collide when a group of friends get sucked into the beta version of the
titular videogame, a title that kills the gamer whose character dies in
play. In a death-defying race against time, the survivors, including
Hutch (Jon Foster), Abigail (Samaire Armstrong), pipsqueak Swink
(Frankie Muniz), October (Sophia Bush) and her wiseass brother Phineas
(Jimmi Simpson, bringing some much-appreciated levity to the early
proceedings), must work together to solve the mystery of the game —
based on a real-life 17th century noblewoman known as “The Blood
Countess” — all while desperately trying to evoke Travolta’s dance
moves from the misguided sequel to Saturday Night Fever… err,
no, no, I mean, simply stay alive. Investigating the case from the
outside in — which is to say, expressing incredulity regarding the
kids’ story — is Detective Thibodeaux (Wendell Pierce).

Packaged in a regular Amray case, Stay Alive is presented in
2.35:1 widescreen, enhanced for 16×9 televisions. A Dolby digital 5.1
surround sound audio mix pumps up the aural horror, alongside optional
French and Spanish subtitles. Bonus features include a short visual
effects reel that cuts together, music video-style, a clutch of
artists’ drawings and conceptual work. There’s also an interactive
bonus menu template, sort of laid over the regular DVD menu, which
allows you to “build” a character from several traits, and then flash
forward to see what happens to you after your selections. It’s an
intriguing and somewhat freaky little gambit, but one that ultimately
doesn’t have too much replay value, so limited are its branching
options.

There’s also an audio commentary track from writers Matthew Peterman
and William Brent Bell (the latter of whom also directs), in which the
pair discuss and joke about the challenges of mounting their
independently financed $10 million production (hence the 15 credited
producers!), the research that went into the project and centered
around the real-life Elizabeth Bathory (who allegedly killed 650 girls
in Romania and bathed in a tub of their blood) and the introduction of
an entirely new character, Alice Kreig in the longer cut of the film.
It’s a breezy, enjoyable offering, grounded in reality and refreshingly
cognizant of and honest about some the movie’s shortcomings. C- (Movie) C+ (Disc)

I was resistant to My Name Is Earl
when it first bowed last fall. I resented the ubiquitous ad campaign,
which seemed to trump the rest of, if not the entirety of that autumn’s
offerings, then certainly the rest of NBC’s schedule in aggregate.
There was a seeming air of arrogance and condescension attached to the
manner in which the show was pitched — “Here’s our new comedy, and by
Jesus, you’re going to like it!” Even if the product itself
isn’t actually detestable, I tend to react negatively to that sort of
from-on-high dictation; it reminds me too much of the hot girl who’s
just more than a little aware of her hotness, and a vacuous
bitch as a result of not having to develop any other qualities of
personal merit. A year later, I’m not completely sold on My Name Is Earl
as the type of mainstream comedy hit that NBC — and many Emmy voters,
coincidentally — envision it as, but there are certain trashy delights
to be found herein.

Nadine Velasquez), that works in the hotel where the pair live. Also
figuring into the proceedings is Earl’s screeching ex, Joy (Jaime
Pressly, always spot-on in purposefully heightened and/or deep-fried
fare like this and Poor White Trash).

The show gets a way with an awful lot for its early time slot
(pedophilia and rape jokes, anyone?), but what holds it together is
Lee, who has a natural, easygoing doofus’ charm. The parade of guest
stars (Jon Favreau, Christine Taylor, Juliette Lewis, Giovanni Ribisi,
Beau Bridges, Missi Pyle and Timothy Olyphant) commences a bit early
for a show of this type (can Ben Stiller be far behind, or Kevin Smith
and Jason Mewes, for that matter?), but I suppose is just further
confirmation of NBC’s infatuation… err, confidence in it.

Spread out over four discs in slimline cases in turn stored in a cardboard slipcase, My Name Is Earl: Season One
is presented in 1.78:1 anamorphic widescreen with an English language,
Dolby digital 5.1 surround sound audio track, a nice differentiation
for a sitcom. Optional subtitles in English, Spanish and French are
also available. Exclusive to this DVD set is a 13-minute short, “Bad
Karma,” which proffers an amusing alternate vision of the show’s
conceit — namely, that Earl makes a list of everyone who’s ever screwed
him over and dishes out some cold-case payback. All two dozen episodes
are contained herein, along with eight episodic audio commentaries by
Garcia, various members of the creative team… and, on the Mother’s Day
episode entitled “Dad’s Car,” their mothers. The last bit is a nice,
amusing twist — something I don’t think I’ve seen/heard on a DVD
before. Deleted scenes with optional commentary, an extremely hearty
little blooper reel (20 minutes!) and a 38-minute behind-the-scenes
featurette round out a solid slate of bonus materials. B- (Show) A- (Disc)

Disney has, with movies like Remember the Titans, Miracle, The Rookie, Glory Road and this autumn’s Invincible,
shrewdly positioned itself as the go-to studio for inspirational,
family-friendly sports tales based on true stories, slots that
new-to-DVD releases The Miracle Match and Stick It (below) also for the most part comfortably fit into.

Goal!
trilogy — for which Disney is handling domestic distribution — is the
higher-profile of its two recent soccer releases, director David
Anspaugh’s The Miracle Match tells the story of one of the
greatest upsets in sports history. Set two weeks before the 1950 World
Cup, it centers on a group of rag-tag group of recreational players
from St. Louis and New York chosen to represent their country in
Brazil. Consumed with conflicts — personal, cultural and, more
pressingly, of disparate, clashing pitch style — the players had only a
matter of days to gel and form a team before suiting up against the
British squad, widely regarded as one of the best in the world. Given
to narrative hyperbole and clichéd dialogue, The Miracle Match
is a niche title, a solid rental for hardcore soccer fans but likely
few others. Patrick Stewart is the encouraging coach, narrating the
film from afar, and Wes Bentley (American Beauty) and Gerard
Butler give solid performances. If Anspaugh and screenwriter Angelo
Pizzo, working from a novel by Geoffrey Douglas, don’t quite achieve
the heights of previous collaborations Rudy and Hoosiers,
it’s chiefly because soccer remains an inherently less known and
knowable sport this side of the Atlantic, its action rhythms hopelessly
foreign.

Stick It, on the other hand, isn’t based on a true story, but
does hit many of the same empowering beats we’ve come to expect from
movies of such an ilk, and does it in a colorful enough fashion to
succeed on its own terms. Bring It On screenwriter Jessica
Bendinger takes a directorial dip with the film, utilizing the
too-familiar-by-half narrative template of a talented but rebellious
gymnast, Haley Graham (Missy Peregrym), who returns to the world of
structured competition with the assistance of a no-nonsense new coach,
Burt Vickerman (Jeff Bridges). The rigid rules and spandex-clad,
intra-squad bickering are off-putting to her, but Haley’s love of the
sport eventually resurfaces, and she wins over teammates who hold a
grudge against her for walking out of a competition. Some of the
landings are nicely stuck, others a bit less compellingly so, but for
tween girl audiences Stick It is right in their wheelhouse.

The Miracle Match is presented in 2.40:1 widescreen enhanced
for 16×9 televisions, with Dolby digital 5.1 surround sound, but
unfortunately includes no bonus materials save optional French and
Spanish subtitles. Stick It, meanwhile, comes with a nice slate
of complementary extras to add to its 1.85:1 widescreen presentation.
Thirteen minutes of deleted scenes come with optional commentary from
Bendinger, and the writer-director also sits for two feature-length
audio commentary tracks — one with actresses Peregrym and Vanessa
Lengies, the other with editor Troy Takaki and cinematographer Daryn
Okada. The former is obviously the spunkier and more back-slapping,
while the latter offers more production-oriented tidbits. Featurettes
on floor routines, stunt double gymnastics and the movie’s visual
effects work counterbalance the levity of a three-minute blooper reel
and Missy Elliott’s “We Run This” music video. C (The Miracle Match) C- (Disc) / C+ (Stick It) A- (Disc)

The notion of “a feel-good German comedy” is one thing, as
is the surface impression of a movie called Guys
and Balls. Director Sherry Horman’s film, though, is as baldly a piece of sunny
mainstream entertainment as one can imagine for a gay-themed German flick. Eagerly
pitching woo in the fashion of underdog sports and blue-collar tales Bend It Like Beckham, Hardball and The Full Monty, soccer flick Guys
and Balls sails by somewhat thinly on the charms of its lead.

newcomer Maximilian Brückner, above right) has had
one overriding passion ever since he was a little child — soccer.  Now, as a young adult, he’s the goalie of a
small-town club team. On the same day he accidentally lets down his teammates
in an important match, though, they discover he’s homosexual, and promptly give
him the boot from the squad. Seeking revenge, Ecki sets out to form an all-gay
team with a little help from his supportive sister Susanne (Lisa Marie
Potthoff). They draft a washed-up soccer star (Rolf Zacher) as their coach, and
things come together in fine, if somewhat paint-by-numbers fashion — a trajectory
which, naturally, includes a new love interest for Ecki in the form of Sven
(David Rott). Eventually, though, Ecki must cross paths with his former squad, paving
the way for the ultimate grudge match.

The Audience Award winner at the 2005 Outfest Film Festival,
Guys and Balls is for the most part an
attempt at a gay-themed crowd-pleaser through and through. Screenwriter
Benedikt Gollhardt is apparently a German television writer, and his sitcom
instincts are borne out in somewhat winning fashion herein. For those worried
about such things, the jokes aren’t pitched in too steep a culturally specific
fashion, they’re far more rooted in character. Some of the supporting
characters are thinly imagined and lean heavily on yawn-inducing stereotypical
humor (the leather-clad, Village People enthusiast, etc.), but it’s more to do
with the economical strokes of the genre than any real laziness or misanthropy.
If arthouse, queer and sports flicks all interest you, this curio exists at
their intersection.

Housed in a regular Amray plastic case and presented in 1.85:1
anamorphic widescreen on a dual layer disc, Guys
and Balls comes with two German language audio tracks, in Dolby digital stereo
2.0 and Dolby digital 5.1 surround sound. English subtitles, naturally,
complement the release. There’s a bit of edge enhancement attached to the
image, but nothing too sustained or irksome. Unfortunately, there are no
supplemental features save for a collection of preview trailers for similarly
themed films and series, like Third Man
Out and Dante’s Cove. C (Movie)
D+ (Disc)

The success of a hearty piece of genre fare like Annapolis, a military drama of macho square-off, is largely reliant upon the magnetism of its lead. There’s a comfortable rite-of-passage to these narratives, and audiences need a sturdy and personable guide to make their interest seem something more than fleeting. A very good thing, then, that Annapolis enlists the services of James Franco. For the full review, from IGN, click here.

1977’s Eaten Alive is the movie Tobe Hooper made two years after Texas Chainsaw Massacre,
and it’s being re-released on DVD now alongside another tricked-out DVD
version of that aforementioned horror classic, and in the shadow of a
big screen prequel from New Line. Plotwise, this thinly imagined Psycho
knock-off is little more than a derisible piece of classic-era slasher
mayhem, but — notably for genre buffs — it does replace Diamond
Entertainment’s horribly substandard transfer and full-frame release of
several years back.

Set deep in the Texas bayou, amidst the
dankest of whorehouses and bars, sits the decrepit Starlight Hotel.
Owned and operated by lonely war veteran Judd (Stalag 17’s
Neville Brand, oozing maniacal intensity), it receives few visitors.
That could be because of the remote backwoods location, or maybe it’s
Judd’s violent mood swings. Or maybe it’s the giant alligator in the
half-moat that snakes from the backyard around to the front porch. Who
knows…

Regardless, you know from frame one of a movie like this that things
aren’t going to end well, for pretty much everyone involved. Among
those that get caught up in Judd’s web are Clara (Death Race 2000’s
Roberta Collins), a runaway prostitute from the nearby town; a strange
young couple, Faye (Marilyn Burns) and Roy (William Finley) and their
ward; a dying father (Mel Ferrer) and his nubile daughter (Crystin
Sinclaire); and a sex-starved local yokel named Buck (a youngish Robert
England), who delivers the same rhyming, introductory line of
evocative-kitsch dialogue that Quentin Tarantino would nip for use in Kill Bill, Vol. 1.

Packaged in a regular Amray case, Eaten Alive is presented in
1.85:1 format, with Dolby digital and 2.0 mono audio mixes. Bonus
features include a brief featurette with new video interview footage
from Robert Englund recounting his participation in the movie, a still
photo gallery and theatrical trailers, among other tidbits. The worthy
supplemental distraction in the midst of all this rather craptacular
execution comes in the form of a fascinating and careening cobbled
together audio commentary track from producer/co-writer Mardi Rustam,
make-up artist Craig Reardon (who recounts his first occupational brush
with rouging bare breasts, as well as Hooper being fired and missing
from some of the shoot) and actors Finley and Richards. It’s the aforementioned
Collins, however, who provides the most entertainment bang for your
buck, recounting star Brand’s sweet disposition… until he tried to
sexually assault her! I guess the statute of limitations has expired,
but still: fascinating stuff, if for mostly the wrong reasons. D- (Movie) B- (Disc)

Veteran
filmmaker and producer Sydney Pollack came uncertainly to his first
documentary, on celebrated modern architect (and longtime friend) Frank
Gehry, but the result is a casually seductive and disarmingly relaxed
filing, the perfect movie for those intrigued by notions of the sublime
in buildings and structures, but generally unable to articulate or wrap
their heads around such concepts.

Responsible for some of the
most stunning and innovative designs in the world — including the
Experience Music Project in Seattle and the Walt Disney Concert Hall in
Los Angeles, which gets major run here during its formative phases —
Gehry’s work style can best be likened to improvisational jazz; he
loves messy freehand sketches (hence the title), and after taping
together an early mock-up of the aforementioned Disney Hall in a
brainstorming session, he describes it as “so stupid it’s beautiful.”
Mixing the freewheeling nature of art with the much more unforgiving
laws of physics that govern design and construction, Gehry is a true
American original.

Pollack, prowling about with his mini-DV camera, inserts himself
into the proceedings here, but in a far from officious manner. Rather,
he’s the perfect Everyman guide for a project like this, bringing to
the table neither a wonkish appreciation for architecture nor, really,
overindulgence upon explicatory, talking head vocabulary. That doesn’t
mean we don’t get insightful interviews, because we do — with everyone
from Charles Jencks and Ed Ruscha to Dennis Hopper (who lives in a
Gehry-designed home) and Bob Geldorf. Jumping back and forth between
stories about the man (he changed his last name from Goldberg at the
hectoring insistence of his first wife) and his methods (he often works
in two or three different scales at once on a single project, so as to
avoid getting married to the models), Sketches of Frank Gehry is an absorbing look at a unique imagination and a fascinating little movie in its own right.

Housed in a regular Amray case, Sketches of Frank Gehry is
presented in a clear, 1.78:1 anamorphic widescreen transfer that
preserves the aspect ratio of the movie’s brief, ultra-limited
theatrical bow this past May, alongside an English language 5.1 Dolby
digital audio track that smoothly captures the movie’s rather
pedestrian aural demands while also showcasing hints of accompanying
atmospherics that paint a rich portrait of Gehry’s work space.
Additionally, subtitles are available in French. The film’s sole
supplemental bonus feature comes in the form of a 34-minute Q&A
with Pollack from its Los Angeles premiere. Moderated by Sideways
director Alexander Payne, this informal chat of friendly softballs is
marred somewhat by poor sound quality, but Pollack is an always
interesting interview, and he speaks in engaging fashion about his
first, breathtaking experience with the Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao,
Spain (he was licking his wounds during the international press tour
for Random Hearts, and ducked in to its grand unveiling after
an invitation from Gehry) and his reluctance to heed editor Karen
Schmeer’s instincts and insert conversational footage of him into Sketches of Frank Gehry. To purchase the movie via Amazon, click here. B (Movie) B- (Disc)

Authenticity is an underrated commodity on many fronts. Heck, it’s helped George W. Bush find presidential election twice (well, arguably twice…) despite not exactly being the most intelligent or well spoken guy on any given city block. Similarly, The King of Queens is a genial, well-worn comedy that initially took its leading cues from fellow CBS laffer Everybody Loves Raymond when it bowed in 1998, but eventually found its own scrappy voice and thus worked its own comfortable groove into couches all around America.

Created by Michael Weithorn and David Litt, the series centers around parcel delivery truck driver Doug Heffernan (Kevin
James) and his wife Carrie (Leah Remini). In place of a brood of
precocious and/or ankle-biting kids, however, is Carrie’s father Arthur
(Jerry Stiller), who lives with the couple. As is typical of these
“oafish patriarch” shows, Doug spends plenty of time raging against
Carrie’s attempts to get him to lead a healthier lifestyle, and many
jokes come from the mindset and canted point of view of a
sports-obsessed guy’s guy. (“Great, I screwed up and ate all the
franks,” says Doug mournfully at one point. “Now all I have left is a
stupid bowl of beans.”) The regular addition of Mad TV’s Nicole
Sullivan as Arthur’s part-time caregiver Holly is an inspired touch,
and Victor Williams scores subtle points for his work as Doug’s
recently divorced best friend, Deacon Palmer.

While several of the two dozen episodes this season dip back into overly familiar
terrain — like Doug and Carrie’s nervousness and competitiveness with
their new, white-collar neighbors — there’s some legitimate fun to
be had too. “Affidavit Justice” finds Doug pretending to be a lawyer, while both “King Pong” and “Icky Shuffle” showcase Doug’s competitive steak when Arthur buys a ping pong table and and the aforementioned duo team up for a shuffleboard tournament, respectively. “Eggsit Strategy” (bonus points for the title) finds Carrie’s job in jeopardy when her flaky boss is fired, and “Damned Yanky” delves winningly into the subject of sexual fantasy, with Carrie upset that her husband’s apparently aren’t always about her. Sixth season guest stars include Janeane Garofalo, Judge Reinhold, Jon Favreau, Anne Meara (co-star Stiller’s real-life wife), Saturday Night Live‘s Rachel Dratch and Lou
Ferrigno as the Heffernans’ sad-sack neighbor.

The King of Queens: 6th Season is presented on three discs
stored in attractive gatefold packaging that is in turn housed in a
cardboard slipcase. Episodes come in 1.33:1 full frame transfers, with
English Dolby surround sound audio. As is unfortunately too frequently
the case with later seasons of current day sitcoms, there are no
supplemental bonus features contained here. While there might not be a
lot for James or Remini at this point to say about their characters,
surely some of the series’ writers could offer up a handful of
interesting audio commentaries or interviews about the plotting out of
seasonal arcs or other such tidbits, which would be a nice morsel for
longtime fans. B- (Show) C- (Disc)