For movie fans looking for some dramatic features, Mill Creek is more than happy to provide an eight film boxed set of some varied dramas that will surely attract any audience in the mood for soapy, entertaining, or who just want to kill some time. The “Star Studded Dramas” are worthy of the watches, if only for their varying degrees of tone since neither title is very similar to the other.
2000’s Billy Bob Thorton directed “All the Pretty Horses” finds Matt Damon as a cowboy who falls in love with the local rancher’s daughter, who so happens to be Penelope Cruz. Filled with sudsy direction and a great cast, this is one of Matt Damon’s most unique films. 2004’s “A Love Song for Bobby Long” stars an interesting cast including John Travolta as an alcoholic and Scarlett Johannson as the woman who befriends him in the somewhat bleak drama about characters colliding in the middle of tragedy and soon they begin to learn about one another in ways they never imagined.
2005’s “The Squid and the Whale” is a strong drama about familial dysfunction as Jessie Eisenberg plays one of two young boys caught in the middle of an never ending battle between his divorced mother and father.
Torn between loyalties and looking for his own persona in the middle of a free spirited mother and an overbearing father, it’s an uneasy and often uncomfortable drama that sparks wonderful performances. 2003’s “Off The Map” stars a seasoned cast of actors including Sam Shephard and Amy Brenneman in a story about a young girl learning life, love, and loss as her father sinks in to a crippling depression. 2005’s “Lords of Dogtown (Extended Cut)” is a cinematic adaptation of “Dogtown and Z-Boys” and is worthy of the watch only for the cast. The film itself it a mediocre interpretation of the documentary and doesn’t offer much dramatic material, save for a great performance by Heath Ledger. 1997’s “Excess Baggage” stars Benicio Del Toro as a car thief who accidentally steals a car with a young girl inside. The young girl is Emily, a rich brat that has staged her own kidnapping and accidentally goes along for a ride with the thief.
The two, now stuck with one another, form a friendship and go on an entertaining road trip that spells the last real boom of popularity for Alicia Silverstone and marks an early performance from future acting heavyweight Del Toro. 1991’s “Motorama” is an uneven dramatic action movie abouy a kid who runs away from an abusive home in a Mustang to play the Motorama game that could win him almost a billion dollars if he completes the game. But corruption and the law soon intervene to stop his adventures. Finally in 2006’s “Running with Scissors,” Joseph Cross leads a humongous cast of wonderful actors in an eccentric coming of age tale about a mentally ill and dysfunctional family who adopts a young boy whose unstable mother and alcoholic father hands him over to. With folks like Brian Cox, Gwyneth Paltrow, and Alec Baldwin, among many, this is a dramedy worth watching.