In the Stacks: Library's film collection offers cinema classics to recent hits
School is nearly back in session. Have you just remembered your English assignment? The Juneau Public Libraries carry many movies based on classics you may be studying. Newly purchased DVD classics for desperate high school students include "The Cherry Orchard," "Lord of the Flies," "The Scarlet Letter," "Fahrenheit 451" and "1984." The early bird gets the worm.
"Rumpole of the Bailey": We've got the complete first and second seasons of the acclaimed Masterpiece Theater series featuring detective and lawyer Horace Rumpole. Rumpole's acerbic wit and brilliant mind keep viewers coming back for more. Four discs contain 12 episodes and a bonus feature, "Rumpole's Return," plus biographies of the author, Sir John Mortimer, and the actor who plays Rumpole, Leo McKern.
"Mahabharata": An epic myth from India, and one of the world's longest poems, this is more than five hours of dreamlike, engrossing plot as two sides of a royal (and semi-divine) family struggle for dominance. Adapted from a nine-hour stage play, the spare set has been praised for creating a timeless feel to the film and allowing the characters prominence.
"Treasures from American Film Archives": Though many types of plastics seem to live forever, film plastics don't, and so for many years there has been a push to recopy older movies before they decay. This collection highlights films from 18 organizations, which have worked to preserve classics in many genres, and includes silent films, avant-garde and independent works, home movies, animation, pioneering special effects, documentaries and newsreels. One of the films included is the hard-to-find "The Cheechahcos," the first movie made in Alaska. Fifty films, from 1893 to 1985, take up four disks and provide more than 11 hours of entertainment for hardcore film buffs.
"Rock 'n' Roll High School": Modeled on the cheesy B flicks from the 50s, this is every high school rocker's dream come true. When Vince Lombardi High School gets a tough new principal, it's only a matter of time before the kids rebel. Exploding rats, rock music on the PA system, teachers going from straightlaced to punk, the movie just gets goofier by the minute and features music by, among others, the Ramones, Fleetwood Mac, Alice Cooper, Devo and Todd Rundgren. Definitely a cult classic.
"Red Dwarf I": Here are the first six episodes of the hilarious British sci-fi TV series that alternately parodies and pays homage to classic television and manages to meld "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Universe" with "The Odd Couple." Chicken-soup-machine repairman Dave Lister wakes up from 3 million years of suspended animation to find that he's the only human left alive - but he still has plenty of company, beginning with Holly, the ship he's on.
"Bend it like Beckham": Jess wants to play soccer just like her hero, David Beckham, but her parents, Indian immigrants, think it is unladylike in this British comedy. With the help of her soccer-playing friend Jules, Jess joins a girls' team and starts ducking out of her mother's lessons in being a proper Indian woman. But her two cultures collide when her sister's wedding date is announced.
"Rhinoceros": Another surrealistic comedy you'll either love or hate: Stanley feels like an outsider - his only friend is his prissy neighbor, John, and his only interest outside of alcohol is his lovely co-worker, Daisy. But Stanley's world is getting more interesting: It is becoming filled with rhinos. Stanley finds that he alone is immune to the virus that is transforming the citizens of New York. Features Gene Wilder and Zero Mostel in the last film they worked on together.
"David Copperfield": Before he was Harry Potter, Daniel Radcliffe was David Copperfield in this Masterpiece Theater production of Dickens' classic work. Partly autobiographical, it is the story of a how a young boy in the early 1800s matures into a man of integrity despite his hard upbringing, horrible stepfather and tragic early marriage.
• Toddlertimes and Storytimes are still in recess this upcoming week. Toddlertimes will resume Jan. 5 and Storytimes on Jan. 7. Don't forget, the downtown and Mendenhall Valley libraries will close at 4 p.m. on Wednesday, Dec. 31, and Douglas will be closed all day. All libraries will be closed Jan. 1, and will resume normal hours on Friday, Jan. 2.