Jumper - Buy from Amazon: Single-Disc Edition, or 2-Disc Special Edition, or Blu-ray
Jumper was a sci-fi film with potential. However, when the budget started growing, the studio demanded bigger names in the leads in order to increase the film's box office potential, so they fired a couple of lesser known actors and went with Hayden Christensen and Rachel Bilson. Huh?

These are not two actors known for their box office hits. Sure, Hayden Christensen played Anakin Skywalker a couple of times, but when he was hired his biggest hit beside the two Star Wars films was Life as a House. And Rachel Bilson's only major film role before this was The Last Kiss, which was a box office disappointment. However, deciding to go with bigger names doesn't necessarily affect the film's quality. Going with wooden actors does. The acting in this film is nearly universally poor among the four leads. Hayden Christensen lives down to his reputation for being wooden, Rachel Bilson was uninteresting as his love interest, and it felt like Samuel L. Jackson was phoning it in. The two actors who played young Davey and young Millie were more interesting than the rest of the main cast, save for Jamie Bell.

As for the story itself... Well, there's lots of special effects. Sadly, that's the biggest drawing power here as we get almost no backstory to either the Jumpers or the Paladins, who hunt and kill the Jumpers. (This is explained better in the original book.) And what little story we get seems ridden with logical flaws. Without strong leads or a comprehensive story, I found it very hard to get into the movie. I thought it ended too abruptly, leaving too many unanswered questions, but moments after the credits started rolling, I had forgotten most of what I watched.

For those still interested in the DVD, it comes in three versions: Single-Disc Edition, 2-Disc Special Edition, or Blu-ray. And all three are loaded with extras. The Single-Disc Edition has an audio commentary track with the director and others, who provide more than enough information to be worth listening to. Other extras include an animated graphic novel that helps fill in some of the backstory we don't learn about in the movie. Doug Liman's Jumper: Uncensored is a 35-minute long making-of featurette, which details the making of movie, which had it problems. Jumping Around the World is just under 11 minutes and it is about all of the location shoots. Making an Actor Jump is 7:30 minutes and it about the visual effects. Jumping from Novel to Film is about the process of adapting the novel. There are 11-minutes worth of deleted scenes and finally a previsualization of one of the scenes. The 2-Disc Special Edition has the above extras, as well as a free digital copy of the movie. The Blu-ray has all of that, plus a Picture-in-Picture track that can also be watched as a branching featurette if one's Blu-ray player can't handle Picture-in-Picture. The Picture-in-Picture track actually uses the technology and doesn't feel like they are just playing with a new toy and don't know what to do with it. However, there are not that many pop-ups and it feels too sparse to be completely effective.

Jumper is based on a book that had cinematic potential. However, somewhere along the way that potential was lost. The end result is perhaps not as bad as its Tomatometer score, but certainly not great. Personally, I would recommend only a rental, although fans of the movie will love the DVDs that are coming out this week, and if there's a choice, the Blu-ray is the way to go.

The Odd Couple - Season Four - Buy from Amazon
The penultimate season of this TV series, which was based on the amazing movie of the same name. While the show never lived up to its predecessor, this was still one of the best, and most underrated sitcoms from the late 1970s.

While the show is great, watching this many episodes in such a short period does emphasize the somewhat repetitive nature of the show. Yes, many of the episodes do follow a similar pattern with Oscar trying to be left alone and Felix trying to become more involved in his life, as a way of helping him, only to drive Oscar up the wall. While this repetition would normally kill a show's effectiveness, here the writing is great and the chemistry between the two leads is fantastic. Highlight episodes of this season include The Odd Decathalon where Felix and Oscar compete in a decathlon to see which one is in better shape. This is the Army, Mrs. Madison, which is a flashback story to Oscar's wedding, and why he isn't in his marriage photograph. The Exorcists, where Felix starts hearing noises and becomes convinced that the air conditioner is haunted. ... Yeah, it doesn't make a lot of sense in the show either, but it's still funny. Cleanliness is Next to Impossible has Oscar about to lose a woman he really likes because he is a slob, so he turns to Felix for help. And of course, any episode with Myrna is also a highlight, and she's in a number of fourth season episodes.

As for extras, there are none. There are no subtitles either, but there are proper chapter placements and a play all button on each disc. This treatment is typical for TV on DVD releases from this era.

There's just one more release for The Odd Couple, which is bittersweet news for fans of the show. While it only lasted five seasons, the show maintained a strong quality level throughout and Season Four is no exception. I can recommend picking it up, but without anything in terms of extras, I can't be enthusiastic with that recommendation.

Scarlett Johansson - Anywhere I Lay My Head - Buy from Amazon
It's not uncommon for singers to become actors and it is not looked at as strange. On the other hand, going from actor to singer is routinely seen as a vanity project. This was certainly the buzz surrounding this project.

For this CD, Scarlett Johansson decided to cover a dozen or so Tom Waits songs, which was a tricky proposition. Tom Waits has serious underground cred, but he is also a "love him or hate him" kind of singer. Those who love his music are generally going to hate the idea of someone covering his song, especially some actor doing what appears to be a vanity project. On the other hand, those who hate his music will have no interest in the CD. My opinion of Tom Waits has always been thus: He is a great songwriter, but a terrible singer. (He is much like Leonard Cohen in that regard.) This makes me one of the more receptive potential audience members. But will that be enough?

The songs have a smoky jazz feel to them combined with a hint of the gothic. I've never been to New Orleans, but this is the kind of music that I imagine one would encounter in the somber parts of town where the voodoo priests hangout, only that music would not be as overproduced. As for Scarlett Johansson singing ability, it's mediocre. Maybe. Quite frankly, there are times I can't tell if anyone is singing because the lead vocals are buried in the mix. Either producer David Sitek doesn't know what he's doing, or he's trying to do the best with really weak material and was trying to hide Johansson's voice as much as possible. Possibly a mixture of the two. A few of the songs that sounded pretty good, including "Falling Down" and "Fannin Street," both of which featured David Bowie, as well as "I Wish I Was in New Orleans" and "Anywhere I Lay My Head." However, there are none that I have felt the need to place into my heavy rotation MP3 list.

Scarlett Johansson's Anywhere I Lay My Head is not the disaster that some are making it out to be, at least not in my mind. However, nor it is a must have. Solidly mediocre. I can't be more enthusiastic than that.

There Will Be Blood - Blu-ray - Buy from Amazon
Part of the first wave of Paramount Blu-ray releases. This one actually came out last week, but the screener arrived late. Since I've already reviewed the movie, I won't be spending time on the movie itself and will just talk about whether it's worth the upgrade or not.

Good news: the High Definition transfer is excellent and I have no real complaints here. Bad news: the High Definition transfer is the only improvement from the 2-Disc set, which I wasn't able to recommend in the first place. Worse yet, this is not a movie that really benefits from the High Definition treatment and it is a film carried by its cast, and not special effects.

There Will Be Blood is an amazing movie, but so far I am not impressed by its treatment on the home market. The 2-Disc set had practically no extras, which is not acceptable for an award-winning film, while the Blu-ray release offers nothing new. Given the quality of the movie, I really want to recommend purchasing here. But the odds of a double-dip are high enough that a rental is in order. Rent now, wait for the special edition.