DVD Corner

“Because I Said So”: Matricide. Diane Keaton’s last good film was “Something’s Gotta Give,” in which her performance was so spot-on, it earned her an Academy Award nomination for best actress. “Because I Said So,” on the other hand, finds the actress so meddling and shrill, she hardly will enjoy the same acclaim. This story about a mother trying to marry off her single daughter finds Keaton on another predictable tear – though one more abrasive than the movie can absorb. She’s a modern day Mommie Dearest, with Mandy Moore’s Milly dodging her mother’s verbal blows while audiences get hammered with hysteria as a result. Not an awful movie, particularly thanks to the fine supporting cast, but a wearying movie. Rated PG-13. Grade: C

“Cruel Intentions: Blu-ray”: “Dangerous Liaisons” for the teenage set. Sarah Michelle Gellar, Ryan Phillippe, Reese Witherspoon and Selma Blair star in a movie in which Gellar and Philippe’s Kathryn and Sebastian work hard to ruin Blair’s Cecile, who bleeds kindness, and Witherspoon’s Annette, a heroic virgin. They have their reasons, but really, for these rich kids, they do it for sport. The film’s cheat ending aside – after a nice start, it’s a huge disappointment – this arch, ridiculous movie heaves, sweats and steams, and for the most part, it delivers what its title promises. Rated R. Grade: B

“The Fall Guy: Season One”: In 1981, well before the advent of computer-assisted stunt work, there was the real thing, which is what the first season of “The Fall Guy” is all about. The show found Lee Majors not only belting out the theme song – itself a pop-culture oddity – but also suffering all sorts of action-packed stunts as Colt Savers. The test of any show is whether it holds up through the years, and while “The Fall Guy” doesn’t disappoint in echoing a bombastic decade with such episodes as “Ladies on the Ropes” and “The Meek Shall Inherit Rhonda,” the pleasure it once evoked seems better suited for the time in which it was conceived. Grade: C+

“Hex: Complete First Season”: “Buffy the Vampire Slayer” and “Charmed” by way of BBC America. The promising first season of “Hex” embraces the ongoing idea that boarding schools are the place to be if one happens to be otherworldly. Such is the case for Cassie Hughes (Christina Cole), whose growing telekinetic powers might make her feel out of place amid the English elite with whom she attends classes, but their disdain for her is nothing compared to the real force about to enter her life – the fallen angel Azazeal (Michael Fassbinder), who sees in Cassie a way to further his own agenda. Joined by her ghostly roommate Thelma (the funny Jemima Rooper), Cassie becomes a force, which is a good thing since a force is what it’s going to take to keep Azazeal at bay. Good performances and solid writing mark the series. Grade: B

“Katharine Hepburn Collection”: Katharine Hepburn’s career in movieland, as she liked to call it, began opposite John Barrymore in 1932 with “A Bill of Divorcement,” of which she observed, “I was very lucky to be in the film – it was a showy part.” It was also the beginning of a string of early hits, including 1933’s “Morning Glory,” for which she won her first Academy Award – and which is one of six films assembled in this new collection from Warner. Other films include 1935’s “Sylvia Scarlet,” 1944’s “Dragon Seed,” 1945’s “Without Love,” 1946’s “Undercurrent” and the 1978 television movie, “The Corn is Green.” The collection doesn’t feature the best Hepburn films, though it does offer a glimpse into why she was one of our most enduring stars – she defied convention. Physically, she was a reed, all angular lines and flat-chested boyishness beneath a toss of auburn curls that framed a square face; she was hardly what Hollywood was seeking at a time when the bold curves of Jean Harlow, Carole Lombard and Mae West were commanding the screen. Still, much like her Yankee counterpart Bette Davis, Hepburn quickly became a woman Hollywood – and the world – couldn’t do without. The camera loved her, especially how her cheekbones moved in concert with the upward slant of her eyes, but it was her fierce streak of independence and her seemingly bottomless talent that made her a star. Grade: B

“Waiting for God – Season 2”: Tom (Graham Growden) and Diana (Stephanie Cole) might be waiting for God, but they aren’t doing so quietly. At the Bayview Retirement Village, where death is everyone’s last visitor and the food is notoriously bad, these two refuse to go out gracefully, particularly Diana, whose last breath, one senses, will be spent sticking it to somebody with a complaint. Tom exists more in the ether, but he’s far from out of it. Together, they’re a team, occasionally taking breaks from their long conversations to create all sorts of trouble, intended or not. Grade: A-

“WWE: Wrestlemania 23”: Whether this makes the right choice for a last-minute Father’s Day gift we’ll leave for you. It does, however, feature at least one messy, feel-good moment when Vince McMahon, blustering, blubbering and spitting, gets his hair buzzed off when he loses a bet to Donald Trump during the “Hair vs. Hair” match. Recently fired by NBC, Trump takes to the ring in a business suit and fades like a daisy the moment he’s surrounded by all those WWE superstars. Features Randy Orton, John Cena, Shawn Michaels and Kane, as well as the heavyweight match between Batista and the Undertaker, which has a predicable rhythm culled from years of bouncing against ropes, whirling through the air and slamming against trunks of flesh. You already know if this is for you. For others, it’s just more of the same. Grade: C