To Be or Not to Be News

Beyond a Reasonable Doubt Michael Douglas joins the ranks of the straight-to-DVD crowd, and not a moment too soon! I guess just being generally greasy and procreating with Catherine Zeta-Jones got a little too boring, so he went for a quick paycheck and decided to star in the incredibly silly Beyond a Reasonable Doubt.

From his early days on "Your Show of Shows" to his work as a writer on the satirical "Get Smart" to his feature films and Broadway shows, Mel Brooks has been making audiences laugh for over 50 years.

Published: Thursday, December 17, 2009 at 1:00 a.m. Last Modified: Wednesday, December 16, 2009 at 9:52 a.m. If you've got a Mel Brooks fanatic among your friends or family, a new Blu-ray collection is prime holiday gift material.

SHAME ON ME for laughing out loud, even in the privacy of my own home, at the oft-crass antics of the three bedraggled guys in the Golden Globe-nominated comedy "The Hangover." But the thing is, the fellas - groomsmen played with sardonic panache by Bradley Cooper, Ed Helms and Zach Galifianakis - are very funny.

This week's batch of Blu-ray releases offer quality over quantity. Unlike some weeks, there aren't a big slew of choices.

Should Germans laugh about Adolf Hitler? The Deutsche Theater in Berlin last week gave its own "Yes" answer by staging a theatrical version of "To Be or Not To Be," Ernst Lubitsch's 1942 cult movie that satirizes Germany's takeover of Poland.

The Blu-rays are flying fast and furiously these days. Criterion, in particular, is starting to ramp up with some of the greatest films in history in the best format possible on your TV these days.

With the fading days of vaudeville in the 1920s, advent of radio in the 1930s and first flicker of television in the 1940s, emerged a generation of Jewish comedians who dominated American humor media for more than half a century.

With the collapse of the studio system, the death of the censorship code and the advent of color television, Hollywood went through a lot of odd permutations in the 1960s.

It's hard to say where the truth really lies. October 27, 1954 Disneyland , Walt Disney's first television series, premieres on ABC.

Best known as a creator of broad film farces and uproarious parodies, jack-of-all-trades Mel B rooks has been entertaining audiences for years with his wacky and absurdist humor.

Freaks 1932 // 64 Minutes // Not Rated Dr. Jekyll And Mr. Hyde 1941 // 114 Minutes // Rated G House Of Wax 1953 // 88 Minutes // Rated PG The Haunting 1963 // 112 Minutes // Rated G Released by Warner Bros.

The Locarno Film Festival announced Thursday that it would host what it called an "exhaustive" retrospective of pioneering film director Ernst Lubitsch in its 2010 edition, the first official move from new Locarno artistic director Olivier Pere.

Quentin Tarantino returns to public notice with a Second World War movie, though be warned, it bears about as much relation to historical realism as did To Be or Not To Be or Where Eagles Dare, both of which it passingly recalls.

Quentin Tarantino returns to public notice with a Second World War movie, though be warned, it bears about as much relation to historical realism as did To Be or Not To Be or Where Eagles Dare, both of which it passingly recalls.

Synopsis: December 1944: the 'total war' is as good as totally lost. Goebbels, however, isn't willing to be so easily defeated.

Anti-Semitism was a fact of life in Europe in the 16th Century. Jews were forced to live in ghettoes and to observe curfews - they were banned from owning property and so became money-lenders. Shylock, played by AL PACINO, is deeply resentful about all this, especially when the Christian merchant, Antonio, , spits on him.

''To Be Or Not To Be'' is a fast-moving farce involving a theater company in the midst of the Nazi occupation of Poland.

Louie Walks, a one man show , is a musical oddity created by and starring Ian Finkel .

"To Be Or Not To Be" is a fast-moving farce involving a theater company in the midst of the Nazi occupation of Poland.