Starring: John Belushi, Tim Matheson, John Vernon, Verna Bloom, Tom Hulce

Summary: This is one of those movies that works for all the wrong reasons--disgusting, lowbrow, base humor that we are all far too sophisticated to find amusing. So, just don't tell anyone you still think it's a riot to watch John Belushi as the brutish Bluto slurp Jell-O or terrorize his less-aggressive fellow students. This crude parody of college life in the '60s spawned many imitations, but none could match the fresh-faced talent or bad taste of this huge box office success. (Remember all those toga parties in the '80s?) The first of the National Lampoon movies, this was originally released as National Lampoon's Animal House. Keep an eye out for a very young Kevin Bacon in his first credited screen appearance. --Rochelle O'Gorman

Starring: Dana Barron, Eddie Bracken, Christie Brinkley, John Candy, Chevy Chase

Summary: The Griswolds have planned all year for a great summer vacation. From their suburban Chicago home, across America, to the wonders of Wally World fun park in California, every step of the way has been carefully plotted. Except a few hundred hysterical exceptions.

National Lampoon's Vacation is a sublimely goofy comedy, thanks largely to Chevy Chase in his signature role of Clark Griswold. The inept but sincere Clark takes misfortune in stride. So what if they lose all their money when their new car gets wrecked. And it's not too bad when Cousin Eddie (Randy Quaid) deposits sour Aunt Edna (Imogene Coca) in their back seat for a lift to Phoenix. But what really keeps Clark's eyes on the road is a flirtation with a mysterious blonde (Christie Brinkley) in a red Ferrari.

For those along on the ride, National Lampoon's Vacation, called "fast, funny satire" by The New York Times' Janet Maslin, is a jolly jaunt.

Running Time: 98 min.

Format: DVD MOVIE

Starring: Woody Harrelson, Juliette Lewis, Tom Sizemore, Rodney Dangerfield, Everett Quinton, Pruitt Taylor Vince, Jared Harris, Edie McClurg, Russell Means, Lanny Flaherty, O-Lan Jones, Richard Lineback, Robert Downey Jr., Ed White, Kirk Baltz, Terrylene, Maria Pitillo, Josh Richman, Sean Stone, Melinda Renna

Summary: Oliver Stone would like to have the last word on America's media culture of voyeurism and violence, but whatever he's trying to say in this grisly, unconventional movie comes across terribly garbled. Woody Harrelson and Juliette Lewis play traveling serial killers who become television celebrities when a Geraldo-like personality (Robert Downey Jr.) turns their madness into the biggest story in the country. Stone extensively rewrote an original script by Quentin Tarantino, and he employs a mosaic of different film stocks, video, and pop pastiches to create a sense of blurred lines between visual phenomena. (The background on Lewis's character's life as an abused child, for instance, is presented as a sitcom starring Rodney Dangerfield.) But the result of these experiments is a pompous, even amateurish effort at grasping the reins of a real-life national debate. One almost wants to tell Stone to sit down and raise his hand next time if he thinks he has something to say. The controversial director would like Natural Born Killers to be nothing less than a monumental achievement, but it's one of the emptier entries in his filmography. --Tom Keogh

Starring: Gastón Pauls, Ricardo Darín, Leticia Brédice, Tomás Fonzi, Graciela Tenenbaum, María Mercedes Villagra, Gabriel Correa, Pochi Ducasse, Luis Armesto, Ernesto Arias, Amancay Espíndola, Isaac Fajm, Jorge Noya, Oscar Nuñez, Ignasi Abadal, Carlos Lanari, Roberto Rey (III), Celia Juárez, Alejandro Awada, Antonio Ugo

Summary: Nine Queens joins a line of sly thrillers about master-pupil con artists and games within games within games that includes The Sting, House of Games, and Heist. In the first five minutes, we watch an overt scam--a young Argentinian named Juan (Gastón Pauls) running the two-10s-for-a-5 hornswoggle on a convenience store clerk--then find that we have been tricked along with the bystanders as another brand of deception kicks in. And so it goes as Juan, with both trepidation and excitement, drifts into partnership for a day with an older, more cosmopolitan conman, Marcos (Ricardo Darín). Knocking around Buenos Aires--from gritty downtown to cozy neighborhood side streets to a swank hotel where wealth murmurs behind every door--these damnably resourceful scoundrels try not to miss a bet, including an epic swindle involving the titular "Nine Queens," a set of ultrarare stamps. Writer-director Fabián Bielinsky keeps a taut rein on everything, including his own cleverness. The end result is an entertainment as bracingly disciplined as it is ingenious. --Richard T. Jameson

Starring: Cary Grant, Eva Marie Saint, James Mason, Martin Landau

Summary: Middle-aged Madison Avenue advertising executive Roger O. Thornhill is mistaken for a government agent by a gang of spies. He gets involved in a series of misadventures and is pursued across the States by both the spies and the government whilst being helped by a beautiful blonde.

Starring: Judi Dench, Cate Blanchett, Tom Georgeson, Michael Maloney, Joanna Scanlan

Summary: Gold stars to all for this taut psychological thriller based on Zoe Heller's novel that that gets more insidiously twisted as it unfolds. Oscar-nominated for her chilling performance, Dame Judi Dench gives a master class as schoolteacher Barbara Covett, a frumpy, friendless, and flinty spinster who lives with her cat. A formidable presence, Barbara is standoffish with colleagues and not one for students to trifle with (not that they'd dare). Cate Blanchett, also an Oscar nominee and winner of several critics society awards for her impassioned performance, costars as Sheba Hart, the new, overwhelmed art teacher who first becomes enthrall to Barbara after she steps in to help Sheba discipline unruly students. Barbara cultivates a friendship, and insinuates herself into Sheba's chaotic life, which includes her older husband (Bill Nighy), teenage daughter, and a son with Down's syndrome. Then, Barbara catches the reckless Sheba in a compromising position with a 15-year-old student (Andrew Simpson). Seizing her opportunity, the calculating Barbara does not turn her in. Rather, she wants to "help" her. "She's the one I've been waiting for," she writes in the journals she meticulously keeps, and which provide, in voiceover, her corrosive commentary. This all sounds very Fatal Attraction, but no boiling rabbits, please; we're British. Philip Glass's Oscar-nominated score accentuates the growing menace. Though there is little in these characters to admire, (one would think GLAAD would have something to say about the predatory turn Barbara's character takes), Notes on a Scandal is a compelling tour-de-force for its Grade-A cast. --Donald Liebenson

Notes on a Scandal Extras

Cate Blanchett and Judi Dench on their characters in the film

Beyond Notes on a Scandal

Book to Movie Adaptations

More Cate Blanchett Films

What Was She Thinking? Notes on a Scandal: A Novel

Stills from Notes on a Scandal