BURBANK, Calif.--(ENTERTAINMENT WIRE)--March 21, 2000-- Warner Home Video today announced an all-star DVD release schedule for April featuring 1999's critically acclaimed action-adventure ``Three Kings.''

Each priced at $24.98 (SRP), the April DVD features include the timeless comedy of ``Caddyshack,'' the romantic wit of ``Three to Tango,'' the nostalgic fun of ``Diner'' and the thrills and chills of ``The House on Haunted Hill.''

``Three Kings'' (available April 11, catalogue No. 17862)

The highly praised action-adventure starring George Clooney (``ER,'' this summer's ``The Perfect Storm''), Mark Wahlberg (``Boogie Nights'') and Ice Cube (``Boyz 'N the Hood'') centers around career soldier Archie Gates (Clooney), who has been marking time in his Gulf War base camp while high-tech U.S. specialists fight. But now, after the war's end, it's time for action as Gates and three other Americans decide to raid a bunker holding a stash of gold stolen by the Iraqi army. Get in, get out, get rich: The plan couldn't be easier. Or so they thought. DVD features include a behind-the-scenes documentary -- ``Under the Bunker: On the Set of 'Three Kings,''' and a tour of the Iraqi village set. The personal experiences of the filmmakers are revealed in two feature-length audio commentaries (from director David O. Russell and producers Chuck Roven and Ed McDonnell) plus an interview from director of photography Tom Sigel. Also included is the director's Video Journal, deleted scenes with Russell's commentary, special photography from Spike Jonze (actor-director ``Being John Malkovich''), as well as ``An Intimate Look Into the Acting Process With Ice Cube.'' Explore ``Bunkers'' to uncover three hidden features revealing codes that unlock special additions on the Web including a TV spot and the theatrical trailer. Enhanced extras for DVD-ROM PCs include links to CNN's Gulf War archives, and special Web events including online screenings and chats with the filmmakers and stars.

``Caddyshack: 20th Anniversary Edition'' (available April 4, catalogue No. 17215)

Chevy Chase (``Snow Day''), Rodney Dangerfield (``Back to School''), Bill Murray (``Rushmore'') and Ted Knight (``The Mary Tyler Moore Show'') star in this comedy classic spoof on country-club life. When a land developer tries to build condos on a ritzy country club site, he becomes the focus of outrageous antics, spoofs and gags from the kings of slapstick. DVD features include the behind-the-scenes documentary ``Chaddyshack: The 19th Hole'' (featuring outtakes, other rare footage and reminiscences by the film's stars and creators), the original theatrical trailer, and production notes.

``Diner'' (available April 4, catalogue No. 65077)

Kevin Bacon (``My Dog Skip''), Ellen Barkin (``Drop Dead Gorgeous''), Timothy Daly (``Wings''), Steve Guttenberg (``Police Academy''), Mickey Rourke (``9 1/2 Weeks''), Paul Reiser (``Mad About You'') and Daniel Stern (``City Slickers'') star as friends grappling with careers, romance and other momentous issues in a Baltimore diner at the end of 1959. DVD features include the new ``making of'' documentary, ``Diner: On the Flip Side,'' which spotlights writer/director Barry Levinson and the film's stars, an all-new introduction by Levinson and the original theatrical trailers of this and Levinson's latest film ``Liberty Heights.''

``House on Haunted Hill'' (available April 18, catalogue No. 18018)

Geoffrey Rush (``Shakespeare in Love''), Famke Janssen (``Goldeneye''), Taye Diggs (``The Best Man''), Bridgette Wilson (``I Know What You Did Last Summer''), Ali Larter (``Varsity Blues'') and Chris Kattan (``Saturday Night Live'') star in the remake of this 1959 classic horror tale, which starred Vincent Price. In this spine-chilling thriller, five strangers each have to survive the night in a house with a terrible past for a chance to make $1 million. The DVD is packed with special features including: a behind-the-scenes documentary (``Tale of Two Houses,'' which compares the original Vincent Price starrer with this new version), six mini-documentaries on the film's special effects, audio commentary by director Wiliam Malone, deleted scenes with the director's introduction, extensive motion menus, theatrical trailers, widescreen format, subtitles and Dolby Digital 5.1. Enhanced features for DVD-ROM PCs include ``Escape From the House'' DVD challenge; ``Try to Make it Out of the House Alive!''; two special essays, ``Horror Retro'' and ``Famous Remakes''; the original theatrical Web site; and a variety of theatrical trailers featuring other horror films available on DVD from WHV.

``Three To Tango'' (available April 11, catalogue No. 16986)

In this gender-bending romantic comedy starring Dylan McDermott (``The Practice''), Matthew Perry (``The Whole Nine Yards'') and Neve Campbell (``Scream 3''), a young architect on the rise must sooner or later come out of the closet and declare that he is ... straight. The only problem is that the woman of his dreams feels comfortable around him ... because she thinks he is gay. DVD features include dual format (pan and scan/widescreen), the theatrical trailer, subtitles and Dolby Digital 5.1 audio.

More than 5,000 DVD titles are currently available from all the major studios at traditional retail outlets and through online services and it is estimated that nearly 100 million DVD discs were shipped in 1999.

(a) David Ansen, Newsweek 

BEVERLY HILLS, Calif., March 20 /PRNewswire/ -- A circle of celebrities is set to join Elite Model Management as they kick-off their 21 city quest to find the newest stars of the fashion world. Among those already confirmed to be in attendance are Shannon Doherty, Elizabeth Berkley, Natassja Kinski, Noah Wyle, Ed Burns, Mark Wahlberg, Tobey Maguire, Jared Leto, Amanda Foreman, Linda Cardellini, Anthony Anderson, Ron Lester, Alex Meneses, Djimon Hounsou and Natasha Henstridge. In addition, cast members from ``NYPD Blue'' and other shows will be there. And the list is sure to go on...

The event marks the launch of The Elite Model Look 2000, the premiere talent scouting event for the fashion industry. Boasting such previous winners and contestants as Cindy Crawford, Stephanie Seymour, Frederique, Karen Mulder, Nadja Auermann, Gisele Bundchen, Yfke Sturm, and actresses Elizabeth Berkley and Natasha Henstridge, Elite Model Look has a history of launching some of the top names in the fashion industry.

Join us for the Elite Model Look 2000 at the Northridge Fashion Center 9301 Tampa Avenue, Northridge, CA, on March 21st from 6:00 - 8:00 p.m., and on March 22nd from 4:00 - 8:00 p.m.

Joining Elite at these events will be interactive teen fashion website AccessStyle.com. There will be live performances by Universal Records and Motown Records recording artists Phoenix Stone and R Angels, and Q Records' new band, 3 Below. Also, this year Elite Model Look has partnered with Teen Celebrity magazine, Wet Seal/Contempo Casuals, The Sports Club/LA, Bare Escentuals, who will provide make-overs for each contestant, and Model Network and Digital Island, who will broadcast several of the competitions live on the Internet. General Growth Properties is hosting all the events at their top shopping centers, and the T.J. Martell Foundation, a foundation for leukemia, cancer and AIDS research, will benefit from ticket sales to our National Finals.

The finalists selected from the regional events will win an all-expense paid trip to Miami Beach in July to compete in the National Finals, where three to five U.S. Finalists will be selected to go on to compete at the Elite Model Look International Event in Switzerland. In all, over 300,000 young women worldwide are expected to compete in the Elite Model Look.

Applications can be picked up at participating malls' customer service desks, in Teen Celebrity magazine, at selected Wet Seal and Contempo Casuals stores or at www.accessstyle.com and elitemodellookusa.com. NO ENTRY FEE REQUIRED. For more information on Elite Model Look, please contact Eileen Koch, Koch & Company, A Public Relations Firm, 310-274-5586.

You know the name Calvin Klein. It comes with baggage - the boxer shorts with the logo waistband, Kate Moss whispering Obsession on cinema screens across the world, the "dirty denim" currently modelled by Macy Gray in magazine ads from here to eternity.

Klein is a global brand, his name synonymous with the two most lucrative aspects of modern fashion - a streetwise youth culture, cross-pollinated with an upmarket luxury image. Together, these twin strengths spell money. Loads of it.

Which is exactly what Calvin himself is set to make if Tommy Hilfiger's accountants and lawyers can pull it off. Though neither of the vast fashion conglomerates will confirm it, Hilfiger is understood to be close to completing the $1 billion purchase of Calvin Klein, which has been on sale for almost a year, in a deal that will allow Hilfiger to vault over Ralph Lauren to become the largest single fashion retailer in the world.

What role 57-year-old Klein may play in the combined company is unclear, but a sale will probably bring an end to one of the most remarkable careers in American business. It's 31 years since Klein and his boyhood friend from the Bronx, Barry Schwarz, borrowed $10,000 and started a company that has become the 19th most recognisable brand name according the rag trade bible, Women's Wear Daily, and last year sold $5.1 billion worth of perfume, pillow cases, T-shirts, jeans and cosmetics.

Why Klein is selling up is unclear, except that a billion dollars is tempting reward. Perhaps he senses that being a brand rather than a person is not what it used to be.

Certainly, as the fashion industry prepares business testimonials for the day when the sale is announced, Klein himself remains a remote figure, better known through the channels of gossip and innuendo and the attention bought by famous advertising campaigns (Brooke Shields in "Nothing comes between me and my Calvins" in 1978, the furore of the "heroin chic" ads in the mid-Nineties and last year's "kiddie porn" fiasco) than anything he's ever said about himself.

In 1994, an unauthorised biography, Obsession, tracked his rise from the Bronx to the pinnacle of the international fashion world, emphasising his conflictful sexuality, his full-tilt indulgence in the devil-may-care club and cocaine culture of the Studio 54 years, and a marriage that soon collapsed.

But beyond a few comments about his rock 'n' roll years in the Seventies and Eighties, Klein has managed to remain almost entirely absent from his own story.

That, however, is about to change. Within the pages of a controversial biography of Klein's friend, movie and record mogul David Geffen, a clearer picture has emerged, one that lightly fleshes out the portrait of "Clean Calvin", revealing the close friendship between the two men, and how Geffen came to the rescue of his friend in the late Eighties when Klein's business was about to collapse. Since Geffen initially helped Tom King, a gay Wall Street Journal writer, to pen The Operator and cleared him to speak to his friends, the book stands as a reliable account of the group of powerful homosexual businessmen in the States known as the Velvet Mafia.

Had Geffen listened to the advice of his old friend, his unhappiness with the biography, which portrays him as a vindictive opportunist capable of limited acts of generosity, might have been avoided: Klein had advised Geffen not to let a queen write his biography, correctly sensing that what Geffen assumed would give him a better chance at a sympathetic portrayal would turn out to be the opposite - which is precisely what happened.

According to The Operator, Geffen was drawn to Klein after the fashion designer rocketed to stardom in the mid-Seventies. Both came from similar backgrounds, both had tried marriage, and both were drawn to the high life of drugs and promiscuity that found its centre in the secret VIP basement of Studio 54. When Geffen decided to launch his own label but couldn't decide what to call it, Klein stepped in and said he should call it "Geffen" as it had worked well for him. "People in the record business just don't do that," Geffen responded. Klein persisted and finally hit on a compelling reason Geffen ought to put his own name on the door. "You'll get laid more," he said. Geffen took his advice.

GEFFEN'S friendship with Klein extended further. He helped Klein's daughter, Marci, get a job as a booker at the US comedy Saturday Night Live, and even bought Klein's old holiday home in the gay community of Fire Island. Then, in 1991, Geffen discovered that his friend was about to go bankrupt. Sales of his famous jeans had collapsed and the company was facing payments of junk-bond debt it was in no position to pay. Geffen stepped in and bought the debt for $62 million.

He then took a major role in the company, encouraging Klein to license off the manufacturing of his jeans and underwear and to concentrate on design and marketing. Then, in a move that did more to re-establish Klein as a fashionable designer than any other, he convinced him to hire Mark Wahlberg, the young white rap star known as Marky Mark, as the company spokesmodel - and to dress Wahlberg in nothing but his underwear for an advertising campaign.

Throughout the Nineties, Klein triumphed as his company championed understated, neutral-toned American sportswear. But it's also one of the secrets of billion-dollar fashion companies that the name on the label rarely has much to do with the clothes themselves. Teams of designers come up with the clothes, marketing teams cook up attention-grabbing campaigns, focus groups advise on what people want to wear and statisticians pore over demographic charts to tell them who to target and where.

There is a sense in the New York fashion world that Klein is bored with his perfectly antiseptic, efficient and controlled corporate machine, and in recent public appearances he has looked tired, remote and anxious. The sale of his company has not exactly fired the world of fashion with the same kind of interest that greets the manoeuvres of LVMH's Bernard Arnault or the changes at Yves Saint Laurent. Such a well-known, heavily licensed brand name has little of the allure of the under-performing, unexploited labels that are currently selling for grossly inflated prices in Europe.

Still, the Hilfiger deal is likely to please the once-wild Klein, a man perhaps ready to hang up his boxer shorts and opt for the quiet life. Besides, the fortune he stands to make should take care of any doubts he may have.

R

``American Psycho'' (Lions Gate Films) -- for strong violence, sexuality, drug use and language.
``Beyond Redemption'' (Avalanche Home Entertainment) -- for violence.
``Blackmale'' (A-Pix Entertainment) -- for strong violence, sexuality, language and drug use.
``Brown's Requiem'' (Avalanche Releasing) -- for violence, nudity and language.
``Caracara'' (HBO Home Video) -- for strong violence, some language and a sex scene.
``Cherry'' (Cypress Films) -- for language.
``Child 2 Man'' (Mercury Home Entertainment) -- for violence, drug use, language and sexuality.
``Committed'' (Miramax Films) -- for language.
``The Debt'' (Mercury Home Entertainment) -- for some violence and a scene of sexuality.
``Divided We Stand'' (Delta Entertainment) -- for language and some violence.
``Escape Under Pressure'' (Pressure Productions) -- for violence.
``Eye'' (Leo Home Video) -- for violent images.
``The Filth & The Fury'' (Fine Line Features) -- for pervasive strong language, drugs and sexual content.
``Flypaper'' (Trimark Pictures) -- for strong sexuality, and for violence, language and drug content.
``Forbidden Highway'' (Cameo Films) -- for strong sexuality and some language.
``The Girl On the Bridge'' (Paramount Pictures) -- for some sexuality.
``Goat on Fire and Smiling Fish'' (Stratosphere Entertainment) -- for language, some sexual content and brief drug use.
``High Fidelity'' (Buena Vista) -- for language and some sexuality.
``The Horrible Dr. Bones'' (Full Moon Releasing) -- for some horror violence/gore and language.
``Inferno'' (Trimark Pictures) -- for violence, language and some nudity.
``Memento'' (I Remember Productions) -- for violence, language and some drug content.
``The Million Dollar Hotel'' (Kintop Pictures) -- for language and some sexual content.
``Moving Target'' (New Concorde) -- for violence and language.
``Once In the Life'' (The Shooting Gallery) -- for pervasive language, strong violence and some drug content.
``Pups'' (Allied Entertainment) -- involving juveniles, strong language including sexual dialogue, and brief sexuality.
``Quills'' (20th Century Fox) -- for strong sexual content including dialogue, violence and language.
``Red Letters'' (Red Letters) -- for strong language including sexual dialogue, and for some nudity.
``Sexy Beast'' (20th Century Fox) -- for pervasive language, strong violence and some sexuality.
``Summer Temptations 2'' (MegaStar Pictures) -- for strong sexuality.
``Time Code'' (Screen Gems) -- for drug use sexuality, language and a scene of violence.
``The Virgin Suicides'' (Paramount Pictures) -- for strong thematic elements involving teens.
``The Way of the Gun'' (Artisan Pictures) -- for strong violence/gore, language and some sexuality.
``The Yards'' (Miramax Films) -- for violence and a scene of sexuality.

Pg

``Perfect Game'' (Buena Vista Home Entertainment) -- for mild language.
``Titan A.E.'' (20th Century Fox) -- for action violence, mild sensuality and brief language.
``Wild Grizzly'' (Monarch Home Video) -- for wildlife violence peril and brief language.
``Center Stage'' (Columbia) -- for language and some sensuality.
``The Crew'' (Buena Vista) -- for sexual content, violence and language.

G

``The Little Mermaid 2'' (Buena Vista)

Reuters/Variety

LAS VEGAS, March 7, 2000 -- Finally, something to report from ShoWest!

Stars (lots of 'em) came out at noon today to do their time at the New Line/Fine Line luncheon, hyping (what else?) upcoming New Line/Fine Line flicks. The event, held at the multimedia-readied, projection-screen-laden Paris Ballroom, featured celebs prancing down a catwalk for all to see (if you could see), sitting down at their designated tables and, then, eating!

Yes, this is what passes for excitement at a  movie-theater-owners trade show. Did we mention that not one of the stars said a single word?

No, we're not complaining. We're just worried about the talents. You know, they've got egos.

Anyway, here's a rundown of the spotted celebs:

Adam Sandler: Single-handedly brought the level of formality and decorum way down with his ultra-casual attire of Adidas tee, a zipper sweater and denims. There to hype his new frat-boy comedy "Little Nicky."

Patricia Arquette: Peroxide-bleached blonde. We couldn't really catch a good look at her face because her facial skin tone and her hair sorta bled into each other under the spotlight. (Another "Little Nicky" pusher.)

Jennifer Lopez: Yes, she still makes movies. She was here for the thriller "The Cell." Well, all right, she actually wasn't here here. Lopez has got the cushiest gig out of everyone. Instead of having to actually show up at this thing in person, she was teletransmitted via video. (Must be all those court-related matters that were tying her down.)

Dennis Quaid: A member of the "Frequency" contingent (the upcoming fantasy/thriller), he was the first person to be introduced, and we didn't know which way he'd be strolling down the catwalk. So to make a long explanation short, we, um, sort of didn't really see him.

Ali Larter: Female co-star of the studio's newest Gen-Next horror flick "Final Destination," this highly touted newcomer looked like she could be any 18- to 21-year-old from anywhere.

Devon Sawa: Male version of the above. (Conveniently, also featured in "Final Destination.")

Jimmy Smits: Well, you know, it's Jimmy Smits.

Jon Seda: The real-life boxer (coming soon to a theater near you as an aspiring boxer in "Price of Glory" with Smits) was doing the old one-two uppercut, right jab dance all the way to the table.

Vince Vaughn: Lopez's "Cell" co-star looked disheveled in that "Swingers" way. Hold on, isn't he always though?

Melina Kanakaredes: Er, we looked somewhere else again. But we did catch that the "Providence" lady is going to star opposite Robert De Niro in the thriller "Fifteen Minutes."

Omar Epps: The "Love and Basketball" star looking noticeably irate.

In other ShoWest happenings:

COMING (MAIN) ATTRACTION: As promised, the studio delivered promotional footage from that fan-boy fantasy also known as "The Lord of the Rings." More of a short making-of film rather than a true trailer, the reel alternated clips from the (still-in-the-making) epic film with interviews with director Peter Jackson and actors Sean Astin and Elijah Wood. And judging from the applause, this film is certainly one to watch for in the end of 2001.

OTHER TRAILERS THAT BUZZED: "Thirteen Days," the Kevin Costner vehicle about the Cuban missile crisis and Sandler's "Little Nicky."

TRAILERS WE LIKED, REGARDLESS OF THE BUZZ: (1) "The Cell." Vaughn plays a cop, Lopez plays the serial killer he's chasing. Other than that, there's no logical way we could piece together a coherent story line from the trailer. That said, the clip was still a snazzy and stylish piece that is at once perverse and surreal; (2) "State and Main." Now we really don't know what this one's about. But an auspicious ensemble cast certainly compensates for it. The David Mamet comedy reunites P.T. Anderson crewmates Philip Seymour Hoffman and William H. Macy, as well as piling on Alec Baldwin and Sarah Jessica Parker.

OTHER NOTABLE SNEAKS: "Rush Hour 2" (a rearrangement of film clips from the 1998 original, save for a new voice-over and some new titles); "Bones" (an extremely minimal trailer for a horror movie that was so deliberately minimal it reminded us of another little horror flick name of, um, "The Blair Witch Something or Other"); and, "Town and Country," Warren Beatty's long, long, long delayed marital comedy, with Goldie Hawn and Diane Keaton.

The "Town and Country" clips were uncensored. And by uncensored, we specifically mean the F-bomb that co-star Garry Shandling dropped at the very end of the trailer -- a phrase that you can bet won't make it out to the public come actual release time. (At least not in trailer form.)

MORE TRAILERS!OK. By now you're probably thinking (hoping) that we've run out of trailers. Wrong.

Eleven more came our way via the Miramax shindig this evening. To make it fast and painless, the most notable sneaks included: the slasher film send-up "Scary Movie; an anachronistic adaptation of "Hamlet" with Ethan Hawke; "Boys and Girls," a teen flick with Freddie Prinze Jr.; "Birthday Girl," starring Nicole Kidman as a Russian woman with a past; and "Bounce," featuring ex-lovers Gwyneth Paltrow and Ben Affleck as lovers.

But really the coolest thing seen at the Miramax preview was the trailer for "The Yards." Mixing old-school and new-school bad boys James Caan, Mark Wahlberg and Joaquin Phoenix, the film looks to be operating heavily on the generic codes of Mafia flicks.

OK, no more trailer talk. Until tomorrow.

WHERE'S HARVEY? Miramax chief Harvey Weinstein (a notable no-show at the Golden Globes and Sundance) was not the only notable MIA at tonight's Miramax shindig. There was also a total absence of Miramax stars to promote any of the Miramax films (OK, trailers) discussed above. No word on why.

WEDNESDAY'S EXPECTED STAR SIGHTINGS: The early sked-line on the Sony luncheon Wednesday reads a little something like this: Sandra Bullock, Brooke Shields, Mel Gibson, Elizabeth Shue, Chris O'Donnell, Matt Damon, Penelope Cruz, Drew Barrymore, Lucy Liu, Cameron Diaz and Bill Murray. Experience tells us that they'll be doing pretty much the same dog-and-pony show as the stars at today's New Line/Fine Line luncheon.

PLUGGING AWAY: For most folks at ShoWest this morning, Hollywood was not merely a click away on the Internet but right there at their breakfast table. The day's events were kicked off with a portly breakfast (scrambled eggs, bacon and potatoes) at the majestic Champagne Ballroom hosted by our very own Hollywood.com. Representing the entertainment dot.com were Hollywood.com Chairman and CEO Mitchell Rubenstein and President Laurie S. Silvers, among others. The hands-down highlight was the sneak preview of a Hollywood.com theatrical trailer titled "Easy."

LAS VEGAS (Variety) - New Line Cinema, whose sole big hit in 1999 was the ``Austin Powers'' sequel, gave movie theater execs a sneak preview of its 2000 slate Tuesday, and signaled that it was returning to its roots: comedy and mayhem, much of it with urban appeal.

The Time Warner-owned studio showed clips of 17 pictures to attendees at the annual ShoWest convention, and trotted out Adam Sandler, Harvey Keitel, Patricia Arquette, Jimmy Smits and Verne Troyer (Mini-Me from ``Austin Powers 2'') for photo opportunities.

Pictures generating the most applause included ``The Cell,'' a summer thriller starring Jennifer Lopez; ``Little Nicky,'' the holiday release starring Sandler; ``Thirteen Days,'' a Cuban Missile Crisis drama with Kevin Costner; ``Rush Hour 2,'' with Chris Tucker and Jackie Chan teaming as they did in the $140 million-grossing original; and ``Lost Souls,'' a Satanic creepfest with Winona Ryder.

``Town & Country,'' the long-gestating ensemble comedy with Warren Beatty, Diane Keaton, Garry Shandling and Goldie Hawn, did appear on the product reel -- for the second consecutive year. No talent appeared at the luncheon to promote the picture, which now looks to be headed for a fall release.

By far the best-received part of the presentation concerned three pictures that aren't on the 2000 slate: the ``Lord of the Rings'' trilogy. The three are being shot simultaneously in New Zealand. ``Rings'' clips mixed behind-the-scenes footage, cast interviews and a smattering of finished snippets.

The unorthodox shooting schedule will yield a releasable trio sometime in 2001, presenting New Line with a dilemma: When to slot them? The reel gave an answer, at least for now: Christmas 2001, 2002 and 2003.

Later Tuesday, in a low-key presentation, Miramax Films offered a glimpse of 13 of its upcoming releases -- featuring two adaptations of Shakespeare, a ``Highlander'' sequel, Texas law enforcement and the mandatory Gwyneth Paltrow romance.

Execs at the Walt Disney Co.-owned studio told attendees to expect 25 to 30 releases this year, down from 32 in 1999, in keeping with belt-tightening across the industry. The product reel touched on high-profile pictures including ''Bounce,'' with  Paltrow and Ben Affleck; ``The Yards,'' with Mark Wahlberg, Charlize Theron and James Caan; ``Texas Rangers,'' with Dermott Mulroney and James Van Der Beek; Nicole Kidman starrer ``Birthday Girl''; the latest ``Highlander'' installment  called ``Highlander End Game''; ``Hamlet'' with Ethan Hawke; and Kenneth Branagh's ``Love's Labour's Lost.''

Notably absent from the reel was a third Shakespeare adaptation, ``Othello.'' Other no-shows included this summer's Merchant Ivory Prods. picture ``The Golden Bull,'' with Nick Nolte, Uma Thurman and Angelica Huston. 

BURBANK, Calif.--(ENTERTAINMENT WIRE)--March 8, 2000-- ``Three Kings,'' the highly praised action adventure film starring George Clooney, Mark Wahlberg and Ice Cube, will be available from Warner Home Video (WHV) on VHS rental and DVD on April 11.

``Three Kings'' was voted best picture of the year by Newsweek's David Ansen and by the Boston Film Critics Association, who also gave a best director nod to David O. Russell. To date, the film has landed on more than 125 U.S. critics' top 10 lists. The Wall Street Journal's Joe Morgenstern said ``Three Kings'' sets ``a gold standard for all other movies this (past) year.''

The DVD (presented in 16:9 Widescreen) will be a specially enhanced, Web-enabled version with loads of extras priced at $24.98 SRP.

The DVD will include these special features:

--   Behind-the-scenes documentary: "Under the Bunker: On the Set of Three Kings"
--   Two feature-length audio commentaries with director David O. Russell and producers Chuck Roven and Ed McDonnell
--   Tour of the Iraqi village set
--   Interview with director of photography Tom Sigel
--   David O. Russell's Video Journal
--   Deleted scenes with commentary from director Russell
--   Special photography from Spike Jonze, actor-director ("Being John Malkovich")
--   An intimate look inside the acting process with Ice Cube
--   Bunkers: Three hidden features found on menu pages. (Two bunkers reveal codes that will unlock special features on the Web and one bunker will unlock a TV spot.)
--   Theatrical trailer

The enhanced features for DVD-ROM PCs will include:

--   Links to CNN's Gulf War archives
--   Special Web events: Online screenings and chats with filmmakers/stars (details to be announced)
--   Original theatrical Web site and more

``Three Kings'' centers around career soldier Archie Gates (Clooney), who has been marking time in his Gulf War base camp while high-tech U.S. specialists fight. But now, after the war's end, it's time for action as Gates and three other restless Americans decide to raid a bunker holding a stash of gold stolen by the Iraqi army. Get in, get out, get rich: the plan couldn't
be easier. Or so they thought.

``Three Kings'' is rated ``R'' and has a running time of 114 minutes. 

Three Kings (18) General release
The imaginative American writer-director David O Russell follows Spanking the Monkey and Flirting With Disaster with his first Hollywood studio film in Three Kings, and in marked contrast to many other indie directors who sold their souls and originality to the studios, there is not a hint of compromise about this dark action-comedy set in the Iraqi desert at the end of the Gulf War. This is the flipside of the hyped-up CNN coverage by which the war was most prominently communicated to western viewers.

The dramatic focus of the film is on four US soldiers - played with panache by George Clooney, Mark Wahlberg, Ice Cube, and Spike Jonze, the director of the imminent Being John Malkovich - all of whom are bored and disillusioned with their essential uselessness in a war fought by hitech specialists, and pestered by the media, personified in a pushy, self-important reporter played by Nora Dunn.

Strip-searching an Iraqi prisoner, the soldiers find a map wedged in his buttocks. It gives directions to a stash of stolen Kuwaiti gold bullion which the soldiers, none of them heroes in the Saving Private Ryan mould, seek out with zeal to steal for themselves. Their progress is made all the easier by the fact that the Iraqi troops are preoccupied with suppressing their own rebellious people - who had been encouraged by the US to rise up against Saddam Hussein, and then abandoned.

Although vehemently critical of US foreign policy, Three Kings is never preachy, and its abrasive humour has such a jagged edge that it makes the film's serious commentary on the war all the more pointed. Its cultural antecedents would include MASH, Catch-22 and Salvador.

One of the funniest scenes involves one of the Americans being interrogated by an Iraqi (Said Taghmaoui from La Haine) who blames racist Americans for what Michael Jackson has done to his appearance - which is as bleached-out as the surreal imagery with which Russell injects a manic, hallucinatory quality into his film. The comedy of Three Kings is ultimately the humour of desperation as the protagonists are plunged into bloody chaos and confronted with the palpable fears and horrific physical destruction of war - and unexpected crises of conscience - in this bold, accomplished picture.

MY life has changed quite a lot since I wrote of my brush at the Berlin Film Festival with George Clooney. Women are suddenly much nicer to me. I get invited to a lot more parties. Old ladies help me across the road. The checkout girl at Budgens puts "reduced to clear" stickers on my boxes of Frosties. I've been asked to join the local rock-climbing club. My barber wants to interview me for his online magazine. And the gay guy upstairs told me that all the men in his choir have started reading the Telegraph. I really must thank Mr Clooney if I ever get the chance to be ignored by him again: he's a diamond geezer, as we say in Belsize Park, and he brings a ray of light into the lives of old ladies, gay choristers and abandoned Iraqis everywhere.

The abandoned Iraqis are the ones in his new movie, Three Kings. George spreads his charm among them in a way that we now understand to be entirely native to him. Yet it turns out that Clooney not only has all that transferable charm, he has a conscience too, albeit an ever-so-slightly befuddled one. He has the good sense to deplore Rupert Murdoch, and he finds himself appalled by America's record of service in the Middle East. As a result he has made a war picture that is out of the ordinary: a strange hybrid of the traditional action movie (with special effects) and the liberal protest movie in which, as he says himself, "nothing goes unquestioned".

Hollywood film culture has always been a place where powerful liberals (Charlie Chaplin, Gene Kelly, Barbra Streisand, Warren Beatty) sparred with notable Republicans (Louis B Mayer, Ronald Reagan, Arnold Schwarzenegger), but the movies more often represent the American Way and, especially in war pictures, the conservative ideal of the heroic patriot tends to carry the day. But not here. Three Kings won't be selling any war bonds: it is a movie which leaves America looking messy and stupid and up to its ears in wrong-doing.

Clooney, Mark Wahlberg and Ice Cube play a trio of American soldiers in the closing days of the Gulf war. They are nicely bored in the way that soldiers often are - hungry for action, and wholly dependent on camaraderie. They set out on a mission to retrieve some stolen gold (stolen by Saddam's Republican Guard from the sheiks of Kuwait) and they run into hundreds of Iraqi refugees, people being hounded and killed by Saddam.

Though there is supposed to be a cessation of violence, the three soldiers take it upon themselves to kill the bad Iraqis, and skirmish with them in several different ways, before making an attempt to guide the refugees to safety across the Iranian border. Along the way there is much lampooning of the American press, and the drama constitutes a serious critique of the Allies' commitment to the long-term welfare of the Iraqi people.

There is a real sense of desolation in the desert scenes. There is also an element of comedy in the relationship between these Three Stooges on the Basra Road. Yet the politics of the picture are frankly weird: the unAmericanism is not a problem (it's actually quite refreshing for a mainstream Hollywood picture), but the argument is a bit confused. The opposition to the war is based on a slightly dodgy foundation, that America did not do enough, that it failed to "finish the job", and that by being a little more aggressive it might have made a real difference.

This is very much a squaddie's view: finish off the job. The failure to kill Saddam, or obliterate his regime, still rankles with the military, and in this sense the film captures something accurate from the soldier's point of view. But it is not sophisticated criticism in the larger context. The movie fails to address the real motive underpinning the war, and, in a very simplistic - one must say, very American way - it fails to see that you can't lambaste governments for bombing a country and then add that they didn't bomb enough. The film tries to say something large - why were the Americans so keen to be in the Gulf? - but ends up saying something small - why didn't we bomb Saddam into dust? It's slightly childish, like not wanting to be at the party, but wanting to eat all the cakes.

For all that, the film at least is about something. It is a great relief to get away from Bravo Two Zero depictions of military heroics against the unseen enemy. David O Russell's Three Kings is oppositional and quirky in a good way, and my good friend Mr Clooney at least makes a stab at something I wish was less scarce in the movies: thinking.

George Clooney has signed up Brad Pitt, Julia Roberts and Mark Wahlberg to co-star with him as four of the 11 in the remake of 1960's Ocean's Eleven, which starred Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, Sammy Davis Jr. and Angie Dickinson. Reunited with Out of Sight director Steven Soderbergh, Clooney produces the film, to start shooting in January.

''It's like The Sting -- a film about an incredible heist,'' he says. The first time, Sinatra and his cronies tried to hold up the Sands, which no longer exists, and four others. Now the targets are three casinos: Steve Wynn's Mirage, Treasure Island and Bellagio.

''Won't Steve Wynn mind us holding up the casinos?'' Clooney asked fellow executive producer Jerry Weintraub, a pal of Wynn's. ''And he said, 'No, he loves it!' ''

Casting continues for more of the gang.
-- Jefferson Graham 

David O. Russell's Three Kings is a superb surprise, but it does present a problem of classification: is it an action adventure disguised as a history lesson, or the other way round?

The adventure aspect is full-blooded. In the immediate aftermath of the Gulf War, four American servicemen find a map in the Iraqi desert. Their first indication of its importance is its hiding place, clenched as it is between the buttocks of a captive. The map shows the location of an unspecified valuable - call it a treasure. What can it be but Kuwaiti bullion looted by Saddam and ready for relooting? In the unravelling, admittedly partial, of the regime a small group of Americans waving a piece of  paper has a good prospect of being able to take charge of just about anything without needing to fire a shot.

The four treasure seekers are a cross-section of the American forces. There's Archie Gates (George Clooney), a Special Forces major just short of retiring, a career soldier, cynical but alert. There's Sergeant Troy Barlow (Mark Wahlberg), a capable and patriotic reservist with a new baby back in Detroit. There's Staff Sergeant Chief Elgin (Ice Cube), a committed Christian who doesn't find much more fulfilment in uniform than he does in his job as an airport baggage handler. And there's Private Conrad Vig (Spike Jonze), who's enough to give rednecks a bad name all by himself. He's just smart enough to be dangerous (but only just), and redeemed if at all by his hero-worship of Barlow.

The quartet also represents a cross-section of American celebrity. Clooney is still best known from ER on television, while Wahlberg started as a hip hop artiste and Ice Cube as a rapper. Jonze, making his acting debut, is known as a director of videos (Beastie Boys, Fatboy Slim) and the Oscar-nominated Being John Malkovich.

Russell and his cinematographer, Newton Thomas Sigel, bleach out the colours in the opening section, to give the film something of a documentary look. When colours begin to seep back, they're appropriately disorientating. In the bunker to which the map leads the men, an opening door is as likely to reveal a stack of blue jeans or a cache of mobile phones, or a prisoner under torture, as the bullion they have come for.

Russell is known for two independent films, Spanking The Monkey and Flirting With Disaster, and he's certainly escalated his technique for this project. There are startling shots, barely on the right side of gimmickry, of the insides of bodies perforated by bullets. Clooney seems to bring with him the emergency-doctor resourcefulness of his television character, and these shots (which start when he lectures his comrades about the nastiness of gunshot wounds) prepare us for a climactic bit of  intervention. Russell has also come up with a variation on Peckinpah's slow-motion staging of gunfights, although here it's only the bullets that are slowed down, and the effect is fatalistic rather than gloating.

Russell's screenplay, based on a story by John Ridley, includes a certain amount of post-Tarantino patterning. If two characters wrangle about whether it is Lexus or Infiniti that makes a convertible, you can be sure that an incongruous expert (an Iraqi in charge of a vast underground garage, say) will settle the matter. If someone has been needled about his race's inability to throw a football, you can bet that he will get his chance to shine when the stakes are high and the football has explosives attached.

But there are also stranger patterns, incidents which have a symbolic overtone without straining realism too much. Early in the men's expedition a cow explodes, raining cow parts on them, blooding them in the most literal way. A tanker that skids towards them deluges them with its contents - milk, in the desert. By the time one of the party is being interrogated and force-fed a thick liquid, we almost expect it to be honey. But of course it's the real cause of the war just ended. It's oil.

When they start out on their quest, the heroes (apart from the major) have zero knowledge of the country they're in. Chief Elgin objects to certain derogatory ways of referring to the natives, but it's not their sensibilities he's concerned about. Why use terms like "dune coon" or "sand nigger" when there's a perfectly inoffensive alternative available in "camel jockey"? But when they venture into the terrain, their political education begins, as they discover an Iraq quite different from the one they have seen on television. This is a country in which the populace has been urged by America to rise up against its tyrant, but finds no help forthcoming when it does.

The attention paid to the internal affairs of foreign countries in Hollywood action pictures is largely a matter of finding a place and a time where dark-skinned people might conceivably open fire on the outnumbered heroes. Three Kings is rather different. The director showed the script to Iraqi expatriates who had witnessed the war and the uprising. Care has been taken with details of dialect and gesture. The Iraqi interrogator is not a sadist, but a man who has lost his daughter to an American bomb, and he too wants to understand. Who gave him his training in interrogation techniques, anyway? Why, Uncle Sam, back when Iraq was an ally against Iran.

At the same time, Russell never loses sight of the genre in which he's operating, and the conventions that rule it. If he doesn't bring off the learning curve of the heroes without a faint sense of wishful thinking, it's clear that he's given it a lot of thought. There's a moment near the end when it looks as if the film is going to backtrack on its painstaking inclusion of people and issues that are usually background at best. There's a group of Iraqis trying to cross the border to Iran, only they've been manhandled into a compound just short of their goal. And there's a renegade American, handcuffed by his own side, who needs help very soon if his lungs are going to go on working.

All the odds are stacked against the Iraqi crowd and in favour of the writhing American. Not all of the Iraqis speak English. We haven't seen them talk to their wives in Detroit, as the American did. We don't know if they have a young child, as he has. The actors are unfamiliar - we certainly haven't seen them modelling underwear for Calvin Klein, the way the American did. Above all, in film language, an individual outweighs a group, and they are in long shot while he's in close-up. What chance do they have?

Yet Russell, having managed a moment of balance which seems set to foreground the conventional elements of the story all over again, resists following it through. The strictly thrilling aspects of the film run out some way before the end, but what is most thrilling in another sense about Three Kings is the ambition of its good intentions.

So many films since Vietnam have refought that war, in an anguish of repetition and blame-shifting: The Deer Hunter added some existentialism and a torture gimmick, competitive Russian roulette, that the North Vietnamese hadn't thought of. Rambo revisited the territory of the war, but this time with a pure agenda of rescue. Heartbreak Ridge portrayed American involvement in Grenada as Vietnam without the mistakes.

In none of these films, of course, was military action something that happened, in any real sense, to non-Americans. Sure, their bodies might have been riddled with bullets, but their souls weren't thrown into turmoil by the collapse of a national dream.

Three Kings is a corrective to this maudlin strain in American films. How heartening, in a year when an exhausted sort of campaign is under way for the presidency, that a film-maker should care enough about a war ten years in the past to refight it in a new way, trying to understand rather than feel better, creating a wound if necessary rather than rushing to close one up, breaking with the American cult of success long enough to question the leadership of a war that was reckoned a victory.