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The one that looks the most interesting to me this week is The Book of Life, an animated presentation about being torn between fulfilling the expectations of your family and following your heart. I also find the animation style itself to be conductive to telling this particular story, and can’t wait to see how it all fits together. The other film worth checking out is Men, Women & Children, a story about how the internet has totally changed how we all deal with each other, and grow closer (or farther) together/apart.

The live action version of Black Butler was released in January in Japan, June 14th in Canada, and comes out next week in the UK. Unfortunately it is not scheduled for movie theaters in the US that I could find, but it has been released on all-region DVD here. Originally set in the England of Queen Victoria, the new movie is set in 2020 to give the mingling of the cultures a more realistic environment. When a girl’s parents are killed, she sells her soul to a demon, in return for which he becomes her butler and serves her in all things… including tracking down her parent’s killers. The Manga was excellent, the Anime was quite good as well, I am looking forward to seeing how well they did with the live action version.

Ths weekend we get Dracula Untold, a story about the ruler and hero Vlad Tepes sacrificing much to save his family and his subjects from the invading armies. In some ways this is a lot closer to the historic facts of his life and times than most Dracula movies, and includes his Impaler tendencies, although with those scenes adjusted to retain the PG-13 rating. Except for that whole Vampire thing they could have passed this as a historical epic, but that just helps spice up the story. I will be in the theaters for this one.