Carrie

Carrie is a big-city teenager whose life is turned upside down when she moves to a horse ranch in Wyoming to live with her father. But everything changes when Carrie meets Flicka, a wild, jet-black mustang who's just as free-spirited and strong-willed as Carrie. The two form a special bond and Carrie opens her heart to her father and a handsome, local boy.

Taking place in Rego Park, Queens, New York, a blue-collar married couple, Doug, a deliveryman, and Carrie, a secretary at a law firm, who both live with Carrie's oddball father, Arthur, try to make the best of what they got while trying to make their marriage somewhat normal and getting through tiny problems that they have together, even the occasional run-in with Carrie's father.

Sisters Carrie and Anna Berniers have been supporting their ne'er-do-well brother Julian through various failed businesses; now, he returns home with a sudden fortune and his young bride. Jealousies both old and new will play a part as the sisters try to understand what Julian's been up to, and as his wife wonders if there's another woman involved.

When a television series runs for ten years, it's pretty clearly a success: having run from 1974-1984, Little House on the Prairie certainly merits a release on DVD, and Imavision has stepped up to the plate with season boxed sets. Little House on the Prairie: Season 3 continues the story of the Ingalls family: Charles and Caroline Ingalls and their children Mary, Laura, and Carrie, trying to raise a family and run a farm in the pioneer town of Walnut Grove. Little House on the Prairie is "family entertainment" in the best sense of the phrase: it's clearly intended to be a show that the adults and children in a family will watch and enjoy together.

Even though I was a kid while the show was on the air, for some reason I never watched it, so this DVD set was my first taste of the series (but not the premise, as I've read all the Little House books several times). I was half expecting the show to be too dated, but it's not: it has aged well and I have to say, it's fun to watch. The stories are fairly straightforward and pretty lightweight, but nonetheless they're very watchable and surprisingly satisfying. If I had to describe Little House on the Prairie in one word, it would be "sweet"… and most importantly, it manages to be sweet and genuinely heart-warming without slipping over the line into saccharine sentimentality. The characters are likable, and the stories do a nice job of using not just the Ingalls family but also quite a few recurring characters from the town in the various episodes, giving a sense of continuity overall even though the episodes are generally self-contained.

Little House on the Prairie's fourth season, which premiered on September 12, 1977, proved to be the most successful in the series' run. Season four cracked the Nielsen Top Ten, and became the seventh-highest rated show of the 1977-78 television season, beating out mid-70s favorites such as M*A*S*H, Barney Miller, Soap, and The Love Boat. The most-watched episode in the series' history - the two part hanky-drowner "I'll Be Waving As You Drive Away" - garnered an Emmy nomination for Melissa Sue Anderson's harrowing portrayal of the blinded Mary Ingalls. The cast of Little House on the Prairie was on a roll in a season that, oddly enough, is all about change and a departure from the status quo. The fourth season sees the exit of beloved characters, the end of lingering storylines, the introduction of new friends, and some of the most startling plot developments to hit the series during its ten-year run.

In the fall of 1977, Victor French, who played the Ingalls' grizzled neighbor Mr. Edwards, left Little House to star in the ABC sitcom Carter Country. Strangely, the departure of Mr. Edwards (as well as his wife, postmistress Grace Snider-Edwards, and their adopted children Carl and Alicia), is never addressed. The family is simply gone from Walnut Grove (that is, until Carter Country was canceled and French returned solo). To replace Mr. Edwards, Michael Landon cast brawny Los Angeles Rams football star (and future FTD spokesman) Merlin Olsen as farmer Jonathan Garvey. Jonathan's wife, Alice (Hersha Parady), and young son Andy (Patrick Laborteaux) neatly fill the void left by the Edwards family: Alice serves as the town postmistress and Andy becomes a best friend to Laura (Melissa Gilbert).

After moving in together in an impossibly beautiful New York apartment, Carrie Bradshaw and Mr. Big make a rather arbitrary decision to get married. The wedding itself proves to be anything but a hasty affair–the guest list quickly blooms from 75 to 200 guests, and Carrie's simple, label-less wedding gown gives way to an enormous creation that makes her look like a gigantic cream puff. An upcoming photo spread in Vogue puts the event–which will take place at the New York Public Library–squarely in the public eye. Meanwhile, Carrie's girlfriends–Samantha, the sexpot; Charlotte, the sweet naïf; and Miranda, the rigid perfectionist–could not be happier. At least, they couldn't be happier for Carrie. Charlotte still has the unrealized hope of getting pregnant. Samantha is finding a loving, committed relationship more grueling than she could have imagined. Miranda unwittingly…

Carrie Bradshaw (Sarah Jessica Parker), successful author and everyone’s favorite fashion icon next door is back, her famously sardonic wit intact and sharper than ever as she continues to narrate her own story about sex, love and the fashion obsessed single women in New York City.

Brian De Palma returns to the mind-blowing potential of telekinesis in the follow-up to his 1976 horror hit Carrie. While vacationing with his psychic son, Robin (Andrew Stevens), and close associate Childress (John Cassavetes), government agent Peter Sandza (Kirk Douglas) survives a terrorist attack, only to discover that it was staged by Childress so he could kidnap Robin for his own nefarious purposes. With the assistance of another psychic and an employee at the Paragon Institute for Psychic Research, Peter discovers a telekinetic Chicago high-school girl named Gillian (Amy Irving), who may be able to help him find Robin.