DVD REVIEWS OF NEW RELEASES.

Byline: ROB LOWMAN

If you had heard Hugh Laurie deliver a line like, ``I don't know much about pornography -- but I know what I like,'' you might think it's one of those zingers that his cranky character delivers on ``House.''

Actually, not. It's from ``A Bit of Fry and Laurie,'' a British sketch-comedy series he did in the late '80s. The show itself will bring to mind the absurdist humor of ``Monty Python's Flying Circus,'' without the Terry Gilliam graphics. Watching Laurie perform with the witty Stephen Fry is revealing in light of his Fox series.

When you watch Laurie in ``Fry and Laurie,'' you see the actor using some similar facial mannerisms and double takes that have become familiar on the Fox show. But, in the medical drama, Laurie cleverly mines them for dramatic effect. While he may have come across as a ninny in a comedy sketch, as Gregory House he comes across as a sarcastic SOB but also a human being, albeit very flawed. (How was Laurie overlooked for an Emmy nomination?)

The second season of ``House'' established it as network TV's best drama. Produced by Bryan Singer (``X-Men,'' ``Superman Returns''), the show is less about medicine and soap-opera interpersonal relations than about the moral and ethical choices the characters make, which take on heightened drama because of the life-and-death situations.

House is a wounded character, both emotionally and physically. He uses a cane after an operation that removed muscle from his leg, and he is addicted to painkillers. Having been unconscious during the procedure, he blames his girlfriend at the time (Sela Ward), whom he still longs for. Ward's character appears for part of season two, only married to another man, making House's life more tortuous.

The doctor is the brilliant diagnostician who prefers to take the patient out of the equation. (They all lie, after all.) And he is condescending to his staff (Jesse Spencer, Jennifer Morrison and Omar Epps), his boss (Lisa Edelstein) and fellow doctor and only friend (Robert Sean Leonard.)

This last season found House acting childish, foolish and heroic, despite his better instincts. It's impossible not to be riveted by Laurie's performance, but it would only go so far without the interesting conundrums House and his colleagues deal with.

It's a small world of characters in ``House,'' which works to the show's advantage. Changes are subtle but dynamic. The cast -- especially Epps -- is superb, the writing razor-sharp.

The new season starts Sept. 5. With last season ending with a cliffhanger, I suggest you get started watching.

Rob Lowman [phone]

[e-mail]

NEW FILMS

With two films like ``Das Boat'' and ``The Perfect Storm'' under his belt, it's clear that director Wolfgang Petersen has an affinity for water, but after ``Poseidon'' -- a remake of Irwin Allen's 1972 disaster flick, ``The Poseidon Adventure,'' about an ocean liner that is upended by a tidal wave -- he must have a sinking feeling.

The film sunk at the box office, but not from lack of effort by Petersen, who gives the story some visual pizazz -- thanks to CGI effects -- lacking in the original, which despite its setting was more often than not a talky soap opera.

The stars of the '72 flick -- Gene Hackman and Ernest Borgnine -- have been replaced with Kurt Russell as the former mayor of New York and Josh Lucas as a professional gambler who had been in the Navy, which gives him supposed insight into how to escape the overturned ship.

The pair lead a band of survivors who have left behind the others -- who heeded the advice of the captain (Andre Braugher). We soon, unsurprisingly, learn he has made a terrible miscalculation.

As Russell and Lucas' characters bicker while leading their small group -- some die (the obvious ones), some live and, of course, there is the obligatory child in peril. ``Poseidon's'' two saving graces are its relative brevity for a disaster film (100 minutes), and some of its special effects.

Yesterday it was puppy love, now the barely-out-of-her-teens Lindsay Lohan tries to make a romantic comedy in ``Just My Luck.'' Even with Lohan's energy, no one's ready to buy her in such a role. It just plays as awkward. There's a certain irony in the fact that Kristen Bell -- six years Lohan's senior -- is still more convincing as a teen.

``Silent Hill'' -- one more film based on a video game -- wastes the talents of two good actors, Radha Mitchell and Sean Bean, in order to try and make the audience's skin crawl. Well, it did make me nauseous.

Sydney Pollack's documentary ``Sketches of Frank Gehry'' tries to understand the creative process of the architect who created such monumental structures as Walt Disney Concert Hall and the Bilbao Guggenheim. There are fascinating discussions with artists such as Ed Ruscha about Gehry, and most interestingly with Dr. Milton Wexler, the therapist who has treated the architect for decades.

You shouldn't expect that Pollack, who takes part in some of the discussions, will ever really come to grips with the questions raised. The film is really about the process anyway, and Pollack deserves credit for making it intriguing.

OLDER FILMS

If there was one old-time star I wish were on the screen today, it's Barbara Stanwyck. The actress, who would have turned 100 next year, always seemed the most modern of women, especially as the slick Phyllis Dietrichson in Billy Wilder's 1944 film noir ``Double Indemnity.'' Stanwyck could be classy, but her appeal was that there was something naughty about her, and nowhere is she naughtier than in ``Double Indemnity,'' where she convinces Fred MacMurray's character to help take out an insurance policy on her husband and murder him.

There is a newly remastered special edition of the classic film out with commentary by movie historian Richard Schickel and an interesting documentary, ``Shadows of Suspense.''

I love Kate Hepburn, too, but she spoke to a different age with her New England Brahmin air. That was why she paired up so well with the earthy Spencer Tracy. In one of their engaging but somewhat dated films together, Frank Capra's 1948 ``State of the Union,'' the two mix politics and love as she plays a Republican presidential candidate's wife who teaches him to ignore his shady advisers and speak the truth. Obviously, a fantasy.

TELEVISION

When it returns for its third season Oct. 5, ``Veronica Mars'' will be paired on the CW with ``The Gilmore Girls.'' A good idea, considering that both are hip, witty dramas laden with bits of comedy.

``Mars'' is about a high school loner in a California coastal town (the kind Ross Macdonald's detective Lew Archer used to prowl) who has turned amateur private eye after her mother runs off and her father is disgraced as sheriff.

Mars is played by a smart, edgy Kristen Bell, but it's hard to believe she's only in high school. Still, the actress (who should be a bigger star) is terrific at conveying her conflicted life as a teen -- insecure, longing, but with a resolute toughness.

The only bad thing about this entertaining series is that it's opposite ``House,'' which means it's TiVo time.

Later this year, Helen Mirren will be on the big screen in ``The Queen,'' as Elizabeth II, the current British monarch. Earlier this year, she portrayed the virgin queen in the HBO miniseries ``Elizabeth I.''

And why not? There is no one more regal than Mirren (a dame) in Hollywood. As Elizabeth I, she makes human a larger-than-

life figure while still keeping her larger than

life. That regal demeanor has always been Mirren's appeal, whether it's as DCS Jane Tennison in the ``Prime Suspect'' series or Morgana in John Boorman's 1981 retelling of the Arthurian legend ``Excalibur.''

``Elizabeth I'' begins 20-some years into the queen's reign, when she is smitten like a schoolgirl by the Earl of Essex (Hugh Dancy), roughly three decades her junior. This territory has been traversed before by Bette Davis and Errol Flynn in ``The Private Lives of Elizabeth and Essex.''

There is more age disparity between Dancy and Mirren, which -- along with the fact that it's on cable -- is starker than the Davis-Flynn version. And while Davis is a Hollywood legend, Mirren is a more compelling actress, in my book, making a grand production even grander.

Two canceled but not bad sci-fi series from last season are also out: ``Threshold'' -- about an elite team investigating a covert extraterrestrial invasion -- didn't even last a season, but any show with Carla Gugino and Peter Dink-

lage is worth watching. The set includes four unaired episodes. ``Invasion'' -- about a different kind of covert extratrerrestrial invasion -- never kept the numbers of its lead-in, ``Lost.'' The series -- set in the Florida everglades -- had a bit of ``Invasion of the Body Snatchers'' and was watchable, if not compelling.

THE PRICE TAGS

TELEVISION

``House, M.D. -- Season Two'' (Universal; $59.98)

``Veronica Mars -- The Complete Second Season'' (Warner; $59.98)

``Invasion -- The Complete Series'' (Warner; $59.98)

``Threshold -- The Complete Series'' (Paramount; $54.99)

``Elizabeth I'' (HBO; $29.98)

``A Bit of Fry and Laurie'' (BBC/Warner; ``Season One and Season Two $24.98 each)

``Blue Thunder: The Complete Series'' (Columbia; $39.95)

``Conviction -- The Complete Series'' (Universal; $59.98)

``The Robinsons -- Complete Series One'' (BBC/Warner; $24.98)

NEW FILMS

``Sketches of Frank Gehry'' (Columbia; $24.98)

``Silent Hill'' (Columbia; $28.95)

``Poseidon'' -- (Warner; $28.98, single disc, $36.98 two-disc special edition)

``Just My Luck'' (Fox; $29.99)

``Phat Girlz'' (Fox; $27.98)

OLDER FILMS

``Double Indemnity -- Special Edition'' (Universal; $26.98)

``This Island Earth'' (Universal; $14.98)

``Kicking & Screaming'' (Criterion Collection; $29.95)

``The Wizard'' (Universal; $14.98)

``Beyond the Poseidon Adventure'' (Warner; $14.98)

``Radioland Murders'' (Universal; $14.98)

``State of the Union'' (Universal; $14.98)

FOR CHILDREN

``Saving Shiloh'' (Warner; $19.98)

``Sesame Street: Elmo's Potty Time'' (Sony Wonder; $12.98)

``Little Bear -- Halloween Stories'' (Paramount; $16.99)

``Disney's Little Einsteins -- Mission Celebration'' (Disney;$19.99)

MUSIC

``Chris Botti -- Live: With Orchestra And Special Guests'' (Sony; $19.98)

CAPTION(S):

5 photos

Photo:

(1) Hugh Laurie as Dr. Gregory House in the Fox series ``House.''

(2) no caption (``Poseidon'')

(3) no caption (``Veronica Mars'')

(4) no caption (``Elizabeth I'')

(5) no caption (``Threshold'')