The week’s DVDs begin on the couch:

DVDs and streaming for March 31 by Boo Allen

This week, we begin on the couch:

The Voices (***)

Marjane Satrap, the Iranian-born director of the animated marvel Persepolis, guides a wide-eyed Ryan Reynolds through his spirited role as Jerry, a shy, unassuming man who seems to lead two lives. He works at a bathroom supply warehouse and then comes home to talk to his dog and cat. And they talk back to him (also voiced by Reynolds). Dear Jerry sometimes forgets to take his meds, much to the annoyance of his court-appointed therapist (Jacki Weaver). And when he misses the drugs, strange things happen, such as talking animals. One night, Jerry accidentally kills a fellow worker, the requisite office babe Fiona (Gemma Arterton). Jerry cuts her up and before long, her head, now safely in his refrigerator, also talks back to Jerry. She’s lonely in there and needs company, so Jerry embarks on his serial killer career, all the while talking to his feuding heads and hilarious pets. It’s as bizarre as it sounds, and strangely enough never becomes overly violent. In fact, Jerry remains a sweet and warm guy. Michael Perry’s script gives plenty of back-story information on Jerry, while also making his human interactions clever and witty. The mixture doesn’t always work, but it will usually keep a viewer off guard.

Rated R, 103 minutes.

Extras: a 17 minute “making of” featurette, a seven minute featurette on the special effects along with three minutes on an effects comparison, five minutes on “The Voices of Ryan Reynolds,” a cast and costume sketch gallery, nine deleted scenes and five minutes of extended scenes, and 20 minutes of “animatics” (storyboards).

Our Mother’s House (***1/2), The Doctor’s Dilemma (***)

On Demand Warner Archive releases two unrated films starring once popular British actor Dirk Bogard. The pair offers a wide representation of his talent, playing a cheap grifter in the first, Our Mother’s House (1967, 104 minutes), and a cultured grifter in the second, The Doctor’s Dilemma (1958, 99 minutes). Bogard receives top billing in House but does not appear for the film’s first half, devoted entirely to the story of seven children in London who lose their mother (including nine year-old Mark Lester who would take the title role in the following year’s Oscar winning Best Picture Oliver!). They fear they will be taken away, so they bury mumsie in the garden. After, the tribe then lives creatively on their own. That is, until their long lost father (Bogard) arrives. When he discovers the children have been forging their mother’s welfare checks, he joins in on the scam, that is, until pushing too hard. Jack Clayton directed from Julian Gloag’s novel, giving the film a sense of hovering realism with shady interiors and roughened settings. Bogard again receives top billing in Dilemma, based on George Bernard Shaw’s talky, claustrophobic play. Bogard shares screen time with an excellent ensemble cast comprised of a quartet of some of England’s most distinguished mid-century character actors: Alastair Sim, Robert Morley, Felix Alymer and John Robinson. In 1903 London, a luminous Leslie Caron breaks up the Boys Club by playing Mrs.Dubedat, wife of penurious but talented artist Louis (Bogard). He suffers from tuberculosis, sending her to seek remedy from Dr. Ridgeon (Robinson), a noted specialist who recently has allegedly found a cure—first of one of the many pokes Shaw takes at the medical establishment. Ridgeon assembles a trio of his high-stomached co-harts to help treat Louis, only to find the artist an unrepentant con-man who borrows money and even steals from them. Ridgeon faces the dilemma of saving the artist or a fellow physician, a task made more difficult with his immediate infatuation with Mrs. Dubedat. Anthony Asquith (son of a former British prime minister) directs from Anatole de Grunwald’s script based on Shaw’s play. Asquith rightfully accentuates the mordant Shavian wit and clever dialogue.

High stomached are they both, and full of ire,

in rage deaf as the sea, hasty as fire.

Ships (**1/2)

Ali (Ugur Uzunel) works in a Turkish shipyard, mostly taking orders from his domineering father. When he has time, he daydreams, with some of his thoughts giving way to picturesque fantasies about ships, escaping on them, and finding his soul-mate through them. The young man accidentally meets Eda (M. Sitare Akbas), a relatively free-spirited woman who paints graffiti and encourages Ali’s dreams. Together, the two meander through a series of mostly slight sequences that nevertheless provide writer-director Elif Refig opportunities to show off her visual creativity. The film has little dialogue, as Refig lets her camera paint the narrative, with endless sunsets, sea vistas and anything with dappled sunlight that might pop up on the picturesque shipping docks.

Not rated, 100 minutes.

Extras: Refig’s 21 minute short film “Man to Be.”

Als on DVD and streaming: Alice’s Restaurant, The Beat Generation, The Facts of Life, Night Game, Without a Clue.