Random DVD and Blu-ray announcements

Started by wilder, November 01, 2011, 01:54:56 AM

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wilder

^ Will vouch for Body Melt and Brainscan

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January 8, 2019 April 23, 2019

David Mamet's The Spanish Prisoner (1997) on blu-ray from Ammo



Everything changes for rising corporate star Joe Ross (Campbell Scott) when he meets the wealthy and mysterious Jimmy Dell (Steve Martin) at a tropical resort. Dell offers to help Ross protect his new business process invention, but in short order Ross finds himself falsely accused of murder. Working with the FBI and his assistant, Susan Ricci (Rebecca Pidgeon), Ross sets out to prove his innocence and disentangle himself from the diabolical entrapment.

The Spanish Prisoner (1997) - Amazon








January 29, 2019

Raphael Nussbaum's Pets (1973) on blu-ray from Vinegar Syndrome, from a 2K restoration



Teenage Runaway Bonnie (Candice Rialson) has escaped the clutches of her controlling brother, only to become immediately embroiled in a twisted web of sexual manipulation. Initially convinced to aid in a carjacking, Bonnie is then taken in by a lecherous lesbian artist who hopes to groom her into a sapphic lover, only to have her plans thwarted by the perverse advances of a local gallery owner whose bizarre proclivities include the keeping of an unusual assortment of 'pets.'

A truly unparalleled exploitation film viewing experience, Raphael Nussbaum's PETS veers between moments of overwrought melodrama and jarring bouts of unhinged sleaze. Co-starring Ed Bishop (TV's UFO), Joan Blackman (BLUE HAWAII), and Mike Cartel (RUNAWAY NIGHTMARE), and adapted from Nussbaum's own stage play, Vinegar Syndrome presents this drive-in classic newly restored from rare 35mm elements and on Blu-ray for the very first time.







Q1 2019 TBD

Alan Parker's Mississippi Burning (1988) on blu-ray from Kino, from a 4K remaster



When a group of civil rights workers goes missing in a small Mississippi town, FBI agents Alan Ward (Willem Dafoe) and Rupert Anderson (Gene Hackman) are sent in to investigate. Local authorities refuse to cooperate with them, and the African American community is afraid to, precipitating a clash between the two agents over strategy. As the situation becomes more volatile, the direct approach is abandoned in favor of more aggressive, hard-line tactics.






Q1 2019 TBD

Wim Verstappen's Blue Movie (1971) on blu-ray from Cult Epics



Blue Movie is of historical interest as it was the first film produced in Holland with full frontal nudity for both sexes. While it has its share of graphically depicted sexual scenes, it also has a story. Released from prison for sex offences, a young man moves into an apartment house with very thin walls, and the sounds he hears make him believe his neighbors are having sex all the time. He has a married neighbor, a professor. The professor arranges things so that his wife can meet and seduce the sex offender, possibly so that the humiliating revenge of impotence can be visited upon him.

NSFW

Dutch Sex Wave Trailer - Vimeo



March 11/12, 2019

Peter Glenville's The Prisoner (1955) on blu-ray from Arrow US & Arrow UK



Banned from the Cannes and Venice Films Festivals for being anti-Communist and excoriated elsewhere as pro-Soviet propaganda, Peter Glenville's The Prisoner stoked controversy at the time of its original release and remains a complex, challenging and multifaceted exploration of faith and power.

In an unnamed Eastern European capital, an iron-willed Cardinal (Academy Award®-winner Alec Guinness, The Ladykillers) is arrested by state police on charges of treason. Tasked with securing a confession from him by any means necessary is a former comrade-in-arms from the anti-Nazi resistance (Jack Hawkins, The Bridge on the River Kwai). Knowing the Cardinal will never fold under physical torture, the Interrogator instead sets out to destroy him mentally, breaking his spirit rather than his body.

Adapted by acclaimed playwright Bridget Boland (Gaslight) from her own stage-play and showcasing powerhouse performances by two actors at the height of their game, The Prisoner is a tense, thought-provoking and disturbing drama about the endurance of the human spirit.







March 4/5, 2019

Robert Siodmak's Phantom Lady (1944) on blu-ray from Arrow US & Arrow UK



After a fight with his wife, Scott Henderson (Alan Curtis, High Sierra) heads to a bar to drown his sorrows. There he strikes up a conversation with a mysterious, despondent lady who agrees to accompany him to a show uptown but withholds her name. Arriving home, Scott is met by grimly countenanced cops - his wife has been strangled with one of his neckties and he is the prime suspect. He has a solid alibi but his theatre companion is nowhere to be found and no one remembers seeing them together. When Scott is charged with murdering his wife, it falls to his devoted secretary 'Kansas' (Ella Raines, Brute Force) to find the phantom lady and save Scott from the electric chair... Adapted from a hit novel by acclaimed crime writer Cornell Woolrich, Phantom Lady boasts stylish cinematography, cruel characters and memorable performances from Ella Raines and Franchot Tone (Mutiny on the Bounty).



February 12, 2019

F.W. Murnau's The Haunted Castle (1921) and The Finances of the Grand Duke (1924) on blu-ray from Kino



Before plumbing the depths of horror and despair with such films as Nosferatu (1922) and Faust (1926), Friedrich Wilhelm Murnau crafted a moody drama of a storm-bound manor and the grim mystery that lurks within: The Haunted Castle.

Also included on this double feature Blu-ray is The Finances of the Grand Duke, which has Murnau exploring the realm of light comedy in a playful espionage thriller reminiscent of Ernst Lubitsch.




April 9, 2019

Noir Archive Vol. 1 (1944-1945) on blu-ray from Kit Parker Films



-Address Unknown (1944)
-Escape in the Fog (1945)
-The Guilt of Janet Ames (1947)
-The Black Book aka The Reign of Terror (1949)
-Johnny Allegro (1949)
-711 Ocean Drive (1950)
-The Killer That Stalked New York
-Assignment Paris (1952)
-The Miami Story (1954)

Noir Archive Vol. 1 (1944-1945) - Amazon

wilder

Quote from: wilder-The Black Book aka The Reign of Terror (1949)

Quote from: IMDB User metaphor-2Brilliant film noir disguised as French Revolution Epic

True film noir, that densely urban, disillusioned body of work characterized by the deep shadows that separate the characters from each other and isolate them from society, was almost always set in contemporary cities... in France before WWII and in America after it. ALMOST... Anthony Mann's THE BLACK BOOK (aka REIGN OF TERROR) is one of its finest examples, a costume thriller set in the French Revolution, and somehow managing to create the visual style and emotional mood of true film noir in a completely atypical setting.

This is a film to watch for its cinematic, visual brilliance... The story is serviceable, but the experience it services is a thrilling piece of movie art. Photographed by the great John Alton (a man who, it is said, could re-light Times Square at high noon, if necessary) the frame consistently dazzles and intrigues. Anthony Mann's taut and claustrophobic work (rather at odds with the usual French Revolution epic, and with Mann's later work in other genuinely epic-scale costume dramas) draws a compelling parallel between the atmosphere of fear in post-revolutionary France and in mid-20th century McCarthyite America.








wilder

#842
March 26, 2019

Blood Hunger: The Films of José Larraz on limited edition blu-ray from Arrow US & Arrow UK

*Arrow also has a second Larraz box set in the works that will contain Edge of the Axe (1988), Black Candles (1982), and Deadly Manor (1990)

There was a great discussion about his work on the Daughters of Darkness podcast a couple years ago.





One of the most underrated and oft-neglected genre filmmakers of his generation, Spanish-born director José Ramón Larraz (Symptoms) finally receives his due with this collection of his work, the first of its kind, bringing together a fascinating cross-section of films from the first half of his lengthy cinematic career.

In Larraz's debut feature, the hitherto ultra-rare Whirlpool (1970), Vivian Neves stars as Tulia, a young model invited to a photographer's secluded country home for what purports to be a quiet weekend retreat – but soon transpires to be anything but. 1974's Vampyres – perhaps the best known and most widely-released of all José Larraz's films – sees a duo of blood hungry female vampires prowling the British countryside, from where they lure unsuspecting male motorists back to their imposing, dilapidated mansion for draining... in more ways than one. Meanwhile, in 1978's The Coming of Sin (La Visita del Vicio, in its native Spanish), a young gypsy girl experiences a violent sexual awakening as her dreams of a naked young man on horseback become reality.

By turns terrifying, titillating, artful and scandalous, these three films collected here – all newly restored from original film elements, with Whirlpool and The Coming of Sin making their Blu-ray world premieres – collectively offer film fans a unique perspective on the fascinating, highly-varied career of one of the horror genre's most overlooked auteurs.


Blood Hunger: The Films of José Larraz - Diabolik DVD



Q1 2019 TBD

Daryl Duke's The Silent Partner (1978) on blu-ray from Kino



A timid bank teller anticipates a bank robbery and steals the money himself before the crook arrives. When the sadistic crook realizes he's been fooled, he tracks down the teller and engages him in a cat-and-mouse chase for the cash.






March 26, 2019

Val Lewton & Robert Wise's The Body Snatcher (1945) on blu-ray from Shout Factory



In Edinburgh, renowned surgeon and now teacher of anatomy Dr. MacFarlane, has been paying John Gray (Boris Karloff), a cabman, to clandestinely bring him exhumed bodies of the recently deceased for classroom demonstration purposes. With cemeteries being increasingly guarded, Gray turns to murder to provide MacFarlane with fresh bodies. Realizing that he will never be rid of Gray, who constantly taunts him with his knowledge of MacFarland's past indiscretions, MacFarlane engages the malevolent Gray in a hand-to-hand fight to the death, the ultimate results of which provide the victor with an episode of unprecedented psychological horror...

The Body Snatcher (1945) - Amazon



January 22, 2019

John Schlesinger's Yanks (1979) on blu-ray from Twilight Time. Also available from Eureka in the UK.



A World War II epic both sweeping and intimate, Yanks is a triumph for director John Schlesinger (Midnight Cowboy, Sunday Bloody Sunday), and a moving showcase for its splendid ensemble cast led by Richard Gere and Vanessa Redgrave. A war film without battle scenes, Schlesinger's drama instead focuses on relationships far from the front, examining the romantic entanglements between the stationed U.S. soldiers and the locals in a small town in Northern England in the 1944 period before the Normandy landings.

Three very different women find themselves attracted to the American G.I.s at a new military base in town. Gere is Sgt. Matt Dyson, initiating a tentative courtship with a young woman still pining for her fiancée overseas. Redgrave is wealthy socialite Helen, engaged in an affair with a captain (William Devane), while both of them long for their respective spouses far from home. And Sergeant Ruffelo's fling with Mollie (Wendy Morgan) occurs just as the interactions between the Yanks and their British hosts begin to strain under the tension of the war, and uncertainty about what happens to their new romances.

A personal passion project for Schlesinger -- who was given free creative reign after the success of Marathon Man (1976) -- Yanks was generally not afforded the attention it deserved upon initial release, and as one of the director's warmest films, it's a gem ripe for rediscovery.







January 22, 2019

John Huston's Beat the Devil (1953) on blu-ray from Twilight Time, from a 2016 restoration



A group of con artists stake their claim on a bogus uranium mine. Huston and Truman Capote concocted this offbeat, very funny satire of MALTESE FALCON-ish movies on location in Italy. Low-key nature of comedy eluded many people in 1954 and it immediately became a cult favorite, which it remains today.



January 22, 2019

Fritz Lang's The Return of Frank James (1940) on blu-ray from Twilight Time



Frank James continues to avoid arrest in order to take revenge on the Ford brothers for their murder of his brother Jesse.



February 2019 TBD

André de Toth's None Shall Escape (1944) on MOD blu-ray from Sony



The career of a Nazi officer shown as flashbacks from his trial as a war criminal.

wilder

December 6, 2019

Roman Polanski's Bitter Moon (1992) on blu-ray from Studio Canal (Germany)



Nigel Dobson is an English perfect gentleman, married to equally respectable Fiona. On a cruise heading for India, they meet a highly unconventional couple, American unpublished would-be literary celebrity Oscar, in a wheelchair, and his much younger Parisian wife, Mimi.

Bitter Moon (1992) - Amazon DE






April 9, 2019

Frank Tuttle's This Gun for Hire (1942) on blu-ray from Shout Factory



A hired killer dodges police while tracking down the enemy agents who tried to frame him.



April 29/30, 2019

Aleksey German's Khrustalyov, My Car! (1998) on blu-ray from Arrow US & Arrow UK, from a 2K restoration of the original camera negative



Named after the apocryphal exclamation of Soviet security chief Lavrentiy Beria as he rushed to Stalin's deathbed, this blackly funny, deliriously immersive satire distils the anticipation and anxiety in the Moscow air, as the Soviet despot lay dying.

Late winter 1953. The lives of nearly half the planet are in Stalin's hands. A military surgeon, General Yuri Georgievich Klensky (Yuri Tsurilo), finds himself a target of the "Doctors' Plot": the anti-Semitic conspiracy accusing Jewish doctors in Moscow of planning to assassinate the Soviet elite. Pursued, abused, and marked for the gulags, Yuri is chased and dragged through a Stalinist Soviet nightmare. His desperate, jolting journey encapsulates the madness of the era.

Directed by Aleksei German (Hard to Be a God), Khrustalyov, My Car! proved wildly provocative when it was screened at the 1998 Cannes film festival, despite being championed as the best film of the festival by the president of the Cannes jury that year, Martin Scorsese. A one-of-a-kind collision of nightmare and realism, German's film is presented here in a new restoration with a wealth of illuminating extras.







April 8/9, 2019

Alain Resnais' Mélo (!986) on blu-ray from Arrow US & Arrow UK



Master director Alain Resnais (Last Year At Marienbad) blurs the line between cinematic technique and theatrical artifice in his award-winning Mélo, adapted from Henri Bernstein's classic play about a doomed love triangle in 1920s Paris.

Pierre (Pierre Arditi, Love Unto Death) and Marcel (André Dussollier, A Good Marriage) are both celebrated concert violinists and lifelong friends, in spite of their differing temperaments. Pierre is modest, sensitive and content with his lot; Marcel is hungry, driven, and pursues a solo career that takes him to the four corners of the world. After years apart, the two friends reunite when Pierre invites Marcel to his home for dinner. It is then that Marcel first meets Pierre's wife Romaine (Sabine Azéma, Cosmos), sparking a passionate affair that can only end in tragedy before the curtain falls.




2019 TBD

Elmer Clifton & Ida Lupino's Not Wanted (1949) on blu-ray from Kino, from a 4K restoration. New restorations of Ida Lupino's The Bigamist (1953) and The Hitch-Hiker (1953) are also forthcoming.



After a beautiful but unsophisticated girl is seduced by a worldly piano player and gives up her out-of-wedlock baby, her guilt compels her to kidnap another child.






March 18, 2019

Michael Apted's The Triple Echo (1972) on blu-ray from Indicator (UK), from a 2K restoration from the original camera negative



When a young soldier (Deacon) deserts his outfit and hides in a remote farm, the farm owner (Jackson) and he fall in love. But their idyll is shattered by the arrival of a boorish, violent army sergeant (Reed) searching for his AWOL recruit.

The Triple Echo (1972) - Powerhouse Films


This trailer is wild





March 18, 2019

John Dexter's The Virgin Soldiers (1969) on blu-ray from Indicator (UK)



Set in Singapore in the early 1950s, this impressive adaptation of Leslie Thomas' best-selling, scandalous novel centres on a group of naïve, young British Army recruits billeted to Malaya who have no experience of either love or war.

The Virgin Soldiers (1969) - Powerhouse Films






March 18, 2019

Anthony Mann's A Dandy in Aspic (1968) on blu-ray from Indicator (UK)



The final film by the great Anthony Mann (Winchester '73, El Cid) A Dandy in Aspic is a stylish and complex cold-war thriller starring Laurence Harvey (Room at the Top, The Manchurian Candidate) as a Russian double-agent working for British Intelligence who is assigned to track down and kill an unusual target.

Falling between the outlandish exploits of James Bond and the dour realism of John le Carré's 'circus of spies', this paranoid thriller is a dark and refined affair, with a superb supporting cast headed by Mia Farrow (Rosemary's Baby, See No Evil) and Tom Courtenay (The Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner, Otley), wonderful cinematography by regular Powell and Pressburger cameraman Christopher Challis, and with a terrific score by Quincy Jones.


A Dandy in Aspic (1968) - Powerhouse Films



March 18, 2019

Billy Wilder's Irma la Douce (1963) on blu-ray from Masters of Cinema (UK)



In Paris, a former policeman falls in love with a prostitute, and tries to get her out of that life by paying for all of her time.

Irma la Douce (1963) - Amazon UK



April 30, 2019

Jim Sheridan's The Boxer (1997) on blu-ray from Shout Factory



Young Danny Flynn is released from prison 14 years after "taking the rap" for the IRA and tries to rebuild his life in his old Belfast neighborhood.



wilder

2019 TBD

George Romero's Martin (1978) on blu-ray from Second Sight (UK)



Young Martin (John Amplas) is entirely convinced that he is an 84-year-old blood-sucking vampire. Without fangs or mystical powers, Martin injects women with sedatives and drinks their blood through wounds inflicted with razor blades. After moving to Braddock, Penn., to live with his superstitious uncle (Lincoln Maazel), who also believes Martin is a vampire, Martin tries to prey exclusively on criminals and thugs but stumbles when he falls for a housewife (Sara Venable).






2019 TBD

George Romero's Dawn of the Dead (1978) on blu-ray from Second Sight (UK)



Following an ever-growing epidemic of zombies that have risen from the dead, two Philadelphia S.W.A.T. team members, a traffic reporter, and his television executive girlfriend seek refuge in a secluded shopping mall.



2019 TBD

Mikhail Kalatozov's I Am Cuba (1964) on blu-ray from Milestone, from a 4K restoration



Started only a week after the Cuban missile crisis, director Mikhail Kalatozov's wildly schizophrenic celebration of Communist kitsch mixes Slavic solemnity with Latin sensuality. Four stunning vignettes feverishly explore the seductive, decadent (and marvelously photogenic) world of Batista's Cuba—deliriously juxtaposing images of rich Americans and bikini-clad beauties sipping cocktails poolside with scenes of ramshackle slums. Using wide-angle lenses that distort and magnify, Sergei Urusevsky's acrobatic camera achieves wild gravity-defying angles as it glides effortlessly through long continuous shots, exploring the innermost feelings of the characters and their often desperate situations.






Summer 2019 TBD

Paul Schrader's Blue Collar (1978) on blu-ray from Kino



When Detroit autoworkers Zeke Brown (Richard Pryor), Jerry Bartowski (Harvey Keitel) and Smokey James (Yaphet Kotto) decide to rob their own union, they are initially disappointed by the relatively small haul. However, upon closer inspection, the three amateur thieves discover that they have made off with something potentially much more valuable than money: the union's ledger, filled with bogus figures and links to organized crime. Should they blackmail the union or go to the authorities?



February 26, 2019

Blake Edwards' Wild Rovers (1971) on blu-ray from Warner Archive



Ross Bodine and Frank Post are cowhands on Walt Buckman's R-Bar-R ranch. Bodine is older and broods about how he will get along when he's too old to cowboy. Post is young and ambitious for a better life and suggests they rob a bank.

Quote from: Letterboxd user Filipe FurtadoA key Edwards film, for all his bittersweet surface his movies usually hide one of the bleakest wordviews in American cinema and this is one his more blunt treatments of the moral compromises needed to just keep going.



February 26, 2019

Tony Williams' Next of Kin (1982) on blu-ray from Severin



When a young woman inherits a creaky retirement home, she'll find herself in a waking nightmare of murder, madness and a legacy of evil that may be inescapable. Jackie Kerin, John Jarratt (WOLF CREEK) and Alex Scott (ROMPER STOMPER) star in this "stylish and creepy must-see" (The Digital Fix) thriller featuring an intense synth score by Klaus Schulze of Tangerine Dream.






April 2019 TBD

Joseph Pevney's The Strange Door (1951) on blu-ray from Kino



The Sire de Maletroit (Charles Laughton), is an evil French nobleman so obsessed with hatred for his own brother (Paul Cavanagh) that he imprisons him in the castle dungeon. The Sire tries to destroy the life of Cavanagh's daughter (Sally Forrest) by forcing her to marry rogue (Richard Stapley), but plans are upset when they fall in love. Aided by Voltan (Boris Karloff), an abused servant, the lovers attempt to escape but the Sire imprisons them in a cell, whose closing walls may mean violent death for these innocent victims.

wilder

May 28, 2019

Joseph Losey's Boom! (1968) on blu-ray from Shout Factory



The wealthy, self-absorbed eccentric Sissy Goforth has taken up residence on a secluded Mediterranean island where she dictates her memoirs, flies into rages and screams insults at her servants. Her health now failing, she drinks, takes pills and has a doctor give her injections to ease the pain. Into her reclusive life comes a stranger who manages to climb to her villa and survive a guard dog attack before introducing himself as a poet. Though attracted by the visitor she soon discovers he has a reputation for appearing when wealthy women are about to meet their demise and is known locally as the Angel of Death.) Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton light up the screen in what acclaimed playwright Tennessee Williams (A Streetcar Named Desire) described as the best film adaptation of his work he'd ever seen.

A notorious bomb on its initial release, Boom! has since built up a cult following for its one-of-a-kind mixture of camp, lyricism, and the highly combustible chemistry of its two leads. More than fifty years after Boom!'s debut, Shout! Factory invites you to light the fuse on a re-examination of this highly unusual drama.




May 27, 2019

Olivier Assayas' Demonlover (2002) on blu-ray from Arrow UK



Twenty years after David Cronenberg prophesised the dark side of the Internet age in Videodrome, acclaimed French filmmaker Olivier Assayas (Irma Vep) updated it for the New Millennium in his startlingly prescient Demonlover, a chilling exploration of the nexus between sex and violence available at the click of a button.

Up-and-coming executive Diane (Connie Nielsen, One Hour Photo) lets nothing stand in her way when it comes to landing the lucrative Tokyo Anime contract for the Volf Corporation, guaranteeing worldwide exclusive rights to the latest in cutting-edge hentai. Despised by her assistant (Chloe Sevigny, American Psycho) and engaged in a risky game of corporate espionage, her ruthless ambition meets its match in Elaine (Gina Gershon, Bound), the charismatic representative of an American Internet porn company called Demonlover. However, the company is only the front for an online portal to the Hellfire Club, which gives its users control over the next big thing in interactive extreme pornography: real women, tortured according to subscribers' whims, in real time. Diane wants a piece of the action, and will stop at nothing to get it; but as she delves deeper into the twisted world of the Hellfire Club, reality slips away and the stakes of the game are raised to the point of no return.

Armed with an iconic score by art-rock pioneers Sonic Youth, Assayas' neo-noir/cyberhorror masterpiece is finally unleashed for the first time on Blu-Ray, with revealing extras and a new director-approved restoration.


Demonlover (2002) - Arrow Films






April 8, 2019

Henry King's The Song of Bernadette (1943) on blu-ray from Eureka (UK)



One of the rare Hollywood studio films to address spiritual belief and religious conviction in a serious and complex fashion, the beloved classic THE SONG OF BERNADETTE made a star of its leading lady Jennifer Jones, who won the Academy Award for Best Actress, in addition to taking home a Golden Globe during those awards' very first ceremony (the film also won Globes for Best Dramatic Film and Best Director). A moving portrait of faith, the film is one of the crowning achievements of director Henry King.

Based on the best-selling historical novel by Franz Werfel, the film chronicles the life of 14-year-old Bernadette Soubirous, who began seeing visions of the Blessed Virgin Mary in Lourdes, France in 1858. When news of Bernadette's vision first spreads through the town, there are those who decry her as mentally unsound, while others wholeheartedly believe –particularly when the spring that erupts near the grotto that housed the visitations contains water that seems to have miraculous healing properties.


The Song of Bernadette (1943) - Amazon UK






April 22, 2019

Max Ophuls' The Reckless Moment (1949) on blu-ray from Indicator (UK)



Joan Bennett (Scarlet Street, Suspiria) stars as a suburban housewife who covers up a murder to protect her teenage daughter, only to find herself blackmailed by an immoral small-time crook, played by James Mason (North by Northwest, The Deadly Affair).

The Reckless Moment (1949) - Powerhouse Films



April 22, 2019

Robert Rossen's Lilith (1964) on blu-ray from Indicator (UK)



The final film by the great, yet underrated Robert Rossen (All the King's Men, The Hustler) is a compelling tale of love, madness, and forbidden desire. Warren Beatty (Mickey One, The Fortune) stars as a young war veteran who takes a job as on orderly in a local asylum and falls under the spell of beautiful schizophrenic, Lilith (Jean Seberg – A Bout de souffle, Bonjour Tristesse).

Boasting a superb supporting cast that includes Peter Fonda, Jessica Walter, Gene Hackman and Kim Hunter, Rossen's delicate and powerful film is one of the most under-appreciated American films of the 1960s.


Lilith (1964) - Powerhouse Films



April 22, 2019

Anatole Litvak's The Snake Pit (1948) on blu-ray from Indicator (UK), from a 4K remaster struck from the original camera negative



Shocking and highly controversial at the time of release, The Snake Pit broke new ground in Hollywood cinema for its depiction of mental illness and its treatment. Olivia de Havilland (Gone with the Wind, The Heiress), delivers an astounding performance as a young bride who suffers a breakdown and finds herself committed to an asylum.

Director Anatole Litvak (Sorry, Wrong Number, Anastasia) had to fight to persuade producer Darryl Zanuck to back the film, but the result remains one of the most potent and powerful films to tackle the subject and was an influence on later works such as Sam Fuller's Shock Corridor (1963), Robert Rossen's Lilith (1964) and Miloš Forman's One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (1975).


The Snake Pit (1948) - Powerhouse Films



April 22, 2019

Joseph L. Mankiewicz's Dragonwyck (1946) on blu-ray from Indicator (UK)



The directorial debut of the great Joseph L Mankiewicz (All About Eve, Suddenly, Last Summer), Dragonwyck is a glorious melding of Gothic chills and baroque melodrama. A beautiful Connecticut farm girl (Gene Tierney) finds herself embroiled in a conspiracy of madness, murder and intrigue after she agrees to become governess and nurse to the family of her distant cousin (Vincent Price).

Echoing Hitchcock's Rebecca (1940), and reuniting stars Tierney and Price for the third time in as many years (having previously starred together in Otto Preminger's Laura, 1944, and John M Stahl's Leave Her to Heaven, 1945), Dragonwyck is a magnificently creepy chiller with a career-defining performance by Price, luminous cinematography by the legendary Arthur C Miller, and a wonderful Alfred Newman score.


Dragonwyck (1946) - Powerhouse Films



April 2, 2019

RKO Classic Romances Collection on blu-ray from Kino



-Millie (1931) Dir: John Francis Dillon | Helen Twelvetrees, Lilyan Tashman & Joan Blondell
-Kept Husbands (1931) Dir: Lloyd Bacon | Clara Kimball Young, Joel McCrea & Ned Sparks
-The Lady Refuses (1931) Dir: George Archainbaud | Betty Compson & John Darrow
-The Woman Between (1931) Dir: Victor Schertziner | Lili Damita & Lester Vail
-Sin Takes a Holiday (1930) Dir: Paul L. Stein | Constance Bennett, Basil Rathbone & Zasu Pitts



April 2, 2019

RKO Classic Adventures Collection on blu-ray from Kino



-The Painted Desert (1931) Dir: Howard Higgin | William Boyd, Helen Twelvetrees & Clark Gable
-The Pay-Off (1930) Dir: Lowell Sherman | Lowell Sherman, Marian Nixon & Hugh Trevor
-The Silver Horde (1930) Dir: George Archainbaud | Evelyn Brent, Joel McCrea & Jean Arthur



Q1 2019 TBD

James Ivory's The Bostonians (1984) on blu-ray from Cohen Media Group, from a 4K restoration



In 19th-century Boston, charismatic Southern lawyer Basil Ransom and his cousin, devoted suffragette Olive Chancellor, contend for the future and the soul of the gregarious and youthful Verena Tannant. Basil is simply infatuated with her as a potential lover and wife. Olive, on the other hand, hopes to shape her political and social views and use her to forward the women's-rights movement.In 19th-century Boston, charismatic Southern lawyer Basil Ransom and his cousin, devoted suffragette Olive Chancellor, contend for the future and the soul of the gregarious and youthful Verena Tannant. Basil is simply infatuated with her as a potential lover and wife. Olive, on the other hand, hopes to shape her political and social views and use her to forward the women's-rights movement.






April 15, 2019

Billy Wilder's One, Two, Three (1961) on blu-ray from Masters of Cinema (UK)



One of director Billy Wilder's most frenetic comedies, the madcap Cold War and corporate politics satire ONE, TWO, THREE has to be one of the only films almost capable of making its Wilder predecessors Some Like It Hot and The Apartment seem sedately paced in comparison. Featuring a hilarious lead performance by James Cagney (apparently so exhausted by the rapid-fire pace that he then retired for twenty years!), ONE, TWO, THREE hasn't always been as famous as Wilder's other comedies, but it's among his best.

Cagney is C.R. "Mac" MacNamara, a top Coca-Cola executive shipped off to (then West) Berlin and told to keep an eye on his boss' 17-year-old Atlanta socialite daughter Scarlett (Pamela Tiffin) while she visits Germany. Scarlett's tour seems endless, and Mac discovers she's fallen for a (then East) Berlin communist agitator and the young couple are bound for Moscow! Mac has to bust up the burgeoning romance before his boss learns the truth, all the while dealing with his wife Phyllis (Arlene Francis) and her own impatience with German living.


One, Two, Three (1961) - Amazon UK



Quote from: wilder on January 06, 2019, 06:36:14 AM
March 26, 2019

Blood Hunger: The Films of José Larraz on limited edition blu-ray from Arrow US & Arrow UK

*Arrow also has a second Larraz box set in the works that will contain Edge of the Axe (1988), Black Candles (1982), and Deadly Manor (1990)

There was a great discussion about his work on the Daughters of Darkness podcast a couple years ago.









Quote from: wilder on December 02, 2018, 03:25:58 AM
February 4/5, 2019

Luigi Bazzoni's The Possessed (1965) on blu-ray from Arrow US and Arrow UK, from a 2K restoration from the original camera negative



The Possessed is a wonderfully atmospheric proto-giallo based on one of Italy's most notorious crimes, The Alleghe killings, and adapted from the book on that case by acclaimed literary figure Giovanni Comisso.

Peter Baldwin (The Ghost, The Weekend Murders) stars as Bernard, a depressed novelist who sets off in search of his old flame Tilde (Virna Lisi, La Reine Margot), a beautiful maid who works at a remote lakeside hotel. Bernard is warmly greeted by the hotel owner Enrico (Salvo Randone, Fellini's Satyricon) and his daughter Irma (Valentina Cortese, Thieves Highway, The Iguana with the Tongue of Fire), but Tilde has disappeared under suspicious circumstances. Bernard undertakes an investigation and is soon plunged into a disturbing drama of familial secrets, perversion, madness and murder...

Co-written by Giulio Questi (Death Laid an Egg, Arcana) and co-directed by Luigi Bazzoni (The Fifth Cord, Footprints on the Moon), The Possessed masterfully combines film noir, mystery and giallo tropes, whilst also drawing on the formal innovations of 1960s art cinema (particularly the films of Michelangelo Antonioni). A uniquely dreamlike take on true crime, The Possessed is presented here in a stunning new restoration.



wilder

May 21, 2019

Roman Polanski's Bitter Moon (1992) on blu-ray from Kino



After hearing stories of her, a passenger on a cruise ship develops an irresistible infatuation with an eccentric paraplegic's wife.



April 16, 2019

Gus Trikonis' Supercock (1975) on blu-ray from Garagehouse Pictures



Seth Calhoun (Ross Hagen), an American cowboy, and his prized pet cock, Friendly, travel to the Phillipines to enter the First International Cockfighting Olympics and a for chance to win $100,000. But little do they realize the crooked contest is run by the vicious Nono brothers (Seeno, Heeno and Speeno), who will stop at nothing, including cocknapping, to block the cowboy and his cock from competing. In a race against time, Seth must team up with a comely double-crosser (Nancy Kwan) and woozy WW2 vet (Tony Lorea) to thwart the Nono gang and locate Friendly before it's too late.

Directed by underrated exploitation veteran Gus Trikonis (The Swinging Barmaids), Supercock a.k.a. Fowl Play, Bet to Kill is a fun, fast-paced, action-packed romp through the seedy, cruel underbelly of legal cockfighting championships in Manila. Available in HD for the first time ever from the only known 35mm print materials obtained from Ross Hagen's estate.






May 28, 2019

Jacques Rivette's The Nun aka La Religeuse (1966) on blu-ray from Kino, from a 4K restoration



In eighteenth-century France a girl (Suzanne Simonin) is forced against her will to take vows as a nun. Three mothers superior (Madame de Moni, Sister Sainte-Christine, and Madame de Chelles) treat her in radically different ways, ranging from maternal concern, to sadistic persecution, to lesbian desire. Suzanne's virtue brings disaster to everyone in this faithful adaptation of a bitter attack on religious abuses by the Enlightenment philosopher Denis Diderot.






May 28, 2019

Henri-Georges Clouzot's Woman in Chains aka La Prisonnière (1968) on blu-ray from Kino, from a 4K restoration



Stanislas Hassler blazes the development of modern art in his gallery, packed with works of surprising shapes, colours and textures, and where exhibitions turn into media events. Gilbert Moreau is one of the artists whose sculptures are on display in the gallery. His wife, Josée, is intrigued by the stern Stanislas, who devotes his free time to photography in an apartment that highlights his sophisticated artistic tastes. But besides enlarged pictures of calligraphic samples, Stanislas is amassing a collection of photographs that reveal a disturbed character. So why would Josée endanger her mature relationship with Gilbert for the morbid observation of Stanislas's hidden personality?






March 26, 2019

Nico Mastorakis' In the Cold of the Night (1990) on blu-ray from Vinegar Syndrome, from a 4K restoration of the original camera negative



Every night in his dreams, photographer Scott Bruin goes back to the same house and kills the same woman. Again. And Again. Then one day, the girl of his nightmares becomes the girl of his dreams...and a sinister conspiracy starts to unfold. A hot, steamy erotic thriller with some unpredictable twists and turns.








May 27, 2019

James Hadley Chase's No Orchids for Miss Blandish (1948) on blu-ray from Indicator (UK)



Possibly the most controversial British film ever produced, this lurid crime drama caused an unprecedented storm of controversy upon release: local councils banned it, the Bishop of London denounced it, and MPs demanded an investigation into the BBFC for allowing it to be seen.

Based on the notorious novel by James Hadley Chase (which itself was condemned by George Orwell), No Orchids for Miss Blandish is a mixture of sex, violence and immorality, and tells the brutal story of a kidnapped heiress who falls for one of her crazed captors.

This fascinating example of British film noir, which the Monthly Film Bulletin described as "the most sickening exhibition of brutality, perversion, sex and sadism ever to be shown on a cinema screen", is now released on UK Blu-ray for the very first time.




May 27, 2019

Nicolas Roeg's Track 29 (1988) on blu-ray from Indicator (UK)



The explosive combination of director Nicolas Roeg (Performance, Don't Look Now, The Man Who Fell to Earth) and writer Dennis Potter (Pennies from Heaven, The Singing Detective) created one of British cinema's most unique and disquieting works – the hugely underrated Track 29.

Freely adapted from Potter's BBC TV play Schmoedipus, this unsettling film stars Theresa Russell (Bad Timing, Black Widow) as an unhappy, possibly unstable, housewife who welcomes a young man (Gary Oldman – Prick Up Your Ears, Darkest Hour) into her home when he claims to be her long-lost son. Ambitious, ambiguous and surreal, Track 29 is a kinky psychological send-up of American mores – a view from the dis-united states of consciousness.




May 27, 2019

Jack Gold's Who? (1974) on blu-ray from Indicator (UK)



Adapted from the novel by famed science fiction writer Algis Budrys, Who? is a fascinating cold-war thriller/sci-fi hybrid. Elliott Gould (Little Murders, California Split) is an FBI agent trying to determine the true identity of a top US physicist who was horrifically injured in a car accident in East Berlin. The scientist is returned to the West encased in a metal mask and body-suit, reconstructed via cybernetic surgery. Is the man behind the metal mask who he claims to be, or is he a Soviet dupe trained to infiltrate US security?

Who?, from director Jack Gold (The Reckoning, The National Health), is one of the most unusual and affecting science fiction thrillers of the 1970s – not least because of the extraordinary performance by Joseph Bova as the masked enigma at the heart of the story.




March 25, 2019

Jindrich Polák's Ikarie XB 1 (1963) on blu-ray from Second Run (UK)



It is the second half of the 22nd century and a spaceship called Ikarie XB 1 is on its way to Alfa Centauri to search for extraterrestrial forms of life. Its crew, made up primarily of scientists from various fields, being far from our solar system, is exposed to unknown and unimaginable dangers. At the same time, though, it also carries a number of ordinary human worries as well as joys. Kališ´s black and white shots in a wide screen format alongside with Liška´s innovative electronic music and convincing set pieces and clothing create a stylistically refined fictional world of a distant future. In addition, the matter-of-fact type of performance by the best Czech actors from the time period add a natural feel while also providing a psychological layer to it. The script writers drew some of their inspiration from a novel by Stanisław Lem called The Magellanic Cloud. It is also worth mentioning the fact that they resisted the politicization that sci-fi films of that time frequently were subjected to which often made them fairly superficial. Instead of pitting two rivalling systems against one another, thus creating an obvious East versus West division, they depict the hope for a better, morally more advanced humankind vs the "riff raffs" of the 20th century, which did not leave anything but disasters in their wake.






May 13, 2019

Anatole Litvak's The Night of the Generals (1967) on blu-ray from Eureka (UK), from a 4K restoration



Peter O'Toole and Omar Sharif star in this powerful World War II thriller from director Anatole Litvak (The Snake Pit; Sorry, Wrong Number) about a Nazi general who becomes a serial killer. When a Polish prostitute is brutally murdered in Nazi-occupied Warsaw, her killer is identified only as a German general. For years the crime remains unsolved, until the killer strikes again, bringing this mesmerising mystery to an unforgettable finish.






May 20, 2019

Fritz Lang's The Woman in the Window (1944) on blu-ray from Masters of Cinema (UK), from a 4K restoration



One of legendary director Fritz Lang's first noir films, THE WOMAN IN THE WINDOW is also rightfully considered one of the most important examples of the genre, a landmark movie that became one of the initial representations of noir first singled out by French critics after WWII. A triumph for Lang, legendary writer/producer Nunnally Johnson (THE GRAPES OF WRATH), and leading man Edward G. Robinson (shedding his earlier gangster roles to portray a love-struck obsessive), the film remains a classic American nail-biter.

Robinson is Richard Wanley, a successful psychiatrist biding his time while his wife and children are on vacation when he encounters beautiful Alice (a radiant Joan Bennett), who bears an uncanny resemblance to the subject of a portrait he had just admired. When Richard and Alice retire to her home, her wealthy, jealous boyfriend intrudes, and is killed after a struggle. Alice convinces Richard to cover up the crime, but as Richard's district attorney friend (Raymond Massey) investigates and the boyfriend's bodyguard (Dan Duryea) begins to apply pressure to Richard, the walls begin to close in...




April 8, 2019

David Miller's Beautiful Stranger (1954) on blu-ray from Network (UK)



Hollywood icon Ginger Rogers makes her British film debut in this rarely-seen crime drama from the early 1950s. Directed by David Miller - then riding high with his American noir classic Sudden Fear! - and co-starring Herbert Lom and a young Stanley Baker, Beautiful Stranger is presented here as a brand-new High Definition transfer from the original film elements in its original theatrical aspect ratio.

"Johnny" Victor, a gorgeous ex-actress, lives in luxury on the French Riviera courtesy of Louis Galt - a wealthy businessman with global interests. But Louis' fortune is built on crime and his possessive mania brings about a train of violence from which death is the only certain outcome...




Summer 2019 TBD

Bryan Forbes' The Whisperers (1967) on blu-ray from Kino, from a 2K remaster



The Whisperers tells the story of an impoverished old woman living alone in a seedy apartment who enjoys a rich fantasy life as an heiress. When she discovers stolen money hidden by her son, she believes her fantasy has come true.



May 28, 2019

Michael Gordon's Portrait in Black (1960) on blu-ray from Kino. Produced by Ross Hunter.



As the health of tyrannical but gravely ill shipping tycoon Matthew Cabot (Lloyd Nolan) declines, he relies on pain medicine injected by his physician, Dr. David Rivera (Anthony Quinn). What Cabot doesn't know is that his frustrated wife, Sheila (Turner), is having an affair with the doctor and has conceived a plan to do away with her husband. David agrees to go through with the murder, but threatens to confess their crime when Sheila begins receiving anonymous letters from a blackmailer.



May 28, 2019

David Lowell Rich's Madame X (1966) on blu-ray from Kino. Produced by Ross Hunter.



Holly Parker (Turner) is married to high-powered diplomat Clay Anderson (John Forsythe), but finds that her attention wanders when he's away. She starts an affair with a wealthy bachelor (Ricardo Montalban), but her life unravels when he dies unexpectedly. Her mother-in-law (Constance Bennett) advises Holly to leave Clay and their baby and start a new life. Years later, when a petty criminal (Burgess Meredith) tries to blackmail Holly, who is now a prostitute, things get even worse for her.



May 17, 2019

Jim Jarmusch's Broken Flowers (2005) on blu-ray from Kino



When a mysterious pink letter informs Don Johnston that he may have a 19-year-old son, he visits four former lovers, where he comes face to face with the errors of his past and the possibilities of the future.



May 4, 2019

Rian Johnson's Brick (2005) on blu-ray from Kino



High school student Brendan Frye prefers to stay an outsider, until the day that his ex-girlfriend Emily reaches out to him unexpectedly and then vanishes. To find her, Brendan enlists the aid of his only true peer, The Brain, while keeping the assistant vice principal only occasionally informed of what quickly becomes a dangerous investigation.



June 11, 2019

Sidney J. Furie's The Entity (1982) on blu-ray from Shout Factory



Carla Moran awakens one night to find herself being beaten and raped by an unseen presence. Terrified of what's happening to her, and shunned by friends and family who think she's lost her mind, she seeks help from parapsychologists.



June 25, 2019

Joseph M. Newman's This Island Earth (1955) on blu-ray from Shout Factory



Two nuclear Earth scientists are kidnapped by aliens from the planet Metaluna as part of a last-ditch effort to save it from being destroyed by neighboring, rival planet Zagon.



April 2019 TBD

Juan Antonio Bardem's The Corruption of Chris Miller aka. La corrupción de Chris Miller (1973) on blu-ray from Vinegar Syndrome, from a 4K restoration



Chris Miller (former Spanish child star, Marisol) lives with her stepmother Ruth (Jean Seberg; Breathless) in a large secluded mansion in the countryside. Both women have been traumatized by the mysterious disappearance of Chris' father but their isolation is soon interrupted by the arrival of a mysterious young drifter, Barney (Barry Stokes; Prey), who they take on as a handyman. All the while, an unknown scythe wielding killer has been stalking the area, leaving an ever growing body count, and it's not long before the women grow increasingly suspicious of Barney...

A bloody and twist filled giallo from acclaimed filmmaker Juan Antonio Bardem (Death of a Cyclist), THE CORRUPTION OF CHRIS MILLER has remained one of the hardest to see of all Spanish produced gialli. Lushly photographed by Juan Gelpí (Crypt of the Living Dead) and scored by Waldo de los Ríos (House That Screamed), Vinegar Syndrome is proud to present this under-seen masterpiece of early 70s Euro horror in a brand new 4k restoration and in its original scope framing, for the first time on home video.




June 4, 2019

Paul Leni's The Man Who Laughs (1928) on blu-ray from Flicker Alley, from a 4K restoration



Flicker Alley, in partnership with Universal Pictures, are proud to present Universal Picture s new 4K restoration of the 1928 silent classic, The Man Who Laughs, accompanied by a newly recorded orchestral score by the Berklee School of Music. Based on the novel by Victor Hugo, the story centers on the extraordinary adventures of Conrad Veidt s Gwynplaine, whose wide and mirthless grin inspired DC Comics legendary Batman villain, the Joker. Veidt's character has become well known to most cinephiles. Orphaned as a child, Gwynplaine is punished by the king for his father s transgressions, by having face carved into a hideous grin. Disfigured and alone, Gwynplaine rescues a blind girl Dea, and both end up staring in a sideshow where they fall in love. Because she cannot see, Dea does not know about her lover s tormented grin.

Masterfully directed by Paul Leni, The Man Who Laughs marks Leni s penultimate work. Having grown up in Germany during the era of Expressionism, Leni embraces haunting characters, twisted sets, harsh angles, and deep shadows. Heralded as one of the best American silents emulating German Expressionism, The Man Who Laughs presents Leni at his creative directorial peak. Originally released silent, the film was enough of a hit for Universal in 1928 that the studio released it with a synched musical score using the Movietone sound-on-film process, presented here as a secondary audio track.

Part of Universal Picture s ongoing silent restoration initiative, The Man Who Laughs honors the studio's rich film history that has spanned more than a century. The primary source element for this restoration was a 35mm composite fine grain from the Universal Pictures vault, created in 1954 from the nitrate original camera negative. NBCUniversal's restoration team was able to stabilize and deflicker the film as well as repair scratches, warps, and dirt. The 4K digital restoration was completed by NBCUniversal StudioPost.




June 4, 2019

Paul Leni's The Last Warning (1929) on blu-ray from Flicker Alley, from a 4K restoration



Universal Pictures and Flicker Alley present Universal Pictures new 4K restoration of the 1929 silent classic, The Last Warning, accompanied by a newly recorded score from Arthur Barrow. Adapted from Thomas F. Fallon s 1922 Broadway play of the same name, The Last Warning is based on the story The House of Fear by Wadsworth Camp and centers on an unsolved murder that occurs during a live Broadway performance. When the victim s body goes missing, the death remains unsolved and the theater is condemned. That is, until years later when a suspicious new producer arrives to restage the play with the original cast and crew. As one of the last silents Universal produced, The Last Warning was later released as a part-talkie with roughly sixty feet of sound scenes added.

The Last Warning was Paul Leni's final film before his untimely death, and a prime showcase for Universal's 1920s leading lady, Laura La Plante. An artist at his creative directorial peak, Leni s camera never stops shifting, offering cutaways and trick shots involving nervous could-be culprits, a highly suspicious sleuth, and cast members who suddenly disappear in the darkened theater. The result is a cinematic funhouse that restlessly cross-examines the suspense of the story s stage play against the real murder mystery saga, all unfolding amid the outstanding production design of Charles D. Hall.

Part of Universal's ongoing silent restoration initiative, The Last Warning honors the studio's rich film history that has spanned more than a century. Universal's team of restoration experts conducted a worldwide search for The Last Warning's available elements, ultimately working with materials from the Cinémathèque française, and the Packard Humanities Institute Collection in the UCLA Film & Television Archive. NBCUniversal's restoration team was able to stabilize and deflicker the film as well as repair scratches, warps, and dirt. The 4K digital restoration was completed by NBCUniversal StudioPost.

wilder

#847
January 29, 2019

Danièle Huillet & Jean-Marie Straub's The Chronicle of Anna Magdalena Bach (1968) on blu-ray from Grasshopper Film



The life and music of Johann Sebastian Bach as presented by his wife, Anna.








April 16, 2019

Jonathan Demme's Melvin and Howard (1980) on blu-ray from Twilight Time



The story of hard-luck Melvin Dummar, who claimed to have received a will naming him an heir to the fortune of Howard Hughes



April 23, 2019

Albert Brooks' Modern Romance (1981) on blu-ray from Sony



World-class neurotic Robert Cole (Albert Brooks, The Muse) just can't stop thinking about Mary (Kathyrn Harrold, Raw Deal). Especially after he breaks up with her. Fanatically obsessed with the beautiful bank exec, he repeatedly wins her back ­ and then immediately loses her again by grilling her long-distance callers, harassing her business clients, and dogging her every move. But even as Robert and Mary head for another breakup, there's still hope for them yet. Because when it comes to true love, it ain't over 'til it's over.



July 16, 2019

Val Lewton & Jacques Tourner's The Leopard Man (1943) on blu-ray from Scream Factory



Is it man, beast or both behind a string of savage maulings and murders? An escaped leopard provides the catalyst for a foray into fear in which a cemetery is the rendezvous for death and love, and a closed door heightens rather than hides the horror of a young girl's fate.



2019 TBD

Francesco Rosi's Christ Stopped at Eboli (1979) on blu-ray from Rialto, from a 2K restoration




Carlo Levi (Gian Maria Volontè), a painter, writer, doctor, and intellectual, is exiled to Grassano, an impoverished town with only one car and one toilet, in southern Italy. Levi learns to find the humanity in this seemingly backward hamlet. Made for Italian television in four 55-minute parts, it was cut in half for its 1980 U.S. release (to 2 hours — Rosi's own theatrical cut was 2½) and senselessly re-titled Eboli. This is the U.S. theatrical premiere of Rosi's complete, uncut epic.






July 16, 2019

Noir Archive Vol. 2 (1952-1956) on blu-ray from Kit Parker Films. Available exclusively through MVD's online store



-Cell 4255, Death Row
-Rumble on the Docks
-The Crooked Web
-Footsteps in the Fog
-5 Against the House
-The Night Holds Terror
-New Orleans Uncensored
-Bait
-Spin a Dark Web



June 3, 2019

Jacques Tourner's Nightfall (1957) on blu-ray from Arrow (UK), restored from the original elements



During his long and varied career, Jacques Tourneur (The Comedy of Terrors, Cat People) tackled a breadth of genres on both sides of the Atlantic. With 1956's Nightfall, he returns to the noir trappings he tackled so successfully with Out of the Past for a tale of deception, intrigue and paranoia.

Adapted from the novel by prolific crime fiction author James Goodis (Dark Passage), Nightfall is the story of Jim Vanning (Aldo Ray, The Violent Ones; The Naked and the Dead), an innocent man wrongly accused of murder. On the same night he has a chance encounter in a bar with glamorous model Marie (Anne Bancroft, The Graduate), the hoods he's spent the past year running from catch up with him, determined to recover the money they believe he stole from them. Pursued by both the hoods and law enforcement, Vanning and Marie go on the lam, leading to a desperate chase that takes them from the streets of Los Angeles to the snowy peaks of Wyoming.

Eschewing both the big names associated with the genre and its familiar urban locales, and featuring striking monochromatic photography by Oscar-winner Burnett Guffey (From Here to Eternity), Nightfall is a gripping and inventive late-period noir which shows that, even in its twilight years, the genre still had room for innovation.




June 11, 2019

The Girl Most Likely To... (1973) on blu-ray from Kino, from a 2K restoration. Includes an audio commentary by film historians/authors Amanda Eyes and Kier-La Janisse (House of Psychotic Women)



Stockard Channing (Grease) is Miriam Knight, an "ugly duckling" college girl who is mistreated by everyone, including her bubble-headed roommate and the callous campus jock. But after an accident causes her to undergo reconstructive surgery, Miriam emerges from behind the bandages a ravishing beauty. It's payback time when she uses her new attractiveness to exact revenge on all those who wronged her. Ed Asner (TV's Lou Grant) plays the police inspector who's hot on the trail of the femme fatale. A dark comedy written by comedy legend Joan Rivers (Rabbit Test) and directed by TV veteran Lee Philips (On the Right Track), The Girl Most Likely to... will leave you in stitches.



June 25, 2019

David Millers' Midnight Lace (1960), on blu-ray from Kino. Includes an audio commentary by film historian Kat Ellinger. Produced by Ross Hunter.



Doris Day plays Kit Preston, elegant newlywed wife of British Financier Anthony Preston. Shortly after moving to one of London's toniest neighborhoods, she is threatened by an unknown party. The tension mounts as the menacing phone calls continue and Anthony shows little concern, until Kit begins to doubt her own sanity and the motives of everyone around her.



May 21, 2019

Bernhard Wicki's Morituri (1965) on blu-ray from Twilight Time



Marlon Brando plays a world-weary, conscientious objector to all wars in the tense, thoughtful Morituri, an adult drama about wartime ethics and the price of commitment to a cause. Brando plays Robert Crain, a German deserter who escaped the Nazis with his fortune intact, happy to be sitting out the battle in British-governed India. His comfort is challenged when an intelligence official (Trevor Howard) essentially blackmails him into going undercover, posing as an SS officer taking passage on a German ship carrying tons of rubber for munitions. Crain's mission is to deliver the ship into Allied hands, but once he's aboard, he becomes a target of derision by the proud, anti-Nazi captain (Yul Brynner) and suspicion by a handful of Resistance members planning to scuttle the voyage.



June 18, 2019

Jean-Luc Godard's Détective (1985) on blu-ray from Kino



Jean-Luc Godard directs this comic thriller starring Nathalie Baye and Claude Brasseur. The film is set in an old Parisian hotel populated with extraordinary characters, including the house detective, who is still trying to solve a murder from years before.



June 18, 2019

Jean-Luc Godard's First Name: Carmen (1983) on blu-ray from Kino



First Name: Carmen tells the parallel stories of a quartet rehearsing Beethoven and a group of young people robbing a bank, supposedly to get the funds to make a film.



June 18, 2019

Terry Bedford's Slayground (1983) on blu-ray from Kino



From Donald E. Westlake, the creator of Point Blank, The Outfit and The Grifters! It should have been a quick and easy heist for Stone (Peter Coyote, Bitter Moon, Heart of Midnight), a cold cash hit on an armored car. But things turn ugly when a young girl is accidentally killed during the getaway and the child's grieving father hires a sadistic assassin to avenge her death. Now Stone is on the run from a relentless killing machine, a chase that will lead them to a run-down amusement park on the bleak British coast where death is the final contract and vengeance is the ultimate ride.






March 19, 2019

Allan Dwan's The River's Edge (1957) on blu-ray from Twilight Time.

Resized screencaps, below. Full-size screencaps on DVDBeaver



Deep in the lonely New Mexico desert, Ben Cameron and his wife Meg struggle to build their small ranch. But the arrival of the charming but deadly trickster Nardo Denning could tear apart more than their homestead. With a gun in his hand and a secret about Meg's past in his heart, Denning forces Ben to guide him safely to Mexico with his stolen fortune. As they navigate the dangerous terrain, each man struggles to gain the upper hand for survival — and for Meg — in this tense and gripping Western.










wilder

July 16/17, 2019

Josef von Sternberg's Crime and Punishment (1935) on blu-ray from Arrow US & UK, restored from the original film elements



After fleeing Nazi Germany following the success of M and re-establishing himself in Britain as a villain for Alfred Hitchcock, the great Peter Lorre arrived in Hollywood in 1935, signed to a contract with Columbia Pictures. His dream star vehicle: a big-screen adaptation of Fyodor Dostoyevsky's most famous novel Crime And Punishment. His choice of director: Josef von Sternberg, already celebrated and castigated in equal measure for his seven-film collaboration with Marlene Dietrich.

Roderick Raskolnikov (Lorre) has graduated from university as a noted expert in criminology, but nonetheless lives in extreme poverty. Desperate and anguished, he murders a miserly pawnbroker, stealing her valuables before fleeing into the night. The next day, he encounters Inspector Porfiry (Edward Arnold), the detective assigned to the murder, and is asked by Porfiry to consult on the case when an innocent man is arrested as a suspect. How long until the conflicted, guilt-ridden Raskolnikov arouses the master detective's suspicions?

One of many attempts at the time by Hollywood studios to give cinema an air of prestige by adapting great works of literature, Von Sternberg's stylish direction and Lorre's tour-de-force performance are ready for rediscovery in this Blu-Ray premiere of their only collaboration.




July 14/15, 2019

Mitchell Leisen's Hold Back the Dawn (1941) on blu-ray from Arrow US & UK



From one of the most underrated directors of Hollywood's golden era, Mitchell Leisen (Remember the Night), comes the heart-rending romantic drama Hold Back the Dawn. Charles Boyer (Gaslight) gives an enthralling performance as Georges Iscovescu, a Romanian-born gigolo who arrives at a Mexican border town seeking entry to the US. Faced with a waiting period of eight years, George is encouraged by his former dancing partner Anita (Pauline Goddard, Modern Times) to marry an American girl and desert her once safely across the border. He successfully targets visiting school teacher Emmy Brown (Olivia de Havilland, Gone with the Wind), but his plan is compromised by a pursuing immigration officer, and blossoming feelings of genuine love for Emmy.

A moving and thoughtful film with a wonderful script (co-written by Billy Wilder), Hold back the Dawn benefits from evocative performances by Boyer and de Havilland, and an over-arching sense of romantic melancholy.




2019 TBD

David Cronenberg's Early Works on blu-ray from Arrow (UK), from new restorations



One of the most singular auteurs of the horror and science fiction genres, David Cronenberg has wowed audiences with his depictions of body transformations and explorations of society, this collection of his early short and feature films shows a master learning his craft and exploring many of the themes that would dominate his most celebrated work.

Transfer (1966), Cronenberg's first short film, is a surreal sketch of a doctor and his patient. From the Drain (1967) finds two men in a bathtub, which may be part of a centre for veterans of a future war.Stereo (1969), Cronenberg's first official feature film, stunningly shot in monochrome, concerns telepaths at the Institute for Erotic Enquiry where patients undergo tests by Dr. Luther Stringfellow. In Crimes of theFuture (1970) Cronenberg worked in colour and with a larger budget, where we find the House of Skin clinic director (Ronald Mlodzik, returning from Stereo) searching for his mentor, Antoine Rouge, who has disappeared following a catastrophic plague.

Cronenberg's early amateur feature films, shot in and around his university campus, prefigure his later films' concerns with strange institutions, male/female separation and ESP, echoing the likes ofVideodrome, Dead Ringers and Scanners.




July 23, 2019

Robert Siodmak's Criss Cross (1949) on blu-ray from Shout Factory



Steve Thompson (Burt Lancaster) is a hardworking armored car driver with a fatal attraction to his ex-wife Anna (Yvonne De Carlo), who's now married to notorious hoodlum Slim Dundee (Dan Duryea). Unable to stay away from her, Steve has a secret tryst with Anna ... only to be discovered by Dundee. To cover up their affair, Steve convinces Dundee that he only met with Anna to get Dundee's help in robbing an upcoming payroll shipment he will be driving. The hood falls for the ruse, which triggers a series of harrowing events that ultimately lead to violence and death. Criss Cross is a classic film noir suspense tale from a true master of the genre, director Robert Siodmak (The Killers).



Summer 2019 TBD

Billy Wilder's The Lost Weekend (1945) on blu-ray from Kino



Don Birnam, long-time alcoholic, has been "on the wagon" for ten days and seems to be over the worst; but his craving has just become more insidious. Evading a country weekend planned by his brother Wick and girlfriend Helen, he begins a four-day bender. In flashbacks we see past events, all gone wrong because of the bottle. But this bout looks like being his last...one way or the other.



May 14, 2019

Buster Keaton Collection: Volume 1 (1926-1928) on blu-ray from Cohen Media Group, from 4K restorations




The General (1926)

Many critics consider The General to be the last great comedy of the silent era, and it consistently ranks as one of the greatest films of all time on international critics' polls. Set during the Civil War and based on a true incident, the film is also an authentic-looking period piece that brings the scope and realism of Matthew Brady-like images to brilliant life. Keaton portrays engineer Johnnie Gray, rejected by the Confederate Army and thought a coward by his girlfriend (Marion Mack). When a band of Union soldiers penetrate Confederate lines to steal his locomotive, Johnnie Gray sets off in pursuit. Seven of the film's eight reels are devoted to the chase, featuring hilarious comedy and amazing stunts performed by Keaton himself.

Steamboat Bill, Jr. (1928)

In this silent comedy, college boy William Canfield Jr. (Buster Keaton) reunites with his boat captain father in a Mississippi River town.



April 23, 2019

Arthur Robison's The Informer (1929) on blu-ray from Kino



In Ireland, an IRA man (Lars Hanson) betrays a killer to the police, thinking he is his mistress's lover.



May 14, 2019

Gabe Bartalos' Saint Bernard (2013) on blu-ray from Severin



His award-winning FX career spans both grindhouse (BRAIN DAMAGE, FRANKENHOOKER, the LEPRECHAUN series) and art-house (Matthew Barney's CREMASTER CYCLE). Now writer/producer/director Gabe Bartalos brings his own years-in-the-making vision to the screen, as an unhinged orchestra conductor named Bernard (Jason Dugre of Bartalos' SKINNED DEEP) graphically descends into a surreal odyssey of chaos, psychosis and "f*cked-up sh*t that looks cool as hell" (Bloody-Disgusting.com). Warwick Davis (WILLOW) and notorious Andy Kaufman cohort Bob Zmuda (MAN ON THE MOON) co-star – with a performance by punk legends The Damned – in this "must-see for the truly adventurous" (UnseenFilms.net), transferred from the original negative and unleashed beyond the underground festival circuit for the first time ever.





July 10, 2019

Roger Christian's The Sender (1982) on blu-ray from Arrow (UK)



A disturbed telepathic man is able to transmit his dreams and visions into the minds of the people around him.





June 18, 2019

Tony Richardson's The Border (1982) on blu-ray from Kino



A corrupt border agent decides to clean up his act when an impoverished woman's baby is put up for sale on the black market.



Summer 2019 TBD

Richard Compton's Return to Macon County (1975) on blu-ray from Kino



In 1958, two teenagers take their pride and joy, a hopped-up Chevy, and start a cross-country journey to enter it in the National Championship drag races in California. Along the way they hook up with a pretty but dingy waitress who quits her job and hops in their car--and turns out to be more trouble than they thought--drag-race a gang of town punks who lose to to them and then accuse them of cheating, and come up against a local cop who is obsessed with putting these two "juvenile delinquents" in jail.


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2019 TBD

Nina Menkes' Queen of Diamonds (1991) on blu-ray from Arbelos, from a 4K remaster

Anna Biller interviewed Menkes recently for the Talkhouse. There's also an extended interview with Menkes over at Film Comment.



Menkes' Queen of Diamonds (Sundance '91) is the second title in a quartet of films (alongside The Great Sadness of Zohara (1983), Magdalena Viraga (1986), and The Bloody Child (1996)), that Menkes produced, wrote, directed, and shot, all of which star her sister, Tinka Menkes.

Queen of Diamonds follows the alienated life of Firdaus (Tinka Menkes), a Blackjack dealer in a Las Vegas landscape juxtaposed between glittering casino lights and the deteriorating desert oasis. Negotiating a missing husband and neighboring domestic violence, Firdaus' world unfolds as a fragmented but hypnotic interplay between repetition and repressed anger. Shot with a beautiful compositional rigor echoing Chantal Akerman's Jeanne Dielman,Queen of Diamonds is a remarkable and demanding masterpiece of American independent filmmaking. Heralded as one of the most challenging and subversive filmmakers working today, the re-release of Queen of Diamonds marks the start of a new critical recognition for Menkes' groundbreaking body of work.

New restoration by The Academy Film Archive and The Film Foundation, with funding provided by the George Lucas Family Foundation. The film will be co-presented with Eos World Fund. Arbelos will release the film theatrically in spring of 2019, with VOD and Blu-ray to follow.






August 27, 2019

Francis Ford Coppola's Apocalypse Now (1979) on 4K Blu-ray, from a 4K restoration of the original camera negative for the very first time.

Will include the recent Tribeca Q&A between Coppola and Steven Soderbergh.



In Vietnam in 1970, Captain Willard takes a perilous and increasingly hallucinatory journey upriver to find and terminate Colonel Kurtz, a once-promising officer who has reportedly gone completely mad. In the company of a Navy patrol boat filled with street-smart kids, a surfing-obsessed Air Cavalry officer, and a crazed freelance photographer, Willard travels further and further into the heart of darkness.





July 30, 2019

Fridrikh Ermler's Fragments of an Empire (1929) on blu-ray from Flicker Alley



"If influence is the criterion for determining the significance of a film director," writes Russian film scholar Denise J. Youngblood, "then Fridrikh Ermler is perhaps the most important director in Soviet film history." Why he does not join the ranks of Eisenstein, Kuleshov, and Vertov as one of the great masters of Soviet filmmaking is unknown. Yet his legacy as an intricate craftsman of deceptively simple stories layered with psychological depth and technical proficiency lives on in his work.

Fragment of an Empire was Ermler's last silent feature and last of four productively contentious collaborations with the method actor Fiodor Nikitin. To prepare for his part as Filimonov - a soldier suffering from total amnesia due to shell shock from the Great War - Nikitin apparently disguised himself as a doctor's assistant in the Forel Psychiatric Clinic, where he studied actual amnesia patients. Ermler, meanwhile, may have drew upon his own first-hand knowledge of war as a former spy of the tsarist army to create a profoundly realistic and moving portrait of man whose memories begin to awaken in concert with the radical transformation of the Bolshevik Revolution of October 1917.




September 17, 2019

Sidney Lumet's Find Me Guilty (2006) on blu-ray from MVD Visual



Based on the true story of Jack DiNorscio, a mobster who defended himself in court for what would be the longest mafia trial in U.S. history.



July 22, 2019

Bloody Terror - The Shocking Cinema of Norman J Warren (1976-1987) on blu-ray from Indicator (UK)



One of British genre cinema's most important and distinctive independent filmmakers, Norman J Warren made a series of horror films which were at the forefront of a new wave in British horror during the 1970s. Reflecting a period of permissiveness and fearlessness, Warren's distinctive stylings are far removed from the Gothic conventions of Hammer Films, deliberately upped the ante in terms of sex, violence and gore to create a new breed of horror that was designed to shock for shock's sake.

Five of Norman J Warren's horrifying chillers are presented here in new restorations and on Blu-ray for the very first time in the UK. Containing a wealth of new and archival extras – including new appreciations by contemporary British filmmakers, new cast and crew interviews, audio commentaries on all five films, rare short films, outtakes and alternative scenes, and making-of documentaries – this stunning Limited Edition box set is strictly limited to 6,000 units.






June 18, 2019

H. Bruce Humberstone's Pin Up Girl (1944) on blu-ray from Twilight Time



Beautiful U.S.O. singer and compulsive liar Lorry Jones (Betty Grable) and her best friend leave Montana for war jobs in Washington, D.C. Stopping in New York City along the way, Lorry spins a web of lies, turning herself into a Broadway star to gain the company of handsome war hero Tommy Dooley (John Harvey). Jealous club singer Molly McKay (Martha Raye) suspects Lorry's claims are false and hopes to expose her. The situation worsens when Tommy ends up in Washington at Lorry's new office.





August 27, 2019

Philippe Mora's documentary Brother Can You Spare a Dime? (1975) on blu-ray from VCI



Brother Can You Spare a Dime? is the chronicle of an unforgettable piece of American history - twelve crazy, painful seesaw years, from the Wall Street crash to Pearl Harbor.

By juxtaposing contemporary news and documentary footage with extracts from Hollywood classics such as Golddiggers, Lady Killer and Wild Boys of the Road, director Philippe Mora offers us an immediate, intricate and evocative scrapbook of the 1930's. Somehow there are uncanny echoes of some of our current preoccupations: strikers at Ford's, mass unemployment, breadlines, vigilante gangs and failing fortunes...

Two heroes emerge: James Cagney, the rough diamond, hood-with-a-heart-of-gold star of the Movies, the little man who won't be beaten, and Franklin D. Roosevelt himself: tough yet benign, stepping into the breach with confidence and determination, yet imperceptibly crumpling under the weight of responsibility as he leads America through her most difficult years until the final humiliation of Pearl Harbor.

Songs and images stick in the mind: fortunes dwindle, the small man's savings disappear, even the banks go bust; men lose their jobs and join the breadlines to the haunting title song of Brother, can you spare a dime?; hobos and okies take to the road while Bessie Smith sings Nobody loves you when you're down and out; a ragged child huddles against the bleak landscape as Woody Guthrie sings the Dust Bowl Blues; an abandoned cat shivers on the ledge of a flooded home... Only Hollywood offers an escape from reality for these are the Golden Years of Bogart, Cooper and Dietrich. We glimpse Gable and Vivien Leigh at the screen test of Gone with the Wind; George Raft dances a languorous tango with Carole Lombard; Shirley Temple dimples and Chaplin jokes while Busby Berkeley fills the screen with his lavish extravaganzas...and the marathon dancers stumble on... As Ginger Rogers says: It's the depression, dearie...






July 2, 2019

Jean-Pierre Melville's Bob le flambeur (1956) on blu-ray from Kino, from a 4K restoration



In Paris, Bob Montagne (Roger Duchesne) is practically synonymous with gambling -- and winning. He is kind, classy and well-liked by virtually everyone in town, including police inspector Ledru (Guy Decomble). However, when Bob's luck turns sour, he begins to lose friends and makes the most desperate gamble of his life: to rob the Deauville casino during Grand Prix weekend, when the vaults are full. Unfortunately, Bob soon learns that the game is rigged and the cops are on to him.



July 2, 2019

Jean-Pierre Melville's Le Doulos (1962) on blu-ray from Kino, from a 4K restoration



Burglar Maurice Faugel (Serge Reggiani) has just finished his prison sentence. He murders Gilbert Vanovre (René Lefèvre), a receiver, and steals the loot from another robbery. As Maurice prepares for another burglary, his friend Silien (Jean-Paul Belmondo) brings him all the necessary equipment. But Maurice doesn't know that Silien is a police informant.



July 2, 2019

Jean-Pierre Melville's Leon Morin, Priest (1961) on blu-ray from Kino, from a 4K restoration



As the Germans take over France during World War II, widowed mother Barny becomes increasingly anxious about her half-Jewish daughter. She decides to hide the girl on a nearby farm and have her baptized as a cover. The ceremony reminds Barny of the absurdity of religion, and inspires her to pick a fight with parish priest Léon. She's surprised to learn that he shares a great many of her views, and the two begin a chaste yet deep relationship.



July 2, 2019

Georges Lautner's Le Professionnel (1981) on blu-ray from Kino



French secret agent Joss Baumont is sent to one of the African countries to kill their president Njala. However, at the last moment the political situation changes and the French secret service turns him in to the African authorities, and he is sentenced to a long-term imprisonment. After the daring escape he returns to France and deliberately informs his former chiefs of his presence promising them to kill Njala who has just arrived to the country with the official visit.



July 2, 2019

Jacques Deray's The Outsider aka Le Marginal (1983) on blu-ray from Kino



The story is about Commissioner Jordan who arrives in Marseille to combat drug trafficking activities in his own unique way.



July 9, 2019

Jean-Luc Godard's Alphaville (1965) on blu-ray from Kino, from a 4K restoration



A US secret agent is sent to the distant space city of Alphaville where he must find a missing person and free the city from its tyrannical ruler.



July 23, 2019

Luis Bunuel's Death in the Garden (1956) on blu-ray from Kino



Amid a revolution in a South American mining outpost, a band of fugitives—a roguish adventurer (Georges Marchal), a local hooker (Simone Signoret), a priest (Michel Piccoli), an aging diamond miner (Charles Vanel), and the miner's deaf-mute daughter (Michèle Girardon)—are forced to flee for their lives into the jungle. Starving, exhausted, and stripped of their old identities, they wander desperately lured by one deceptive promise of salvation after another. Shot in vibrant Eastmancolor and featuring a star-studded cast, Death in the Garden is an adventure film with Surrealist gestures and symbolism.



July 23, 2019

Luis Bunuel's The Milky Way (1969) on blu-ray from Kino



Jean (Laurent Terzieff) and Pierre (Paul Frankeur) are drifters who travel from Paris to Spain on the Way of St. James pilgrimage route. On the journey, the two men encounter many strangers who debate aspects of Catholic faith as well as heresies that have been rejected by the religion. Their trek defies time as they meet historical figures such as Jesus and the Marquis de Sade. At the end of their trip, Jean and Pierre are left with more questions than answers.



July 23, 2019

Mitchell Leisen's Death Takes a Holiday (1934) on blu-ray from Kino



Death (Fredric March) is unable to relate to humans, so he takes the form of Prince Sirki, and tries life as a person. Many women are instantly attracted to Prince Sirki, but once they really get to know him, they become frightened. It isn't until he meets the beautiful Grazia (Evelyn Venable) that Death finally learns what it is to love. But when Grazia's father (Guy Standing) learns of Prince Sirki's real identity, he tries to break up the relationship.



July 23, 2019

Mitchell Leisen's Easy Living (1937) on blu-ray from Kino



Jean Arthur and Ray Milland shine in this screwball comedy written by Academy Award winner Preston Sturges. Mary Smith (Arthur) is a poor working girl who literally has a fortune dropped in her lap when a wealthy financier (Edward Arnold) tosses a sable coat out a window and it lands on her. Everyone automatically assumes she's his mistress, and soon her fairytale-like rags-to-riches lifestyle threatens a very real romance with an inept writer (Milland). It's a "delightful comedy" (Leonard Maltin's Classic Movie Guide) full of misunderstandings that showcases high-society slapstick at its best!



July 23, 2019

Kathryn Bigelow & Monty Montgomery's The Loveless (1982) on blu-ray from Arrow, from a 2K restoration of the original camera negative



Raw, angry and honest, The Loveless evokes, with unflinching clarity, both an attitude and a bygone era, exploring the tensions between two very different Americas.





June 6, 2019

Roman Polanski's Death and the Maiden (1994) on blu-ray from Arthaus (Germany)



A political activist is convinced that her guest is a man who once tortured her for the government.



September 2019 TBD

Noir Archive Volume 3: (1956-1960) on blu-ray from Kit Parker Films



-The Crimson Kimono
-The Lineup
-The Shadow in the Window
-The Long Haul
-Pickup Alley
-The Tijuana Story
-She Played with Fire
-The Case Against
-Brooklyn, Man on a String



July 15, 2019

Hal Ashby's Coming Home (1978) on blu-ray from Masters of Cinema (UK)



A woman, whose husband is fighting in Vietnam, falls in love with another man who suffered a paralyzing combat injury there.



July 22, 2019

Robert Altman's Come Back to the 5 & Dime, Jimmy Dean, Jimmy Dean (1982) on blu-ray from Masters of Cinema (UK)



The Disciples of James Dean meet up on the anniversary of his death and mull over their lives in the present and in flashback, revealing the truth behind their complicated lives. Who is the mysterious Joanne and what's the real story behind Mona's son, James Dean Junior ?



July 22, 2019

Elia Kazan's A Tree Grows in Brooklyn (1945) on blu-ray from Masters of Cinema (UK)



In the early 1900s, the Nolans, a poor Brooklyn tenement family, strive not only to survive, but also to improve their existence. The studious Francie worships her father, waiter and aspiring singer Johnny, despite his alcoholism and pie-in-the-sky pipe dreams. With her stony resolve, mother Katie holds the family together, including a flirtatious and impetuous aunt.

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Film Aficionado, an invaluable DVD and Blu-ray database, is shutting down June 10th

Edit - It lives!

Quote from: May 26, 2019ANNOUNCEMENT: The rumors of our demise have been greatly exaggerated -- well kind of. I'm happy to inform you that Samuel from DVDCompare has graciously agreed to take over FilmAf. We are working on the transition details, but there should be no interruption of service. Long live FilmAf! Long live DVDCompare!

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October 1, 2019

Stanley Kubrick's The Shining (1980) on 4K blu-ray from Warner Bros., from a 4K scan of the original camera negative



A caretaker of an isolated resort, has a complete mental breakdown, terrorizing his young son and wife.



June 24, 2019

Robert Downey Sr.'s Putney Swope (1969) on blu-ray from Vinegar Syndrome, from a 4K restoration



Dark satire in which the token black man on the executive board of an advertising firm is accidentally put in charge. Renaming the business "Truth and Soul, Inc.", he replaces the tight regime of monied white ad men with his militant brothers. Soon afterwards, however, the power that comes with its position takes its toll on Putney...



June 25, 2019

George Cukor's Gaslight (1944) on blu-ray from Warner Archive, from a 4K restoration



Lights flicker and dim. Footsteps sound from a sealed-off attic. Mysterious events only vulnerable young Paula sees and hears make her fear she's losing her mind — exactly what treacherous spouse Gregory hopes. Directed by George Cukor, Gaslight shines as a superb exercise in suspense. Ingrid Bergman won her first Academy Award® as Paula, doubting her sanity while clinging to it. Fellow Oscar nominee Charles Boyer skillfully plays against type as smoothly evil Gregory. Joseph Cotten, Dame May Whitty and an 18-year-old Angela Lansbury in her movie debut (also capturing an Oscar nomination) help make the Victorian era vividly realized through production design that earned an Academy Award



July 22, 2019

Alan Parker's Birdy (1984) on blu-ray from Sony. Also forthcoming from Indicator (UK)



Birdy (Matthew Modine) returns from the Vietnam War scarred from the horrific experiences of battle. He is so damaged by what he saw that he has shut himself off from reality completely, imaging that he is actually a bird. Birdy is confined to a mental hospital, where the doctors are at a loss as to how to treat him. In an attempt to help, Al (Nicolas Cage), his best friend from high school -- and who was also in Vietnam -- visits him every day to try and get through to him.





June 1, 2019

Konstantin Ershov and Georgiy Kropachyov's Viy - Spirit of Evil (1967) on limited edition blu-ray from Severin. Standard edition to be released later this year.



A young priest is ordered to preside over the wake of a notorious witch in a small old wooden church of a remote village. This means spending three nights alone with a corpse, with only his faith to protect him. *Viy was the first horror fantasy film to be made in the former Soviet Union.





Summer 2019 TBD

J. Lee Thompson's Return from the Ashes (1965) on blu-ray from Kino, from a 2K  remaster



An expert chess player, Stanislaus Pilgrin (Maximilian Schell) is also an unrepentant cad and schemer. Looking for a way to inherit a fortune, Stanislaus marries Dr. Michele Wolf (Ingrid Thulin), a rich Jewish widow. Later, however, he becomes involved with his wife's stepdaughter, Fabienne (Samantha Eggar), resulting in a complicated web of seduction and deception that ends in murder. Will the duplicitous Stanislaus succeed in getting Michele's money?

Quote from: Criterion Forum user DRW.moveFans of Petzold's PHOENIX; Return from the Ashes is based on the same source novel, but continues the story through two more acts. Its a superbly Hitchcockian thriller that's been unavailable for far too long.



August 20, 2019

Mark Robson & Val Lewton's Isle of the Dead (1945) on blu-ray from Scream Factory



A small island off the coast of Greece holds a secret so dreadful, that once you step on its shore, you must remain there forever. General Nikolas Pherides (Karloff) is such a visitor. He came to honor the grave of his wife, and discovers that the entire island has been overrun with a plague - a sickness that drives the victims insane. Soon, Pherides succumbs to the illness. When insanity runs rampant, grave robbery, premature burial and vampires are the unspeakable horrors that await those on the Isle of the Dead.



August 6, 2019

Billy Wilder's The Front Page (1974) on blu-ray from Kino



Successful Chicago newspaper reporter Hildy Johnson (Jack Lemmon) is hanging up his journalist's hat to marry Peggy Grant (Susan Sarandon). When his editor, the arrogant, self-important Walter Burns (Walter Matthau), learns of Hildy's plans, he goes to great lengths to keep his star writer. They learn that the notorious (but possibly wrongfully accused) criminal, Earl Williams (Austin Pendleton), has escaped on the eve of his execution, and Hildy can't resist this one last sensational story.



August 6, 2019

Billy Wilder's A Foreign Affair (1948) on blu-ray from Kino



In occupied Berlin, an army captain is torn between an ex-Nazi café singer and the U.S. congresswoman investigating her.



August 13, 2019

Alfred Hitchcock's Blackmail (1929) on blu-ray from Kino, from a new restoration



A shopkeeper''s daughter fights off blackmail after she kills a young artist who had tried to rape her.



August 13, 2019

Alfred Hitchcock's Murder! (1930) on blu-ray from Kino, from a new restoration



A juror in a murder trial, after voting to convict, has second thoughts and begins to investigate on his own before the execution.



June 25, 2019

Joseph Losey's Galileo (1975) on blu-ray from  Kino



Challenged by a new student, tutor and theorist Galileo co-opts emerging telescope technology and discovers irrefutable proof of the heretical notion that the earth is not the center of the universe. But in a rigid society ruled by an uneasy alliance of aristocracy and clergy already undermined by the Plague and the Reformation, science is a threat and enlightenment is a luxury. Faced with either death at the hands of the Inquisition or recantation to a hypocritical but all-powerful Papacy, Galileo must choose between his own life and the restless scientific curiosity that he has spurned family, friends, and wealth to pursue.



August 26, 2019

André De Toth's Day of the Outlaw (1959) on blu-ray from Kino. Also available from Masters of Cinema (UK)



Cowboys and ranchers have to put their differences aside when a gang of outlaws, led by army captain Jack Bruhn, decide to spend the night in a little Western town.



August 13, 2019

Marcel Carné's Port of Shadows (1938) on blu-ray from Kino, from a 4K restoration



A military deserter finds love and trouble (and a small dog) in a smoky French port city.



August 13, 2019

Jacques Becker's Touchez Pas au Grisbi (1954) on blu-ray from Kino, from a 4K restoration



An aging, world-weary gangster is double-crossed and forced out of retirement when his best friend is kidnapped and their stash of eight stolen gold bars is demanded as ransom.



August 13, 2019

Henri Decoin's Razzia sur la chnouf (1955) on blu-ray from Kino, from a 4K restoration



International drug baron Henri Ferré, nicknamed 'Le Nantais', is tasked with restructuring a narcotics ring operating in Paris. The gangster head Paul Liski provides him with a cover, a bar named Le Troquet, not realising that Ferré is in fact working for the police. Far from supporting the drugs racket, Ferré's mission is to break it once and for all...



August 20, 2019

Perry Hanzell's The Harder They Come (1972) on blu-ray from Shout Factory, from a new transfer of the original 16mm negative

Also included is the first-ever home entertainment release of Perry Henzell's long lost follow up feature, No Place Like Home, which had gone unfinished and was thought to have been lost. The film follows Susan, a producer from New York, visiting Jamaica to shoot a shampoo commercial. When the commercial's actress disappears, Susan finds herself venturing further into the island, and drifting further from her real life. Also includes Perry Henzell: A Filmmaker's Odyssey, a new documentary about its genesis and restoration.



Wishing to become a successful Reggae singer, a young Jamaican man finds himself tied to corrupt record producers and drug pushers.



July 9, 2019

The Buster Keaton Collection: Volume 2 on blu-ray from Cohen Media Group



Sherlock Jr (1924)

Buster plays a movie projectionist who daydreams himself into the movies he is showing and merges with the figures and the backgrounds on the screen. While dreaming he is Conan Doyle's master detective, he snoops out brilliant discoveries.

The Navigator (1924)

Rollo (Buster Keaton) decides to marry his sweetheart Betsy and sail to Honolulu. When she rejects him he decides to go alone but boards the wrong ship, the "Navigator" owned by Betsy's father. Unaware of this, Betsy boards the ship to look for her father. whom spies capture before cutting the ship loose. It drifts out to sea with the two socialites each unaware of there being anyone else on board.

wilder

August 19, 2019

Marlene Dietrich & Josef von Sternberg at Paramount (1930-1935) on blu-ray from Indicator (UK)

This is the equivalent of Criterion's box set in terms of film contents, but includes many different extras. A detailed post on Criterion Forum breaks down the similarities and differences between them.



-Morocco (1930)
-Dishonored (1931)
-Shanghai Express (1932)
-Blonde Venus (1932)
-The Scarlet Empress (1934)
-The Devil is a Woman (1935)

The collaboration between filmmaker Josef von Sternberg and actress Marlene Dietrich is one of the most enduring in all Hollywood cinema. Tasked by Paramount bosses to find 'the next big thing', director von Sternberg lighted upon German silent star Dietrich and brought her to Hollywood. Successfully transitioning from the silent to the sound era, together they crafted a series of remarkable features that expressed a previously hitherto unbridled ecstasy in the process of filmmaking itself. Marked by striking cinematography, beautiful design and elaborate camerawork these vibrantly sensuous films redefined cinema of the time, while Dietrich's sexually ambiguous on-screen personas caused a sensation and turned her from actor to superstar and icon. Lavish, lascivious and wildly eccentric, the films Josef von Sternberg and Marlene Dietrich made for Paramount Pictures in the 1930s provide a unique testimony to Hollywood's Golden Age.

The six films that von Sternberg made with Dietrich in Hollywood are presented here in new restorations on Blu-ray for the very first time in the UK. Containing a wealth of new and archival extras – including new appreciations, interviews, audio commentaries, rare films, outtakes and deleted audio, documentaries... and more! This stunning box set is strictly limited to 6,000 units.




August 19/20, 2019

William Friedkin's Cruising (1980) on blu-ray from Arrow US & Arrow UK, from a 4K restoration of the original camera negative supervised by William Friedkin



New York is caught in the grip of a sadistic serial killer who is preying on the patrons of the city's underground bars. Captain Edelson tasks young rookie Steve Burns with infiltrating the S&M subculture to try and lure the killer out of the shadows. As he immerses himself deeper and deeper into the underworld, Steve risks losing his own identity in the process.


August 6, 2019

Alfred Sole's Alice, Sweet Alice (1976) on blu-ray from Arrow, from a 2K restoration of the original camera negative



A young Brooke Shields meets an untimely end in this religious-themed proto slasher par excellence from director Alfred Sole.On the day of her first communion, young Karen is savagely murdered by an unknown assailant in a yellow rain mac and creepy translucent mask. But the nightmare is far from over – as the knife-wielding maniac strikes again and again, Karen's bereaved parents are forced to confront the possibility that Karen's wayward sister Alice might be the one behind the mask.

Bearing influences from the likes of Hitchcock, the then-booming Italian giallo film and more specifically, Nicolas Roeg's Don't Look Now, Alice, Sweet Alice is an absolutely essential – if often overlooked – entry in the canon of 1970s American horror.




2019 TBD

Robert Altman's Beyond Therapy (1987) on blu-ray from Scorpion Releasing



Neurotic New Yorker Bruce (Jeff Goldblum) is a manic bisexual who enjoys a good cry. Equally insecure Prudence (Julie Hagerty) is the uptight writer he meets through the personal ads. Bob Christopher (Christopher Guest) is Bruce's roommate and former lover who is insanely jealous of Prudence. Prudence is also sleeping with her lecherous therapist Stuart (Tom Conti) while Bruce's therapist Charlotte (Glenda Jackson) may be crazier than any of her patients. Add an extremely overprotective mother and a very odd French restaurant, and you have a one-of-a-kind comedy about life, love and the happy endings that lay BEYOND THERAPY. Genevieve Page co-stars in this dysfunctional romantic comedy directed by seven-time Oscar-nominee Robert Altman and co-written by Christopher Durang, based on his smash Broadway play.   



2019 TBD

Serge Gainsbourg's Je t'aime moi non plus (1976) on blu-ray from Kino



Cult icon Serge Gainsbourg wrote, directed, and scored this tale of doomed love between a lonely truck stop waitress (Jane Birkin) and a hunky garbage truck driver (Joe Dallesandro), whose boyfriend (Hugues Quester) becomes increasingly jealous of the two.





July 30, 2019

Marcel L'Herbier's L'Argent (1928) on blu-ray from Flicker Alley, from a 4K restoration of the original camera negative



Adapted from Émile Zola's novel of the same name, L'Argent is an all-too-timely work of filmmaking loosely based off of the 1882 collapse of Union Générale bank, which subsequently crashed the stock market and plunged France into a decade-long recession. Helmed by Marcel L'Herbier, one of the original members of French cinema's avant-garde, the film uses Zola's tale of mid-1800s stock market speculation to comment on the 1920s greed-fueled fascination with global economies. The story centers on the unscrupulous Nicolas Saccard, played by Pierre Alcover, who makes a bad bet, loses his societal standing and his mistress, and tries to recoup it all by backing an aviator with a daredevil plan to cross the Atlantic to exploit raw materials in the New World.

L'Argent is L'Herbier's silent-era swan song. Known for his ability to translate artistic and innovative sensibilities into commercial fare, L'Herbier designed the film to compete with the super-productions coming out of France, United States, and Germany at the time. It is thus bursting with state-of-the-art techniques, a big-name international cast, 1500 extras, and was shot by France's highest paid cameraman at the time, Jules Krüger. L'Herbier made use of a dozen cameramen flying on pulleys and dollies, as well as an unmanned camera that descended and revolved to capture the stock exchange in full frenzy. Even as the pilot embarks on his trans-Atlantic flight, action on the stock market floor intensifies in a montage of Eisensteinian proportions.

L'Argent was forgotten by many until it was reconstructed in the 1970s, and did not receive a proper preservation until the 1990s. Now, thanks to Lobster Films—with the support of Marie-Ange L'Herbier (the director's daughter), the French CNC and SACEM, the original camera negative of this silent classic has been rescanned at a pristine 4K resolution. Flicker Alley's publication of L'Argent features a new score from Olivier Massot, preformed by the National Orchestra of Lyon under the direction of Timothy Brock, and an earlier orchestral adaptation from Rodney Sauer, preformed by the Mont Alto Orchestra. Also included in this deluxe edition is The Making of L'Argent, one of the first-ever behind-the-scenes documentaries of a feature film. This bonus featurette, complete with a new 4K restoration from the original 35mm elements, and two new musical compositions, including a fascinating score by Tempsion, is a masterpiece in itself.

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#853
August 28, 2019

Roman Polanski's The Tenant (1976) on blu-ray from Shock (Australia)



A bureaucrat rents a Paris apartment where he finds himself drawn into a rabbit hole of dangerous paranoia.





September 24, 2019

Ida Lupino: Filmmaker Collection on blu-ray from Kino



Never Fear (1950) - from a new 2K restoration

Carol Williams (Sally Forrest, Not Wanted) is a beautiful young dancer whose body, and promising career, is suddenly crippled by polio. Carol's dance partner and fiancé, Guy Richards (Keefe Brasselle, A Place in the Sun), wants to see her through her illness, but the angry, self-pitying Carol prefers to go it alone. Her father (Herb Butterfield, Shield for Murder) takes her to the Kabat-Kaiser Institute for rehabilitation, where she meets fellow patients like Len Randall (Hugh O'Brian, Ambush Bay) on her tough road to recovery. The second feature directed by Ida Lupino (The Hitch-Hiker), who herself had been stricken with polio as an adolescent, Never Fear is a psychologically probing look at coping with chronic illness. Co-written and co-produced by Lupino and her partner Collier Young (The Bigamist) and wonderfully shot in black-and-white by Archie Stout (Fort Apache).


The Bigamist (1953) - from a new 4K restoration from the original camera negative

The Bigamist is an amazingly sympathetic portrait of a figure historically given very short shrift: the title character is not only a two-timer—he's a traveling salesman as well. But, as embodied by that perpetually pressured everyman of the 1950s, Edmond O'Brien, the bigamist comes across as a victim of his own sensitivity. Caught between two complementary spouses, O'Brien's dazed indecisiveness dominates the narrative. As always in Ida Lupino's directorial efforts, a strong social consciousness informs all choices: Joan Fontaine is an upper-crust "lady," reverently attached to her dying father, while Lupino herself plays a tough-talking working woman, waitressing in a cheap Chinese restaurant. But no on-screen triangle could beat the one behind the camera—The Bigamist was produced and written by Collier Young, Lupino's longtime collaborator and recently divorced husband, whose new wife was none other than Joan Fontaine. The wonderful cast includes Edmund Gwenn, Kenneth Tobey and Jane Darwell.


The Hitch-Hiker (1953) - from a new 2K restoration

Beyond its cultural significance as the only classic film noir directed by a woman (screen legend Ida Lupino), The Hitch-Hiker is perhaps better remembered as simply one of the most nightmarish motion pictures of the 1950s. Inspired by the true-life murder spree of Billy Cook, The Hitch-Hiker is the tension-laden saga of two men (Edmond O'Brien and Frank Lovejoy) on a camping trip who are held captive by a homicidal drifter (the great William Talman). He forces them, at gunpoint, to embark on a grim joyride across the Mexican desert. Renegade filmmaking at its finest, The Hitch-Hiker was independently produced, which allowed Lupino and ex-husband/producer Collier Young to work from a treatment by blacklisted writer Daniel Mainwaring, and tackle an incident that was too brutal for the major studios to even consider.


Not Wanted (1940) - from a new 4K restoration

In Ida Lupino's directorial debut Not Wanted, young and naive "unwed mother" Sally Forrest's life spirals out of control after her musician beau (Leo Penn) ditches her for an out-of-town gig, despite the presence of another man (Keefe Brasselle) determined to win her heart. After leaving Warner Brothers, legendary screen actress Ida Lupino co-founded The Filmakers, an independent production company conceived as an alternative to the dominant aesthetics of Hollywood. With the low-key, intimate Not Wanted, Lupino tackled the "taboo" topic of out-of-wedlock pregnancy, immediately venturing into terrain where big-budget mainstream fantasy-spinners feared to tread. In many ways this extraordinary first directorial effort, while uncredited, already bears the stamp of Lupino's unique vision: the remarkable empathy felt for the lead character (Sally Forrest as the dazed, traumatized young waitress thrust into the world of unwed motherhood), the hallucinatory moments (note the amazing subjective camerawork of the childbirth sequence), and the deft location shooting (as Forrest wanders through the bus stations and boarding houses of small-town America



September 23, 2019

Michael Winner's The Girl-Getters aka The System (1964) on blu-ray from Indictor (UK). Region-free. Also coming from Kino.



The first of six collaborations between two of British cinemas most infamous figures – Oliver Reed (The Damned, The Triple Echo) and Michael Winner (Death Wish) – The System finds both at their creative peak. Reed is leader of a gang of youths, who spend a hot summer season in Devon in pursuit of women – including Jane Merrow (The Appointment) and Barbara Ferris (A Nice Girl Like You). Filmed on location, and shot by the great Nicolas Roeg before he turned his attentions to directing, The System boasts a fine supporting cast, including Julia Foster (Alfie), Harry Andrews (The Deadly Affair), and David Hemmings (Fragment of Fear).



September 23, 2019

Alberto Cavalcanti's They Made Me a Fugitive (1947) on blu-ray from Indicator (UK). Region-free



They Made Me a Fugitive is a prime example of British film noir. Trevor Howard plays Clem Morgan, an RAF officer during the war, now unemployed since demobilisation. Turning to the black market, he finds himself embroiled in a life of crime that will lead to prison, a daring escape, and a deadly manhunt. Boasting striking cinematography by Otto Heller, whose later credits would include Michael Powell's Peeping Tom and classic Cold War thriller The Ipcress File, this UK Blu-ray premiere of They Made Me a Fugitive is accompanied by two rare short films, made during Howard's own time in the RAF during WWII, featuring his earliest known on-screen appearances.



September 23, 2019

Jirí Weiss' 90° in the Shade (1965) on blu-ray from Indicator (UK). Region-free



A rare Anglo-Czech co-production, 90° in the Shade is a fascinating, little-seen drama directed by Jiří Weiss (Romeo, Juliet and Darkness) and co-written by David Mercer (Morgan: A Suitable Case for Treatment). Set at the height of summer, the film concerns shop assistant Anne Heywood (The Fox), and two men who will affect her life: James Booth (The Man Who Had Power Over Women), the married man with whom she is having affair, and Rudolf Hrusínský (The Cremator), an auditor who has family problems of his own. Filmed simultaneously in English and Czech versions, Indicator is proud to present both cuts on Blu-ray for the first time ever.



2019 TBD

William Asher's Johnny Cool (1963) on blu-ray from Scorpion Releasing



A rich divorcee joins a Sicilian hit man sent to Los Angeles by a deported mobster.





Fall 2019 TBD

Frank Perry's Ladybug, Ladybug (1963) on blu-ray from Kino, from a new 2K remaster



The teachers and students of a countryside elementary school are thrown into a panic when an air raid siren goes off, warning them of a imminent nuclear attack. They are unaware that it has gone off by mistake, and separate the children into groups -- one of which is headed by the anxious Mrs. Andrews (Nancy Marchand) -- to take them home. Harriet (Alice Playten) invites her classmates into her family's bomb shelter, but tragedy strikes when she won't allow one of her classmates to enter.



June 30, 2020

Wild Palms (1993) on blu-ray from Kino. Written by Bruce Wagner



A dark, sexy, noir Los Angeles of the future is the backdrop for Oliver Stone's haunting, sci-fi saga of greed, treason and virtual reality. Harry Wyckoff (James Belushi) is about to become a player in a dark and terrifying battle where everything is at stake and no one is who they seem. Featuring an all-star cast, this story about a cult, a corporation, and a conspiracy to rule the country, is one of the most original movie events in recent history.





October 1, 2019

Barry Sonnefeld's Addams Family Values (1993) on blu-ray from Paramount



A comical Gothic horror-movie-type family tries to rescue their beloved uncle from his gold-digging new love.





2019 TBD

Stuart McGowan's The Ice House aka The Passion Pit (1969) on blu-ray from Grindhouse Releasing



A serial killer who works in an ice house murders women, then brings their bodies back to the ice house and stores them there. He also murders his identical twin brother, who is a policeman, and takes his place in the investigation.





October 29, 2019

Chuck Russell's The Blob (1988) on blu-ray from Shout Factory



Remake of the 1958 horror sci-fi about a deadly blob which is the spawn of a secret government germ warfare project which consumes everyone in its path. Teenagers try in vain to warn the townsfolk, who refuse to take them seriously, while government agents try to cover up the evidence and confine the creature...



August 12, 2019

Powell & Pressburger's Oh...Rosalinda!! (1956) on blu-ray from Network (UK), restored from the original camera negative



The reappearance of any lost movie is (usually) cause for celebration: but when the movie in question is a 'lost' production from the revered partnership of Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger, it's time to break open the champagne!

It flows freely enough in this spirited mid-50s musical comedy, which imports the Johann Strauss operetta Die Fledermaus to contemporary Cold War Berlin, under occupation of the four Allied powers. With music from the Vienna Symphony Orchestra and a stellar cast including Michael Redgrave, Anton Walbrook and Anthony Quayle, this sumptuous Cinemascope/Technicolor production might have been expected to repeat the towering success of The Archers' 1951 hit The Red Shoes. Yet Oh... Rosalinda!! proved a box office disappointment, and would be the last of Powell and Pressburger's extravagant musical productions. The partnership came to an amicable end two years later with Ill Met by Moonlight, while Oh... Rosalinda!! quickly disappeared into obscurity and has been seldom seen since its original theatrical exhibition in the autumn of 1955.

Oh... Rosalinda!! continued Powell and Pressburger's run of ballet-inspired movies, arising from Powell's interest in what he referred to as 'composed film'. Beginning with the finale of Black Narcissus, the idea was developed further in The Red Shoes and saw its ultimate expression in 1951's The Tales of Hoffman. Shot entirely on soundstages at Elstree, Oh... Rosalinda!!'s stylised, trompe l'oeil sets suggest an opulent theatrical production and lend the movie a dreamlike, other-worldly atmosphere. With its fruity performances, playful dance numbers and occasionally avant garde cinematography, Oh... Rosalinda!! is an undeniably eccentric piece of work – but its sheer unbridled enthusiasm is hard to resist.


Quote from: Carlos ValladaresWho the what now?!? Powell and Pressburger have always veered towards the cartooned eccentric, but this...this sets world records in drunken craziness. Imagine, if you will, that the dance sequence from The Red Shoes had a car crash with Jacques Tati's Playtime, with Gigi in the front seat and Phantom of the Paradise in the back. And then the AAA driver is Frank Tashlin.

Yadda yadda yadda fantasy becomes reality, yadda yadda yadda artifice artifice. None of those pretty words accurately capture my elated confusion at this thing called a musical.

Vienna here is depicted as a flat comic book—Expressionist libraries, punchy Americans, vodka-slugging Russians, fat German blobs called "a man" multiplied by two in drunken Anton Walbrook stupors, and va-va-voom vamps galore. P&P's soundscape (a mushy, contrived mix of English opera and trick stereo) punches the sides of my head with its strung-out surrealism—did I dream this? Did this really happen? What vicious colors, too; aggressive pinks, mad mauves, nothing is ever allowed to be "kind of expressive" in Oh... Rosalinda!!



August 20, 2019

The Buster Keaton Collection: Volume 3 on blu-ray from Cohen Media Group, from 4K restorations



Seven Chances (1925)

Buster gets word that if he can be married by seven o'clock that evening he will inherit $7,000,000. When his sweetheart refuses, he proposes to everyone in skirts, including a Scotsman. Hopeful still, he advertises for a bride and is horrified to discover 500 would-be=brides hot on his trail in a hilarious chase to the finish.

Battling Butler (1926)

Based on the popular stage musical, Battling Butler stars Keaton as a pampered socialite who pretends to be a famed prizefighter in order to impress his girlfriend's bullying brothers.



2020 TBD

Douglas Sirk's Taza, Son of Cochise (1954) on blu-ray from Kino



The two sons of Apache leader Cochise (Jeff Chandler) have conflicting views of the white men who trepass on their land; Taza (Rock Hudson) argues for peaceful co-existence but his younger brother Naiche (Bart Roberts) joins Geronimo on the warpath. One of the few Westerns made in the 1950s that attempted to present a positive view of Native Americans, Taza, Son of Cochise was the second of eight movies that Rock Hudson made with director Douglas Sirk. Filmed on location in Utah, the natural setting of the desert is one of the movie's many assets which is vividly captured by the glorious Technicolor cinematography.



Fall 2019 TBD

Michael Winner's The Girl-Getters aka The System (1964) on blu-ray from Kino, from a 2K remaster. Also coming from Indicator (UK)



In a picturesque village on the sea, resident Tinker (Oliver Reed) has developed a foolproof plan to seduce -- and then ditch -- wealthy ladies. Thanks to his work photographing tourists on summer vacation, he retains the names and addresses of his female clients, which get put in a pool. He and his hoodlum friends then make their selections and go out on the prowl. But the jaded Tinker finds his callous worldview shaken when he becomes smitten with an on-the-ball model (Jane Merrow). Directed by Michael Winner.


September 23/24, 2019

Billy Wilder's The Major and the Minor (1942) on blu-ray from Arrow US & Arrow UK



Legendary actress and dancer Ginger Rogers (Monkey Business) stars as Susan Applegate, a struggling young woman who pretends to be an 11-year old girl in order to buy a half-price train ticket. Fleeing the conductors, she hides in the compartment of Major Philip Kirby (Ray Milland, The Big Clock, The Pyjama Girl Case). The Major believes Susan is a child and takes her under his wing, but when they arrive at the military academy where Kirby teaches, his fiancée (Rita Johnson) grows suspicious of Susan's ruse...

Co-written by Wilder and Charles Brackett (Hold Back the Dawn), The Major and the Minor assumes the guise of a light romance narrative in order to cleverly explore themes of identity and deception. Wilder's American debut is presented here for the first time in stunning High Definition, with a selection of illuminating extras.




September 2, 2019

William Dieterle's Dark City (1950) on blu-ray from Arrow UK



Originally developed as a star vehicle for Burt Lancaster, the lead role in the gripping revenge noir Dark City ultimately became the Hollywood debut of 26-year-old Charlton Heston, already confidently wielding the intense, rugged charisma that would define his career.

Once a decorated war hero, Danny Haley (played by Heston) now leads a group of small-time card sharks who know a sucker when they see one. They cheat their latest mark, Arthur (Don DeFore, Ramrod) out of $5000 at the poker table; but when Arthur hangs himself in despair, his unstable, hulking older brother (Mike Mazurki, Night and the City) seeks violent revenge on the grifters responsible. As the bodies pile up, Danny and his lover, nightclub singer Fran (Lizabeth Scott, Too Late For Tears), flee to Las Vegas... but Danny is about to learn he can't hide from the consequences of his actions.




August 20, 2019

Otto Preminger's Whirlpool (1949) on blu-ray from Twilight Time



A woman secretly suffering from kleptomania is hypnotized in an effort to cure her condition. Soon afterwards, she is found at the scene of a murder with no memory of how she got there and seemingly no way to prove her innocence.



July 2019 TBD

Busby Berkeley's Footlight Parade (1933) on blu-ray from Warner Archive, from a new remaster



Chester Kent struggles against time, romance, and a rival's spy to produce spectacular live "prologues" for movie houses.



Fall 2019 TBD

René Clair's The Flame of New Orleans (1942) on blu-ray from Kino



Countess Claire Ledoux has only one thing on her mind – to marry a man of means. Ledoux's engagement to Charles Giraud appears to be smooth seas ahead... until Captain Robert Latour storms into town and takes the wind out of her sails. Though it takes fainting spells and double identities to delay and disguise the truth, the Countess discovers that the greatest treasure of all – a heart of gold – is worth more than a pot of it.



July 29, 2019

Milos Forman's Loves of a Blonde (1965) on blu-ray from Second Run (UK), from a 4K restoration. Region free.



A subtle and beautifully observed social satire which maintains a remarkable balance between despair and hope, this bittersweet romance from Milo Forman, the multiple Oscar-winning director of Black Peter, One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, and Amadeus, unfolds as a sweetly seductive film but also provides a wry critique of life under totalitarianism. Forman is able to distill universal truths from the simplest of situations and present them with a sharp yet compassionate eye.



August 20, 2019

Alain Resnais' Last Year at Marienbad (1961) on blu-ray from Kino, from a 4K restoration



In this unconventional French drama, a group of unnamed aristocrats interact at a palatial château, resulting in an enigmatic tale told partially in flashback. X (Giorgio Albertazzi) is convinced that he has met the beautiful A (Delphine Seyrig) before in the Czech resort town of Marienbad, and implies they had a romantic relationship. M (Sacha Pitoeff), who may be A's husband or boyfriend, confronts her mysterious suitor, leading to conflict and questions about the truth behind his story.



September 16, 2019

Fred Zinnemann's High Noon (1952) on blu-ray from Masters of Cinema (UK), from a 4K restoration



While the film has become a favourite of U.S. presidents from Eisenhower and Reagan to Clinton, its release was controversial: John Wayne (who had turned down the role) and Howard Hawks hated it, precisely because it was viewed as a thinly veiled allegory for the House Un-American Activities Committee hearings investigating communism at the time. Its politics make it even more intriguing now, but regardless, High Noon is one of the most important — and gripping films — of the 1950s

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December 10, 2019

Jacques Rivette's Joan the Maid (1994) on blu-ray from Cohen Media Group, from a 4K restoration



For the first installment of his ambitious yet restrained two-part study, director and co-screenwriter Jacques Rivette surveys the revelatory period where Joan met with royalty, joined the army, and led the French into battle against the English. As Joan, Sandrine Bonnaire gets at the reality behind the legend, showing the matter-of-fact courage of a teenage girl. For both films, costume designer Christine Laurent was additionally co-screenwriter.

The second part of Rivette's diptych, brought leading lady Sandrine Bonnaire a César Award nomination for her powerful performance. Joined in this installment by other excellent French actresses, including Edith Scob, Hélène de Fougerolles, and Nathalie Richard, Bonnaire taps into her character's vulnerability as she plays out windows in the final two years of Joan's life, from the battlefield victory to prison life to the stake.






June 21, 2019

Juraz Herz's Morgiana (1972) on blu-ray from Studio Hamburg Enterprises (Germany). No subtitles. Also available in a box set along with Herz's films Ferat Vampire and Beauty and the Beast



Klara and Viktoria are sisters. Their father dies, leaving most of his property to Klara. When Klara becomes involved with a man that her sister loves, Viktoria begins to plot her murder.





August 26, 2019

Karel Kachyna's Ucho aka The Ear (1970) on blu-ray from Second Run (UK), from a new remaster of the original materials. Region free.



In Karel Kachyna's darkly satirical political-noir, a high-ranking Communist official and his wife begin to suspect that their home has been put under surveillance by the Party. Over one night, the growing tension exposes a bitter fault-line in their relationship, feeding an intense atmosphere of paranoia and dread.  Daring to address the taboos of the Stalinist era, The Ear was banned soon after completion, and remained unseen until the fall of Communism twenty years later. Combining a not-so-private portrait of a disintegrating marriage with a searing blackly-comic critique of totalitarianism, this landmark film is an extraordinary indictment of life under an oppressive system.



2020 TBD

Basil Dearden's The Mind Benders (1963) on blu-ray from Kino, from a 2K restoration



Following the death of a fellow scientist accused of being a communist spy, Dr. Henry Longman (Dirk Bogarde) works to prove that his colleague had been brainwashed. To do so, Longman subjects himself to experiments in a sensory deprivation tank. This starts to take a heavy toll on his mental health; in particular, it alienates him from his wife. Additionally, his scientific credibility suffers and with it the chances for discovering the truth about his colleague.




August 20, 2019

Nicolas Roeg's The Witches (1990) on blu-ray from Warner Archive



While holidaying at a seaside resort a young boy stumbles upon a witch convention. Based on the book by Roald Dahl.



August 27, 2019

Muscha's Decoder (1984) on blu-ray from Vinegar Syndrome



FM (FM Einheit of Einstürzende Neubauten) has discovered something incredible in the monotonous 'muzak' played through the fast food restaurant H Burger's speaker system: the tracks are laced with subliminal messages designed to ensure complacency and consumerism. Experimenting with his discovery, FM soon realizes that by changing the type of music played, he can manifest a whole range of emotional responses and stir up the populace from their consumerist subordination. But as the diners are emotionally awakened, they become more and more prone to rioting and general social unrest, which puts FM in an increasingly dangerous position, especially when the sinister and mysterious organization behind the the plot to keep the public complacent takes an interest in finding and stopping him...

An underground hit from Germany's punk and new wave infused youth culture of the early 80s, director Muscha's DECODER blends arresting visuals, urban industrial aesthetics, science fiction, and moments of shocking violence, along side searing commentary on late 20th century consumerist culture. Co-starring punk icon Christiane Felscherinow and William S. Burroughs in a supporting role and featuring music by Soft Cell, The The and industrial pioneers Einstürzende Neubauten, Vinegar Syndrome is proud to bring this criminally under-seen masterpiece of German weirdness to Blu-ray, in a brand new 2k restoration of its original 16mm camera negative.




September 17, 2019

Harold Pinter and Peter Hall's The Homecoming (1973) on blu-ray from Kino



In North London, an all-male beehive of inactivity is ruled with a foul mouth and an iron hand by the abusive Max (Paul Rogers) and his brother, the priggish palace eunuch Sam (Cyril Cusack). Rounding out the precision vulgarity of The Homecoming's "situation tragedy" are the sons, punch-drunk demolition man Joey (Terence Rigby) and the magnificient Ian Holm (Lord of the Rings, The Sweet Hereafter) as pimp-smart Lenny. When, under cover of darkness, the prodigal son Teddy (Michael Jayston) brings his wife Ruth (Vivien Merchant) home to meet his family for the first time, he gets far more and less than he bargained for. To Teddy's rueful discomfort, Ruth's Mona Lisa smile forms the gateway to a labyrinth of Freudian dread, venal family values, and naked neediness that could only come from the mind of Harold Pinter.

Director Sir Peter hall re-renders his original Royal Shakespeare Company London stage triumph as a bleached, claustrophobic delirium that exploits the jagged tempos and seductive tensions of Pinter's best play as no theater staging could. The New York Times declared the American Film Theatre's production of The Homecoming, "a movie of astonishing dynamism." Indeed, director Atom Agoyan (The Sweet Hereafter) went so far as to say, "I often find myself seeking solace from this film. Its poetry and twisted sense of compassion and humor have assuaged many moments of despair and confusion. Other people have religion, I have my copy of The Homecoming."




October 28/29, 2019

John Landis' An American Werewolf in London (1981) on blu-ray from Arrow US & Arrow UK, from a 4K restoration of the original camera negative supervised by John Landis



American tourists David (David Naughton) and Jack (Griffin Dunne) are savaged by an unidentified vicious animal whilst hiking on the Yorkshire Moors. David awakes in a London hospital to find his friend dead and his life in disarray. Retiring to the home of a beautiful nurse (Jenny Agutter, Walkabout) to recuperate, he soon experiences disturbing changes to his mind and body, undergoing a full-moon transformation that will unleash terror on the streets of the capital...



October 29, 2019

Joseph Pevney's Man of a Thousand Faces (1957) on blu-ray from Arrow



James Cagney plays Lon Chaney in this glossy Hollywood biography, a reverent, melodramatic tribute that focuses on his turbulent private life and rise from vaudeville clown to hard-working Hollywood extra to movie star. Cagney brings to the role passion and compassion that burn through the indifferent direction and show-biz clichés to create a vivid, energetic portrait of the enigmatic cult star who rarely let audiences see his true face.



August 27, 2019

William Wyler's Jezebel (1938) on blu-ray from Warner Archive



A tempestuous Southern belle's willfulness threatens to destroy all who care for her.



October 15, 2019

Thorold Dickinson's Queen of Spades (1949) on blu-ray from Kino



Anton Walbrook stars as Russian army captain Herman Suvorin, who secretly covets the wealth and position of his fellow officers and becomes obsessed with learning the secrets of the card game Faro. When he hears that the elderly Countess Ranevskaya (Edith Evans) has struck a bargain with the devil to gain the very knowledge he so desires, he worms his way into her household and does all he can to wrestle the knowledge from her - but the price turns out to be higher than he could ever have imagined.



September 10, 2019

Martin Scorsese's Casino (1995) on 4K blu-ray from Universal



A tale of greed, deception, money, power, and murder occur between two best friends: a mafia enforcer and a casino executive, compete against each other over a gambling empire, and over a fast living and fast loving socialite.



October 29, 2019

Martin Scorsese's Kundun (1997) on blu-ray from Kino



The incredible true story of one of the world's most fascinating leaders - Tibet's Dalai Lama - and his daring struggle to rule a nation at one of the most challenging times in its history.



October 29, 2019

Martin Scorsese, Francis Ford Coppola, and Woody Allen's New York Stories (1989) on blu-ray from Kino



A middle-aged artist obsessed with his pretty young assistant, a precocious 12 year old living in a hotel, and a neurotic lawyer with a possessive mother make up three stories.