Random DVD and Blu-ray announcements

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Haha.

Screencaps from Arrow's release of Blanche

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2017 TBD

Floyd Mutrux's Aloha, Bobby And Rose (1975) from Scorpion Releasing. Mutrux also made the underrated Dusty and Sweets McGee (1971)



Bobby has a new '68 Camaro and a dead-end job. Rose has a young son and a nowhere life. One night, they meet, fall in love and share a dream of leaving the seedy side of Hollywood for the easy life of Hawaii. But when an innocent prank goes tragically wrong, Bobby and Rose are on the run from the law and for their lives. As they take to the highway, they find that paradise is just out of reach...and that 'aloha' can also mean 'goodbye.'

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2017 TBD

Vasili Mass' Spider (1991) on blu-ay from Mondo Macabro



A young model's life spins out of control after she visits the studio of an eccentric artist and poses for a painting of Virgin Mary.

[wilder]

March 20, 2017

Ildikó Enyedi's My 20th Century (1989) on blu-ray from Second Run (UK)



My 20th Century (1989) - Amazon UK

This magical film spins a tale of twin girls, Dóra and Lili, who are born in 1880 Budapest on the same moment Thomas Edison presents his electric lightbulb to the world. The sisters are soon orphaned and separated in childhood, and follow different paths: one grows up to a naïvely idealistic, bomb-toting anarchist, the other a pampered, hedonistic courtesan who paths cross once again on the Orient Express on New Year s Eve 1899...

Moving at a dizzy pace between Budapest, Hamburg, New York, Burma, Austria, Paris and Siberia, this is a film of dazzling beauty and acumen. It is a modernist fable, a fantasmagoria of scientific, political and sexual revolution and radicalism, the birth of cinema, and the joy of life.

[wilder]

Available Now

Josef von Sternberg's Blonde Venus (1932) on blu-ray from Elephant Films (France)



A nightclub singer (Marlene Dietrich) becomes a playboy's (Cary Grant) mistress to support her son and ailing husband (Herbert Marshall).

Blonde Venus (1932) - Amazon France

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Summer 2017 TBD

Michael Anderson’s Conduct Unbecoming (1975) on blu-ray from Scorpion Releasing, from a new HD master



Honor. Duty. Respect. The timeless moral and ethical code of our military - and the backbone of civilized Western society.

All are at risk for this British regiment stationed in colonial India at the end of the nineteenth century. The conduct unbecoming: a beautiful widow (Susannah York) is brutally attacked by one of the new officers. In a desperate bid to prevent a public scandal, the superior officers Richard Attenborough, Trevor Howard, Stacy Keach, and Christopher Plummer undertake a Court Martial. Can an idealistic young officer (Michael York) defend the accused attacker (James Faulkner), even if it means shattering the military's - and his own - code of honor? Based on a play by Barry England, the British Conduct Unbecoming revolves around a sexual violation--which may or may not have occurred.

June 12, 2017

Alexander Mackendrick’s Mandy (1952) on blu-ray from StudioCanal (UK)



The film chronicles the life of a deaf girl, from the moment her parents realize that she has no hearing, through her struggle to express herself and learn how to lip-read. Her mother and father argue over the best way to deal with her condition, leading to a scandalous marriage breakdown.

Mandy (1952) - Amazon UK



May 30, 2017

Billy Wilder’s One, Two, Three (1961) from Kino



C.R. MacNamara (Cagney), a top-ranking executive stationed in West Berlin, is charged with the care of his boss' visiting daughter. But when he learns that she's gone and married a fierce young communist - and that his boss will be arriving in town in 24 hours - Mac must transform the unwilling beatnik into a suitable son-in-law or risk losing his chance for advancement! Before you can say "one, two, three," his plans have spun out of control and into an international incident that could infuriate the Russians, the Germans and, worst of all, his own suspicious wife!

[wilder]

June 19/20, 2017

Dario Argento’s The Bird With the Crystal Plumage (1970) on limited edition blu-ray from Arrow UK and Arrow US, from a new 4K restoration from the camera negative



In 1970, young first-time director Dario Argento (Deep Red, Suspiria) made his indelible mark on Italian cinema with The Bird with the Crystal Plumage – a film which redefined the 'giallo' genre of murder-mystery thrillers and catapulted him to international stardom.

Sam Dalmas (Tony Musante, We Own the Night), an American writer living in Rome, inadvertently witnesses a brutal attack on a woman (Eva Renzi, Funeral in Berlin) in a modern art gallery. Powerless to help, he grows increasingly obsessed with the incident. Convinced that something he saw that night holds the key to identifying the maniac terrorising Rome, he launches his own investigation parallel to that of the police, heedless of the danger to both himself and his girlfriend Giulia (Suzy Kendall, Spasmo)…

A staggeringly assured debut, The Bird with the Crystal Plumage establishes the key traits that would define Argento's filmography, including lavish visuals and a flare for wildly inventive, brutal scenes of violence. With sumptuous cinematography by Vittorio Storaro (Apocalypse Now) and a seductive score by legendary composer Ennio Morricone (Once Upon a Time in the West).

[wilder]

April 4, 2017

Douglas Sirk’s Interlude (1957) on blu-ray from Elephant Films (France)



A U.S. newswoman (June Allyson) falls in love with a married symphony composer (Rossano Brazzi) in Munich.

Interlude (1957)- Amazon France

Douglas Sirk’s Magnificent Obsession (1954) on blu-ray from Elephant Films (France)



Reckless playboy Bob Merrick (Rock Hudson) crashes his speedboat, requiring emergency attention from the town's only resuscitator — at the very moment that beloved local Dr. Phillips has a heart attack and dies waiting for the life-saving device. Thus begins one of Douglas Sirk's most flamboyant master classes in melodrama, in which Bob and the doctor's widow, Helen (Jane Wyman), find themselves inextricably linked amid a series of increasingly wild twists, turns, trials and tribulations.

Magnificent Obsession (1954) - Amazon France

Douglas Sirk’s Captain Lightfoot (1955) on blu-ray from Elephant Films (France)



An Irish swashbuckler (Rock Hudson) woos a rebel leader's (Jeff Morrow) daughter (Barbara Rush) in 19th-century Ireland.

Captain Lightfoot (1955)- Amazon France

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May 30, 2017

Alfred Hitchcock's The Paradine Case (1947) from Kino



The lovely Mrs. Paradine (Ann Todd) is accused of poisoning her older, blind husband. She hires lawyer Anthony Keane (Gregory Peck) to represent her. Though Keane is married to a striking and devoted woman, he finds himself strangely attracted to his glamorous defendant. His deepening feelings convince him of her innocence, even though the evidence and his sense of reason may indicate otherwise.

[wilder]

April 18, 2017

Woody Allen's Another Woman (1988) on blu-ray from Twilight Time, pre-order from Screen Archives on April 5, 2017



When philosophy professor Marion Post (Gena Rowlands) rents an apartment to work on her new book, she soon realizes that she can hear into the next room, which houses a psychiatrist's office. Marion becomes captivated by the sessions of a patient named Hope (Mia Farrow). As Hope talks about her emotional issues, Marion begins to reevaluate her life. She comes to realize that her coldness has shut her off from friends and family, and she has missed a chance for true love.

Screencaps from Arrow UK's release:

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May 23, 2017

The Jacques Rivette Collection (1976-1981) on limited edition blu-ray from Arrow US



Contains:

-Duelle (1976)
-Merry-Go-Round (1981)
-Noroît (1976)

The more expensive Arrow UK edition also contains Out 1 (which is available from Carlotta in the US).

The Jacques Rivette Collection - Amazon

2017 TBD

It’s the Old Army Game (1926), starring W.C. Fields, on blu-ray from Kino from a new 2K master



Elmer Prettywillie, the village druggist, is awakened by a woman who needs a 2-cent stamp in the middle of the night. Seeking again a state of somnolence, Prettywillie must contend with the clamorous collectors of garbage, and with those of his own castle who have caught forty winks and then some. The letter-carrying lady, in trying to post her missive, manages to summon the city's fire department to the pharmacy where, unable to find a fire, they sit and sip sodas while Prettywillie panders to their every want. When they leave, a bit of a blaze does erupt, but Prettywillie is forced to his own resources. Meanwhile, George Parker is smitten with Elmer's buxom assistant and uses the storefront to promote a bogus land deal. The Prettywillie fortune is thus inflated, enabling the purchase of a flivver, but Elmer ends up wrecking a Florida estate and finally the flivver, foiling the schemers and delighting the denizens of the town, whose jubilation Elmer takes for an acute case of distemper. He jails himself for safekeeping.



Running Wild (1927), starring W.C. Fields, on blu-ray from Kino from a new 2K master



Cowardly Elmer Finch is browbeaten by his wife, daughter, fat son and the family dog. After hypnosis he is domineering. He enters a contract with a fifteen-thousand dollar payoff, so his courage can last beyond the hypnosis.

[wilder]

October 24, 2017

William Dieterle’s Portrait of Jennie (1948) on blu-ray from Kino



One of the most unusual romances ever filmed, Portrait Of Jennie is the picture of sumptuous perfection. Starring Joseph Cotten (Citizen Kane) and Oscar winner Jennifer Jones (A Farewell To Arms). When struggling artist Eben Adams (Cotten) meets the beautiful and mysterious Jennie (Jones), he is instantly captivated. Before long, Jennie has become his great muse and he is enjoying success and bliss beyond his dreams. But there is a price to pay for such elation, and soon Eben must face the truth about who Jennie really is.   

[wilder]

June 19, 2016

Luis Bunuel’s Death in the Garden (1956) on blu-ray from Masters of Cinema (UK)



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 his def-mute daughter-are 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 brilliant Eastmancolor and featuring a star-studded cast, Death in the Garden is a pulsating adventure film, alive with Surrealist gestures, making it classic Luis Bunuel.

Death in the Garden (1956) - Amazon UK

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RealorFake4K.com - Database of UHD titles, discerns between titles from 4K or equivalent sources ("real" 4K") and titles originated from lesser sources (i.e. shot/mastered in 2K, upscaled to 4K - "fake 4K"), where not much difference will be seen compared to a 1080p blu-ray

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Summer 2017 TBD

Henry King's Duel in the Sun (1946) on blu-ray from Kino. This movie has several other uncredited directors, including Josef von Sternberg, who was apparently hired as a visual consultant (for a film in technicolor!).



When her father is hanged for shooting his wife and her lover, half-breed Pearl Chavez goes to live with distant relatives in Texas. Welcomed by Laura Belle and her elder lawyer son Jesse, she meets with hostility from the ranch-owner himself, wheelchair-bound Senator Jackson McCanles, and with lustful interest from womanizing, unruly younger son Lewt.

2017 TBD

James Ivory's Maurice (1987) on blu-ray from Cohen Media Group, from a new 4K restoration



Set against the stifling conformity of pre-World War I English society, E.M. Forster's Maurice is a story of coming to terms with one's sexuality and identity in the face of disapproval and misunderstanding.

Maurice Hall (James Wilby) and Clive Durham (Hugh Grant) find themselves falling in love at Cambridge. In a time when homosexuality is punishable by imprisonment, the two must keep their feelings for one another a complete secret. After a friend is arrested and disgraced for "the unspeakable vice of the Greeks," Clive abandons his forbidden love and marries a young woman. Maurice, however, struggles with his identity and self-confidence, seeking the help of a hypnotist to rid himself of his undeniable urges. But while staying with Clive and his shallow wife, Anne, Maurice is seduced by the affectionate and yearning servant Alec Scudder (Rupert Graves), an event that brings about profound changes in Maurice's life and outlook.