Newsletter - FOR THE WEEK

OF January 28th, 2013

'Iorana korua! - This week we have Criterion, Josef von Sternberg, Stanley Donen, Luis Bunuel, Bob Fosse, Otto Preminger, Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne and more. New Calendar listings include films-to-Blu-ray and DVD by Sam Mendes, Sang-soo Hong, Tom Tykwer, Stephen Frears, Steven Spielberg, Stanley Kramer, Ken Loach and more. We continue with our CONTEST of the week with the prize of a Warner Blu-ray of The Jazz Singer!

DVDBeaver's eBay store HERE selling:

NOTABLES:

Their First Films - VERY RARE OUT OF PRINT First films of PIALAT, RESNAIS, GODARD, RIVETTE, TRUFFAUT, LECONTE, MELVILLE!

Visions of Light: The Art of Cinematography (OUT OF PRINT DVD, 2000)

Wuthering Heights (OUT-OF-PRINT DVD, 1997) 1939 version Laurence Olivier

 

FEATURE Blu-ray and DVD chosen for January!

FOLLOW US on TWITTER! (where we post important reviews, contests - prizes, calendar updates - plus much more...)

TOOLBAR THE 'DVDBeaver Toolbar'! Give it a test drive! I've created a very simple toolbar for Film-Fans/DVD-o-philes/cinephiles. It embeds effortlessly within Internet Explorer 5.0+ (Windows Vista/XP/2000) and Firefox 1.0.1+ (Windows, Mac, Linux). It offers quick links to Searching both the Net (via Google) and DVDBeaver directly, Amazons, Asian etailors, Forums (Criterion, Home Theater, AVS, Rotten Tomatoes, Film Noir), IMDb, DVDBasen, Beaver links, Blu-ray information, Cinephile Blogs/Journals (Rosenbaum, Kehr, Acquarello etc.). What do you think? FOR MORE INFORMATION / AVAILABLE HERE *** (We can adjust this to suit popular opinion - on-the-fly - no re-install required!)

January 28th CONTEST  identify the clip on the CONTEST PAGE to win a brand new Warner Blu-ray of The Jazz Singer

If there are DVD titles you'd like us to cover - please feel free to recommend!

Gary at 2ze dot com

The Confrontation - Paralleling the dramatic student protests and riots that were exploding across the world in the 1960s at the time the film was made, THE CONFRONTATION is a story of protest and rebellion in 1947 Hungary when the Communist Party have just taken power. Jancso's first colour film is another virtuoso display by a director at the peak of his powers, and eloquently explores the complex issues and inherent problems of revolutionary democracy. DVD Release Date: January 28th, 2013

Boris Karloff Triple Feature - A cinematic icon, Boris Karloff was one of Hollywood’s greatest actors. Although synonymous with horror, Karloff excelled in other genres as well, providing a lasting legacy of memorable performances. And in this collection of three rarely seen gems drawn from his work at Warner Bros., Karloff shines in a wide range of roles, encompassing mystery, adventure and drama. West of Shanghai (1937): A wily warlord (Karloff) holds a small group of Americans prisoner in a northern China mission. The Invisible Menace (1938): Army intelligence suspects an ex-con (Karloff) of murdering the ordnance expert who framed him. Devil’s Island (1939): A French doctor (Karloff) wrongfully convicted of treason falls victim to the barbaric cruelties of the penal colony’s commandant. DVD Release Date: January 8th, 2013

Wuthering Heights - The acclaimed masterpiece based on Emily Bronte's novel. Laurence Olivier and Merle Oberon star as Heathcliff and Cathy whose tortured love affair is doomed to a tragic end. Academy Award(R)-winning cinematography and moving performances make t Year: 1939 Director: William Wyler Starring: Lawrence Olivier, Merle Oberon, David Niven. DVD Release Date: January 15th, 2013

The Kid With a Bike BD - Eleven-year-old Cyril (Thomas Doret), all coiled anger and furious motion, is living in a group home but refuses to believe he has been rejected by his single father (Jérémie Renier). He spends his days frantically trying to reach the man, over the phone or on his beloved bicycle. It is only the patience and compassion of Samantha (Cécile de France), the stranger who agrees to care for him, that offers the boy the chance to move on. Spare and unsentimental but deeply imbued with a heart-rending tenderness, The Kid with a Bike is an arresting work from the great Belgian directors Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne, masters of the empathetic action film. Criterion Blu-ray Release Date: February 12th, 2013

Django BD - Originally banned in Britain for its comic-strip iconoclasm and graphic violence, this rates alongside Leone's 'Dollars' trilogy as one of the daddies of the spaghetti/paella Western. It's a clean- up-and-paint-the-town-blood-red revenge drama with a difference. Nero's mud-spattered ex-Yankee soldier, first seen squelching towards a US-Mexican border ghost town, a coffin forever in tow, has every Western hero's quality in extremis. His speed-of-light gunslinger outlaw has a romantic heart - his wife was killed by one of Major Jackson's KKK-like henchmen - and an enigmatic morality. He solves the war between Jackson's men and General Rodríguez' bandidos by dispensing death to all, but his sympathies are shown when he later teams up with Rodríguez for a gold heist. Corbucci's style is a mix of social realism, highly decorative visuals, and finely mounted action sequences. For the rest, there are enough mud-wrestling prostitutes, whippings, ear-loppings, explosions and scenes of wholesale slaughter to keep any muchacho happy. Argent Films Blu-ray Release Date: January 21st, 2013

Laura BD - The sleekest of noirs, the chicest of murders, and deliciously twisted--the detective is a necrophiliac, two of the title character's suitors seem gay, and the Laura all the men are vying for is a corpse with no face. Indeed LAURA, goes the genre one further by taking apart the conventions, then putting them back together, and diving wholeheartedly into them for the finale--a cocktail party denouement to name the killer. Blu-ray Release Date: February 5th, 2013

Cabaret BD - Flamboyant and eccentric American entertainer Sally Bowles (Minnelli) sings in Berlin’s decadent Kit Kat Club, even as Nazism rises in Germany in 1931. She falls in love with a British language teacher (York) – whom she shares with a homosexual German baron (Griem). But Sally's insular, carefree, tolerant and fragile cabaret world is about to be crushed under the boot of the Nazis as Berlin becomes a trap from which Sally's German friends will not escape. Blu-ray Release date: February 5th, 2013

The Nest BD - The quiet town of North Port is being overrun by cockroaches! Sheriff Tarbell (Franc Luz) believes that genetic experiments being conducted by the INTEC Corporation are the cause. Confronted with a potential disaster, Mayor Johnson (Robert Lansing) calls for help. When Dr. Hubbard (Terri Treas) from INTEC arrives, she realizes that an innocent experiment has gone terribly wrong. Ordinary cockroaches are turning into creatures with a taste for blood. Worse, the roaches are genetically mutating... literally becoming whatever they eat! Blu-ray Release date: February 19th, 2013

Midnight Son - MIDNIGHT SON is the story of Jacob, a young man confined to a life of isolation, due to a rare skin disorder that prevents him from being exposed to sunlight. His world opens up when he meets Mary, a local bartender, and falls in love. Tragically, Jacob's actions become increasingly bizarre as he struggles to cope with the effects of his worsening condition. Forced by the disease to drink human blood for sustenance, he must control his increasingly violent tendencies as local law enforcement narrow their focus on him as a suspect in a series of grisly murders. Eureka DVD Release Date: February 11th, 2013

Police - Gerard Depardieu "in one of his strongest performances" (Sight and Sound) is a tough French detective who's a little too attached to his work and is torn between his professional code of honor and the demands of his heart when he finds himself romantically drawn to a drug dealer's girlfriend (Sophie Marceau) who's also a suspect in his investigation of a drug smuggling syndicate. This one-of-a-kind thriller co-stars Sandrine Bonnaire and is directed by legendary director Maurice Pialat (To Our Loves). DVD Release Date: September 18th, 2012

Titanic (1953) BD - The 1912 sinking of the luxury liner Titanic is used as a backdrop for a several fictional subplots, chief of which involves snooty socialite Clifton Webb and his wife Barbara Stanwyck. Stanwyck has booked passage on the ill-fated passenger ship with her daughter (Audrey Dalton) and son (Harper Carter), leaving Webb far behind. Webb manages to board the ship at the last minute, and discovers that Stanwyck plans to divorce him; she further informs him that he is not the father of their son. When the Titanic sideswipes an iceberg and begins its slow descent in the Atlantic, the women and children are put on the lifeboats while the men stay behind to face death... Blu-ray Release date: January, 2013

Ticks BD - A group of problem teens from Los Angeles join an inner-city wilderness project in and attempt to get back in touch with life's priorities; led by do-gooders Holly and Charles (Rosalind Allen and Peter Scolari). When they get to the campsite, they begin having problems adjusting to the wild life, particularly with the local marijuana growers using herbal steroids to accelerate plant growth, and the mutated ticks that the leaky steroid system has created - These oversized mutant ticks with an insatiable lust for human flesh starts terrorizing the campground, eating the campers and everything else in sight. Blu-ray Release date: January 22nd, 2013

White Zombie BD - Along a desolate road in the Haitian mountains, a carriage bearing Neil Parker and Madeleine Short encounters a funeral in which the body is being buried in the road. Further down the road, the coach stops at the sight of a man of satanic appearance: six human shapes step forth, and the horrified driver shouts ''Zombies!'', signaling the first appearance of the living dead in American cinema. When first released, WHITE ZOMBIE occupies a deserved place beside DRACULA and FRANKENSTEIN as one of the most eerie and interesting horror films of the 1930's and remains a horror classic. Blu-ray Release date: January 29th, 2013

That Obscure Object of Desire BD - Adapted from Pierre Louÿs’ 1898 novel ‘Le Femme et le Pantin’, That Obscure Object of Desire marked Bunuel’s final film. Recounted in flashback to a group of railway travellers, the story wryly details the romantic perils of Mathieu (Bunuel favourite Fernando Rey), a wealthy middle-aged French sophisticate who falls desperately in love with his 19-year-old former chambermaid Conchita (Carole Bouquet). Thus begins a surreal game of sexual cat-and-mouse, with Mathieu obsessively attempting to win the girl’s affections as she manipulates his carnal desires, each vying to gain absolute control of the other. Brimming with the subversive wit which characterises Bunuel’s finest work, That Obscure Object of Desire takes satiric aim at a decadent, decaying society riddled with political unrest and moral bankruptcy. Blu-ray Release date: January 29th, 2013

Indiscreet BD - In this reteaming of the stars of Alfred Hitchcock's Notorious by producer and director Stanley Donen (Charade) - Romance is in the air when a dashing diplomat (Cary Grant) is introduced to a beautiful and famous actress (Ingrid Bergman). The fact that he's married doesn't stop the love-struck pair from falling into a passionate affair. But it turns out that the actress isn't the only one with the talent for role-playing - her married lover is actually a single playboy with no intentions of settling down. When his secret is revealed, she decides to give her Romeo a taste of his own medicine. Two of the film's best features are the terrific color photography by legendary cinematographer, Freddie Young (Doctor Zhivago) and the magnificent new look gowns by Christian Doir designed for Bergman. Norman Krasna adapted his own play "Kind Sir" for the big screen. Blu-ray Release date: January 22nd, 2013

The Blue Angel BD - Ironically, veteran German actor and Academy Award winner Emil Jannings’ was the "star" of The Blue Angel, however the German bombshell stole the picture right out from under him. Clearly, Jannings had nothing to offer compared to the sight of Dietrich adjusting her panties on camera. On the surface the story is a simple one — about the ruin and degradation of a respected high school professor by an erotic but disreputable cabaret singer, Lola Lola, but there is more: Subsequent history has shown The Blue Angel to be a fascinating documentary of the decadence of the fast-evaporating post-WWI Weimar Republic that would come crashing down with the advent of Adolph Hitler in 1933. Blu-ray Release Date: January 28th, 2013
 

 Next 4 weeks on the Calendar