Newsletter - FOR THE WEEK

OF April 25th, 2011

  This Week's Highlights
Kon ta bai  - Passive week with films-to-disc by Richard Fleischer, more Alejandro Jodorowsky to Blu-ray, noirish Jules Dassin, Ghibli-esque Japanese animation, salacious Radley Metzger and a tasteless robotic-parts-schoolgirl. Latest additions to the calendar have forthcoming Blu-rays of films by Friedrich W. Murnau, Buster Keaton, Wim Wenders, J. Lee Thompson, Apichatpong Weerasethakul, Martin Scorsese, Brian De Palma, a Monty Python classic and a DVD boxset for Andrei Tarkovsky and more - Plus a new Blu-ray prize for this week's contest clip. Own the physical, my friends...

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April 25th CONTEST - identify the clip on the CONTEST PAGE to win a Sealed Blu-ray of De Sica's Bicyle Thieves

 

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LATEST ADDITIONS TO THE RELEASE CALENDAR:

 

Nosferatu [Blu-ray] (Friedrich W. Murnau, 1922) Ermitage Cinema

Buster Keaton - Short Films Collection: 1920 - 1923 (3-Disc Ultimate Edition) [Blu-ray] - Kino

The Andrei Tarkovsky Collection - Ivan's Childhood (1962) Andrei Rublev (1966) Solaris (1972) The Mirror (1975) Stalker (1979) Nostalgia (1983) The Sacrifice (1986) - R2 UK Artificial Eye

The Guns of Navarone [Blu-ray] (J. Lee Thompson, 1961) Sony Pictures

Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives (Apichatpong Weerasethakul, 2010) Strand Releasing

Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives [Blu-ray] (Apichatpong Weerasethakul, 2010) Strand Releasing

Pina [Blu-ray] (Wim Wenders, 2011) Artificial Eye

Houdini & Those Daring Young Men and Thier Jaunty Jalopies [Blu-ray] - Legend Films

As Far As My Feet Will Carry Me (Hardy Martins, 2001) R2 UK Second Sight Films

Obsession [Blu-ray] (Brian De Palma, 1976) Arrow Video

New York, New York [Blu-ray] (Martin Scorsese, 1977) RB FR Fox Pathe

Of Gods and Men [Blu-ray] (Xavier Beauvois, 2011) Sony

Monty Python and the Holy Grail [Blu-ray] (Terry Gilliam, Terry Jones, 1975) Sony Pictures

Dante's Peak [Blu-ray] (Roger Donaldson, 1997) Universal Studios

The Eagle [Blu-ray] (Kevin Macdonald, 2011) Universal Studios

The Women In Cages Collection (Roger Corman's Cult Classics) [Big Doll House, Women In Cages, The Big Bird] - Shout! Factory

The Man Who Could Cheat Death / The Skull [Blu-ray] - Legend Films

Student Bodies and Jekyll & Hyde Together Again [Blu-ray] - Legend Films

Heavy Metal [Blu-ray] (Gerald Potterton, 1981) Sony

Camille 2000 [Blu-ray] (Radley Metzger, 1969) Cult Epics

Hannie Caulder [Blu-ray] (Burt Kennedy, 1972) Olive Films

Speer & Hitler (Heinrich Breloer, 2005) R2 UK Second Sight Films

Rio Breaks (Justin Mitchell, 2009) R2 UK Mr Bongo Films

The Theo Van Gough Collection - R2 UK Network Releasing

Arachnid [Fantastic Factory Collection] (Jack Sholder, 2001) R2 UK Arrow Video

Romasanta: The Werewolf [Fantastic Factory Collection] (Paco Plaza, 2004) R2 UK Arrow Video

Faust: Love of the Damned [Fantastic Factory Collection] (Brian Yuzna, 2000) R2 UK Arrow Video

Mao's Last Dancer [Blu-ray] (Bruce Beresford, 2009) 20th Century Fox

Torso [Blu-ray] (Sergio Martino) - Blue Underground

High and Low [Blu-ray] (Akira Kurosawa, 1963) Criterion Collection

Beauty and the Beast [Blu-ray] (Jean Cocteau, 1946) Criterion Collection

Naked [Blu-ray] (Mike Leigh, 1993) Criterion Collection

The Music Room (Satyajit Ray, 1959) Criterion Collection
The Music Room
[Blu-ray] (Satyajit Ray, 1959) Criterion Collection

Léon Morin, Priest (Jean-Pierre Melville, 1961) Criterion Collection
Léon Morin, Priest
[Blu-ray] (Jean-Pierre Melville, 1961) Criterion Collection

Life During Wartime (Todd Solondz, 2009) Criterion Collection
Life During Wartime
[Blu-ray] (Todd Solondz, 2009) Criterion Collection

 

 

ONE VOICE (not Ellsworth Monkton Toohey): Short shorts - pretty impressed with Dassin's Rififi! via Blu-ray (with English subs!), Jodorowsky's The Holy Mountain seems up-to-snuff and I had a head-rush of enjoyment revisiting The Girl Who Leapt Through Time  Fleischer's Violent Saturday is still not anamorphic. There is something to Metzger's The Lickerish Quartet but nothing worth speaking of for The Machine Girl. Lots more coming next week! Au + Ag!

  THIS WEEK's REVIEWS / COMPARISONS
 

Violent Saturday - A number of otherwise insignificant small-town stories erupt into drama when a gang of hoodlums decides to rob the local bank. A father looking for pride in his son's eyes, a timid clerk who is a peeping tom by night, a man striving to re-win his wife's love, an Amish farmer faced with viciousness, and a proper older woman turned thief, all find themselves entangled with the bank robbers as a peaceful weekend turns violent.

The Lickerish Quartet BD - Castello Balsorano in Italy's Abruzzi mountains is home to an ex-GI (Frank Wolff, CALIBER 9), his imperious wife (Erika Remberg, CIRCUS OF HORRORS), and her son (Paolo Turco, WHAT HAVE THEY DONE TO OUR DAUGHTERS?). Tired of watching stag films in the great hall, they go out to the local carnival and are amazed to see the star (Silvana Venturelli, CAMILLE 2000) of the film they have been watching as a motorcyclist on the "Wall of Death."
Blu-ray Release Date: April 26th, 2011

The Holy Mountain BD - A Christlike figure wanders through bizarre, grotesque scenarios filled with religious and sacrilegious imagery. He meets a mystical guide who introduces him to seven wealthy and powerful individuals, each representing a planet in the solar system. These seven, along with the protagonist, the guide and the guide's assistant, divest themselves of their worldly goods and form a group of nine who will seek out the Holy Mountain, in order to displace the gods who live there and become immortal.
Blu-ray Release date: April 26th, 2011

The Machine Girl BD - Even the tragic deaths of the innocents are played for laughs here, either by their outrageous nature or by the cartoonish evilness of the murderers. When a schoolfriend gets killed by Ami’s enemies, the leader of the group tells his underlings to rape the corpse, saying the opportunity to have sex with a college girl doesn’t come by every day (upon which command the goons start disrobing enthusiastically). In bad taste? Sure!
Blu-ray Release Date: April 26th, 2011

Rififi BD - After making such American noir classics as The Naked City and Brute Force, blacklisted director Jules Dassin went to Paris and embarked on his masterpiece: a twisting, turning tale of four ex-cons who hatch one last glorious heist in the City of Lights. At once naturalistic and expressionistic, this melange of suspense, brutality, and dark humor was an international hit and earned Dassin the Best Director prize at the Cannes Film Festival.
Blu-ray Release Date: May 9th, 2011

The Girl Who Leapt Through Time BD - "The Girl Who Leapt Through Time” is anime of rare pedigree. Director Mamoru Hosoda, the Ghibli refugee originally slated to helm Howl's Moving Castle, Gainax's master character designer Yoshiyuki Sadamoto and longtime Ghibli art director Nizo Yamamoto coming together at Madhouse to adapt a story by Paprika author Yasutaka Tsutsui. Sounds like it should be absolute magic… and it very nearly is.
Blu-ray Release Date: April 26th, 2011
 

 Next 4 weeks on the Calendar

April 25th, 2011

 

Abel (Diego Luna, 2010) R2 UK Artificial Eye

Betty Blue [Blu-ray] (Jean-Jacques Beineix, 1986) Cinema Libre

Blow Out (Brian De Palma, 1981) Criterion
Blow Out [
Blu-ray] (Brian De Palma, 1981) Criterion (BEAVER REVIEW)

Confessions [Blu-ray] (Tetsuya Nakashima, 2010) RB UK Third Window Films

Les diaboliques [Blu-ray Dual Format] (Henri-Georges Clouzot, 1955) RB UK Arrow Academy  (BEAVER REVIEW)

Don't Look Back [Blu-ray] (D.A. Pennebaker, 1967) Docudrama

The Dorm That Dripped Blood [Blu-ray] (Stephen Carpenter, Jeffrey Obrow, 1982) Synapse Films (BEAVER REVIEW)

El Topo [Blu-ray] (Alejandro Jodorowsky, 1970) Anchor Bay (BEAVER REVIEW)

Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas [Blu-ray] (Terry Gilliam, 1998) Criterion

Fly Away (Janet Grillo, 2011) Docurama

The Enforcer [Blu-ray] (Corey Yuen, 1995) Vivendi Entertainment

The Girl Who Leapt Through Time [Blu-ray] (Mamoru Hosoda, 2006) Bandai Visual (BEAVER REVIEW)

The Grim Reaper (La Commare Secca) (Bernardo Bertolucci, 1962) R2 UK Mr Bongo

Henri-Georges Clouzot's Inferno [Blu-ray] (Serge Bromberg, Ruxandra Medrea, 2009) Flicker Alley

The Holy Mountain [Blu-ray] (Alejandro Jodorowsky, 1973) Anchor Bay

In Our Name (Brian Welsh, 2010) R2 UK Artificial Eye

Joanna [Blu-ray] (Michael Sarne, 1968) BFI Video

Jolene [Blu-ray] (Dan Ireland, 2008) Entertainment One

Lunch Hour [Blu-ray] (James Hill, 1961) UK BFI Video

The Machine Girl [Blu-ray] (Noboru Iguchi, 2008) Tokyo Shock (BEAVER REVIEW)

Mamma Roma (Pier Paolo Pasolini, 1962) R2 UK Mr Bongo

The New York Ripper - Fan High Res Edition [Blu-ray] (Lucio Fulci, 1982) RB UK Shameless

On Tour (Mathieu Amalric, 2010) R2 UK Artificial Eye

The Personals [Blu-ray] (Kuo-fu Chen, 1998) Sony

Il Posto (Ermanno Olmi, 1961) R2 UK Mr Bongo

Prostitute (Tony Garnett. 1980) R2 UK BFI

Romeo and Juliet [Blu-ray] (Renato Castellani, 1954) VCI

The Scent of Green Papaya [Blu-ray] (Anh Hung Tran, 1993) Lorber Films

The Terrorizers [Blu-ray] (Edward Yang, 1986) Sony

The Tourist [Blu-ray] (Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck, 2010) RB Optimum (BEAVER REVIEW)

Tropical Fish [Blu-ray] (Yu-Hsun Chen, 1995) Sony

Vive L'Amour [Blu-ray] (Ming-liang Tsai, 1994) Sony

 

 

May 2nd, 2011

 

All the Right Moves [Blu-ray] (Michael Chapman, 1983) 20th Century Fox

Fat Girl [Blu-ray] (Catherine Breillat, 2001) Criterion

The Green Hornet (Three-Disc Combo: Blu-ray 3D / Blu-ray / DVD) (Michel Gondry, 2011) Sony Pictures

Guy and Madeline on a Park Bench (Damien Chazelle, 2009) Cinema Guild

Houdini & Those Daring Young Men and Thier Jaunty Jalopies [Blu-ray] - Legend Films

I Come with the Rain [Blu-ray] (Anh Hung Tran, 2008) RB UK Trinity

Laila (George Schnéevoigt, 1929) Flicker Alley

M (further restoration) [Blu-ray] (Fritz Lang, 1931) RB DE Universum

The Man Who Could Cheat Death / The Skull [Blu-ray] - Legend Films

Midnight Cowboy [Blu-ray] (John Schlesinger, 1969) RB UK 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment

Smiles of a Summer Night [Blu-ray] (Ingmar Bergman, 1955) Criterion

A Somewhat Gentle Man (Hans Petter Moland, 2010) Strand Releasing

Student Bodies and Jekyll & Hyde Together Again [Blu-ray] - Legend Films

Taps [Blu-ray] (Harold Becker 1981) 20th Century Fox

Twelve O'Clock High [Blu-ray] (Henry King, 1949) 20th Century Fox

What Dreams May Come [Blu-ray] (Vincent Ward, 1998) Universal

 

May 9th, 2011

 

Abbas Kiarostami Collection - Certified Copy, Ten Taste Of Cherry, The Wind Will Carry Us, ABC Africa, 10 On Ten - R2 UK Artificial Eye

Albert Capellani - coffret 4 DVD + livret édition limitee - R2 FR Pathe

Archipelago (Joanna Hogg, 2010) R2 Uk Artificial Eye

The Complete Avengers 50th Anniversary Edition - R2 UK - Optimum

Bananas!* (Fredrik Gertten, 2009) Oscilloscope Laboratories

Black Death [Blu-ray] (Christopher Smith, 2010) Magnolia

Blue Valentine [Blu-ray] (Derek Cianfrance, 2010) Weinstein

Blue Valentine [Blu-ray] (Derek Cianfrance, 2010) RB Optimum

Born to Be Bad (Nicholas Ray, 1950) R2 UK Odeon Entertainment

Budrus (Julia Bacha, 2009) Typecast Releasing

Budrus (Julia Bacha, 2009) R2 UK Dogwoof

Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid [Blu-ray Book] (George Roy Hill, 1969) - 20th Century Fox

Chico & Rita [Blu-ray] (Javier Mariscal, Fernando Trueba, 2010) RB UK Icon

Christmas in July (Preston Sturges, 1940) Universal Studios

Civilisation [Blu-ray] (Kenneth Clark, 1969) 2entertain

Dead Man Walking [Blu-ray] (Tim Robbins, 1995) MGM

Faust: Love of the Damned [Fantastic Factory Collection] (Brian Yuzna, 2000) R2 UK Arrow Video

Hail the Conquering Hero (Preston Sturges, 1944) Universal Studios

His Kind of Woman (John Farrow, 1951) R2 UK Odeon Entertainment

The Horse Soldiers [Blu-ray] (John Ford, 1959) MGM

Hotel Rwanda [Blu-ray] (Terry George, 2004) MGM

How I Ended This Summer (Aleksei Popogrebsky, 2010) Film Movement

I Saw the Devil [Blu-ray] (Ji-woon Kim, 2010) Magnolia

I See a Dark Stranger (Frank Launder, 1946) R2 UK Odeon Entertainment

The Illusionist [Blu-ray] (Sylvain Chomet, 2010) Sony Pictures Classics

Laputa: Castle in the Sky [Blu-ray] (Hayao Miyazaki, 1986) RB UK Elevation Sales

The Manchurian Candidate [Blu-ray] (John Frankenheimer, 1962) MGM

The Misfits [Blu-ray] (John Huston, 1961) MGM

My Neighbors the Yamadas [Blu-ray] (Isao Takahata, 1999) RB UK Elevation Sales

Patton (40th Anniversary Limited Edition) [Blu-ray Book] (Franklin J. Schaffner, 1970) - 20th Century Fox

The Paolo Sorrentino Collection (Il Divo / The Consequences of Love / The Family Friend / One Man Up) R2 UK Artificial Eye

The Pillow Book [Blu-ray] (Peter Greenaway, 1996) RB UK Park Circus

Rififi [Blu-ray] (Jules Dassin, 1955) RB UK Arrow

The Sign of the Cross (Cecil B. DeMille, 1932) Universal Studios

Some Like It Hot [Blu-ray] (Billy Wilder, 1959) MGM

Something Wild (Jonathan Demme, 1986) Criterion
Something Wild [
Blu-ray] (Jonathan Demme, 1986) Criterion

The Theo Van Gough Collection - R2 UK Network Releasing

 

 

May 16th, 2011

 

Anger aka La rabbia (Pier Paolo Pasolini, 1963) Raro Video

Araya (Margot Benacerraf, 1959) Milestone Cinematheque

Barry Lyndon [Blu-ray] (Stanley Kubrick, 1975) Region FREE DE Warner

Barry Lyndon [Blu-ray] (Stanley Kubrick, 1975) Region FREE FR Warner

Beverly Hills Cop [Blu-ray] (Martin Brest, 1984) Paramount

Bhutto (Johnny O'Hara, 2010) First Run Features

Biutiful (Alejandro González Iñárritu, 2010) R2 UK Optimum Home Entertainment

Benda Bilili! [Blu-ray] (Renaud Barret, Florent de La Tullaye, 2010) RB UK Trinity Films

The Comancheros [Blu-ray] (Michael Curtiz, 1961) 20th Century Fox

Deep Red [Blu-ray] (Dario Argento, 1975) Blue Underground

Diabolique (Henri-Georges Clouzot, 1954) Criterion
Diabolique [
Blu-ray] (Henri-Georges Clouzot, 1954) Criterion

El Cid [Blu-ray] (Anthony Mann, 1961) RB UK Anchor Bay Entertainment

Elephant White [Blu-ray] (Prachya Pinkaew, 2011) First Look Pictures

The Fall Of The Roman Empire [Blu-ray] (Anthony Mann, 1964) RB UK Anchor Bay Entertainment

Five Deadly Venoms [Blu-ray] (Cheh Chang, 1978) Weinstein Company

The Best of Global Lens: China - Dam Street, Luxury Car, Uniform, Stolen Life - First Run Features

He (Creep Creepersin, 2009) Severin

Hurry Sundown (Otto Preminger, 1967) Olive Films

The Hustler [Blu-ray] (Robert Rossen, 1961) 20th Century Fox

I Saw the Devil [Blu-ray] (Ji-woon Kim, 2010) RB UK Elevation Sales

Jagged Edge [Blu-ray] (Richard Marquand, 1985) Image Entertainment

Lolita [Blu-ray] (Stanley Kubrick, 1962) Region FREE DE Warner

Lolita [Blu-ray] (Stanley Kubrick, 1962) Region FREE FR Warner

Live Like a Cop Die Like a Man (Ruggero Deodato, 1976) Raro Video

Marriage Italian Style [Blu-ray] (Vittorio De Sica, 1964) Lorber Films

The Other Woman [Blu-ray] (Don Roos, 2011) MPI

Pale Flower (Masahiro Shinoda, 1964) Criterion
Pale Flower [
Blu-ray] (Masahiro Shinoda, 1964) Criterion

Platoon [BBlu-ray] (Oliver Stone, 1986) MGM

Romasanta: The Werewolf [Fantastic Factory Collection] (Paco Plaza, 2004) R2 UK Arrow Video

Shoeshine (Vittorio De Sica, 1946) Entertainment One

Sophia Loren: Award Collection (Yesterday, Today & Tomorrow / Marriage Italian Style / Sunflower / Vittorio D) - Lorber Films

Such Good Friends (Otto Preminger, 1971) Olive Films

Sunflower [Blu-ray] (Vittorio De Sica, 1970) Lorber Films

The Thin Red Line [Blu-ray] (Terrence Malick, 1998) RB UK 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment

Twisted Desires: Three Pink Masterpieces (3-Disc Set) - Sayuri Ichijo: Following Desire (1972), Yakuza Justice: Erotic Code Of Honor (1973) And Twisted Path Of Love (1973) - Zeitgeist Films

The Twilight Zone: Season 4 [Blu-ray] Image Entertainment

Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow [Blu-ray] (Vittorio De Sica, 1963) Lorber Films

 

 

     
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