Newsletter - FOR THE WEEK

OF July 15th, 2019

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Halito! More Summer Blu-rays reviewed this week by Criterion, Kino, Eureka, Second Sight, Sony, Universal, Shout! Factory, Ammo Content,... of films directed by Francis Ford Coppola, Rainer Werner Fassbinder, David Mamet, Luc Besson , Chan-wook Park, Joseph Newman, Jack Arnold, Roy Ward Baker, Alberto Cavalcanti, Charles Crichton, Basil Dearden, Robert Hamer, José Ferrer, Peter Duffell and others. Our Calendar has last week's updates of films-to-Blu-ray by directors Elia Kazan, Fred Zinnemann, Alain Resnais, Samuel Fuller, Abbas Kiarostami, Mario Bava, Herbert Wilcox, Leo McCarey, Bertrand Blier, Gerry Anderson, Sylvia Anderson, Manoel de Oliveira, Peter Collinson, Aldo Lado, Derek Jarman, Harold Pinter, Derek Jarman, Carlos Reygadas and more. We also have our Feature Blu-ray and 4K UHD posted for JULY Enjoy!!

LISTING PAGES:

Cinema of Japan, Discs of the Year for 2018, The TOP 100 DISCS, Ingmar Bergman's Cinema, HAGSPloitation, BLAXPloitation, OZPloitation, 'WOMEN IN PRISON' CINEMA, CREATURE-FEATURES (on Blu-ray!), PRE-CODE FILMs (on Blu-ray!), SILENT ERA FILMs (on Blu-ray!), HAMMER Studios (on Blu-ray!) The 100 BEST Neo-Noirs (on Blu-ray!), The GREATEST 100 Westerns (on Blu-ray!), Giallo on Blu-ray!, ESSENTIAL NOIR on Blu-ray!, Shopping Guide for Blu-rays at Amazon.FR (France), Shopping Guide for Blu-rays at Amazon.DE (Germany) and our LATEST ARTICLES: Movies From... the End of the World,  The Beauties of Star Trek (TOS)

Feature Blu-ray and 4K UHD chosen for the Month of JULY!

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ONE VOICE (not Ellsworth Monkton Toohey): Francis Ford Coppola's Bram Stoker's Dracula in 4K UHD is an immersive presentation of a brilliant film. The Ultra High Resolution visuals add another layer to the film's period representation. Joseph Newman's This Island Earth come to Shout! Factory in the most complete Blu-ray package to date for this quintessential 50's science-fiction gem. This is the definitive home theatre presentation. One of my absolute favorites of the 50's sci-fi flics. Part of their BRD Trilogy Blu-ray package, Criterion's transfer of Rainer Werner Fassbinder Lola (1981) via a vibrant new 4K restoration. Dead of Night is considered one of the greatest horror anthology films; five stories of supernatural terror from four different directors on a new Kino Blu-ray restored in 4K from original archival materials. It has a Tim Lucas commentary and we give it a very strong recommendation! David Mamet's The Spanish Prisoner is a film I have re-watched the most - and despite the bare-bone status the new Blu-ray notches ahead of the very old DVD. Luc Besson's Lucy is one of the more incredible pieces of cinema eye-candy in recent years and in 4K UHD it's a total visual feast, with an expressive Scarlett Johansson, of an intriguing science-fiction film. It produces a great night in the home theatre. Chan-wook Park's Thirst is a vital and keen reworking of vampirism and is on a visually imperfect new Blu-ray from Kino. Eureka of the UK bring us a new Blu-ray of The Cockleshell Heroes is a superior action-war effort. It showcases a less-exposed unit (The British version of the Navy Seals) at the height of the Second World War. Asylum is another chilling horror anthology from Amicus starring Peter Cushing, Herbert Lom and Britt Ekland, while The House That Dripped Blood is another collection of horror shorts with Cushing, Christopher Lee and Ingrid Pitt. The latter written by Psycho author Robert Bloch and both are on new Second Sight Blu-ray with a wealth of supplements.

“To be a legend, you've either got to be dead or excessively old!.” ― Christopher Lee

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The House That Dripped Blood BD - A Scotland Yard detective investigates a mysterious mansion with a ghoulish history and a chilling fate for its occupants in these four tales of terror. One of the classic Amicus anthologies written by Psycho author Robert Bloch and starring Peter Cushing, Christopher Lee and Ingrid Pitt. Blu-ray Release Date: July 29th, 2019

The Spanish Prisoner BD - Joe Ross is a rising star. He's designed a process that will make his company millions. He wants a bonus for this work, but fears his boss will stiff him. He meets a wealthy stranger, Jimmy Dell, and they strike up an off-kilter friendship. When the boss seems to set Ross up to get nothing, he seeks Dell's help. Then he learns Dell is not what he seems, so he contacts an FBI agent through his tightly-wound assistant, Susan Ricci. The FBI asks him to help entrap Dell. He accepts, a sting is arranged, but suddenly it's he who's been conned out of the process and framed for murder. Bewildered and desperate, he enlists Susan's aid to prove his innocence. Blu-ray Release Date: June 25th, 2019

Bram Stoker's Dracula 4K UHD - From the moment Dracula (Oldman) trails a bloodied razor across his tongue with a look of ecstasy, you know that this version, going back to source in Stoker's novel, isn't going to offer a silver-tongued bloodsucker hovering over swooning damsels. In the opening sequences, Dracula's soul-mate Elisabeta (Ryder) commits suicide in the mistaken belief that he had died in battle. Forsaking God, he seems doomed to an endless existence of guilt and loneliness, until lawyer Jonathan Harker (Reeves) shows him a picture of his fiancée, who just happens to be the spitting image of Elisabeta. A gorgeous, stylised adaptation, full of visual tricks and dazzling camerawork, this places the emphasis firmly on perverse, rampant eroticism. 4K Ultra HD Release Date:October 3rd, 2017

This Island Earth BD - Let us start with a plot that rarely gets more appealing for a young adventure-seeking lad of any era: Dr. Cal Meacham (played by tall, dark and absurdly deep-voiced actor Rex Reason) is a handsome scientist, able to dabble in nuclear energy and expertly pilot jet planes. Cal and his Jimmy Olson-like sidekick Joe, played by Robert Nichols, have received a strange metal-paged instruction manual on how to build an "interocitor". This reviewer looks skyward rubbing his jaw as an eerie sequence of single organ notes plays in the background "hmmmm... interocitor you say". Blu-ray Release Date: July 9th, 2019

Lucy 4K UHD - Starting with the provocative premise – that human beings use only 10% of their brain capacity – this is strictly science fiction. Filmmaker Luc Besson knew that this percentage figure was inaccurate, yet plunged ahead with his inventive adventure, revolving around a naïve young American named Lucy (Scarlett Johansson) who gets tricked into delivering a mysterious metal briefcase to a Taiwanese crime boss, Mr. Jang (South Korean actor Choi Min Sik), and forced to become one of his drug mules. When she’s repeatedly kicked in the gut, there’s leakage from the bag of blue crystals, a narcotic known as CPH4, that’s been surgically inserted in her abdomen, and a metamorphosis occurs: Lucy becomes superhuman. Determined not only to wreak primal revenge on her captors but also to acquire more and more knowledge, employing her increasing array of powers and skills – she contacts Professor Norman (Morgan Freeman), a neuroscientist who is lecturing about cerebral capacity at a university in Paris. 4K Ultra HD Release Date: August 9th, 2016

Asylum BD - When Doctor Martin arrives for a job interview at a secluded asylum for the incurable insane, he must prove himself by listening to the macabre tales of four inmates and deducing which is the former head of the facility who suffered a breakdown. One of the most chilling anthologies of terror from Amicus starring Peter Cushing, Robert Powell, Herbert Lom and Britt Ekland. Blu-ray Release Date: July 29th, 2019

Thirst BD - Sang-hyun, a priest working for a hospital, selflessly volunteers for a secret vaccine development project intended to eradicate a deadly virus. However, the virus eventually takes over the priest. He nearly dies, but makes a miraculous recovery by an accidental transfusion of vampire blood. He realizes his sole reason for living: the pleasures of the flesh. Blu-ray Release Date: June 18th, 2019

The Cockleshell Heroes BD - A British major leads a suicide mission to take out a German shipyard in occupied France in The Cockleshell Heroes (1955). This war movie marked the American film debut of Trevor Howard and it was also the second directorial effort for actor Jose Ferrer who also had the starring role. Irving Allen and Albert R. Broccoli, one of the producers of the James Bond film series, joined forces to produce this film for Warwick Pictures and Columbia which was an expensive motion picture for its time. Blu-ray Release Date: July 15th, 2019

Dead of Night BD - Considered the greatest horror anthology film, the classic British chiller Dead of Night features five stories of supernatural terror from four different directors, yet it ultimately feels like a unified whole. The framing device is simple but unsettling, as a group of strangers find themselves inexplicably gathered at an isolated country estate, uncertain why they have come. The topic of conversation soon turns to the world of dreams and nightmares, and each guest shares a frightening event from his/her own past. Many of these tales have become famous, including Basil Dearden's opening vignette about a ghostly driver with "room for one more" in the back of his hearse. Equally eerie are Robert Hamer's look at a haunted antique mirror that gradually begins to possess its owner's soul, and Alberto Cavalcanti's ghost story about a mysterious young girl during a Christmas party. Legendary Ealing comedy director Charles Crichton lightens the mood with an amusing interlude about the spirit of a deceased golfer haunting his former partner, leaving viewers vulnerable to Cavalcanti's superb and much-imitated closing segment, about a ventriloquist (Michael Redgrave) slowly driven mad when his dummy appears to come to life. Deservedly acclaimed and highly influential, Dead of Night's episodic structure inspired an entire genre of lesser imitators. Kino Blu-ray Release date: July 9th, 2019

Lola (1981) BD - Germany in the autumn of 1957: Lola (Barbara Sukowa), a seductive cabaret singer–prostitute, exults in her power as a tempter of men, but she wants more—money, property, and love. Pitting a corrupt building contractor (Mario Adorf) against the new straight-arrow building commissioner (Armin Mueller-Stahl), Lola launches an outrageous plan to elevate herself in a world where everything—and everyone—is for sale. Shot in childlike candy colors, Rainer Werner Fassbinder’s Lola, an homage to Josef von Sternberg’s classic The Blue Angel, is a wonderfully satirical tribute to capitalism. Blu-ray Release Date: July 9th, 2019
 

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