Newsletter - FOR THE WEEK OF July 20th, 2009

 

This Week's Highlights

Zdravo! - 11  Blu-rays covered this week. Firstly be sure to check out the 50% OFF Criterion SALE below! It's an eclectic mix this week (Duh) but a few highly impressive titles surfaced.  There are some extensive Calendar Updates, sales and another, relatively easy, new contest, and more.....
TOOLBAR - NEW BUTTONS ADDED! (you spoke - we listened) - 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!)
July 20th CONTEST - identify the clip on the CONTEST PAGE to win a brand new Blu-ray of Jailhouse Rock-  Best of luck all!
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If there are DVD titles you'd like us to cover - please feel free to recommend!

Gary at 2ze dot com

  NEW SALES

• BIG SALE ON CRITERIONs at AMAZON (Blu, Pre-order and others): El Norte [Blu-ray] (50% OFF!), The 400 Blows [Blu-ray] (50% OFF!), The Last Emperor [Blu-ray] (50% OFF!), The Man Who Fell to Earth [Blu-ray] (50% OFF!), Ace in the Hole (41% OFF!), Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas (40% OFF!), Last Year at Marienbad [Blu-ray] (50% OFF!), Wages of Fear [Blu-ray] (50% OFF!), The Seventh Seal [Blu-ray] (50% OFF!), The Third Man [Blu-ray] (50% OFF!), Chungking Express [Blu-ray] (50% OFF!), The Last Metro [Blu-ray] (50% OFF!), Bottle Rocket [Blu-ray] (37% OFF!)

$14.99 Blu-ray SALE - 96 titles to choose HERE

Amazon UK Blu-ray SUMMER SALE HERE

Use Amazon code SONYPIC5 for $5 off Dr. Strangelove on Blu-ray

• Use Amazon code GHOSTBLU for $5 off Ghostbusters on Blu-ray

Blu-rays from only £8.98 at Amazon UK HERE

• 36% OFF CRITERION FAVORITES HERE

• WORLD CINEMA SALE STILL ON - UP To 70% OFF HERE

• SALES: US Blu-ray up to 53% OFF        UK Blu-ray 2 for 3 SALE       Amazon France Blu-ray SALE (BUY 1 get 1 FREE!)

LATEST ADDITIONS to the Calendar: (PRE-ORDER & save!):

The Rita Hayworth Film Collection (Cover Girl, 1944 - Tonight and Every Night, 1945 - Gilda, 1946 - Salome, 1953, Miss Sadie Thompson, 1953) - Sony Pictures

The William Castle Film Collection (Homicidal (1961), Mr. Sardonicus (1961), Zotz! (1962), The Old Dark House (1963), 13 Ghosts (1960), 13 Frightened Girls! (1963) and Strait-Jacket (1964) - Sony Pictures

The Sam Fuller Film Collection (It Happened in Hollywood (1937), Adventure in Sahara (1938), Power of the Press (1943), Shockproof (1949), Scandal Sheet (1952), The Crimson Kimono (1959) and Underworld U.S.A. (1961) - Sony Pictures

12 Monkeys [Blu-ray] (Terry Gilliam, 1995) MCAV9

For All Mankind [Blu-ray] (Al Reinert, 1989) - R'B' UK - Eureka MoC

The Prisoner - Complete Series [Blu-ray] (1967)- R'B' UK – Network

Star Trek: The Original Series Remastered Season 2 [Blu-ray] - (most probably Region FREE) UK – Paramount

The Exiles (Kent MacKenzie, 1961) R2 UK BFI

The Pursuit of Happiness (Robert Mulligan, 1971) Sony Pictures

The Wizard of Oz (70th Anniversary Ultimate Collector's Edition) (Victor Fleming, 1939) - Warner Home Video

The Wizard of Oz (70th Anniversary Ultimate Collector's Edition) [Blu-ray] (Victor Fleming, 1939) - Warner Home Video

Army of Darkness Screwhead Edition [Blu-ray] (Sam Raimi, 1992) Universal

An American Werewolf in London Full Moon [Blu-ray] (John Landis, 1981) Universal

Star Trek XI (3-Disc Edition) [Blu-ray] (Exclusive to Amazon.co.uk) (J.J. Abrams, 2009) - (most probably Region FREE) UK – Paramount

Van Helsing [Blu-ray] (Stephen Sommers, 2004) Universal

Hot Fuzz [Blu-ray] (Edgar Wright, 2007) Universal

Shaun of the Dead [Blu-ray] (Edgar Wright, 2004) Universal

A Charlie Brown Christmas Deluxe Edition [Blu-ray] Warner

Horton Hears a Who (1970) [Blu-ray] Warner

Snatch [Blu-ray] (Guy Ritchie, 2000) Sony

How To Be A Man (Classic Educational Shorts Volume 1) (1949-1970) – Kino

British Cinema: Renown Pictures Comedy Collection: (Where There's A Will, Down Among the Z Men, Love In Pawn, Those People Next Door, No Smoking, Not So Dusty) – VCI

The Hanging Woman (Jose Luis Merino, 1972) Troma

How the Grinch Stole Christmas (1966): Deluxe Edition [Blu-ray] – Warner

Kabei (Yoji Yamada, 2008) Strand Releasing

Golden Age Noir 2 (1956 - 8 features starring Lee Marvin, Vincent Price, Dick Powell etc.) - Raunchy Tonk

Black Rain (Shohei Imamura, 1989) Animeigo

Fados (Carlos Saura, 2007) Zeitgeist Films

Sick Girl (Special Edition DVD) (Eben McGarr, 2007) Synapse Films

The Barbara Stanwyck Show, Vol. 1 (1960) - E1 Entertainment

A Walk In The Sun (Lewis Milestone, 1945) VCI Entertainment

Trouble the Water (Carl Deal + Tia Lessin, 2008) Zeitgeist Films

Momitsu BDP-899 -Region FREE Blu-ray Player advertised as the World's first truly region freeBlu-ray and DVD player. See the Beaver scoop on this incredible new product.
  REGION FREE Blu-ray PLAYER!

 

ONE VOICE (not Ellsworth Monkton Toohey):  Bill Douglas' Comrades gets the most authoritative nod this week - a Region-FREE Blu-ray must-own! It's pretty hard not to succumb to Redford's picturesque A River Run Through It - and those Blu-ray looping video supplements are wonderful. I got a huge kick out of the Kreskin-esque The Great Buck Howard - pure amusement. Coraline must surely be recognized as well for it's unique digital animation charm. The visuals alone of 300 "Complete Experience" are fascinating to behold. Irwin Allen's The Towering Inferno fits you right into the 70's disaster-flic mode with close to 3-hours of flammable celebrity stunts. Leonard gives a thumbs up for The Diary of Anne Frank but I think we better hold-off on Severin's transfer of The Inglorious Bastards. It's a shame that great cinema like The Others and Atonement aren't ready for us to purchase their Blu-ray renditions. Midnight Express  remains harrowing and the Blu-ray is up to snuff.

  THIS WEEK's REVIEWS / COMPARISONS
 

The Towering Inferno BR - Hot off the heels of the success of "The Poseidon Adventure," producer Irwin Allen chose to follow up that seaworthy disaster epic with yet another excursion in peril: "The Towering Inferno," which went on to become an even bigger box office success than its predecessor, and remains to this day one of the most suspenseful and potent thrillers ever to come from a Hollywood studio. Much like the circumstances surrounding the Titanic disaster, those which enshroud the sudden and deadly fire that engulfs the newly-built Glass Tower in San Francisco stem from one thing: human arrogance. The building's owner (William Holden) is convinced that nothing can bring his structure to its knees, despite the knowledge that his son-in-law (Richard Chamberlain) was behind the decision to use faulty electrical wiring. Even with the warnings of the tower's chief architect (Paul Newman), who takes every opportunity to advise against holding off the dedication ceremony until a later date, the gala still goes on as planned, resulting in the entrapment of hundreds of people 135 stories up, with the flames chewing up their precious little time for a rescue effort. Blu-ray Release Date: July 14th, 2009

The Great Buck Howard
BR - I love this town!" he shouts with outstretched arms in Akron, and Akron still loves him. He is famous for his "signature effect," in which his evening's fee is given to an audience member, and he uses his psychic powers to find it. He has never failed, and no one has ever discovered how he does it. Buck was named "The Great" by Carson and still maintains a facade of Greatness, even in front of Troy (Colin Hanks, Tom's son), his newly hired road manager. Malkovich invests him with self-importance and yet slyly suggests it's not all an act; you believe at some level Buck really does love that town, and also when he says, as he always does, "I love you people!". Blu-ray Release date: July 21st, 2009

A River Run Through It
BR - Academy Award-winner Robert Redford (Best Director, Ordinary People, 1980) captures the majesty of the Montana wilderness and the strength of the American family in this acclaimed adaptation of Norman Maclean's classic memoir. Craig Sheffer stars as the young Norman, and Brad Pitt stars as his brother Paul, an irresistible daredevil driven to challenge the world. Growing up, both boys rebel against their stern minister father. While Norman channels his rebellion into writing, Paul descends a slippery path to self-destruction. Co-starring Tom Skerritt as the Reverend Maclean and Emily Lloyd as wild-hearted Jessie Burns. Blu-ray Release date: July 28th, 2009

Comrades
BR - It's odd if rather touching to know that a man can secure a place in artistic history with such a small body of work. While others might have done much more, Douglas' awesome autobiographical trilogy (My Childhood from 1972, My Ain Folk from 1973 and My Way Home from 1978) combined with Comrades has earned him a love and affection denied his more prolific contemporaries. A Scot resident in Devon, Douglas' love of the area and its history and his interest in the working men of today and yesteryear made him the perfect man to make Comrades. At first glance, the film with its running time and starry cast might seem like any other epic, but this is a picture very much in the Douglas mould. Where other directors might have used the Tolpuddle story as the backdrop for a Thomas Hardy-esque tale of thwarted passion, Douglas saw a less romantic but more compelling story about hard graft and social injustice. Blu-ray Release date: July 27th, 2009

Coraline
BR - Based on Neil Gaiman’s international best-selling book and helmed by The Nightmare Before Christmas director Henry Selick, is the first high definition, stop-motion animated feature to be shot in 3D. In the film, a young girl (voiced by Dakota Fanning) walks through a secret door in her new home and discovers an alternate version of her life. On the surface, this parallel reality is eerily similar to her real life--only much better. But when this wondrously off-kilter, fantastical adventure turns dangerous, and her counterfeit other mother (voiced by Teri Hatcher) tries to keep her forever, Coraline must count on her stubborn determination, bravery, the aid of her neighbours and a talking black cat to save her real parents and some ghost children and to get back home. Blu-ray Release date: July 21st, 2009

The Diary of Anne Frank
BR - Stevens made a number of important decisions about his production: to film it in black & white, to keep mostly to a single set – more like the play and less like a typical movie – and to use an unknown in the part of Anne. That turned out to be teen model Millie Perkins (who, in the movie, at times bears a fascinating resemblance to Giant and A Place in the Sun star, Elizabeth Taylor). Millie went on to a career in TV, seen most recently in 2006 in The Young and the Restless. Joseph Schildkraut as Otto provides the rudder for the film; Millie, the heart and soul. Not a trained actress, she acquits herself quite well. The film, though bordering on sentimentality, is nonetheless a moving and sometimes suspenseful portrait of affection, humanity, dreams and loss. Blu-ray Release date: June 16th, 2009

300 "Complete Experience"
BR - 300 is nothing if not breathtakingly gorgeous to look at, providing you don’t look too closely. It's a master class in the melding of a certain school of graphic art and cinema, as much indebted to Frank Frazetta as Frank Miller. The trailers that I saw prior to the movie's release gave the impression that it was pretty much all battles, with lots of Matrix-like slow- and stop-motion. I thought two hours of that would be slightly less painful than an IRS audit so, naturally, I submitted. I was surprised to find that a considerable part of the movie was involved with local politics. The dialogue that supported the film was - except for the all the proclamations about Freedom, which I personally found hard to swallow, given the manifest lack of it – not at all embarrassing to listen to. In short, I felt my money and time was not wasted. Re-watching the film on this Blu-ray edition, I found myself liking the movie more, once my original resistances had run their course. Blu-ray Release date: July 21st, 2009

The Inglorious Bastards
BR - "Whatever THE DIRTY DOZEN did," screamed the ads, "they do it dirtier!" INGLORIOUS BASTARDS is more than just the inspiration for Quentin Tarantino's long-rumored next movie; this 1978 international smash remains perhaps the biggest and most badass war movie in EuroCult history! Blu-ray Release Date: July 28th, 2009

The Others
BR - What you will get with The Others, however, are some of the creepiest, most atmospheric chills to permeate a cinema screen for years - for by choosing the unseen over the blatant, swapping graphic violence and gruesome murder for self-closing doors and self-playing pianos, and spilling not a single drop of blood along the way, Amenabar has created a haunting, imaginative shocker which is likely to rattle around in your brain for days after. Blu-ray Release Date: July 7th, 2009

Atonement
BR - The hat trick of Ian McEwan’s 2001 novel, Atonement, was spinning a typical English country-estate melodrama while simultaneously deconstructing trad Brit lit and equating the writing process with divine providence. Successfully translating these ideas to the screen, however, seemed as likely as Heathcliff coming to a happy ending. Which makes Joe Wright’s big-screen version all the more impressive: He’s produced a gripping, romantic yarn without sacrificing the source’s meta-examination of fiction’s power. Not even the director’s swooning take on Pride & Prejudice (2005) could have prepared folks for this. Blu-ray Release Date: August 5th, 2008

Midnight Express
BR - Forever embroiled in controversy, Midnight Express divides viewers into opposing camps: those who think it's one of the most intense real-life dramas ever made, and those who abhor its manipulative tactics and alteration of facts for the exploitative purpose of achieving a desired effect. That effect is powerfully achieved, regardless of how you may feel about director Alan Parker and Oscar®-winning screenwriter Oliver Stone's interpretation of the story of Billy Hayes. Blu-ray Release date: July 21st, 2009

 

Next 3 weeks on the Calendar

 

Week of July 20th, 2009

2 or 3 Things I Know About Her (2 ou 3 choses que je sais d’elle) (Jean-Luc Godard, 1967) - Criterion Collection

9 Songs [Blu-ray (Michael Winterbottom, 2004) R'B' - Optimum Home Entertainment

An Empress and the Warriors (Ching Siu Tung, 2008) - Weinstein Company

Anti-Clock (Jane Arden + Jack Bond, 1980) R2 UK BFI Video
Anti-Clock [Blu-ray] (Jane Arden + Jack Bond, 1980) R'B' UK BFI Video

Coraline (Henry Selick, 2009) Universal Studios

Coraline [Blu-ray] (Henry Selick, 2009) Universal Studios

Echelon Conspiracy (Greg Marcks, 2009) Paramount

Echelon Conspiracy [Blu-ray] (Greg Marcks, 2009) Paramount

The Great Buck Howard [Blu-ray] (Sean McGinly, 2008) Magnolia

Made in U.S.A. (Jean-Luc Godard, 1966) - Criterion Collection

Midnight Express [Blu-ray] (Alan Parker, 1978) Sony Pictures

Prison Break: The Final Break [Blu-ray] - 20th Century Fox

The Unknown Woman (Giuseppe Tornatore, 2006) Image Entertainment

Watchmen (Director's Cut) [Blu-ray] (Amazon Digital Bundle + Digital Copy and BD-Live) (Zack Snyder, 2009) - Warner

Watchmen (Director's Cut) [Blu-ray] (Amazon Exclusive Nite Owl Ship) - ( Zack Snyder, 2009) Warner Home Video

Week of July 27th, 2009

The 10th Victim (Elio Petri, 1965) Blue Underground

12 Monkeys [Blu-ray] (Terry Gilliam, 1995) MCAV9

A River Runs Through It [Blu-ray] (Robert Redford, 1992) Sony Pictures

Bad Boy Bubby [Blu-ray] (Rolf de Heer, 1993) Blue Underground

Battlestar Galactica: The Complete Series - Universal Studios

Battlestar Galactica: The Complete Series [Blu-ray] - Universal Studios

Becoming Charley Chase - VCI Entertainment

Bill Douglas Trilogy [Blu-ray] (My Childhood, My Ain Folk, My Way Home) R'B' UK BFI

Comrades (Bill Douglas, 1986) R2 UK BFI

Comrades [Blu-ray] (Bill Douglas, 1986) R'B' UK BFI

Eagles Over London [Blu-ray] (Enzo G. Castellari, 1970) Severin Films

Green Lantern: First Flight (DC Universe) [Blu-ray] (Lauren Montgomery, 2009) Warner

The Hal Hartley Collection (Trust / Henry Fool / The Girl From Monday) R2 UK Artificial Eye

Il Divo (Paolo Sorrentino, 2008) R2 UK Artificial Eye

Inglorious Bastards [Blu-ray] (Enzo G. Castellari, 1978) Severin Films

Monsters, Inc. [Blu-ray] (Pete Docter, 2001) R'B' Walt Disney Studios

Repulsion (Roman Polanski, 1965) - Criterion Collection

Repulsion [Blu-ray] (Roman Polanski, 1965) - Criterion Collection

Torso (Sergio Martino, 1973) Blue Underground

 

Week of August 3rd, 2009

Big Trouble in Little China [Blu-ray] (John Carpenter, 1986) 20th Century Fox

Frozen Land (Aku Louhimies, 2005) Olive Films

Icons Of Screwball Comedy, Vol. 1 (2-disc) - If You Could Only Cook (1935), Too Many Husbands (1940), My Sister Eileen (1942), She Wouldn't Say Yes (1945), and Ain't Love Cuckoo (1946)- Sony
Icons Of Screwball Comedy, Vol. 2 (2-disc) - First, Theodora Goes Wild (1936), The Doctor Takes a Wife (1940), A Night to Remember (1943) Together Again (1944) - Sony

King Kong [Blu-ray] (John Guillermin, 1976) Universal Aus/Zoom

The Last Starfighter [Blu-ray] (Nick Castle, 1984) Universal Studios

Leaving Las Vegas [Blu-ray] (Mike Figgis, 1995) Universal Aus/Zoom

Lucky Star (Frank Borzage, 1929) R2 UK BFI

My Cousin Vinny [Blu-ray] (Jonathan Lynn, 1992) 20th Century Fox

The Mysteries of Pittsburgh [Blu-ray] (Rawson Marshall Thurber, 2008) Peace Arch Home Entertainment

Penny Points To Paradise/Let's Go Crazy (Anthony Young, 1951) - R'B' BFI

Seventh Heaven (Frank Borzage, 1927) R2 UK BFI

Sling Blade [Blu-ray] (Billy Bob Thornton, 1996) Miramax

The Soloist [Blu-ray] (Joe Wright, 2008) Dreamworks Video

The Window (Carlos Sorin, 2008) Film Movement

Winstanley [Blu-ray] (Kevin Brownlow, 1975) R'B' - BFI


     
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