DVDBeaver Newsletter - April 21st, 2006

 

Hello friends, This will be a short-ish newsletter with only 5 new reviews/comparisons but we will publish the 10 winners of the Criterion DVD of Louis Malle's Elevator to the Gallows' (Ascenseur pour l'échafaud) Free-Giveaway contest previously located HERE

Firstly the Answers (far too easy for our little community!):

A. Noël Calef
B. Jeanne Moreau & Jean-Claude Brialy

C. Virtual

D. Jacques-Yves Cousteau

E. 7-15515-01772-5

How the winners were chosen: All correctly answered emails were listed chronologically from the time and date I received. From the 490 correct emails - 10 random numbers were chosen corresponding to that chronology (first correct response was #1 - last was #490. The winners are listed at the bottom of the email. Thanks to everyone who participated!  

 

Upcoming Deal of the Year (remember only Amazon.UK deducts their 17% VAT from foreign orders!)

The Powell & Pressburger Collection - 9 DVD Box Set - (A Matter Of Life & Death, The Red Shoes, The Life & Death Of Colonel Blimp, A Canterbury Tale, I Know Where I'm Going, 49th Parallel, Battle Of The River Plate, Ill Met by Moonlight, They're A Weird Mob) Granada Ventures R2 UK

 

Easiest way to catch up is simply read the new Newsletter Archive HERE.

 

Recent Additions to the Release Calendar

Abhijaan (Satyajit Ray, 1962) Eureka Masters of Cinema R2 UK

Kwaidan (Masaki Kobayashi, 1964) Eureka - Master's of Cinema R2 UK

John Wayne-John Ford Film Collection (The Searchers Ultimate Edition / Stagecoach Two-Disc Special Edition / Fort Apache / The Long Voyage Home / The Wings of Eagles / She Wore a Yellow Ribbon / They Were Expendable / 3 Godfathers) - Warner Home Video

The John Ford Film Collection (Cheyenne Autumn, The Informer, Sergeant Rutledge, Mary of Scotland, The Lost Patrol) Warner Home Video

The Nymph (Lina Wertmueller, 1996) Koch Lorber Films

Nathalie... (Anne Fontaine, 2003) Koch Lorber

Dazed and Confused (Richard Linklater, 1993) Criterion Collection

The Powell & Pressburger Collection - 9 DVD Box Set - (A Matter Of Life & Death, The Red Shoes, The Life & Death Of Colonel Blimp, A Canterbury Tale, I Know Where I'm Going, 49th Parallel, Battle Of The River Plate, Ill Met by Moonlight, They're A Weird Mob) Granada Ventures R2 UK

Equinox (Jack Wood, 1970) 2-disc Criterion Collection

The Ultimate Film Noir Collection -Scarlet Street, Detour (1945), The Strange Love Of Martha Ivers, Whistle Stop (1946), He Walked By Night, Trapped (1949), Impact (1949), D.O.A. (1950), Quicksand (1950), The Hitch-Hiker (1953), Bonus - Best Of Film Noir - Passport Int'l (Vid)

The Poseidon Adventure (Special Edition) (Ronald Neame, 1972) 20th Century Fox

The Towering Inferno (Special Edition) (John Guillermin, Irwin Allen, 1974) 20th Century Fox

Earthquake (Mark Robson, 1974) Universal

Go West/The Big Store (Edward Buzzell, 1940) Warner

Room Service/At the Circus (William A. Seiter, 1938) Warner

 

RECOMMENDATIONS:  Easy work this week - In our new resolution to review less, but always the important releases we recommend all that we have reviewed. The Passenger is really the big event. Jack's commentary is colorful and the film continues to grow on me year after year. Malle's Elevator to the Gallows is primo Noir. What a magnificent debut! I knew one day I would get the long version of Kwaidan in a great transfer - I should have guessed that the boys at Masters of Cinema would be involved. Renoir's Swamp Water is not a classic but I love everything from his American period. Finally... Isabelle Hubert? Chabrol? - I'm there - Rien Ne Va Plus.

 

New Reviews:

 

Swamp Water - This is commonly known as Jean Renoir's first American film (1941), although Renoir scholar Alexander Sesonske has established that Renoir's creative role in the project was severely hampered by producer Darryl F. Zanuck and that he didn't regard much of the film as his own. (The ending, for instance, was written by Zanuck and directed by Irving Pichel.) Nevertheless, the film has certain beauties and pleasures. Part of it was shot in Georgia's Okefenokee swamp, and the treatment of the small community living nearby is often pungent and distinctive.

Rien Ne Va Plus - In this chilly thriller THE SWINDLE -- his 50th feature-- he teams contemporary star Isabelle Huppert and veteran star (of 80 films!) Michel Serrault as small time con artists. Serrault is charming in a goofy way; an irritable loner looking for laughs. Huppert now aging gracefully displays her usual cold nonchalant beauty.

Elevator to the Gallows - In his mesmerizing debut, twenty-four-year-old director Louis Malle brought together the beauty of Jeanne Moreau, the camerawork of Henri Decaë, and the now legendary score by Miles Davis. A touchstone of the careers of both its star and director, Elevator to the Gallows (Ascenseur pour l'échafaud) is a richly atmospheric thriller of mistaken identity unfolding over one tense night in Paris.

The Passenger - Michelangelo Antonioni takes his own uniquely unanswerable and elliptical look at the basic precepts of identity and truth. Character study, suspense and road picture wrapped up into one intentionally-paced masterpiece of pure cinema. Not unlike Antonioni's L'Avventura and Blow-Up we are introduced to a mystery - soon to uncover an even deeper one hidden under its emotional surface.

Kwaidan - Winner of the Special Jury Prize at Cannes, Kwaidan features four nightmarish tales adapted from Lafcadio Hearn's classic Japanese ghost stories. For this lavish, 'scope production, Kobayashi drew extensively on his own training as a student of painting and the fine arts. Indeed, the breadth of the film's poetic expression is unmatched in all of Japanese cinema: breathtakingly photographed on handpainted sets, the film is at once a miniature writ large, and an abstract wash of luminescent colors that seem to hail from another world.

 

Next 3 weeks on the Calendar:

 

Week of April 24th, 2006

The Robert Altman Collection: M*A*S*H, A Perfect Couple, Quintet, A Wedding (Altman) Fox
Blissfully Yours (Apichatpong Weerasethakul, 2002) Second Run [R2-UK]

Blood For Dracula / Flesh For Frankenstein (Morrissey, 1974) Tartan

Bogie & Bacall - The Signature Collection ( Howard Hawks : The Big Sleep, Dark Passage, Key Largo, To Have and Have Not) Warner Home Video

Classic Musicals from the Dream Factory (Ziegfeld Follies / Till the Clouds Roll By / Three Little Words / Summer Stock / It's Always Fair Weather) Warner Home Video

Come and See (Elem Klimov, 1985) Nouveaux Pictures [R2-UK]

Damnation (Bela Tarr, 1988) Facets

The Double Life of Veronique - Artificial Eye - [R2-UK]
Effi Briest (Rainer Werner Fassbinder, 1974) [R2-UK]
Elevator to the Gallows (Louis Malle, 1957) Criterion
Fists in the Pocket (Marco Bellocchio , 1965) Criterion Collection
Every Little Thing (Nicolas Philibert, 1997) Second Run [R2-UK]

Forgotten Noir, Vol. 1 - Portland Expose (Harold D. Schuster , 1957) + They Were So Young (Kurt Neumann, 1954) Vci Video

The Guard From Underground (Kiyoshi Kurosawa, 1992) Arts Magic

Guys & Dolls (Widescreen Deluxe Edition) (Joseph L. Mankiewicz, 1955) MGM

Harlan County, U.S.A. (Barbara Kopple , 1976) Criterion Collection

Heimat II: A Chronicle of a Generation (Edgar Reitz, Robert Busc,1992) Facets

The Hidden Blade (Yôji Yamada, 2004) Tartan

Hotel du Nord (Marcel Carné, 1938) Soda Pictures [R2-UK]

The Intruder (Claire Denis, 2004) Wellspring
The Kingdom (Lars Trier, 1994) Tartan [R2-UK]

Lemonade Joe (Oldrich Lipska, 1967) Facets
Lovers of the Arctic Circle (Julio Medem, 1998) Home Vision

Mother Joan of Angels (Jerzy Kawalerowicz) Polart

Night Watch (Timur Bekmambetov, 2004) 2-disc -20th Century Fox Home Entertainment
The Passenger (Antonioni, 1975) Sony Pictures
Tickets (Abbas Kiarostami/Ken Loach/Ermanno Olmi, 2005) Artificial Eye [R2-UK]

Where the Truth Lies (Atom Egoyan, 2005) R2 UK - Momentum Pictures

Yűkoku (Patriotism) (Yukio Mishima, 1966) [R2-Japan] or from YesAsia HERE

 

Week of May 1st, 2006

Baby Doll (Elia Kazan, 1956) Warner Home Video

Cat on a Hot Tin Roof DELUXE EDITION (Richard Brooks, 1958) Warner Home Video

Delicatessen (Marc Caro, Jean-Pierre Jeunet , 1992) Miramax

Go West/The Big Store (Edward Buzzell, 1940) Warner

Histoire (s) du cinéma - 4 DVD (Jean-Luc Godard) Gaumont R2 France

Night of the Iguana (John Huston, 1964) Warner Home Video

Nathalie... (Anne Fontaine, 2003) Koch Lorber

The Nymph (Lina Wertmueller, 1996) Koch Lorber Films

The Roman Spring of Mrs. Stone (Jose Quintero , 1961) Warner Home Video

Room Service/At the Circus (William A. Seiter, 1938) Warner

A Streetcar Named Desire (Elia Kazan, 1951) Warner Home Video

Sweet Bird of Youth (Richard Brooks, 1962) Warner Home Video

Tennessee Williams Film Collection (A Streetcar Named Desire 1951 Two-Disc Special Edition / Cat on a Hot Tin Roof 1958 Deluxe Edition / Sweet Bird of Youth / The Night of the Iguana / Baby Doll / The Roman Spring of Mrs. Stone) (1958) Warner Home Video

The Ultimate Film Noir Collection -Scarlet Street, Detour (1945), The Strange Love Of Martha Ivers, Whistle Stop (1946), He Walked By Night, Trapped (1949), Impact (1949), D.O.A. (1950), Quicksand (1950), The Hitch-Hiker (1953), Bonus - Best Of Film Noir - Passport Int'l (Vid)

 

Week of May 8th, 2006

Earthquake (Mark Robson, 1974) Universal

Grizzly Man (Werner Herzog, 2005) Momentum Pictures

Late Spring (Yasujiro Ozu 1949) Criterion Collection

The New World (Terrence Malick, 2006) New Line Home Video

The Poseidon Adventure (Special Edition) (Ronald Neame, 1972) 20th Century Fox

The Towering Inferno (Special Edition) (John Guillermin, Irwin Allen, 1974) 20th Century Fox

 

Best to all!

Gary

 

P.S. Seems on tap - Godard's Histoire(s) du cinéma - 4 DVD Boxset from Gaumont Columbia Tri-Star Home Video listed for May 4th, 2006! HERE

 

P.P.S. - We notice prices are slowly increasing (%'s just updated) - nab while you can...:

Summer With Monika (60% off), The Gospel According To St. Matthew (46% off), Jamon Jamon (60% off), Les Amants Du Pont-Neuf (65% off), Girl on the Bridge (70% off), Baise-Moi (56% off), The Seventh Seal (65% off), Central Station (62% off), Kes (56% off), The Adventures Of Priscilla Queen Of The Desert (2-disc) (70% off), Amelie (Two Disc Special Edition) [DTS] (72% 0ff), Pedro Almodovar Collection: Bad Education / Tie Me Up, Tie Me Down / Live Flesh / All About My Mother / Talk To Her (58% off), Visconti's Conversation Piece (61% off), The Fallen Idol (43% off), Sherlock Holmes - The Definitive Collection (54% off), Katherine Hepburn - 6-disc Screen Goddess Boxset (52% off), Rita Hayworth - 6-disc Screen Goddess Boxset (52% off), Barbara Stanwyck - 6-disc Screen Goddess Boxset (52% off), Sophia Loren - 6-disc Screen Goddess Collection (52% off), Marilyn Monroe - 6-disc Screen Goddess Boxset (52% off)

 

The TEN Elevator to the Gallows winners (you will be contacted by email) are:

Peter from Cheshire, CT

Wouter from the Netherlands
Andy from Kennesaw GA

Dag S. from Norway

Brian P. B. from Seattle, WA

Jonathan from Mesquite, Tx

Stefan M. from Barcelona

Kieran from Sausalito, CA

Matthias from Bonn, Germany

Gregory from Vancouver, B.C.

 

We will try to do more in the future!