It must be time to preorder for October because all the horror movies are getting announced for Blu-ray. You’ll want to clear some space on your shelves in advance for those, but we’ll have to get through some new releases first.
Walter Salles’s road movie should look exquisite on Blu-ray, especially because he made it a point to shoot on 35mm film. Depending how it is transferred to HD, the grain itself could give the cross-country locations a unique look. No extras are mentioned as of yet, but even if they just save the space for a primo transfer of the movie, that would be just fine.
Sofia Coppola’s ode to the Facebook generation should like shiny and sparkly on Blu-ray. Mixing some actual online footage with cinematography by the late Harris Savides, Coppola gave the true-life crime story the glamorous movie of the perpetrators’ dreams.
The bonus features seem to be going with the celebrity hype angle. In “Scene of the Crime with Paris Hilton,” I am to infer that Hilton is featured taking us back through the break-in at her house? “Tabloid Culture,” with author of the Vanity Fair article Nancy Jo Sales, might give us a more journalistic angle on the story. There is also a traditional “making of” and trailer, but no Coppola commentary.
A quick notice from Well Go USA, a top distributor of Asian Cinema on Blu-ray, The Last Tycoon has Chow Yun-Fat and Sammo Hung, directed by Wong Jing. As a fan of Hong Kong cinema, I’m excited just to see a new movie from this talent. Chow plays real life gangster Cheng Daqui, and Hung plays his crime mentor. It’s likely this may be more drama than action, but I’m willing to take that chance.
Halloween is one of those movies that gets re-released an unusual number of times, like the Evil Dead movies and Blade Runner. It makes sense. It’s an A-list title for distributors who typically deal with films with much smaller fan bases. I don’t think it’s news that director John Carpenter came back to support this release. It’s his baby, but getting Jamie Lee Curtis on board is a coup, almost as big as getting her to do Halloween H20 and then Halloween Resurrection to give way to Busta Rhymes kickboxing Michael Myers.
I actually never saw the Halloween Blu-ray so I don’t know how it looked or if it needed this new HD transfer supervised by Dean Cundey. Aren’t cinematographers usually involved in the transfers? If not, what the hell? The new commentary with Carpenter and Curtis should be fun because Curtis will say anything. There’s also a new Jamie Lee Curtis featurette in HD (as opposed to standard def for the extras), “On Location,” which may be the feature from the 25th anniversary DVD, and trailers, TV and radio spots, and additional scenes from the TV version which have been incorporated in previous DVD editions. The new picture on the cover is nice too.
Scream Factory announced their bonus features for their John Carpenter release, the zombie Satan movie Prince of Darkness. Going head to head with Halloween, Prince has the benefit of a Blu-ray debut, and there’s no reason to believe that Carpenter fans won’t get both movies.
The bonus features include a Carpenter commentary, an all new interview with Carpenter, an all new interview with Alice Cooper, an all new interview with actor and VFX supervisor Robert Grasmere, a look at the score with Alan Howarth, an episode of “Horror’s Hallowed Grounds” on location, an alternate opening from the TV version and the trailer.
Shout! Factory Acquires ITV Library
Falling under the category of industry news, Shout! Factory announced a distribution agreement with ITV Studios Global Entertainment to release a slew of titles on home video, which should include some Blu-ray debuts. Films include Sophie’s Choice, On Golden Pond, Saturn 3, Capricorn One and The Boys From Brazil. Many of these films had studio distribution theatrically, but seem to have been all over the place on VHS and DVD. Shout! is a nice new home that will hopefully result in good transfers and bonus features.
Last Unicorn had a Blu-ray already but many of those are A-list movies that need to be in the high-definition format. Sophie’s Choice is of course the Meryl Streep holocaust drama. On Golden Pond is Henry and Jane Fonda with Katharine Hepburn and Dabney Coleman in a family drama. Capricorn One is a really cool government conspiracy thriller. Boys from Brazil is a movie I never saw about cloning Hitler, a fascinating and terrifying dramatic prospect. I’ll finally see it on Blu-ray. Saturn 3 is a space station robot thriller with Farrah Fawcett, Kirk Douglas and Harvey Keitel. There were many more titles on the ITV list but these are some primo ones to make us clear some shelf space early.
Fred Topel is a staff writer at CraveOnline and the man behind Shelf Space Weekly. Follow him on Twitter at @FredTopel.
