Between the Christmas releases and the Halloween
horrors, this week is getting mighty full of releases.
The good news is, many of them are high quality.
First, the genre releases:
- 3rd
Rock From
The Sun – Season Two: The adventures of Tom, Dick,
Harry and Sally
continue. I never could figure out why an
archeologist and a
physicist shared an office, though. - American
Gothic: I’ll go on about this at length in the
“Pick of the Week”
section below. - Avenger
– The
Complete Collection: For the anime fans. - Battle
of the
Worlds: A 1961 film starring Claude Rains. I’ve
never heard of it
before. - Bewitched:
This is the movie from earlier this year. - Bewitched
–
The Complete Second Season: This is the colorized
version of the
old TV series. - Bewitched
–
The Complete Second Season: This is the black and
white version of
the old TV series. - Billy
the Kid
vs. Dracula: I know this by reputation only. If
you own a copy of
Plan 9 From Outer Space, this may be of
interest to you. - Cowboy
Bebop
Complete Sessions Vol. 1-6: An Amazon.com
exclusive collection. - Danger
Mouse:
Complete Seasons 3 and 4: The series that launched
Count Duckula. - Day
of the
Triffids: This 1963 film stars Howard Keel and
Nicole Maurey. - Dracula
vs. Frankenstein: Another horror flick just in
time for Halloween. - Flash
Gordan
Conquers the Universe Volumes 1 and 2: Starring
the remarkable
Buster Crabbe. - Flash
Gordan
Vol. 2: This stars Steve Holland. - The
Flesh
Eaters: The Amazon user comments indicate that
this horror film
is the edited for television version. - Ghost
in the
Shell – Stand Alone Complex Official Log DVD/Guide
Book: This
looks like a set of extras for the fans. - Gorgo:
The
monster movie. In Technicolor! - Horror
Planet: I vaguely recall hearing about this. - House
of Wax
(1953) / House of Wax (2005): A double pack of the
original and
remake. - House
of Wax
(2005): A release of just the remake. - Incident
on a
Dark Street / Incubus: I don’t know about the
first title, but the
second title was reviewed some time
ago. It still
stands as the only Esperanto language film produced
out of Hollywood,
and stars a pre-Trek William Shatner. Written and
directed by The
Outer Limits creator Leslie Stevens. - Invasion
Earth
– The War Has Begun: Six episodes on 2 DVDs. - Jesse
James
meets Frankenstein’s Daughter: I’m guessing this
isn’t a romantic
comedy. It’s probably very funny, but not the way the
filmmakers
wanted it to be. - Kino’s
Journey
– The Complete Collection: Another complete Anime
series. - Kiss
Meets the
Phantom of the Park: I’ve heard many things about
this movie, none
of them good. I must own it! - Looney
Tunes
Golden Collection: The mere fact that this was
released and yet
wasn’t the pick of the week tells you much
about American
Gothic. - Looney
Tunes –
Movie Collection: This contains “The Bugs
Bunny/Road Runner Movie”
and “1001 Rabbit Tales.” - The
Munsters –
Complete Second Season: Fred Gwynne and Yvonne
DeCarlo starred in
this sitcom. - Point
Pleasant
– The Complete Series: Another early
cancellation. - Puppets
Who
Kill: Complete Second Season: This show is about
puppets who
kill. - Tales
From The
Crypt – Complete Second Season: Just in time for
Halloween. - Those
Who Hunt
Elves – The Complete Collection: I’ve heard this
has more
substance than the previews might indicate. - Tom
and Jerry
– Spotlight Collection, Volume 2: The cat and
mouse games continue. - Toxie’s
Top
Ten Collector’s Tin: I don’t know which individual
titles are
included here. - Tripping
the
Rift – Complete First Season: My interest in the
involvement of
Stephen Root cannot outweigh my disinterest in the
involvement of Chuck
Austen. - The Wizard of Oz is getting a new, high
quality digital
transfer with loads of extras. Available in two
DVD and three
DVD sets. I
went with the three disk version myself.
Now, the non-genre releases:
- Alias
– The Complete
Fourth Season: Get caught up on the life of Syndey
Bristow. - Atomic Age Classics: Three volumes, sold
seperately,
collecting educational classroom films from the 1940s
through the
1960s. The three are collected in themes about Manners,
Courtesy and
Etiquette, Hygiene,
Dating and Delinquency, and A-Bombs,
Fallout and Nuclear
War. - The
Beverly
Hillbillies/Petticoat Junction Christmas
Collection: Those who are
collecting the official season releases of these shows
may have
noticed the absence of Christmas specials. They’ve
been collected
here instead. - Billie
Holiday –
Ultimate Collection: Not my cup of tea, but it
looks like a well
authored DVD set with extras. - The
Charles Dickens
Collection: This includes versions of David
Copperfield,
Oliver Twist, and Great
Expectations. - Clockwatchers:
An
office comedy well reviewed at Sundance. - Degrassi
Junior High
– The Complete Collection: The Canadian melodrama
that inspired
part of Shannon Doherty’s wardrobe in
Mallrats. - The
Doris Day Show –
Season 2: As frightening as some of the genre
picks, I assure
you. - A&E
Literary
Classics – The Romance Collection 2: This 14 DVD
set includes
“Horatio Hornblower,” “Nicholas Nickleby,” “Vanity
Fair,” “The Flame
Trees of Thika,” “The Mayor of Casterbridge,” “Tess of
the
D’Urbervilles,” and “The Great Gatsby.” - The
General/Steamboat
Bill Jr.: There are more expensive (and likely
higher quality)
releases of both of these, but if you’re looking to
try out a silent
comedy and don’t want to spend $20 on a DVD to try it,
take a look at
this. The General is one of the funniest
movies I’ve ever
seen. - Hart
to Hart – The
Complete First Season: Detective drama from the
1980s. I spent
many Saturday afternoons watching this, “Simon and
Simon,” and “The
Rockford Files” after a morning of cartoons. Good
times. - Herbie
– Fully
Loaded: This year’s Herbie movie. - Horatio
Hornblower
Collector’s Edition: An 8 DVD set of the Ioan
Gruffudd
series. - Jamaica
Inn / Easy
Virtue: Two Hitchcock movies just in time for
Halloween. - Kids
in the
Hall – Complete Season Three: I crush your head.
Crush!
Crush! - Kill!:
A
Criterion Collection samurai release. - The L
Word – The
Complete Second Season: For the fans of well
reviewed lesbian
drama. - Le
Samourai: Another Criterion Collection release.
Those people do
amazing work with DVDs. This one is not in the boxed
set below. - The
Leonard
Bernstein Concert Boxed Set: It’s a 9 DVD
collection. Could make
for good Christmas shopping. - Little
House on the
Prairie – Complete Season 9: I’ll never forget the
description of
this series from “WKRP In Cincinnatti”: “It’s got
burning babies and
blind people and wholesome stuff like that.” - MADtv
– The Best of
Seasons 8, 9 and 10: This is sketch comedy that
struck me as
funny, unlike some of the other sketch comedy shows on
the air I’ll
choose not to name. - Masterpiece
Theatre
Collection – Romance: This includes “Anna
Karenina,” “Wuthering
Heights” and “Reckless” in a 7 DVD collection. - Rebel
Samurai –
Sixties Swordplay Classics: A Criterion Collection
boxed set
including Samurai Rebellion, Sword of the
Beast,
Samurai Spy, and Kill!. - Samurai
Rebellion: The individual release that’s in the
above boxed
set. - Samurai
Spy –
Criterion Collection: This one is in the boxed
set, too. - Sword
of the
Beast: The fourth and final entry in the boxed
set. - Titanic
– Special
Collector’s Edition: How in blazes did this
unoriginal and
uninspired formulaic love story become the highest
grossing film of
all time, and by such a large margin? I know they
released in a slow
time of year to massive hype, I know they had an ad
and press campaign
that made it fashionable to see the movie multiple
times, and I know
it had James Cameron and Leonardo DiCaprio backing it
up, but I still
don’t get how it went from merely successful to what
it became. I can
take some comfort in knowing that, way back when it
was first released
on DVD in August 1999, the first DVD collection of the
three
Wallace and Gromit shorts outsold it by a
rather comfortable
margin. - The
Wages of
Fear: Another Criterion Collection release.
Finally, the pick of the week. In a week with
Hitchcock, several
Criterion Collection movies, The Wizard of
Oz, and The
Looney Tunes Golden Collection Vol. 3, we’ve got
some great
choices in this category to pick from. So, why did
American
Gothic get chosen? Well, frankly, this is the
television series
I’ve ever seen. (Remember, when I reviewed Firefly,
I gave it 41 out
of 42.) This was the first series I saw that had
incredible
writing, dramatic tension, and real horror strung out
every hour. It
was also the first series I got addicted to that was
cancelled before
the first season finished. Later on, I managed to
catch all the
episodes on Space:
The Imagination
Station, and I couldn’t believe the quality of the
episodes we
were denied. Great writing, great acting, and an
incredible series
cliffhanger ending (that, strangely, works as a form
of closure, much
like the series ender to Angel) set this
apart in so many
ways. I am completely baffled by the cancellation of
shows like this,
Profit and Firefly while certain
other shows remain
on the air year after year. Do yourself a favour and
pick this up.
Wow, that’s a lot of movies and stuff
Is there anything special/new added to Amazon’s version of Cowboy Bebop? From the picture at least, it looks like the same DVDs that have been available for years, just bundled together to save you a few bucks.
Oh, hey, time to start cyberstalking. I just realized that I went to high school with one of the recent additions to the cast of MADtv. (Hi, Crista :D )
Re: Wow, that’s a lot of movies and stuff
That’s what it looks like. There are similar packages
coming of Fox materials next week, and on November 22,
there’s a frickin’
huge set through the Warner Bros. label. (I’ve found
someone to split that set with, so expect a glut of reviews
when I start getting some time off.) I would like to know
how they call this unprecendented when Criterion had a
similar set not long ago, but still, this is incredible.
It’ll probably take a day just to sort through them all.