There are a lot of good low-cost box sets out this week, as well as virtually all non-Disney versions of “Alice in Wonderland.”
First, the DVD picks:
- The 39 Steps: The 2008 remake, not the Hitchcock original.
- 2012
- Alice in Wonderland (1933): Starring Richard Arlen, Gary Cooper, Cary Grant and W.C. Fields.
- Alice in Wonderland (1966): Starring Peter Sellers
- Alice in Wonderland (1999): Starring Robbie Coltrane, Whoopi Goldberg, Ben Kingsley and Christopher Lloyd
- Alice (2009): A miniseries starring Matt Fewer, Harry Dean Stanton, Tim Curry and Cathy Bates
- Ant Bully: Includes activity book
- Aria: The Origination: Season 3 of the anime based on the visual novel, plus the OVA for that season.
- Award Winning Comedy Collection: Includes “The Full Monty,” “M*A*S*H” and “My Cousin Vinny.”
- Award Winning Drama Collection: Includes “Once,” “Slumdog Millionaire,” and “Walk the Line.”
- Award Winning Drama Collection: Includes “All About Eve,” “Cleopatra,” and “Norma Rae.”
- Award Winning Drama Collection: Includes “Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid,” “The French Connection” and “The Hustler.”
- Award Winning Drama Collection: Includes “The Fly,” “Independence Day” and “The Omen.”
- Award Winning Drama Collection: Includes “Last King of Scotland,” “Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World,” and “Wall Street.”
- Award Winning Sci Fi Collection: Includes “The Abyss,” “Alien” and “Aliens.”
- Bitch Slap (Unrated): Blaine: To the best of my knowledge, there has never been a rated release of this flick.
- Castle in the Sky (Two Disc Special Edition)
- A Cinderella Story: Includes activity book.
- Clash of the Titans: The 1981 edition.
- Classic Quad – Set 1: Includes “Anna Karenina,” “A Farewell to Arms,” “Les Miserables” and “The Sun Also Rises.”
- Classic Quad – Set 2: Includes “Anna and the King of Siam,” “Cole Porter’s Can-Can,” “Daddy Long Legs” and “Star!”
- Classic Quad – Set 3: Includes “An Affair To Remember,” “Leave Her To Heaven,” “A Letter to Three Wives” and “Peyton Place.”
- Code Geass Leouch of the Rebellion: R2, Part 4: With Kitch or Without Kitch
- Curious George 2: Follow That Monkey
- Degrassi: The Next Generation Season 7
- Degrassi: The Next Generation Season 8
- Dennis the Menace: Includes activity book
- Designing Women: Season Three
- Disaster Collector’s Set 3: Includes “Delta Force Commando,” “Crash Drive,” “The Pandora Project” and “C.I.A. II: Target Alexa.”
- Doctor Who Dalek War: Frontier in Space and Planet of the Daleks (Stories 67 and 68)
- Doctor Who: Remembrance of the Daleks (Special Edition) – Story 152
- Dog Whisperer with Cesar Millan: Season Four, Vol. 1
- Double Feature: Includes “An Affair To Remember” and “Ever After.”
- Double Feature: Includes “Commitments” and “The Full Monty.”
- Double Feature: Blaine: Includes “Little Miss Sunshine” and “Juno.” I haven’t seen the former, but “Juno” is fantastic.
- Double Feature: Includes “Never Been Kissed” and “What Happened in Vegas.”
- Double Feature: Includes “Moulin Rouge” and “Tristan and Isolde.”
- Double Feature: Includes “Garden State” and “Say Anything.”
- Double Feature: Includes “The Devil Wears Prada” and “27 Dresses”
- Double Feature: Includes “Walk the Line” and the gangster-style version of “Romeo and Juliet.”
- Eureka Seven: Good Night, Sleep Tight, Young Lovers: Alex: This is a sequel movie to the TV series Eureka Seven, one which takes a more serious tone than the TV series did.
- Family Collector’s Set Vol. 2: Includes “White Fang,” “The Adventures of the Black Stallion,” “Forbidden Territory” and “Lassie: The Painted Hills.”
- Family Collector’s Set Vol. 3: Includes “The Derby Stallion,” “Bailey’s Billions,” “When Zachary Beaver Came to Town” and “A Horse for Danny.”
- Free Willy: Includes activity book.
- Free Willy 2: The Adventure Home (Keepcase)
- Free Willy 2: The Adventure Home: Includes activity book
- Free Willy 3: The Rescue (Keepcase)
- Free Willy 3: The Rescue: Includes activity book
- Gangster Collector’s Set Vol. 2: Includes “The Last Days of Frankie the Fly,” “The Funeral,” “The Immortals” and “Mean Johnny Barrows.”
- Gentlemen Broncos
- Hallmark Collector’s Set Vol. 3: Blaine: At the time of this writing, there is no description indicating what this includes.
- Have Gun Will Travel: Season Four, Vol. 1
- Hayate the Combat Butler: Part 4
- Horror Collector’s Set: Includes “Kraken: Tentacles of the Deep,” “Howling IV: The Original Nightmare,” “Night Shadow” and “Raging Sharks.”
- Horror Collector’s Set Vol. 3: Includes “Live Animals,” “Roman,” “Wages of Sin” and “Skeleton Man.”
- Horror Collector’s Set Vol. 5: Includes “Hindsight,” “Night of the Living Dead,” “Razor Eaters” and “Cruel World.”
- Jeremiah: Season Two (Amazon.com Exclusive): This was also the final season of this JMS series.
- Karin: The Complete Series: Alex: Also known as “Chibi Vampire” if you’re reading the manga published by Tokyopop. This is basically about a young female vampire (from a family of vampires) who instead of needing to drink blood has a nosebleed problem. Yeah.
- Kit Kittredge: An American Girl: Includes activity book
- Kurokami Vol. 1: Alex: One of the first anime series based on a Korean Manga (I’m not calling it Manhwa because the series was originally published in Japan).
- Life
- Life (Uncut Version)
- A Little Romance
- Phoenix Pts. 1-3: Alex: Brick of episodes of the adaptation of Osamu Tezuka’s manga.
- Matlock: Season Four
- Mobile Suit Gundam 00: Season 2, Part 1: With Kitch or Without Kitch
- Movie Marathon Collection: Flashback Comedies: Blaine: Includes “For Love or Money,” “Casual Sex?,” “The Secret of my Success,” “The Hard Way” and “Career Opportunities.” I really enjoyed “The Secret of my Success,” and “Career Opportunities” was the one that showed the world just how grown up that girl from “Labyrinth” had become.
- Movie Marathon Collection: Girls Rule: Blaine: Includes “Josie and the Pussycats,” “Honey,” “Blue Crush,” “The Perfect Man” and “Head Over Heels.” I can give “Josie and the Pussycats” a pretty strong recommendation, though it’s probably cheaper to buy individually. I haven’t watched the rest of the set to judge.
- Movie Marathon Collection: Old School Hits: Includes “Trippin’,” “Half Baked,” “Screwed,” “How High” and “CB4.”
- Movie Marathon Collection: Romantic Favorites: Includes “Along Came Polly,” “The Wedding Date,” “Intolerable Cruelty,” “The Story of Us” and “Wimbledon.”
- Movie Marathon Collection: Steve Martin: Blaine: Includes “Bowfinger,” “Parenthood,” “Housesitter,” “Dead Men Don’t Wear Plaid” and “The Lonely Guy.” I’m told “Dead Men Don’t Wear Plaid” is a masterpiece of film editing.
- My Neighbor Totoro (Two Disc Special Edition)
- The Neverending Story: Includes activity book. Reviewed here.
- Poltergeist: The Legacy Season 2 (Amazon.com Exclusive)
- Ponyo (Two Disc Edition with Plush)
- Ponyo (Two Disc Edition)
- The Private Lives of Pippa Lee
- Return to the 36th Chamber: Alex: Dragon Dynasty release. As a reminder – Dragon Dynasty basically is to old martial arts films what Criterion Collection is for arthouse films.
- Rifftrax Double Feature: Includes “Shorts Vol. 1” and “Night of the Living Dead.”
- Sci-Fi Collector’s Set Vol. 3: Includes “T-Force,” “Lifepod,” “Star Knight” and “Hidden Agenda.”
- The Sci-Fi Collector’s Set Vol. 4: Includes “Leeches,” “The Cold Equations,” “Last Lives,” and “Firehead.”
- Sci-Fi Thrillers Collector’s Set: Includes “The Sender,” “The Code Conspiracy,” “The Invader” and “Storm Trooper.”
- Scooby Doo (2002): Includes activity book.
- Sesame Street: Abby in Wonderland
- Sherlock Holmes 4 Pack: Includes “Prelude to Murder,” “Secret Weapon,” “Terror by Night,” and “Woman in Green.”
- Spin
- Tell Them Anything You Want: With Maurice Sendak and Spike Jonze
- Where the Wild Things Are
- The Wraith
- WWE Royal Rumble 2010
Now, the Blu-Ray picks:
- The 36th Chamber of Shaolin: Alex: Dragon Dynasty Release, their first (and hopefully not their last) on Blu-Ray.
- 2012 (Two Disc Edition): Blaine: At the time of this writing, it’s the same price as the single disc edition.
- 2012 (Single Disc Edition)
- Alice (2009)
- Clash of the Titans (1981)
- Eureka Seven: Good Night, Sleep Tight, Young Lovers
- Gentlemen Broncos
- Kurokami Vol. 1
- The Neverending Story
- Ponyo (Two Disc Edition): Alex: This is the first Miyazaki film to my knowledge to be released stateside on Blu-Ray.
- The Private Lives of Pippa Lee
- Where the Wild Things Are
- Yozakura Quartet: Complete Collection: Anime series about a group of four teenagers protecting their town from supernatural threats.
Finally, the picks of the week. Blaine says, “Take your pick of the ‘Award Winning’ collections to taste.” Alex says, “So much Miyazaki. If I had to pick just one, I’d go with Totoro, because that’s probably the perfect Miyazaki kid’s film, and I’d say it’s absolutely impossible to go wrong with that movie. Ultimately though, any Miyazaki film this week will work. On the Blu-Ray front, Neverending Story is good, though I’ll be adding 36th Chamber of Shaolin to my Netflix Queue.”
FYI none of the amazon links are working, they all return a 404.
Thanks for the heads up. Dave just fixed it.
Wow I didn’t even know there WAS a second season of Jeremiah. I’ve had the first season sitting on my shelf for years. I’ll be buying this regardless but has anyone else gotten an “on-demand” burn release like this?
I’ll probably be adding Ponyo to my buy list too.
An update on this in case anyone cares: It’s a very bare-bones release. Single layers discs, no extras, and basic packaging that says the name and disc contents and that’s about it. There was some noticeable video pixelation at times on discs 5 and 7.
Still a budget release is better than no release, but some commentary tracks would have been nice.
Wow. Rereleases of the Free Willy movies. Could be, quite possibly, the WORST timing ever.
These things are queue weeks, if not months in advance, but…damn. Talk about some bad juju.
Wow, a version of Alice in Wonderland was released in ’33, ’66, and ’99…. There’s got to be some mystical significance to that, right?
…right?
No release of Dreamchild to DVD, though. I recall really liking the frequently creepy tale of the real Alice visiting New York in the 1930s and recalling her friendship with Lewis Carroll. Jim Henson created some disturbing versions of the Wonderland characters for the film.
I also have some curiosity about Bitch Slap, if only because Lucy Lawless, Renée O’Connor, and Kevin Sorbo all make appearances. (The former Xena and Gabrielle apparently play lesbian nuns).
Great info! Unfortunately as long as this list is, it’s getting harder to read (or maybe I’m just feeling my years). Also, I think it’s ‘kitsch’.