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ARCHIVED NEWS - FEBRUARY 2003 |
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27th February Warner Home Video are going to release four very tempting double bill DVDs on April 14th, showcasing eight classic British movies. Each disc will contain two complete movies, with an RRP of £15.99. There are two comedy double bills: one starring the lad 'imself Tony Hancock (in The Rebel and The Punch and Judy Man), the other featuring Alistair Sim (in The Green Man and School For Scoundrels). There are also two BAFTA-winning David Lean movies, The Sound Barrier and Hobson's Choice, and a pair of children's favourites, The Railway Children and Swallows and Amazons.
Buena Vista Home Entertainment will release Mimic 2 on May 5th. The disc will feature 5 Days of Mimic 2 (about a quarter of an hour of behind the scenes footage), Behind The Sound (a five-minute featurette about the film's audio mix) and some deleted scenes. 26th February
It's clear that that there's been very little, if any, restoration work carried out, and it's likely that the discs may have been sourced from existing video transfers, rather than going back to the original 35mm elements (which might have given results comparable to those of any relatively recent feature film, but is a much more expensive option). There may have been a conscious decision to use a muddy colour palette, but even shots that should be natural look drab. The episodes have poor contrast. The level of detail isn't too bad - certainly much better than previous home video formats - but often patches of the picture look smeary, perhaps indicating sloppy encoding. The three discs are all DVD5s. Analysis of the bitrate shows an almost flat baseline of 4.5Mb/sec, and the average isn't much above that. This is definitely a sign of poor compression: the highs should be higher, and the lows lower. The SF Channel Nigel Kneale interview is on the Quatermass Conclusion disc, and runs for just under twenty minutes. In lieu of a complete review, which I'll add at the weekend, here are a couple of menu shots.
By all accounts the film is a grade A turkey, but it does apparently offer plenty of opportunities to ogle Heather Graham's womanly curves, so it can't be all bad! The film will be presented in anamorphic widescreen (1.85:1 ratio), with 5.1 audio. The disc will also include a theatrical trailer, and a featurette, Killing Me Softly. The disc will have a suspiciously low £9.99 RRP.
25th February Columbia Tristar will be adding four high-profile titles to their Superbit range on May 12th: Gladiator, The Fast and the Furious, Shakespeare in Love and Das Boot. Quality freaks may also like to know that Play.com are also offering sixteen Superbit titles at a knock-down £9.99 at the moment, including Gattaca, Godzilla and Bram Stoker's Dracula. Four of my favourite UK series are being released over the next couple of months, on VCI's budget label, Cinema Club. The four series are from the Granada library: Poirot, Sherlock Holmes (the definitive TV series, starring Jeremy Brett), Prime Suspect and Cracker. The discs each have an RRP of £9.99, but there are substantial discounts available if you buy them as box sets (released simultaneously with the first batch of each title). Here's a look at some example sleeve images, and a breakdown of what episodes are being released when... Poirot
12th May: 31-disc Poirot box set (RRP £199.99)
The Adventure of the Clapham Cook / Murder in the Mews The Adventure of Johnnie Waverly / 4 & 20 Blackbirds The Third Floor Flat / Triangle At Rhodes Problem At Sea / The Incredible Theft The King of Clubs / The Dream The Murder of Roger Ackroyd Lord Edgware Dies Hercule Poirot's Christmas Peril At End House - Parts 1 & 2 The Veiled Lady / The Lost Mine The Cornish Mystery / The Disappearance of Mr Davenheim Double Sin / The Adventure of the Cheap Flat The Kidnapped PM / The Adventure of the Western Star How Does Your Garden Grow? / The Million Dollar Bond Robbery The Plymouth Express / Wasps' Nest
16th June:
The Tragedy at Marsdon Manor / The Double Clue The Mystery of the Spanish Chest / The Theft of the Royal Ruby The Affair At The Victory Ball / The Mystery of Hunter's Lodge The Adventure of the Egyptian Tomb / The Underdog Yellow Iris / The Case of The Missing Will The Adventure of the Italian Nobleman / The Chocolate Box The Dead Man's Mirror / Jewel Robbery at the Grand Metropolitan The Mysterious Affair at Styles The ABC Murders
14th July:
Hickory Dickory Dock Dumb Witness Murder On The Links Death In The Clouds One, Two, Buckle My Shoe Murder in Mesopotomia Evil Under The Sun
14th April:
23-disc Sherlock Holmes box set (RRP £159.99)
The Hound of the Baskervilles The Master Blackmailer The Sign of Four The Eligible Bachelor The Last Vampyre The Mazarin Stone / The Cardboard Box The Golden Pince-Nez / The Red Circle The Three Gables / The Dying Detective The Illustrious Client / The Creeping Man Shoscombe Old Place / The Boscombe Valley Mystery The Problem Of Thor Bridge / The Disappearance of Lady Frances Carfax Wisteria Lodge / The Bruce Partington Plans
9th June:
The Devil's Foot / Silver Blaze The Man With The Twisted Lip / The Six Napoleons The Musgrave Ritual / The Abbey Grange The Priory School / The Second Stain The Final Problem / The Empty House The Greek Interpreter / The Norwood Builder The Red-Headed League / The Copper Beeches The Blue Carbuncle / The Resident Patient The Crooked Man / The Speckled Band The Naval Treaty / The Solitary Cyclist A Scandal in Bohemia / The Dancing Men
Prime Suspect
12th May:
7-disc Prime Suspect box set (RRP £49.99)
Prime Suspect 1 Prime Suspect 2 Prime Suspect 3 Prime Suspect 4 - Inner Circles Prime Suspect 4 - Scent of Darkness Prime Suspect 4 - The Lost Child Prime Suspect 5
Cracker
12th May:
10-disc Cracker box set (RRP £69.99)
The Mad Woman In The Attic To Say I Love You One Day A Lemming Will Fly To Be A Somebody The Big Crunch Men Should Weep Brotherly Love Best Boys True Romance White Ghost
Other forthcoming Cinema Club TV drama titles include Traffik (14th April, 2-disc set, £12.99 RRP), The Jury (14th April, 2-disc set, £12.99 RRP), The Camomile Lawn (14th April, 2-disc set, £12.99 RRP), Shackleton (14th April, £9.99 RRP), Renny Rye's 1999 adaptation of Oliver Twist (12th May, £9.99 RRP), the 2000 version of Anna Karenina (12th May, £9.99 RRP), Micawber (12th May, £9.99 RRP), A Dance To The Music of Time (12th May, 2-disc set, £12.99 RRP) and Bloody Sunday (16th June, £9.99 RRP). A few interesting feature film releases also feature in Cinema Club's lineup, all with an £9.99 RRP: Jan Svankmajer's Little Otik (16th June), Peter Greenaway's Pillow Book (16th June), Richard Loncraine's 1985 adaptation of Dennis Potter's Brimstone And Treacle (14th April), the Director's Cut of Natural Born Killers (12th May), and Larry Clark's controversial Bully (16th June). Phew! 24th February MGM have released a revised list of features for the upcoming Die Another Day DVD (see 20th February, below), noting that this is a "very much work in progress" list. They have also clarified that there won't be any deleted scenes on any disc, from any region. Click here to see the revisions to the spec, which are listed at the bottom of the page.
Jackie from Jackie's Tomorrow People Scrapbook has been in touch to confirm that it's actually actress Anne Curthoys (who played Tricia Conway in Secret Weapon) who will join Nicholas Young and Peter Vaughan-Clarke on the commentary track for The Tomorrow People - Volume 3.1. (Let's hope that Revelation get the sleeve credits sorted out before it hits stores!) Jackie also tells me that Curthoys will also be on the Revenge of Jedikiah disc, and that Peter Davison has somehow been persuaded to contribute his thoughts to the A Man For Emily disc, which should be a lot of fun!
22nd February
Revelation will also be releasing the acclaimed ITV thriller series Wire In The Blood, adapted from the novels by Val McDermid, and starring Robson Green and Hermione Norris. The company will release a three-disc DVD Collector's Box Set that contains the complete series on May 5th, with a RRP of £29.99. A sample episode from the series is currently being offered attached to Total DVD magazine, which also contains trailers for forthcoming releases Crime Traveller (see News, 4th February, below, and 11th November) and Steve Gallagher's Oktober. Revelation will also release material from the Thames television series Freddie Starr's Comedy Express, and nine episodes of Dogtanian and the Three Muskehounds on DVD on April 28th. Fox will issue another standalone disc of The Simpsons on April 7th, titled Risky Business. The disc will contain four episodes with a work-related theme: Realty Bites (season 9), Homer The Smithers (season 7), Deep Space Homer (season 5) and Marge Gets A Job (season 4). The disc will also contain a never-before-seen bonus Chief Wiggum featurette. RRP is £15.99. I've had a quick look at Mosaic's Cube 2: Hypercube DVD, which will be released on 21st April. The disc will initially be exclusively available from Virgin Megastores and Virgin Express stores, until October. The disc is presented in 1.78:1 ratio, with anamorphic enhancement, and boasts 5.1 Dolby Digital audio. The disc features terrific animated menus, a commentary track from producer / co-writer Ernie Barbarash and film editor Mark Sanders (not, as been reported elsewhere, by director Andrzej Sekula), extensive behind the scenes material, a trailer and two TV spots. Unless they're contained within the Making of... featurette, or hidden as Easter Eggs, there's no sign of the deleted scenes listed on the press release. Look for a full review soon. 21st February Behold - the sleeve art for the second Ealing DVD Collection box set! Clicking on the image will lead to an expanded shot of the whole pack. For a detailed description of the contents, see the entry for 19th February, below.
20th February
MGM UK has always tried to add content to their discs to give them the edge on Region 1 imports (and they've often succeeded - several major Special Edition titles, like Thelma & Louise and Raging Bull were released here first, or are still exclusive to the UK). The last James Bond movie, The World is Not Enough contained an exclusive featurette, Bond Down River. In the case of Die Another Day the UK will have an exclusive fifty-minute documentary (From Script To Screen). The only thing that's conspicuously absent from the UK specifications are any deleted scenes. If these were added to the Region 2 disc, fans would have to buy both versions! Fox has brought forward the release date of The X-Men 1.5 Special Edition to the 31st of March.
The two-disc set from Momentum Pictures will offer the viewer two viewing options. In normal mode the film will be presented in 1.78:1 anamorphic ratio, with 5.1 audio. In interactive mode the film appears in a window, alongside menu options which allow the viewer to switch between contestants and locations (this will include several key sequences with multi-angle video!) The film is supported by a commentary track from director Marc Evans and producer Jon Finn. The second disc will contain half an hour's worth of deleted scenes with commentary, a thirty-minute Making of... documentary, photo gallery and trailers. The disc is due for release on 21st April, with an RRP of £19.99. 19th February We've got a great new competition for you today: we've got three copies of Pathe Distribution's new Dog Soldiers DVD up for grabs. Although not officially a "Special Edition", the disc is crammed with bonus materials, including two commentary tracks, deleted scenes and a Making of... featurette! To enter, click on the banner above! I'll be adding a review of the disc later this week, but, trust me, this is definitely a disc that horror and action fans will want for their collections. Incidentally, our Dark Angel competition is still running: you can find that here. For some time now BBC Worldwide have been releasing a series of exemplary Doctor Who DVDs, each lovingly created, and packed with bonus materials. The series even has a team of dedicated restoration experts working on it, resulting in several new techniques that have redefined the cutting edge of archive television preservation and re-mastering. Their latest disc, The Seeds of Death is reviewed here, and a new feature article about some of the work that goes into re-mastering 1960s black and white episodes of the series can be found here.
Contrary to earlier reports, the UK version of Road to Perdition will not now feature DTS audio. Also, the twenty-six-minute HBO Making of... documentary has been dropped from Region 1 DTS disc (it wasn't on the copies that hit the shops last week). The DTS variant does, however, feature a 5.1 Dolby Digital track, so the choice between the different versions now boils down to a straight decision to get DTS audio or the HBO documentary. All the discs have the deleted scenes and Sam Mendes' audio commentary. Finally, and a little belatedly, here's a good look at the sleeve of ClearVision's three-disc Quatermass box set. ClearVision has also kindly supplied a series of fill-size frame enlargements from the series, which you can see by clicking on the sleeve.
14th February 2003
On April 7th Fox UK release a new DVD version with a whole disc full of bonus material, confusingly titled X-Men 1.5. What's more, the new disc also boasts DTS audio! Read our review of the new X-Men disc here.
As if that wasn't enough, you lucky, lucky people, here are the sleeves for another two of DD Video's forthcoming Hammer DVDs. The Abominable Snowman sleeve is quite attractive, but the Frankenstein and the Monster From Hell one is pretty grim!
12th February 2003 OK, some clarification on yesterday's Hammer announcements. Quatermass II will have a single commentary by Nigel Kneale and Val Guest (almost certainly the same one that's on the American Anchor Bay disc). The "documentary" that was supposed to be on The Quatermass Xperiment disc is indeed an episode from the dire World of Hammer series, but it's now been moved to the X - The Unknown disc. From now on I'm refusing to refer to it as a documentary, since it's merely a clip show loosely cobbled together with voice-over that imparts about as much useful information on the studio as the Hitch-Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy does about Earth. DD Video plan to use about half a dozen episodes spread across their sixteen titles, and also plan to release the series separately. Staying with Quatermass, ClearVision Video has announced more details of its Quatermass set (which we featured in our 17th January news update). The three-disc set will include a History of Quatermass booklet, and a previously unseen Sci-Fi Channel interview with Kneale. The set, which will be released on April 7th, has a rather steep RRP of £34.99 (considering that the Quatermass Conclusion compilation is essentially just a glorified bonus feature). It looks like The Goodies are finally going to get a proper home video release (following a couple of poorly-promoted BBC Video tapes and a very rare release of some of the ITV shows, in the early days of sell-through video). Network are releasing eight episodes which were selected by fans, believed to be Kitten Kong (the Golden Rose of Montreaux Special), Superstar, The Goodies and the Beanstalk, Movies, Kung-Fu Capers, Black and White Beauty, Saturday Night Grease and the show's very first episode, Tower of London. The two-disc set is already available for pre-ordering at several online stores (MVC even has a sleeve image!) More news as I receive it! The BBFC continues to be a great source of information about forthcoming releases. Often things turn up there before they've been officially announced!
The BBFC also has commentary tracks for Grave (James A. Contner), Normal Again (Rick Rosenthal), Hell's Bells (David Soloman), Smashed (Turi Meyer), Bargaining (David Grossman) and Once More With Feeling (Joss Whedon) listed. These listings also confirm that the version of Once More With Feeling will be the extended version, and that the season opener, Bargaining, might be presented as it originally aired - as one double-length (85-minute) episode. It also seems that Universal is lining up episodes from Law and Order for release here in the UK, and Fox UK are to release NYPD Blue. Good news for fans of these series, but little consolation for the hard done by followers of the mighty Homicide: Life on the Street, which has been released on disc in France, but only with French audio. And don't think I've forgiven you for dropping the show, Channel 4 bastards! Ahem. Where where we? VCI has certificated Russell Harty Goes... Upstairs, Downstairs, which originally broadcast on Boxing Night 1975 and featured interviews with the cast members of the popular LWT series. This is doubly welcome news for fans of the series, who will be delighted that VCI is finally adding some bonus material to their discs, and also that the company is continuing to release the series (the last disc was released in August last year). Finally, two commentary tracks for the recent James Bond movie Die Another Day have been scrutinised by the ever-vigilant staff at the Board, one with director Lee Tamahori and producer Michael G. Wilson, the other with stars Pierce Brosnan and Rosamund Pike. The Shaken And Stirred...On Ice featurette has also been certificated, and is widely believed to be the first of many extras that will form part of a two-disc set. 11th February 2003 Have I got a special treat for you today?! ("Yes", is the answer!) Here's an exclusive look at the sleeves for two of the eagerly-awaited Hammer films coming from DD Video on March 17th: The Quatermass Xperiment and Quatermass II. I think the sleeves are rather charming, and nicely capture the spirit of the two movies. The company is planning to release sixteen Hammer movies during 2003, including X - The Unknown, The Abominable Snowman, Captain Kronos - Vampire Hunter and Frankenstein and the Monster From Hell. DD Video is also planning to release many of the studio's popular comedy films, including I Only Arsked, Nearest and Dearest, Up The Creek, Further Up The Creek, Life With The Lyons and The Lyons in Paris. They also have a trilogy of Dick Barton spy thrillers: Dick Barton at Bay, Dick Barton Secret Agent and Dick Barton Strikes Back and Robert Aldrich's rarely-seen bomb-disposal drama Ten Seconds From Hell. DD Video seem to be well aware that Hammer fans are a demanding bunch, and promise that, wherever possible, the films will be presented in their original aspect ratio, and will have bonus materials. The Quatermass Xperiment will feature an interview with director Val Guest, a "documentary on Hammer SF" (let's hope it's not simply an episode of the feeble World of Hammer TV series) and a 24-page guide book. Quatermass II will also feature a Val Guest interview, "audio commentaries" and a 24-page guide book. X - The Unknown and The Abominable Snowman are due in April, Frankenstein and the Monster From Hell and Captain Kronos in May. RRP for each disc is £15.99. I wish DD luck with their range. There's obviously still a thriving market for Hammer's horror films, but it remains to be seen if there's much demand for the rest of the studio's output. (Very few of their comedy and drama films have ever received a home video release). DD is also up against a well-established collection of discs from American label Anchor Bay, which includes some of the same titles.
8th February 2003 A few bits and pieces of news: Revelation Films have announced that they're going to release the recent ITV psychological thriller series State of Mind, which starred Niamh Cusack and This Life's Andrew Lincoln. No date, specifications or extras have been finalised yet.
If the press release is to be believed, the UK version of the set will have one less deleted scene than the American set (one from The Unnatural seems to be AWOL). A featurette that appeared on the standalone UK One Son DVD, The X-Files Profile: The Cigarette-Smoking Man, is also absent, as are the forty-odd American TV spots. Kim Manners' commentary for Milagro isn't specifically mentioned by the press release, but it has already been certificated by the BBFC, and there's a reference to "commentaries from creator Chris Carter and other writers", so its inclusion seems a safe bet. Perhaps the greatest loss - if it turns out that the press release is correct - will be the series of thirteen mini-featurettes showcasing the series' special effects, with commentary by Paul Rabwin. 6th February 2003 Click here to read our review of Carlton's The Second Coming disc. If you were planning to watch this (on ITV) on Sunday and Monday, you're in for a rare treat, but don't be surprised if you also feel the urge to pick up Carlton's DVD the following Monday (the 17th)... 4th February 2003 Here are the sleeves for Revelation's 24th March releases.
3rd February 2003
The disc is due for release on February 17th. See the update on 24th January, below, for more details.
Here's a peek at the sleeve for the first of the series six releases, Volume 26. If you're wondering who that chap on the left is, then you really, really need to see Volume 25... MGM would like to point out that this image is subject to change.
2nd February 2003 Lionel Jeffries' fine period ghost story The Amazing Mr Blunden is being released on DVD by Anchor Bay, on February 24th, with an RRP of £16.99. You can read our review of this disc by clicking here. PREVIOUS NEWS PAGES: |
Here's
a look at the box and disc art for Signs, which is being released
on March 31st. The film is another terrific thriller from M. Night
Shyamalan, and it looks like the disc will be packed with bonus material,
and will feature a DTS audio track that's not on the Region 1 version! The
film will also be released as part of a five-disc set, which will include
the existing two-disc versions of The Sixth Sense and Unbreakable. 
I've
taken a brief look at ClearVision's forthcoming Quatermass DVD, and
sad to report it's not looking terribly impressive. 
Pathé
are releasing the "intense story of love, lust and an obsession
spiraling out of control", Killing Me Softly on April
7th. 
A
new review for you today! This time Mosaic Entertainment's Cube 2:
Hypercube DVD (see yesterday's news, below, for more details) comes
under scrutiny. The original 1997 film was a brilliant high concept idea,
and very nicely executed. However, it left plenty of unanswered questions,
so does Cube 2: Hypercube live up to the potential? Read 
Revelation
Films launch the third series of The Tomorrow People with volume 3:1
Secret Weapon on April 28th. The disc will feature a commentary track,
but there's conflicting information about who will feature on it (stars
Nicholas Young and Peter Vaughan-Clarke seem certain, the third
contributor may be Philip Gilbert or Elizabeth Adare). The story marks the
introduction of a new cast member, Dean Lawrence, as Tyso.
The
UK retail release of Big Brother-style horror flick My Little
Eye is shaping up nicely. 
Warner
Home Video will be releasing a second boxed set of Ealing comedies on
April 28th. The new set will contain three classic films: Hue and Cry,
The Titfield Thunderbolt and the sublime Passport to Pimlico.
Not as stellar a lineup as the first set, perhaps, but two superb films
and one that's pretty good is a decent enough lineup! Each film will be
presented in full-frame format, with mono sound. As further incentive (and
to justify the rather steep £40 RRP), the set also comes with bonus disc,
containing the recent fifty-minute Forever Ealing documentary
(shown at the end of last year by Channel 4), which is narrated by Daniel
Day Lewis, grandson of Michael Balcon, the man who ran the studio during
it's most fertile period. The fourth disc will also contain trailers for Passport
to Pimlico and The Titfield Thunderbolt, and introductions to
four Ealing classics by Martin Scorsese (The Lavender Hill Mob),
Terry Gilliam (The Ladykillers), Stephen Frears (The Man in the
White Suit) and John Landis (Kind Hearts and Coronets). (These
were probably shot at the same time as the Forever Ealing documentary).
The set will also contain four poster art postcards, and a DVD-ROM section
featuring original campaign brochures. 
For
some reason the whole X-Men phenomena pretty much passed me by
until the movie version arrived. The film largely confounded people's
expectations, and certainly revived interest in a genre that had been
almost obliterated by Joel Schumacher's execrable Batman & Robin. 
Recent
additions to their database include several bonus features for the Buffy
The Vampire Slayer Season 6 box set: outtakes, an "A&E
TVography" [43'02"], a 30m season overview titled Life is the
Big Bad, an Academy of Television Arts and Sciences panel discussion,
running just under an hour, Karaoke singalongs (presumably for Once
More With Feeling, but possibly destined for the standalone disc), and
a five-minute featurette titled Buffy Goes To Work. 
Fox
will release Season 6 of The X-Files in the UK on March 17th. The
six disc set contains all twenty-two episodes, including the award-winning
Agua Mala, presented in 1.78:1 anamorphic widescreen ratio, with
2.0 Dolby Digital surround sound. Recommended retail price will be
£79.99. Bonus features include a commentary track for Triangle (by
Chris Carter), fourteen deleted scenes (which can be viewed separately -
with or without commentary from Frank Spotnitz - or watched as part of the
relevant episode, via branching).
Three
further volumes of Gerry Anderson's Terrahawks will be released,
which will also be available in a boxed set with an RRP of £34.99. Volume
4 contains the episodes To Catch A Tiger, The Midas Touch,
Operation SAS and Ten Top Pop, with profiles of Ninestein,
Mary Falconer, Kate Kestrel and Hawkeye, record covers, scripts, Kate's
song list, a press photo shoot history and continuity stills from To
Catch a Tiger. Volume 5 contains Unseen Menace, A
Christmas Miracle, Midnight Blue and Play It Again Sam,
and will also include profiles of Yungstar and Yuri, voice cast details,
scripts, The White House, continuity stills from Thunder Road, updated
Gerry Anderson biography and a history of unfilmed scripts. Volume 6
completes the show's first season, with My Kingdom For A Zeaf, Zero's
Finest Hour, The Ultimate Menace, Gold and Ma's
Monsters. The disc also contains profiles of Treehaw, Hawkwing and The
Overlander, as well as scripts, press brochures, an explanation of noughts
and crosses, unfilmed scripts and continuity stills from Happy Made Day.
RRP for the individual discs is £15.99. 
Revelation
are also releasing the first four episodes of Crime Traveller on
March 24th, as a two-disc box set, with an RRP of £19.99. The episodes
are Jeff Slade and the Loop of Infinity, Death in the Family,
Fashion Shoot and Revenge of the Chronology Protection
Hypothesis. Extras are disappointingly thin - biographies of Michael
French and Chloe Annett, an episode guide and synopsis. 
Here's
the latest sleeve image for Carlton's forthcoming The Second Coming DVD.
(The old version has now been archived in the 
Stargate
SG-1 junkies must be suffering from extreme withdrawal symptoms at the
moment (the last new release was back in September!)
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