DVD Talk Forum - Criterion releases for October 2010

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Criterion releases for October 2010

The Magician - Spine 537

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SYNOPSIS: Ingmar Bergman’s The Magician (Ansiktet) is an engaging, brilliantly conceived tale of deceit from one of cinema’s premier illusionists. Max von Sydow stars as Dr. Vogler, a mid-nineteenth-century traveling mesmerist and peddler of potions whose magic is put to the test by a small town’s cruel, eminently rational minister of health, Dr. Vergerus. The result is a diabolically clever battle of wits that’s both frightening and funny, shot in rich, gorgeously gothic black and white.

Disc Features

-New, restored high-definition digital transfer (with uncompressed monaural soundtrack on the Blu-ray edition)
-New visual essay by Bergman scholar Peter Cowie
-Brief 1967 video interview with director Ingmar Bergman about the film
-Rare English-language audio interview with Bergman, conducted by filmmakers Olivier Assayas and Stig Björkman
-New and improved English subtitle translation
-PLUS: A booklet featuring an essay by critic Geoff Andrew, a reprinted essay by Assayas, and an excerpt from Bergman’s autobiography Images: My Life in Film

Paths of Glory - Spine 538

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SYNOPSIS: A pivotal work by Stanley Kubrick, Paths of Glory is among the most powerful antiwar films ever made. A fiery Kirk Douglas stars as a French colonel serving in World War I who goes head-to-head with the army’s ruthless top brass when his men are accused of cowardice after being unable to carry out an impossible mission. This haunting, exquisitely photographed dissection of the military machine in all its absurdity and capacity for dehumanization (a theme Kubrick would continue to explore throughout his career) is assembled with its legendary director’s customary precision, from its tense trench warfare sequences to its gripping courtroom climax to its ravaging final scene.

Disc Features

-New, restored high-definition digital transfer (with uncompressed monaural soundtrack on the Blu-ray edition)
-New audio commentary by critic Gary Giddins
-Television interview from 1979 with star Kirk Douglas
-New video interviews with Kubrick’s longtime executive producer Jan Harlan, Paths of Glory producer James B. Harris, and actress Christiane Kubrick
-Excerpt from a French television program about real-life World War I executions similar to the events dramatized in Paths of Glory
-Theatrical trailer
-PLUS: An essay by Kubrick scholar James Naremore

House - Spine 539

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SYNOPSIS: How to describe Nobuhiko Obayashi’s indescribable 1977 movie House (Hausu)? As a psychedelic ghost tale? A stream-of-consciousness bedtime story? An episode of Scooby-Doo as directed by Mario Bava? Any of the above will do for this hallucinatory head trip about a schoolgirl who travels with six classmates to her ailing aunt’s creaky country home and comes face-to-face with evil spirits, a demonic house cat, a bloodthirsty piano, and other ghoulish visions, all realized by Obayashi via a series of mattes, animation, and collage effects. Equal parts absurd and nightmarish, House might have been beamed to Earth from some other planet. Never before available on home video in the United States, it’s one of the most exciting cult discoveries in years.

Disc Features

-New, restored high-definition digital transfer (with uncompressed monaural soundtrack on the Blu-ray edition)
-Constructing a House, a new video piece featuring interviews with director Nobuhiko Obayashi, story scenarist and daughter of the director Chigumi Obayashi, and screenwriter Chiho Katsura
-Emotion, a 1966 experimental film by Obayashi
-New video appreciation by director Ti West (House of the Devil)
-Theatrical trailer
-New and improved English subtitle translation
-PLUS: An essay by Chuck Stephens

The Darjeeling Limited - Spine 540

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SYNOPSIS: In The Darjeeling Limited, from director Wes Anderson, three estranged American brothers reunite for a meticulously planned, soul-searching train voyage across India, one year after the death of their father. For reasons involving over-the-counter painkillers, Indian cough syrup, and pepper spray, the brothers eventually find themselves stranded alone in the middle of the desert—where a new, unplanned chapter of their journey begins. Featuring a sensational cast, including Owen Wilson, Adrien Brody, Jason Schwartzman, and Anjelica Huston, The Darjeeling Limited is a visually dazzling and hilarious film that takes Anderson’s work to richer, deeper places than ever before.

DIRECTOR-APPROVED SPECIAL EDITION:

-New high-definition digital transfer, supervised and approved by director Wes Anderson (with DTS-HD Master Audio on the Blu-ray edition)
-Anderson’s short film Hotel Chevalier (part one of The Darjeeling Limited), starring Natalie Portman, with commentary by Anderson
-Audio commentary featuring Anderson and cowriters Jason Schwartzman and Roman Coppola
-Behind-the-scenes documentary by Barry Braverman
-Anderson and filmmaker James Ivory discussing the film’s music
-Anderson’s American Express commercial
-On-set footage shot by Coppola and actor Waris Ahluwalia
-Audition footage, deleted and alternate scenes, and stills galleries
-Original theatrical trailer
-PLUS: A booklet featuring an essay by critic Richard Brody and original illustrations by Eric Anderson

The Seven Samurai - Spine 2

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SYNOPSIS: One of the most beloved movie epics of all time, Akira Kurosawa’s Seven Samurai (Shichinin no samurai) tells the story of a sixteenth-century village whose desperate inhabitants hire the eponymous warriors to protect them from invading bandits. This three-hour ride—featuring legendary actors Toshiro Mifune and Takashi Shimura—seamlessly weaves philosophy and entertainment, delicate human emotions and relentless action into a rich, evocative, and unforgettable tale of courage and hope.

SPECIAL EDITION THREE-DISC SET:

-All-new, restored high-definition digital transfer
-Two audio commentaries: one by film scholars David Desser, Joan Mellen, Stephen Prince, Tony Rayns, and Donald Richie; the other by Japanese-film expert Michael Jeck
-A 50-minute documentary on the making of Seven Samurai, part of the Toho Masterworks series Akira Kurosawa: It Is Wonderful to Create
-My Life in Cinema, a two-hour video conversation between Akira Kurosawa and Nagisa Oshima produced by the Directors Guild of Japan
-Seven Samurai: Origins and Influences, a new documentary looking at the samurai traditions and films that impacted Kurosawa’s masterpiece
-Theatrical trailers and teaser
-Gallery of rare posters and behind-the scenes and production stills
-New and improved English subtitle translation
-PLUS: A booklet featuring essays by Peter Cowie, Philip Kemp, Peggy Chiao, Alain Silver, Kenneth Turan, Stuart Galbraith, Arthur Penn, and Sidney Lumet and an interview with Toshiro Mifune

All will be available on DVD and Blu-ray.