Arrow Video Restores Director Robert Aldrich's The Big Knife For Blu-ray/DVD Combo Pack Release On Aug. 29

Arrow Video, with domestic sales and distribution expertise provided by MVD Entertainment Group, has tabbed Aug. 29 as the release date for a Blu-ray/DVD Combo Pack edition of director Robert Aldrich’s 1955 film noir interpretation of playwright Clifford Odets’ 1949 Broadway play, The Big Knife.

Jack Palance, who was riding high during this period with Best Supporting Actor nominations for his performances in Sudden Fear (1952) and Shane (1953), took over for John Garfield (stage play) as film star Charlie Castle.   

Since Aldrich produced the film, with the screen adaptation handled by James Poe (nominated for four Oscars for his writing — Around the World in 80 Days, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, Lilies of the Field and They Shoot Horses Don’t They? — with a win for Around the World in 80 Days), so he signaled the importance of the release by opening it at the Venice Film Festival in September of 1955.  It won the Silver Lion and opened theatrically the following month.

Charlie Castle (Palance) is a movie star, a big star, with an estranged trophy wife (played by Ida Lupino), who wants to control his career (shadows of Bette Davis and Olivia de Havilland legal battles with their respective studios), but his efforts to do so are frustrated by studio boss Stanley Shriner Hoff (Rod Steiger), who has the “dirt” on his star (an auto accident).   Hoff’s studio “henchman,” Smiley Coy (played by Wendell Cory), keeps Castle in line and eventually Castle simply gives up (literally).

Others in this star-packed cast include Jean Hagen and Shelley Winters as Castle love interests, with Winters the target of a murder plot (she got on the wrong side of Smiley Coy), and Everett Sloane as Castle’s ineffectual agent.

This new 2K restoration (from the original film elements) includes a new film commentary by film critics Glenn Kenny (Premiere and the Village Voice, among others) and Nick Pinkerton (Film Comment) and the 1977 documentary short titled Bass on Titles (Saul Bass prepared the film’s unique title sequence).

Paramount Home Media To Release Nickelodeon's Tales of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Wanted Bebop and Rocksteady This September (And More)

Paramount Home Media turned to the world of kidvid during the lead-up to the long July 4^th holiday weekend and offered up two new DVD release announcements featuring popular Nickelodeon series.

On Sept. 12 our friends Leonardo, Donatello, Raphael and Michelangelo are back with more adventures in the DVD debut of Tales of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Wanted Bebop and Rocksteady.   

With the demise of Super-Shredder in the climax to the fourth season of the series, it seemed that all would be right in the turtle universe, but Tiger Claw has other ideas … including using Kavaxas to bring Shredder back as a, gulp, zombie!   Stay tuned, this battle between good and evil isn’t over yet!

Arriving the following week, Sept. 19, is Blaze and the Monster Machines: Wild Wheels Escape to Animal Island.   Four amazing episodes featuring Blaze and his friends (Stripes, Starla, Darington, etc.), who land on Animal Island, a magical place, where they are transformed into “animal-trucks” … new friends, new adventures and a lizard truck named Lazard (voiced by Bill Ray Cyrus), who is none too friendly, await them there!  Wild races … and even wilder rescues, go Blaze, go!

Synergetic Distribution's Charlotte Heads To The DVD Marketplace On Aug. 8

Synergetic Distribution, with sales and distribution support provided by MVD Entertainment Group, has tabbed Aug. 8 as the DVD debut date for the horror anthology titled Charlotte.

The young boy is safely tucked in bed, the phone rings and it is the dutiful mother checking in with the babysitter to see how things are going.   “Fine,” the young woman responds.   She is then momentarily distracted, “Huh, what, oh sorry, it was the doll,” says the babysitter.   

There is a moment of silence and then comes, “Doll?,” the mother questions, “what doll?”  The babysitter seems equally puzzled by the question (after all, the doll is right there in front of her), “Why the doll with the cracked face.”   

Two things happen next in Charlotte … first the concerned mother replies, “We don’t have a doll,” and second, the babysitter is suddenly powerless to stop what unfolds before her — transfixed by the power of the doll who is not there!   Six tales of the macabre transpire, each more terrifying the next, and the helpless babysitter must endure them all!  

Will the mother return and end the nightmare, or is this a vortex of evil from which there is no escape!

Sony Pictures Home Entertainment Selects Oct. 3 As The Street Date For A New 4K Restoration Of Lost Horizon: 80th Anniversary Edition

Sony Pictures Home Entertainment has tabbed Oct. 3 for the delivery of a new 4K restoration of director Frank Capra’s 1937 Shangri-La adventure classic.  On that early October street date film fans will certainly be lining up early for the Blu-ray release of Lost Horizon: 80^th Anniversary Edition, starring Ronald Colman, Jane Wyatt and Sam Jaffe as the “High Lama.”

Nominated for Best Picture (losing out to The Life of Emile Zola), Sony Pictures has included a restoration audio commentary, an alternate ending and a featurette showcasing the before and after comparisons of the film’s new 4K restoration.

Universal Picture Home Entertainment Pick Oct. 3 For The Dubut Of Cult Of Chucky As DVD And Blu-ray/DVD Combo Pack Editions

Universal Pictures Home Entertainment announced this past week that Chucky will return for another round of mayhem on Oct. 3 in DVD and Blu-ray/DVD Combo Pack editions of his latest horror outing, Cult of Chucky.

It’s a family (Chucky family, that is) reunion as Don Mancini handles the writing and directing, Brad Dourif returns as the iconic voice of Chucky, Jennifer Tilly is Tiffany (Chucky’s “lovely” bride), Fiona Dourif returns as Nica Pierce, who is locked up in a nut house for Chucky’s crimes and an adult Alex Vincent returns as Andy (27 years later) to bring the events of the original film, Child’s Play, full circle.

Bonus features include commentary from filmmaker Don Mancini and puppeteer Tony Gardner and a pair of featurettes — “Inside the Insanity of Cult of Chucky” and “Good Guy Gone Bad: The Incarnations of Chucky.”

Writer/Director David Bowers’ Diary of a Wimpy Kid: The Long Haul Arrives As DVD And Blu-ray Product Offerings On Aug. 8

20^th Century-Fox Home Entertainment will be bringing to market on Aug. 8 the latest installment in the adventures of Greg — the “Wimpy Kid” — Heffley (this time played by Jason Drucker).  The plan is to have both DVD and Blu-ray editions of writer/director David Bowers’ Diary of a Wimpy Kid: The Long Haul available at retail on that date.

The ARR is a quick-to-market 81 days and domestic box office receipts were $20.3 million (if there is to be fifth film in the series it will likely be a direct-to-video product offering).

Bonus features, deleted scenes (including deleted animation), a blooper reel and six featurettes — “Making a Scene,” “Greg Heffley’s 10 Rules for the Perfect Road Trip,” “Road Games,” “A Decade of Wimpy Fun,” “Learn to Draw” and “Haulin’ Through Georgia.”

Undercrank Productions Debuts Marion Davies 1922 Silent Film Release Of When Knighthood Was In Flower As A Blu-ray/DVD Combo Pack On July 25

Her name was Marion Davies, one the great stars of the silent era, but she was perhaps best known for her long-standing relationship with William Randolph Hearst and the lavish, star-studded parties that the couple hosted at Hearst Castle in San Simeon, California.   

This past week, Undercrank Productions, a specialist is the restoration of silent films, announced that three of her films from the early 1920s will be making their home entertainment debuts on July 25.

Key among these is director Robert G. Vignola’s 1922 film adaptation of Charles Major’s turn of the century best-selling novel, When Knighthood Was In Flower.   Working with the Library of Congress, Ben Model’s Undercrank Productions will be making a new 2K scan (from a surviving 35mm nitrate print) of the film, which will be made available for the first time to the home entertainment marketplace as a Blu-ray/DVD Combo Pack.   A new theatre organ score is also provided by Model.

Davies stars as Mary Tudor, sister to King Henry VIII (Lyn Harding), who is in love with a commoner (played by Forrest Stanley), but her brother has other plans for her … a marriage to the King of France!

Also heading home — as DVD-only releases — are The Bride's Play (1922, direction by George Terwilliger, co-starring John B. O'Brien and Frank Shannon) and Beauty's Worth (1922, Vignola also directs and Forrest Stanley is once again her co-star).