Tuesday, September 23, 2014
The Latest Inventory Of Box Office Hits Heading To The DVD and Blu-ray Market Place: Sept. 19, 2014
Eagle Rock Entertainment Packs November With The Rolling Stones, Monty Python And The Doors
Eagle Rock Entertainment
has set a powerhouse line-up of new DVD and Blu-ray releases featuring three of
the most iconic groups to “perform” in the past fifty years. The Rolling Stones, The Doors and, drum roll
please, Monty Python!!! That’s one hell
of a threesome!
Kicking off the hit
parade on Nov. 4 are DVD and Blu-ray SKUs of The Rolling Stones: From the
Vault - Hampton Coliseum, Live in 1981. This live concert was part of the group’s
1981 tour and this venue was set up as a pay-per-view event … raw and
live.
The footage from the
concert has been restored and legendary Grammy-winner, music engineer and
producer Bob Clearmountain has remixed the original tracks (26 numbers in all,
plus a “Happy Birthday to Keith” rendition) for this release.
Cuts include “Under My
Thumb,” “Time Is On My Side,” “Beast Of Burden,” “Jumping Jack Flash” and
topped off with “Satisfaction.”
Nov. 11 brings the DVD
and Blu-ray debut of vintage Jim Morrison and The Doors footage filmed by the
group. Titled, The Doors: Feast of Friends,
the would-be documentary of their 1968 tour … it was never completely finished
and with the exception of a few festival screenings (and unauthorized midnight
showings) this ill-fated attempt to capture the group in cinéma vérité blend of behind-the-scenes and on-stage performances
has been MIA (for almost 45 years).
Fully restored from the
original negative, the film has been color-corrected and mastered in HD with a
newly remixed soundtrack and supervised by Bruce Botnick. In addition to this 45-minute “time capsule,”
Eagle Rock Entertainment has included three bonus goodies to complete this
must-have for fans of The Doors.
These are:
Feast of Friends: Encore, a newly-prepared look at this unique period
in the group’s history, The Doors are Open, a vintage 1968
Brit-TV documentary and The End, which was filmed in
Toronto, Canada during August of 1967.
You can toss the bootlegs
… come Nov. 11 The Doors: Feast of Friends on DVD and Blu-ray will be the
keeper!
Also on Nov. 11 are DVD
and Blu-ray editions of the ultra-exclusive, ten-shows only presentation of Monty
Python Live (mostly): One Down Five to Go.
Filmed at the famed O2
venue in London on the last of the ten-shows only run, the reunion of Monty
Python (sans Graham Chapman, who appears via video clips) was an amazing live
stage show. Comedy skits and classic
musical numbers — that all Python fans can sing without a bouncing ball — were
blended nicely with new bits that left all ten audiences wanting more! And we’re talking three-hours on-stage!
The Stones, The Doors and
Monty Python, who could possibly ask for more?
Well, how about more
Stones to cap off the three-week run of new-to-DVD and Blu-ray product
offerings!!!
Eagle Rock Entertainment
does an encore on Nov. 18 with The Rolling Stones: From the Vault - L.A.
Forum, Live in 1975. This
classic live concert (40 years ago) will be available as newly-restored DVD and
Blu-ray editions.
Two-and-a-half hours on
stage, with 25 numbers and capped off by “Sympathy For The Devil,” it just
doesn’t get any better than that! Other
songs in the mix that night include “Gimme Shelter,” “You Can’t Always Get What
You Want,” “Brown Sugar” and “Jumpin’ Jack Flash.”
No matter how you cut it
… that’s one hell of a November line-up!
Writer/Director John Bevilacqua’s My Funny Valentine Will Make Its DVD Debut On Nov. 18 From FilmWorks Entertainment
FilmWorks Entertainment
announced this past week that writer/director John Bevilacqua’s My
Funny Valentine, a comedy about love and writing, will be making its
DVD debut on Nov. 18.
Zander (Tom Payne — The
Physician, Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day) is a writer suffering from a
form of “writer’s block.” No, he can
write the words quite nicely, that’s not his problem. But when it comes to the one thing that he really
wants, love, he’s folds-up like a house cards into an insecure heap.
He can’t just write love
into his life — it just doesn’t work that way — but that exactly what he has in
mind when he meets Zoe (Pippa Black — Lemon Tree Passage, as Tonya in TV
sitcom Outsourced, etc.).
Thunderstruck, he asks her to assist him with his latest film script,
and in doing so figures that he will eventually write his way into her
heart. We shall see how that works
out!!!
My Funny Valentine is also a love story about the city of Los
Angeles, which has never looked more inviting than the way filmmaker John Bevilacqua
has filmed it. Even with the budgetary
limitations of an indie flick he delivers a side of the city that few see.
This delightful comedy also includes an
inviting soundtrack and some quirky characters (advice to the lovelorn comes
from all quarters) that tie it all together nicely.
Bonus features include
newly-prepared cast interviews.
Wolfe's Selects Oct. 28 As The DVD Debut Date For Documentary Filmmakers Mark Herzog and Sandrine Orabona’s Lady Valor: The Kristin Beck Story
Chris Beck did 13 tours
of duty in Iraq and Afghanistan as a Navy SEAL. They don’t come any tougher than that and
Beck has the honors to prove it, but senior chief Christopher Beck’s greatest
challenge came after service as a Navy SEAL, when it was revealed on an
Anderson Cooper 360° that he revealed that he was a transgender and who would
transition to Kristin Beck.
On Oct. 28 Wolfe will
present the DVD debut of documentary
filmmakers Mark Herzog and Sandrine Orabona’s Lady Valor: The Kristin Beck Story. This in-depth look at Beck’s life before —
and after — the announcement details the reactions, the friendships won and
lost and the battle that didn’t end in the deserts of Afghanistan and Iraq, but
continue anew.
Bonus features include
footage of Beck in both training and combat and an additional extended
interview with Kristine prepared after Lady Valor: The Kristin Beck Story
was completed.
Paramount Home Media Distribution Tabs Dec. 9 As The Street Date For A Blu-ray/DVD Combo Pack Edition Of My Fair Lady: 50th Anniversary Ediition
Paramount Home Media
Distribution will be celebrating the 50th Anniversary of the
theatrical release of My Fair Lady on Dec. 9 with a newly
restored special edition Blu-ray/DVD Combo Pack edition.
Bonus goodies include the
documentary More Loverly Than Ever: The Making of My Fair Lady Then and Now,
the featurette titled “Comments on a Lady,” a vintage interview with filmmaker
Martin Scorsese and treasures from the vaults related to this timeless classic,
including highlights from the 1965 Oscar ceremonies, footage from both the
London and Los Angeles premieres and alternate vocals from Audrey Hepburn.
In other release news
this week from Paramount Home Media, the Stephen King bestseller, Under
the Dome — which started out as an event mini-series, but was so successful
that it “mutated” into a full-blown series — returns on Dec. 9 with both
Blu-ray and DVD editions of Under the Dome: Season Two.
Bonus features include
“Readings from the Dome,” “Welcome Back to Chester’s Mill,” and
“Inside/Outside: The Transmedia World,” plus an interview with writer Stephen
King.
The following week, Dec.
16, Halle Berry’s sci-fi series, produced by none other than Steven Spielberg, Extant:
The First Season will be heading to the consumer market place as both
DVD and Blu-ray sets (all 13 episodes).
A mysterious space
mission (with an “impossible” conclusion) and a robotic “son” (whose program
appears to have sanctioned itself) are only a few of the mysteries that
confront astronaut Molly Woods (Halle Berry) and her husband John (Goran
Visnjic) when she returns from a 13-month solo mission in space.
Bonus nuggets include
featurettes variously titled “Extant: Filming Season One,” “The Story of
Extant,” “Extant: The Cast,” “The Offspring” and “The Future World of Extant,”
plus a there are a collection of CBS video promos for the series.
Well Go U.S.A.'s Iceman Heads To DVD and Blu-ray On Nov. 11
Who needs a time machine
when you have a deep freeze that puts some very interesting individuals on ice dating
all the way back to the Ming Dynasty (16th Century ice-encased
relics).
That’s the premise of
director Law Wing Cheong’s mega-budget Iceman, which is heading to the
domestic market as DVD and Blu-ray product offerings from Well Go U.S.A. on
Nov. 11.
Four ancient “icemen” are
uncovered in the film’s prologue in China and are carefully placed in
cryo-status tubes for transport back to the lab for examination, but an
accident occurs enroute and the time-trapped warriors suddenly find themselves
on the streets of Hong Kong.
Ying (Donnie Yen — Ip
Man, Lung Fu Moon, The Founding of a Republic), a palace guard
wrongfully-accused of murder, awakens to find himself in an alien world. He has,
however, the very good fortune of bumping into May (Shengyi “Eva” Huang — Kung
Fu Hustle, The Emperor and the White Snake, etc.) on — as luck would
have it — Halloween, so his odd “costume” goes pretty much unnoticed in the
manic streets of Hong Kong.
She helps him get
orientated (and naturally romance blooms in the process) to his new
surroundings, but time and events from a bygone era have a peculiar way of
catching up, even to those who are completely out of step with it.
The others that were
frozen with him are out for revenge, but they are just as disoriented as he is
… which makes for some interesting action sequences as the technology of the
Ming Dynasty comes face to face with modern Hong Kong!
Bonus features for Iceman,
which is presented in Cantonese with English subtitles, include a
behind-the-scenes featurette titled “The Making of Iceman.”
Filmmaker Michelle Ehlen's Laugh-Out-Loud Comedy Hetrosexual Jill Makes Its DVD Splash From Ariztical Entertainment On Oct. 28
OMG … that’s the quickest
way to start when it comes to a description of writer, director and star
Michelle Ehlen's Hetrosexual Jill. With
tongue firmly planted-in-cheek, and yet not afraid to cut loose with some
out-and-out slapstick humor, she serves up one perfectly-pitched and very
outrageous “romantic comedy.”
Hetrosexual Jill will be making its DVD bow on Oct. 28 courtesy of
Ariztical Entertainment.
Jill (Jen McPherson) is
in a support group for “ex-lesbians” and as sort of a final test to see if the
“cure” for such desires has taken hold she turns to her former partner, Jamie
(Ehlen), to see if she can weather her super-butch storm. Of course it all goes sideways … and
hilariously so.
There are sight gags,
there’s stand-up (if Michelle Ehlen ever tires of acting or filmmaking she’s an
absolute natural in her comedic timing … there’s a career waiting in stand up)
and her actors play it all to the hilt, with kudos to McPherson for being both
funny, sexy and the perfect foil (her timing is always right there).
And, as a bonus, Ehlen gives plenty of
screen time to Keye Chen who delivers a rat-a-tat-tat style of comedy that is both
infectious and spot-on funny. It doesn’t
matter if you are gay or straight … a funny film is a funny film and that’s exactly
what Hetrosexual
Jill is in spades!
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