Warner Bros. Home Entertainent's Godzilla: King Of The Monsters Stomps Home On Aug. 27

The “Kaiju” is back.  Big time!!  Only last week Mill Creek Entertainment announced that the Japanese Kaiju-based television series (and subsequent movies) Ultra Q and Ultraman would be delivered as Blu-ray collections on Oct. 15.

This week Warner Bros. Home Entertainment got in the action with the announcement that a three-SKU helping of writer/director Michel Dougherty’s Godzilla: King of the Monsters would be available for fans to savor on Aug. 27.

Not only did Godzilla stomp to $109.2 million in domestic ticket sales in June (overseas another $275 million in box office receipts), but the beast of lore brought with him Mothra, Rodan and King Ghidorah.   That is quite the ensemble.  For the record, the ARR comes in at 88 days.

As to bonus features, Godzilla: King of the Monsters comes with commentary from writer/director Michel Dougherty (Krampus, Trick 'r Treat), screenwriter Zach Shields (Krampus) and actor O'Shea Jackson Jr. (Straight Outta Compton), deleted scenes and a stunning collection of 14 featuettes — “The Isla de Mara Volcano,” “Millie Bobby Brown: Force of Nature,” “Reimagining Rodan,” “Monster Tech: Monarch Joins the Fight,” “Godzilla 2.0,” “The Yunnan Temple,” “Castle Bravo,” “Monsters are Real,” “The Antarctic Base,” “Mothra: Queen of the Monsters,” “Making Mothra,” “Creating Ghidorah,” “The Undersea Lair” and “Welcome to the Monsterverse.”

20th Century-Fox Home Entertainment Looks To Sept. 17 For The Home Entertainment Launch Of Writer/Director Simon Kinberg's X-Men: Dark Phoenix

20^th Century-Fox Home Entertainment looks to the post-Labor Day period for the home entertainment packaged media launch of writer/director Simon Kinberg’s X-Men: Dark Phoenix.   The date selected for a three-SKU release blitz is Sept. 17. 

The ARR for that mid-September street-date Tuesday works out to 102 days and domestic box office receipts currently register $65.1 million.

Planned for distribution are Combo Pack editions for the 4K Ultra HD (with Blu-ray) and Blu-ray (with DVD) formats, plus consumers can also select a single-edition DVD of the film as one of their purchasing choices.

The only bonus feature common to all release SKUs is the featurette titled “How to Fly Your Jet to Space with Beast.”

Exclusive to the 4K Ultra HD and Blu-ray Combo Pack editions are commentary by filmmaker Simon Kinberg (his feature-film directing debut after being a long-time producer, with a Best Picture Oscar nomination for his co-production of The Martian … other film production credits include Deadpool, X-Men: Apocalypse, Murder on the Orient Express), who is joined by co-producer Hutch Parker (The Wolverine, X-Men: Days of Future Past, etc.), plus there are deleted scenes (with optional commentary) and the five-part production documentary titled “Rise of the Phoenix: The Making of Dark Phoenix.”

Criterion Collection Announces It October 2019 Slate Of New Film Restorations Destined For DVD And Blu-ray Release • John Sayles' Matewan Tops The List

The Criterion Collection announced its October slate of new film restorations destined for release as DVD and Blu-ray editions this past week.

Topping the list is a new 4K digital restoration of writer/director John Sayles’ 1987 film release of Matewan (restoration supervised by Sayles), which will be available on Oct. 29 as a double-disc DVD edition, as well as a single-disc Blu-ray SKU.

John Sayles is a master storyteller, nominated for Oscars twice for his scripts — Lone Star (1996) and Passion Fish (1992).   His characters are flushed-out two and three levels deep … small, seemingly insignificant roles take on a life of their own, even if the screen time is limited.   This is what makes his films so marvelous.

The backstory on how this film came to be is terrific.   Sayles, as he tells it, hitchhiked all through West Virginia during the summer of 1970, taking in the tales and stories of those who gave him rides and befriended him.   The legend of the Matewan Massacre (locals), or as it is officially known, “The Battle of Matewan,” which took place on May 19, 1920, struck a chord with him.   He spent the next 17 years researching and writing a screenplay for what would come to be Matewan.   17 years!!

In the meantime, he honed his screenwriting craft on such films as director Joe Dante’s Piranha and The Howling, director Lewis Teague’s The Lady in Red and Alligator … and then his own films, Return of the Secaucus Seven, The Brother from Another Planet and Baby, It’s You.  

Matewan also includes several John Sayles collaborators, his college classmate and long-time friend, David Strathairn (Return of the Secaucus Seven, The Brother from Another Planet, Eight Men Out and Limbo, among others), Chris Cooper, whose performance in Sayles’ Lone Star is nothing short of brilliant, and Mary McDonnell (Passion Fish).

Filmed on location in West Virginia, with the mining town of Thurmond doubling for Matewan (which had been destroyed by flooding of the Tug Ford River and was subsequently rebuilt), Sayles recruited locals for roles in the film — 31 of which had speaking parts!!!   It was a seven-week shoot and the result was Matewan.

Despite glowing reviews, the film did not do well at the box office during its theatrical rollout in late August of 1987 (the film had debuted at the Cannes Film Festival in April of that year).   History, however, has elevated Matewan to be among some of the best films from Sayles.

Bonus features include a vintage commentary with Sayles and cinematographer Haskell Wexler (who was nominated for the Oscar for his work here), a new documentary on the making of the film and two newly-prepared video sessions with composer Mason Daring and production designer Nora Chavooshian.

Rounding out the October calendar of film restorations on the way to the home entertainment marketplace are: 3 Silent Classics by Josef von Sternberg (a three-disc collection on Oct. 8), which includes Underworld (1927), The Last Command (1928) and The Docks of New York (1928); Danish filmmaker Benjamin Christensen’s 1922 film release of Haxen (available on Oct. 15, which includes the 1968 re-work titled Witchcraft Through the Ages) and documentary filmmaker Leon Gast’s Oscar-winner for Best Documentary in 1996, When We Were Kings (available on Oct. 22).

For the period ending July 12, 2019 ... New DVD, Blu-ray and 4K Ultra HD selections added to the DVD & Blu-ray Release Report's database

 

DVD New Additions

BBC Entertainment

07/09/19 — Released Shakespeare and Hathaway: Season Two (2 disc set)

Championship Productions

07/09/19 — Released 15 Keys to Developing a Great Team Culture, Aggressive Match-Up Zone Defense, Ball Screen Defense, Ball Screen Offense vs. 2-3 Zone, Culver Way: Teaching Foundations for Ice Hockey, Developing Players for a Free-Flowing Offensive System, Early Shot Clock Offense and Side Out Specials, Our Approach to Defense: Philosophy & Drills, Supercharge Your Offensive System: The Best Offensive Concepts I've Seen and Ways to Enhance Your Full & Half Court Defense

Cinedigm Entertainment

07/09/19 — Released Tell it to the Bees

DreamScape Media

07/09/19 — Released Bee Team 2, Good Son, Highlights: Making Friends, Pup Scouts 3 and Rescue and Jessica

Dynamic

07/09/19 — Released Pietro Mascagni: Cavalleria Rusticana

Get Digital World (MOD)

07/09/19 — Released Big Traffic Firesale, Bulletproof Keto Diet, Calisthenics Home Workout: Beginners Edition, EZ Free Fanpages, Fitness Tracking, Lose Weight and Reboot Your Metabolism With the Keto Diet and Sales University: Master Course (6 disc set)

Gravitas Ventures (MOD)

07/09/19 — Released Above the Best, I Like Me and Shadows of Sofia

Hallmark Channel

07/09/19 — Released Sun, Sand and Romance

I-Cine

07/09/19 — Released Dinh Menh Ta Gap Nhau (10 disc set), Hoang Phi So - Kieu Truyen (24 disc set) and Song Mo Coi (11 disc set)

Icarus Films

09/03/19 — Adds Ghosts of Attica

09/10/19 — Sets DIVEST! The Climate Movement on Tour

Kino Lorber

07/09/19 — Released 3 Faces (Farsi) (ARR of 123 days; box office: $71,613) and Dead of Night

Leomark Studios, LLC (MOD)

07/09/19 — Released Behind the Face (Mongolian), Lease, Of Sinners and Saints and Spiders' Man

Lionsgate Home Entertainment

07/09/19 — Released High Life (ARR of 95 days; box office: $1,221,064) and The Professor

Lionsgate Home Entertainment (MOD)

07/09/19 — Released Outlaws

Naxos

07/09/19 — Released Lully: Te Deum; Biber: Missa Salisburgensis and Tchaikovsky: Pique Dame - The Queen of Spades (2 disc set)

PBS Direct

07/02/19 — Released Rhythm of the Dance

07/09/19 — Released Arthur Celebrates Community, Breakthrough: The Ideas That Changed The World (2 disc set), Chasing the Moon (3 disc set), Endeavour: The Complete Sixth Season (2 disc set), Last Survivors, Ready Jet Go!: One Small Step and Trump's Trade War

PCN Productions (MOD)

07/09/19 — Released African American Experience: Camp William Penn and the U.S. Colored Troops, It's History: DeBence Antique Music World, Keystone Cuisine: The Brewerie and PCN Profiles: Odin Rathnam

Paramount Home Media

09/03/19 — Sets Sunny Day: Welcome to the Pet Parlor

09/10/19 — Sets Hawaii Five-O: The Ninth Season (6 disc set) and SEAL Team: Season Two (5 disc set)

09/24/19 — Sets Billions: Season Four (4 disc set) and Madam Secretary: Season 5 (4 disc set)

Rainbow Media Group (MOD)

07/09/19 — Released King of Stage: The Woodie King Jr. Story

Rarefilmsandmore.com (MOD)

07/09/19 — Released Der Brave Soldat Schwejk (German) and Wanda's Trick (silent-1918)

07/16/19 — Sets Ein Stern Fallt Vom Himmel (German)

Screen Media

07/09/19 — Released Clara

Serpent Films (MOD)

07/02/19 — Released 2 Classic Movies (2 film set: Curse of the Swamp Creature, Destroy All Planets) and 2 Classic Movies (2 film set: Doomsday Machine, First Spaceship on Venus)

07/09/19 — Released 2 Classic Movies (2 film set: Invaders from Space, Invasion of the Bee Girls), 2 Classic Movies (2 film set: King of the Zombies, Lady Frankenstein) and 2 Classic Movies (2 film set: Moon of the Wolf, Night Fright)

Seventh Art Productions

07/09/19 — Released Exhibition on Screen: Young Picasso

Silent Hall of Fame (MOD)

07/02/19 — Released White Moth (silent-1924)

07/09/19 — Released His Grace's Last Will (silent-1919)

Smart Mark Video (MOD)

07/09/19 — Released IWA Mid-South: Egg Sucking Dog Days of Summer - Jeffersonville, IN, IWA Mid-South: This One's for Papa Saint - Jeffersonville, IN and Underground Empire Wrestling: Explicit Endeavors - Los Angeles, CA

The Film Collector’s Society (MOD)

07/09/19 — Released Affair in Monte Carlo, Alimony Madness, Animal Kingdom, Bear Island, Beatles: Their Golden Age, Big News, Bird of Paradise, Broadway to Cheyenne, Broken Dream, By Appointment Only, Cary Grant: American Movie Legend, Cavalcade of Dance, Channel Crossing, Cheating Blondes, Confessions of a Nazi Spy, Constant Woman, Corruption, Count of Monte Cristo, Cowboy Counsellor, Crooked Circle, Cross Examination, Crusader, Damnation Alley, Daring Daughters, Dark Tide, Diamond Trail, Discarded Lovers, Docks of San Francisco, Dream House, Drifter, Ecstasy, Dupont Show of the Month: Harvey, Emperor Jones, Exposure, Falling For You, Falling in Love With the Girl Next Door, Ferry to Hong Kong, Finnegan Begin Again, Five Weeks in a Balloon, Flames (aka: Fire Alarm), Flaming Signal, For Keeps, Forgotten, Friday the Thirteenth, Frogmen, Gambling Sex, Ghoul, Gideon of Scotland Yard, Gideon's Trumpet, Gigolettes of Paris, Girl From Calgary, Girl From Chicago, Girl From Mandalay, Glass Menagerie, Gold, Great Lie, Green for Danger, Hal Roach: Hollywood's King of Laughter, Hamlet, Hard Knox, Hard Man, Hard Rock Harrigan, Harlow, Harriet Craig, Haunted Trails, Headless Woman (Spanish), Heart Punch, Hearts of Humanity, If I Were Rich (aka: Cash; aka: For Love or Money)

Two Little Hands Productions (MOD)

07/09/19 — Released Baby Signing Time, Volume 1: It's Baby Signing Time, Baby Signing Time, Volume 2: Here I Go, Baby Signing Time, Volume 3: A New Day and Baby Signing Time, Volume 4: Let's be Friends

Uni Music – Deutsche Grammophon

07/09/19 — Released Wagner: Lohengrin - 2018 Bayreuth Festival (2 disc set)

Universal Pictures Home Entertainment

08/27/19 — Sets Secret Life of Pets 2 (ARR of 81 days; box office: $140,658,930)

WWE

07/09/19 — Released WWE: The MIZ - A-List Superstar (2 disc set)

Wild Eye Releasing

10/29/19 — Sets Plaguers: 10th Anniversary Special Edition

Wild Eye Releasing (MOD)

07/09/19 — Released From the Dead

Blu-ray New Additions

AGFA

10/15/19 — Sets Scary Movie (Blu-ray/DVD Combo Pack)

Cohen Media Group

07/09/19 — Released Buster Keaton Collection, Volume 2 (2 silent films: Sherlock Jr. (1924) The Navigator (1924))

07/16/19 — Sets Ash is the Purest White (Mandarin)

Dark Night Films (MOD)

07/09/19 — Released Evil Deeds

Dynamic

07/09/19 — Released Pietro Mascagni: Cavalleria Rusticana

Flicker Alley

07/09/19 — Released Extraordinary World of Charley Bowers (12 silent short films: A.W.O.L. (1918), The Extra-Quick Lunch (1919), Egged On (1926), Fatal Footsteps (1926), He Done His Best (1926), Now You Tell One (1926), A Wild Roomer (1927), Many A Slip (1927), Nothing Doing (1927), Say Ah-h! (1928), There It Is (1928), Whoozit (1928); plus five short films: It's A Bird (1930), Believe It Or Don't (1935), Pete-Roleum and His Cousins (1939), A Sleepless Night (1940), Wild Oysters (1941)) (2 disc set)

FUNimation

07/09/19 — Released In Another World With My Smartphone (2 disc set),  Island: The Complete Series (2 disc set) (with Digital Copy) and Panty and Stocking with Garterbelt: Complete Series (2 disc set)

GKids, Inc.

07/09/19 — Released Big Bad Fox and Other Tales (Japanese) (Blu-ray/DVD Combo Pack)

Gravitas Ventures (MOD)

07/09/19 — Released Above the Best, I Like Me and Shadows of Sofia

Grindhouse Releasing

07/09/19 — Released Tough Ones (Italian) (2 disc set with bonus CD)

Kino Lorber

07/09/19 — Released 3 Faces (Farsi), Annihilators, Dead of Night, Peter Pan (silent-1924) and Tuff Turf

Lionsgate Home Entertainment

07/09/19 — Released High Life (with Digital Copy) and The Professor (with Digital Copy)

Lionsgate Home Entertainment (MOD)

07/09/19 — Released Outlaws

MPI Home Media

07/09/19 — Released Edge of Love

Meridian Releasing Group (MOD)

07/09/19 — Released Nine Meals from Chaos: Director's Cut

Mill Creek Entertainment

10/15/19 — Sets Ultra Q: The Complete Series (4 disc set) (with Digital Copy) and Ultraman: The Complete Series (6 disc set) (with Digital Copy)

Naxos

07/09/19 — Released Casella: La Donna Serpente, Rossini: Il Barbiere di Siviglia, Tchaikovsky: Pique Dame - The Queen of Spades and Verbier Festival: The 25th Anniversary Concert

PBS Direct

07/09/19 — Released Chasing the Moon (3 disc set) and Endeavour: The Complete Sixth Season (2 disc set)

PCN Productions (MOD)

07/09/19 — Released African American Experience: Camp William Penn and the U.S. Colored Troops, It's History: DeBence Antique Music World, Keystone Cuisine: The Brewerie and PCN Profiles: Odin Rathnam

Paramount Home Media

09/24/19 — Released Stephen King's The Stand: Collector's Edition (2 disc set)

Sentai Filmworks

07/09/19 — Released Pet Shop of Horrors

Shout! Factory

07/09/19 — Released Great Northfield Minnesota Raid, Silent Hill: Collector's Edition (2 disc set) and This Island Earth

Smart Mark Video (MOD)

07/09/19 — Released CCW: Thy Kingdom Come - San Fernando, CA, IWA Mid-South: Egg Sucking Dog Days of Summer - Jeffersonville, IN, Underground Empire Wrestling: Blood by Blood - Sun Valley, CA, Underground Empire Wrestling: Empire Rising - Sun Valley, CA, Underground Empire Wrestling: Explicit Endeavors - Los Angeles, CA and Underground Empire Wrestling: March of the Damned - Sun Valley, CA

T-Series

07/09/19 — Released Smash Hitz, Volume 7

Uni Music – Deutsche Grammophon

07/09/19 — Released Wagner: Lohengrin - 2018 Bayreuth Festival

Universal Pictures Home Ent.

08/27/19 — Sets Secret Life of Pets 2 (Blu-ray/DVD Combo Pack) (with Digital Copy)

09/03/19 — Sets Ma (Blu-ray/DVD Combo Pack) (with Digital Copy)

VCI Entertainment

10/25/19 — Sets Leg Fighters (Mandarin) (Blu-ray/DVD Combo Pack)

Wild Eye Releasing

10/29/19 — Sets Plaguers: 10th Anniversary Special Edition

4K Ultra HD New Additions

 

Universal Pictures Home Entertainment

08/27/19 — Sets Secret Life of Pets 2 (4K Ultra HD/Blu-ray Combo Pack) (with Digital Copy)

Paramount Home Media Targets Sept. 24 For The DVD Debut Of Madam Secretary: Season 5

It was another very busy week for Paramount Home Media with multiple street-date assignments for hit selections from their extensive TV-on-DVD library.

In the last couple of weeks we’ve learned that Billions: Season Four will be available on Sept. 24, The Good Fight: Season Three arrives on Sept. 10 and Bull: Season Three hits retail outlets on Sept. 3.

This week we find that not one, but three more full seasons of popular TV series will be available on DVD for fans to enjoy during the month of September.

Sept. 24 marks the arrival of Madam Secretary: Season 5 — all 20 episodes — on DVD.   And, as with other current announcements, Madam Secretary, starring Téa Leoni, has been renewed for a sixth season.

Also getting full-season release packages on DVD — both streeting on Sept. 10 — are SEAL Team: Season Two and Hawaii Five-O: The Ninth Season.

But wait, there is more … from Nickelodeon on Sept. 3 is the latest round of adventures of Sunny Day and her talking dog Doodle, Sunny Day: Welcome to the Pet Parlor.   Four fun-filled episodes will be available on DVD featuring a royal pet wedding, the design and conversion of a truck into the new dog-grooming truck, “Groom & Vroom,” and more.

Lastly, and timed to take full advantage of the theatrical release of Stephen King’s It Chapter Two on Sept. 6, is a new Blu-ray presentation of Stephen King's apocalyptic mini-series, The Stand.    The double-disc special edition Blu-ray set will be available on Sept. 24.

Mill Creek Entertainment Acquires Distribution Rights To The Tsuburaya Productions Co., Ltd Ultraman Library • First Wave On Oct. 15

Mill Creek Entertainment announced this past week that the company had acquired domestic distribution rights to the entire Tsuburaya Productions Co., Ltd Ultraman library.   Over 50 years of programming, which represents in excess of 1,100 series episodes and 20 feature films.

This is a big one and Mill Creek wasted no time in setting Oct. 15 as the street date for Blu-ray sets of both Ultra Q: Complete Series 01 and Ultraman: Complete Series 02 … Steelbook special editions will be available on Oct. 15 as well.

When domestic audiences were gathered around their TV sets in 1966 to watch Star Trek, half a world away Japanese audiences were treated to Ultra Q, a “Kaiju” (literally translated as giant monsters or beasts … think along the lines of Godzilla, Rodan, Mothra and you will be in the right ball park) anthology of stories and weird tales featuring exotic beasts, dragons, aliens, you name it and Ultra Q threw in just about everything, including ghostly aberrations.

A reporter (Hiroko Sakurai) and a sci-fi writer/aviator (Kenji Sahara) are the forerunners to the X Files’ Dana Scully and Fox Mulder, who investigate and report on the various creatures that are among us.

All 28 episodes in the Ultra Q series will be available on Blu-ray as a four-disc collection … with Digital Copy as a bonus.   These are the original Japanese-language broadcast episodes (with optional English subtitles).

Also arriving on Oct. 15 is the first installment in the Ultraman series.   With the huge success of Ultra Q, Tsuburaya Productions sprung into action and quickly developed a slew of “Ultra” series adventures that continue to run to this day.    

The first of these was a 39-episode series titled Ultraman, which starred Susumu Kurobe as “Ultraman,” Akiji Kobayashi as the leader of “The Science Patrol” and both Kenji Sahara and Hiroko Sakurai are back, but in different personas. 

More monsters, more aliens … bigger, bigger, bigger and even more exciting with a member of Earth’s defense force, “The Space Patrol,” as the hero who is the very mysterious “Ultraman” — he can who grow to a giant size in order to battle monsters and save the earth!!!   

Ultraman will be available as a six-disc collection on Blu-ray, with Digital Copy as a bonus.  Ultraman is also presented in its original Japanese broadcast form, with English subtitles.

67 episodes down … Mill Creek Entertainment is just getting started.   Stay tuned fans!!!