Paramount Home Media Teams With Nickelodeon For The DVD Debut Hey Arnold!: The Jungle Movie On Feb.13

Year after lonely year went by and the fate of Arnold — that Arnold, the animated Arnold from Hey Arnold!, the popular Nickelodeon series that ran from 1996 through 2004 — was left unresolved.   

Series creator, Craig Bartlett, had it all worked out with Nickelodeon to deliver Hey Arnold!: The Jungle Movie, but then this happened and then that happened and finally it just didn’t happen.   So forever — cartoon land “forever,” that is — Arnold would live with his grandparents in the rooming house and the fate of his parents would never, ever be resolved.   

Rejoice!   Word arrived from Paramount Home Media this past week that it finally happened and Hey Arnold!: The Jungle Movie got made and it will be making its DVD debut on Feb. 13.   Rumors abound that this is either the long-anticipated wrap to the series … or, a possible prelude to a reboot of Hey Arnold!   

Either way, fans — and new fans — can now learn what Arnold’s (voiced by (Mason Vale Cotton) map leads to in the jungle of San Lorenzo.   And, as luck would have it, Arnold, his buddy Gerald (voiced by Benjamin Flores Jr.), the lovely Helga (voiced by Francesca Marie Smith) and their classmates “win” a trip to San Lorenzo … but it’s a trick!!!

Will Arnold solve the mystery of what happened to his parents?   Will the perpetual fifth graders of PS 118 escape the trap set by “pirates?”   You’ll have to wait until Feb. 13 to find out!   Grrrrrrr … the wait, but it’s a wait that is well worth it. 

Also heading home on Feb. 13 are the latest comedy antics of Abbi Jacobson and Ilana Glazer in Broad City: Season 4 … a double-disc DVD release.

Bonus goodies included deleted and extended scenes, a blooper reel and the “Hack Into Broad City” webisodes.

Mill Creek Entertainment Expands Its Feb. 6 Release Calendar With The Three-Disc DVD Collection Of Christopher Lee’s 100 Years of Horror

Mill Creek Entertainment continues to expand its Feb. 6 priced-to-collect DVD and Blu-ray release slate with news this week that horror icon Christopher Lee’s 100 Years of Horror will be available as a three-disc DVD presentation on this first street-date Tuesday in February.

All 24 episodes, featuring such topics as “Frankenstein’s Friends,” “Werewolves,” “Boris Karloff,” “Scream Queens” and more … you name a subject related to horror and Christopher Lee, along with Roger Corman, the late Hugh Hefner, Fred Olen Ray, Robert Wise (and more), cover it with interviews and film footage.   If you are a genre fan, 100 Years of Horror in this priced to own (an SRP of just $14.98) collection is an absolute must on DVD!!!

And speaking of horror, Feb. 6 will also see the three-disc, ten-film collection titled Shadow Stalkers released on DVD.   The SRP is just $14.98 (and that’s before discounts at retail).

Included in this collection is director Irvin Kershner’s 1978 thriller, Eyes of Laura Mars (screenplay by John Carpenter), starring Faye Dunaway, Tommy Lee Jones, Brad Dourif and Raul Julia.  

Other films in the collection include Nightmare in Wax (1969, Cameron Mitchell), The Driller Killer (1979, directed by and starring Abel Ferrara), Don't Answer the Phone (1980, written and directed by Robert Hammer, with Nicholas Worth and Flo Lawrence), Happy Birthday to Me (1981, with Melissa Sue Anderson and Glenn Ford) and Karen Black teams with Bud Cort in director Michael Schroeder’s 1988 chiller, Out of the Dark.

And for Christmas-season horror fans, Shadow Stalkers includes both director Edmund Purdom’s Santa-slaughter flick, Don't Open Till Christmas, and writer/director Theodore Gershuny’s 1972 film, Silent Night, Bloody Night (with Patrick O'Neal, John Carradine and Mary Woronov).

Rounding out the list of new Feb. 6 DVD releases are Seasons of the Heart (starring Carol Burnett and George Segal) and Sudden Fury: A Family Torn Apart (both feature Digital Copy), plus the Dean Martin & Jerry Lewis Collection, which includes five films — Don't Raise the Bridge, Lower the River, Hook Line and Sinker, 3 on a Couch, Who was That Lady? and How To Save A Marriage and Ruin Your Life plus 28 episodes from the Colgate Comedy Hour (this is a six-disc set).

Documentary Filmmaker Michal Goldman’s Nasser’s Republic: The Making of Modern Egypt On DVD From Icarus Films On Jan. 23

When you consider the headline news this past week, that the Trump Administration will be moving the American embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, the timing couldn’t be better for the new DVD release coming from Icarus Films on Jan 23.   This would be documentary filmmaker Michal Goldman’s Nasser’s Republic: The Making of Modern Egypt.

Turkey’s president, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, immediately called for a pan-Islamic summit, but all eyes in the region (Europe included) will be on Egypt, not Turkey, as to how this move plays out in the Middle East.   

Gamal Abdel Nasser is the heart of modern Egypt … filmmaker Michal Goldman details Nasser’s rise to power in 1952, the Six-Day War with Israel in 1967 and his death in September of 1970 from a massive heart attack.   The legacy of these 18 years as president of Egypt reverberate to this day as his successes — and failures — remade a post-war Egypt into a nation that is at the center of the Middle East.  

Nasser’s Republic: The Making of Modern Egypt is a documentary that American audiences should see to more fully understand the pivotal role that Egypt plays in the region.   To this point, Goldman took four years to assemble, not only the history of Nasser, but to conduct numerous interviews with scholars, Islamists, secularists and the people of the street.  

Weaved together, the result is a fascinating look at modern Egypt and the man who molded it.

Bonus features include commentary by director Michal Goldman, an additional clip from the film and a 16-page booklet.

Warner Bros. Home Entertainment Selects Jan. 16 For The Home Entertainment Release Of Director Denis Villeneuve’s Blade Runner 2049

Warner Bros. Home Entertainment avoided the temptation of slamming director Andy Muschietti’s smash film adaption of Stephen King’s It and director Denis Villeneuve’s futuristic thriller, Blade Runner 2049, into the December home entertainment launch window.   With Dunkirk in place on Dec. 19, both of these hits could easily wait until Q1’18 for genre fans to savor.

It received a Jan. 9 street date and news arrived this past week that Blade Runner 2049, one of the most anticipated films of 2017, will follow on Jan. 16 as a four-SKU product launch.

The ARR works out to 102 days and the box office take currently stands at $90.8 million.

Planned for distribution are a stand-alone DVD edition, a pair of Blu-ray selections — a Blu-ray/DVD Combo Pack and a double-disc Blu-ray package featuring both 3D and 2D viewing options — and a 4K Ultra HD/Blu-ray Combo Pack.   

      

The film is absolutely gorgeous, and, as with last year’s Passengers from director Morten Tyldum and screenwriter Jon Spaihts, Blade Runner 2049 plays out as a solid sci-fi thriller and as a much deeper look at what it is to be human.   It is also relentlessly depressing — even more depressing than the fate of Aurora and Jim as they live out their lives on the Avalon … never reaching their destination.

Ryan Gosling is “K,” a new Blade Runner, and Harrison Ford returns as the world-weary Deckard, who knows “stuff” that makes both him and K targets … hunted by both humans and androids.   

As to bonus goodies, common to all SKUs is the six-part presentation of “Blade Runner 101,” which breaks down into “Blade Runners,” “The Replicant Evolution,” “The Rise of Wallace Corp,” “Welcome to 2049,” “Joi” and “Within the Skies.”   Exclusive to the Blu-ray/4K Ultra HD configurations are two featurettes — “Designing The World of Blade Runner 2049” and “To Be Human: Casting Blade Runner 2049” — and three “prologues” — “2022: Black Out,” “2036: Nexus Dawn” and “2048: Nowhere to Run.”

Arrow Video's 2K Restoration Of Director John Grissmer’s Scalpel Ready For A Blu-ray Push On Feb. 20

Arrow Video, with domestic sales and distribution expertise provided by MVD Entertainment Group, will be bringing a new 2K restoration of director John Grissmer’s 1977 (and 1978) gothic tale, Scalpel (aka: False Face) to market as a Blu-ray product offering on Feb. 20.

The film’s backstory is fascinating in that it was shot in and around Atlanta, Georgia in October of 1975, disappeared for all of 1976 and then surfaced as a regional indie release from United International Pictures in January of 1977 … and then disappeared again.   It was titled False Face.

Somewhere along the line Embassy Pictures acquired the film and retitled it Scalpel and gave it a wide theatrical release in September of 1978.   

The new title moved the film into the “horror” category, but it’s more akin to a demented murder mystery with Robert Lansing (4D Man, The Grissom Gang, Empire of the Ants, etc.) starring as plastic surgeon Dr. Phillip “Phil” Reynolds.  It seems that when he takes a dislike to people around him they die mysterious deaths … his wife drowned in the backyard pool and his daughter’s “boyfriend” met a similar fate.

Which brings us to the film itself, which opens with Dr. Reynolds and his brother-in-law, Bradley (played by long-time character actor Arlen Dean Snyder), sharing drinks over the death of Robert Thorndike — Bradley’s father and Phil’s former father-in-law.   Both, it seems, were on the outs with the old man, who left his entire fortune to his grand daughter, Heather (played by veteran soap and TV series player Judith Chapman) … who mysteriously vanished after her boyfriend’s death.

In no time the pair almost mow-down a stripper, who has been beaten to a pulp, and was left dazed to wander the streets bleeding and in shock.   As good samaritans, they rush her to the nearby hospital, where as luck would have it, Phil just happens to work.   

In one of those “light bulbs” going on moments, Phil stops the routine call to the police — to report the beating — and takes the dear girl under his personal care.   After all, he is a plastic surgeon and her broken jaw and mangled face — beaten beyond recognition — can be repaired under his skillful “scalpel” and care. 

This is where the film gets creepy.   Phil molds the girl’s face, “Jane Doe” (also played by Chapman), to that of his daughter, Heather … and begins training her to be his daughter, with the deal that they split the money.    He also takes to sleeping with her … 

Eventually Bradley gets suspicious of what Phil is up to and that means that he too will have to have an “accident.”    So where is the real Heather and will “Jane” and Phil get away with this multi-million dollar deception?   To find out, pick up this new Blu-ray edition of Scalpel from Arrow Video on Feb. 20.

As to bonus goodies, there’s a newly-minted commentary option from film historian Richard Harland Smith and new video sessions with unspecified members of the film’s production crew.

Universal Pictures Home Entertainment Tabs Feb. 6 For The Home Entertainment Launch Of A Bad Moms Christmas

Universal Pictures Home Entertainment has selected Feb. 6 as the street date for the writing and directing team of Jon Lucas and Scott Moore’s A Bad Moms Christmas, their hit follow-up to the 2016 release of Bad Moms.

Both DVD and Blu-ray/DVD Combo Pack editions will be available.

With $64.7 million these bad moms — Mila Kunis, Kristen Bell and Kathryn Hahn (and friends) — can be bad again and again … and again!   The ARR for that first street-date Tuesday in February comes in at 95 days.

Bonus nuggets include a gag reel, “additional” scenes and a music video featuring the film’s product crew.

Lionsgate Home Entertainment Looks To Jan. 30 For Tyler Perry's Latest Theatrical Hit On DVD And Blu-ray • Boo 2! A Madea Halloween

Tyler Perry has been a godsend to the Lionsgate studio, providing hit after hit.   But are his efforts really appreciated?   Are his hit films just being taken for granted?   It’s hard to say, it is the holidays and things can get rushed, but judging from the lack of PR enthusiasm on the part of Lionsgate Home Entertainment you just have to wonder … where's the love for his latest hit as it transitions from theatres to the home entertainment marketplace?   Oh well.

His latest box office success, Boo 2! A Madea Halloween, will be heading home on Jan. 30 as both DVD and Blu-ray/DVD Combo Pack editions.   With that Q1’18 street date, the ARR works out to 102 days and box office receipts currently total $47.2 million.

Bonus treats include outtakes, deleted scenes and a pair of featurettes — “Caddy Whack Boo” and “Why We Love Joe!”

Also getting a release date is the directing team of Michael and Peter Spierig’s Jigsaw, the latest edition in the studio’s lucrative Saw franchise. 

A three-SKU array of home entertainment products will be ready for fans of the series to enjoy on Jan. 23 … these will be a stand-alone DVD edition, a Blu-ray/DVD Combo Pack edition and a 4K Ultra HD/Blu-ray Combo Pack selection.

The ARR works out to a swift-to-market 88 days and ticket sales currently stand at $37.6 million.

Lionsgate Home Entertainment has been slow to get the official press announcement out on Jigsaw (again, it could be the holiday season), so we have to rely on WaxWorks’ Dec. 4 “Hot Sheet” sales bulletin for information on the street date (sans details on bonus goodies, of course).