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NEWS ARCHIVE - 15th-21st APRIL 2006 |
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12th May 2006 DVD NEWS
The film, about four jaded men who decide to end their lives after one last wild and gluttonous party, stars La Dolce Vita's Marcello Mastroioanni, Michel Piccoli, Philippe Noiret and Barbarella's Ugo Tognazzi. The film will be presented in widescreen "16:9" format. Bonus features include Frank Bordoni's Blow Out ("the award winning TV chef discusses the culinary delights of La Grande Bouffe and presents a master-class on how to make crepes suzettes with Grand Marnier and orange sauce") and a picture galley. The RRP is £19.99.
The film, the story of a young circus
girl's
The film will be supplemented by a commentary track (by Gaiman and director Dave McKean), forty-five minutes of behind-the-scenes featurettes and interviews, and a photo gallery. The RRP is £15.99. The film will also available as part of a box set that will also contain the existing special editions of two other Henson Company movies: Labyrinth and The Dark Crystal. The release date for Ronnie Barker's masterpiece Futtock's End has been put back: Digital Classics' "digitally re-mastered" disc will now be released on June the 26th. Hot off the presses... artwork for two forthcoming BBC titles, the disappointing BBC Sherlock Holmes Collection box set, and the second season of Waking The Dead.
AUSTRALIAN DVD NEWS And now for some DVD news from the land down under!
The three-disc set will also feature the series' 1984 Christmas special, Around The Corner, complete and uncut, and with the original broadcast adcaps. Bonus features include a restored episode of The Sweeney that features George Cole (Tomorrow Man); never-before-seen Minder outtakes, PDFs of original story information for each episode; an image gallery; production notes and guest cast bio's. RRP is TBA. There will be a second set of Minder bloopers on the Series Six set. This will probably follow in July, and is rumoured to also feature some very exciting bonus items! Madman Television will release the third series of Midsomer Murders on June the 21st. This is a two-disc set containing four feature-length episodes. Bonus materials include guest cast bio's, textless title sequences, image galleries and an insert reproduction of the Midsomer Murders sales brochure. The RRP is $39.95 AUD (about £15).
The first season of Doctor Finlay
will be released by Madman Television as a two-disc DVD set on July the
26th. The set will contain the complete series, and bios. The episodes
have undergone some restoration for this box set. Further volumes will
follow at regular intervals, and, if the first set is successful, these
may feature bonus material.
Here's the sleeve art for the two Madman titles...
HAMMER DVD NEWS
There will be three
The discs are: Volume One - Bad Blonde and Man Bait; Volume Two - A Stolen Face and Blackout; and Volume Three - Gambler and the Lady and Heat Wave. Each pair of films will be on a DVD-9, with bios, trailers, and a bonus called The World of Hammer Noir. All six films will be presented in 4:3 format. The RRP for each disc is $14.99. The box set has an RRP of $29.99. All the discs apparently have the same sleeve design (the same as the box set, above). IMAX NEWS Wolfgang Petersen's remake of The Poseidon Adventure, Poseidon, will be making waves - geddit? - at the bfi London IMAX Cinema, near Waterloo station, from June the 1st (the day the film officially makes its UK theatrical debut). The film, which stars Kurt Russell, Josh Lucas and Richard Dreyfuss, should look pretty impressive on the cinema's twenty-metre-high screen! For more information, call the box office (on 0870 787 2525), or visit the bfi IMAX website. Next up... Superman Returns! 9th May 2006 DVD NEWS Here's a better look at the four sleeves in the Alan Bleasdale collection from Channel 4 DVD (see yesterday's News, below).
8th May 2006 ZETA MINOR NEWS Ceri has reviewed the Australian version of the Poldark - Series One DVD box set, which, unlike the UK edition, offers the episodes as they originally aired. There is, however, a sting in the tail, which you'll discover when you read Ceri's review... The Incoming database has been updated, with more than fifty additions last week, not to mention lots more additional links and information. DVD NEWS We finally have some more information about some of the forthcoming Channel 4 DVD releases.
The collection features three titles: GBH, Jake's Progress and Melissa. They will be released individually, or together in the Alan Bleasdale Collection box set, which has an RRP of £59.99. The BAFTA-winning 1991 series GBH, which stars Robert Lindsay as a power-crazy politician whose plans are undermined by a mild-mannered schoolteacher, played by Michael Palin, will be released as a four-disc set. The series is made up of seven episodes, varying in length between seventy-three and ninety-two minutes. The set will include a commentary track by Robert Lindsay, Michael Palin and commissioning editor Peter Ansorge. The RRP is £29.99. Jake's Progress also stars Robert Lindsay, who plays a father of a young boy, Jake, who becomes murderously jealous of his baby brother. The four-disc set features six fifty-minute episodes. Bonus features include a commentary track, by Lindsay and Barclay Wright, who played Jake. The set will also include a deleted (opening) scene. The RRP is £24.99. 1997's Melissa was Bleasdale's adaptation of Frances Durbridge's classic 1960s thriller, about a war correspondent (Tim Dutton) drawn into intrigue and murder when he falls in love with a blonde PR girl (Jennifer Ehle). The five-part series, which also stars Julie Walters and Adrian Dunbar, will be presented on two discs, with a bonus interview with Alan Bleasdale. The RRP is £19.99.
They're releasing the first season of the 1993 sit-com Joking Apart on May the 29th. The series was written by Coupling's Stephen Moffatt, who has described the series as "the funniest show people have never heard of". It stars Cold Feet's Robert Bathurst as a comedy writer whose life falls into turmoil when his wife (Fiona Gilles) leaves him. Bathurst, incidentally, has said of the series that it's "the most enjoyable job I will ever do. It’s the only show I’ve ever done which I’m really happy to revisit". The disc has been lovingly re-mastered, and features commentary tracks on four of the six episodes (by Stephen Moffatt, and stars Robert Bathurst, Fiona Gilles and Tracie Bennett), and an especially-shot featurette, Fool If You Think It's Over. Because the company only has one title, they've decided to distribute it by mail order. You can order it from their website. Note that the label is also soliciting ideas for future releases (here).
Other titles on the set are: Operation London Bridge (1975 / col / 18mins); Wires Over the Border (1974 / col / 18mins); Fully Fitted Freight (1957 / b&w / 21mins); Groundwork for Progress (1959 / b&w / 30mins); Farmer Moving South (1952 / b&w / 17mins); Making Tracks (1956 / b&w / 17mins); I am a Litter Basket (1959 / b&w / 7mins); E for Experimental (1975 / col / 20mins); The Third Sam (1962 / b&w / 10mins); Modelling for the Future (1961 / col / 8mins); People Like Us (1962 / b&w / 9mins); Britannia - A Bridge (1973 / col / 19mins); and A Future on Rail (1957 / b&w / 10mins). The set will include a booklet containing an introduction and film notes by BFT historian Steven Foxon.
The disc will feature a "re-mastered" version of the film, in the collection's steel DVD case packaging. The disc will be presented in anamorphic 2.35:1 ratio. Bonus features include seven cast and crew interviews (50m approx); an Alternate Credit Roll (5m); the 1994 forty-five minute Making of... documentary, and a new ninety-minute documentary, titled History Through The Lens: Outlaws Out of Me. The RRP is £17.99. Forthcoming Cinema Reserve titles include The Seven Year Itch (June), The Fly (July) and Brazil (August).
The film, a haunted house movie featuring a separated couple linked by webcams, will be presented with Anchor Bay's customary selection of audio tracks. Special features include an award-winning short film by the director, Michael Costanza, called Mama Said (3m); his NYU student film Flasher (3m); an alternate scene (4m); a behind-the-scenes featurette (13m); cast auditions (4m); bloopers (4m); and a stills gallery. The RRP is £14.99.
The film, a psychological thriller about a young couple harassed by a murderer with a grudge, will be offered with a choice of Dolby Digital 2.0, 5.1 and DTS 5.1 audio tracks. Bonus features include an hour-long Making of... featurette, a photo gallery and theatrical trailer. The disc has an RRP of £14.99. Tartan is using the success of Michael Haneke's Caché (a.k.a. Hidden) to release a Collector's Edition version of his memorable 1997 thriller Funny Games. The film, about a pair of psychopaths who terrorise a family on holiday at their lakeside cabin, will be presented in anamorphic widescreen format, with a choice of Dolby Digital 2.0, 5.1 and DTS 5.1 audio tracks. The film has apparently been "fully re-mastered", and will have newly-created English subtitles (presumably player-generated subtitles - the ones on the current disc are burnt-in). The current disc is not anamorphic. Bonus features will include an interview with Haneke (the one on the current disc is a text interview - I'm not sure if this is will be the that one, or a video interview), and a trailer. The RRP is £19.99.
The set will include the notorious Exposé (a.k.a. former video nasty The House on Straw Hill, which co-stars Udo Kier, Linda Hayden and Brush Strokes' Karl Howman), Hardcore (co-starring Victor Spinetti, Ronald Fraser and the great Graham Crowden), and Let's Get Laid (Hayden, again, Robin Askwith, Tony Haygarth, and the much-missed Anthony Steel). The set has an RRP of £19.99. Last week's Zeta Minor News can be viewed here. Previous Zeta Minor News entries can viewed here. |
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Some
of the retailers - notably Amazon.com and Choices Direct - have revealed
details of the forthcoming James Bond Ultimate Edition two-disc
sets. In lieu of an official press release, we've added all the details
and sleeve images to the
Nouveaux
Pictures will release Marco Ferreri's award-winning 1973 film La Grande
Bouffe (Blow Out) on DVD on July the 3rd. 
Sony
Pictures will release Mirrormask, the remarkable fantasy film
Umbrella
Entertainment will release all eight episodes of the fifth season of the
Thames Television classic Minder in June. 
American
label VCI Entertainment has formally announced July the 25th as the date
they'll release their first six Exclusive / Hammer noir films.
An
eagerly-awaited collection of Alan Bleasdale releases will be released on
June the 12th. 
It's
not often that you find someone passionate enough about a vintage
television programme that they're prepared to finance a DVD release
themselves, but that's the case with the first disc from a new label,
RePlay.
A
third volume of British Transport Films will be released by the BFI on May
the 29th. The double-disc set, titled
Twentieth
Century Fox Home Video will add a two-disc
Hailed
by no less an authority than Shivers magazine as "the spookiest low
budget horror film since The Blair Witch Project", the supernatural
chiller The Collingswood Story will be released on DVD by Anchor
Bay Entertainment UK on June the 19th.
Paul
Fox's movie The Dark Hours,
A
label called Village will release a box set of cult 70s British movies
written and directed by James Kenelm Clarke, and featuring sex icon Fiona
Richmond on July the 12th. 
