DVD Releases: October 4, 2005


	Alfred Hitchcock: The Masterpiece Collection The Val Lewton Horror Collection Distributors often resort to hyperbole in an effort to differentiate their newly released titles from previous editions of DVDs and retrospective collections. But, because there’s so little difference between silver, gold and platinum versions of a DVD, these adjectives have practically lost all meaning, and the same holds true with such abused superlatives as special, classic, collectible and ultimate. Universal probably didn’t have to add the word Masterpiece to the title of its hefty new Hitchcock set -- his profile alone would have been sufficient -- but in this case, at least, the word correctly describes the box’s contents. The same holds true for the tag, legendary, on Warners’ collection of thrillers produced by Val Lewton. Even without the benefit of CGI animation, motion-capture and multi-channel digital sound, Hitchcock and Lewton tingled more spines in their days than a battalion of computer-generated zombies. The Hitchcock set boasts a 36-page book, 14 documentaries and 9 featurettes, in addition to newly re-mastered editions of Saboteur, Shadow of a Doubt, Rope, Rear Window, The Trouble With Harry, The Man Who Knew Too Much, Vertigo, Psycho, The Birds, Marnie, Torn Curtain, Topaz, Frenzy and Family Plot. On separate bonus discs are, AFI Salute to Alfred Hitchcock, Masters of Cinema: Alfred Hitchcock, All About ‘The Birds,’ The Making of ‘Psycho’ and new documentary that showcases Hitchcock's films, career and legacy. The studio has also released a three-disc set of the maestro’s wonderful TV anthology series, Alfred Hitchcock Presents: Season One ($39.98). The stories, 39 from 1955-56, were based on short pieces by such writers such as John Cheever, John Collier, John Wyndham, Ray Bradbury, Robert Bloch, Roald Dahl, Alexander Woollcott and Ambrose Bierce. Some of these titles have been included in four-episode sets, but not in full-season packages. Both supplement the Signature Collection of mid-career titles, released in January by Warners. The Russian-born, American-educated Lewton was responsible for shepherding a string of highly stylized noir-horror flicks through RKO’s B-movie mill in the ’40s. Although he never directed, as producer, his stamp is on practically every frame of Cat People, The Curse of the Cat People, I Walked with a Zombie, The Body Snatcher, Isle of the Dead, Bedlam, The Leopard Man, The Ghost Ship, The Seventh Victim and Shadows in the Dark. Considering that he was limited to a budget of around $200,000 per picture (and the titles dreamed up by RKO brass), the quality of his signature films was amazing, and his influence among future generations of filmmakers has never waned. Watch Lewton and Jacques Tourneur’s Cat People alongside Paul Schrader’s not-bad 1982 adaptation, and the artistic principle, less is more, will make perfect sense. Commentary is provided by historian Greg Mank, Simone Simon, Kim Newman, Steve Jones, Steve Haberman, Robert Wise and Tom Weaver. The set also includes Steve Haberman and Constantine Nasr’s documentary, Shadows In The Dark: The Val Lewton Legacy. -- Gary Dretzka

	The Interpreter More interesting than almost anything else in Sydney Pollack’s complex political thriller is where it takes place. The Interpreter was the first film ever to be shot inside the New York headquarters of the United Nations, and such distinctive locations as the General Assembly and the Security Council. (It took advantage of the organization’s weekend breaks.) Nicole Kidman played a U.N. interpreter who inadvertently overhears hints of an assassination plot against the despot, who holds a firm grip on her African homeland. Sean Penn portrayed the Secret Service agent who must decide if her story holds water. The ensuing race-against-time produces a sufficient number of exciting scenes -- and the actors, including Catherine Keener as Penn’s partner, are typically fine -- to recommend it for DVD renters with a taste for Hollywood-style intrigue. But, one wonders what Hitchcock might have done with a story in which an overheard conversation threatens the stability of an entire continent, and an interpreter doing her job becomes a target for assassins from both sides of the conspiracy. The extras include the featurettes, A Day in the Life of Real Interpreters and The Ultimate Movie Set: The United Nations. -- Gary Dretzka

	Secrets of Angels, Demons & Masons Origins of the Da Vinci Code As part of the unofficial build-up for the release next May of Ron Howard’s adaptation of The Da Vinci Code, video stores already are overflowing with documentaries, travelogues and dramas involving secret societies, hidden treasure and long-suppressed theories on the life of Christ. Most go with the flow of Dan Brown’s scholarship, but a handful take it to task. The twin docs, Secrets of Angels & Demons and Secrets of Masons, are based on a book by Dan Burstein and Arne de Keijzer, which took dead aim on Brown’s theories about the Illuminati and the Freemasons. The secretive inner-workings of the latter, especially, have fascinated audiences for years, most recently in National Treasure, but also to good effect in John Huston’s wonderful adventure, The Man Who Would Be King. Next up, from Disinformation Company, is Origins of the Da Vinci Code. In it, Michael Bott and Henry Lincoln, revisit the mysteries advanced in the novel, while adding some new discoveries about the landscape geometry of the original Pentacle of Mountains. Wouldn’t it be great if someone declared a six-month moratorium on all hype surrounding The Da Vinci Code and other dubious mysteries surrounding the life, death and love life of Jesus Christ? Hasn’t he suffered enough? -- Gary Dretzka

	Cinderella: Disney Special Platinum Edition Disney has designated Cinderella as one of 10 landmark titles to be made available on DVD for only one year, then withdrawn and issued again a decade later. These 10 time-honored movies fall under the company’s Platinum Edition banner. Released in 1950, Cinderella represented the studio’s first post-World War II foray into fully developed, feature-length films, as well as its initial deployment of Tin Pan Alley tunesmiths to write the songs. Its success would re-establish Disney as a prominent player in Hollywood for decades to come. (Disney's first live-action movie, Treasure Island, would arrive five months later). God knows what new video format will be in vogue in 2015, but this splendid volume should do nicely until then. A generously appointed version of Cinderella top ends at retail for about $30, while the more elaborately packaged Collector‘s Gift Set adds another $16-20. Among the features in both volumes are Rags to Riches: The Making of Cinderella, reconstructed versions of deleted songs; The Cinderella That Almost Was, with newly discovered deleted scenes; a 1922 Cinderella Laugh-O-Gram; ESPN Classic's Cinderella Stories; a storyboard-to-film comparison, The Opening Sequence; and From Walt's Table: A Tribute to Disney's Nine Old Men. For children and parents, alike, it doesn’t get much better than Cinderella. -- Gary Dretzka

The Warriors: The Ultimate Director's Cut The lingering cult-like popularity of The Warriors proves, once again, that classic stories never grow old. Walter Hill’s hyper-violent gangland adventure was inspired by Anabasis, Xenophon's account of the retreat of a Greek mercenary army, from Persia, after supporting Cyrus the Younger in his attempt to gain the Persian throne. Instead of Asia Minor, Hill’s staging ground is the Bronx, and Cyrus appears here in the personage of a messianic thug whose assassination is mistakenly blamed on street toughs from Coney Island. To avenge Cyrus’ death, dozens of New York street gangs put aside their differences long enough to set traps for the retreating Warriors. Upon the release of The Warriors, in 1979, Nervous Nellies in the media predicted that real-life hooligans would emulate the cartoonish gangs in the movie -- inspired as much by Marvel Comics as A Clockwork Orange -- and terrorize the nation’s malls and multiplexes. Somehow, the republic survived the threat. -- Gary Dretzka

The Holy Girl If it weren’t for a special promotion on Netflix, I probably would have missed this sensational spiritual drama from the very talented Argentine writer-director Lucrecia Martel. In her first feature, La Cienaga, and again in The Holy Girl, Martel portrayed life in her provincial hometown of Salta (a.k.a., the Swamp) much in the same way Faulkner turned fictional Yoknapatawpha County into a combination petri dish and pressure cooker. The Holy Girl focuses on the lives of two teenage girls as they adjust simultaneously to their evolving sexuality and engrained religious passion. The mother of one of the girls falls for a doctor attending a convention in the hotel she manages, but things get complicated when the teenage daughter discovers he is the same man who had earlier made a rather rude physical pass at her. The girl keeps this encounter secret, but the doctor’s anxiety over being revealed as a pervert among his peers is palpable. Martel’s approach to the material recalls the work of Isabel Allende, Gabriel Garcia Marquez and other South American writers and filmmakers whose art exists at the intersection of the corporeal and spiritual worlds. -- Gary Dretzka

From Tragedy to Triumph: The Jewish Experience 1933-1967 Koch Lorber has assembled seven feature-length documentaries, including two Academy Award-winners, that will help ensure a permanent visual record of the events that led directly not only to the Holocaust, but also to the creation of Israel and the war that tested its ability to survive. Genocide and The Long Way Home, both of which won Oscars as Best Documentary Feature, are from Moriah Films of the Simon Wiesenthal Center, as are Unlikely Heroes, Liberation,and In Search of Peace. Photographer, which juxtaposes rare color photographs of the Lodz ghetto with the testimony of survivors, won the Prix Europa. They Looked Away examines the role played by Allied nations in the period before World War II, which might have cleared the way for Germany’s Final Solution. -- Gary Dretzka

Dr John: Live at Montreux 1995 No one epitomizes the musical spirit of New Orleans as well as Dr. John, and, in the wake of Hurricane Katrina, it’s great to have a reminder of good times in the Big Easy. There’s no better interpreter of the unique R&B styling of such New Orleans musicians as Professor Longhair, Fats Domino, Allen Toussaint and Huey Piano Smith, than The Night Tripper. This delightful performance DVD is part of Eagle Vision’s extensive Live at Montreux series. It includes three additional songs -- Mac’s Boogie, Tipitina, Junko -- that are as representative of New Orleans funk as gumbo and gris-gris. -- Gary Dretzka

Warren Miller's Riders Collection Warren Miller's Impact Warren Miller's Fifty Movies and documentaries about surfing -- scuba diving, even -- are far more prevalent in the action-sports marketplace than those focusing on skiing. If it weren’t for Robert Redford in Downhill Racer, Roger Moore in The Spy Who Loved Me and James Brown in Ski Party, I’d be hard-pressed to come up with any titles at all. Clearly, this has more to do with the fact that serious skiers tend not to wear bikinis and lingerie when navigating the slopes, while beach-based activities require that women wear little more than a piece of dental floss, a handkerchief and two postage stamps. Truth is, though, by the time Bruce Brown’s The Endless Summer became a breakthrough hit, in 1966, Warren Miller’s skiing docs already were a fixture among fans of the sport and outdoors adventures. The mogul of moguls has continued to turn out movies for more than a half-century, expanding his repertoire to include all manner of extreme snow-based activities, including snowboarding and mountain kayaking. New to DVD, Warren Miller’s Riders Collection, is comprised of Freeriders, Snowriders and Snowriders 2. Warren Miller’s Impact adds the music of such groups as Coldplay, the Vines, the Dandy Warhols, Jane’s Addiction and the Red Hot Chili Peppers to the mix. Warren Miller’s Fifty is a retrospective of material from the master’s catalogue. Beautiful scenery and hot action … what more could one hope for while waiting for the first big snow storm of winter 2006? -- Gary Dretzka

Fangoria: Blood Drive II The influential fanzine, Fangoria, has been in the business of covering the horror-slasher-monster genre for more than a quarter-century. As such, it’s a pretty good arbiter of bad taste in the cinema, and a predictor of hot young talent. Blood Drive II is a compilation of winning entries in the second Fangoria Blood Drive short-film competition. Besides the winning titles, the DVD offers an extra hour of bonus materials, including a day in the life of actor Bruce Campbell and behind-the-scenes tour of special-effects studio KNB EFX. -- Gary Dretzka

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