Upcoming Warner Archive Blu-rays
Today, the Warner Archive Collection announced four upcoming Blu-ray releases expected later this spring. It’s a fantastic line-up, including a true masterpiece of B-movie noir, a spiritual sequel to The Bad and the Beautiful, and the first directorial effort of Spaghetti Western maestro Sergio Leone. Finally, there’s a men-on-a-mission flick which I want to pick up more for the audio commentary than for the film itself, because it features the hosts of the Pure Cinema Podcast (my favorite filmcast).
Here are the full details from the Warner Archive Collection Facebook page:
GUN CRAZY (1949) (BD)
NEW 2018 1080p HD MASTER
Run Time 87:00
Subtitles English
DTS HD-Master Audio 2.0 MONO – English
ORIGINAL ASPECT RATIO – 1.37:1, 4 X 3 STANDARD
BD 50
Special Features:
- Commentary by Author/Film-Noir Specialist Glenn Erickson
- Feature Length Documentary: “Film-Noir: Bringing Darkness to Light” (2006)
- Special thanks to UCLA Film & Television Archive for their contributions to this release
When gun fancier Bart Tare sees Annie Laurie Starr’s sideshow sharpshooting act, he’s a dead-bang goner. He and she go together, as Bart ultimately says, “like guns and ammunition.”The two become bank robbers on the run, eluding roadblocks and roaring into movie history as one of the benchmark film-noir works. Joseph H. Lewis directs this ferocious thriller, selected for the National Film Registry and often cited as a forerunner to Bonnie and Clyde. Peggy Cummins and John Dall star, meeting in a sexually charged carny shooting contest and soon driven by impulses of violence and arousal they don’t fully understand. They’re young, foolish, doomed – and point blank in Gun Crazy’s unforgiving sights.
TWO WEEKS IN ANOTHER TOWN (1962)
NEW 2018 1080p HD MASTER
Run Time 107:00
Subtitles English SDH
DTS HD-Master Audio 2.0 MONO- English
16 X 9 LETTERBOX, ORIGINAL ASPECT RATIO – 2.35:1
COLOR
BD 50
Special Features:
- Theatrical Trailer (HD)
In 1952, star Kirk Douglas, director Vincente Minnelli, producer John Houseman and screenwriter Charles Schnee teamed for what many consider the greatest drama ever made about Hollywood: The Bad and the Beautiful. Ten years later, they took another powerful insider’s look at the movie business, this time adapting a book by Irwin Shaw. Douglas portrays has-been screen idol Jack Andrus. Just out of a sanitarium, Jack grabs at a small role in a movie shot in Rome by a director (Edward G. Robinson) whose career is also on the skids. When the director falls ill, Jack takes over, realizing this is his last shot at personal and professional redemption. Trenchant, confrontational and intensified by Minnelli’s genius for color, Two Weeks in Another Town captures the passion of creative people facing the abyss.
COLOSSUS OF RHODES (1961)
NEW 2018 1080p HD MASTER
Run Time 128:00
Subtitles English SDH
DTS HD-Master Audio 2.0 MONO- English
16 X 9 LETTERBOX, ORIGINAL ASPECT RATIO – 2.35:1
COLOR
BD 50
Special Feature:
- Commentary by Film Historian Christopher Frayling
Filmmakers often begin their directing careers with works of limited scale. Sergio Leone began with a Colossus. Spectacle is king in The Colossus of Rhodes, Leone’s first credited film as a director. Sun-bronzed heroes (including toga-wearing Rory Calhoun) battle tyranny. Prisoners scramble for their lives in coliseum pageants of doom. Usurpers connive. Revolution erupts. And towering over all the excitement is the mighty bronze Colossus that straddles the harbor, fighting foes by dropping burning oil from the huge cauldron it holds and firing streams of molten lead from the catapults in its headpiece. Once upon a time, it dazzled the ancient world. Cult-movie fans think it’s pretty nifty, too.
DARK OF THE SUN (1968)
NEW 2018 1080p HD MASTER
Run Time 100:00
Subtitles English SDH
DTS HD-Master Audio 2.0 MONO- English
16 X 9 LETTERBOX, ORIGINAL ASPECT RATIO – 2.35:1
COLOR
BD 50
Special Features:
- Theatrical Trailer (HD)
- New Commentary by Trailers From Hell’s Larry Karaszewski and Josh Olson with Brian Saur and Elric D. Kane
Take elite commandos, send them on a do-or-die assignment – and sit back and watch the action explode. The men-on-a-mission formula that worked in 1967’s The Dirty Dozen and in Where Eagles Dare (released in the U.S. in 1969) provides another salvo of volatile screen adventure with this strike force saga released in 1968. Rod Taylor and Jim Brown are among a mercenary unit rolling on a steam train across the Congo, headed for the dual tasks of rescuing civilians imperiled by rebels and recovering a cache of diamonds. The film’s violence is fierce, unforgiving, ahead of its time. Quentin Tarantino would offer a tribute of sorts to this red-blooded wallop of a cult fave by using part of its compelling score in Inglourious Basterds (2009).
