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New to Blu – Week of 12/1/2015
Each week here at Bloody Disgusting we like to highlight some of the new Blu-ray releases hitting shelves across the world. Please note that this isn’t every release for the week, just a few of the ones that jumped out at us.
Not a lot of new releases this week but plenty to be excited about if you’re a fan of steelbooks. I know I am and that Kick Boxer release is a must!
US Releases
Fear the Walking Dead: The Complete First Season (Starz/Anchor Bay)
Synopsis:
What did the world look like as it was transforming into the horrifying apocalypse depicted in “The Walking Dead”? This spin-off set in Los Angeles, following new characters as they face the beginning of the end of the world, will answer that question.
Reservoir Dogs – Target Exclusive Mono X Steelbook (Lionsgate)
Synopsis:
Four Perfect Killers. One Perfect Crime. Critically acclaimed for its raw power and breathtaking ferocity, it’s the brilliant American gangster movie classic from writer-director Quentin Tarantino. They were perfect strangers, assembled to pull off the perfect crime. Then their simple robbery explodes into bloody ambush, and the ruthless killers realize one of them is a police informer. But which one?
Cooties (Lionsgate)
Synopsis:
A mysterious virus hits an isolated elementary school, transforming the kids into a feral swarm of mass savages. An unlikely hero must lead a motley band of teachers in the fight of their lives.
Twice Told Tales (Kino Lorber)
Synopsis:
Three horror stories based on the writings of Nathaniel Hawthorne. In the first story titled “Dr. Heidegger’s Experiment”, Heidegger attempts to restore the youth of three elderly friends. In “Rappaccini’s Daughter”, Vincent Price plays a demented father innoculating his daughter with poison so she may never leave her garden of poisonous plants. In the final story “The House of the Seven Gables”, the Pyncheon family suffers from a hundred year old curse and while in the midst of arguing over inheritance, the Pyncheon brother kills his sister…
The Walking Dead: The Complete Fifth Season (Starz/Anchor Bay)
Synopsis:
The Walking Dead tells the story of the aftermath of a zombie apocalypse and follows a small group of survivors traveling across the United States in search of a new home away from the hordes of zombies. The group is led by Rick Grimes, who was a police officer in the old world. As their situation grows more and more grim, the group’s desperation to survive pushes them to do almost anything to stay alive.
Goodnight Mommy (Starz/Anchor Bay)
Synopsis:
In the heat of the summer, a lonesome house in the countryside between woods and corn fields, lives nine-year-old twin brothers who are waiting for their mother. When she comes home, bandaged after cosmetic surgery, nothing is like before. The children start to doubt that this woman is actually their mother.
Highlander – Target Exclusive Mondo X Steelbook (Lionsgate)
Synopsis:
During a fierce sword battle in the 1500s, Connor MacLeod, a simple Scotsman known as a poor fighter, is mortally wounded — but he does not die. MacLeod learns from the mysterious Ramírez that he is of a race of immortals. These rare knights never age and never reproduce, they can only meet death by the blade of another of their kind. Leaping back and forth through the centuries, MacLeod once again meets the evil Kurgan who nearly killed him 500 years ago. There can only be one.
Queen of Blood (Kino Lorber)
Synopsis:
It’s the year 1990 and scientists receive a distress call from an alien spaceship that has crash-landed on Mars. Dr Farraday (Rathbone) decides to send a team of astronauts, including Allan Brenner (Saxon) and Paul Grant (Hopper), on a rescue mission. On the planet, they discover just one survivor. This green-skinned alien is brought aboard, but when one man is attacked and drained of his blood, the survivors are soon racing home, before they too become victim to the bloodsucker.
UK Releases
Ant-Man (Zavvi Steelbook)
Synopsis:
Armed with the astonishing ability to shrink in scale but increase in strength, con-man Scott Lang must embrace his inner-hero and help his mentor, Dr. Hank Pym, protect the secret behind his spectacular Ant-Man suit from a new generation of towering threats. Against seemingly insurmountable obstacles, Pym and Lang must plan and pull off a heist that will save the world.
Nightmares in a Damaged Brain (88 Films)
Synopsis:
Mentally unbalanced patient, George Tatum, is released from a New York mental hospital, slums it up on sleazy 42nd Street, and then travels to Florida to terrorize an unsuspecting family. Brutal, uncompromising, and graphic, this is one NIGHTMARE that you’ll never forget! Originally released unrated to theaters during the height of the slasher craze in the early 1980s, this slasher-splatter classic has garnered a huge cult horror fanbase in the years since.
The Orphanage (Zavvi Steelbook)
Synopsis:
Laura spent the happiest years of her childhood growing up in an orphanage by the seaside, cared for by the staff and fellow orphans whom she loved as brothers and sisters. Now, thirty years later, she returns with her husband Carlos and Simon, their 7-year-old son, with a dream of restoring and reopening the long-abandoned orphanage as a home for disabled children. The new home and mysterious surroundings awaken Simon’s imagination and the boy starts to spin a web of fantastic tales and not-so-innocent games… A troubling web that begins to disturb Laura, drawing her into the child’s strange universe which resonates with echoes of long-forgotten, deeply unsettling memories of her own childhood. As the opening day draws near, tension builds within the family. Carlos remains sceptical, believing that Simon is making everything up in a desperate bid for attention. But Laura slowly becomes convinced that something long-hidden and terrible is lurking in the old house, something waiting to emerge and inflict appalling damage on her family.
Kick Boxer (Zavvi Steelbook)
Synopsis:
When U.S. kickboxing champ Eric Sloane is crippled in the ring by the dastardly Tong Po, his younger brother Kurt (Jean-Claude Van Damme) vows revenge. But if he is to defeat Po, Kurt must first learn a martial art known as Muay-Thai, so he seeks out the expertise of fight guru Xian Chow. Thanks to Chow’s unconventional training methods, Kurt becomes an expert kickboxer. But is he good enough to defeat Tong Po?
Guardians of the Galaxy (Zavvi Steelbook)
Synopsis:
An Earth-born outlaw who came of age in space, Peter “Star-Lord” Quill joins with four idiosyncratic aliens, including a bounty-hunting raccoon and a living tree, to recover a coveted infinity stone and fight an intergalactic evil.
Austraila Releases
Hammer Horror Redux: The Blu-ray Collection (Shock)
Synopsis:
Packaged in a deluxe book and slipcase, this exclusive Blu-ray Collection features 11 of the finest restored Hammer Horror titles in HD plus 2 more Hammer films and the complete World of Hammer series in Standard Definition.
Psycho: The Complete Collection (Via Vision Entertainment)
Synopsis:
Together for the first time this ultimate Psycho collection brings you all six films from the Psycho legacy franchise.
Germany Releases
Dr. Terror’s House of Horrors (Wicked-Vision Media)
Synopsis:
Cinematographer turned director, Freddie Francis’ cult horror tale stars Peter Cushing as the mysterious Dr. Schreck. Schreck boards a train and offers to tell his five fellow passengers their fortunes using his “House of Horrors” tarot cards. The deadly tales he tells includes werewolves, voodoo and a severed hand. Who is this sinister Doctor and where exactly is the train heading?
Scream Factory brought Frank LaLoggia’s 1988 Halloween movie Lady in White to Blu-ray several years back, and now Vinegar Syndrome gives the film a 4K Ultra HD upgrade.
Vinegar Syndrome’s Lady in White 4K release is available now and shipping now!
Watch the trailer below and grab your copy from Vinegar Syndrome today.
This limited edition 4-disc 4K UHD/Blu-ray x 3 set comes with a spot gloss hard slipcase + slipcover combo (designed by Dylan Haley), includes a 40-page perfect bound book and is limited to 8,000 units. It is only available on their website and at select indie retailers.
The full Special Features package includes…
- 4-disc Set: 1x 4K Ultra HD (High Bitrate BD100) / 3x Region A Blu-ray
- 4K UHD presented in Dolby Vision High-Dynamic-Range
- Newly scanned & restored in 4K from its 35mm original camera negative
- Presented in three versions: 126-min Pre-Release Director’s Cut (UHD+BD), the 118-min Extended Home Video Cut (BD), and the 113-min Theatrical Cut (BD)
- New group commentary track with writer/director Frank LaLoggia, alongside actors Lukas Haas, Joelle Jacobi, and Len Cariou for the Pre-Release Director’s Cut
- New commentary track with Frank LaLoggia, moderated by Scott Neumyer for the Extended Home Video Cut
- New commentary track with authors Emma Westwood and Stephen A. Russell for the Extended Home Video Cut
- Archival commentary track with Frank LaLoggia for the Extended Home Video Cut
- “Learning How to Fly” (10 min) – an interview with actress Karen Powell
- “A Snapshot in Time” (9 min) – an interview with actress Lisa Taylor
- “Human Touches” (6 min) – an interview with actress Lucy Lee Flippin
- “Still Relevant” (16 min) – an interview with actress Rose Weaver
- “75% Listening, 25% Editing” (9 min) – an interview with editor Steve Mann
- “Welcome to Willowpoint Falls” (6 min) – a location featurette hosted by Benjamin Scrivens, founder of Fright-Rags
- “Dream Talking: Looking Back” – a visual group commentary for the Pre-Release Director’s Cut with Frank LaLoggia, and actors Lukas Haas, Joelle Jacobi, and Len Cariou (103 min)
- Deleted Scenes with introduction and optional commentary by writer/director Frank LaLoggia (36 min)
- Behind-the-scenes footage with introduction and optional commentary by writer/director Frank LaLoggia (16 min)
- Extended behind-the-scenes footage (73 min)
- Introduction from the 20th anniversary dvd release
- Promotional ‘industry sales’ trailer (7 min)
- 40-page perfect bound book with essays by film historians Molly Henery, Mark H. Harris, and Heidi Honeycutt (limited edition only)
- Multiple radio spots
- Theatrical trailer
- Multiple TV spots
- Workprint trailers (7 min)
- Still gallery
- Reversible sleeve artwork
- English SDH subtitles
1962. Nine-year-old Frankie Scarlatti enjoys a homespun childhood in a rustic Western New York town. The entire community gets into the spirit of Halloween, but then two bullies prank Frankie by locking him in his school cloakroom, leaving him trapped for the night. Alone and afraid, his slumber is interrupted when the ghost of a little girl appears, and Frankie witnesses the specter of her murder by an unseen assailant. Later, while recovering at home, the girl’s ghost appears to him again. With help from his older brother, Frankie begins investigating the circumstances of her death. He soon discovers that her murder was one of several unsolved crimes connected to a local child-killer. As the town’s bucolic veneer fades and long-buried secrets and tensions bubble to the surface, all of the clues to the mystery seem to point towards a huge mansion inhabited by a reclusive woman known as “The Lady in White.”
A nostalgia-driven ghost story wrapped within an intricate murder mystery and coming-of-age drama, writer-director-composer Frank LaLoggia’s passion project Lady in White remains one of the most beautiful and original American horror films of the 1980s. Featuring acclaimed actors Alex Rocco (The Godfather), Len Cariou (Executive Decision), and Sydney Lassick (Carrie, The Unseen), it boasts the first starring role by Lukas Haas (Mars Attacks, Inception) as well as breathtaking photography by Academy Award® winner Russell Carpenter (True Lies, The Lawnmower Man). Vinegar Syndrome is honored to bring this genre masterpiece to 4K UHD, newly restored from its original 35mm camera negative and presented in three versions: its pre-release director’s cut, its extended home-video version, and its original theatrical version, along with an abundance of both new and archival extras.
Paul Lê wrote here on Bloody Disgusting back in 2023, “Over the years, fans have described this film as gateway horror, but they liken it more to The Watcher in the Woods than, say, Hocus Pocus or Casper. There are chilling moments that warrant its PG-13 rating.”
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