Dirkie: Lost in the Desert (Jamie Uys, 1970)

“One of the most…
TRAUMATIZING AND SADISITIC ‘FAMILY MOVIES’ EVER MADE.”
                                                 The San Francisco Bay Guardian

The Most Amazing Adventure A Boy Ever Lived Through
Now On Blu-Ray For The First Time Ever!

Filmmaker Jamie Uys (THE GODS MUST BE CRAZY) cast his own son as a sickly eight year-old boy stranded with his pet dog in the Kalahari Desert, “one of the most rugged and desolate regions on the face of the earth.” The result is a children’s feature so punishing and merciless that it has been nicknamed “The Passion of the Dirkie.” Severin Films proudly presents the “sadistic yet hilarious” (Ilovehotdogs.net) South African survival movie about a boy menaced by plain crashes, infernos, hungry hyenas, angry elephants, spitting cobras, stinging scorpions, dwindling cough medicine, dehydration, and a grueling landscape. Beautifully rendered in Techniscope and Technicolor despite nightmarish shooting conditions that took the film’s crew almost 7,000 miles through the wilderness of Namibia, DIRKIE: LOST IN THE DESERT set South African box office records on its release and traumatized select children all around the world.

“We’re all the better for receiving…
THIS ODDBALL ALL-AGES TRIP INTO AN ARID APOCALYPSE.”
Birth. Movies. Death

Special Features:

• English and Afrikaans Theatrical Release Versions
• New Commentary with Star Wynand Uys and Film Scholar Ernest Mathijs
• … And Your Little Dog Too – An Interview with Producer Boet Troskie
• Trailers
• Poster Gallery
• BONUS FILM: Papam Pasivadu, a Telegu-language re-make from India

Aboard the Calypso – Sea and Cinema with Jacques Cousteau

The Criterion Collection, a continuing series of important classic and contemporary films presents Aboard the Calypso – Sea and Cinema with Jacques Cousteau.

Explorer. Inventor. Author. Conservationist. Filmmaker. Jacques Cousteau was an iconic figure in marine exploration, spending more than sixty years investigating undersea kingdoms and sharing his tales with the world. Over three award-winning feature films spanning twenty years, Cousteau reveals the beauty and dangers beneath the waves of the Red Sea, the Indian Ocean, the Mediterranean, and the frozen Antarctic, finding seldom seen tropical wonders, describing the pressures of living in an underwater base for weeks at a time, and persevering through the life or death struggle to survive at the South Pole. Both the committed naturalist and the keen showman, Cousteau portrayed his oceanic marvels with the idealism and the spectacle of science fiction and inspired generations to care for alien worlds here at home and no longer hidden from view.

Special Edition Three-Blu Ray Set Features:

• New high definition digital transfers of The Silent World, World Without Sun, and Voyage to the Edge of the World, with uncompressed monaural soundtracks on the Blu-rays
• French and English-language audio tracks
• Introductions by Wes Anderson, James Cameron, and Werner Herzog
• Of Silence and Men: The Pioneers of The Silent World, a 50-minute documentary featuring interviews with Jacques Cousteau, co-director Louis Malle, camera designer André Laban, Cousteau scholar Franck Machu, and Malle biographer Pierre Billard
• Two Men, A Masterpiece, an interview with Jacques Cousteau and Louis Malle
• The Silent World’s Legacy, interviews with Jacques Cousteau, Luc Besson, and Jacques Perrin
• Early films of Jacques Cousteau: 18 Meters Deep, Shipwrecks, Landscapes of Silence, Seals in the Sahara, Around a Reef, Off Tunisian Coasts, One sortie du “Rubis,” SCUBA Diary, Danger Under the Sea, Rhythm on the Reef, and The Red Sea
• Station 307 and The Fountain of the Vaucluse, a pair of short films by Louis Malle made in collaboration with Jacques Cousteau
• Edmond Séchan’s Academy Award-winning short The Golden Fish, produced by Jacques Cousteau
• Restoration demonstration
• Trailers
• New and improved English subtitle translation
• PLUS: A booklet featuring an essay by filmmaker Luc Jacquet and excerpts from Cousteau’s 1953 book The Silent World: A Story of Undersea Discovery and Adventure

Mill of the Stone Women (Giorgio Ferroni, 1960)

SCARES THAT WILL LEAVE YOU PETRIFIED!

Hans, a young artist, arrives at the famous Dutch windmill of Professor Wahl to study the horrible stone statues contained within the local landmark, a mechanical carousel of history’s most notorious women meeting their gruesome and untimely ends. There, he becomes captivated with Wahl’s mysterious and seductive daughter notwithstanding Hans’s relationship with a local art student. Warned by Professor Wahl to stay away from his seriously ill daughter and suspicious of her private doctor, Hans begins to suspect that deadly family secrets are being kept within the mill…

Giorgio Ferroni’s Mill of the Stone Women was Italy’s first horror film shot in color and has become a classic of the Italian Gothic genre. Arrow Video proudly presents four versions of the film with this release, newly restored from the best materials available and including the notorious “topless” shots of sexy French star Dany Carrel originally cut from the US release.

Special Features:

• New high definition transfers of the film in its 95-minute international version, 90-minute French version, 96-minute Italian version, and 93-minute German version
• High-Definition Blu-ray (1080p) and Standard DVD Presentation
• Uncompressed monaural soundtracks on the Blu-ray edition
• Newly translated English subtitles for French, Italian, and German editions
• Optional English SDH subtitles for the deaf and hard of hearing
• Introduction to the film by author and critic Alan Jones
• Audio Commentary with film critic Tim Lucas
• Archival interview with actor Wolfgang Preiss
• Deleted and alternate scenes
• Theatrical trailers
• Stills and poster gallery
• Illustrated collector’s booklet featuring new writing by Andrea Bini, an essay by Pete Tombs, and a comparison of the versions of the film by Tim Lucas, illustrated with original stills and posters

The Specialist (Sergio Corbucci, 1969)

HIS SPECIALTY IS VENGEANCE!

French pop superstar Johnny Hallyday is Hud, a solitary gunfighter devoted to avenging the murder of his brother falsely accused of robbing a bank and hung by the townsfolk of Blackstone, Nevada.  Riding into town, Hud finds himself caught between the town’s plotting elite, their by-the-book sheriff, and the gang of bandits outside of town led by the one-armed El Diablo.

Sergio Corbucci and cinematographer Dario Di Palma create a stylishly cynical revenge Western unlike any other.  Featuring memorable scene-chewing performances by Gastone Moschin and Mario Adorf and roles by the beautiful Françoise Fabian, Sylvie Fennec, and Angela Luce, The Specialist is a strange, disillusioned parable presented here in an exclusive high definition restoration from the original Techniscope negative.

Special Features:

• Brand new restoration from the original 35mm Techniscope camera negative
• High Definition Blu-ray (1080p) and Standard Definition DVD presentations
• Original Italian and English soundtracks in uncompressed PCM mono audio
• Newly translated English subtitles for the Italian soundtrack
• Optional English subtitles for the deaf and hard of hearing for the English soundtrack
• A Man Called Hud – brand new interview with star Johnny Hallyday
• Hooray for Pollywood – brand new interview with star Francoise Fabian
• Archived interview of director Sergio Corbucci
• US, European, and international trailers
• Illustrated collector’s booklet featuring new writing by Austin Fisher

The Mercenary (Sergio Corbucci, 1968)

HE SELLS DEATH TO THE HIGHEST BIDDER!

After his iconic role as Sergio Corbucci’s Django, Franco Nero teamed up once again with the Spaghetti Western’s “other Sergio” to become The Mercenary.  Nero plays Kowalski, a Polish mercenary who sells his expertise to a band of Mexican outlaws led by Paco Roman (Tony Musante), and aids them as they seek to support the revolution and themselves.  When the Federal Army closes in, loyalties and political philosophies become strained between Kowalski, Paco, and their beautiful revolutionary ally Columba (Giovanna Ralli).  Jack Palance joins Corbucci’s fabulous cast as Curly, Kowalski’s dandified rival and cutthroat villain.  With a memorable score by Ennio Morricone and Bruno Nicolai, The Mercenary is a political statement with loads of commercial appeal, presented here in an exclusive high-definition restoration from the original Techniscope negative.

Special Features:

• Brand new restoration from the original 35mm Techniscope camera negative
• High Definition Blu-ray (1080p) and Standard Definition DVD presentations
• Original Italian and English soundtracks in uncompressed PCM mono audio
• Newly translated English subtitles for the Italian soundtrack
• Optional English subtitles for the deaf and hard of hearing for the English soundtrack
• Brand new interview with star Franco Nero
• How to Make a Revolution – featurette on the film’s production including interviews with Franco Nero, Tony Musante, Sergio Corbucci, Nora Corbucci, Luciano Vincenzoni, and Eugenio Alabiso
• US, European, and international trailers
• Illustrated collector’s booklet featuring new writing by Austin Fisher and Howard Hughes

A Matter of Life and Death (Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger, 1946)

The Criterion Collection, a continuing series of important classic and contemporary films presents A Matter of Life and Death.

As his plane is going down in flames, doomed World War II pilot, Squadron Leader Peter Carter (David Niven) meets over the radio the love of his life, an American radio operator named June (Kim Hunter).  He miraculously survives the crash and the pair commence their romance, but Carter is troubled with a life-threatening brain injury treated by a village doctor (Roger Livesey) and a heavenly collector (Marius Goring) intent on escorting his errant soul to the other side.  Originally designed as a propaganda piece to promote better relations between Britain and the United States, Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger’s A Matter of Life and Death became an English classic featuring delightful performances by its cast, accomplished Technicolor cinematography by Jack Cardiff, and spectacular production design by Alfred Junge.

Disc Features:

• New 4K digital restoration, with uncompressed monaural soundtrack on the Blu-ray
• Audio commentary by film historian Ian Christie
• Martin Scorsese on A Matter of Life and Death
• Thelma Schoonmaker Powell and Grover Crisp on AMOLAD and its restoration
• Interview with cinematographer Jack Cardiff
• A Matter of Fried Onions, Diane Broadbent Friedman on the medical foundation of AMOLAD
• Behind the scenes footage, filmed during a visit to Denham Studios by Canadian soldiers
• “The King and the Stars,” a Front Page newsreel by British Pathé on the 1946 Royal Command Film Performance screening, along with unused and unissued footage of the event and the press reception
• New interview with author J. K. Rowling and actor Daniel Radcliffe in appreciation of the film
• Two Lux Radio Theatre productions from 1947 (starring Ray Milland, Ann Blyth, and Nigel Bruce) and 1955 (starring David Niven and Barbara Rush)
• The Hedda Hooper Show – This is Hollywood‘s 30-minute radio adaptation, starring David Niven, Kim Hunter, and Vincent Price
• Screen Director’s Playhouse radio production from 1951, starring Robert Cummings and Julia Adams
• Kinescope of the “Stairway to Heaven” TV adaptation for Robert Montgomery Presents, starring Richard Green, Jean Gillespie, and Bramwell Fletcher
• Parody sketch from Big Train, featuring Simon Pegg, Kevin Eldon, Mark Heap, and Amelia Bullmore
• Gallery of sketches and stills of Alfred Junge’s production designs
• Sequence shot for Powell and Pressburger’s unmade The White Cockade, starring David Niven and Pamela Brown
• PLUS: A booklet featuring behind the scenes photos, the script, and new essays by film critics Dave Kehr, Robert Horton, and Mark Kermode