British distributors Arrow Video have officially announced that they will add three titles to their Blu-ray catalog in December: Dario Argento's
Tenebrae (1982), John Carpenter's
Big Trouble in Little China (1986), and Robert Altman's
The Long Goodbye (1973). Arrow Video will also release on DVD Paul Bartel's
Lust in the Dust (1985).
Tenebrae
A notorious horror classic returns in all its depraved glory. This infamous video nasty updated the classic Giallo blueprint for the gorified 80s, courting controversy and drenching the viewer in crimson arterial spray.
A razor-wielding psycho is stalking the horror writer Peter Neal, in Rome to promote his latest work, Tenebre. But the author isn't the obsessive killer's only target, the beautiful women who surround him are doomed as one by one, they fall victim to the murderer's slashing blade…
Will fiction and reality blur as fear and madness take hold? Watch in terror as by turns the cast fall victim to the sadistic imagination of Dario Argento, Italy's master of horror.
Special Features:
- Limited Edition SteelBook packaging featuring original artwork
- Newly remastered High Definition digital transfer of the film
- Presented in High Definition Blu-ray (1080p) and Standard Definition DVD
- Optional original English & Italian Mono Audio tracks (uncompressed PCM Mono 2.0 Audio on the Blu-ray)
- Optional English subtitles for Italian audio and English SDH subtitles for English audio for the deaf and hard of hearing
- Audio Commentary with authors and critics Kim Newman and Alan Jones
- Audio Commentary with Argento expert Thomas Rostock
- Introduction by star Daria Nicolodi
- The Unsane World of Tenebrae: An interview with director Dario Argento
- Screaming Queen! Daria Nicolodi remembers Tenebrae
- A Composition for Carnage: Composer Claudio Simonetti on Tenebrae
- Goblin: 'Tenebrae' and 'Phenomena' Live from the Glasgow Arches
- Original Trailer
- Exclusive collector's booklet featuring brand new writing by Alan Jones, author of Profondo Argento
- More to be announced!
- Street Date: December 16th
Big Trouble in Little China
Following Escape from New York and The Thing, John Carpenter and Kurt Russell re-unite for this mystical, action, adventure, comedy, kung-fu, monster, ghost story!
Russell plays Jack Burton, a reasonable guy who is about to experience some unreasonable things in San Francisco's Chinatown. As his friend's fiancée is kidnapped Jack becomes embroiled in a centuries-old battle between good and evil. At the root of it all is Lo Pan, a 2000-year-old magician who rules an empire of evil spirits. Jack goes to the rescue dodging demons, goblins and the unstoppable Three Storms as he battles through Lo Pan's dark domain.
One of Carpenters most enjoyable and best loved films, Big Trouble in Little China brilliantly juggles delirious set-pieces, comedy and kung-fu action with a razor sharp script of corking one-liners, as Jack would say "It's all in the reflexes".
Special Features:
- Limited Edition SteelBook packaging
- High Definition presentation of the film from a digital transfer prepared by Twentieth Century Fox
- Optional 5.1 DTS-HD Master Audio and uncompressed Stereo 2.0 Audio
- Isolated 5.1 DTS-HD Isolated Score Soundtrack
- Optional English SDH subtitles for the deaf and hard of hearing
- Audio Commentary with director John Carpenter and star Kurt Russell
- Return to Little China – A brand new interview with John Carpenter
- Being Jack Burton – A brand new interview with Kurt Russell
- Carpenter and I – A brand new interview with cinematographer Dean Cundey
- A new interview with producer Larry Franco
- Interview with visual effects producer Richard Edlund
- Vintage Making-of featurette featuring cast and crew
- Extended Ending
- Deleted Scenes
- Music Video
- Gallery of behind-the-scenes images
- 3 original trailers
- TV Spots
- Booklet featuring new writing on the film by John Kenneth Muir, author of The Films of John Carpenter, a re-print of an article on the effects of the film from American Cinematographer, illustrated with archive stills and posters
- Street Date: December 2
The Long Goodbye
When private eye Philip Marlowe (Elliott Gould) is visited by an old friend, this sets in train a series of events in which he's hired to search for a missing novelist (Sterling Hayden) and finds himself on the wrong side of vicious gangsters.
So far so faithful to Raymond Chandler, but Robert Altman's inspired adaptation of the writer's most personal novel takes his legendary detective and relocates him to the selfish, hedonistic culture of 1970s Hollywood, where he finds that his old-fashioned notions of honour and loyalty carry little weight, and even his smoking (universal in film noir) is now frowned upon.
Widely misunderstood at the time, The Long Goodbye is now regarded as one of Altman's best films and one of the outstanding American films of its era, with Gould's shambling, cat-obsessed Marlowe ranking alongside more outwardly faithful interpretations by Humphrey Bogart and Robert Mitchum.
Special Features:
- High Definition presentation of the film from a digital transfer by MGM Studios
- Original uncompressed mono 2.0 PCM audio
- Optional English SDH subtitles for the deaf and hearing impaired
- Rip Van Marlowe – An interview with director Robert Altman and star Elliott Gould
- Vilmos Zsigmond Flashes The Long Goodbye – An interview with the legendary cinematographer
- Giggle and Give In – Paul Joyce's acclaimed documentary profile of Robert Altman, with contributions from Altman, Elliott Gould, Shelley Duvall, assistant director Alan Rudolph and screenwriter Joan Tewkesbury
- David Thompson on Robert Altman - David Thompson, editor of 'Altman on Altman' and producer of the BBC's 'Robert Altman in England', talks about The Long Goodbye 's place in Altman's filmography
- On Raymond Chandler - Raymond Chandler's biographer, Tom Williams, outlines the author's life and work and discusses Altman's adaptation of The Long Goodbye
- On Hard Boiled Fiction - Crime writer and critic Maxim Jakubowski discusses the emergence of hard boiled detective characters from the pages of the pulp magazines from the 1920s through to the 1950s.
- Original Theatrical Trailer
- Radio Spots
- Booklet featuring new writing on the film by Brad Stevens, a new interview with assistant director Alan Rudolph and an extract from American Cinematographer discussing Zsigmond's unique treatment of the film, illustrated with original archive stills and posters
- Street Date: December 2
Lust in the Dust (ArrowDrome DVD)
The sun beats down hard on the town of Chili Verde, New Mexico – where temperatures flare and passions reach boiling in the midday heat. The locals spend their days downing Tequila and breaking bottles over heads… and that's just the womenfolk!
When Abel Wood, an enigmatic lone cowboy type, comes riding into town, the locals immediately suspect that he has come in search of the legendary buried gold. Quick on the draw and tall in the saddle he may be, but Abel faces stiff competition if he's to get his hands on the prized booty.
From the legendary Paul Bartel (Death Race 2000, Eating Raoul) Lust in the Dust is a treat for both fans of Westerns and lovers of John Waters-type subversive humour, featuring the inimitable Divine (Hairspray, Pink Flamingos) in a typically larger-than-life performance; whilst Tab Hunter, in the role of Abel, delivers a sharp-shooting, gun-toting turn worthy of Clint himself.
Special Features:
- Original Theatrical Trailer
- Booklet
- Street Date: December 9th