The Criterion Collection has released a new clip from a video piece featuring director Spike Lee, which appears on the Blu-ray release of Billy Wilder's recently restored
Ace in the Hole.
Official synopsis: Billy Wilder's
Ace in the Hole is one of the most scathing indictments of American culture ever produced by a Hollywood filmmaker. Kirk Douglas gives the fiercest performance of his career as Chuck Tatum, an amoral newspaper reporter who washes up in dead-end Albuquerque, happens upon the scoop of a lifetime, and will do anything to keep getting the lurid headlines. Wilder's follow-up to
Sunset Boulevard is an even darker vision, a no-holds-barred exposé of the American media's appetite for sensation that has gotten only more relevant with time.
Special Features:
- Restored 4K digital transfer, with uncompressed monaural soundtrack on the Blu-ray
- Audio commentary by film scholar Neil Sinyard
- Portrait of a "60% Perfect Man": Billy Wilder, a 1980 documentary featuring interviews with Wilder by film critic Michel Ciment
- Interview with actor Kirk Douglas from 1984
- Excerpts from a 1986 appearance by Wilder at the American Film Institute
- Excerpts from an audio interview with Wilder's coscreenwriter Walter Newman
- Video afterword by filmmaker Spike Lee
- Stills gallery
- Trailer
- PLUS: Essays by critic Molly Haskell and filmmaker Guy Maddin
Note: Blu-ray.com has already reviewed
Ace in the Hole. Click on the link to read our review.