Columbia Noir #1 Blu-ray
HomeColumbia Noir #1 Blu-ray
Posted August 20, 2020 11:20 PM by Webmaster
British label Indicator/Powerhouse Films has announced that it will release on Blu-ray Columbia Noir #1 (1945-1958). The six-disc box set will be available for purchase on November 16.
Description: Six tough, no-nonsense noirs from six of the genre's toughest, no-nonsense directors: Budd Boetticher's Escape in the Fog, in which a nurse and a war veteran take on Nazi spies in San Francisco; Joseph H Lewis' The Undercover Man, inspired by the real-life case against Al Capone; Richard Quine's Drive a Crooked Road, which finds Mickey Rooney moving away from comedies and musicals to a tougher persona; Phil Karlson's 5 Against the House, starring Kim Novak as a nightclub singer embroiled in a casino heist; Vincent Sherman's The Garment Jungle, from which Kiss Me Deadly director Robert Aldrich was famously fired; and Don Siegel's police procedural The Lineup, based on the radio and television series, and as brutal a film as he ever made.
All six films are presented for the first time on Blu-ray in the UK, with The Undercover Man and Drive a Crooked Road making their world Blu-ray premieres. This stunning collection also boasts a 120-page book, and is strictly limited to 6,000 numbered units.
CONTENT
ESCAPE IN THE FOG (Budd Boetticher, 1945)
Veteran nurse Eilene Carr (Nina Foch) experiences disturbing nightmares and wakes up screaming in a hotel in San Francisco. To her amazement the man she was dreaming about, Barry Malcolm (William Wright), is at her hotel. Relating her dream of three men attempting to kill him, Eilene then agrees to accompany Barry to a meeting, unaware that he's involved in an espionage plot relating to Japanese agents. In spite of her continued dreams and blackouts, Eilene proves invaluable to Barry's mission.
THE UNDERCOVER MAN (Joseph H Lewis, 1949)
Determined Treasury Department investigator Frank Warren (Glenn Ford) goes after a ruthless mobster known as The Big Fellow. When a key informant is murdered, Warren pursues the gangster on charges of tax evasion. But, with a slick mob lawyer hampering him at every turn, and threats being lobbed toward Warren's wife (Nina Foch), the lawman's chances of achieving a conviction are slim to none. His only hope is that one syndicate bookkeeper will have the courage to turn state's evidence.
DRIVE A CROOKED ROAD (Richard Quine, 1954)
Eddie Shannon (Mickey Rooney) is a guileless Los Angeles auto mechanic with dreams of one day racing in European car meets. Eddie encounters fetching Barbara Mathews (Dianne Foster) and, much to his surprise and delight, she agrees to date him. But Barbara's true intentions are revealed when she introduces Eddie to her associates -- Steve Norris (Kevin McCarthy) and Harold Baker (Jack Kelly) -- who, as it turns out, need a getaway driver for a planned bank heist.
5 AGAINST THE HOUSE (Phil Karlson, 1955)
When college buddies Ronnie (Kerwin Mathews) and Roy (Alvy Moore) are briefly detained by the Reno police in association with a casino robbery, Ronnie becomes obsessed with figuring out how to plan the perfect heist. At first it is a strictly intellectual exercise, but when the emotionally disturbed Korean War vet Brick (Brian Keith) gets involved, the friends -- including straitlaced Al (Guy Madison) and his nightclub-singer girlfriend, Kaye (Kim Novak) -- have to pull the job for real.
THE GARMENT JUNGLE (Vincent Sherman and Robert Aldrich, 1957)
New York garment factory owner Walter Mitchell (Lee J. Cobb) goes the extra, deceitful mile in battling his employees' efforts to unionize. He hires gangster Artie Ravage (Richard Boone) to interfere with the grassroots efforts. After Mitchell's son, Alan (Kerwin Matthews), returns from Europe and befriends one of the union organizers (Robert Loggia), Mitchell eventually tries to mend his unethical ways. Unfortunately, this does not sit well with the violent, vengeful Ravage.
THE LINEUP (Don Siegel, 1958)
From legendary director Don Siegel (Dirty Harry) comes this compelling crime thriller based on a popular television series. Dancer (Eli Wallach, The Good, the Bad and the Ugly) is a psychopathic San Francisco gangster who uses unwitting tourists to bring in heroin from the Orient. When one of the deliveries goes awry, a cop gets killed, bringing the police into action. But Dancer and his associate, Julian (Robert Keith, Guys and Dolls), have three new unsuspecting carriers, including a little girl with a Japanese doll. It is up to the police to solve the case before Dancer kills innocent people.
SPECIAL FEATURES AND TECHNICAL SPECS
Description: Six tough, no-nonsense noirs from six of the genre's toughest, no-nonsense directors: Budd Boetticher's Escape in the Fog, in which a nurse and a war veteran take on Nazi spies in San Francisco; Joseph H Lewis' The Undercover Man, inspired by the real-life case against Al Capone; Richard Quine's Drive a Crooked Road, which finds Mickey Rooney moving away from comedies and musicals to a tougher persona; Phil Karlson's 5 Against the House, starring Kim Novak as a nightclub singer embroiled in a casino heist; Vincent Sherman's The Garment Jungle, from which Kiss Me Deadly director Robert Aldrich was famously fired; and Don Siegel's police procedural The Lineup, based on the radio and television series, and as brutal a film as he ever made.
All six films are presented for the first time on Blu-ray in the UK, with The Undercover Man and Drive a Crooked Road making their world Blu-ray premieres. This stunning collection also boasts a 120-page book, and is strictly limited to 6,000 numbered units.
ESCAPE IN THE FOG (Budd Boetticher, 1945)
Veteran nurse Eilene Carr (Nina Foch) experiences disturbing nightmares and wakes up screaming in a hotel in San Francisco. To her amazement the man she was dreaming about, Barry Malcolm (William Wright), is at her hotel. Relating her dream of three men attempting to kill him, Eilene then agrees to accompany Barry to a meeting, unaware that he's involved in an espionage plot relating to Japanese agents. In spite of her continued dreams and blackouts, Eilene proves invaluable to Barry's mission.
THE UNDERCOVER MAN (Joseph H Lewis, 1949)
Determined Treasury Department investigator Frank Warren (Glenn Ford) goes after a ruthless mobster known as The Big Fellow. When a key informant is murdered, Warren pursues the gangster on charges of tax evasion. But, with a slick mob lawyer hampering him at every turn, and threats being lobbed toward Warren's wife (Nina Foch), the lawman's chances of achieving a conviction are slim to none. His only hope is that one syndicate bookkeeper will have the courage to turn state's evidence.
DRIVE A CROOKED ROAD (Richard Quine, 1954)
Eddie Shannon (Mickey Rooney) is a guileless Los Angeles auto mechanic with dreams of one day racing in European car meets. Eddie encounters fetching Barbara Mathews (Dianne Foster) and, much to his surprise and delight, she agrees to date him. But Barbara's true intentions are revealed when she introduces Eddie to her associates -- Steve Norris (Kevin McCarthy) and Harold Baker (Jack Kelly) -- who, as it turns out, need a getaway driver for a planned bank heist.
5 AGAINST THE HOUSE (Phil Karlson, 1955)
When college buddies Ronnie (Kerwin Mathews) and Roy (Alvy Moore) are briefly detained by the Reno police in association with a casino robbery, Ronnie becomes obsessed with figuring out how to plan the perfect heist. At first it is a strictly intellectual exercise, but when the emotionally disturbed Korean War vet Brick (Brian Keith) gets involved, the friends -- including straitlaced Al (Guy Madison) and his nightclub-singer girlfriend, Kaye (Kim Novak) -- have to pull the job for real.
THE GARMENT JUNGLE (Vincent Sherman and Robert Aldrich, 1957)
New York garment factory owner Walter Mitchell (Lee J. Cobb) goes the extra, deceitful mile in battling his employees' efforts to unionize. He hires gangster Artie Ravage (Richard Boone) to interfere with the grassroots efforts. After Mitchell's son, Alan (Kerwin Matthews), returns from Europe and befriends one of the union organizers (Robert Loggia), Mitchell eventually tries to mend his unethical ways. Unfortunately, this does not sit well with the violent, vengeful Ravage.
THE LINEUP (Don Siegel, 1958)
From legendary director Don Siegel (Dirty Harry) comes this compelling crime thriller based on a popular television series. Dancer (Eli Wallach, The Good, the Bad and the Ugly) is a psychopathic San Francisco gangster who uses unwitting tourists to bring in heroin from the Orient. When one of the deliveries goes awry, a cop gets killed, bringing the police into action. But Dancer and his associate, Julian (Robert Keith, Guys and Dolls), have three new unsuspecting carriers, including a little girl with a Japanese doll. It is up to the police to solve the case before Dancer kills innocent people.
SPECIAL FEATURES AND TECHNICAL SPECS
- 2K restorations of Escape in the Fog, The Undercover Man and The Garment Jungle
- High Definition presentations of Drive a Crooked Road, 5 Against the House and The Lineup
- Original mono soundtracks
- Audio commentary with film historian Pamela Hutchinson on Escape in the Fog (2020)
- Audio commentary with writer and film programmer Tony Rayns on The Undercover Man (2020)
- Audio commentary with critic Nick Pinkerton on Drive a Crooked Road (2020)
- Audio commentary with critic David Jenkins on 5 Against the House (2020)
- Audio commentary with film historian Kevin Lyons on The Garment Jungle (2020)
- Audio commentary with author James Ellroy and the Film Noir Foundation's Eddie Muller on The Lineup (2009)
- Audio commentary with film historian David Del Valle and author and screenwriter C Courtney Joyner on The Lineup (2020)
- Introduction to Drive a Crooked Road by Martin Scorsese (2014)
- It's a Jungle Out There (2007): archival interview with actor Robert Loggia conducted after a screening of The Garment Jungle
- Appreciation of The Garment Jungle by Tony Rayns (2020)
- The Influence of Noir (2009): appreciation of The Lineup by filmmaker Christopher Nolan
- Two episodes of The Lineup radio series: The Candy Store Murder (1950), written by Blake Edwards and Richard Quine; and The Case of Frankie and Joyce (1951)
- Screen Snapshots: Mickey Rooney, Then and Now (1953): Columbia Pictures promotional short featuring the famed performer looking back at his series of Mickey Maguire comedies
- Man on a Bus (1955): short film directed by Joseph H Lewis for the United Jewish Appeal, featuring a star-studded cast, including Walter Brennan, Broderick Crawford, Lassie, and Ruth Roman, and presented in High Definition
- Original theatrical trailers for Drive a Crooked Road, 5 Against the House, The Garment Jungle and The Lineup
- The Lineup trailer commentary: short critical appreciation by A History of Violence screenwriter Josh Olson
- Image galleries: promotional and publicity materials
- New and improved English subtitles for the deaf and hard-of-hearing
- Limited edition exclusive 120-page book with new essays by Iris Veysey, Paul Duane, Jill Blake, Wheeler Winston Dixon, Nathalie Morris, and Sergio Angelini; archival interview extracts with Budd Boetticher, Joseph H Lewis, Phil Karlson, and Robert Aldrich; extracts from the autobiographies of Don Siegel and Vincent Sherman; and film credits
- MORE EXTRAS TO BE ANNOUNCED
- REGION-B "LOCKED"
