The folks at the Criterion Collection have released a brand new video showing legendary producer/director Roger Corman visiting their notorious DVD/Blu-ray closet and picking up some of his favorite films.
Synopsis: A key forerunner of the new breed of dark, brooding westerns that would cast a shadow over America's frontier folklore, this subversive psychological saga sounds a death knell for the myth of the outlaw hero. In one of his most morally complex roles, Gregory Peck stars as Jimmy Ringo, an infamous gunslinger looking to hang up his holsters and start a new life, but whose reputation draws him inexorably into a cycle of violence and revenge from which he cannot escape. Directed with taut efficiency by the versatile studio-era craftsman Henry King, and shot in striking deep-focus style by master cinematographer Arthur C. Miller, The Gunfighter forgoes rough-and-tumble action in favor of an elegiac exploration of guilt and regret that speaks to the anxious soul of postwar Ameri
Special Features and Technical Specs:
NEW 4K RESTORATION OF THE FILM, with uncompressed monaural soundtrack
New interview about director Henry King and the film with filmmaker, writer, and archivist Gina Telaroli
New video essay on editor Barbara McLean by film historian and author J. E. Smyth
Audio excerpts of interviews with King and McLean from 1970 and '71
English subtitles for the deaf and hard of hearing
In his carnivalesque portrait of provincial Italy during the Fascist period, Federico Fellini satirizes his youth and turns daily life into a circus of social rituals, adolescent desires, male fantasies, and political repartee, all set to Nino Rota's classic, nostalgia-tinged score. The Academy Award-winning Amarcord was one of Fellini's most popular films and remains one of cinema's enduring treasures.
Synopsis: At the height of the Cold War, the Soviet film industry set out to prove it could outdo Hollywood with a production that would dazzle the world: a titanic, awe-inspiring adaptation of Leo Tolstoy's classic tome in which the fates of three souls—the blundering, good-hearted Pierre; the heroically tragic Prince Andrei; and the radiant, tempestuous Natasha—collide amid the tumult of the Napoleonic Wars. Employing a cast of thousands and an array of innovative camera techniques, director Sergei Bondarchuk conjures a sweeping vision of grand balls that glitter with rococo beauty and breathtaking battles that overwhelm with their expressionistic power. As a statement of Soviet cinema's might, War and Peace succeeded wildly, garnering the Academy Award for best foreign-language film and setting a new standard for epic moviemaking.
Special Features and Technical Specs:
NEW 2K DIGITAL RESTORATION, with 5.1 surround DTS-HD Master Audio soundtrack on the Blu-ray
New interviews with cinematographer Anatoly Petritsky and filmmaker Fedor Bondarchuk, son of Sergei Bondarchuk
Two 1966 documentaries about the making of the film
Television program from 1967 profiling actor Ludmila Savelyeva, and featuring Sergei Bondarchuk
New program with historian Denise J. Youngblood (Bondarchuk's "War and Peace": Literary Classic to Soviet Cinematic Epic) detailing the cultural and historical contexts for the film
NEW 4K RESTORATION APPROVED BY DIRECTOR MARTIN SCORSESE, with 2.0 surround DTS-HD Master Audio soundtrack
New video essays by film critics Geoffrey O'Brien and Sheila O'Malley on Scorsese's mastery of formal techniques and the film's triumvirate of characters
Three audio commentaries, featuring Scorsese and editor Thelma Schoonmaker; director of photography Michael Chapman, producers Robert Chartoff and Irwin Winkler, casting director Cis Corman, music consultant Robbie Robertson, actors Theresa Saldana and John Turturro, and sound-effects supervising editor Frank Warner; and boxer Jake La Motta and screenwriters Mardik Martin and Paul Schrader
Fight Night, a making-of program featuring Scorsese and key members of the cast and crew
Three short programs highlighting the longtime collaboration between Scorsese and actor Robert De Niro
Television interview from 1981 with actor Cathy Moriarty and the real Vikki La Motta
Interview with Jake La Motta from 1990
Program from 2004 featuring veteran boxers reminiscing about La Motta
Trailer
English subtitles for the deaf and hard of hearing
PLUS: Essays by poet Robin Robertson and film critic Glenn Kenny