For the week of May 5th, Decal Releasing and Neon will release a Blu-ray of Mohammad Rasoulof's The Seed of the Sacred Fig (دانهی انجیر معابد), starring Soheila Golestani, Missagh Zareh, Mahsa Rostami, Setareh Maleki, Niousha Akhshi and Amineh Arani.
Description: Shot entirely in secret, Mohammad Rasoulof's award-winning thriller, THE SEED OF THE SACRED FIG, centers on a family thrust into the public eye when Iman is appointed as an investigating judge in Tehran. As political unrest erupts in the streets, Iman realizes that his job is even more dangerous than expected, making him increasingly paranoid and distrustful, even of his own wife Najmeh and daughters Sana and Rezvan.
Decal Releasing's Blu-ray of The Seed of the Sacred Fig contains a making of featurette.
New on Blu-ray from Mill Creek Entertainment is Ultraman Trigger: Complete Series + Ultraman Trigger Episode Z (ウルトラマントリガー NEW GENERATION TIGA) (2021-2022), starring Meiku Harukawa, Mao Ichimichi, Sumire Uesaka, Raiga Terasaka, Runa Toyoda and Shun'ya Kaneko.
Description: Kengo Manaka lives on Mars as a botanist. However, his peaceful life comes to an end as a monster bears down on the settlement, Kengo's fate leads him to a chance encounter. The Giant of Light is reborn. His name: Ultraman Trigger!
Mill Creek's Blu-ray of Ultraman Trigger contains all 25 episodes and the Ultraman Trigger Episode Z movie with original Japanese: DTS-HD MA 2.0 audio and English subtitles. Extras include a playable card from the Ultraman card game.
New on Blu-ray from Kino Lorber is Bruno Dumont's The Empire (L'Empire), starring Lyna Khoudri, Anamaria Vartolomei, Camille Cottin, Fabrice Luchini, Brandon Vlieghe and Julien Manier.
Description: In a quiet and picturesque fishing village in Northern France, a very special child is born, unleashing a secret war between extraterrestrial forces of good and evil. In an attempt to restore their empires, two opposing forces from the depths of outer space, One and Zero, unleash an apocalyptic conflict on Earth. The villainous Zero forces secretly take over the bodies of village locals in order to foster pandemonium on our planet. At the same time, a new species engineered by the One is working towards a new, harmonious evolution. While waiting for the final battle, the imperial legions struggle to win humanity over to their cause. If that all sounds a bit out there, that's because this slapstick space opera comes from the singular mind of Bruno Dumont (France, Slack Bay). Featuring wonderfully bizarre performances from French stars like Fabrice Luchini, Camille Cottin, and Anamaria Vartolomei, this gonzo sci-fi spectacle is part Star Wars, part Spaceballs, and 100% Dumont.
Kino's Blu-ray of The Empire contains trailers.
Turning to catalog titles, Undercrank Productions has a Blu-ray for the Tom Tyler Silent Film Collection (1929), containing two features starring Tom Tyler: The Man from Nevada and Law of the Plains:
Label description: Best known today for his later roles as Captain Marvel (1941) and The Phantom (1943), this collection brings together two of Tom Tyler's last silent features: The Man from Nevada (1929) and Law of the Plains (1929), unseen for over 90 years.
Produced by J. P. McGowan and distributed by Syndicate Pictures, these B-westerns were the bread and butter of most small-town theaters in the 1920s and 1930s. Just as the careers of western stars like William S. Hart and Tom Mix were winding down, Tyler emerged as a new breed of wholesome cowboy hero.
In The Man From Nevada, Tyler gallops to the rescue of Natalie Joyce and her family, protecting them from a villian who threatens to rob their homestead. Tyler is a fast riding, straight shooting rancher in Law of the Plains, avenging the death of his father against a gang of outlaws led by J. P. McGowan.
Both films in the Tom Tyler Silent Film Collection are sourced from new 2K scans of nitrate prints and come with new scores (in Dolby Digital 2.0) by Ben Model. Extras include a slideshow with musical score. For a full release breakdown, read Jeffrey Kauffman's Blu-ray review.
Coming to 4K UHD from the Criterion Collection is Jacques Demy's The Umbrellas of Cherbourg (Les Parapluies de Cherbourg) (1964), starring Catherine Deneuve, Nino Castelnuovo, Anne Vernon, Marc Michel, Jean Champion and Harald Wolff. Sourced from a new 4K master (undertaken by Ciné-Tamaris and approved by Mathieu Demy, director Jacques Demy's son), Criterion presents The Umbrellas of Cherbourg with a choice of DTS-HD MA 5.0 or LPCM Mono audio tracks and in 4K SDR on the 4K UHD disc. Extras on the Blu-ray include the documentary Once Upon a Time...The Umbrellas of Cherbourg (2008), an interview from 2014 with film scholar Rodney Hill, French television interviews from 1964 with Jacques Demy and composer Michel Legrand, audio interviews with Legrand (in 1991) and Catherine Deneuve (in 1983) at the National Film Theatre in London, a featurette on the 2013 remaster and trailers. Also included is an essay by critic Jim Ridley.
Also coming from Criterion is a new 4K UHD edition of Norman Jewison's In the Heat of the Night (1967), starring Sidney Poitier, Rod Steiger, Warren Oates, Lee Grant, Larry Gates and James Patterson. Previously released in 2022 by Kino Lorber, Criterion's 4K UHD edition of In the Heat of the Night is also presented in 4K SDR with a choice of LPCM Mono or DTS-HD MA 5.1 audio tracks. Extras include audio commentary from 2008 with Norman Jewison, cinematographer Haskell Wexler, Rod Steiger and Lee Grant, while an included Criterion Blu-ray additionally features interviews from 2018 with Jewison, Grant and author Aram Goudsouzian (Sidney Poitier: Man, Actor, Icon), a portion of a 2006 American Film Institute interview with Sidney Poitier, and the featurettes Turning Up the Heat: Movie-Making in the '60s and Quincy Jones: Breaking New Sound (both 2008), as well as a trailer. Also included is an essay by critic K. Austin Collins. For a full release breakdown, read Svet Atanasov's 4K UHD review.
Coming to Blu-ray from Fun City Editions is Ulu Grosbard's Falling in Love (1984), starring Robert De Niro, Meryl Streep, Harvey Keitel, Jane Kaczmarek, David Clennon and Dianne Wiest. Sourced from a new 4K master, Fun City Editions presents Falling in Love with a new audio commentary by Jim Hemphill and an image gallery. Limited edition content includes a "booklet with new essays by Mitchell Beaupre and Daniel Schweiger" while packaging includes reversible artwork.
Coming to 4K UHD from Shout Factory is Robert Zemeckis' What Lies Beneath (2000), starring Harrison Ford, Michelle Pfeiffer, Miranda Otto, James Remar, Wendy Crewson and Amber Valletta. Sourced from a new 4K scan of the original camera negative (approved by cinematographer Don Burgess), Shout presents What Lies Beneath with a choice of DTS-HD MA 5.1 or 2.0 audio tracks and Dolby Vision HDR on the 4K UHD disc. Extras include audio commentary with Robert Zemeckis, the new feature-length documentary You Know: Uncovering What Lies Beneath (featuring new interviews with Zemeckis, Don Burgess, Amber Valletta, producers Steve Starkey and Jack Rapke, writers Sarah Kernochan and Clark Gregg, production designer Rick Carter, costume designer Susie DeSanto, composer Alan Silvestri, visual effects supervisor Robert Legato, special effects supervisor Shane Mahan and puppeteer Jason Matthews), the featurette Constructing a Thriller and a theatrical trailer.
Also coming this week, Walt Disney Home Entertainment has a 4K UHD upgrade for Chris Sanders and Dean DeBlois's Lilo & Stitch (2002), featuring the voices of Daveigh Chase, Chris Sanders, Tia Carrere, David Ogden Stiers, Kevin McDonald and Ving Rhames. Sourced from a new 4K master, Disney presents Lilo & Stitch with a new Dolby Atmos remix and Dolby Vision HDR. A bundled Blu-ray copy of the film contains audio commentary, several short featurettes and two music videos. For a full release breakdown, read Jeffrey Kauffman's 4K UHD review.
Finally this week, Oscilloscope Laboratories has a Blu-ray for Matt Mahurin's documentary I Like Killing Flies (2004), starring Michael Fishman, John A. Papa, and Eve Shopsin.
Description: Documentarian and longtime customer Matt Mahurin follows chef and proprietor Kenny Shopsin and his family as they face the gentrification of New York's Greenwich Village that threatens the continued existence of Shopsin's General Store. I Like Killing Flies captures Kenny as he not only conjures comfort food on his Frankenstein stove from a menu containing hundreds of dishes, but as he serves up morsels of wit and wisdom on work, family, politics, sex, and even cooking. Mahurin believed Kenny's brilliance transcended the four walls of his corner eatery and needed to be shared with those who would never have the chance to partake of Kenny's food for the belly and the soul.
Oscilloscope's Blu-ray of I Like Killing Flies contains the short film Cooking With Kenny and a theatrical trailer.