Blu-ray Highlights: Week of July 26th, 2015 – Jiggety-Jig, Jiggety-Jog

Remember when I complained about how few Blu-rays of interest were released last week? Yeah, well, you’re going to look back fondly at that week because this one’s even worse.

Which Blu-rays Interest You This Week (7/28/15)?

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New Releases

Home‘ – Kudos to DreamWorks for making a major animated feature with a young black girl as the protagonist. Shame on DreamWorks for making that movie a blatant knockoff of ‘Lilo & Stitch’ without hardly any effort to disguise it at all. Jim Parsons as the voice of the alien was already annoying even in the short snippets featured in the trailer. I can’t imagine watching a whole movie of that.

The Water Diviner‘ – Russell Crowe made his directorial debut with a sweeping historical epic about a man (himself) trying to find his three missing sons after the Battle of Gallipoli. Our Blu-ray reviewer Matthew liked it. Our theatrical review Phil did not. Reaction on the whole was very mixed.

Burying the Ex‘ – How long has it been since Joe Dante made a movie that got a theatrical release in America? I’m pretty sure that was 2003’s woeful ‘Looney Tunes: Back in Action’. His latest, a black comedy about a guy who’s naggy girlfriend dies in a freak accident but comes back as a zombie, is not only going direct-to-video, the Blu-ray is exclusive to Best Buy – which means you’ll never see it in a store and nobody will ever hear of it.

White God‘ – In an existential Hungarian drama, dogs rise up to lead a revolution against their human masters. To be clear, this is live action with real trained dogs, not animated. It’s like ‘Rise of the Planet of the Apes’ meets ‘Lassie’, but told from the dogs’ point-of-view and centered around an allegorical political message. Fascinating.

Lost Soul: The Doomed Journey of Richard Stanley’s Island of Dr. Moreau‘ – I talked about this a couple weeks ago. I guess it got pushed back.

Catalog Titles

Most of the notable catalog releases this week are cult titles. Kino has quite a selection. Melanie Griffith plays a spunky heroine in the Western-ish sci-fi tale ‘Cherry 2000‘. From the same director is the apocalyptic thriller ‘Miracle Mile‘. Tim Thomerson leads a squad of WWII soldiers who find a UFO in the cheesefest ‘Zone Troopers‘. The studio then celebrates Lee Marvin in the Western ‘Monte Walsh‘ and the crime thriller ‘Prime Cut‘.

Meanwhile, horror fans might look to Redemption for Jess Franco’s ‘The Erotic Rites of Frankenstein‘.

Television

Aside from the anime releases of which I know nothing at all, the only major TV collection of the week is the second season of Syfy’s viral/zombie/apocalypse thing ‘Helix‘.

My $.02

I’m not seeing much here, to be honest. I still have the ‘Lost Soul’ documentary on my to-rent list. I might add ‘White God’ to that. Otherwise, I don’t see anything I need to buy.

Are you also sitting out the week?

11 comments

  1. Nate

    Target has some cool exclusive Mondo steelbooks for Shaun of the Dead, The Thing, and Flash Gordon coming out tomorrow. Those will be the only movies I pick up this week.

  2. I’ll be picking up Home this week. It’ll be a good one to watch with my daughter and scratch my 3D itch. I’ve always wanted to see Cherry 2000, 25 years later I still haven’t, so what’s a few more months of waiting going to hurt? Duarte’s review was very encouraging. Ghost Town might be kind of cool, and I probably saw it back in the day ( I certainly remember the box at the video store), but if I did, I have no memory of it. I see some stuff on sale for 4.99 at Best Buy, so I might pick up some older cheapo titles as well. Slow weeks are good to have, because they allow me to play catch up on other flicks.

    • Bolo

      Yeah, the favourable review of ‘Cherry 2000’ and the recommendations in the discussion area are enough to get me to give it a shot. I’m looking forward to it now.

  3. Lord Bowler

    I’m interested in ‘Helix: The Complete Second Season’, really enjoyed the show. It took some great twists.

    A great classic western, I definitely want ‘Monte Walsh’ with Lee Marvin.

    And, of course the next DCAU title: ‘Justice League: Gods & Monsters’.

  4. William Henley

    Nothing for me this week, but that is fine, my money is going to a game coming out this week, the new King’s Quest game. It is the first time in years that I preordered a video game.

  5. C.C.

    Miracle Mile is an interesting flick. It dates a little since it reflects a very silly POV that in the 80s- nuclear was imminent (very chicken little stuff). But it is a nice Twilight Zone-esque nugget with great Tangerine Dream music. (And I have to mention some awful acting from Denise Crosby pre-Next Generation Star Trek with a giant 80s Brick Cellphone making like a stereotype 80s Wall Steet-er).

    • EM

      That “silly” POV didn’t seem so silly then, and it produced some effective fare both in that decade (WarGames, The Terminator, Mad Max 2, The Day After…) and before (Fail-Safe, Dr. Strangelove, On the Beach…). And while the tension has diminished, in an age of rogue states, political brinksmanship, fanatical terrorism, and increasing technological dependence, the possibility still exists.

  6. ‘The Erotic Rites of Frankenstein’ sounds like ‘The Erotic Adventures of Hercules’ (from ‘The Simpsons’).

    Joe Dante’s ‘The Hole’ is quite excellent, by the way.

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