Every week we dive into the cream of the crop when it comes to home releases, including Blu-ray and DVDs, as well as recommended deals of the week. Check out our rundown below and return every Tuesday for the best (or most interesting) films one can take home. Note that if you’re looking to support the site, every purchase you make through the links below helps us and is greatly appreciated.
Mr. Turner (Mike Leigh)
On their surfaces, Mike Leigh and J.M.W. Turner — the artist at the center of his latest film, Mr. Turner — couldn’t seem more like polar opposites. The 19th-century English painter created colossal landscapes of ships and seas, odd impressions that feature little in terms of human life. Leigh, the director of Naked, Topsy-Turvy, and Another Year, works on a microcosmic scale, investigating psychology through dialogue and camera movement, finding precise moments at which the human shell can break. But both are perceptibly searching for the in-between — or, as one character in the film suggests, turning “particles into chaos.” These two artists search for the essence of life through the blending of the material building blocks of the world, offering much to ponder without necessarily asserting their own importance. Even if the artist is a fool, the work will always stand. – Peter L. (full review)
Selma (Ava DuVernay)
There are certain figures in history that are so endlessly studied, referenced, and revered that their name alone conjures the narrative of an entire movement or era, so much so they can seem untenable. Such is certainly the case with civil rights activist, leader, and pastor Martin Luther King, Jr. While those descriptors are rightfully apt, in Ava DuVernay‘s studio debut, Selma, we witness the figure as an empathetic husband, friend, father, and, simply, a man with deep-rooted struggles, both in his life and the lives he hoped to change. – Jordan R. (full review)
Steven Spielberg
Finally arriving on Blu-ray today is one of Steven Spielberg‘s more underrated dramas, his 2005 historical thriller Munich, but it’s not the only film from the director. After getting a box set release earlier this year, a batch of other films from Spielberg will be getting individual releases today. These include his thrilling debut Duel, his follow-up, the Bonnie and Clyde riff The Sugarland Express, his sprawling (and underappreciated) comedy 1941, as well as the sentimental drama Always. – Jordan R.
Winter Sleep (Nuri Bilge Ceylan)
The hotel at the center of the drama in Winter Sleep — both the newest film from Turkish director Nuri Bilge Ceylan and the Palme d’Or winner at last year’s Cannes Film Festival — sits high above the villages in the remotest part of the Anatolian plateau. The film’s protagonist, Mr. Aydin, lives in a paradise: a majestic collection of small houses for his pile of books, the guests he forms friendly relationships with for brief periods of time, and numerous warm fires that protect him from the harsh oncoming winter. He has also unknowingly built a prison for his sister, his wife, and himself, remaining so closed-off from the world that his thoughts have become deluded. – Peter L. (full review)
Black Sea
Black or White (review)
The Last Five Years (review)
Lost River (review)
Recommended Deals of the Week
(Note: new additions are in red)
The American (Blu-ray) – $8.69
Amelie (Blu-ray) – $6.70
A Most Violent Year (Blu-ray) – $14.97
Anna Karenina (Blu-ray) – $12.02
The Babadook (Blu-ray) – $14.98
Before Midnight (Blu-ray) – $9.99
Beginners (Blu-ray) – $8.98
Black Swan (Blu-ray) – $6.25
The Bling Ring (Blu-ray) – $7.99
Bronson (Blu-ray) – $10.91
Burn After Reading (Blu-ray) – $8.52
The Cabin in the Woods (Blu-ray) – $7.88
Casino (Blu-ray) – $8.93
Captain Phillips (Blu-ray) – $9.99
Cloud Atlas (Blu-ray) – $6.97
Cloverfield (Blu-ray) – $8.68
Collateral (Blu-ray) – $7.88
Do the Right Thing (Blu-ray) – $9.49
Drive (Blu-ray) – $7.99
The Fly (Blu-ray) – $6.99
Gangs of New York (Blu-ray) – $7.50
Goodfellas (Blu-ray) – $8.35
Good Will Hunting (Blu-ray) – $7.50
The Grey (Blu-ray) – $8.72
Haywire (Blu-ray) – $7.64
Hot Fuzz (Blu-ray) – $8.73
The Illusionist (Blu-ray) – $9.99
The Immigrant (Blu-ray) – $10.00
Inglorious Basterds (Blu-ray) – $8.73
Jackie Brown (Blu-ray) – $5.00
Jane Eyre (Blu-ray) – $8.55
Killing Them Softly (Blu-ray) – $7.99
L.A. Confidential (Blu-ray) – $8.55
The Lady From Shanghai (Blu-ray) – $8.49
The Last Waltz (Blu-ray) – $7.88
Looper (Blu-ray) – $9.50
Lost In Translation (Blu-ray) – $8.71
Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World (Blu-ray) – $6.49
Margaret (Blu-ray) – $9.49
Martha Marcy May Marlene (Blu-ray) – $7.44
Never Let Me Go (Blu-ray) – $6.24
No Country For Old Men (Blu-ray) – $4.96
Observe & Report (Blu-ray) – $7.49
Office Space (Blu-ray) – $8.99
Pariah (Blu-ray) – $6.13
Persepolis (Blu-ray) – $6.89
Public Enemies (Blu-ray) – $8.72
Pulp Fiction (Blu-ray) – $7.00
Reality Bites (Blu-ray) – $8.49
The Secret In Their Eyes (Blu-ray) – $6.70
A Serious Man (Blu-ray) – $7.98
Seven (Blu-ray) – $7.00
Seven Psychopaths (Blu-ray) – $7.95
Shutter Island (Blu-ray) – $6.96
Singin’ in the Rain (Blu-ray) – $7.99
Spring Breakers (Blu-ray) – $7.99
Synecdoche, NY (Blu-ray) – $7.44
There Will Be Blood (Blu-ray) – $8.35
The Tree of Life (Blu-ray) – $7.50
The Truman Show (Blu-ray) – $7.99
This is the End (Blu-ray) – $9.99
Vanilla Sky (Blu-ray pre-order) – $8.36
Waltz with Bashir (Blu-ray) – $9.05
We Own the Night (Blu-ray) – $9.08
Where the Wild Things Are (Blu-ray) – $6.94
Whiplash (Blu-ray) – $14.99
The Wrestler (Blu-ray) – $6.99
Zero Dark Thirty (Blu-ray) – $9.50
What are you picking up this week?