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. If we were provided screener copies, we’ll have our own write-up, but if that’s not the case, one can find official descriptions from the distributors. Check out our rundown below and return every Tuesday for the best 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.
The Fly (Kurt Neumann)
Scientist Andre Delambre becomes obsessed with his latest creation, a matter transporter. He has varying degrees of success with it. He eventually decides to use a human subject, himself, with tragic consequences. During the transference, his atoms become merged with a fly, which was accidentally let into the machine — and he winds up with the fly’s head and one of its arms, while the fly winds up with Andre’s head and arm. Eventually, Andre’s wife, Helene discovers his secret and must make a decision whether to let him continue to live like that or to do the unthinkable and euthanize him to end his suffering… – Blu-ray.com
Renato (Ugo Tognazzi) and Albin (Michel Serrault)—a middle-aged gay couple who are the manager and star performer at a glitzy drag club in Saint-Tropez—agree to hide their sexual identities, along with their flamboyant personalities and home decor, when the ultraconservative parents of Renato’s son’s fiancée come for a visit. This elegant comic scenario kicks off a wild and warmhearted French farce about the importance of nonconformity and being true to oneself. A breakout art-house smash in America, Edouard Molinaro’s La Cage aux Folles inspired a major Broadway musical and the blockbuster remake The Birdcage. But with its hilarious performances and ahead-of-its-time social message, there’s nothing like the audacious, dazzling original movie. – Criterion
The acclaimed, best-selling novel by John le Carré, about a Cold War spy on one final dangerous mission in East Germany, is transmuted by director Martin Ritt into a film every bit as precise and ruthless as the book. Richard Burton is superb as Alec Leamas, whose relationship with the beautiful librarian Nan, played by Claire Bloom, puts his assignment in jeopardy. The Spy Who Came in from the Cold is a hard-edged and tragic thriller, suffused with the political and social consciousness that defined Ritt’s career. – Criterion
Critic-filmmaker Dan Sallitt’s directorial approach reaches something of a cathartic apotheosis in The Unspeakable Act, an unexpectedly modest and reserved film for one whose narrative hinges on a teenage girl’s (Tallie Medel) incestuous feelings for her older brother (Sky Hirschkron). 1998’s Honeymoon, Sallitt’s first professional feature (second, if you count Polly Perverse Strikes Again!), delineates its central relationship in long takes that tend to keep the entire bodies of the two lead actors within the frame at any given moment, a ploy that simultaneously emphasizes their intimacy and their growing physical discomfort. 2004’s digitally-shot All the Ships at Sea takes a different approach, using revealing close-ups and mathematically precise shot / reverse-shot cadences that reinforce the boundaries separating the two main characters’ belief systems.
The Unspeakable Act moves fluidly between both formal systems: long takes that patiently observe the domestic activity of the story’s Brooklyn-based family are paired alongside the selective cutting of Jackie’s (Medel) frank discussions with her brother and, eventually, her therapist. For all the shock-potential present in the premise, Sallitt embeds a sneaky universality within the narrative by drawing on the anxieties all of us feel when on the verge of a transitional jump, like Jackie’s impending evolution from high school to college. Medel’s performance is superb, too: the biggest takeaway on a recent revisit was discovering just how daringly funny she can be in the role, particularly as she begins to open up to her shrink and explore the contours of high-school sexuality. And Sallitt’s deep-focus aesthetic (a welcome rebuke to the soft-focus trend pervading American independent cinema) helps fashion one of the year’s most dynamic, resourceful feats of mise-en-scène, the film’s frames consistently packed with bursts of color: the green living room; Jackie’s turquoise hoodie; and the green-and-gold front porch that could belong to a Green Bay Packers super-fan. – Danny K.
Recommended Deals of the Weeks
(Note: new additions are in red)
21 Jump Street (Blu-ray) – $9.99
Airplane! (Blu-ray) – $8.49
The American (Blu-ray) – $4.99
Cool Hand Luke (Blu-ray) – $7.99
Collateral (Blu-ray) – $8.05
Contact (Blu-ray) – $6.49
Dark City (Blu-ray) – $7.99
Fargo (Blu-ray) – $7.49
Fight Club (Blu-ray) – $9.99
Goodfellas (Blu-ray) – $7.99
Hugo (Blu-ray) – $9.99
Inception (Blu-ray) – $8.00
Memento (Blu-ray) – $7.99
Moneyball (Blu-ray) – $9.99
Naked Gun (Blu-ray) – $7.99
Not Fade Away (Blu-ray) – $9.99
Once Upon a Time in the West (Blu-ray) – $8.99
Pulp Fiction (Blu-ray) – $9.52
Raging Bull (Blu-ray) – $6.99
Seven (Blu-ray) – $10.49
Seven Psychopaths (Blu-ray) – $9.99
Sid & Nancy (Blu-ray) – $8.99
Somewhere (Blu-ray) – $10.74
South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut (Blu-ray) – $9.99
Star Trek (Blu-ray) – $9.96
Terminator 2: Judgement Day (Blu-ray) – $7.79
There Will Be Blood (Blu-ray) – $7.99
The Thing (Blu-ray) – $8.99
The Truman Show (Blu-ray) – $9.99
Wanderlust (Blu-ray) – $7.36
Wayne’s World (Blu-ray) – $7.99
Winter’s Bone (Blu-ray) – $5.00
Young Frankenstein (Blu-ray) – $9.99
Zodiac (Blu-ray) – $7.99
What are you picking up this week?