Now then, we have a couple of new title announcements/bits of release news odds and ends to cover today...
First, Kino Lorber Studio Classics has officially confirmed that their new Ultra HD restorations of Sergio Leone’s A Fistful of Dollars (1964) and For a Few Dollars More (1965) will street on 5/31. These will be 4K with SDR only, like The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly (reviewed here). Also like that release, they’ll be loaded with extras. Which is really exciting and also really makes us hopeful that someone at Paramount Pictures Home Entertainment is watching and may decide to release Leone’s 1968 masterpiece Once Upon a Time in the West in 4K UHD as well. Meanwhile, you can see the cover artwork for the two Man with No Name tiles above and also below.
Also in 4K Ultra HD news, retail sources are now confirming word we first posted back in January, specifically that Universal Studios Home Entertainment will be releasing The Alfred Hitchcock Classics Collection: Volume 2 in 4K Ultra HD on 5/10, including Saboteur (1942), Shadow of a Doubt (1943), Marnie (1964), The Trouble with Harry (1955), and Family Plot (1976). This time, each film will also be available separately on the format. We’ll post the Amazon pre-order links when they go live, but in the meantime you can see the box set artwork below.
Back to that thought I mentioned a moment ago: GKids has just revealed that they’ve obtained the North American distribution rights to four of director Makoto Shinkai’s earlier animated films, which will be released on Blu-ray and DVD later this year (through their Shout! Factory distributor), including Voices of a Distant Star (2002), The Place Promised in Our Early Days (2004), 5 Centimeters Per Second (2007), and Children Who Chase Lost Voices (2011). Each will feature original Japanese language versions and dubbed English as well. You can read the official statement here.
Are there any fans of the Disney Movie Club out there? Well, you may be interested to know that Darby O’Gill and the Little People (1959) and The Gnome-Mobile (1967) are now available on Blu-ray as DMC exclusives. They just dropped this week.
Also, if there are any fans of 80s music—specifically the band The Police—we’ve learned that their 1982 documentary The Police Around the World is going to be re-released in May (tentative street date is 5/20) on DVD and quite likely Blu-ray, mastered from new 4K scans of the original 16 mm negatives. It looks like the plan is to release expanded and remastered CD and vinyl SKUs of the music from the film, packaged with DVD copies, and a Blu-ray should be available separately by itself. The official announcement is expected to be made on Monday morning, so we’ll check back then with more details.
Finally today, no doubt many of you have seen this already, but Disney has now dropped the first teaser trailer for their upcoming Star Wars: Obi-Wan Kenobi limited streaming series, which debuts on Disney+ on 5/25. I don’t know about you, but I’m pretty excited. It’s a lovely thing to be able to regularly reconnect with your inner 10-year-old as an adult, especially given the state of the world these days. Anyway, here’s a look at that...
And here’s a look at the cover artwork for the two Man with No Name titles and also Hitchcock in 4K as well. Amazon links will be added as they go live…
All right, that’s all for this week. Have a great weekend and be sure to keep your eyes peeled here and on our social media feeds for those West Side Story and The Godfather Trilogy 4K reviews over the next few days.
Stay tuned!
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