New on Disc: Portrait of a Lady on Fire gets a Picture Perfect Release

June 23, 2020

This could be the worst week for DVD / Blu-ray releases I’ve seen, outside of when a Tuesday falls on January 1st. The reason for this is simple, Trolls World Tour is hitting VOD. Or to be more precise, it is transitioning from premium VOD to electronic sale through VOD. You can now buy it for the same price you could rent it before. This film is easily the biggest release of the lockdown and it will easily be the biggest DVD / Blu-ray release of the summer. Unless there’s a monster TV-on-DVD release this fall, it will be the biggest release until the pandemic fully subsides. And, since there are parts of the world that are hitting daily records for new cases, including many parts of the United States, that could be a few more months at the very least. Fortunately, while there are only three releases on the highlights list this week, two of them are Pick-of-the-Week contenders. Murder by Decree and Portrait of a Lady on Fire are both absolutely worth picking up, but the latter wins out for Pick of the Week thanks to its Criterion Collection Blu-ray release.

Highlights

Murder by Decree: Special Edition - Buy from Amazon: Blu-ray
Christopher Plummer plays Sherlock Holmes in this movie, which pits the famous detective against Jack the Ripper. The film is a classic of the genre, but mostly forgotten. Extras include a new audio commentary track and an archive audio commentary from the director, Bob Clark, who doesn’t get enough credit for his work, in my opinion. Over a decade from the mid 1970s through to the mid 1980s, he made amazing films in a wide variety of genres include the nostalgia comedy A Christmas Story, teenage sex comedy Porkys, teenage slasher Black Christmas, and this murder mystery. Granted, the rest of his career wasn’t … good. At all. However, these four films in such diverse genres still shows he had range as a director.

On a related note, this release also gives me a chance to bring up my favorite theory about the identity of Jack the Ripper: no one. The first two murders happened, but they were done by different people and the details were exaggerated to sell newspapers. The theory goes so far as to say the letters the police received were written by a journalist, again to hype the story and to sell newspapers, and that these letters inspired someone else to commit a copycat murder.

Portrait of a Lady on Fire: Criterion Collection - Buy from Amazon: DVD or Blu-ray
This film earned Oscar-worthy reviews, but it was mostly ignored by Awards Season voters. Additionally, it has plenty of extras in the form of a quartet of interview featurettes and a written essay. It is easily the Pick of the Week.

South Park: The Complete Twenty-Third Season - Buy from Amazon: DVD or Blu-ray
It has been more than a decade since I thought South Park was consistently funny, but lasting for 23 seasons is a remarkable achievement.

Other Movie Releases

And Then We Danced - Buy from Amazon: DVD or Blu-ray
Braking For Whales - Buy from Amazon: DVD, Blu-ray
Burden - Buy from Amazon: DVD
Caravans - Buy from Amazon: DVD or Blu-ray
Cleanin’ Up the Town: Remembering Ghostbusters - Buy from Amazon: Blu-ray
Corpus Christi - Buy from Amazon: DVD or Blu-ray
Daddy Issues - Buy from Amazon: DVD or Blu-ray
Devil’s Night: Dawn of the Nain Rouge - Buy from Amazon: DVD
Dream Demon - Reviews - Buy from Amazon: Blu-ray
Eureka Seven: The Complete Series - Buy from Amazon: Blu-ray
Eureka Seven: Astral Ocean - Buy from Amazon: Blu-ray
Fairy Gone: Season One — Part One - Buy from Amazon: Blu-ray
A Good Woman is Hard to Find - Buy from Amazon: DVD
Hans Christian Andersen - Buy from Amazon: Blu-ray
Inheritance - Buy from Amazon: DVD
INXS - Live Baby Live: Live At Wembley Stadium - Buy from Amazon: Blu-ray
Jasper Mall - Buy from Amazon: DVD or Blu-ray
The Last Supper - Buy from Amazon: DVD or Blu-ray
The Last Valley - Buy from Amazon: DVD or Blu-ray
The Legion - Buy from Amazon: DVD
The Mad Fox - Buy from Amazon: Blu-ray
Real Girl: Complete Collection - Buy from Amazon: Blu-ray
The Road to Wellville - Buy from Amazon: Blu-ray
A Ship of Human Skin - Buy from Amazon: DVD or Blu-ray
The Spider - Buy from Amazon: Blu-ray
Strike Up the Band - Buy from Amazon: Blu-ray
Tokyo Olympiad: Criterion Collecion - Buy from Amazon: DVD or Blu-ray

And Then We Danced and Tokyo Olympiad are both stellar films and worth checking out. They are definitely better than their sales ranks on Amazon would indicate.

TV on DVD Releases

Detective Montalbano: Episodes 35 & 36 - Buy from Amazon: DVD
The Magic School Bus Rides Again: Blast Off! - Buy from Amazon: DVD
Pennyworth: The Complete First Season - Buy from Amazon: DVD or Blu-ray

South Park: The Complete Twenty-Third Season is the biggest TV on DVD release of the week by a huge margin. However, it was selling well enough to be included in the main list.

3D Blu-ray Releases

House of Wax - Buy from Amazon: 3D Blu-ray Combo Pack

The original House of Wax, the one with Vincent Price, is getting a 3D release this week. Awesome.

C.S.Strowbridge

Filed under: DVD and Blu-ray Releases, Home Market Releases, Caravans, Burden, Trolls: World Tour, Inheritance, Portrait de la jeune fille en feu, Corpus Christi, INXS: Live Baby Live at Wembly Stadium, And Then We Danced, A Good Woman is Hard to Find, Legionnaire’s Trail, Devil’s Night: Dawn of the Nain Rouge, Braking For Whales, Daddy Issues, Dream Demon, Tôkyô orinpikku, Das Letzte Mahl, Jasper Mall, The Spider, A Ship of Human Skin, Koiya koi nasuna koi, South Park, Magic School Bus, Eureka 7, Pennyworth, Fairy Gone, Real Girl, Bob Clark, Christopher Plummer, Vincent Price