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.
The Complete Lady Snowblood (Toshiya Fujita)
A young woman (Meiko Kaji), trained from childhood as an assassin and hell-bent on revenge for the murders of her father and brother and the rape of her mother, hacks and slashes her way to gory satisfaction in turn-of-the-twentieth-century Japan. Rampant with inventive violence and spectacularly choreographed swordplay, Toshiya Fujita’s pair of influential cult classics Lady Snowblood and Lady Snowblood: Love Song of Vengeance are bloody, beautiful extravaganzas composed of one elegant widescreen composition after another. The first Lady Snowblood was a major inspiration for Quentin Tarantino’s Kill Bill saga, and both of Fujita’s films remain cornerstones of Asian action cinema. – Criterion.com
Experimenter (Michael Almereyda)
Experimenter sets for itself an impossibly high bar to clear. Almereyda’s storytelling does not need to be Nabokovian to be good, and the choice of a historical subject instead of oneself allows significance to be bestowed on the individual. His film is deftly and intelligently edited, with Peter Sarsgaard’s addresses to the audience forcing contemplation at the most radical moments, reminding viewers that this is a work of art, not a Wikipedia page. Save for the ending, there is no high-school-level historiography, only the visible work of a director expertly matching eyelines, creating clearly defined spaces for characters to inhabit and encroach upon, and using blocking and reveals to create meaning. Not everything can be Citizen Kane or Speak, Memory, although it’s always good to see something try; it’s even better, however, to see it succeed on its own terms, as Experimenter does. – Forrest C. (full review)
Sicario (Denis Villeneuve)
Director Denis Villeneuve knows how to shake an audience. With Prisoners and Enemy, he couldn’t have made two more-different (but equally chilling) thrillers. With Sicario, the director once again delivers a heart-pounding experience as he explores a situation rife with conflict and murky ethics. The sparse exposition, the striking compositions, the moral ambiguity, and its three excellent performances make for an entirely unforgettable drama. – Jack G.
The Walk (Robert Zemeckis)
The knowledge that Philippe Petit survived his 1,350-foot-high, 45-minute-long, eight-interval walk across the twin towers of New York’s in-construction World Trade Center on August 7, 1974 is hardly an issue for The Walk, a film so admiring of and respectful to its subject that no option but success ever seems possible. Joseph Gordon-Levitt’s Petit is the first thing to follow a borderline anachronistic TriStar logo — a rare ‘90s throwback that ultimately feels fitting, given the relaxed-yet-methodical approach from Robert Zemeckis, bucking current studio filmmaking trends — and the way his grin, perhaps just a bit shit-eating, fills the IMAX screen couldn’t more loudly tell us that we’re under his spell. (Nor could his French accent — which sounds not unlike this writer’s brother after he’s had a few drinks and someone mentions the great European nation — more loudly telegraph that this is also an actor’s interpretation.) A showman is always a storyteller, and striking the (ahem) balance between showing and telling will make way for some of this picture’s greatest strengths and central weaknesses. – Nick N. (full review)
Also Arriving This Week
The Green Inferno (review)
Infinitely Polar Bear
Scouts Guide to the Zombie Apocalypse (review)
True Detective: The Complete Second Season
The Visit (review)
Recommended Deals of the Week
Top Deal: A selection of Blu-rays on The Criterion Collection are under $20, including The Life Aquatic, Wild Strawberries, Ivan’s Childhood and many more.
A Clockwork Orange (Blu-ray) – $9.65
A Most Violent Year (Blu-ray) – $10.00
A Separation (Blu-ray) – $8.05
A Serious Man (Blu-ray) – $7.55
The American (Blu-ray) – $8.32
Amelie (Blu-ray) – $8.99
Beginners (Blu-ray) – $7.00
Black Swan (Blu-ray) – $6.54
The Brothers Bloom (Blu-ray) – $8.24
The Cabin in the Woods (Blu-ray) – $7.88
Captain Phillips (Blu-ray) – $8.99
Casino (Blu-ray) – $9.49
Dear White People (Blu-ray) – $9.99
Eastern Promises (Blu-ray) – $6.57
Enemy (Blu-ray) – $9.96
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (Blu-ray) – $9.99
Far From the Madding Crowd (Blu-ray) – $12.99
Gangs of New York (Blu-ray) – $5.00
Godzilla (Blu-ray) – $9.97
Goodfellas (Blu-ray) – $7.23
Goodnight Mommy (Blu-ray) – $12.99
Good Will Hunting (Blu-ray) – $7.50
A History of Violence (Blu-ray) – $9.69
Inglorious Basterds (Blu-ray) – $9.47
Kingdom of Heaven 10th Anniversary (Blu-ray) – $8.88
Kiss Kiss Bang Bang (Blu-ray) – $9.69
The Lady From Shanghai (Blu-ray) – $8.77
Looper (Blu-ray) – $9.93
Lost In Translation (Blu-ray) – $9.49
Magic Mike (Blu-ray) – $7.99
Magnolia (Blu-ray) – $9.69
Margaret (Blu-ray) – $9.49
Martha Marcy May Marlene (Blu-ray) – $5.99
Matchstick Men (Blu-ray) – $9.99
Michael Clayton (Blu-ray) – $9.65
Mission: Impossible – The 5 Movie Collection (Blu-ray) $34.99
Mr. Smith Goes to Washington (Blu-ray) – $6.99
Never Let Me Go (Blu-ray) – $8.69
No Country For Old Men (Blu-ray) – $5.05
Observe & Report (Blu-ray) – $7.49
ParaNorman (Blu-ray) – $5.38
Pariah (Blu-ray) – $6.48
Persepolis (Blu-ray) – $6.49
Pulp Fiction (Blu-ray) – $5.00
Reality Bites (Blu-ray) – $9.49
Re-Animator (Blu-ray) – $8.03
Rio Bravo (Blu-ray) – $9.69
Road to Perdition (Blu-ray) – $8.99
Seven (Blu-ray) – $7.50
Seven Psychopaths (Blu-ray) – $6.99
Short Term 12 (Blu-ray) – $9.89
A Single Man (Blu-ray) – $6.14
Synecdoche, NY (Blu-ray) – $6.25
There Will Be Blood (Blu-ray) – $9.04
The Tree of Life (Blu-ray) – $6.89
Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy (Blu-ray) – $6.79
Trick ‘r Treat (Blu-ray) – $9.69
True Grit (Blu-ray) – $9.99
Volver (Blu-ray) – $5.98
We Own the Night (Blu-ray) – $6.89
Where the Wild Things Are (Blu-ray) – $7.99
The Wrestler (Blu-ray) – $7.33
What are you picking up this week?