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 Nice Guys (Shane Black)
It’s been over 40 years since Chinatown, and roughly the same amount of time separates the events of that film from those of The Nice Guys, another tale of a private detective in Los Angeles taking on an initially simple case which leads him to a vast, environmentally centered criminal conspiracy. The Nice Guys even carries on Chinatown’s heartbeat of individual helplessness when confronted with the casual body disposal of profit-hungry industrialists. So, too, does the movie bring the sensibility of its time to its throwback setting — while Chinatown’s L.A. is a distinctly ‘70s landscape of grim stoicism, The Nice Guys‘ L.A. is suffused with nearly as much irreverent contemporary irony as it is smog. The 1938-set Chinatown is a more faithful reflection of the city in the ‘70s than the 1977-set Nice Guys. It’s particularly appropriate that, in the new film, we aren’t even really looking at L.A. at all most of the time, but rather a skillful artifice fashioned out of Atlanta. – Dan S. (full review)
Sunset Song (Terence Davies)
A tension is formed by a cut, quickly transporting our heroine from an expansive wheat field to a confined classroom. We’re not just talking the difference of 70mm for the former and the Ari Alexa for the latter, but that of, to quote Kate Bush, the “sensual world” versus the punishment of destiny. Based on a mainstay of Scottish classrooms, Sunset Song is a triptych of sorts chronicling farmgirl Chris’ (Agyness Deyn) womanhood; the first deals with her abusive father (Peter Mullan) and the pain he inflicts on her and the others in the family, the second follows her falling in love and marrying Ewan (Kevin Guthrie), while the third sees Ewan enlisting to fight in World War I and coming back a violent man that resembles her father. – Ethan V. (full review)
Wiener-Dog (Todd Solondz)
As uncomfortable a viewing experience it may be, the best films from Todd Solondz slowly reveal themselves with their character intricacies and distinct touches, burrowing deep inside as they replay in one’s mind. In his latest feature, Wiener-Dog, he’s crafted a series of incisive, perceptive vignettes mutually connected by the shifting owners of his title character. Aptly described by Solondz as Au Hasard Balthazar meets Benji, there’s no denying it bears his brand of humor and heartbreak in every scene. – Jordan R. (full review)
Woman in the Dunes (Hiroshi Teshigahara)
One of the 1960s’ great international art-house sensations, Woman in the Dunes (Suna no onna) was for many the grand unveiling of the surreal, idiosyncratic world of Hiroshi Teshigahara. Eiji Okada plays an amateur entomologist who has left Tokyo to study an unclassified species of beetle found in a vast desert. When he misses his bus back to civilization, he is persuaded to spend the night with a young widow (Kyoko Kishida) in her hut at the bottom of a sand dune. What results is one of cinema’s most unnerving and palpably erotic battles of the sexes, as well as a nightmarish depiction of everyday life as a Sisyphean struggle—an achievement that garnered Teshigahara an Academy Award nomination for best director. – Criterion.com
Also Arriving This Week
Clown (review)
The Duel
Maggie’s Plan (review)
The Man Who Knew Infinity (review)
Midnight Run
A Taste of Honey
Recommended Deals of the Week
All the President’s Men (Blu-ray) – $8.49
The American (Blu-ray) – $6.13
Amelie (Blu-ray) – $6.50
The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford (Blu-ray) – $8.19
Beginners (Blu-ray) – $6.41
Bone Tomahawk (Blu-ray) – $9.99
The Brothers Bloom (Blu-ray) – $9.99
The Cabin in the Woods (Blu-ray) – $8.74
Casino (Blu-ray) – $9.49
Cloud Atlas (Blu-ray) – $7.99
Dear White People (Blu-ray) – $9.99
Django Unchained (Blu-ray) – $7.99
The Deer Hunter (Blu-ray) – $9.96
Eastern Promises (Blu-ray) – $9.56
Far From the Madding Crowd (Blu-ray) – $7.99
Frank (Blu-ray) – $8.99
Godzilla (Blu-ray) – $8.00
The Grand Budapest Hotel (Blu-ray) – $9.99
Greenberg (Blu-ray) – $5.10
The Guest (Blu-ray) – $9.99
Heat (Blu-ray) – $7.88
Holy Motors (Blu-ray) – $10.57
The Informant! (Blu-ray) – $8.26
Inglorious Basterds (Blu-ray) – $7.99
Interstellar (Blu-ray) – $7.99
The Iron Giant (Blu-ray pre-order) – $9.99
Jaws (Blu-ray) – $7.88
Kiss Kiss Bang Bang (Blu-ray) – $9.69
Kumiko, the Treasure Hunter (Blu-ray) – $9.79
The Lady From Shanghai (Blu-ray) – $8.99
Looper (Blu-ray) – $7.88
Lost In Translation (Blu-ray) – $9.49
Mad Max: Fury Road (Blu-ray) – $9.99
Magnolia (Blu-ray) – $8.79
The Man Who Wasn’t There (Blu-ray) – $9.49
Margaret (Blu-ray) – $9.85
Martha Marcy May Marlene (Blu-ray) – $5.26
Midnight Special (Blu-ray) – $12.96
Michael Clayton (Blu-ray) – $9.69
Moneyball (Blu-ray) – $9.99
Nebraska (Blu-ray) – $8.99
Never Let Me Go (Blu-ray) – $8.40
No Country For Old Men (Blu-ray) – $5.99
ParaNorman (Blu-ray) – $9.99
Persepolis (Blu-ray) – $9.90
The Piano (Blu-ray) – $7.34
A Prophet (Blu-ray) – $6.99
Pulp Fiction (Blu-ray) – $9.99
Re-Animator (Blu-ray) – $9.99
Road to Perdition (Blu-ray) – $8.99
The Searchers / Wild Bunch / How the West Was Won (Blu-ray) – $10.42
Sex, Lies, and Videotape (Blu-ray) – $6.32
Short Term 12 (Blu-ray) – $9.74
Shutter Island (Blu-ray) – $6.79
A Separation (Blu-ray) – $6.80
A Serious Man (Blu-ray) – $5.75
A Single Man (Blu-ray) – $5.80
Sicario (Blu-ray) – $11.99
Somewhere (Blu-ray) – $5.20
There Will Be Blood (Blu-ray) – $5.99
Volver (Blu-ray) – $5.95
Waltz With Bashir (Blu-ray) – $6.50
Where the Wild Things Are (Blu-ray) – $7.70
The White Ribbon (Blu-ray) – $8.60
The Wrestler (Blu-ray) – $8.90
What are you picking up this week?