My Two Cents
Thursday, 15 January 2015 14:53

Five BD Reviews, Best Picture nominees, Theory of Everything official & an effort to save John Barry’s Moonraker score

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Today is review day here at The Bits, and we’ve got a fine batch for you. To kick things off, I’ve updated my review of DreamWorks’ first film ever, The Peacemaker, from 2010. We’ve also updated a pair of great 2011 BD reviews from our dear friend Barrie Maxwell on the old Bits website: Warner’s Citizen Kane: 70th Anniversary UCE and Ben-Hur: 50th Anniversary UCE. Finally, we have a pair of new Blu-ray reviews today too from our own Tim Salmons, including Synapse’s fine new Prom Night: Special Edition and a Robert Altman classic that’s now available from our friends at Criterion: Nashville. All these discs are well worth your time and the reviews are pretty fine as well, if we do say so ourselves, so we hope you enjoy reading them!  [Read on here…]

There’s not a lot of announcement news today, but Universal has officially set James Marsh’s new Best Picture nominee film The Theory of Everything for Blu-ray and DVD release on 2/17. Both versions will feature audio commentary by director James Marsh, the Becoming the Hawkings featurette, and deleted scenes. The film will be available digitally on 2/10. See the final cover artwork below.

Speaking of the newly-announced Best Picture nominees, they are officially: American Sniper, The Imitation Game, Selma, Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance), Boyhood, The Grand Budapest Hotel, The Theory of Everything, and Whiplash. You can read the complete list of this year’s Oscar nominees here at Oscar.com.

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Also announced today for music fans is Daryl Hall and John Oates: Live in Dublin from Eagle Rock Entertainment. Filmed at the Olympia Theatre on July 15, 2014, the concert will be available on 3/31 in DVD+2CD, Blu-ray and digital formats.

Finally today, here’s something interesting for you Bond fans: As some of you may be aware already, the master tapes for composer John Barry’s score for Moonraker have apparently been lost. But Tadlow Music boss James Fitzpatrick and Bond fans around the world have banded together on Kickstarter to have the complete score re-recorded by the Prague Philharmonic Orchestra. The effort would be overseen by conductor Nic Raine, who worked with Barry back in the day. You can read more about all this here at The Yorkshire Post (thanks to Bits reader Tim H. for the link) and you can contribute to this worthy Kickstarter here.

We’ll leave you with a look at the cover artwork for Universal’s The Theory of Everything, as well the other Best Picture nominees that are now available for pre-order on Amazon (all but Birdman are – note that some street dates are TBA), and new John Hughes Yearbook Collection Blu-ray...

The Theory of Everything (Blu-ray Disc)    Whiplash (Blu-ray Disc)    Boyhood (Blu-ray Disc)

The Grand Budapest Hotel (Blu-ray Disc)    Selma (Blu-ray Disc)    American Sniper (Blu-ray Disc)

The Interview (Blu-ray Disc)    The John Hughes Yearbook Collection (Blu-ray Disc)    The Imitation Game (Blu-ray Disc)

Back tomorrow. Stay tuned...

Bill Hunt

 

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