Displaying items by tag: Tim Salmons

All right, we have some great release news to report for you all today...

But first, we also have another new Blu-ray review: Tim has taken a look Bruno Mattei’s Cruel Jaws (1995) on Blu-ray from Severin Films. You’ll find that here.

Now then, that news we mentioned...

Our friends at Shout! and Scream Factory have just announced the 4K Ultra HD release of John Carpenter’s Prince of Darkness: Collector’s Edition on 1/19. The 4K/Blu-ray package will carry an SRP of $34.98. The 4K disc itself will include Dolby Vision and HDR10 high dynamic range, along with a new Dolby Atmos audio mix. All of the existing extras from Scream’s excellent Blu-ray release will carry over. You can see the cover artwork at left and also below. [Read on here...]

We’re closing out the week today with a little bit more release news and some new disc reviews. Let’s get to the reviews first...

Tim and Dennis have been busy these last couple days; Tim has posted a new review of David Cronenberg’s Shivers (1975), newly-released on Blu-ray as part of Lionsgate’s Vestron Video Collector’s Series.

Also, Dennis has turned in his thoughts on John Badam’s The Hard Way (1991) on Blu-ray from Kino Lorber Studio Classics, along with David Roby’s Most Wanted (2020) from Paramount, and Pierre Jourdan’s I Am a Dancer on Blu-ray from Film Movement and StudioCanal.

I’ve also begun working on a pair of new 4K Ultra HD releases, which I expect to have up over the next few days, so be sure to watch for these. [Read on here...]

All right, today’s update on The Bits is going to be a quick one, as yesterday’s post obviously made a big splash on the Interwebs. Yesterday was also my birthday, and I ended up spending most of the day working, so I’m going to take a little bit of a break this afternoon.

BUT... we do have a few things for you...

First, on Tuesday night we posted Tim’s mammoth 2-part and in-depth review of Scream Factory’s outstanding new 12-film/16-disc Friday the 13th Collection: Deluxe Edition Blu-ray box set, which streets next Tuesday (10/13). And it is every bit as awesome as you’re hoping it is. Our hats off to everyone at Scream and elsewhere who were involved in this set. That includes our old friend Peter Bracke, as well as our very own Tim Salmons, who is thanked in the set’s liner notes booklet for contributing rare trailers and TV spots. He’s too modest to mention it, but there you go. The set is amazing, the review is here, and we hope you enjoy both!

Also today, we’ve posted the latest update of our Release Dates & Artwork section here at The Bits, featuring all the latest Blu-ray, DVD, and 4K cover artwork and Amazon.com pre-order links. And just to let you know, the whole section—which had been rather buggy lately—should now be working fully. As always, any time you order literally anything from Amazon by clicking on our links, you’re helping to support our work here at The Bits and we really do appreciate it. [Read on here...]

We’ve got some interesting news to report today...

First though, our own Michael Coate has posted a new History, Legacy & Showmanship column here at The Bits, featuring a look back at CBS’s The Mary Tyler Moore Show in honor of its 50th anniversary. Michael interviews historians Herbie J. Pilato and Vince Waldron on the popular TV series and its legacy. Enjoy!

Also today, we’ve posted the latest update of our Release Dates & Artwork section with all the latest Blu-ray, DVD, and 4K Ultra HD cover artwork and Amazon.com pre-order links.

Before we get to announcements today, we’ve learned from our sources that Warner should be officially announcing the 4K Ultra HD release of The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings sometime in the next two weeks, if all goes well with delivery of the 4K masters. [Read on here...]

All right Bits readers, we’ve got a pretty significant news update for you today...

We’ve been tracking many of these titles, but a few of the 4K catalog titles we’re going to talk about today are breaking news, thanks to our old friends over at Media Play News.

They’ve just issued the September 2020 Digital edition of their magazine, which features an extensive look at the recent surge of 4K Ultra HD catalog releases. The publication’s editor, Stephanie Prange (who, full disclosure, I’ve known for many years), wrote a great longform piece for the issue called 4K Ultra HD: Into the Vaults about the process of preparing classic catalog films for release on the format.

Not only is it informative (and I should note that I was among the people interviewed therein), it includes some great news about forthcoming titles. [Read on here...]

Good afternoon, friends. Hope you all had a lovely weekend.

We’ve got a couple things for you today, starting with a new Blu-ray review. Our own Tim Salmons has done yeoman’s work sinking his teeth into/reviewing Arrow Video’s mammoth and outstanding Gamera: The Complete Collection box set on the format.

The good news: If you’re a fan of kaiju films—and this specific giant turtle in particular—it’s an amazing box set. The bad news: It sold fast and now seems to be out virtually everywhere online. There are a few retailers getting limited stock in now and again, but they go quickly. So unfortunately, unless Arrow is able to reprint it (which I’m told is unlikely at least for now), you might be out of luck. But we couldn’t let their good work go unacknowledged.

And though the set came out on 8/18, it’s literally taken Tim this long to go through it all. Here’s his epic review and we hope you enjoy it.

Also, I posted my thoughts on Lionsgate’s new Ghost in the Shell (1995) 4K release on Friday (click here in the event you missed it). And Dennis has reviewed George Marshall’s The Ghost Breakers (1940), starring Bob Hope, on Blu-ray from Kino Lorber Studio Classics. [Read on here...]

All right, it’s been a busy week here at The Bits so far and we’ve got a lot of ground to cover today.

First of all, sorry for the lack of daily updates. The reason is three-fold. First, we’ve been working on reviews here at the website—more on that in a moment. Second, we had 110° heat here in SoCal this past weekend, with which our AC could not keep up. That meant my home theater was close to 90°, which made reviewing unpleasant, plus there was the danger of power outages. The good news is that we’ve made up for it since the heat broke—again, more on that in a moment. (The bad news is that our skies this afternoon are an unnatural shade of apocalyptic yellow-orange due to the California wildfires, but that’s neither here nor there.) The third reason is more complicated.

We’ve been hearing from many of our readers based in the Netherlands that you’re unable to see The Bits website. The cause of this is that—apparently—a very large portion of the Internet’s DDoS attacks and cyber shenanigans either come from, or are routed through—Netherlands IP addresses. So our server team is working on a solution to block the riff-raff while allowing the rest of you actual readers to see the site. Please be patient while we sort it all out. Unfortunately, this kind of thing seems perfectly in keeping with the whole 2020 milieu. [Read on here...]

All right, I’m busy working on a review of Studio Canal’s new 4K Ultra HD release of Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure, which is available now (click here). Note however the disc only has 2.0 audio. It’s a release that superfans of the film will certainly want, but for almost everyone else, the terrific Shout! Factory release is still going to be the preferred version (though sadly it’s essentially out of print). I hope to have the review up soon.

Meanwhile, Tim has posted reviews of another pair of 4K titles from our friends at Blue Underground and director Lucio Fulci, the horror/gaillo titles The House by the Cemetery (1981) and The New York Ripper (1982). Looks like both discs are worth your time, if you’re a fan of the filmmaker (though I will confess that graphic horror and gore isn’t really my thing).

In any case, if you’re wondering why we’ve blacked out the cover artwork (save for the title logos), it’s this: Google advertising routinely flags images that are sexually suggestive or violent. Not that either of these is especially bad, but it’s not a person that makes these decision, it’s an AI that tends to flag things randomly. When it does flag something, it turns off advertising and then it’s a whole stupid process of requesting a review. Given our limited resources, we really can’t waste time dealing with it. So there you go.

Yes, it turns out the Internet is just as stupid as everything else in 2020. [Read on here...]

We have some new release news, announcements, and an interesting rumor to report on today. But first, we’ve got some new disc reviews here at The Bits for you, including...

Tim’s look at Terence Fisher’s 1962 Hammer Studios production of The Phantom of the Opera, available now as a new Collector’s Edition Blu-ray from our friends at Scream Factory. He’s also taken a look at John Harrison’s Tales from the Darkside: The Movie, also available on Collector’s Edition Blu-ray from Scream.

[Editor’s Note: While you’re listening to the audio commentary with Harrison and George Romero on that disc, know that I was in the booth as it was being recorded back in November of 2001. You can see my coverage of the day here on The Bits, complete with pictures. John’s become a friend over the years, and let me tell you, George was every bit as warm and lovely a human being as you’d hope. It makes me very happy to see this film and commentary get another appearance on disc for fans to rediscover.]

Not done yet with reviews... I’ve just posted my thoughts on David Twohy’s Pitch Black, soon to arrive on 4K Ultra HD from our friends at Arrow Video. The film really does benefit from both the new 4K scan of the original camera negative and the HDR grade, though the audio is the same 5.1 DTS-HD MA mix found on the previous Blu-ray. The disc is also loaded with extras, including nearly all the legacy content and new material too. It’s a worthy upgrade for fans. Note however that the title shipped without a slipcover due to a production problem. So if you happen to be surprised that your copy doesn’t have a slipcover, that’s why. [Read on here...]

Okay, we’ve got some significant release and industry news to report today. But first, new disc reviews...

Tim has just posted a review of Pierre B. Reinhard’s Revenge of the Living Dead Girls (1987) on Blu-ray from Severin Films.

And Dennis has turned in his thoughts on Budd Boetticher’s World War II drama The Red Ball Express (1952), now available on Blu-ray from Kino Lorber Studio Classics.

Also, I’ve just gotten my hands on Arrow Video’s new Pitch Black 4K Ultra HD, so I’m going to have a review of that up by Friday.

But tomorrow is likely to be an interesting news day, as that’s when the industry’s mid-year numbers get released. So I’ll have more on that tomorrow afternoon. [Read on here...]