We have a super slow week on the blu-ray 4K UHD front this holiday week with only a handful of notable titles coming out and none of those releasing in the 4K UHD format.
Only one title is getting its home video debut this week and that is the Taraji P. Henson/Sam Rockwell race drama called The Best of Enemies. Universal is giving the film a Blu-ray + DVD + Digital HD release that comes with three featurettes and a trailer.
Vinegar Syndrome takes up the slack this week with three films hitting our Most Wanted list. First up is the satirical comedy film written and directed by Robert Downey Sr. that gets a new 4K restoration from various 35mm pre-print elements. The release also contains a couple of previously released audio commentaries, some video interviews and a handful of other material.
Next, the company is putting out on a blu-ray + DVD combo-pack, of John Huckert's The Passing that will feature the new 3K restoration that comes from 16mm archival elements. The region-free release will also contain previously released extras such as a commentary, a couple of interviews, a gallery and more.
The 1993 John Leguizamo crime drama Night Owl is getting a brand new 2K restoration from the 16mm negatives by Vinegar Syndrome. The company will include the previously released audio commentary with director Jeffrey Arsenault, interviews, cast audition pieces, and more on the region-free reversible slipcovered release.
The folks over at Arrow Films have recently blessed The 1978 classic comedy film FM with a brand new restoration from a 4K scan of the original negative. The film has been out of print for quite a while and other than a bad batch of DVD's several years back, this film has never been seen in hi-def. Here's your chance.
Here is what is coming out on blu-ray and 4K Ultra HD This week
Putney Swope (blu-ray)
Vinegar Syndrome
Street Date: July 2, 2019
Assuming he is incapable of winning, all of the members of a prestigious Madison Avenue advertising firm accidentally vote to appoint the company's only black executive, Putney Swope, as chairman of the board. His unexpected win behind him, Swope changes the company's name to 'Truth and Soul, Inc,' fires nearly all of its elderly white employees, and focuses solely on creating subversive, outlandish, and shocking campaigns. As the company is catapulted to new heights of success, Swope finds that he has drawn the ire of the U.S. President, who seeks to declare him and his renegade staff a threat to national security.
- New 4K restoration from various 35mm pre-print elements
- Audio commentary with director Robert Downey Sr.
- Video interview with Robert Downey Sr. from 2001 on Putney Swope
- Video interview with Robert Downey Sr. from 2008 on Putney Swope
- Q and A from the film's screening at the 2005 Philadelphia Film Festival
- Audio interview with cinematographer Gerald Cotts
- Audio commentary with film critic and historian Sergio Mims
- Original theatrical trailer
- Massive archival article & promo gallery
- Reversible cover artwork
The Passing (Collector's Edition Blu-ray)
Vinegar Syndrome
Street Date: July 2, 2019
Ernie and Rose are two widower WWII veterans with no one but each other, living in a crumbling old house outside of Baltimore. Wade is a youthful, blue collar laborer with a wife and young child. Their lives seem predetermined to never intersect, until Wade's wife is savagely assaulted and, in a fit of anger, Wade accidentally kills her attacker, subsequently finding himself convicted of murder and sentenced to death.
Fears of morbidity are also affecting Ernie who, on the advice of his doctor, agrees to enroll in a mysterious program in which the minds and souls of the elderly can be implanted into the bodies of the young. Eager to experience youth once again, Ernie agrees, with Wade forcibly assigned to be Ernie's new physical self. But neither of the two men, one willing, one victim, are prepared for the true results of the horrifying procedure…
- New 2K restoration from 16mm archival elements
- Audio commentary with director John Huckert, moderated by Tom Fitzgerald of EXP TV
- "Water Under the Bridge" – an interview with producer/co-writer Mary Maruca
- "Passing Time" – an interview with cinematographer Richard Chisolm
- Promotional & article gallery
- Short films directed by John Huckert:
- "The Water that is Passed" (1976)
"Quack" (1976)
"Einmal" (1979)
"Ernie & Rose" (1982)
- "The Water that is Passed" (1976)
- Reversible cover artwork
FM (Blu-ray)
Arrow Films
Street Date: July 2, 2019
If you can't get a date… make one! After proving himself the king of heartfelt teen flicks with Sixteen Candles and The Breakfast Club, writer-director John Hughes infused the genre with a hefty dose of wacked-out sci-fi comedy in Weird Science, a film where every teenage boy's wildest fantasies come to life.
Perenially picked-on high school nerds Gary (Anthony Michael Hall, Sixteen Candles) and Wyatt (Ilan Mitchell-Smith) are sick of their status at the bottom of the social food chain. Using Wyatt's computer, the two hatch a plan to create their dream woman – and following a massive power surge, that woman unexpectedly appears in the form of Lisa (Kelly LeBrock). Gorgeous, intelligent, and blessed with limitless magic powers, Lisa makes the boys' dreams come true… but what about Wyatt's gun-toting psycho older brother Chet (Bill Paxton), and the two bullies (Robert Downey Jr and Vamp's Robert Rusler) determined to put them back in their place?
- New restoration by Arrow Films from a 4K scan of the original negative
- High Definition (1080p) Blu-ray presentation of the original Theatrical Version of the film (94 mins), plus seamlessly-branched exclusive Extended Version (97 mins), featuring two additional scenes newly remastered in high-definition
- Original lossless stereo audio, plus 5.1 DTS-HD MA surround option (theatrical version only)
- Original English subtitles for the deaf and hard of hearing
- Edited-for-TV version of the film (SD only, 95 mins), plus comparison featurette highlighting the alternate dubs and takes
- Option to watch additional scenes from the Extended Version separately
- Newly-filmed interview with special makeup creator Craig Reardon
- Newly-filmed interview with composer Ira Newborn
- Newly-filmed interview with supporting actor John Kapelos
- All-new interview with casting director Jackie Burch
- It's Alive: Resurrecting Weird Science, an archive documentary featuring interviews with cast, crew and admirers, including star Anthony Michael Hall
- Theatrical trailers and TV spots
- Image gallery
- Reversible sleeve featuring original and newly commissioned artwork by Tracie Ching
- First pressing only: Illustrated collectors' booklet featuring new writing on the film by Alexandra Heller-Nicholas and Amanda Reyes
Night Owl (Blu-ray)
Vinegar Syndrome
Street Date: July 2, 2019
Jake (James Raftery) is an apathetic, post-punk vampire who spends his nights cruising seedy music dives for drugged out women to seduce and kill to satisfy his bloodlust. After murdering Zohra, a young Puerto Rican woman, Jake becomes the focus of her brother, Angel, who's desperate to find his missing sister and fears that Jake might be involved in her disappearance…
- New 2K restoration from the 16mm camera negative
- Audio commentary with director Jeffrey Arsenault
- "Night Life" – an interview with Jeffrey Arsenault
- "Living For the Night" – an interview with actor James Raftery
- "A Chance to Die" – an interview with actress Karen Wexler
- Archival interview with Jeffrey Arsenault
- Original cast auditions
- Raw interview footage with Caroline Munro (specifically shot in 1991 for use in Night Owl)
- Original video trailer
- Reversible cover artwork
And now for our MOST WANTED ON BLU-RAY AND 4K for the week of July 2, 2019
Best of Enemies (4K Ultra HD + Blu-ray + Digital HD)
Universal
Street Date: July 2, 2019
A timely drama that centers on an unlikely relationship between Ann Atwater (Academy Award nominee Taraji P. Henson, Hidden Figures), an outspoken civil rights activist, and C.P. Ellis (Academy Award winner Sam Rockwell, Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri), a local Ku Klux Klan leader who reluctantly co-chaired a community summit, battling over the desegregation of schools in Durham, North Carolina during the racially-charged summer of 1971. The incredible events that unfolded would change Durham and the lives of Atwater and Ellis forever.
- Special Features:Make a Connection - Featurette
- Ann Atwater - Featurette
- An Unlikely Friendship - Featurette
- Theatrical Trailer