April showers bring May flowers, but they also give you a good excuse to sit back and enjoy the new Blu-rays, books and vinyl records from Arrow Video and Arrow Academy.
First is Seijun Suzuki: The Early Years. Vol. 2 – Border Crossings: The Crime and Action Movies that includes another five feature films from the director noted for Branded to Kill and Drifter. The early films include Eight Hours of Terror (1957), The Sleeping Beast Within (1960), Smashing the 0-Line (1960), Tokyo Knights (1961) and The Man with a Shotgun (1961). My favorite of the batch is Tokyo Knights. This is the tale of a kid who has to juggle college with running his late father’s mob activities. Why hasn’t this been remade into an American movie?
Sleeping Dogs is a dystopian world flick that helped launch the careers of director Roger Donaldson (No Way Out, Species) and actor Sam Neill (Jurassic Park, Possession). A political leader not only institutes marshal law, but invites the Americans to help him take control of his citizens. Neill plays a man who wants to get away from it all only to discover he’s in the middle of it. To truly make the film work, they bring in Warren Oates (The Wild Bunch). Along with a commentary track from Donaldson, Neil and actor-writer Ian Mune, there’s an hour long documentary about how the movie came about in a New Zealand before Lord of the Rings.
A Pistol For Ringo & The Return Of Ringo: Two Films By Duccio Tessari are both of the Spaghetti Westerns starring Giuliano Gemma (Dario Argento’s Tenebrae) and directed by Tessari. We reviewed this double feature already. Finally there’s Killer Klowns From Outer Space is the Chiodo brothers at their finest. Aliens arrive to invade the Earth. But instead of being creatures from outer space, they take the form of clowns. So this film covers a lot of phobias. It’s a film that throws back to the Creature Double Feature days.
There’s also the book All the Colours Of Sergio Martino about one of the masters of the giallo genre having made The Strange Vice of Mrs Wardh, Torso and The Suspicious Death of a Minor.
Here’s the press release from Arrow Video:
New from Arrow Video US and Arrow Academy US
Seijun Suzuki: The Early Years. Vol. 2 Limited Edition [Blu-ray + DVD] (4-17)
Sleeping Dogs [Blu-ray] (4-17)
A Pistol For Ringo & The Return Of Ringo: Two Films By Duccio Tessari [Blu-ray](4-24)
Killer Klowns From Outer Space [Blu-ray] (4-24)
All the Colours Of Sergio Martino [Book] (4-3)
The Hitcher [Book] (4-6)
Ennio Morricone – Autopsy: Original Soundtrack [Vinyl] (4-21 – Record Store Day)
via MVD Entertainment Group
Go All-Around the World with Arrow this April!
Break out your passport because Arrow Films is ready to take you on a journey across the globe for a taste of cinema from all corners. First up, the Arrow express takes us to Japan with the release of Seijun Suzuki: The Early Years, Vol. 2 – Border Crossings: The Crime and Action Movies. This set brings to home video for the first time outside of Japan, 5 films from the first 5 years of Suzuki’s career (1957-1961). Released under Nikkatsu’s Borderless Action line, these thrillers of mob warfare and exuberant action helped set the stage of Japanese action to come.
Moving from the islands of Japan to the island of New Zealand with the release of Roger Donaldson’s Sleeping Dogs. Based on the novel Smith’s Dream, Sleeping Dogs helped launched the New Zealand New Wave movement, introducing a system of government tax breaks and creating a boom of film production in the country. The film is also significant for starring a young Sam Neill who would go on to be sort of a big deal.
The next stop on this April adventure takes us to Europe with a pair of spaghetti westerns with A Pistol for Ringo & The Return of Ringo: Two Films by Duccio Tessari. While Tessari doesn’t have the quite the name recognition as Leone, he was a major player in the spaghetti western world having co-written A Fistful of Dollars a year before making his back-to-back Ringo films. The films were a rousing success and helped kick-start the career of actor Giuliano Gemma.
Arrow’s journey through the world of film comes to a close in the United States with the 80’s cult classic Killer Klowns from Outer Space. Since the beginning of time, clowns have always been scary rather than funny, but it was the release of the Chiodo Brothers horror-comedy that forever cemented clowns as space creatures with a thirst for human blood. If this circus comes to your town, move.
April releases from Arrow will also include two more books – All the Colours of Sergio Martino and The Hitcher. The former takes a look at the 40 year career of the Italian maestro Sergio Martino, while the latter exams the complex beast that is Robert Harmon’s 1986 film The Hitcher.
Finally, the month will see the Arrow Records release of Autopsy: Original Soundtrack from Ennio Morricone on marbled orange vinyl. Previously unreleased on vinyl, this soundtrack is one of the most experimental scores from the Oscar winner’s legendary career.
Seijun Suzuki: The Early Years. Vol. 2 Limited Edition [Blu-ray + DVD]
Available for home-viewing for the very first time ever outside of Japan, this collection of bleak crime thrillers, brash mob dramas and exuberant action movies, made across the first five years of Seijun Suzuki’s career within Nikkatsu’s Borderless Action (mukokuseki akushon) line, presents a heady mix that laid the ground for what was to come.
BLU-RAY
SKU: AV141
UPC: 760137121688
SRP: 69.95
Street Date: 04/17/18
Label: Arrow Video
Genre: Cult
Language: Japanese
Sleeping Dogs
Adapted from C.K. Stead’s novel Smith’s Dream, Sleeping Dogs almost single-handedly kickstarted the New Zealand New Wave, demonstrating that homegrown feature films could resonate with both local and international audiences, and launching the big-screen careers of director Roger Donaldson (No Way Out, Species) and Sam Neill (Jurassic Park, Possession).
BLU-RAY
SKU: AA026
UPC: 760137120087
SRP: 39.95
Street Date: 04/17/18
Label: Arrow Academy
Genre: Mystery/Thriller
Language: English
Run Time: 107 mins
A Pistol For Ringo & The Return Of Ringo: Two Films By Duccio Tessari
In A Pistol For Ringo, the eponymous hero, played by Giuliano Gemma (Day of Anger, Tenebrae), infiltrates a ranch of Mexican bandits to save a beautiful hostage (Nieves Navarro, Death Walks in High Heels). In The Return Of Ringo, the gunslinger, now a veteran of war, disguises himself as a Mexican in order to take revenge on outlaws who have stolen his property and taken his wife.
BLU-RAY
SKU: AV137
UPC: 760137110187
SRP: 39.95
Street Date: 04/24/18
Label: Arrow Video
Genre: Cult
Language: English
Run Time: 98 mins
Killer Klowns From Outer Space
When Mike and his girlfriend Debbie warn the local police that a gang of homicidal alien-clowns have landed in the nearby area (in a spaceship shaped like a circus big-top, no less), the cops are naturally sceptical. Before long however, reports are coming in from other anxious residents detailing similar run-ins with the large-shoed assailants.
BLU-RAY
SKU: AV138
UPC: 760137110286
SRP: 39.95
Street Date: 04/24/18
Label: Arrow Video
Genre: Cult
Language: English
Run Time: 86 mins
All The Colours Of Sergio Martino
Mondo, giallo, crime thriller, cannibal, comedy, western, sci-fi and action. Over the best part of 40 years Italian Maestro Sergio Martino has worked tirelessly in many genres of film and television. While his output is often diverse in tone and theme, one thing you can always guarantee is that his cinema is always entertaining.
BOOK
SKU: AB006
UPC: 9780993306068
SRP: 29.95
Street Date: 04/03/18
Label: Arrow Books
Genre: Documentary
Language: English
The Hitcher
Robert Harmon’s 1986 film The Hitcher is a complex beast: reviled at the time of its release, it has been adored in the long term as one of the most intoxicating, unrelenting highway cult films ever made.
BOOK
SKU: AB005
UPC: 9780993306051
SRP: 29.95
Street Date: 04/06/18
Label: Arrow Books
Genre: Documentary
Language: English
Ennio Morricone – Autopsy: Original Soundtrack
Orange vinyl. ARROW RECORDS is proud to present the original soundtrack to Armando Crispino’s nightmarish giallo thriller, Autopsy (Macchie solari). Previously unpublished on vinyl, this is one of legendary composer Ennio Morricone’s most uncompromisingly experimental scores.
RSD Vinyl
SKU: AR007
UPC: 5027035018737
SRP: 39.99
Street Date: 04/21/18
Label: Arrow Records
Genre: Soundtrack
Language: English
Run Time: 75 mins
