is love surreal? or real?

Honestly, this tops anything that Criterion's released in the last year.

calm down. :p

for starters, it doesn't top the criterion treatment of fanny and alexander in my book. or the cassavetes box set.

I dunno. I kinda think it does for me. But L'eclisse is tough to top for me. 2005 is shaping up to be a solid year. A number of long-awaited titles are hitting stores. I may hafta invest in another DVD shelf!

Don't get too excited by the Greg Mank-Simone Simon "commentaries." The way they're advertised is a little misleading. It's actually a commentary by Mank, with clips from audio tapes of his interviews with Simon -- not a traditional, scene-specific commentary from her.

Still, this looks like the best set yet from Warners, and maybe the best of the year.

There's a newly-revised list of specs up at DVD Times: looks like The Leopard Man and The Seventh Victim are getting commentaries, too (Leopard Man from William Friedkin).

http://www.dvdtimes.co.uk/content.php?contentid=57451

I wonder why they aren't releasing Leopard Man/Ghost Ship separately.

I was wondering the same thing. As I understand it, Leopard Man is supposed to be pretty terrific.

They're both great (as is Seventh Victim) but it makes sense they'd leave them in the box. They're not as well-known titles as Cat People or I Walked With a Zombie, and they don't have a big name like Karloff in them.

I doubt too many fans of those films will be too sad to have to spring for the full box set.

Looks like the Robert Wise commentary on The Body Snatcher will be different from the laserdisc set. He flew solo on that one, where he has Steve Haberman as a companion here.

The Seventh Victim is the quiet sleeper in the set - Tom Conway at the height of his deviant, sexual allure; Kim Hunter in school-girl uniform searching for her lost elder sister through Manhattan's chic devil-worshipping loafers. The film was heavily cut before release, so the plot can be a little confusing (even UK and US release prints differ slightly). If Warner are able to locate the deleted footage, drinks are on me all night.

Steve Haberman? Wasn't he a writer for Mel Brooks?

Please tell us more about your advance copy of the Lewton set.

This is great news, love the box artwork and DVD jackets.

I'm just going through the numbers, compiling lists of upcoming DVD purchases, setting aside money, all that. This set has SRP of $59.95, but Amazon lists it at 30% off ($41.94, or $4.66 per film). After DDD's expected 20% off sale (can anyone wait that long?), it will be $34.53, or $3.84 per film.

That's Alpha-Video level pricing, for expected Criterion-level quality, even if it is low-brow entertainment.

yes that breaks down to approximately:

4.1269 cents per minute!

Remember kids, that the ultimate aim of capitalism is the transformation of art into commerce, such that all art can be measured in emotional fulfillment received per dollar spent!!

Ha ha ha!

First review is up:

http://www.fangoria.com/ghastly_review.php

Is anyone else's set the same packaging monstrosity that mine appears to be (i.e. an extraneous column with a top the doesn't close and discs that fall out of the bottom), or did I receive some sort of horrendous printing error?

Oh hell, I just hit the fast forward button by mistake!

Must recalculate!

same thing here.That sucks! I bought it on amazon...Did you? This really isn't a "box set". You just buying a bunch of dvds together...

This "box set" doesn't exist, apparently.

http://dvdtimes.co.uk/content.php?contentid=57451

So what does the packaging actually consist of? I can't visualize it?

It's hard to explain.Did you ever see or bought a box set on a "Wholesale club"? You Know? Like BJ's or Sam's club? Usually you get the original box INSIDE another box.(a taller box)This "sleeve" is usually twice as big and it has the same cover of the original box that you're suppose to find inside of it. The diferrence is that you don't find any box inside....just the 5 dvds.Anyway...that's what I got.


I tried my best.

I just got mine a minute ago that I ordered from Amazon.com. The 5 DVDs are in a thin cardboard case. There is one side with no flap, leaving the DVD spines exposed. It's a nice case, but I wish it were sturdier. Inside, there are no booklets or slips of paper telling you about which scenes are on what tracks.

The labels and the images on the spines and covers are cool though.

I can't wait to go home and start watching them.

Sounds like two different 'cases'?

Alonzo is your case the same as the other warner collection boxes?
And, is the other cover just four sides with no top or bottom? Or, is it a sleave like the criterion collectors sets?

Mine has a top and bottom, as well as a back flap that's not meant to be pulled out. The front is completely open. It's made of a glossy card stock that's thin and rather flimsy when empty.

I have to go home to check it, but I thought my other Warners collections (Scorsese, Film Noir) had a stronger cardboard used for the sleeve.

Sort of. Durability-wise, it's certainly as flimsy as a a sleeve (as opposed to a box set). However, by the phrase "an extraneous column," I'm referring to the unnecessary 4-5 inches of empty space above the DVD amarays themselves; there's even a "stopper" of sorts built into the inside of the case so the amarays stop before said space. All together, the set stands about a foot high vertically.

The discs slip into the sleeve from the bottom, therefore rendering the sleeve itself useless for storing the discs - they simply just fall right out when you pick the set up. Add to this the fact that the top panel of the set doesn't stay closed, as well as the fact that it doesn't fit on a typical DVD storage shelf at all, and you have one of the more arbitrary packaging designs I've ever seen. In fact, the more I look at this thing, the less sense it makes.

I bought my set from a local retailer - Tower Records to be specific - but I also noticed that my local Best Buy has the same hideous thing. The more aesthetically-inclined or pratical-minded (read "anal retentive") consumer will probably do best to order from amazon, like our friend Alonzo.