Arrow Announcements, Speculation & Wild, Irresponsible Conjecture

[hearthesilence]

Criterion really dropped the ball here. It would've been a perfect opportunity to add Vanilla Ice to the collection.

[beamish14]

Guess there are no Turtles fans here, since Arrow posted a teaser for Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles yesterday and no one mentioned it. I assume it will be a set of the 3 live action New Line/Golden Harvest titles.

It’s astounding how neglected the first film had been given the success of multiple new features in the last 10 years.

I still think it ranks alongside The Crow, Ghost World, and Batman Returns as the best sequential art adaptation from Hollywood

[Orlac]

Oh I love the first TMNT...and the third one, weirdly enough, which is very despised. Part II doesn't do much for me. It felt too silly for me, even as a 12 year old!

[Maltic]

I rewatched TMNT recently and noticed teen turtles ca. 1990 would make references to classic movies like The Grapes of Wrath. What a time to have been alive.

[Orlac]

I rewatched TMNT recently and noticed teen turtles ca. 1990 would make references to classic movies like The Grapes of Wrath. What a time to have been alive.

As a kid, I had two different novelisations of the film. In the longer one, Ralph, as in the movie, goes to see Critters. In the junior novelisation, he goes to see E.T!

[beamish14]

The first really does an extraordinary job of skewing heavily towards Eastman and Laird’s work while making some concessions for the younger audiences who were drawn in by the 1987 animated show. There are truly amazing moments like Raphael’s breakdown and April O’Neil getting slapped and having her apartment burned to the ground by the Foot Clan is still shocking

I remember when I saw it for the first time that I tugged on my mom’s shirt in excitement when Elias Koteas (really inspired casting, and appropriate given that he’s Canadian) first appeared, as it was a genuine surprise that Casey Jones would be in it.

[hearthesilence]

I didn't realize how trippy it was to have Koteas in the movie until I was older and caught The Thin Red Line, Crash and Exotica among others.

Found this from an interview in 2014:

“Quite honestly, my life at that time was in such turmoil. That’s really what I remember,” Koteas admits. “The job was a reprieve from that: going and playing with turtles and pretending I’m this swashbuckling, tree-swinging, rooftop vigilante guy.”

When the Canadian-born actor auditioned, he had no familiarity with the Ninja Turtles comics. What he did have was the start of a very promising career, playing standout characters in films like John Hughes’s Some Kind of Wonderful and Francis Ford Coppola’s Tucker: The Man and His Dream. For him, the appeal of Casey Jones was the character’s generous spirit. “With whatever was going on in my life, it just felt like, ‘Ah, this is appropriate. Let me live out a fantasy of protecting the weak,’” says Koteas...

...for the most part, the 1990 blockbuster doesn’t cross his mind — except when fans approach him. “I get stopped in the street and it’s like, ‘Hey, there’s Casey Jones!’ There’s nothing but gracious gratitude, if there is such a term,” says Koteas. “So yeah, Ninja Turtles kind of makes me smile when I think about it. But it seems like such a long time ago…. This is probably the most I’ve ever talked about it.”

[jt938]

Criterion really dropped the ball here. It would've been a perfect opportunity to add Vanilla Ice to the collection.

I'm sure Cool As Ice will be coming at some point.

[beamish14]

Criterion really dropped the ball here. It would've been a perfect opportunity to add Vanilla Ice to the collection.

I'm sure Cool As Ice will be coming at some point.

Still curious to finally know if Spielberg saw it before hiring Janusz Kaminski to shoot Schindler’s List

[colinr0380]

The 90s live action Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles film is also another work that Red Letter Media has been reappraising in recent years. Of course the big coup will be if Arrow are able to reinstate the nunchuk scenes, particularly the string of sausages being used as improvised nunchuks in the second film, which were cut out of the film in the UK for fears of imitable behaviour! Now we live in an age beyond chain pull toilets, which I think was something that particularly worried the BBFC in providing a handy source for nunchuk-style weapons, it may not be so much of an issue! And of course at the moment the UK is more focused on banning samurai swords (or as they somewhat weirdly put it: "ninja swords", which suggests that the UK government hasn't gotten over the whole TMNT thing!) that obviously all households in the UK have lying around the place.

(While I never really took much notice of these feature films as a kid - and could not get through the recent Michael Bay live action ones - I did enjoy the original animated series back in the day, and really loved the more recent 2012 series, which shifted through an impressive number of styles during its course, including the inevitable 80s-styled one!)

[Orlac]

The 90s live action Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles film is also another work that Red Letter Media has been reappraising in recent years. Of course the big coup will be if Arrow are able to reinstate the nunchuk scenes, particularly the string of sausages being used as improvised nunchuks in the second film, which were cut out of the film in the UK for fears of imitable behaviour! Now we live in an age beyond chain pull toilets, which I think was something that particularly worried the BBFC in providing a handy source for nunchuk-style weapons, it may not be so much of an issue! And of course at the moment the UK is more focused on banning samurai swords (or as they somewhat weirdly put it: "ninja swords", which suggests that the UK government hasn't gotten over the whole TMNT thing!) that obviously all households in the UK have lying around the place.

(While I never really took much notice of these feature films as a kid - and could not get through the recent Michael Bay live action ones - I did enjoy the original animated series back in the day, and really loved the more recent 2012 series, which shifted through an impressive number of styles during its course, including the inevitable 80s-styled one!)

The TMNT films have been uncut in the UK for over 20 years!

Medusa/Hong Kong Legends reiussed the original to cinemas in 2003, making a big song-and-dance of the reinstated nunchaku scenes - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u9sNcNgovI4

And I remember seeing Part 3 uncut on the UK's Channel 5 back in 1999, even though the VHS was still cut at the time.

Interesting you mention pull-chain toilet chains as the UK VHS/DVD of DRAGON THE BRUCE LEE STORY deleted the nunchaku scene of course, but kep the toilet chain fight!

[colinr0380]

That's interesting about the Medusa/Hong Kong Legends reissues - the early 2000s would have been around the time when that label were finally getting the Bruce Lee films passed uncut as well, so it tracks that they tackled the most infamous case as well, despite it being rather out of their remit! The TMNT films must have gone completely by me at the time! Did Bey Logan do a commentary for them?

Unfortunately I wasn't able to receive Channel 5 in my part of the country until 2008, so I unfortunately missed that screening (I wish Channel 5 was half as edgy these days compared to their first years when they were showing Natural Born Killers and premiering a lot of Russ Meyer films on UK television in 1998 - Common-Law Cabin; Cherry, Harry & Raquel; and Finders Keepers, Lovers Weepers!)

[Orlac]

That's interesting about the Medusa/Hong Kong Legends reissues - the early 2000s would have been around the time when that label were finally getting the Bruce Lee films passed uncut as well, so it tracks that they tackled the most infamous case as well, despite it being rather out of their remit! The TMNT films must have gone completely by me at the time! Did Bey Logan do a commentary for them?

Unfortunately I wasn't able to receive Channel 5 in my part of the country until 2008, so I unfortunately missed that screening (I wish Channel 5 was half as edgy these days compared to their first years when they were showing Natural Born Killers and premiering a lot of Russ Meyer films on UK television in 1998 - Common-Law Cabin; Cherry, Harry & Raquel; and Finders Keepers, Lovers Weepers!)

Once James Ferman left, the BBFC was fine with nuchaku and throwing stars and the like - I believe he resisted calls from his underlings to lift the ban as long ago as the 80s!

We lived in the countryside and didn't get Channel 5 until we went digital in 2002. I remember ringing my grandma who lived in Preston to tape everying from the Laughton Hunchback to Halloween 6!

[Finch]

The only new UK titles are Enemy Territory and The Shootist (scratch that: the TCM movies and Perpetrator and Poseidon are all UK titles, too). Withnail & I and TCM 2 are getting regular editions. Thief 4K was already mentioned by ChunkyLover.

[rapta]

Glad we're getting The Shootist, that was one I very nearly imported before (and was going to risk it working with the Panasonic remote trick), and it was OOS for ages so that held me off too. Hoping we get other key Paramount titles ported over here - I especially want Black Sunday, Night Falls on Manhattan, Unman, Wittering & Zigo, Fear is the Key, The Tin Star, The Desperate Hours and The Day of the Locust.

Surprised we haven't yet seen The Warriors, American Gigolo, Barbarella or announced here before things like Narc and The Shootist to be honest (I believe we may not get A Simple Plan as the UK rights are different). Maybe they're trying to clear all the extras on those and it'll take a bit longer?

[yoloswegmaster]

Arrow has performed a new 4K restoration of Ms. 45 that will be screening at this year's Ritrovato festival, so we can expect a 4K to come soon.

[andyli]

Arrow has performed a new 4K restoration that will be screening at this year's Ritrovato festival, so we can expect a 4K to come soon.

Are you referring to Ms. 45? Funny they credited the film to Alfred Hitchcock.

[yoloswegmaster]

Arrow has performed a new 4K restoration that will be screening at this year's Ritrovato festival, so we can expect a 4K to come soon.

Are you referring to Ms. 45? Funny they credited the film to Alfred Hitchcock.

Yep, I was talking about Ms. 45. Thanks for catching that. I think the Hitchcock credit is just a webpage error since they are screening a new 4K restoration of Lifeboat

[andyli]

Yes, must be a mistake since the film card shows the correct director name.

[Orlac]

The 90s live action Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles film is also another work that Red Letter Media has been reappraising in recent years. Of course the big coup will be if Arrow are able to reinstate the nunchuk scenes, particularly the string of sausages being used as improvised nunchuks in the second film, which were cut out of the film in the UK for fears of imitable behaviour! Now we live in an age beyond chain pull toilets, which I think was something that particularly worried the BBFC in providing a handy source for nunchuk-style weapons, it may not be so much of an issue! And of course at the moment the UK is more focused on banning samurai swords (or as they somewhat weirdly put it: "ninja swords", which suggests that the UK government hasn't gotten over the whole TMNT thing!) that obviously all households in the UK have lying around the place.

(While I never really took much notice of these feature films as a kid - and could not get through the recent Michael Bay live action ones - I did enjoy the original animated series back in the day, and really loved the more recent 2012 series, which shifted through an impressive number of styles during its course, including the inevitable 80s-styled one!)

Talking of TMNT, here's a Canto-pop version of Turtle Power!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wbKNqIAUxgE

[Finch]

[tenia]

Creepshow 2 ?

[redbill]

Creepshow 2 ?

my first thought too, but looks like they already released that; and not sure a 4k upgrade would merit headlining their teaser...

[TechnicolorAcid]

Creepshow 2 ?

my first thought too, but looks like they already released that; and not sure a 4k upgrade would merit headlining their teaser...

They did do that for Crimson Peak’s upgrade so I wouldn’t be surprised if they were doing the same thing again.

[EddieLarkin]

Creepshow 2 UHD is already confirmed via that recent video teaser so it surely will be that. Other UHD upgrades coming soon include

Mona Lisa
Nightbreed
Rawhead Rex
To Live and Die in LA
The Visitor
The Apartment