Satanico Pandemonium: La Sexorcista (1975) DVD9 and Blu-Ray Mondo Macabro

In the spirit of Ken Russell's THE DEVILS and Juan Lopez Moctezuma's ALUCARDA, this is one of the most subversive, violent and shocking films ever made about the religious life. With a stunning performance form the often naked Cecilia Pezet, the film inspired the Salma Hayek character in FROM DUSK TILL DAWN.

Sister Maria (Pezet) is known in the convent for her good works and charitable deeds. But, in the secret depths of her sexual fantasies, she is tormented by visions of another world - a world where her forbidden passions are allowed to run free. In this world, Satan is her master. As her acts of violence and blasphemy increase, Maria realizes that she has been chosen by the Devil himself to destroy the convent and lead her sister nuns into hell!

Helmed by award winning, veteran director Gilberto Martinez Solares, the film is stunningly photographed in eye popping colors, making it one of the best looking entries in the entire nunsploitation genre.

Director: Gilberto Martinez Solares
Cast: Enrique Rocha, Cecilia Pezet, Delia Magana
Country: Mexico
Genre: Horror, Mystery, Thriller

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One, Two, Three (1961) Blu-Ray Eureka – Masters of Cinema, DVD9 and Blu-Ray Kino Lorber

One, Two, Three is Billy Wilder's Hellzapoppin' ode to Cold War politics, the classy comedy with the machine-gun pacing. He brings on the jokes, gags, puns and political jabs so quickly even his perfect cast of fast-talking farceurs has a hard time keeping up with him.

The movie was both filmed during and is set in the months prior to the closing off of East Germany and construction of the Berlin Wall (beginning August 1961, four months prior to the film's release). Cagney is C.R. MacNamara, the head of Coca-Cola's West Berlin office. Ruthless, conniving, and ambitious, early scenes have "Mac" plotting with three equally dodgy Soviet trade representatives (Leon Askin, Ralf Wolter, and Peter Capell) to open the Soviet market.

However, Atlanta-based company president Wendell P. Hazeltine (Howard St. John) nixes the idea, instead ordering Mac to look after his wayward 17-year-old daughter, Scarlett (Pamela Tiffin), who's on a carefree tour of Europe. Her short stay in Berlin inexplicably last two months, and with Hazeltine and his wife arriving soon to collect her, Mac is horrified to learn that she's secretly married Otto Piffl (Horst Buchholz), a militant Communist from East Germany and, further, Scarlett is pregnant.

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Three Fantastic Journeys by Karel Zeman: A Journey to the Beginning of Time (1955), Invention for Destruction (1958), The Fabulous Baron Munchausen (1962) 3 x Blu-Ray Criterion Collection

A former marketing man for a shoe company, Karel Zeman took a job for an animation studio and went on to create not only several of the most influential Czech films of all time, but become arguably the most important Czechoslovak filmmaker of the pre-New Wave era. Zeman's works demonstrate an imagination unrivaled by many filmmakers to have come since, and ingenious approach to special effects more artful than utilitarian.

Criterion's new boxed set, Three Fantastic Journeys by Karl Zeman offers his best three (and most representative) films: Journey to the Beginning of Time, Invention for Destruction (aka The Fabulous World of Jules Verne), and The Fabulous Baron Munchausen. Previously released to Blu-ray in other parts of the world, Criterion's set mostly repurposes supplements from those releases while packaging everything in a wonderful pop-up style folder/booklet consistent with Zeman's designs.

3xBD50 | 1080p AVC | 248 min | 135 Gb + 3% rec
Language: Czech
Subtitles: English
Genre: Adventure, Animation, Family, Sci-Fi, Fantasy, Comedy

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Il cavaliere misterioso / The Mysterious Rider / The Mysterious Cavalier (1948) DVD5

If you can imagine a James Bond movie dolled up in sumptuous 18th-century garb - with moody black-and-white camerawork, Baroque direction and a witty script - you may get some idea of what a rich and rare treat awaits anyone who can track down this long-neglected Riccardo Freda gem.

The film is in no way based on Casanova's memoirs, but only takes his character and uses him in a pure action-adventure realm of 18th century Italy and Russia.
The story is simple: Casanova's brother is imprisoned in 18th century Venice under false accusations and our hero is the only one who can or want to help him to get out. In order to do that he has to find and bring back a compromising letter that was recently stolen from an important government official and is on its way to Russia in order to be delivered to Catherine II the Great personally who is supposed to make its content public. Casanova embarks on a perilous journey to Russia following the letter's trail and striving for adventures that are undoubtedly awaiting him ahead.

Director: Riccardo Freda
Cast: Vittorio Gassman, Maria Mercader, Yvonne Sanson
Country: Italy
Genre: Action, Adventure, Drama

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Jean Harlow 100th Anniversary Collection: Bombshell (1933), The Girl from Missouri (1934), Reckless (1935), Riffraff (1936), Suzy (1936), Personal Property (1937), Saratoga (1937) 7 x DVD5

Jean Harlow, platinum blonde goddess of the silver screen, must have been exactly the kind of movie star that the early '30s needed.

A true trend-setter, the first "Platinum Blonde" provided the template for an archetype that stretches from one century into the next - to Marilyn to Madonna to Gwen Stefani and beyond. She was earthy and sexy, just a little bit naughty but also possessing a sense of humor and a need for acceptance that most everyone can identify with - then and now. True film buffs owe it to themselves to celebrate, discover, or rediscover her achievements as an actor.

This set shows off Harlow's warmth, humor, and versatility in a variety of roles that reflect MGM's often ill-advised attempts to update or modify the lady's image. The movies in this set pair off Harlow with some of the biggest leading men of that time - Clark Gable, Spencer Tracy, Cary Grant, William Powell, Robert Taylor and Franchot Tone (four times!). Still, these are leading lady vehicles through and through. For Harlow fans, it's a treat.

7 x DVD5 | NTSC 4:3 | 629 min | 29.1 Gb + 3% rec
Language: English
Subtitles: none
Genre: Comedy, Drama, Romance

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Absolute Giganten / Absolute Giants / Gigantic (1999) Blu-Ray

A view of Hamburg's port area shrouded in a grey morning mist. Container ships drift by, we see an old Ford Granada and Floyd, Ricco and Walter. Above them, the following headline is visible: "Friendships are like desires: crazy, big, absolutely gigantic. And once they've got you, they don't let go. Some of them never do." These elements from the film Absolute Giants have helped build the modern image of the city of Hamburg. This is the story of three friends who spend their last night together before one of them has to leave the city and his youth behind. For these three friends, the rituals, trust and carefree happiness of teenage years are fading away. But instead of getting lost in a navel-gazing melancholy, the three go out into the night to make it last as long as possible before morning comes.
"Absolute Giants doesn't rely on the trope of the tragic loser we see in recent depressing German films about doomed figures or wanderers of the night. The die is not yet cast on whether Floyd, Ricco and Walter are losers and if they win the lottery of life." (Der Spiegel)

Director: Sebastian Schipper
Cast: Frank Giering, Florian Lukas, Antoine Monot Jr.
Country: Germany
Genre: Comedy, Drama
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The Navigator (1924) Blu-Ray Kino Lorber

For The Navigator, Buster Keaton revisits one of his most beloved character types, the spoiled little rich boy.
Keaton plays Rollo, a member of the idle rich, who asks his idle rich girlfriend Betsy (Kathryn McGuire) to marry him. She turns him down. But this does not deter Rollo from going alone on a cruise to Honolulu. Since the cruise leaves in the morning and he never gets up in the morning, he has his valet drive him there at night to board. Betsy also goes there to pick up papers from her ship owner father (Frederick Broom). But he's kidnapped by foreign agents who don't want the ship to deliver supplies to their enemy they're at war with. The spies cut the ship loose from anchor and it drifts to sea with the only two people on board being Betsy and Rollo. It's absurdly funny as these two pampered members of the elite, who never had to take care of themselves before, now must in order to survive.

BD25 | 1080p AVC | 01:00:12 | 20.2 Gb + 3% rec
Language: English intertitles
Subtitles: none

Directors: Donald Crisp, Buster Keaton
Cast: Buster Keaton, Kathryn McGuire, Frederick Vroom
Country: USA
Genre: Action, Comedy, Romance
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Cinema de notre temps: Chantal Akerman par Chantal Akerman (1997), John Cassavetes (1969), Alain Cavalier – Sept chapitres, cinq jours, 2 pieces-cuisine (1996) DVD9

A televisual memory of cinema, this documentary series about contemporary filmmakers from around the world, created by Janine Bazin and Andre S. Labarthe, is a follow-up to the acclaimed initial series "Filmmakers of our time" (1964-1972).

This is DVD1 of the "Cinema, de notre temps" boxset.

Chantal Akerman par Chantal Akerman (1997) by Chantal Akerman
Akerman creates a fascinating self-portrait that takes us through her career, aided by critics Emmanuel Burdeau and Jean Narboni and filmmaker Luc Moullet.

John Cassavetes (1969) by Andre S. Labarthe & Hubert Knapp
English audio/Optional french subs
The director is interviewed at his house in Hollywood in 1965 during the filming of "Faces," and then three years later in Paris after the movie has finally been finished and is awaiting distribution.

Alain Cavalier - Sept chapitres, cinq jours, 2 pieces-cuisine (1996) by Jean-Pierre Limosin
Jean-Pierre Limosin films his subject, filmmaker Alain Cavalier, in an intimate, personal style that echoes Cavalier's own work.

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The Agnes Varda Collection: La Pointe-Courte / La Pointe Courte (1955), Cleo de 5 a 7 / Cleo from 5 to 7 (1962), Le bonheur / Happiness (1965), L’une chante l’autre pas / One Sings, the Other Doesn’t (1977), Sans toit ni loi / Vagabond (1985), Jacquot de Nantes (1991), Les glaneurs et la glaneuse / The Gleaners & I (2000), Les plages d’Agnes / The Beaches of Agnes (2008) 8 x Blu-Ray Artificial Eye

Revered for her bold political and autobiographically inspired work, Agnes Varda is a seminal feminist filmmaker and matriarch of the French New Wave.

Her influential career began in the 1950s with La Pointe Courte - often considered the unofficial first film of the New Wave - and continues seven decades later, as in 2017 she became the first female director to be awarded an honorary Oscar.

Revered for her bold political and autobiographically inspired work The Agnes Varda Collection is a selection of her most illuminating narrative features. The Blu-ray box set contains eight discs spanning six decades of Varda's feature films, over six hours of special features including interviews, featurettes and short films.

8xBD | 1080p AVC | 790 min | 251 + 3% rec
Language: French
Subtitles: English
Genre: Comedy, Drama, Romance, Biography, History, Documentary

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Ba wang bie ji / Farewell My Concubine (1993) DVD9 and Blu-Ray BFI

Farewell My Concubine is a film directed by Chen Kaige, adapted from a novel by Lilian Lee. The title is based on a traditional Chinese tale about a loyal concubine and her defeated king.

The film follows the lives of two members of the Beijing Opera, starting from the grueling training regimen they had to endure as children in the mid 1920s, until shortly after the end of the Cultural Revolution some 50 years later. The delicate Douzi (Leslie Cheung), son of a prostitute who abandons him to the opera when he grows too old to stay at her brothel, and the tough Shitou (Zhang Fengyi), who immediately bonds with and looks out for the younger boy. The film also stars Gong Li as the woman who comes between them.

It's a beautifully crafted picture that makes use of its large budget for some impressive set pieces, elegant costumes, and outstanding cinematography. There are also two layers at work in this ambitious epic. The personal story of the two men, their lifelong friendship and their complicated relationship as it evolves throughout the years; and also a sweeping retelling of the tumultuous history of China from 1924 to 1976.

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Nineteen Eighty-Four (1984) DVD9 and Blu-Ray Criterion Collection

It's the year 1984 and Britain is part of a superpower called Oceania, ruled over by dictator Big Brother. Oceania is permanently at war, though the opponent changes from Eurasia to Eastasia and back again. Telescreens watch your every move, and pump out propaganda twenty-four hours a day. Winston Smith (John Hurt) works at the Ministry of Truth, whose job it is to rewrite the news to remove "unpersons" and to change history as it suits the ruling Elite. Then he meets Julia (Suzanna Hamilton), who seems to be a sworn celibate and member of the Anti Sex League, but who in reality is rebelling against the state. Winston and Julia fall in love, but their rebellion has not gone unnoticed...

The bigger and more powerful the government, the smaller your freedoms are. This is the crucial truth that emerges from Michael Radford's cinematic adaptation of George Orwell's classic novel.

The story is as timely as ever, unfortunately. Lies are spun and accepted as truth. Slavery is freedom. Big brother is watching. Will we ever evolve out of this particular kind of fascist nightmare?

Director: Michael Radford
Cast: John Hurt, Richard Burton, Suzanna Hamilton
Country: UK
Genre: Drama, Sci-Fi
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