Sony's New Hollywood Set Delayed; the original Scent of a Woman premieres on DVD; and more

While Sony's Rita Hayworth set got a new release date (23 February) for its delay, no date has been listed for the now-delayed New Hollywood box set, which most notably contains the US DVD premiere of Jack Nicholson's Drive, He Said. Sony's Film Noir Classics, Volume 1 released today, but it looks as though Volume 2 has also been postponed indefinitely. Hen's Tooth Video, however, announced the first Region 1 release of Dino Risi's Profumo di donna, which was remade in the 90s as Scent of a Woman with Al Pacino in the Vittorio Gassman role, on 16 February. Rob Zombie's Halloween 2 is set for 12 January but through Sony, not The Weinstein Company... which leads me to wonder if we'll be seeing any more releases from TWC. Universal is releasing Inglourious Basterds in December, but it was a co-production between the studios. Hmm.

Nothing especially enticing on the Blu-ray front, other than Disney's upcoming Beauty and the Beast on 5 October 2010. I do have a soft spot for Renny Harlin's Cliffhanger, which Sony has dated for 12 January; I do not have any warm feelings toward their other Blu-ray release for that day, John McTiernan's Last Action Hero. And finally, bad news for all you Billy Jack fans: Image has yet again pushed its date; this time to 1 May. Gee, and I thought that would have been a film to get people to make the conversion. The DVD releases are listed in descending order of release.

Also, in the next coming day or two, I'll be posting the first of sure-to-be-many end-of-the-year/decade lists. This list will cover the notable Region 1 DVD premieres in 2009, as it looks as though most of the year's releases have been announced by now. One question I do ask: can anyone confirm that the DVDs Facets was releasing of Hans-Jürgen Syberberg's Ludwig: Requiem for a Virgin King and Karl May actually came out? Thanks in advance!

- Cash, 2008, d. Eric Besnard, IFC Films, 12 January, w. Jean Reno, Jean Dujardin, Valeria Golino, François Berléand, Alice Taglioni, Eriq Ebouaney, Ciarán Hands, Jocelyn Quivrin
- Damages, Season 2, 2009, Sony, 12 January
- Halloween 2, 2009, d. Rob Zombie, Sony?, also on Blu-ray, 12 January
- Death in Love, 2008, d. Boaz Yakin, Screen Media, also on Blu-ray, 19 January, w. Jacqueline Bisset, Josh Lucas, Lukas Haas, Adam Brody
- Moscow, Belgium [Aanrijding in Moscou], 2008, d. Christophe Van Rompaey, Terra Entertainment, 26 January
- Profumo di donna [Scent of a Woman], 1974, d. Rino Risi, Hen's Tooth, 16 February
- The Alcove [L'alcova], 1984, d. Joe D'Amato, Severin, 23 February
- Blood on the Flat Track: The Rise of the Rat City Rollergirls, 2007, d. Lainy Bagwell, Lacey Leavitt, Strand, 23 February
- Examined Life, 2008, d. Astra Taylor, Zeitgeist, 23 February
- Power Play, 1978, d. Martyn Burke, Scorpion Releasing, 23 February, w. Peter O'Toole, Donald Pleasence, David Hemmings
- Trailer Park Boys: Countdown to Liquor Day, 2009, d. Mike Clattenburg, Screen Media, also on Blu-ray, 23 February
- The Vicious Kind, 2009, d. Lee Toland Krieger, Image, 23 February, w. Brittany Snow, J.K. Simmons, Adam Scott, Alex Frost

Drive, He Said, Husbands and Fuller from Sony (plus Jeanne Dielman and more)

Partially due to my weekend cold and also in hopes they'd throw an additional something exciting our way today, I'm a little late in posting the August Criterions. Chantal Akerman's Jeanne Dielman, 23 Quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles, starring Delphine Seyrig, will make its home video debut in the US on DVD 25 August. Whit Stillman's The Last Days of Disco, with Chloë Sevigny and Kate Beckinsale, hits on the same date, as well as Blu-rays of Kurosawa's Kagemusha (18 Aug) and Tati's Playtime (18 Aug). The Eclipse set for August sounds promising, a collection of five Nikkatsu noirs (25 Aug): Koreyoshi Kurahara's I Am Waiting, Toshio Masuda's Rusty Knife, Seijun Suzuki's Take Aim at the Police Van, Takumi Furukawa's Cruel Gun Story and Takashi Nomura's A Colt Is My Passport. Eric has a few other titles that might be part of a later Nikkatsu set from Eclipse.

Sony's got a huge line-up for the late-summer and fall, which Eric has already pointed out. A Sam Fuller box set (29 Sep) which includes Crimson Kimono, Underworld USA and Scandal Sheet; Cassaevetes' Husbands (18 Aug), which doesn't appear to be part of their "Martini Movies" set any more; 2 film noir sets, one with a re-release of The Big Heat, and a Rita Hayworth box (all 3 November).

Not mentioned on Filmbo's blog are a few other Sony releases. They've got a set called The New Hollywood Box Set for 15 September. The set includes Jack Nicholson's Drive, He Said, with Karen Black, Robert Towne, Bruce Dern and Henry Jaglom; Bob Rafelson's Five Easy Pieces; Rafelson's The King of Marvin Gardens with Nicholson, Dern and Ellen Burstyn; Peter Bogdanovich's The Last Picture Show; Jaglom's A Safe Place, with Tuesday Weld, Nicholson and Orson Welles; Rafelson's Head with The Monkees; and Dennis Hopper's Easy Rider. This is the R1 debut of both Drive, He Said and A Safe Place. Sony also has Fred Dekker's Night of the Creeps (20 October) and James Hill's A Study in Terror (10 November) premiering on DVD.

Strand is releasing Olivier Ducastel and Jacques Martineau's Born in 68 [Nés en 68], with Laetitia Casta, Yannick Renier and Yann Trégouët, on 11 August. Facets' website has been doing a remodel for the past few weeks, so I've only been able to uncover one of their August releases, another Ning Ying film For Fun on the 25th. PeaceArch has the supposedly dreadful Mysteries of Pittsburgh on 4 August.

Water Bearer is releasing two films in July. Christian Moris Müller's Four Windows [Vier Fenster] and Alessandro Avellis' Ma saison super 8 premiered at the 2006 Berlinale and will street on the 7th. If 80s T&A is your cup-of-tea, Severin will have Screwballs out on 25 August on DVD and Blu-ray, and Anchor Bay is releasing Spring Break, which I talked about in a previous blog about the films available on iTunes.

And finally, here are a few Blu-ray titles coming soon: Terry Gilliam's 12 Monkeys (28 July, Universal); John Carpenter's Big Trouble in Little China (4 August, Fox); Brian De Palma's Casualties of War (21 July, Sony); George A. Romero's Creepshow (8 September, Warner); Jim Henson and Franz Oz's The Dark Crystal (1 September, Sony); Phillip Noyce's Dead Calm (8 September, Warner); Peter Yates' The Deep (7 July, Sony); Takashi Miike's Ichi the Killer (11 August, Tokyo Shock); Henson's Labyrinth (1 Septmber, Sony); Alan Parker's Midnight Express (21 July, Sony); Patty Jenkins' Monster (1 September, First Look); Jonathan Lynn's My Cousin Vinny (4 August, Fox); the director's cut of Oliver Stone's Natural Born Killers (25 August, Warner); the extended cut of Terrence Malick's The New World (8 September, New Line); John Carpenter's Starman (11 August, Sony); Rob Reiner's This Is Spinal Tap (14 July, MGM); and Irwin Allen and John Guillermin's The Towering Inferno (14 July, Fox). The UK update should be coming at you later this week.