Thriller Box Set

Starring:John Forsythe
Studio: Direct Source Specia
Product Type: DVD

The Alfred Hitchcock Box Set (The Ring / The Manxman / Murder! / The Skin Game / Rich and Strange)

Average customer rating:

BETTER TO INVEST IN THE UK RELEASE
Impressive
Hitch finds his "voice"
Early Hitchcock restored.
Early semi-classics RESTORED from 35mm.

The Alfred Hitchcock Box Set (The Ring / The Manxman / Murder! / The Skin Game / Rich and Strange)
Director: Alfred Hitchcock
Manufacturer: Lions Gate
ProductGroup: DVD
Binding: DVD

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Jean Renoir Collection (3-Disc Collector's Edition)
Green for Danger - Criterion Collection
The Heiress (Universal Cinema Classics)
49th Parallel - Criterion Collection
Robert Mitchum - The Signature Collection (Angel Face / Macao / The Sundowners / Home from the Hill / The Good Guys and the Bad Guys / The Yakuza)

ASIN: B000KJU12S
Release Date: 2007-02-06

Description

THE MANXMAN- Poor fisherman Pete falls in love with Kate, the daughter of a landlord on the Isle of Man. Pete decides to leave on his ship to earn some money and then to marry the girl. RICH AND STRANGE- Fred and Emily Hill, a happy young married couple, inherit money and decide to take a world cruise. On board ship their new-found fortune goes to their heads... THE SKIN GAME- The Hillcrests are a wealthy family who have held their country estate for many generations. But they will now enter battle... MURDER!- Diana Baring, an actress in a touring company, is discovered near the scene of the crime when a woman is found murdered. THE RING- 'One Round' Jack Sanders is a young boxer traveling the country with a boxing booth in a fair.

Customer Reviews:

BETTER TO INVEST IN THE UK RELEASE.......2007-05-31

This surely is a great set, but you would be better off getting the UK release The Early Hitchcock Collection (available from Amazon.co.uk), with the same transfers and 4 more films missing here: Champagne (a very rare film in the canon), The Farmer's Wife, Blackmail and Number Seventeen. That set is an absolute must for anyone interested in the film career of Alfred Hitchcock, with some of his earlier British films (including 4 silent movies), lovingly restored and with some wonderful extras, most notably an hour long documentary on early Hitchcock. It's amazing how great these movies look on this new masters (infinitely better than all previous releases, that can now be easily dismissed). I just hope that Studio Canal and Optimun Classic get round to release soon the rest of the British films, particularly The Lodger, the first true Hitchcock work only available so far in unwatchable transfers. Some of these films may not be great works of art, up to the standard set by the master in his later opus, but in all of them can be found moments and ideas which speak loud of a real genius in working process. Don't miss it!

Impressive.......2007-02-10

The 5 films contained in this artfully crafted 3-disc set are really the best versions ever released on US home video. This collection contains the remastered versions from Studio Canal that look and sound incredible. While some say "not Hitchcock's best" these early films are of great interest to both collectors and fans and those interested in the master's early technique. The documentary, while brief, is insightful and well done. Highly recommended.

Hitch finds his "voice".......2007-02-09

First the good news--we get a solid transfers of early Hitchcock with some minor and major classics early in his career. Studio Canal has done a nice job with these and while the transfers aren't scratch free, they look quite good given the age of the source material and quite a bit better than some of the earlier releases of public domain sources. This boxed set (once you open it) looks like an old bound copy of a script. The outside has a photo of Hitch (which reminds me of a deathmask)from the Universal archive.

The first two films in the set "The Ring" and "The Manxman" were made the year after the success of "The Lodger" (which would been shelved when studio executives thought it a disaster. Luckily, Michael Balcon stepped in a man who championed Hitch early in his career and the film was a wild success). "Murder!" is an early talkie (sadly the German version isn't included. It would have been nice to see for comparison sake as it was shot with a different cast on the same sets). In the early days of film alternate versions were shot for other markets where they might be popular usually with a different director. Hitch spoke German since he worked early on in that country shooting films and absorbing much of the early German expressionist styles that he would reference throughout his career)so directed it himself. "The Skin Game" and "Rich and Strange" (the latter an early Hitchcock classic) are also included. A pity that "Blackmail" (Hitch's first talkie that was also shot to be shown as a silent film) isn't included as well.

The bad news is that we don't get any feature length commentary tracks by Hitchcock historians and film scholars (which is just as well if these things bore you). We do, however, get a new 15 minute featurette focusing on Hitchcock's early life, his collaboration with his wife Alma (who is often overlooked--we must remember that it was team Hitchcock collaborating which consisted of Hitch, his wife Alma and whomever their current favorite writer was)and the development of his early style. It features interviews with USC Hitchcock Professor Drew Casper, director Peter Bogdanovich, Hitch's daughter and screenwriter/film historian Steve Haberman. We have a generous amount of clips from the set illustrating their points. I do wish that "The Lodger" had been included in this set but that's a pretty minor point (although honestly it does belong here as an example of his developing sense of style). Also missing is Hitch's "Number 17" which would have been a natural to include in this set even though the plot is a bit confusing, it's a fun ride.

This is an excellent collection of early minor classics as Hitch developed his film style. It's clear that he was influenced by seeing other directors such as Fritz Lang and FW Murnau but he had already begun to develop his own distinctive voice as a film director. This is a good set to get and is a pretty inexpense handsome package for fans.

Early Hitchcock restored........2007-02-09

I'm very glad Canal has invested in restorations for these early Hitchcock films. There probably isn't much money in these restorations as the films have been in public domain for decades and can be found in every DVD bargain bin. They look very good for their age but I question some of the "foley" work added to the soundtracks. In the sound films, it is obvious that tinkling glass sound effects and other little audio nuances have been mixed in to the old mono track.

The films will be primarily of interest to an avid Hitchcock fan, with their subjective camera tricks and embellishments, early examples of the Hitchcock style. "Murder" yields some interesting moments, such as the melodramatic musical cue of "Tristan and Isolde", later used as a basis for Bernard Herrmann's "Vertigo" score.

Looking forward to a second volume from Canal.

Early semi-classics RESTORED from 35mm........2007-02-09

Throw out those Madacy & Laserlight DVD's! The U.K. Studio Canal 35mm Masters are here, professionally released with little artifacting by Lions Gate!
I would have given this DVD box set 5 stars except that 1) These are not Hitchcock classics, they are good examples of his early work but they are no Psycho, 2) While mastered from 35mm, they did not get the Criterion treatment of removing scratches & dirt specks. Still this is a great improvement over previous releases of these titles. I only wish "NUMBER 17" was in this set, that early classic deserves the Studio Canal treatment.

This set features a mix of silent films & early sound British films. There is also a nice 15 minute bonus on disc 3 that explains the difficulties of filming sound films in 1930 and how Hitchcock got around the problems.

Disc #1 : Two Silent Films
"THE RING" (1927) - Two boxers fall in love with a girl named Nellie. Very visual, early signs of Hitchcock's style.
"MANXMAN" (1929) - Hitchcock's last silent film! A Love story about two fishermen & a landlord's daughter.

Disc #2 : Two early sound films
"MURDER" (1930) - the 104 minute U.K. version, good suspence drama. A jurer re-thinks his verdict and investigates the crime himself.
"SKIN GAME" (1931) - Based on a John Galsworthy play, a little stagy. A traditional family battles a (then) modern family over land. Not as racey as the title would suggest.

Disc #3 : One more "talkie" and a bonus feature
"RICH AND STANGE" (1931) - Unexpected riches don't bring happiness for a married couple. A tale with a moral.
"THE HITCHCOCK WAY" (2007) - 15 minute documentary interviewing Alfred's daughter and surviving crew members as well as film historians. Of special interest is the explanation of how difficult it was to work in early sound films and how Hitchcock got around the problems in 1930.

The Emilio Miraglia Killer Queen Box Set

Average customer rating:

Review of the DVD, not the movies.
Great box set
Bad Encoding, Bad company
The box set is too good for the films...
Beautiful box-set

The Emilio Miraglia Killer Queen Box Set
Starring: Antonio De Teffè , Marina Malfatti , Erika Blanc , Giacomo Rossi-Stuart , and Enzo Tarascio
Director: Emilio Miraglia
Manufacturer: Noshame
ProductGroup: DVD
Binding: DVD

General | Horror | Genres | DVD | Video

Suspense | Mystery & Suspense | Genres | DVD | Video

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Similar Items:

Luciano Ercoli's The Death Box Set (Death Walks on High Heels/ Death Walks at Midnight)
The Black Belly of the Tarantula
Dark Waters
The Forbidden Photos of a Lady Above Suspicion
The Fifth Cord

ASIN: B000EQ5UB4
Release Date: 2006-04-25

Description

After his faithless wife dies died under mysterious circumstances, an unbalanced aristocrat remarries, only to have his honeymoon haunted by apparitions, slayings, and an empty tomb in THE NIGHT EVELY CAME OUT OF THE GRAVE. Is madness or murder the soul of the plot… and who will live to know the truth?

When two sisters inherit the family castle, they are plagued by savage murders committed by a black-haired woman in a blood-red cloak -- a description fitting their ancestor, the "Red Queen," whom legend says claims seven lives every hundred years.

Pity those who saw these two giallo gems via faded prints or murky bootleg tapes. NoShame Films proudly presents these genre masterpieces from the twisted mind of Emilio P. Miraglia in their original widescreen glory, in full bloody color, and backed with classic EuroCult scores by Bruno Nicolai

Amazon.com

Giallo, proclaims actress Erika Blanc, in an interview on disc one of The Emilio Miraglia Killer Queen Box Set, is back in style thanks to Quentin Tarantino. She must be right, considering the release of this stylish gift box containing not only two DVDs with Italian horror classics The Night Evelyn Came Out of the Grave (1971) and The Red Queen Kills Seven Times(1972), but copious extras and movie trailers, and a Red Queen action figure. Inappropriate for children, however, director Emilio Miraglia's two films contain nude models and beautiful gore. The Night Evelyn Came Out of the Grave, Miraglia's masterpiece, tells the story of Alan (Anthony Steffen), a man whose obsession with his disloyal dead wife, Evelyn, causes him to prey upon sexy redheads, including Erika Blanc, who in a classic striptease sequence, strips inside a coffin. When Alan finally overcomes his weakness and remarries to Gladys (Marina Malfatti), she tortures him in a particularly cruel way. In The Red Queen, two sisters, Kitty (Barbara Bouchet) and Evelyn, are cursed by a family painting depicting a seven year-cycle in which a Red Queen is raised from the dead to kill seven times. After Evelyn seemingly perishes and multiple killings ensue, their niece Franziska (Marina Malfatti) and Kitty start to suspect that Evelyn may be the Red Queen. Both films are great Giallo, ripe with high-fashion crime scenes, salacious sets, and spooky scores by Bruno Nicolai. Interviews with both actors and crew educate viewers about the climate needed to create these excellent features. The Emilio Miraglia Killer Queen Box Set deserves a place in the library beside Argento's Suspiria and Bava's Kill, Baby, Kill, though any fan of horror will appreciate its fun packaging. --Trinie Dalton

Customer Reviews:

Review of the DVD, not the movies........2007-04-02

As another reviewer suggests, the DVD encoding on these discs is woeful (although it was chapter 8 before the picture started to pixelate and then the disc stopped altogether on mine), but the other problem I have is with the audio/subtitles.

Now I have 3 DVD players (including PC) and with my main one I couldn't change either the audio or subtitles during the movie and neither of them would change from the main menu either! So basically the audio was stuck on Italian with no English subtitles. On my PC, again neither was changeable during the movie but at least they did change from the main menu. Then I tried my backup DVD player and lo and behold, both the audio and subtitles worked from the main menu and the audio was changeable during the movie (but the subtitles couldn't be turned off!).

Which then leads me to my second complaint: the subtitles (I think), although it could be the dub. Either way, when you watch with English audio and English subs the difference is incredible, I'd say at least 70% of what they say is different!! I don't speak/understand Italian, so I have no idea whether it's the dub or subs that are nearer the mark, but either way it makes me think that I'm missing something!

Of course, this is all slightly insignificant as I couldn't even finish the first film properly!

Basically, this company should spend more time and money investing in the quality of the DVD authoring instead of wasting money on pathetic, cheap and tacky little figures! I do hope one other reviewer is right in saying that in time this will become a sought after collectable, at least then I can make a profit from it!

Great box set.......2006-10-24

I bought this back in April and only just got around to watching it. Based on the previous posting, I was worried I wouldn't be able to watch the films, but I had no problem with either one. In fact, both films were quite beautifully transferred and played marvelously. They might not have been the most outrageous of giallos (see the works of Dario Argento or Sergio Martino), but were quite entertaining. And the accompanying interviews, trailers, etc., were put together well, too. All this, plus the incredible "Red Queen" statuette included in the box! Someday, this will probably be a sought-after collectible.

Bad Encoding, Bad company.......2006-07-18

The films in this set I rate a 3 out of 5 as they are classic giallos. However the set is so messed up with bad encoding that you cannot get past scene 6 without pixelation or worse the disc just stops and the player says "Disc unreadable". I have exchanged it a few times to no avail of a fix. Amazon has stopped selling it as of this moment so buyer beware! Noshame doesn't test the discs when they print them and the problem is a lot more widespread than originally thought. I only hope they can remedy this issue before people become leery of purchasing anymore films put out by Noshame. Amazon the great company they are were willing to exchange this a million times over, Noshame on the other hand doesn't even reply to emails or any other contact. Noshame is a GREAT name for this company! Stick with companies like "Anchor Bay" and "Blue Underground" who know how to put out better quality products!

The box set is too good for the films..........2006-06-30

A double box set with a free figurine of the "Red Queen" from the second movie...who would have imagined such lavish treatment for a pair of obscure Euro-horrors like these? The figurine is a fun oddity, but it's the films that I am primarily interested in.

"The Night Evelyn Came Out of the Grave" has apparently never been available before in widescreen and has something of a cult following, which led me to believe it was going to be something special, but actually I was quite disappointed.

The story tells of a wealthy but troubled man called Alan, who pays red-haired women to come back to his massive stately home for a night of passion, but he actually wants to beat and murder them due to a fixation with his dead wife Evelyn, who he once caught cheating on him. His mental state is not helped by the fact that Evelyn also seems to be haunting him, appearing and beckoning to him at odd times, and he fears that she really has "come out of the grave", as the title suggests.

Now this sounds like it could be quite gothic and exciting, but sadly, it's not. Nothing of what goes on is explained very clearly or convincingly. The plot is full of massive holes and unexplained nonsense that just confuses you or wastes time. The first 30 minutes is fairly intriguing, but when Alan meets his third victim, he decides, instead of assulting her, to immediately marry her, and it's after the marriage that the film really comes unravelled. The new wife (obviously played by an Italian actress but hilariously named Gladys) has a wardrobe that seems to consist of nothing but stripper's outfits, which leave her breasts nearly hanging out all the time, and she parades around like this all the time, even when dining with Alan's family or meeting the servants. Mysterious, meaningless things start to happen, like a glass of milk gets misplaced (ooh, scary), or one of the maids is suspected of having red hair (all the maids are wearing obvious wigs anyway, so I didn't see the big hoo-haa), and some of the family silverware disappears (oh, the horror!). None of this actually means anything important, it just drags the story on interminably. Oh yes, and some of Alan's relatives start getting killed, which I suppose is rather more important. After a lot of meandering in this way, the film suddenly chokes into life with an incredible double-double-cross twist ending that is way too implausible, and leaves massive chunks of the mystery still unexplained.

There, I admit it, I didn't think much of this film. Probably the only memorable part of it is cult actress Erica Blanc, who has a small role that features a really silly striptease but not a lot else. Again, I probably did the film a disservice by watching the English dub, and it was truly terrible, especially as the film is supposed to be set in England, so all these exotic looking actresses speak with horrible flat British accents which look completely out of place. I hate to say it, but by the time the climax was reached, I had no interest left in any of the characters.

The second film is "The Red Queen Kills Seven Times", and I prefer it out of the two, although it's less famous and still quite hard going. A woman named Kitty (who picks these names???)is terrified that she has become the target of a bizarre, costumed murderer known as the Red Queen, and all the evidence points to this being her unbalanced and hateful sister. Trouble is, Kitty has been spreading the lie that her sister is out of the country to cover up for the fact that she accidently killed her in a fight, a year before the murders began...So she couldn't be the Red Queen ...or could she?

Yes, well it's time for another confusing mystery as the complicated story demands your deep concentration to understand what is going on, over all the plot holes and more very bad English dubbing. Luckily the lead in this film is played by Euro fave Barbara Bouchet, who does a far better job than the mess made by the heroine of "Evelyn". She's very beautiful and makes a sympathetic and interesting character. The trouble is due to all the surrounding cast, as there are just too many people with not enough expanation of who they are and what they are doing. "Red Queen" benefits from a jolly "family curse" subplot, complete with a morbid painting and the bizarre get-up of the murderous Red Queen, who's appearance you can see by the free figurine! Like "Evelyn", the film benefits from being filmed in a gorgeous ornate castle, but it also fails similarly by trying to dress up a pretty ordinary who-dunnit by using impressive Gothic locations and a silly "return from the dead" sub-plot. I didn't actually understand the twist ending of this film, it's something to do with an inheritance, but it's not very well explained. At least the murder are fun, in fact "Red "Queen" is probably more violent than "Evelyn", despite the former's far more ghoulish premise. It also has a better ending with it's moderately thrilling flooded dungeon scene.

Two films for collectors of the obscure, then. Both the prints are great and in fantastic widescreen. I love No Shame's presentation, I just hope they start finding some better films. I look forward to seeing more from them. They won't have to give away toy action figures next time if the films are better.

Beautiful box-set.......2006-05-06

To any giallo fan, this stunning limited edition box-set is a must have, mine arrived today so I have not had time to view the two films, but so sumptuous is the packaging I feel to open the thing would be a violation. If you are considering this gem, then you'd better hurry as there are only seven thousand of these. Thank You Noshame.

Profiler - Season 2 + 3 + 4 DVD Box Sets Authentic Region 1

Average customer rating:

Profiler - Season 2 + 3 + 4 DVD Box Sets Authentic Region 1
Director: Vern Gillum , and Kevin Hooks
ProductGroup: DVD
Binding: DVD

Average customer rating:

The Essential Sherlock Holmes
Starring: Sherlock Holmes-Box Set
Manufacturer: Delta
ProductGroup: DVD
Binding: DVD

( E ) | Titles | Features | DVD | Video

Mystery & Suspense | Boxed Sets | Stores | DVD | Video

General | Mystery & Suspense | Genres | DVD | Video

Description

There are few characters from literature that take on a life of their own, but Sherlock Holmes, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's fictional detective, is definitely one of them. This incredible 8-DVD set features some of the greatest mysteries ever solved by the great detective on film and TV.

Included are several films starring Basil Rathbone, the man that became synonymous with the character of Sherlock Holmes, as well as bonus features of original radio broadcast with Rathbone in the title role! Top this off with an exclusive documentary produced just for this set and you have a "must have" for fans, collectors and anyone looking for great entertainment!

Product Description

Night Of The Living Dead *** The Terror *** The Blob *** Die Hard Dracula *** Samson vs. Vampire Woman

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