The holiday season is fast approaching, and the consumer feeding frenzy is peaking. So what to get your favorite movie buff this year?
Provided your pockets are deep enough, there are oodles of extravagant ways to delight that special cinephile in your life. A hi-def player is the obvious starting point (HD DVD players can be had these days for as little as $100), but you don't necessarily need to make the leap into high-definition to come up with something spectacular. Lavish, multi-disc box sets abound on both standard and hi-def DVD, and almost any one of them is certain to send a movie fan into fits of convulsive ecstasy.
These sets don't come cheap — most range from 50 to a hundred bucks a pop — but that's the going rate for state-of-the-art editions of classics you'll return to again and again, all packaged in an opulent style that lets you know you're getting what you paid for. Here are a few of the best of the best.
Twin Peaks: Definitive Gold Box Edition David Lynch's supremely odd soap opera changed the parameters of broadcast television, demonstrating that small-screen programming could be every bit as daring as the big screen at its best. This massive new collection presents all 29 episodes from the groundbreaking series' two seasons, plus the remarkable, previously unavailable-on-DVD pilot episode. The material has all been beautifully remastered; the Lynch-approved 5.1 audio remix showcases Angelo Badalamenti's evocative score to spectacular effect; and two full discs of this 10-DVD set are devoted to never before seen extras, including extensive documentaries, deleted scenes and interviews. It's a shame that the commentary tracks featured on the previously issued (and now out of print) edition of Twin Peaks: Season One are missing, but pound-for-pound, this new Gold Box more than measures up to its self-proclaimed definitive status.
I Am Cuba: The Ultimate Edition A dazzling fusion of Soviet cinematic savvy and Latin sensuality, this magnificent not-quite documentary of pre-Castro Cuba is nothing less than pure poetry. Russian director Mikahil Kaltozov (The Cranes Are Flying) filters avant-garde techniques and ideological kitsch through a quartet of stories that provide a delirious tour of early-'60s Cuba, taking us from the decadent nightclubs of Batista's Havana to the haunts of passionate young revolutionaries dreaming of utopian futures. Milestone's deluxe three-disc set of I Am Cuba gives us a transfer that captures the film in all its stunning black-and-white glory, throws in two full-length documentaries and a Martin Scorsese interview, and then cleverly packages the whole thing in a custom cigar box. The icing on the cake is finding this slice of cinematic heaven online for under $35, making it one of the best bargains of the year.
Blade Runner: Five-Disc Ultimate Collector's Edition Ridley Scott's masterpiece of retro sci-fi noir finally gets the digital treatment it deserves, arriving on Dec. 18 in no less than a half dozen special editions of various degrees of awesomeness. You can't go wrong with any of these, although die-hard fans will probably want to spring for the priciest of the lot, the Ultimate Collector's Edition — a limited edition five-disc set that comes packaged in an ultra-cool collectible suitcase with such gewgaws as a replica "spinner" car, an origami unicorn figurine, a lenticular film clip and scads more memorabilia. For less than half that price, though, you can pick up basically the same set — sans suitcase and tchotchkes — in the Complete Collector's Edition, a five-disc box that includes the same five (!) versions of the film and a full disc of bonus material. The various Blade Runner editions will be available on HD DVD and Blu-ray, as well as standard DVD — although even the most hi-def-resistant consumer might be tempted to finally make the leap for this one.
Planet Earth: The Complete Series Simply one of the best nature documentaries ever, this 11-hour series spans the globe, using state-of-the-art technology to capture some of the most astonishing sights and sounds imaginable. It's almost too splendiferous — we're sometimes so mesmerized by the exotic visuals that it's hard to pay full attention to the narration. Whether you choose the DVD or HD versions, make sure to get the BBC edition narrated by Richard Attenborough — not the Discovery Channel's version, which tinkers with the original theme music and replaces Attenborough's voice-over with a more generic turn by Sigourney Weaver.
Berlin Alexanderplatz The Criterion Collection has released a lot of incredible box sets in its time, but this may just be the finest one yet. The magnum opus of the late, great Rainer Werner Fassbinder, Berlin Alexanderplatz is an infinitely perplexing, infinitely satisfying 15-hour soap opera/abstraction based on Alfred Doblin's 1929 novel of life and death in Weimar Germany. Fassbinder has never been so challenging or so humane, communicating even the most grotesque and banal qualities of his characters with tremendous grace and tenderness. Criterion's seven-disc set features a full complement of exquisite supplements, including several documentaries, an eye-catching 80-page book and even a 1931 feature film based on the same source material.
Harry Potter Years 1-5 Limited Edition Gift Set You know you want it: a mammoth collection of all five of Harry's big screen adventures to date, complete with tons of never-before-seen extras, elaborately packaged in a handsome, leathery container that looks very much like the boy wizard's actual suitcase (not to be confused with the sleek steel case the Blade Runner set comes in). As if all that weren't geeky enough, it even includes trading cards. Harry Potter Years 1-5 will be released on both standard DVD and on HD, and both are available Dec. 11.
Ford at Fox Hovering around $200, this is by far the priciest item on our list, but it's money well spent. Although best known for legendary westerns like Stagecoach and The Searchers, John Ford was an enormously versatile filmmaker whose career was as long and as broad as American cinema itself. The 25 movies contained on this 20-disc set include epics from the silent era, comedies (several featuring Will Rogers and early appearances by Spencer Tracy and Humphrey Bogart) and classic dramas such as The Grapes of Wrath, How Green Was My Valley and the masterful Prisoner of Shark Island. Factor in copious extras, a 172-page hardback book and several souvenir booklets, all packaged in a sturdy and extremely imposing vinyl box, and you've got one of the most important — and heaviest — DVD packages of this or any holiday season.
This article appears in Dec 5-11, 2007.