New to Blu: November 18 – 24

It’s another vintage week for collectors of classics on Blu-ray.

The biggest headliners are a two-disc release of Sam Peckinpah’s Major Dundee and Essential Film Noir: Collection 1.

The former has both the theatrical and extended cuts of the 1966 western on separate discs while the latter offers Detective Story, Framed, The Garment Jungle and Alias Nick Beal on separate discs.

Each Imprint release comes with copious extras.

Most of the missing footage from Major Dundee has been reinserted and received a 4K scan while the entire soundtrack has been remixed in 5.1 Dolby Digital (complete with a new score).

The new scenes complete the electrifying depiction of an oppressive Union officer who leads a squad of Rebel prisoners, ex-slaves, and criminals into Mexico to hunt down a band of murdering Apaches, raising the question: who represents a greater threat?

Here are the extras:

• Exclusive audio commentary by film historians Glenn Erickson & Alan K. Rode (on the Extended Version)
• Audio commentary with Nick Redman, Paul Seydor, Garner Simmons and David Weddle
• Passion & the Poetry: The Dundee Odyssey: Mike Siegel’s 2019 feature-length documentary on the making of Major Dundee with L.Q. Jones, James Coburn, Lupita Peckinpah, Chalo Gonzalez and more
• Mike Siegel: About The Passion & Poetry Project: Siegel talks about his beginnings and his ongoing film project about director Sam Peckinpah
• Passion & Poetry: Peckinpah Anecdotes: Nine actors relate what it was like to work with the director
• Isolated score by Christopher Caliendo in DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0 stereo (Extended Cut)

The Essential Film Noir extras include:

• Framed (1947) and Alias Nick Beal (1949): Exclusive audio commentaries by author, historian and Film Noir Foundation president Eddie Muller.
• Detective Story (1951): Exclusive audio commentary by noir expert Alan K Rode; Hollywood Champion: A Tribute to Kirk Douglas (visual essay); theatrical trailer.
• The Garment Jungle (1957): Exclusive audio commentary by Rode; 2007 Q&A with Robert Loggia; theatrical trailer.

Also from Imprint are The Bob Hope Collection: The Cat & The Canary/The Ghost Breakers and Hammer House Of Horror – The Complete Series.

Madman Entertainment also is distributing for the first time on Blu-ray another TV classic, Hornblower: The Complete Collection, and Salvation: The Complete Series.

Also being re-issued on Blu-ray are King Kong (1976), Ray and Monkey.