Home Video (VHS, DVD, Blu-ray, 4k)

Top 20 Selling Blu-ray Discs

1. Gladiator II
2. Wicked
3. Red One
4. Kraven the Hunter
5. Den of Thieves 2: Pantera
6. Nosferatu
7. Akira
8. The Substance
9. Venom: The Last Dance
10. The Lord of the Rings: The Motion Picture Trilogy
11. The Wild Robot
12. Twisters
13. No Country for Old Men
14. Godzilla Minus One
15. Alien: Romulus
16. The Order (2024)
17. Deadpool & Wolverine
18. Transformers One
19. Constantine
20. Bound

Source: Circana VideoScan (based on unit sales from reporting retailers)

Top 20 Selling 4K Ultra HD Blu-ray Discs

1. Gladiator II
2. Nosferatu
3. Akira
4. Wicked
5. Den of Thieves 2: Pantera
6. Red One
7. The Substance
8. No Country for Old Men
9. Transformers One
10. Venom: The Last Dance
11. Constantine
12. Bound
13. The Lord of the Rings: The Motion Picture Trilogy
14. Smile 2
15. The Super Mario Bros. Movie
16. We Were Soldiers
17. Chinatown
18. Amadeus
19. Rio Bravo
20. Alien: Romulus

Source: Circana VideoScan (based on unit sales from reporting retailers)

Top 10 Home Media Sellers (% of Blu-ray's Market Share Noted)

1. Gladiator II (52%)
2. Red One (42%)
3. Kraven the Hunter (47%)
4. Wicked (50%)
5. Den of Thieves 2: Pantera (54%)
6. Nosferatu (66%)
7. Venom: The Last Dance (50%)
8. The Substance (62%)
9. The Wild Robot (39%)
10. Akira (100%)

Source: Circana VideoScan (based on unit sales from reporting retailers)

Further Reading:

• Top Selling Blu-ray and 4K Discs for Week Ended 2025-03-08
• Top Disc Sellers for Week Ended 2025-03-08
• Blu-ray Sales: March 2-8: Gladiator II is Number I in Debut

In recent weeks, we here at JoBlo have written some wild stories about how physical media has sometimes fallen flat with consumers. The idea with physical media was always that, in an era where many people own things digitally (which they don’t really own at all), having a film on Blu-ray meant that it would always be yours. However, collectors have been somewhat shaken up lately by the spectre of laser rot, where, after a certain time, discs simply go bad, regardless of whether you play them or not. As I previously revealed, pretty much every DVD (and HD-DVD) Warner Bros manufactured between 2006-8 fell prey to this, and our own Tyler Nichols followed-up with his own piece, listing hundreds of Blu-ray’s which have always gone bad – for whatever reason.

However, as Tyler notes, in many cases, especially when a disc comes from a specialty label, they’ll do everything they can to replace a defective disc. In fact, even WB has gone on record saying they would replace discs, no matter how old they are (although several readers have reached out to me saying that WB is taking a lot of time to get back to them). Criterion has been especially good at replacing discs that no longer work, and I imagine the same would go for any 4K specialty label, although so far, their discs all seem to work just fine.

With that in mind, we want to celebrate some of our favourite specialty labels. Mine is probably Arrow Video, which is like the Criterion Collection of genre films, but there are plenty of great ones to choose from. Take our poll below and let us know!

That page is such a mess, I can't even see the poll, so throw in your suggestions in the comments below.

I have a couple of Eureka! releases - “Region B” - that I’d like to watch. My (US) PS4 won’t play them, and apparently there’s a limited number of times you can change the region on it.

I see that Blu Ray drive peripherals exist for computers, but my TV is my computer monitor and a separate player seems like a smarter option.

I don’t tend to buy things new, and get most of my tech from thrifting. Are there any particular brands of Blu Ray players that are more likely to be region free? Is there a quick way of looking at a Blu Ray player and determining what region it can play?

Word is that not only is Apple not interested in giving their films a physical release, but they are also refusing requests to do so via third parties.

As it stands, Martin Scorsese’s “Killers of the Flower Moon” is not available for physical purchase in the U.S. Last year, Apple had indefinitely postponed —very likely canceled — the physical media release of the film. Patron holds were being canceled, temp MARC listings were pulled from library catalogs.

Criterion reached out to Apple, multiple times, to take over and release ‘Killers,’ but the streamer is flat out refusing to work with them.

Apple doesn’t release its original films on physical media. In fact, the streamer still hasn’t released their Oscar gloried “CODA” — it remains the only Best Picture winner to have never been available on physical media. Other noteworthy Apple films with the same fate include Ridley Scott’s “Napoleon,” and Joel Coen’s “The Tragedy of Macbeth.”

...

Hell, even Scorsese’s “The Irishman,” a Netflix original, was released on Criterion. The same goes for Alfonso Cuaron’s “Roma,” Jane Campion’s “Power of the Dog,” Bong Joon ho’s “Okja,” and Noah Baumbach’s “Marriage Story.” It’s surprising to see Apple being even more protective of their content than Netflix.

For the time being, if you want to get your hands on “Killers of the Flower Moon,” you’ll have to buy the Region 2 copy, which is only available in Europe, or online stores. There really is no other option.

Top 20 Selling Blu-ray Discs

1. Wicked
2. Nosferatu
3. Amadeus
4. Venom: The Last Dance
5. The Substance
6. No Country for Old Men
7. The Order (2024)
8. Constantine
9. Doctor Who: Sylvester McCoy - Complete Season Two
10. Twisters
11. The Forbidden Kingdom
12. Civil War
13. Godzilla Minus One
14. The Wild Robot
15. Deadpool & Wolverine
16. The Lord of the Rings: The War of the Rohirrim
17. Alien: Romulus
18. The Lord of the Rings: The Motion Picture Trilogy
19. Transformers One
20. Cruising

Source: Circana VideoScan (based on unit sales from reporting retailers)

Top 20 Selling 4K Ultra HD Blu-ray Discs

1. Nosferatu
2. Amadeus
3. Wicked
4. No Country for Old Men
5. Constantine
6. The Forbidden Kingdom
7. The Substance
8. Venom: The Last Dance
9. Civil War
10. Transformers One
11. Cruising
12. Smile 2
13. The Lord of the Rings: The War of the Rohirrim
14. The Super Mario Bros. Movie
15. Highlander
16. Kill Bill Vol. 1
17. Jackie Brown
18. Face/Off
19. Graveyard Shift
20. They Live

Source: Circana VideoScan (based on unit sales from reporting retailers)

Top 10 Home Media Sellers (% of Blu-ray's Market Share Noted)

1. Wicked (49%)
2. Nosferatu (63%)
3. Venom: The Last Dance (51%)
4. Amadeus (99%)
5. The Order (41%)
6. The Lord of the Rings: The War of the Rohirrim (27%)
7. The Substance (62%)
8. The Wild Robot (43%)
9. Twisters (50%)
10. America Is Sinking (N/A)

Source: Circana VideoScan (based on unit sales from reporting retailers)

Further Reading:

• Top Selling Blu-ray and 4K Discs for Week Ended 2025-03-01
• Top Disc Sellers for Week Ended 2025-03-01
• Blu-ray Sales: February 23-March 1: Wicked Composes Itself to Retake the Top Spot

Showing my age here, I thought they were talking about the Sam Raimin original from 2002!!

The headline refers to Spider-Man: No Way Home. 😆

cross-posted from: https://feddit.uk/post/25182874

Outside of rare retrospective screenings, for decades now King Lear has largely been seen, if at all, via low-quality bootlegs. Criterion’s transfer, sourced from a 2K restoration, is a revelation. The painterly beauty of Sophie Maintigneux’s cinematography and its heavy emphasis on naturalistic tones of blues and greens can finally be appreciated, and scenes in dim interiors sport deep black levels with no visible crushing or halo artifacts. Detail is fine enough to make out the faint signs of photo reproduction on the film stills and painting scans woven into the montage. Equally impressive is the soundtrack, which flawlessly renders the stereo track of overlapping dialogue, needle drops and ambient sound. The soundtrack is as blatantly artificial as it is immersively impressionistic, and it’s overwhelming to hear it in its full clarity.

...

Extras

New Yorker critic Richard Brody, likely the film’s biggest champion in the English-speaking world, contributes both an interview and the booklet essay for Criterion’s release. In both, he makes the case for the film as a Gesamtkunstwerk of Godard’s career while also offering ample insight into the project’s convoluted and enervating production. Brody even obliquely features in the interview with Molly Ringwald, who reminisces about how baffled she was on the set of King Lear and how she came to appreciate the film years later when reading Brody’s Everything Is Cinema: The Working Life of Jean-Luc Godard. Also interviewed is Peter Sellars, who recalls in depth the strangeness of the production but clearly prides having participated in the project. The disc also comes with audio of a press conference with Godard at its Cannes premiere, in which he’s his usual evasive, irascible, yet always entertaining self.

Overall

Jean-Luc Godard’s long-neglected masterpiece at last receives a proper video release in a stunning A/V transfer that primes the film for overdue rediscovery.

The 14th century takes a rocking new twist in A Knight's Tale, a stylish, music driven, action packed adventure starring Heath Ledger (The Dark Knight, The Patriot), with heroic performances from Mark Addy (The Full Monty, Down to Earth) and Rufus Sewell (Dangerous Beauty, Dark City). Ledger plays William Thatcher, a peasant squire who breaks all the rules when he passes himself off as a nobleman and takes the jousting world by storm. The only thing that stands between William and his dream of becoming the World Champion of the most extreme of sports is the bad boy of the sport Count Adhemar. And when the two rivals go lance to lance at the world finals, you'd better arm yourself and hang on tight for the ride of your life!

Disc One (4K Ultra HD):

• NEW 4K RESTORATIONS of the Theatrical & Extended versions of the film presented
• DOLBY VISION/HDR PRESENTATIONS OF BOTH VERSIONS
• NEW DOLBY ATMOS (for both versions) + English 5.1 (for both versions)
• 4K HDR picture and Dolby Atmos audio approved by director Brian Helgeland

Disc Two (Blu-ray):

• NEW 5 Deleted & Extended Scenes
• NEW Gag Reel
• NEW Quill and Quarterhorse: 2nd Unit Photography
• Commentary with Director Brian Helgeland and Actor Paul Bettany
• 11 Behind-The-Scenes Featurettes
• 6 Original Deleted Scenes with Filmmaker's Intros
• HBO Making-Of Special
• Music Video
• Domestic and International Trailers & TV Spot

Pre-orders are not live yet, but seeing as this is feddit.uk and you guys are trying to buy European, go look for it at your local stores.

Escaping post-war Europe, visionary architect László Toth (Adrien Brody) arrives in America to rebuild his life, his work, and his marriage to his wife Erzsébet (Felicity Jones) after being forced apart during wartime by shifting borders and regimes. On his own in a strange new country, László settles in Pennsylvania, where the wealthy and prominent industrialist Harrison Lee Van Buren (Guy Pearce) recognizes his talent for building. But power and legacy come at a heavy cost...

Bonus Features:

• Filmmaker Commentary with Director of Photography Lol Crawley
• "The Architects of The Brutalist" Featurette (25 minutes)
• Six Collectible Postcards with architectural renderings by Ákos Sógor

Transfer derived from the original 35mm negatives with VistaVision footage scanned at 6K.

Pre-order: Amazon · A24 Shop

Top 20 Selling Blu-ray Discs

1. Nosferatu
2. Wicked
3. Constantine
4. The Lord of the Rings: The War of the Rohirrim
5. Panic Room
6. Venom: The Last Dance
7. The Order (2024)
8. The Social Network
9. The Substance
10. Uncle Buck
11. Deadpool & Wolverine
12. Alien: Romulus
13. The Wild Robot
14. Twisters
15. Smile 2
16. Summer Rental
17. Transformers One
18. Venom 3-Movie Collection
19. The Lord of the Rings: The Motion Picture Trilogy
20. Godzilla Minus One

Source: Circana VideoScan (based on unit sales from reporting retailers)

Top 20 Selling 4K Ultra HD Blu-ray Discs

1. Nosferatu
2. Constantine
3. The Lord of the Rings: The War of the Rohirrim
4. Wicked
5. Panic Room
6. The Social Network
7. Uncle Buck
8. Venom: The Last Dance
9. Smile 2
10. The Substance
11. Transformers One
12. Kill Bill Vol. 1
13. Deadpool & Wolverine
14. Alien: Romulus
15. Evil Dead Rise
16. Kill Bill Vol. 2
17. Humanoids From the Deep
18. They Live
19. Drugstore Cowboy
20. No Country for Old Men

Source: Circana VideoScan (based on unit sales from reporting retailers)

Top 10 Home Media Sellers (% of Blu-ray's Market Share Noted)

1. Nosferatu (2024) (72%)
2. Wicked (53%)
3. The Lord of the Rings: The War of the Rohirrim (58%)
4. Venom: The Last Dance (52%)
5. Constantine (100%)
6. The Order (2024) (48%)
7. Panic Room (100%)
8. The Substance (56%)
9. America Is Sinking (N/A)
10. The Social Network (99%)

Source: Circana VideoScan (based on unit sales from reporting retailers)

Further Reading:

• Top Selling Blu-ray and 4K Discs for Week Ended 2025-02-22
• Top Disc Sellers for Week Ended 2025-02-22
• Blu-ray Sales: February 16-22: Nosferatu Takes a Bite Out of Wicked

I'm a huge fan of old movies. Now, when I say old I don't mean movies from ten, twenty, or even thirty or forty years ago. I love movies from the Golden Age of Hollywood, specifically the 30s, 40s, 50s and 60s. I've always loved this period, and given how hard it is to find many of these movies on streaming, I've made an effort to buy as many of these movies on physical media as possible. As such, I have thousands of old movies on DVD, and among my most treasured titles are a few dozen DVD box sets Warner Bros put out in the mid-2000s, as they control the best library of classic film.

A few months ago, I dug into an old Humphrey Bogart box set to watch a favorite of mine, Passage to Marseille. After about an hour, the disc simply stopped working. The same thing happened with another movie from the set, Across the Pacific. I actually thought my old Blu-ray player was to blame, and given that I was in need of an upgrade anyway, I bought a new UHD player and just forgot about it.

Flash forward to about a week ago, when I decided to throw on an old Errol Flynn movie called Desperate Journey. The same thing happened. This was more concerning to me, as, unlike the other movies I mentioned, this has never gotten an HD release and was unavailable digitally. I did a little research online, and to my horror, I landed on several home theater forum threads (and a couple of good videos) confirming this was no fluke.

It turns out that virtually every Warner Bros DVD disc manufactured between 2006 and 2008 has succumbed to the dreaded laser rot, where discs simply stop working due to a rotting of the layers. Once it happens, it can't be undone. This was a frequent problem with laserdiscs back in the 80s and 90s, but it wasn't a huge problem with DVDs. The issue comes down to the way the discs were authored. Many of the titles affected, which range from classics like The Wild Bunch and The Shawshank Redemption to TV collections like The Dukes of Hazzard, have been reissued on Blu-ray or digital HD. Some of the titles, such as many of the titles in the Looney Tunes Collections and many of the Golden Age of Hollywood movies, have not, making them, in a lot of cases, lost media.

So, what can be done about this? Nothing. As stated in this RetroBlasting video, we had ticking time bombs on our hands, and the only way around the problem was to rip our faves to something like PLEX, but it's too late for the majority of discs. Warner Bros, of course, has yet to comment on this, so people like me have thousands of worthless discs cluttering our shelves. Here's the most comprehensive list of titles available.

So far, Blu-ray Discs aren't affected, although all HD-DVD discs put out by WB in this period are basically expensive coasters.

While it would be great of WB was to try to make good to consumers by at least offering us replacement MOD discs from the Warner Archive, I'm not holding my breath. Given that the discs only went bad after fifteen years or so, I'm sure they feel like we got our money's worth -- which we certainly didn't in my opinion. Special shout out to Damn Fool Idealistic Crusader, a superb Home Theater YouTube Channel that was way ahead of this story.

UPDATE: According to one of our readers, FilmFan-89, WB will replace some discs if you contact them directly, with a catch. They will only replace discs that are currently in print, and sadly, many of the defective titles are not. Reach out to them through the WB Store and keep us posted in the comment thread if they come through with replacements.

Picked up the new 4K Third Man from Lionsgate, a bit bummed to find the 4K disc doesn't seem to work?

I get the gorgeous menu screen, and the animation works, but no menu option. Opening "Top Menu" re-loads the screen. "Pop Up Menu" doesn't respond. No other controls do anything.

Blu Ray disc works fine, so I got that going for me.

This is on an Xbox One X, I have 2 other players I have't tried it on yet.

Top 20 Selling Blu-ray Discs

1. Wicked
2. Venom: The Last Dance
3. The Substance
4. Deadpool & Wolverine
5. Alien: Romulus
6. The Wild Robot
7. Kill Bill Vol. 1
8. Twisters
9. Tom and Jerry: The Complete CinemaScope Collection
10. Kill Bill Vol. 2
11. Venom 3-Movie Collection
12. Sailor Moon Three-Film Collection: 1993-1995
13. The Expanse: The Complete Series
14. Smile 2
15. Vampires
16. Pretty in Pink
17. Terrifier 3
18. The Lord of the Rings: The Motion Picture Trilogy
19. Transformers One
20. Godzilla Minus One

Source: Circana VideoScan (based on unit sales from reporting retailers)

Top 20 Selling 4K Ultra HD Blu-ray Discs

1. Wicked
2. Venom: The Last Dance
3. The Substance
4. Kill Bill Vol. 1
5. Kill Bill VOl. 2
6. Alien: Romulus
7. Deadpool & Wolverine
8. Smile 2
9. Vampires
10. Pretty in Pink
11. Transformers One
12. The Nice Guys
13. Ghosts of Mars (tie)
14. The Last Voyage of the Demeter (tie)
15. Alien
16. The Wild Robot
17. No Country for Old Men
18. They Live
19. Jackie Brown
20. Aliens

Source: Circana VideoScan (based on unit sales from reporting retailers)

Top 10 Home Media Sellers (% of Blu-ray's Market Share Noted)

1. Wicked (57%)
2. Venom: The Last Dance (55%)
3. The Substance (65%)
4. The Wild Robot (52%)
5. Deadpool & Wolverine (69%)
6. Werewolves (14%)
7. Twisters (53%)
8. Alien: Romulus (77%)
9. Venom 3-Movie Collection (49%)
10. Elevation (40%)

Source: Circana VideoScan (based on unit sales from reporting retailers)

Further Reading:

• Top Selling Blu-ray and 4K Discs for Week Ended 2025-02-15
• Top Disc Sellers for Week Ended 2025-02-15
• Blu-ray Sales: February 9-15: Wicked Not Playing Cat and Mouse in Second Week

Here's a fun piece of Hollywood trivia for you. In 1981, a movie called Great White hit theaters, and made over $18 million domestically, before being yanked from theaters when Universal sued the filmmakers for ripping off Jaws. The movie, which was one of the many Jaws clones released in Italy in the wake of Jaws's success, was directed by Enzo G. Castellari and was seen as an even more blatant than usual rip-off, with it centring around a seaside community terrorized by a Great White shark, whose mayor refuses to take the threat seriously -- only for a crusty old shark hunter to team up with a nerdy landlubber to save the day. Sound familiar?

In the years since they blocked it, the film, which was called The Last Shark in Europe, has once again become available, and now it's getting a fully-loaded Blu-ray from British Label Treasured Films. One important thing to note though, is that while the artwork has a reversible sleeve that allows viewers to choose between the titles The Last Shark and Great While, the American re-cut by Film Ventures, which was the one blocked, is not on the disc. This version of the film has a score by Morton Stevens which was very similar to what John Williams composed for Jaws, and might be one of the reasons Universal was able to get the film pulled. Nevertheless, the extras, which were revealed by our friends at Blu-ray.com, are impressive:

• Presented in widescreen from high definition master
• NEW Audio Commentary with Eugenio Ercolani and Troy Howarth
• NEW Great White Enzo: Interview with Director Enzo G. Castellari (16:43)
• NEW High Tide: Interview with Actor Massimo Vanni (22:11)
• NEW Big Fishes in a Sea Full of Sharks: Interview with Producer Maurizio Amati (19:42)
• NEW Blood Tide: Interview with Producer Ugo Tucci (13:00)
• NEW Unfamiliar Waters: Casterllari Out of Action: Video essay by Mike Foster
• NEW Squali! A Brief Introduction to the Italian Killer Animal Current: Video Essay by Eugenio Ercolani
• Image Gallery
• Trailer and TV Spot
• Reversible Sleeve featuring two artwork choices
• Uncompressed English DTS-HD Master Audio
• English SDH Subtitles

Sadly, the disc is REGION B-locked, but will work fine if you have a multi-region player. It drops on June 6th!

Here's the artwork:

Top 20 Selling Blu-ray Discs

1. Wicked
2. Venom: The Last Dance
3. The Substance
4. Twin Peaks: From Z to A
5. The Wild Robot
6. Twisters
7. Terrifier 3
8. Venom 3-Movie Collection
9. Deadpool & Wolverine
10. Blade
11. Alien: Romulus
12. The Shining
13. Kill Bill Vol. 2
14. Kill Bill Vol. 1
15. Elevation
16. Blade Runner 2049
17. Reagan
18. Godzilla Minus One
19. Jackie Brown
20. A Real Pain

Source: Circana VideoScan (based on unit sales from reporting retailers)

Top 20 Selling 4K Ultra HD Blu-ray Discs

1. Wicked
2. Twin Peaks: From Z to A
3. The Substance
4. Venom: The Last Dance
5. Blade
6. The Shining
7. Kill Bill Vol. 2
8. Kill Bill Vol. 1
9. The Wild Robot
10. Blade Runner 2049
11. Terrifier 3
12. Jackie Brown
13. Transformers One
14. Smile 2
15. Twisters
16. They Live
17. Alien: Romulus
18. Deadpool & Wolverine
19. Se7en
20. Punch-Drunk Love

Source: Circana VideoScan (based on unit sales from reporting retailers)

Top 10 Home Media Sellers (% of Blu-ray's Market Share Noted)

1. Wicked (69%)
2. Venom: The Last Dance (50%)
3. The Substance (74%)
4. Werewolves (19%)
5. The Wild Robot (55%)
6. Twin Peaks: From Z to A (100%)
7. Twisters (55%)
8. Elevation (35%)
9. Venom 3-Movie Collection (51%)
10. Terrifier 3 (54%)

Source: Circana VideoScan (based on unit sales from reporting retailers)

Further Reading:

• Top Selling Blu-ray and 4K Discs for Week Ended 2025-02-08
• Top Disc Sellers for Week Ended 2025-02-08
• Blu-ray Sales: February 2-8: Wicked Is All Good in Debut

Honestly I almost want to find the Laserdisc, DVD and 2D/3D Blu-ray for a complete set

The director of Con Air is Simon West, and he’s got a new movie on the way. It’s called Old Guy, and has Christoph Waltz in the lead role. As part of the promotion for that, he’s been doing an Ask Me Anything session on Reddit, and the question of a Con Air 4K disc came up right from the off.

Simon West confirmed that he’d been involved last year in doing work on the film. “Last year we actually did a 4K upgrade of Con Air”, he wrote.

“We went back to the original negative, we remixed the sound, and colour-corrected it, so that’s in the works, there should be a 4K release coming soon.”

Presumably, that work is also what’s now available in the iTunes version of the film, but while there’s not been confirmation of a fresh physical media release, it’s looking a little more likely. Not unrelated, a 4K remaster of Michael Bay’s Armageddon, another Disney release, has also been completed. The Rock is another obvious candidate from the same era, and the hope and expectation now is that Disney, via Sony, gets these titles moving. Money hasn’t been spent on a 4K remaster for no reason.

Anybody else grow up watching The Secret Life of Machines?

It was an amazing show. Tim Hunkin is still around and making Youtube videos. Sadly Rex is no longer with us.