The year 2005 has seen the release of some outstanding DVD's, and I've made a list of those I found to be the best. My criteria included the artistic merit of the movie, the enhancement value of the bonus materials, and the picture and sound quality. I applied these criteria in a completely subjective fashion, and the result is a personal, idiosyncratic list of my own favorites that doesn't necessarily reflect the popular wisdom.
This 15-disc box set contains 14 films directed by Alfred Hitchcock. I would say all 14 movies are worth watching, and I consider three of them to be masterpieces: "Vertigo," "Psycho" and "Rear Window." But for me, the real pleasure of this DVD set came in watching some of Hitch's less famous films, such as "Frenzy," "The Trouble With Harry," "Rope" and "Shadow of a Doubt." The set includes about 14 hours of bonus materials, mostly in the form of documentaries and featurettes.
"Jules and Jim" has long been one of my favorite movies, partly because of François Truffaut's exuberant filmmaking and partly because of Jeanne Moreau's unforgettable performance. I was thrilled when Criterion released a two-disc edition of this great movie that contained two audio commentary tracks. The film is based on a semiautobiographical novel by Henri-Pierre Roché, and I particularly enjoyed the DVD bonus materials about the novel and the real-life people who inspired it.
Directed by the legendary Kenji Mizoguchi, "Ugetsu" is a Japanese film that's often listed among the greatest of all time. But it's been difficult to see in recent years, so I was delighted when a two-disc edition came out in 2005. The DVD's include an audio commentary by expert Tony Rayns and a two-and-a-half-hour documentary on Mizoguchi's life and work. I especially liked that the DVD's are packaged with a 72-page booklet containing three short stories that were sources for the movie.
Written and directed by Robert Bresson, the French film "Au hasard Balthazar" often appears on greatest-of-all-time lists. For me, watching it and the accompanying bonus materials on DVD was a profoundly moving experience. The movie has an air of spirituality and mysticism, and I consider its ending one of the most emotionally powerful in all of cinema. The DVD contains an outstanding hour-long TV program on the film, as well as a worthwhile video interview with scholar Donald Richie.
Judy Garland leaves sepia-toned Kansas and goes "Over the Rainbow" to Technicolor Oz in this great American classic. I love it when Dorothy, Scarecrow, Tin Man and Lion skip down the Yellow Brick Road, singing "We're Off to See the Wizard." This DVD set contains not only an audio commentary, a making-of and deleted scenes, but also a half-hour documentary on author L. Frank Baum and five pre-1939 screen adaptations of Baum's Oz stories that have a total running time of over three hours.
I rate Martin Scorsese's "Raging Bull" as the greatest American biopic ever made. Robert De Niro gives a towering performance as boxing great Jake La Motta, and Joe Pesci is memorable as Jake's brother, making the film one of the best I know about brothers. Also, the movie is visually dazzling and has an evocative soundtrack. The Special Edition is a two-disc set containing three audio commentaries, a half-hour making-of and other special features with a total run time of an hour and a half.
Jean Renoir directed this English-language Technicolor film, one of the most beautiful I've seen. Shot in and around Calcutta, it's based on a semiautobiographical novel by Rumer Godden. The story is narrated by an unseen Englishwoman—Godden's alter ego—giving what seems to me a somewhat romanticized account of perhaps three months of her adolescence. The DVD provides a stunning hour-long BBC documentary on Godden, and there's also a 13-minute video interview with Martin Scorsese.
A stylish film noir starring Gene Tierney, Clifton Webb, Dana Andrews and Vincent Price, I rate "Laura" as one of the great Hollywood classics. It's a murder mystery in form, but I believe what makes it unforgettable is its undercurrent of brooding romanticism. Webb is memorable in the role of an overrefined, venomous newspaper columnist. The DVD comes with two audio commentaries, one by a film professor, the other by a film historian. There are also A&E biographies on Tierney and Price.
An emotionally powerful drama that takes on controversial subject matter, "Million Dollar Baby" features brilliant performances by Hilary Swank, Morgan Freeman and Clint Eastwood. Although set in the boxing world, I would say the heart of the story is the family-like group formed by the three main characters. When Eastwood's character becomes a surrogate father to Swank's character, he faces some painful decisions. The two-disc DVD set contains extras whose total run time is under an hour.
I loved this bittersweet comedy about two pals going through male mid-life crises. The ensemble acting by Paul Giamatti, Thomas Haden Church, Virginia Madsen and Sandra Oh is outstanding. I think the setting, which is the wine country an hour north of Santa Barbara, is one of the reasons I found the film so charming. There the two guys vacation for a week, meet an interesting pair of women, and have some comic misadventures. The DVD provides an amusing commentary by Giamatti and Church.
