With Christmas right around the corner, the pace of releases has slowed, but there are some real gems here including the first post-Fox-cancellation season of Futurama, the best Woody Allen film in years, a powerful drama that provides an inside look at the financial collapse, and the best neo-noir of the 1980s is out on Blu-ray.

 

 

Once again it’s a slow week for “TV on DVD” releases, but there is at least one gem.  The top  release of the week is clearly Futurama Vol. 6 (Fox, 337 min., $29.99, BD $39.99), which contains 13 episodes of the further adventures of Leela, Fry, Bender and the Planet Express gang including the hilarious “Tip of the Zoidberg” episode.  This set includes the first of the new “post-cancellation” seasons that appeared on Comedy Central—and while the budget for the sci-fi comedy series may not be what it was when it was on primetime, the writing is still sharp and the satire still reflects the vision of series creator Matt Groening (The Simpsons).

 

The only other contemporary release due this week is One Tree Hill: The Complete 8th Season (Warner Bros., 924 min., $59.98), which includes all 22 episodes from the most recent season of the long-running CW drama series.

 

Fans of classic sitcoms may well enjoy The Donna Reed Show: Season 4 (MPI, 1080, min, $39.98), which contains all 39 episodes of the 1950s sitcom starring Donna Reed, Carl Betz, Paul Petersen, and Shelley Fabares.

 

 

There are no blockbusters this week, but quite a few releases with something that will appeal to almost everyone.  The highest-grossing DVD release is likely to be the family film, A Dolphin Tale (Warner Bros., “PG,” $28.98, BD/Combo $35.98), the very essence of a “feel good” movie, which is saved (at least in part) from its "movie of the week" storyline by a cast that includes Morgan Freeman, Ashley Judd, and Harry Connick, Jr.

 

For those who enjoy more adult fare there is Midnight in Paris (Sony, “PG-13,” $30.99, BD $35.99) a strong return to form by director Woody Allen, who manages to lure viewers back to the literary heights of Paris in the 1920s with the aid of a strong performance from Owen Wilson, who brings a combination of likeableness and intelligence tempered with melancholy to the movie’s central role.

 

There is also a trio of films to tempt genre movie fans including the revenge thriller Columbiana (Sony, “R,” $28.98, $34.98), which provides a twist on the genre by making the revenge-seeking protagonist a beautiful woman (Zoe Saldana), Straw Dogs (Sony, “R,” $30.99, BD $34.99), a remake of Sam Peckinpah’s macho saga of “home defense,” which changes the setting from the U.K. to Mississippi in order to give a “red state/blue state” vibe to the proceedings, and The Warrior (Lionsgate, “PG-13” $29.95, BD $39.99), a mixed-martial arts saga set in Pittsburgh that stars Tom Hardy, who plays Bane in the upcoming The Dark Knight Rises., and who brings his immense physicality to his role in Warrior as well.
 

And then for the Gleeks there is Glee: The Concert Movie (Fox, not rated, $29.99, BD $34.99), which features the cast of the hit TV series performing some of their most successful numbers in a concert setting.

 

But in many ways the most interesting release of the week is Margin Call (Roadside Attractions, “R,” $19.98, BD $29.98), an attempt to examine the financial meltdown at a very human level with a thinly-veiled retelling of what happened to Lehman Brothers, the investment bank, which was not bailed and left to fail, an action which directly precipitated the financial crash.  Does this film explain the causes behind the worst financial collapse since the Great Depression?  Well, not completely but it does show how the investment banks competed against each other to produce great combinations of mortgages (many of which were subprime) that were packaged together and sold to investors.  The investment firms had to actually acquire the toxic mortgages for a brief time in order to package them, and when the market turned Lehman Bros. was caught holding a bunch of these highly toxic assets.  Margin Call gets it right when it assigns blame to society for failing to regulate these exotic loan derivatives—and it certainly calls into question all those Monday morning quarterbacks who insist that the bank bailouts were unnecessary.  The Lehman debacle, which precipitated a worldwide financial near meltdown, shows why the bailouts were necessary—and the greedy machinations of the investment bank’s officers, who are well portrayed by a strong cast including Kevin Spacey, Jeremy Irons, and Zachary Quinto, demonstrate why the financial sector needs more regulation, not less.  Margin Call doesn’t provide the full picture, but it gets enough right to make it required viewing for those interested in seeing what went wrong and why.

 

 

In this category as well there's not a huge number of new releases this week, but Heaven’s Lost Property Season 1 (Funimation, “17+,” 350 min., BD/DVD Combo $69.98) is a sexy harem comedy about a horny teenage boy, who encounters a fallen angel who can make his dreams come true.  This 14-episode first season of the series, which is based on the manga by Suu Minazuki, was produced by AIC and aired in Japan in 2009.  While certainly not for all tastes, Heaven’s Lost Property is one of those fan service-filled sexy harem comedies that should please fans of the genre.

 

The second series of Heaven’s Lost Property was simulcast on Crunchyroll, which also simulcast another series making its North American DVD debut, Modern Magic Made Simple (Sentai Filmworks, “17+,” 300 min., $49.98), a “magical girl” anime series produced by Nomad and based on the light novel series by Hiroshi Sakurazaka.

 

But the biggest release of the week is a double-barreled helping of the supernatural action comedy Rosario + Vampire. Rosario + Vampire: Season 1 (Funimation, “17+,” 325 minutes, $64.98) includes the 13-episode first season produced by Gonzo that aired in Japan in 2008. Rosario + Vampire: Capu2, Season 2 (Funimation, “13+,” 315 min., $59.98) contains the 13-episode second season of the series, which is based on the popular manga written by Akihisa Ikeda and published here by Viz Media.  Since they are based on a "Top 25" manga property, these two Rosario anime series should have something of a built-in audience.

 

Re-priced re-releases due this week include Elfin Lied Complete Collection (Sentai Filmworks, “17+,” 325 min., $34.98), which contains all 13 episodes of the ultraviolent (and occasionally sexy) series produced by ARMS that aired in 2004, and the Initial D: Stage 4 Complete Collection (Funimation, “14+,” 560 min., $29.98), the vintage street racing anime series originally released here (in part) by Tokyopop.

 

 

Though it’s not for everyone, it would be hard to find a better David Lynch film than Blue Velvet (MGM, “R,” BD $24.99), and I am happy to report that Lynch himself supervised the color correction on the hi-def transfer for this Blu-ray.  The color and detail are superb in spite of the fact that this is a very “dark” film with lots of low-light shots.  The low key lighting is superbly rendered on the Blu-ray and the soundtrack, which features Angelo Baldalamenti’s score, is a key element in developing the movie’s deeply unsettling vibe.  Showing corruption hiding behind picturesque suburban streets is hardly innovative, but rarely has it been done with more scalpel-like precision than in Blue Velvet, and the performances, especially by Dennis Hopper, who is truly one of the most frightening screen villains of all time, and Isabella Rossellini mark Lynch’s 1986 movie as one of that decade’s best—and now viewers at home can enjoy it with all its singular and disturbing visual brilliance intact.