A fifth week of home entertainment releases in October means a respite from the onslaught of fall titles, but there are some interesting choices here including Pixar’s solid Monsters University, the stylish vampire fantasy Byzantium from Neil Jordan, the sly Christopher Guest mockumentary TV series, Family Tree, three great detective series from across the pond, the Blu-ray debut of the classic Gatchaman anime that spawned Battle of the Planets and even the not-as-bad-you’ve-been told adaptation of Dark Horse’s R.I.P.D.
 
Theatrical Movies
 
This week’s bestselling release will undoubtedly be Pixar’s Monsters University (Disney, “G,” $29.99, BD/Combo $39.99), a prequel to the previous Pixar hit Monsters, Inc.   So high is the level of excellence from Pixar that a film as clever and insightful as Monsters University has been characterized as “fine but forgettable” by critics.  Yes the movie, which borrows from both Animal House and the rHarry Potter novels, is not as original as Up or Wall-E, but it still delivers plenty of laughs along with some key life lessons while managing to entertain both young and old at the same time.  As far as this critic is concerned there is a lot of interesting work being done in all sorts of film genres in many different countries in our era, but in the future, when much of what we think is so wonderful is forgotten, historians will regard Pixar with the same reverence that they now bestow upon Charlie Chaplin and Buster Keaton.
 
Director Robert Schwentke’s adaptation of the Dark Horse Comic R.I.P.D. (Universal, “PG-13,” $28.98, BD $34.98) was one of this summer’s biggest certified bombs, earning just $33.6 million here and $76 million worldwide in spite of its $130 million production cost.  While it is easy to see why critics couldn’t get over the film’s superficial similarities to Men in Black and gave it a Rotten Tomatoes rating of just 13% positive, the movie is not as bad as its notices.  Clearly not for everyone, this black comedy/fantasy does have some laughs and is far from this summer’s worst popcorn movie.  Comic book movie fans may want to wait and catch the film on cable first, but a fair number may want to add it to their collections.  Jeff Bridges does go over-the-top at times, but “The Dude” doesn’t entirely disappoint his fans in this one.  Still, one wonders what would have happened if Zack Galfianakis, the first choice for role, hadn’t had to pull out.  Certainly the comparisons to Men in Black would have been toned down, since it is hard to see Galifianakis playing anyone’s “mentor” a la Tommy Lee Jones.
 
Intellectual horror movie fans will definitely want to check out Neil Jordan’s Byzantium (MPI, “R,” $24.98, $29.98), a stylish vampire thriller with a superior cast that includes Gemma Atherton, Saorise Ronan, and Jonny Lee Miller.  This vampire saga spans several hundred years from the Napoleonic Wars to the present, when the mother and daughter vampire team arrives in a small English coastal town and proceed to take over the dilapidated Byzantium Hotel.  The director of Interview with a Vampire and The Crying Game, Jordan is clearly not creating run-of-the-mill horror films for mainstream audiences, but those who enjoy literary dark fantasies will not be disappointed by Byzantium, which earned a 61% positive rating on review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes—a solid mark for any sort of vampire movie.
 
 
TV on DVD
 
After a bumper crop of TV on DVD releases in September and October, this week there are far fewer new titles, though there are some gems including the innovative legal series Damages: The Complete Series (Sony, 2440 min., $95.99), which includes all 59 episodes of the series that won Emmys for star Glenn Close and several nominations for co-star Rose Byrne.  Damages is not a series for everyone.  The series’ checkered career, which began on cable net FX and then switched Direct TV’s Audience Channel, demonstrates that it lacked mainstream appeal.  However, for those who enjoy legal shows, Damages with its season-long examination of cases from both sides, had a sophistication that few, if any, TV lawyer shows can match, and the series often had clever non-linear plots bolstered by superior acting, which earned it a devoted, albeit rather small audience.
 
But for those with a sense of humor, this week’s top TV release is Christopher Guest’s Family Tree: The Complete First Season (HBO, 300 min. $29.98), a slyly funny series that utilizes Guest’s favorite “mockumentary” format (This Is Spinal Tap, Best in Show, Waiting for Guffman) in following the hapless quest of a feckless 30-something Englishman played by Chris O’Dowd (The IT Crowd, Bridesmaids, The Sapphires), who loses his girlfriend and his job and then decides to retrace his roots.  The current fascination with genealogy is a ripe subject for humor and Family Tree doesn’t disappoint.
 
Also in the mockumentary vein is the web-series Burning Love: The Complete First Season (Paramount, 110 min., $16.99), a scripted series that makes merciless fun of supposedly unscripted matchmaking “reality” shows like The Batchelor.   You will be surprised by some of the actors who make cameos in this Internet satire that should play well on DVD.
 
The first few notes in what will be a symphony of holiday-themed material are out this week including the Heartland Christmas (eOne Entertainment, 90 min., $14.98), which contains a feature-length episode of the Canadian series based on the books by Lauren Brooke (the setting has been changed from Virginia in the novels to Alberta in the TV series), and the animated holiday treat Inspector Gadget Saves Christmas (New Video, $12.98), which features a special introduction by Yuletide savior Bill O’Reilly.
 
Fans of detective dramas are well aware that there are great crime shows produced all over the world.  One of the more popular is the French-language series Spiral, which has even received a limited airing here in the U.S. on PBS stations.  Spiral: Season 2 (MHz Networks, 418 min., $49.95) collects one of the early seasons of this worldwide hit.  Genre fans may want to check out this series, which must be doing something right since it is now broadcast in some 70 countries.
 
For fans of period mysteries from the “Golden Age of the English Murder Mystery” can’t do better than the sumptuously-produced Poirot: Season 9 (Acorn Media, 392 min., $39.98, BD $49.99).  David Suchet stars as Agatha Christie’s Belgian sleuth in these newly-remastered mysteries that now look better than ever, especially on Blu-ray where the Art Deco period details really sparkle.  The four feature-length mysteries in this set originally aired in 2003-2004—and include the opulently-produced classic Death on the Nile, along with Five Little Pigs, Sad Cypress, and The Hollow.  Guest stars include Emily Blunt, Toby Stephens, Phyllis Logan, and Gemma Jones.
 
Another fascinating UK  crime series, Line of Duty: Series 1 (Acorn Media, 305 min., $39.99) is a hard-hitting, ripped-from-the-headlines show that focuses on a young London cop who refuses to go along with the cover-up of a botched counterterrorism operation.  Transferred to the internal affairs department, he is faced with the unenviable task of proving that a high profile police detective is corrupt.  This 2012 series features edgy camerawork that mirrors its narrative and moral complexity as the young cop pursues the charismatic DCI Gates, a high profile black policeman, who is caught up in his own web of deceit in a saga, which definitely doesn’t see things in black and white terms.  This highly realistic police procedural has already been renewed for a second season and is well worth checking out.
 
Anime
 
There is really only one release in this category this week, the classic Tatsunoko Production Gatchaman Complete TV & OVA (Sentai Filmworks, “13+,” 2,770 min., $129.98, BD $149.98),  a massive set, which contains all 105 episodes of the original groundbreaking 1970s anime series that was adapted for broadcast in the U.S. as Battle of the Planets in the late 1970s and through the 1980s.  Sentai is putting out the versions produced by ADV that were released across 18 volumes in 2005 and 2006.  The release includes all 105 episodes of the original series, which is presented in its original Japanese format.  The English dub was produced by ADV and features a pretty faithful translation of the original Japanese script with some added 70s slang.  These sets also include the three 1990s OVAs that basically recapped the plot of the original Gatchaman TV series with updated character designs and altered backgrounds.  The new Sentai Filmworks BD set includes 14 discs, while the DVD set contains 22 discs.
 
In addition Sentai is releasing the Gatchaman OVA Collection (Sentai Filmworks, “13+,” 145 min., $29.98) by itself with a new dub (also included in the BD and DVD Complete Collections above) produced by Seraphim Digital with the original cast of the ADV 2005 dub.

Tom Flinn

The opinions expressed in this column do not necessarily reflect those of the editorial staff of ICv2.com.