Blu-ray Releases
OnVideo's Guide to DVDs
Links to DVD news, information and sales sites.
August 2025
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- August 5
The Burmese Harp
(1956 -- Japan) An Imperial Japanese Army regiment surrenders to British forces in Burma at the close of World War II and finds harmony through song. A private, thought to be dead, disguises himself as a Buddhist monk and stumbles upon spiritual enlightenment. Magnificently shot in hushed black and white, Kon Ichikawa's "The Burmese Harp" is an eloquent meditation on beauty coexisting with death and remains one of Japanese cinema's most overwhelming antiwar sentiments, both tender and brutal in its grappling with Japan's wartime legacy. Formats: 4K UHD + Blu-ray, Blu-ray, with New 4K digital restoration, with uncompressed monaural soundtrack. In the 4K UHD edition: One 4K UHD disc of the film and one Blu-ray with the film and special features. Extras: Read more here. (The Criterion Collection).
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Fires on the Plain
(1959 -- Japan) An agonizing portrait of desperate Japanese soldiers stranded in a strange land during World War II, Kon Ichikawa's "Fires on the Plain" is a compelling descent into psychological and physical oblivion. Denied hospital treatment for tuberculosis and cast off into the unknown, Private Tamura treks across an unfamiliar Philippine landscape, encountering an increasingly debased cross section of Imperial Army soldiers, who eventually give in to the most terrifying craving of all. Grisly yet poetic, "Fires on the Plain" is one of the most powerful works from one of Japanese cinema's most versatile filmmakers. Formats: 4K UHD + Blu-ray, Blu-ray, with new 4K digital restoration, with uncompressed monaural soundtrack. In the 4K UHD edition: One 4K UHD disc of the film and one Blu-ray with the film and special features. Extras: Read more here. (The Criterion Collection).
Back to top- August 12
Cairo Station
(1958 -- Egypt) Youssef Chahine established his international reputation with this masterpiece, which, though initially a commercial failure in Egypt, would become one of the most influential and celebrated works in all of Arab cinema. The director himself stars as Kenawi, a disabled newspaper hawker whose obsession with a sultry drink seller (Hind Rostom, known as the "Marilyn Monroe of Arabia") leads to tragedy of operatic proportions on the streets of Cairo. Blending elements of neorealism with provocative noir-melodrama, Cairo Station is a work of raw populist poetry that explores the individual's search for a place in Egypt's new postrevolutionary political order. Formats: Blu-ray, DVD with new 4K digital restoration, with uncompressed monaural soundtrack. Extras: Read more here. (The Criterion Collection).
Back to top- August 19
A Confucian Confusion / Mahjong: Two Films By Edward Yang
In this pair of sharp, sprawling satires, one of Taiwan's most celebrated filmmakers, Edward Yang, captures the anything-can-happen mood of Taipei at the end of the 20th century. Made in-between his epic dramas "A Brighter Summer Day" and "Yi Yi," "A Confucian Confusion" and "Mahjong" find Yang applying a lighter but no less masterly touch to his explorations of human relationships in an increasingly globalized, hypercapitalistic world. These intricately constructed ensemble comedies-one set in a cutthroat corporate milieu, the other in a shady criminal underworld-reveal the absurdity and cynicism at the heart of modern urban life. A Confucian Confusion (1994). Yang's first foray into comedy may have been a surprising stylistic departure, but in its richly novelistic vision of urban discontent, it is quintessential Yang. This relationship roundelay centers on a coterie of young Taipei professionals whose paths converge at an entertainment company where the boundaries between art and commerce, love and business, have become hopelessly blurred. Evoking the chaos of a city infiltrated by Western chains, logos, and attitudes, "A Confucian Confusion" is an incisive reflection on the role of traditional values in a materialistic, amoral society. Mahjong (1996). Yang's follow-up to "A Confucian Confusion" is another dizzying comedy set in a globalized Taipei, but with a darker, more caustic edge. Amid a rapidly changing cityscape, the lives of a disparate group of swindlers, hustlers, gangsters, and expats collide, with a naive French teenager (Virginie Ledoyen) and a sensitive young local (Lawrence Ko) who tries to protect her caught dangerously in the middle. By turns brutal, shocking, tender, and bitingly funny, "Mahjong" is a dazzling vision of a multicultural Taipei where nearly every relationship has a price and newfound prosperity comes at the expense of the human soul. Formats: Blu-ray, with new 4K digital restorations, with 5.0 surround DTS-HD Master Audio soundtracks. Extras: Read more here. (The Criterion Collection). 
Shoeshine
(1946 -- Italy) An international breakthrough for neorealism, Vittorio De Sica's Academy Award-winning film is an indelible fable of innocence lost amid the hardscrabble reality of 1940s Italy. On the streets of Rome, two boys-best friends Giuseppe (Rinaldo Smordoni) and Pasquale (Franco Interlenghi)-set out to raise the money to buy a horse by shining shoes. When they are inadvertently caught up in a robbery and sent to a brutal juvenile detention center, their loyalty to each other is severely tested. A devastating portrait of economic struggle made all the more haunting by its child's-eye perspective, "Shoeshine" stands as one of the defining achievements of postwar Italian filmmaking. Formats: 4K UHD + Blu-ray, Blu-ray, DVD with New 4K digital restoration, undertaken by The Film Foundation and the Cineteca di Bologna, with uncompressed monaural soundtrack. In the 4K UHD edition: One 4K UHD disc of the film and one Blu-ray with the film and special features. Extras: Read more here. (The Criterion Collection). - August 26
Compensation
(1999) A poignant portrait of Deaf African Americans and the complexities of love at both ends of the 20th century, Zeinabu irene Davis's film is a groundbreaking story of inclusion and visibility. In dual performances, Michelle A. Banks and John Earl Jelks play an educated dressmaker and an illiterate migrant in 1910s Chicago, and a resilient graphic artist and an endearing librarian living in the same city eight decades later. Employing archival photography, an original score blending ragtime and African percussion, and lyrical editing, Davis deftly intertwines the two couple's stories, in ways both tender and tragic. "Compensation" is a landmark of American independent cinema that confronts the social forces and prejudices that hinder love. Formats: Blu-ray, DVD with new 4K digital restoration, supervised and approved by director Zeinabu irene Davis, in collaboration with the UCLA Film & Television Archive and Wimmin with a Mission Productions, and in conjunction with the Sundance Institute, with uncompressed stereo soundtrack. Extras: Read more here. (The Criterion Collection). 
Locked
(2025) From producer Sam Raimi comes a relentless horror-thriller where luxury becomes deadly. When Eddie (Bill Skarsgård) breaks into a luxury SUV, he steps into a deadly trap set by William (Anthony Hopkins), a self-proclaimed vigilante delivering his own brand of twisted justice. With no means of escape, Eddie must fight to survive in a ride where escape is an illusion, survival is a nightmare, and justice shifts into high gear.. Vitals: Director: David Yarovesky. Stars: Bill Skarsgard, Anthony Hopkins, Ashley Cartwright, Michael Eklund, Navid Charkhi. CC, MPAA rating: R, 95 min., Action Thriller, Theatrical release date: March 21, 2025, North American box office gross: $1.6 million, worldwide $3.8 million, Streaming date: April 22, 2025, Paramount. Formats: DVD, VOD, Digital. 
Saving Face
(2004) A queer romantic comedy set in vibrant, multicultural New York City, Alice Wu's irresistible feature debut breathed fresh life into the genre by combining snappy dialogue and a swooning love story with a poignant narrative about a mother and daughter coming to terms with each other. Just as Wil (Michelle Krusiec), a harried young surgical resident, begins a promising romance with the flirtatious dancer Vivian (Lynn Chen), her life is turned upside down when her more traditional Chinese mother (Joan Chen)-unwed and unexpectedly pregnant-moves in with her, forcing both women to confront the generational and cultural barriers that have long troubled their relationship. Both embracing and cleverly subverting rom-com conventions, Wu delivers a bighearted ode to the Chinese American diaspora, and the liberating joy of living one's truth. Formats: Blu-ray, with high-definition digital master, approved by director Alice Wu, with 5.1 surround DTS-HD Master Audio soundtrack. Extras: Read more here. (The Criterion Collection). 
Vermiglio
(2024 -- Italy) In a remote Alpine village, a strict schoolteacher's family undergoes a profound shift when a mysterious Sicilian soldier arrives fleeing the front lines of World War II. As the seasons change, the family's three very different daughters will each find their lives transformed. Blending historically grounded realism with painterly grace, Delpero draws from her own family's history for an at once intimate and momentous vision of a world suspended between the patriarchal past and the stirrings of a new future. Vitals: Director: Maura Delpero. Stars: Tommaso Ragno, Roberta Rovelli,Martina Scrinzi. CC, MPAA rating: NR, 119 min., Action Thriller, Theatrical release date: September 19, 2024 (Italy), December 29, 2024 (USA), North American box office gross: $.216 million, worldwide $3.9 million, Streaming date: March 4, 2025, Janus Contemporaries. Formats: DVD, Blu-ray, VOD, Digital. 
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All listings are based on information from the home video studios. Some release dates may change and titles may come out after a specified date (with no announcement from the studio). Additionally, some titles may be released with little or no advance announcement. And since all DVDs are priced at sell-through and are available for substantial discounts at both online and brick-and-mortar stores, we only list suggested retail prices for some special editions, box sets and collections. 
All DVDs are screened on a reference system consisting of a Oppo BDP-83 Blu-ray Disc Player w/SACD & DVD-Audio, a Rotel RSX-972 Surround Sound Receiver, and Phase Technology 1.1 (front), 33.1 (center), and 50 (rear) speakers and Power 10 subwoofer.
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