(2023) The Tony-nominated Broadway hit comes to the big screen. Composer-lyricist Sara Bareilles is Jenna Hunterson, a waitress and expert pie maker stuck in a small town and a loveless marriage. When a baking contest offers her a chance at escape, Jenna fights to reclaim part of herself. "Waitress" celebrates the power of friendship, dreams, the family we choose and the beauty of a well-baked pie. Based on the 2007 film starring Keri Russell. Vitals: Directors: Diane PaulusBrett Sullivan. Stars: Sara Bareilles, Dakin Matthews, Christopher Fitzgerald, Eric Anderson, Molly Jobe, Joe Tippett.
CC, MPAA rating: NR, 144 min., Musical Drama, North American box office gross: $5.402 million, worldwide $5.402 million, Decal Releasing.Formats: DVD, Blu-ray, VOD, Digital.
Top Disc Releases Next Week
•A Creature Was Stirring •The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds & Snakes •Hypnotic •The Marvels •Priscilla •Under The Fig Trees
American Fiction: A novelist who's fed up with the establishment profiting from "Black" entertainment uses a pen name to write a book that propels him into the heart of hypocrisy and the madness he claims to disdain. (Premium Rental/Sale; Free on MGM+ March 8)
The Book of Clarence: Struggling to find a better life, Clarence is captivated by the power of the rising Messiah and soon risks everything to carve a path to a divine existence. (Digital, VOD only)
Foggy Mountain: In order to raise money for his wife’s medical treatment, professional martial artist Phi competes in a series of increasingly brutal prize fights in nearby villages. However, after winning his final match, he runs afoul of powerful crime lord Ba Rau, who ruthlessly retaliates in a cruel attack on Phi’s wife. Blinded by grief and rage, Phi vows revenge (Digital, VOD only)
Jim Henson: Jim Henson's "Labyrinth" & "Dark Crystal" available to buy or own digitally Feb. 6 (Digital, VOD only)
Imagining the Indian: A comprehensive look at the movement to eradicate the words, images, and gestures that many Native Americans and their allies find harmful, demeaning, and offensive. (Digital, VOD, DVD, Day & date)
The Marvels: Carol Danvers aka Captain Marvel has reclaimed her identity from the tyrannical Kree. When her duties send her to an anomalous wormhole, her powers are entangled with super-fan Kamala Khan, aka Ms. Marvel, and Carol’s estranged niece, astronaut Captain Monica Rambeau. Together, this unlikely trio must team up and work together to save the universe. (Disney+; DVD, Blu-ray release: February 13)
February 9
Float: After she nearly drowns, a young woman unexpectedly falls for the small-town lifeguard who rescued her. Based on the romance novel by Kate Marchant. (Digital, VOD only)
February 11
The Last Voyage of the Demeter: Dracula’s unholy presence dooms the crew of the merchant ship Demeter as it sails from Carpathia to London. Based on a chapter in Bram Stoker's "Dracula." (Paramount+, Showtime)
(2004) Kristanna Loken, Ben Kingsley, Michelle Rodriguez, Michael Madsen. Rayne is a dhampir - a human-vampire hybrid - enslaved by a malevolent traveling circus. When she eventually breaks free of her servitude, Rayne vows to confront her immensely powerful vampire father, Kagan, for abandoning her. But when Rayne learns of her father’s long history of betrayal and vindictiveness, Rayne’s daring quest turns into a fight for her life. A cutting-edge 4k scan sourced from the original negatives, enhanced by a fresh director-Uwe Boll-approved HDR color-grade, and presented in its authentic 2.35:1 aspect ratio—the same immersive format in which the film was originally showcased theatrically. Now restored for the first time on home video. Unrated home video cut of the film. Formats: Blu-ray/4K UHD. Extras: New director audio commentary; deleted and extended scenes; interviews with cast & crew; behind the scenes; CGI making of the film; "Dinner with Uwe Boll." (Massacre Video).
The Book of Harth
(2022) Multiple award-winning documentary 20 years in the making. Documentary centers on NYC-based conceptual artist David Greg Harth, who embarked on a 20-year project to gather signatures from the most culturally relevant figures of our times in his copy of the Holy Bible. As this decades-long odyssey ended, NYC filmmaker Pierre Guillet followed Harth over the last year of the project as he raced to get the final signatures to bring this massive undertaking to a close. "The Book of Harth" is a dissection of not just the art itself but the sacrifices made in the name of art that you won’t soon forget. The film won the Best Documentary Feature award at Kevin Smith's inaugural edition of the Smodcastle Film Festival in 2022, among many other awards. Featuring interviews with philosopher Noam Chomsky, artist Wim Delvoye, filmmakers Paul Schrader, Kevin Smith, and John Waters, and others.
Formats: DVD, VOD, Digital. Extras: Commentary featuring director Pierre Guillet and subject David Greg Harth; deleted scenes with Bruce Springsteen, John Williams, O.J. Simpson, Andrew Cuomo, Stevie Wonder, Michael J. Fox, and Julian Assange. (MVD Entertainment Group).
Funeral Home Blu-ray Debut
(1980) Young and easily frightened 16-year-old Heather (Lesleh Donaldson) is called to stay with her grandmother in the hopes of helping her turn an old funeral home into a bed-and-breakfast. But strange happenings and unexplained murders around the home quickly makes this vacation spot a "dead-and-breakfast" - with no answers in sight as to who or what is causing all the death. It is up to Heather to investigate all the eerie and creepy corners of the former funeral home to unlock a decades old secret - but will she survive to solve the mysteries. Formats: Blu-ray. Extras: New audio commentary with film historians Jason Pichonsky and Paul Corupe; new isolated score selections & audio interview with music historian Douglass Fake; new audio interviews with actor Lesleh Donaldson, first assistant director Ray Sager, and production assistant Shelley Allen; new “Secrets & Shadows” interview with director of photography Mark Irwin; new “Dead & Breakfast” interviews with art director Susan Longmire and set assistant Elinor Galbraith; new “Family Owned & Operated” interview with Brian Allen, president of Premier Drive-In Theatres; new original filming location footage; theatrical trailer; video trailer; TV spots; radio spots; still gallery. (Scream Factory).
McCabe & Mrs. Miller
(1971) This unorthodox dream western by Robert Altman may be the most radically beautiful film to come out of the New American Cinema. It stars Warren Beatty and Julie Christie as two newcomers to the raw Pacific Northwest mining town of Presbyterian Church, who join forces to provide the miners with a superior kind of whorehouse experience. The appearance of representatives for a powerful mining company with interests of its own, however, threatens to be the undoing of their plans. With its fascinating, flawed characters, evocative cinematography by the great Vilmos Zsigmond, innovative overlapping dialogue, and haunting use of Leonard Cohen songs, "McCabe & Mrs. Miller" brilliantly deglamorized and revitalized the most American of genres. Formats: 4K UHD + Blu-ray combo, with 4K digital restoration, with uncompressed monaural soundtrack. One 4K UHD disc of the film and one Blu-ray with the film and special features. Extras:Read more here. (The Criterion Collection).
Peacock (pou)
(2022 -- South Africa) After violating the strict moral standards of The Foundation, the puritanical institution for young women in which she was raised, Anna Pohl (Tarryn Wyngaard) is sent to care for one of its founding members. An Apartheid-era theologian living out his days in paranoia on his isolated farm, Sarel Cilliers (Johan Botha) suffers from frightening visions and demonic hallucinations. Haunted by her own feelings of guilt, Anna slowly gets pulled into, Sarel's terrifying world as she tries to unravel the mysteries behind this sinister place and its connection to the devastating secrets being hidden by The Foundation. An evocative and erotic South African gothic horror that explores the dark recesses of the Afrikaner psyche and its compromised past. Formats: DVD, Blu-ray, VOD, Digital. (IndiePix).
Waitress: The Musical
(2023) Sara Bareilles, Dakin Matthews, Christopher Fitzgerald, Eric Anderson, Molly Jobe, Joe Tippett. The hit Broadway musical about a small-town pie baker with big dreams gets the silver screen treatment. Formats: DVD, Blu-ray, VOD, Digital. (Decal Releasing).
DVD
