While mainstream outlets will no doubt focus on this week’s release of the latest Will Ferrell comedy Blades of Glory, there are several interesting releases hovering farther from the limelight. A full listing of titles is included below (you have “Click to Read More” below to see it), but I’d especially like to draw your attention to a few.

Mondo Macabro is back this week with cult favorite The Blood Rose, a Euro-horror film from director Claude Mulot (click here to read Cinema Strikes Back’s review by Jeff). The Mondo Macabro team have been busy wrapping up their first original feature film Zibahkhana (a Pakistani horror film), which recently had its North American premier at the New York Asian Film Festival, and so their normal process of unearthing buried cinema from around the world was put on hold for a few months. For those who are not familiar with Mondo Macabro, run don’t walk to find yourself a copy of the book Mondo Macabro that started it all. The book is an eye-opening walking tour of films — particularly horror films — from Indonesia, Turkey, the Philippines, India, Hong Kong, and much more. Many of these films nobody would have heard of but for Mondo Macabro, and because none of the films were available, they began to release them on DVD through the Mondo Macabro label. Essential viewing for fans of world horror cinema.

Air Guitar Nation is another must-see this week. The hysterical documentary played at both the South by Southwest and Tribeca film festivals before working its way to a limited theatrical run, and for my part, I had so much fun seeing it that I bought tickets to attend last year’s air guitar championships (also hysterical). This is the rare movie that will appeal to everyone, even those who are only mildly interested in films. The story follows the organizing of the first competition to send an American — stage-named P Diddy — to the semi-serious, semi-joking Air Guitar championships in Europe. I remember going into this movie thinking that watching people air guitar would get really dull after a few minutes, after all how much variation can there be? And then I sat there with my mouth wide open in awe for the next 90 minutes — believe me, there’s more to this than you’d think. I don’t want to give any of the story away, but trust me, you’ll love it. It also spawned the book “To Air is Human“, for those who can’t get enough of the film.

In genre news, the original 3:10 to Yuma starring Van Heflin is coming out in the wake of the remake. It’s a strong western, and director Daves does a particularly good job of making the nominal villain an appealling character in his own right. Also, the Panik House/Synapse team-up is finally bearing fruit, with the release of Teruo Ishii’s notorious Horror of Malformed Men, and Nobuo Nakagawa’s Snake Woman’s Curse.

There are several interesting films coming out on DVD in the UK this week for those of you with all-region, PAL-converting DVD players, including Danny Boyle’s recent sci-fi film Sunshine, which won’t be available on Region 1 DVD for some time. I recommend Sunshine, though, as with most space movies, characters are forced to argue, make up, overreact, etc. beyond the reaches of what is credible, probably to keep the story moving given that an actual portrayal of astronauts in space could be pretty boring.

Also out in the UK this week is Lights in the Dusk, a new film from Finland’s great director Aki Kaurismaki — if you haven’t seen Kaurismaki’s films, they are remarkably similar in feel to Jim Jarmusch films, so much so in fact that it actually undermines Jarmusch a bit, who was clearly heavily influenced by Kaurismaki. Lights in the Dusk is the third film in a trilogy that also included 2002’s The Man Without a Past, a break-out film of sorts for Kaurismaki internationally (though personally Ariel is my favorite of his films).

There are a couple of other interesting Region 2 (PAL) DVD releases this week, and though I haven’t seen The Zombie Diaries, I do love me a zombie film, and so I’m especially excited to see all the positive reviews for that release. Also of note from Europe this week, the Spanish horror film Night of the Sunflowers. Nothing significant sticks out on Region 3 dvd this week, though a few titles are listed below (including one produced by “Andrew Lau” of Infernal Affairs fame).

David also wanted to draw our readers’ attention to a couple of noteworthy television releases: First is the fourth season of the Cartoon Network’s Samurai Jack, the most visually creative show on the air. Second is the release of the first season of NBC’s football drama Friday Night Lights. I haven’t caught this yet, but it’s getting the kind of critical love and buzz of an Arrested Development or Freaks and Geeks - everyone I know who has seen it swears by it. Catch up with this release and then tune in for the second season before it ends up on the brilliant but cancelled pile. Finally, the blockbuster first season of Heroes is coming out. Now, I’ll be the first to admit that the show has massive flaws, including awful pacing, some severe miscasting (the whiny Milo Ventimiglia and Ali Larter, and wooden Sendhil Ramamurthy, though Adrian Pasdar and Masi Oka are very good), and a superficially satisfying ending that deeply insults the audience’s intelligence (creator Tim Kring basically admitted as much in an interview, stating that his intention was for viewers to be too distracted by the dramatics to notice the logical gaps). Nevertheless, the geek factor reaches 11 in a good way - comics fans will love the use of archetypal plots and characters - and when the show is on, it’s really ON.

The high definition battle between HD-DVD and Blu-ray saw the biggest shake-up in two years this week, with the announcement that Paramount and Dreamworks will henceforth only be releasing films on HD-DVD. Paramount had previously been format neutral, and so the sudden change prompted it to cancel all its planned Blu-ray releases, including this week for Blades of Glory, which was nevertheless released on HD-DVD, along with Heroes: Season 1 and catalog titles Dawn of the Dead (the remake), Notting Hill and The Hurricane. As a result, nothing was released this week on Blu-ray. This will likely extend the format war for at least another 18 months, sadly.

Alright, enough of my babbling. A complete list of this week’s highlights follows below. Enjoy!

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Released This Week On DVD in the USA (August 28, Region 1, NTSC):

3:10 to Yuma (Sony)
1957, USA, Director: Delmer Daves

Air Guitar Nation (A&E)
2006, USA, Director: Alexandra Lipsitz

Antibodies (Dark Sky)
2005, Germany, Director: Christian Alvart, serial killer thriller

Blades of Glory (Paramount) (available on DVD and HD-DVD)
2007, USA, Director: Josh Gordon & Will Speck

The Blood Rose aka Ravaged aka Devil’s Maniac(Mondo Macabro)
1969, France, Director: Claude Mulot, “Eyes Without a Face” but with more sex and dwarves

Dawn of the Dead (Universal) (available on HD-DVD)
2007, USA, Director: Zack Snyder

The Dog Problem (Velocity/Thinkfilm)
2006, USA, Director: Scott Caan

Gideon’s Trumpet (Acorn Media)
1980, USA, Director: Robert E. Collins

Heroes: Season One (Universal) (available on DVD and HD-DVD)
2007, USA, Directors: various [TV]

Horror of Malformed Men (Panik House/Synapse)
1969, Japan, Director: Teruo Ishii, notorious film out of circulation for many years

LOL (Benten Films)
2007, USA, Director: Joe Swanberg (new film from the director of “Kissing on the Mouth” and “Hannah Takes the Stairs”)

Red Road (Tartan)
2006, UK/Denmark, Director: Andrea Arnold

Samurai Jack: Season 4 (Turner Home Entertainment)
2007, USA, Directors: various [TV]

Snake Woman’s Curse (Panik House/Synapse)
1968, Japan, Director: Nobuo Nakagawa

Year of the Dog (Paramount)
2007, USA, Director: Mike White

Also coming out on HD-DVD: Notting Hill, The Hurricane

No Blu-ray releases this week (Paramount Blu-ray titles were canceled)

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Released This Week On DVD in the UK (August 27, Region 2, PAL):

Lights in the Dusk
2007, Finland, Director: Aki Kaurismaki (third part in trilogy that included Man Without a Past, director Kaurismaki was a big influence on American director Jim Jarmusch)

Night of the Sunflowers
2006, Spain, Director: Jorge Sanchez-Cabezudo (horror/thriller)

Sunshine (Fox)
2007, UK, Director: Danny Boyle

The Zombie Diaries (Revolver Entertainment)
2006, UK, Director: Michael Bartlett, Kevin Gates

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Released This Week On DVD in Hong Kong (August 29-31, Region 3, NTSC):

Big Shot (Tai Seng)
2007, Hong Kong, (No English subs, but its an adaptation of a Gu Long novel and stars Nicolas Tse)

Simply Actors (Tai Seng)
2007, Hong Kong, Director: Patrick Leung & Chan Hing Kai

The Third Eye (Joy Sales)
2007, Hong Kong, Director: Carol Lai (Produced by Andy Lau)

Wonder Women (Tai Seng)
2007, Hong Kong, Director: Barbara Wong

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Additional Links:
::: DVD Calendar — a Look at What’s Coming Up
::: Discuss This Week in DVD with Others in the Movie Forum Lounge
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“Where’s my Tae Bo exercise video!!!!”

Here at Cinema Strikes Back our goal is to sift through the masses of dvd information so you don’t have to — to cut straight to the good stuff, or at least what us handful of film geeks think is the good stuff. That means that many dvd releases are left off the list, either because they suck or more likely because we don’t know better. Although I can’t promise we’ll include everything sent to us (”ARRGH, How could you not include Postnatal Rescue or Topless Fight Club in this week’s lineup!”), we always welcome feedback, and I invite you to email me here if I’ve forgotten any important releases this week.