Post Description

ECLIPSE SERIES 5: THE FIRST FILMS OF SAMUEL FULLER
complete 3-disc boxset

criterion.com/boxsets/499


DVD Release Date: August 14, 2007


ABOUT THE BOXSET:
His films have been called raw, outrageous, sensational, and daring. In four decades of directing, Samuel Fuller created a legendarily idiosyncratic oeuvre, examining U.S. history and mythmaking in westerns, film noirs, and war epics. And characteristically, it all began with a bang: after printing the legend with the elegant B-pictures I Shot Jesse James and The Baron of Arizona, he got himself into hot water with the FBI on The Steel Helmet, the first American movie to portray the Korean War. These three independent films showed off Fuller?s genre diversity, gutter wit, and subversive force, and pointed the way to a controversial career in studio moviemaking.


CONTENTS:

3 feature films:

I Shot Jesse James (Samuel Fuller, 1949, 81 min.)

The Baron of Arizona (Samuel Fuller, 1950, 97 min.)

The Steel Helmet (Samuel Fuller, 1951, 84 min.)


Format: NTSC

DVD Size: 5.66 + 4.12 + 4.15 GB - Exact Untouched Copy

Time (total): 262 minutes

Type: Black and White

Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1

Sound (main features): English

Subtitles: optional English



DISC DETAILS
=========================

------------------
DISC ONE
------------------

THE BARON OF ARIZONA
criterion.com/films/881
1950, 97 min.
In one of his own favorite roles, Vincent Price portrays legendary swindler James Addison Reavis, who in 1880 concocted an elaborate and dangerous hoax to name himself the ?Baron? of Arizona, and therefore inherit all the land in the state. Samuel Fuller adapts this tall tale to film with fleet, elegant storytelling and a sly sense of humor.

Black and White
1.33:1
English


------------------
DISC TWO
------------------

THE STEEL HELMET
criterion.com/films/445
1951, 84 min.
The Steel Helmet marked Samuel Fuller's official arrival as a mighty cinematic force. Despite its relatively low budget, this portrait of Korean War soldiers dealing with moral and racial identity crises remains one of the director's most gripping, realistic depictions of the blood and guts of war, as well as a reflection of Fuller's irreducible social conscience. So controversial were the film's comments on domestic and war crimes (American bigotry, the Japanese-American WWII internment camps) that Fuller became the target of an FBI investigation.

Black and White
1.33:1
English


------------------
DISC THREE
------------------

I SHOT JESSE JAMES
criterion.com/films/882
1949, 81 min.
After years of crime reporting, screenwriting, and authoring pulp novels, Samuel Fuller made his directorial debut with the lonesome ballad of Robert Ford (played by Red River's John Ireland), who fatally betrayed his friend, the notorious Jesse James. At once modest and intense, I Shot Jesse James is an engrossing pocket portrait of guilt and psychological torment, and an auspicious beginning for the maverick filmmaker.

Black and White
1.33:1
English




=========================================


Posted in: a.b.dvd.criterion
Poster: JimB