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LOCATION: Amazon.com

 

THE SKINNY: Warner Home Video allowed Amazon.com users the chance to pick 10 films to get the DVD treatment. They started the voting with 30 films and whittled down to final 10 films. Now these films will be released on two different dates. The first five will get released on Dec.19 and the final five will hit shelves on Jan.30, 2007. All priced at $19.97. You can preorder the films at Amazon.com today.

 

Films to be released on Dec.19:

 

THE ILLUSTRATED MAN (1969) - A man, whose body is almost completely covered in tattoos (Rod Steiger), is looking for the woman who drew all the intricate designs on him. Each tattoo hides a futuristic story, which is experienced when stared at. Based on the book by Ray Bradbury.

 

Special Features:

• Vintage featurette Tattooed Steiger
• Original theatrical trailer

  

THERE WAS A CROOKED MAN (1970) - Paris Pitman, Jr. (Kirk Douglas) is a cocky inmate who matches wits with prison warden Woodward Lopeman (Henry Fonda) in this 1800s period western drama. Also stars Burgess Meredith, John Randolph and Lee Grant.

 

PRESENTING LILY MARS (1943) - Talented small-town girl Lily Mars (Judy Garland) hounds producer John Thornway (Van Heflin) for a part in his new play, but he doesn't want anything to do with stage-struck amateurs. However, when Lily follows him to New York, he gets to know her and his opinion of her changes for the better. When the leading lady of the play walks out, Lily finally gets her big break on Broadway.

 

Special Features:

• Audio only out take of deleted finale Paging Mr. Greenback
• Audio only version of the “long, later re-edited finale” Where There's Music
• Final version of the film’s Where There's Music as used in the film, but with Stereo audio as a separately selectable feature
• 1943 MGM short subject Heavenly Music
• 1943 MGM cartoon Who Killed Who? directed by Tex Avery
• Original theatrical trailer

 

UP PERISCOPE (1959) – Buoyed by his small screen success as TV’s MAVERICK Warner Bros. gave James Garner his first starring role in a big-budget motion picture with UP PERISCOPE and the box-office results were superb. In this WWII action classic, Garner portrays Lieutenant Braden, who discovers that Sally (Andra Martin), the woman he's been falling in love with, has actually been checking out his qualifications to be a U.S. Navy frogman. He must put his personal life behind him after receiving an assignment in which he is smuggled into a Japanese-held island via submarine to photograph radio codes.

 

OPERATION CROSSBOW (1965) - This is the story of the methods used to defeat Hitler's V1 (doodlebug) and V2 (rocket) "revenge weapons" towards the end of the World War II. Even though the Nazis were in retreat, these weapons could have turned their defeat into victory. The film includes references to Hannah Reich, who in real life was a test pilot and really did fly some of the first 'flying bombs'. With Sophia Loren, George Peppard, Trevor Howard and John Mills

 

Films getting released on Jan. 30, 1970:

 

THE ARRANGEMENT (1969) - Legendary stage and film director Elia Kazan returned to the screen for the first time in several years to create this provocative and moving melodrama. Eddie (Kirk Douglas) is a very rich man who has everything he wants; money, family, success. But a car crash makes him reconsider the life he leads. Searching for the happiness he lost, he remembers his one time lover, Gwen (Faye Dunaway). Meanwhile his wife (Deborah Kerr), schemes to take his fortune.

 

Special Features:

• Vintage behind-the-scenes featurette on the making of The Arrangement
• Original theatrical trailer

 

BAND OF ANGELS (1957) - In an attempt to carry on in his great Rhett Butler tradition, GONE WITH THE WIND star Clark Gable once again flexes his muscular charms in another Civil War-era movie, this time about a torrid romance between a plantation owner and a biracial beauty. Directed by Raoul Walsh, and also starring Yvonne De Carlo and Sidney Poitier, the film is highlighted by a stunning musical score by GONE WITH THE WIND composer Max Steiner.

  

GYMKATA (1985) - Jonathan Cabot (Kurt Thomas) is a champion gymnast. In the tiny, yet savage country of Parmistan, there is a perfect spot for a "star wars" site. For the US to get this site, they must compete in the brutal "Game." The government calls on Cabot, the son of a former operative, to win the game, so in order to do so Cabot combines his skill at western gymnastics with his fighting secrets of the east and forms Gymkata.

 

LOOKER (1981) - A plastic surgeon (Albert Finney) gets suspicious when models he has operated on begin to die in mysterious ways. With the help of Cindy (Susan Dey), the next in line to be killed, he traces the deaths to a mysterious corporation which develops new technologies. Directed and written by Michael Crichton (Westworld, Coma).

 

MADAME CURIE (1943) - Perennial co-stars Greer Garson and Walter Pidgeon followed their triumph in the Oscar-winning Mrs. Miniver, with this memorable biographical classic. Garson portrays the young Polish physics student Marie, who soon falls In love with and marries Dr. Pierre Curie (Walter Pidgeon), in whose lab she had worked. On their honeymoon they decide to investigate a strange effect Professor Becquerel (Reginald Owen) has noticed with the uranium/thorium stones used for Marie’s dissertation, and they determine there must be additional radioactive elements causing it. After years of experimentation in a makeshift lab at the University, they are finally able to isolate a few grains of a new element, radium, from 7 tons of raw material. Unfortunately, at the height of their success, tragedy strikes. The grand success of Madame Curie continued Garson’s winning streak as one of the biggest box-office stars of the decade.

 

Special Features:

• '37 MGM short: The Romance of Radium

Greer Garson Trailer Gallery: Goodbye Mr. Chips '39, Madame Curie, Mrs. Miniver, Pride and Prejudice, Random Harvest

13081-13101

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