Blu-ray & DVD: The Digital Dread Report for 10/13

*Click these links to see our other Release Date Pages: Theatrical, VOD, and TV.

This week brings us another rather large crop of Blu-rays & DVDs to satiate our October hunger, and while we've only featured two titles at the top of our list, there are plenty of good ones below them that are worthy additions to any Horror/Movie Collection.

*Be sure to click the pics to order yourself some flicks!

A disturbed woman is receiving a radical form of psychotherapy at a remote, mysterious institute. Meanwhile, her five-year-old daughter, under the care of her estranged husband, is being terrorized by a group of demonic beings. How these two story lines connect is the shocking and grotesque secret of this bloody tale of monstrous parenthood from David Cronenberg, starring Oliver Reed and Samantha Eggar. With its combination of psychological and body horror, The Brood laid the groundwork for many of the director’s films to come, but it stands on its own as a personal, singularly scary vision.

One of the best Horror movies of the 70's, and our favorite Cronenberg flick, The Brood is an absolute Day One purchase for us. The fact that Criterion is giving it a new 2k transfer only makes is more of a Must Own.

This is a great movie, and one that we're ecstatic to finally have on Blu-ray. Don't miss out on this one.

• New, restored 2K digital transfer, supervised by director David Cronenberg, with uncompressed monaural soundtrack on the Blu-ray.
• New documentary about the making of the film and Cronenberg’s early work, featuring actor Samantha Eggar, executive producer Pierre David, cinematographer Mark Irwin, assistant director John Board, and special makeup effects artists Rick Baker (Videodrome) and Joe Blasco (Shivers, Rabid)
• New, restored 4K digital transfer of Cronenberg’s 1970 feature Crimes of the Future, supervised by the director, plus a 2011 interview with Cronenberg about his early career.
• Interview from 2013 with actors Art Hindle and Cindy Hinds.
• Appearance by actor Oliver Reed on The Merv Griffin Show from 1980.
• Radio spot.
• PLUS: An essay by critic Carrie Rickey.

For six electrifying seasons, no crime series proved more combustible than the Peabody Award-winning Justified. At the explosive center of the action, Western-style, Stetson-wearing, gun-slinging U.S. Marshal Raylan Givens (Timothy Olyphant) confronts murder, drugs, bank heists, mobsters, crime families, corrupt politicians and even his own tumultuous past – and never backs down. His ultimate adversary is the cunning, complex outlaw Boyd Crowder (Walton Goggins), but the real wild card is Ava Crowder (Joelle Carter), the mysterious woman torn between the two men and both sides of the law. From creator Graham Yost and based on legendary author Elmore Leonard's crime novella "Fire in the Hole," it all leads to a perfectly unexpected final showdown.

One of the best TV Shows of the past decade, Justified is one that will always have a place on our shelves, and one that we will re-watch on a regular basis.

Elmore Leonard was a great American writer, and few did crime novels better than he did. If you want to know how dialogue should be written, check out his works. With Justified, he gave us a real, earnest anti-hero in Raylan Givens; a character-rich setting with Harlan County, Kentucky; and an excellent supporting cast of both good guys and villains.

The show may have expanded on his "Raylan" universe, and even taken a few liberties while doing so, but it did so with style, grace, and respect for both the author, and his material. Raylan Givens and Boyd Crowder are, and always will be, two of the greatest Television characters of all-time, and if you have yet to take the Justified plunge, you really should do so.

What a great, great series, this was. 

• All extras included on the previous releases.
• That's a Wrap Gag Reel.
• Three All-New Featurettes.
• Writers' Room Tour with Graham Yost.
• Leaving Harlan Alive: Making the Final Season.
• Harlan Revisited: Favorite Moments.
• In Elmore's Words - featuring actors, who worked with Elmore Leonard, reading select passages from some of his most well-known pieces of work.
• Justified Flask.
• Collectible Packaging.
• Commemorative Disc Book.

Still plenty of good titles for us to sort through, so keep reading!

• San Andreas was big dumb fun that will look great on an HDTV set-up.
• Bates Motel is a solid TV Show, and one that we could see re-watching down the road.
• The Following is pulpy dreck that falls in the "so bad it's good" category. Worth owning? I'm not sure about that, but if you like your TV Shows dumb and fun, it might be at least worth a watch.
• There have been three movies based on the exploits of Dr. Alex Cross, and Kiss the Girls and Along Came a Spider are the only two worth watching. Morgan Freeman, y'all!
• Synapse is releasing two new titles this week -Manos: The Hands of Fate, and Mosquito- and while we're not sure if we'd buy either one, we can say that Synapse does an excellent job with their releases, so they are well worth checking out for those of you who are so inclined.
• Twilight Time is releasing Count Yorga, Vampire; Scream and Scream Again, and Strange Invaders to Blu-ray this week. Twilight Time releases tend to be a bit more pricey, and you can only order directly from them, but they always do a great job with their releases, so it's worth it for the titles you really covet. *Keep in mind that Twilight Time titles are always Limited Edition runs of 3000-5000 copies, so buy quick if you're buying.
• Team America: World Police is funny as hell, and one that we will always re-watch. The fact that this BD is not the Unrated Cut frustrates us a bit, but really, it's still worth owning.

On the DVD Front this week...

• Neon Maniacs and Nightmare are 80's classics, and Wayward Pines was decent enough, I suppose, but most of the other DVD titles this week are ones that we'll be skipping.
• Everything else, as always, is a crap-shoot.