A Retail 'Covenant'

Walmart 'Alien: Covenant' shirt exclusive

Plenty of exclusives for Fox's Alien: Covenant were available at retail when the movie hit shelves Aug. 15.

Walmart offered Blu-ray and UHDs packed with an XL T-shirt emblazoned with the winner of the 2017 Alien Day fan art contest.

Target offered The Blu-ray with a 36-page "Creatures of Alien: Covenant" booklet.

And Best Buy offered Steelbook packaging for both the Blu-ray and 4K Ultra HD Blu-ray combo packs, at a $2 premium for each.

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New on Disc: 'Variete' and more …

Varieté (Blu-ray)

Street 8/22/17
Kino Lorber, Drama, $29.95 Blu-ray, NR.
Stars Emil Jannings, Lya De Putti, Warwick Ward.
1925. Varieté is probably the best and most famous film from the less celebrated E.A. Dupont — with German star Emil Jannings Jannings as the owner of a sideshow.
Extras: The packed Blu-ray includes the previously DVD-released 1922 version of Othello, which also teamed Jannings and Lya De Putti, plus an illuminating supplementary “visual essay” by historian Bret Wood and several options for the background music.
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Money From Home

Olive, Comedy, $24.95 DVD, $29.95 Blu-ray, NR.
Stars Dean Martin & Jerry Lewis, Marjie Millar, Pat Crowley.
1953. The first nine of 16 total Dean Martin & Jerry Lewis comedies were in black-and-white, the final seven were in color, and Money From Home (a Damon Runyon racetrack farce about a potentially underhanded steeplechase contest) was first of the latter bunch.
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'Guardians' Among Steelbook Preorders

Best Buy's 'Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2' 4K/3D Blu-ray Steelbook

Best Buy is taking preorders for Steelbook Blu-ray editions of Disney's Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2. Two variants are available: a Blu-ray/DVD combo pack and a 4K/3D/Blu-ray combo pack. Best Buy's Steelbook is the exclusive 3D edition of the film.

Target will have a Guardians Blu-ray with exclusive digital content.

Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 is available on Digital HD now and arrives on disc Aug. 22.

Target also will have an exclusive Steelbook Blu-ray of Lionsgate's The Walking Dead: The Complete Seventh Season on Aug. 22.

Best Buy had TV Blu-rays starting at $9.99 and offered a free $10 gift card with the purchase of $50 or more of select TV seasons on disc.

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New on Disc: 'Night People' and more …

Night People (Blu-ray)

Kino Lorber, Drama, $29.95 Blu-ray, NR.
Stars Gregory Peck, Broderick Crawford, Anita Bjork, Buddy Ebsen.
1954. Contemporary to its time, Night People had to have been one of the first Hollywood releases to treat American vs. Russian espionage in cat-and-mouse fashion the way John le Carre books and movies eventually did.
Extras: Cecilia Peck (daughter of People lead Gregory) says in the Blu-ray bonus interview she shares with two male siblings that she finds it a challenge to follow the plot twists here.
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State Fair (Blu-ray)

Available via ScreenArchives.com
Twilight Time, Musical, $29.95 Blu-ray, NR.
Stars Pat Boone, Bobby Darin, Pamela Tiffin, Ann-Margret, Tom Ewell, Alice Faye.
1962. As the latest eye-filler from the 20^th Century-Fox catalog served up on a high-def golden platter by Twilight Time, the third and final State Fair is a splendorous view.
Extras: Pat Boone offers voiceover commentary.
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Walmart All In on 'Pure Country'

Walmart devoted significant shelf space to its exclusive Blu-ray and DVD of Warner's Pure Country: Pure Heart, with the title taking up a whole row of the new-release section.

The movie is the third under the "Pure Country" banner, following a 1992 theatrical film starring George Strait and the 2010 direct-to-video "sequel" Pure Country: The Gift, which had little to do with the original other than a similar story of a country singer trying to make it big. The new film follows a similar tact and features Willie Nelson as himself.

In addition to the DVD ($12.96) and Blu-ray ($19.96) versions, Walmart offered a $14.96 DVD double feature of the new film with the original.

Best Buy also had an exclusive DVD two-pack of Universal's new direct-to-video Cop-and-a-Half: New Recruit that paired it with the original 1993 Cop-and-a-Half starring Burt Reynolds. The new one features Lou Diamond Phillips and Lulu Wilson.

Best Buy promoted preorders for Steelbook editions of Disney movies Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 and The Lion King: Signature Collection.

Best Buy also had sales of 4K Ultra HD Blu-rays at $14.99, and superhero movie Blu-rays starting at $5.99.

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New on Disc: 'Running on Empty' and more …

Running on Empty (Blu-ray)

Available via Warner Archive
Warner, Drama, $21.99 Blu-ray, ‘PG-13.’
Stars Christine Lahti, River Phoenix, Judd Hirsch, Martha Plimpton.
1988. Running on Empty was one of the the last Sidney Lumet films that generally pleased everybody with unqualified success, dealing with ’60s political radicals on the run whose past catches up to their teenaged son, played by River Phoenix. who got his only Oscar nomination for playing this shy brooder.
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Road to Rio & Road to Bali

Kino Lorber, Comedy, $14.95 DVD each, $24.95 Blu-ray each, NR.
Stars Bing Crosby, Bob Hope, Dorothy Lamour.
1947/1952. By the time the “Road” pictures’ two superstar leads and their writers got to the later series entries, the fourth wall and all other pretenses of conventional storytelling hadn’t merely been shattered but blown to smithereens by a nuclear device. Even though it’s in black-and-white against relatively drab settings, Road to Rio is quite funny for maybe 75% of the time and offers some of the series’ most ticklish guest shots. Road to Bali, the only “Road” pic shot in color, is lovely to look at while also boasting some funny walk-ons of its own.
Extras: Commentary with Michael Schlesinger and Mark Evanier.
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'Boss Baby' Brings Goodies

Walmart's 'Boss Baby' Blu-ray cover

Fox's July 25 home video release of DreamWorks' The Boss Baby was accompanied by several retailer exclusives.

Walmart offered exclusive box art with the Blu-ray combo pack and 4K Ultra HD Blu-ray combo pack versions, and offered 20 minutes of extras via the Vudu streaming service.

Target offered a gift set that included the Blu-ray combo pack with an exclusive talking keychain that says six movie quotes.

Best Buy offered a Boss Baby lunchbox for $4.99 with the purchase of the film or another qualifying title.

Paramount's Ghost in the Shell also came with some exclusives. Target offered exclusive Blu-ray box art and 30 minutes of exclusive extras. Best Buy offered Steelbook packaging with the Blu-ray and UHD versions.

Again, some DVD versions of new releases were hard to come by at brick-and-mortar stores, With Warner's Unforgettable and Fox's Gifted being Blu-ray only at Best Buy locations. Amazon's DVD of Unforgettable was available only through third-party Marketplace sellers upon its debut.

Amazon also seems to have shut down preorders on several Disney titles, including Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2, Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales and Rebels: The Complete Season Three.

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'Kong' Is King of Exclusives

Walmart's two-pack of 'Kong: Skull Island' and 'Godzilla.'

Retailers weren't shy with exclusives tailored to Warner's Kong: Skull Island July 18.

Walmart actually had two disc exclusives for the new adventure film. The first was a single-disc DVD edition in which the only extra is a director's commentary; the widely available DVD is a two-disc set with a bonus disc containing featurettes and deleted scenes.

The other Walmart exclusive was a Blu-ray two-pack containing Kong: Skull Island and 2014's Godzilla, the film for which the "Kong" reboot is something of a prequel, in that both films are set in the same fictional world and the central monsters of both are destined to fight on film in 2020. In addition, the version of the Kong Blu-ray combo pack included with this set features unique box art.

Best Buy offered a Steelbook edition of the Kong: Skull Island Ultra HD Blu-ray edition.

Target offered a special Kong Blu-ray combo pack with lenticular box art and 12 minutes of exclusive bonus content labeled as "A Terrifying Paradise: Creating Skull Island."

At Amazon, on the other hand, the DVD edition wasn't even being sold on its debut day; fans looking to buy the DVD version from the online retailer had to find a copy from a third-party Marketplace affiliate. To compound the issue, the version of the DVD linked to the title was the Spanish Region 2 version; the proper Region 1 edition was listed separately.

Not that the version availability issues are isolated to Amazon, as several of the big retailers only stocked either the DVD or Blu-ray version of the bigger titles of the week. Target just had the DVD version of Universal's The Promise, while Best Buy stores offered just the Blu-ray version of The Promise and Lionsgate's Free Fire. At Target and Best Buy, the missing version was available online.

Also notable at Target, Sony Pictures' new animated Resident Evil: Vendetta was available only in the Blu-ray version, not DVD or UHD, which were readily available at the other retailers.

Otherwise, Target's weekly ad devoted a lot of space to tout preorders of the Aug. 22 Blu-ray release of Disney's Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2, for which Target is offering a free $5 gift card with preorders. Target's Blu-ray also includes exclusive digital bonus content.

Best Buy will have the exclusive 4K/3D Blu-ray combo pack for Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2.

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New on Disc: 'Joe Versus the Volcano' and more …

Joe Versus the Volcano (Blu-ray)

Available via Warner Archive
Warner, Comedy, $21.99 Blu-ray, ‘PG.’
Stars Tom Hanks, Meg Ryan, Lloyd Bridges, Robert Stack, Ossie Davis.
1990. Despite a loopy affability that occasionally comes off as strained though rarely to deal-breaking extremes, Joe Versus the Volcano is liable to leave viewers sporting a mild smile for a hundred minutes.
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The Savage Innocents (Blu-ray)

Olive, Drama, $29.95 Blu-ray, NR.
Stars Anthony Quinn, Yoko Tani, Peter O’Toole.
1960. This cult hit from director Nicholas Ray gets off to something of a rocky start, which it then rebounds from to not insignificant extent by treating Anthony Quinn’s “Baby Huey of an Inuit” character and customs with sympathy and something like respect.
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Furious Smurfing

Best Buy's Fate of the Furious' Blu-ray Steelbook

Retailers offered a number of exclusives for Universal's The Fate of the Furious and Sony Pictures' Smurfs: The Lost Village.

For the eighth 'Fast & Furious' movie, Best Buy offered Steelbook packaging for both the Blu-ray and Ultra HD Blu-ray versions. Target offered the Blu-ray as a "Limited Deluxe Edition" with a cinch sack. And Walmart offered the Blu-ray versions with exclusive bonus content.

Walmart also offered a gift set of the eight-movie Blu-ray collection with a T-shirt for $69.96.

Target offered previous "Fast & Furious" movies on Blu-ray for $7.99 each. BestBuy.com had a deal to get the previous movies for $5 each with the purchase of Fate of the Furious.

For the "Smurfs" reboot, Target offered a Blu-ray "Summer Vacation Edition" with an exclusive bonus disc offering "Smurf Scout Camp." Walmart offered the Blu-ray with a lunchbox.

Best Buy is taking preorders for an exclusive Steelbook 4K Ultra HD Blu-ray of Warner's Kong: Skull Island, due July 18. Best Buy is also offering $5 in My Best Buy Rewards for members who buy select titles, such as the exclusive Steelbook edition of Sony Pictures' Fifth Element 4K Ultra HD Blu-ray.

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