Stanley Kubrick Special Editions (UK HD) in March

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Warner Home Video have announced the UK Blu-ray Disc and HD DVD release of their new Stanley Kubrick Special Editions on 3rd March 2008. Following their US debut last October, the UK launch will celebrate what would have been the legendary director’s 80th birthday with the re-release of five of Stanley Kubrick’s most highly acclaimed works, fully remastered and accompanied by hours of new and rare features in Special Editions.

2001: A Space Odyssey has been skilfully remastered in time for its 40th Anniversary year; whilst Eyes Wide Shut, The Shining and Full Metal Jacket, debut in their original widescreen cinematic format.

All of the special features have been created in collaboration with, and approved by, the Estate of Stanley Kubrick and offer insightful and in-depth special features including commentaries, documentaries, interviews with the man himself and special new featurettes that provide a rare look into the mind of the master filmmaker.

2001 - Stanley Kubrick’s dazzling, Academy Award®-winning achievement (Special Visual Effects) is an allegorical puzzle on the evolution of man and a compelling drama of man vs. machine. Featuring a stunning meld of music and motion, the film was also Oscar® nominated for Best Director and Best Screenplay.

Kubrick (who co-wrote the screenplay with Arthur C. Clarke) first visits the prehistoric age-ancestry past, then leaps millennia (via one of the most mind-blowing jump cuts ever) into colonized space, and ultimately whisks astronaut Bowman (Keir Dullea) into uncharted space, perhaps even into immortality.

Extras include:

• Commentary by Keir Dullea and Gary Lockwood
• Theatrical trailer
• Channel 4 documentary: 2001: The Making of a Myth
• Standing on the Shoulders of Kubrick: The Legacy of 2001
• Vision of a Future Passed: The Prophecy of 2001
• 2001: A Space Odyssey- A Look Behind the Future
• 2001: FX and Early Conceptual Artwork
• Look: Stanley Kubrick!
• 'What Is Out There?' featurette

A Clockwork Orange - Stomping, whopping, stealing, singing, tap-dancing, violating. Derby-topped hooligan Alex (Malcolm McDowell) has a good time – at the tragic expense of others. His journey from amoral punk to brainwashed proper citizen and back again forms the dynamic arc of Kubrick’s future-shock vision of Anthony Burgess’ novel.

Controversial when first released, the film garnered three Academy Award nominations – Best Picture, Best Director and Best Screenplay. Its power still entices, shocks and mesmerizes today.

Extras include:

• Commentary by Malcolm McDowell and historian Nick Redman
• Theatrical trailer
• Channel 4 documentary: Still Tickin’: The Return of Clockwork Orange
• New featurette: Great Bolshy Yarblockos! Making A Clockwork Orange
• Career profile: O Lucky Malcolm!

Eyes Wide Shut - Kubrick’s daring and controversial last film is a bracing psychosexual journey through a haunting dreamscape, a riveting suspense tale and a career milestone for stars Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman. Cruise plays a doctor who plunges into an erotic foray that threatens his marriage – and may ensnare him in a murder mystery – after his wife’s (Kidman) admission of sexual longings.

As the story sweeps from doubt and fear to self-discovery and reconciliation, Kubrick orchestrates it with masterful flourishes. His graceful tracking shots, rich colors and startling images are some of the bravura traits that show Kubrick as a filmmaker for the ages.

Extras include:

• Scene specific commentary by Sydney Pollack and historian Peter Loewenberg
• Theatrical trailer and TV spots
• Channel 4 documentary: The Last Movie: Stanley Kubrick and Eyes Wide Shut
• Lost Kubrick: The Unfinished Films of Stanley Kubrick
• Kubrick’s 1998 DGA D.W Griffith Award acceptance speech
• Interview gallery featuring Tom Cruise, Nicole Kidman, and Steven Spielberg

Full Metal Jacket - A superb ensemble falls in for Stanley Kubrick’s brilliant saga about the Vietnam War and the dehumanizing process that turns people into trained killers. The scathing indictment of a film was nominated for an Academy Award® for Best Screenplay.

Joker (Matthew Modine), Animal Mother (Adam Baldwin), Gomer (Vincent D’Onofrio), Eightball (Dorian Harewood) and Cowboy (Arliss Howard) are some of the Marine recruits experiencing boot-camp hell under the punishing command of the foul-mouthed Sergeant Hartman (R. Lee Ermy). The action is savage, the story unsparing, and the dialogue is spiked with scathing humour.

Extras include:

• Commentary by Adam Baldwin, Vincent D’Onofrio, R. Lee Ermey and Jay Cocks
• New Featurette: Full Metal Jacket: Between Good and Evil
• Theatrical trailer

The Shining - From a script he co-adapted from the Stephen King novel, Kubrick melds vivid performances, menacing settings, dreamlike tracking shots and shock after shock into a milestone of the macabre. The Shining is the director’s epic tale of a man in a snowbound hotel descending into murderous delusions.

In a signature role, Jack Nicholson (“Heeeere’s Johnny!”) stars as Jack Torrance, who’s come to the elegant, isolated Overlook Hotel as off-season caretaker with his wife (Shelley Duvall) and son (Danny Lloyd).

Extras include:

• Commentary by Garrett Brown and John Baxter
• Theatrical trailer
• Documentary The Making of the Shining, with optional commentary by Vivian Kubrick
• Three new featurettes: View from The Overlook: Crafting the Shining, The Visions of Stanley Kubrick, and Wendy Carlos, Composer