Fantastic Beasts Release Date on DVD & Blu-ray Disc

Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them DVD

In my world Harry Potter fans were totally pleased with the movie  Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them when it was finally released in the movie theatres on November 18, 2016 and now there is another date to be excited about. I know that fans have been waiting and asking when will the DVD and Blu-ray disc for Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them be released?

According to HDRoom, you will be able to start watching some versions of Fantastic Beasts at home on March 7, 2017 though they do not say which formats will be available on that date.  However, they go on to say that the release date for Digital HD, DVD, Blu-ray, Blu-ray 3D and 4K Ultra HD Blu-ray versions is March 28, 2017, timed to coincide with a new Harry Potter 4K release.

You can order your copy of Fantastic Beasts on Amazon by clicking here right now. I see that Amazon has the various format options available and I know that they will protect you with their pre-order price guarantee. If the price goes down between now and the release date, that is the price you will be charged when they ship the movie.

I love the artwork, particularly on the DVD case shown above because it shows more of the characters.  I've included the other images for interest sake. I know you won't be picking your copy of this movie based on the cover artwork but which cover is your favorite?

See you
at the movies!
Brenda

Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them Blu-ray & Digital Download

Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them 4K Ultra HD

Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them DVD Release


More Fantastic Beasts Reading:

Nifty Niffler Gift Ideas.
Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them Movie Review.
Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them Movie Calendar.



All Roads Lead to Rome (2015)


Last night we watched another Italy-themed movie. All Roads Lead to Rome (2015) stars Sarah Jessica Parker, Rosie Day, Raoul Bova (The Tourist, Under the Tuscan Sun) and Claudia Cardinale (an Italian actress.) It is a romantic comedy that starts off in the beautiful Italian countryside and arrives, after an adventuresome journey, in Rome hence the title All Roads Lead to Rome.

The movie was a light and entertaining film, definitely not the best romantic com ever but an enjoyable film with not much to object to. No sex although there is reference to a teen’s unhealthy relationship, some social drinking, marijuana use once and infrequent swearing. The movie is rated PG 13 and that seems like a good guideline to me.



While we did finally arrive in Rome (in the movie), it showed some highlights of the city. However, this would not be my top pick as an Italian-themed movie to enhance your enjoyment of an upcoming or a reminder of a past trip to Italy and Rome. There were a few, “I’ve been there!” moments but overall I felt that the movie did not really do a fabulous job of displaying Rome.

Would I recommend it? Yes, as I said for a light movie. However, I’d pick Letters to Juliet or Under the Tuscan Sun first. You can read more about All Roads Lead to Rome on Amazon by clicking here.

See you
at the movies!
Brenda

More Italy Movies:

My Letters to Juliet movie review.
Dangerous Beauty movie review.
The Tourist with Johnny Depp & Angelina Jolie.

For Better or For Worse: The Bestest Present (1986)

For Better or For Worse: The Bestest Present (1986)

AN ANIMATED CHRISTMAS TELEVISION SPECIAL


This animated Christmas special, For Better or For Worse: The Bestest Present, was created based on Lynn Johnston's popular comic strip, For Better or For Worse. It was produced for Canadian television in December, 1986, and follows the Patterson family as they get ready for the holidays. Of course there are lots of funny moments and a touching finale, which combine to make a lovely film with some voices supplied by Johnston's own children.

This is a very popular Christmas television special that is not widely available on DVD. However, sometimes the videotape is available new and used through various sellers at Amazon and eBay although the rarity and popularity of this item dictates the price especially if someone finds a new copy.  You can find your copy of The Bestest Present on Amazon by clicking here and on eBay here.

See you
at the movies!

Brenda

More Rare Films:


The Great American Cowboy (1973) Documentary Film
Doctor Who The End of the Universe Boxed Set
Snow White Live at Radio City Music Hall

For Better or For Worse: The Bestest Present (1986)

Doctor Who The End of the Universe VHS Boxed Set

Doctor Who The End of the Universe Collection VHS Boxed Set


Doctor Who The End of the Universe Collection is a VHS video set that continues to be sought after. It contains eleven tapes with 56 episodes of the cult favorite television program. A brand new set fetched over $200 recently on eBay.

The BBC started the Doctor Who series on November 23, 1963. As you know, they continue to make programs and the fan base is strong. This videotape set was issued in celebration of the Doctor’s 40th anniversary and, at that time, was the biggest collection of Doctor Who programs available. These eleven tapes include four Doctors, 19 of his companions and 56 episodes of the show.

When I checked this morning, the set was more affordable on eBay than Amazon, where I can see that one is listed for just over $200 plus $12 of shipping and one sold for that about that price recently. You can check eBay to see if there are any Doctor Who End of the Universe Collections by clicking here.  There is a set listed on Amazon right now but it is listed at just under $300. You can check for yourself to see if Amazon has it listed right now by clicking here.

See you
at the movies!
Brenda

More Doctor Who:

Doctor Who Disappearing Tardis Coffee Mug.


Snow White Live at Radio City Music Hall

Disney's Snow White Live at Radio City Music Hall is a hoot to watch. It features a Broadway-style presentation of Snow White that appeared at Radio City Music Hall in 1979. It starred Mary-Jo Salerno as Snow White, Anne Francine as The Evil Queen and Richard Bowne as Prince Charming.

A total of 38 performances were held in 1979, the production closed and then another 68 performances were presented in 1980. In that same year, the show was aired on television and it was aired again in 1987 on the Disney Channel.

Unfortunately, Snow White Live at Radio City Music Hall is also a rare and sought after VHS videotape.  I see a DVD is sometimes available on eBay but I am not sure if it is a legitimate Disney release.

You can click here to find Snow White Live at Radio City Music Hall on Amazon and here to check it out on eBay.

See you
at the movies!
Brenda

More Snow White Reading:

Meet Snow White's Seven Dwarfs.
Meet Adriana Caselotti: The Voice of Snow White
Marge Champion: The Model For Snow White


Don't Forget Videotapes...


In the story Never Forget: The Humble, Indispensable VHS in the Austin Chronicle on January 16, 2009,  Alamo Drafthouse programmers Lars Nilsen and Zack Carlson talk about the rise of Netflix and their enduring love for old-fashioned videotape.

They start by discussing their first experiences with VHS, which might sound like a story from your past if, that is, you remember videotapes at all. One of those stories tells of a Grandfather who was on the cutting edge and who brought home a huge VCR that cost $2,000 in 1981 and of course, some family-safe movies.

My first memory of a VCR at all comes from the time I started dating my husband. He had purchased a BETA VCR, much to the chagrin of his family.

Remember that before VHS, you could not watch movies at home unless they were being shown on television. Buying a VCR in the early 1980s was a truly new and exciting experience. Movies came in as Zack said, "huge, white clamshell cases that opened with a suction-y pop and within that case was this black rectangle that held wonders."

When the story was written in the Austin Chronicle in 2009, only about 25 percent of movies made before VHS had been released on VHS and when I originally wrote this article, just 50 percent of the movies issued on VHS had been made available on DVD. That means that a large number of movies are simply gone.

People are collecting videotapes the way people collected records in the past.  Not because they are better but because they have a different selection. They are looking for a title that has not made the transition to current formats.

The Austin Chronicle article closes with the tale of customer looking for a movie they saw when they were 12 but being disgusted at only finding it available on VHS. How would you handle that situation? If you are a big movie fan and watch older films as well as newer ones, this might have happened to you. If a videotape is the only way you can watch a movie you love, would you buy the tape?

See you
at the movies!
Brenda

Quick Links:

Never Forget: The Humble, Indispensable VHS
Buy these VHS buttons on Etsy. 


How To Look After Your Videotapes

To help your VHS tapes last as long as possible, the experts recommend the following:

  • Store tapes between 60 to 80 degrees Fahrenheit and 40 to 60 percent humidity. If you are comfortable, probably your tapes are.
  • Avoid sudden temperature changes, even within these recommended zones. Neither cold damp basements nor hot dusty attics are good choices for storing your tapes.
  • Be especially careful of condensation - allow at least 24 hours before using when you change the temperature or humidity of your tape.
  • Keep the tapes evenly wound and always rewind them fully. If the tape looks uneven, wind it again. If possible, rewind at slower speeds.
  • Store tapes upright as you would books and keep them in their original cases. You can buy plastic cases to store them in but even the cardboard cases do a good job of keeping the dust away.
  • Put the labels on correctly, where they belong and do not add labels on top of labels. They can interfere with cassette loading and possibly come off inside your VCR.
  • Exercise your tapes once every three years by rewinding or forwarding them.
  • Avoid magnetic fields - the area around any magnet. Your tapes can be erased so do not store them near speakers, motors, toys or other magnetic sources.
  • Transfer your footage every seven years. That helps prevent the images and sounds from fading away.

Are you building your VHS tape collection or looking to protect an existing collection?

Some movies are not available on DVD and they may never be. Would you buy a VHS movie that is not available on DVD for your movie or film collection?

See you
at the movies!
Brenda

More Reading:

A Collector’s Guide to VHS Videotapes. 
Orson Welles' Ghost Story (1951) 
The Star Wars Holiday Special (1978)






A Collector's Guide to VHS Videotapes

A Collector's Guide to Rare VHS Tapes Including the History, Care and Building of Your Collection


What follows is the first in a series of posts and a discussion of rare, out-of-print VHS tapes, from the history to the current status of the videocassette, from how to care for and preserve your video tapes to help collecting old, hard-to-find VHS movies.

These posts were originally written and posted by myself on another website in 2008 and I am moving them here so that you can continue to access the information though I will be breaking what was one popular longer post into a series of shorter ones.

The Video Home System (VHS) was born in 1976. By the 1990s, it was the standard format to record on. However, DVDs came into the market in 1997 and in 2003 they started outselling VHS tapes. By 2006, most studios had stopped releasing new movies on the VHS format.

When I revisited my page in 2014, VHS tapes were still not totally dead. At that point, there were people who had not upgraded to DVD although that number was rapidly shrinking. There were a number of collectors who wanted titles that had not been released on DVD or newer formats and were willing to buy a film on VHS in order to be able to access it.

In 2016, I doubt that there are many who have not upgraded to DVD but I know that there are still collectors who seek titles that have not been reproduced in current formats.  There is concern that some of those titles may never be re-released and collectors intentionally or unintentionally are preserving those titles in their collections by buying hard-to-find VHS copies of those films.

Do you still own a VCR? Are you searching for a special film that is only available on VHS?  I would love to hear from you! In any case, be sure to subscribe to my blog by using the subscription box on the right side of this page.

See you
at the movies!
Brenda

More Reading:

The Peanut Butter Solution.
Crazy from the Heart (1991)
The Cheaters (1945) Christmas movie.


AUTHOR'S NOTE: This page originally written in 2008 and posted on another website.


Fantastic Beasts and Where To Find Them Movie Review

Fantastic Beasts and Where To Find Them Movie Review

Kudos to J.K. Rowling and all of the folks at Warner Brothers who brought to life Fantastic Beasts and Where To Find Them on the big screen in November of 2016.  I went to the movie with trepidation. Would this new movie live up to the expectation of the fans and the reputation of the Harry Potter series books and movies?  I should not have worried; I totally enjoyed the movie. I don't often want to revisit a movie especially immediately after the fact but this is one that I could easily go and see again right away and I am betting that many fans feel the same way.  Fantastic Beasts really was that good.

The movie left me wondering if someone who was not plugged into the Harry Potter franchise would enjoy it as much as the rest of us did and I am not sure. Newcomers might but they definitely would not understand all of the insider references.  Since there are four more Fantastic Beasts movies to come, if you are keen and unacquainted, you might want to go back and read the Harry Potter books and then watch the movies.

Highlights for me were many but I know I laughed out loud quite a few times. I came away wanting some Gigglewater and a certain special umbrella for Christmas.  Gigglewater is a wizarding alcoholic beverage that may cause you to laugh out loud when you drink it though apparently it is a real term from the 1920s.

Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them is an enjoyable film, well done, that sets us up for four more stories.  Eddie Redmayne is outstanding as Newt Scamander, Dan Fogler is a good pairing as the no-maj Jacob Kowalski and Colin Farrell is good when he appears as Percival Graves, Director of Magical Security.  I also particularly enjoyed the sister characters, Porpentina Goldstein as played by Katherine Waterston and Queenie Goldstein as played by Alison Sudol.

OFFICIAL MOVIE TRAILER


You likely don't need it but just in case you do, here is the final trailer for the movie.



MOVIE RATING


Fantastic Beasts is rated PG13. The Movie Mom says that it is given that rating based on fantasy action violence and she recommends it for middle school aged children. I think that is reasonable and this movie comes HIGHLY RECOMMENDED by me particularly if you are involved in Harry Potter's world.

You can order your copy of this movie on Amazon by clicking right here.

See you
at the movies!
Brenda

Quick Links:

Pre-order Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them on Amazon.
Nifty Fantastic Beasts Niffler Gift Ideas.
Fantastic Beasts and Where To Find Them Calendars.









Disney's Halloween Treat (1982)

Disney's Halloween Treat (1982)

Disney's Halloween Treat (1982)Disney's Halloween Treat is a compilation of Walt Disney shorts that includes clips from The Skeleton Dance, The Sword in the Stone, Fantasia, Peter Pan, Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, The Legend of Sleepy Hollow, One Hundred and One Dalmatians, Donald Duck and the Gorilla, Pluto's Judgement Day and the Haunted Mansion ride.  It is a 47-minute film that first aired on The Wonderful World of Disney in 1982 and continued to do so until the middle of the 1990s. Narration was provided by a jack o'lantern puppet that also gave an educational talk about Halloween safety.

Disney released this film on VHS in 1984 but it has not been released on DVD, which means that the copies that are available are on VHS and are expensive. If you would like to own a copy and you still have the capability to view it on videotape, you can check for a copy on  on eBay by clicking right here. Be warned though, this is a rarely found VHS tape and the few copies that are available tend to sell. Today, I see just one for sale and five sold at prices from $50 to $180.

Have you seen Disney's Halloween Treat? Did you like it?

See you
at the movies!
Brenda

More Reading:

Orson Welles' Ghost Story (1951)
Disney's Under Wraps Movie Review (1997)
The Star Wars Holiday Special (1978)
Not Too Scary Movies for Tweens



The Great American Cowboy (1973) Documentary Film

The Great American Cowboy (1973) Documentary Film


THE GREAT AMERICAN COWBOY TAGLINE: 

"The exciting true story of a vanishing American and his special kind of freedom."

The Great American Cowboy is a 1973 documentary film narrated by  Joel Mc Crea, a member of the Cowboy Hall of Fame. It looks inside the rodeo with then modern day cowboys telling the story of rivals Larry Mahan and Phil Lyne as they compete for the National Finals Rodeo Championship title.   It won an Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature (1974).
The Great American Cowboy (1973) Documentary Film Poster
The film is shown here in Walt Disney packaging though I did read that Disney acquired the rights to the film rather than actually making it.  One original movie poster that I saw reads "A Rainbow Adventure Films release" while IMDB says that the production companies are American National Enterprises and Merrill-Rodeo Film Productions.

If you are searching for a copy of this film on DVD or VHS, you can try the Amazon listings here and you can try eBay here but be warned, this appears to be another one of those films that has not made the transition from VHS to DVD. Good luck with your search and be sure to report back and let us know if and when this movie becomes widely available.

Have you seen The Great American Cowboy? Is it a documentary film that you have been wanting to see or is this the first time you have heard of it?

See you
at the movies!
Brenda

More Rare Films:

Orson Welles' Ghost Story (1951)
The Cheaters (1945)
The Star Wars Holiday Special (1978)


Orson Welles' Ghost Story (VHS)

Orson Welles' Ghost Story is an old-fashioned ghost story called exactly that, Ghost Story. It is the tale of a hitchhiker's story set in the Irish countryside. In this short 1951 film, Orson Welles uses ordinary means to scare us and he makes the film fun with his appearance and narration. The short film also includes great performances by Shelah Richards and Helena Hughes and is the work of director Hilton Edwards.

Wikipedia’s plot summary reads:

"It features Welles driving in the countryside one night and offering a ride to a man with car trouble. The man relates a strange event that happened to him at the same location. Two women flagged down his car one evening, asking for a ride back to their manor. They invited him in for a drink, and after leaving, he went back for his cigarette case. He found the manor deserted and decayed. In Dublin, a real estate broker told him the mother and daughter had died years ago. Welles, sufficiently spooked, drops the man off at his home and leaves in a hurry when the man asks him in for a cup of tea or something stronger as the ghostly women had earlier invited him into Glennascaul. As Welles drives off he passes two other stranded women who wave for a ride, flesh and blood women who recognize the famous actor behind the wheel."

This film was nominated for an Academy Award in the Best Short Subject category.

The short film is also known as Return to Glennascaul and is part of a DVD release of Orson Welles' Othello. You can find Ghost Story on Amazon by clicking here and you can find Othello here, though I do not see it in a North American formatted disc.

See you
at the movies!
Brenda

More Rare Films:

Orson Welles' Ghost Story (1951)
The Cheaters (1945)
The Great American Cowboy (1973)



The Cheaters (1945) Christmas Movie

The Cheaters (1945) Christmas Movie

THE CHEATERS TAGLINE 

"Delightful derelict! He's a Rogue...A King...Devil...Pauper...A Millionaire...WHO?" 

For the longest while, The Cheaters was a hard movie to find even on VHS videotape. To the relief of many, it was eventually released on DVD. However, I was not paying attention and it appears that even the DVD is hard to find now. I missed my opportunity. Did you?

The Cheaters is a 1945 movie directed by Joseph Kane that stars Joseph Schildkraut, Billie Burke and Eugene Pallette.

The story line is that of a rich family getting ready for Christmas and their decision to help a starving actor by feeding and sheltering him for the holidays. Wikipedia calls it a screwball comedy and the story line would indicate that it could be exactly that.

Leonard Maltin once said that this film features an "Excellent cast in an enjoyable tale of a wealthy family of snobs humanized by the downtrodden actor they invite for Christmas dinner."

Some consider it  a beloved Christmas film. Apparently, before A Christmas Carol, It's a Wonderful Life, White Christmas and a Christmas Story, this film was one that was shown regularly during the holidays.

The reading I have done indicates that it is probably a dark Christmas movie.  One of the lucky to snatch up a DVD copy and watch it in the last decade called it one of the "finest holiday films he's ever seen." That's a pretty strong recommendation, which makes me want to see this film even more.

If you are searching for a copy of this movie on DVD or VHS, you can try the Amazon listings here and you can try eBay here. Good luck with your search and be sure to report back and let us know if and when this movie becomes widely available.

Have you seen The Cheaters? Is it a movie you have been wanting to see or is this the first time you have heard of it?

See you
at the movies!
Brenda

Quick Links:

Orson Welles' Ghost Story (1951)
The Star Wars Holiday Special (1978)

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