Blu-rays of the Week 

This boxed set collects recent Royal Shakespeare Company stagings of four Bard tragedies at Stratford-upon-Avon. Coriolanus, one of Shakespeare’s most politically relevant works, gets a decent modern-dress production by director Angus Jackson, with a stentorian Sope Dirisu in the title role. Titus Andronicus, maybe his worst play, provides a visceral jolt in Blanche McIntyre’s 2017 modern-dress production, with Hannah Morrish keeping her dignity as the unfortunate Lavinia and David Troughton making a stentorian Titus. 

Julius Caesar, one of his most potent tragedies, is given a compelling staging by director Jackson, with strong acting by Andrew Woodall (Caesar), Alex Waldmann (Brutus), James Corrigan (Marc Antony) and Morrish, whose Portia more than holds her own. And Antony and Cleopatra, one of his most complex, least-produced plays, is given an accomplished staging by Iqbal Khan, with a lackadaisical Antony Byrne as Antony but a lively Josette Simon as Cleopatra. On all discs, hi-def video and audio are first-rate; extras are commentaries, interviews and a featurette.

Beatrice Cenci 

(Unitel)

Berthold Goldschmidt (1903-96), a German-Jewish composer whose music was banned by the Nazis, has been triumphantly rediscovered, and this opera—composed in 1949-50—is a prime example of his accessible but provocative style. Goldschmidt’s splendidly paced account of a young 17th century Italian woman condemned to death with her mother for poisoning her brutally deranged father is filled with melodious and dramatic music worthy of Puccini.

Last summer’s Bergenz, Italy, staging, by director Johannes Erath, unfortunately wallows in grotesque visuals—especially egregious in close-up—that make it more like a freak show than an absorbing tragedy. Still, it’s beautifully performed by a committed cast and orchestra, and the hi-def video and audio are first-rate.

The Mad Adventures of Rabbi Jacob 

Gerard Oury’s dizzying 1974 comedy was a big hit in France and abroad, but its claim to fame is that it’s so broad, so banal, and so basic in its humor—a bigot and his Arab captor disguise themselves as rabbis to elude assassins and the police—that it’s unsurprising that, watching it now, one wonders what the fuss is about.

There’s certainly much energy to it, starting out in Manhattan and moving to Paris, and the cast is enjoyable in a frenetic way, but it plays out like a misfired Mel Brooks-early Woody Allen hybrid. The film looks good in hi-def; lone extra is an interview with co-writer Daniele Thompson.

Supergirl—Complete 4th Season 

(Warner Bros)

Warner Bros. provided me with a free copy of this disc for review.

The fourth season of Supergirl explicitly mirrors what’s happening on the current political scene, as anti-alien sentiment swells in Gotham City and Kara, aka Supergirl (a charming Melissa Benoit), must attempt to win the war on two fronts: as a reporter using the press as a bulwark against fake news, and as a superhero—albeit an alien—battling the villains who have used the divisive atmosphere to make their attacks.

The season’s 22 episodes look striking on Blu-ray; extras include deleted scenes; an hour of highlights from 2018’s San Diego Comic-Con; featurettes; gag reel; and all three crossover episodes of Elseworlds.

4K/UHD of the Week 

(Lionsgate)

As a bloodsucker flick, 2009’s Daybreakers tries something different: in a world inhabited by vampires, humans are the outcasts. But this clever conceit can’t sustain an entire movie, which goes haywire long before its predictable ending. Juicy performances, topped by Willem Dafoe’s strangely resonant resistance fighter and Sam Neill and Ethan Hawke as very different kinds of vampires, help.

So do the diverting visuals of the Spierig brothers’ direction, which are miraculously recreated by the 4K transfer, which is simply outstanding. Extras include a comprehensive two-hour making-of documentary and a short film by the brothers, The Big Picture.

DVD of the Week

The Good Fight—Complete 3rd Season 

(CBS/Paramount)

The third season—coming on the heels of last season’s insanely world-shattering developments—finds lawyer Diane Lockhart setting her sights on an even bigger criminal: Donald tRump. The series makes no bones about itching for a fight with the incompetent chief executive, and if it’s at times too didactic even for those who agree with the political sentiments, a stellar cast—led by the peerless Christine Baranski, of course, but also starring Cash Jumbo, Delroy Lindo, Audra McDonald, Michael Sheen, Gina Gershon and Jane Curtin—keeps one’s attention riveted throughout the 10 episodes.

Extras comprise a gag reel, deleted scenes, and the first episode of the series Star Trek—Discovery.  

CDs of the Week 

(Toccata Classics)

Szymanowski—Piano Works 

(Naxos)

Two 20th century masters known for their voluptuous orchestral works—Italian Ottorino Respighi and Pole Karol Szymanowski—displayed their versatility and eclecticism with music in other genres, including solo piano works. Two new discs show off the composers’ rigor and craft at the keyboard, starting with Respighi’s early piano works on Toccata Classics, including a sonata and Three Preludes on Gregorian Melodies, both anything but apprentice works and played with alternating strength and restraint by Giovanna Gatto.

Szymanowski filled even his solo music with ecstatic exoticism, which his two sets of Etudes demonstrate on a new Naxos disc, along with his sublime Masques, a three-movement sonata in all but name. Andrea Vivanet displays his affinity for these formidable pieces, and one works looks forward to more volumes by both pianists.

Blu-rays of the Week 

(Criterion Collection)

Marco Bellocchio’s remarkable and shocking 1965 debut is a fascinatingly repellent study of one of the most dysfunctional families ever presented onscreen. Lou Castel, who chillingly plays the epileptic son of a blind mother whom he loathes, and younger brother to an attractive sister, with whom he carries on an unconsummated, incestuous affair, leads the superb cast. Bellocchio makes the persuasive case that commitment to an ideal, even one as loathsomely anti-social as this young man has chosen, is preferable to sitting idly by.

Bellocchio has returned to that leftist theme and its endless variations of obsessive love affairs or relationships based on the abuse of power, and 50-plus years later is still Italy’s most fearless filmmaker. There’s a new hi-def transfer that makes piercingly clear the shades of gray in this B&W film; extras are 2005 interviews with Bellocchio, Castel, actress Paola Pitagora, editor Silvano Agosti, critic Tullio Kezich, and filmmaker Bernardo Bertolucci, and a new interview with scholar Stefano Albertini.

Darlin’ 

(Dark Sky)

“Insane” is too mild a description of this standalone sequel to The Woman about a wild young woman taken to a priest- and nun-run home to be “civilized” after a hospital stint; but when her equally batty, knife-wielding mother shows up, all bets are off.

Director-writer Pollyanna McIntosh, who appears as Mom in this demented if tidy horror entry, has conjured a finale in church that must be seen to be (dis)believed. Lauryn Canny gives a committed performance in the title role. The hi-def transfer is fine; extras are deleted scenes and a making-of featurette.

Echo in the Canyon 

Bob Dylan’s son Jakob—of Wallflowers semi-fame—made this intriguing if frustrating documentary revisiting Southern California’s mid-‘60s music scene by showing its relevance today: we see Jakob, Fiona Apple, Regina Spektor, Norah Jones and Moby record and perform the era’s songs in a tribute concert.

The problem is cutting back and forth between occasionally insightful interviews with Michelle Phillips, Crosby, Stills & Nash—Neil Young is quiet but plays a soaring guitar solo in the studio over the end credits—Roger McGuinn, Eric Clapton, Tom Petty and Ringo Starr and Jakob, et al, singing these touchstone tunes, limiting the scope. Either give us a concert film or a documentary. The Blu-ray’s problem—sound and video are first-rate, of course—is that there are no extras, no additional songs from the concert or additional interviews (it would have been nice to hear what else Petty—in his final recorded interview—had to say).

Jezebel 

(Warner Archive)

Bette Davis chews the screen spectacularly in an Oscar-winning performance that dominates William Wyler’s melodramatic 1938 gothic romance as a headstrong Southern belle who vows revenge when her beau returns with a new wife after a year away. Jimmy Stewart is fairly stolid as her man, but Wyler is more interested in Davis’ tantrums anyway; there’s also a pretty grim sequence of yellow fever striking down a southern town, circa 1852.

Ernest Haller’s exquisite, Oscar-winning B&W photography looks splendid on Blu-ray; extras are historian Jeanne Berlinger’s commentary, retrospective featurette, and vintage musical short and cartoon.

Supernatural—Complete 14th Season 

Warner Bros. provided me with a free copy of this disc for review.

In what may be this long-running series’ craziest plot line yet, archangel Michael takes possession of Dean—who, along with his brother Sam, has been fighting supernatural beings and other monsters throughout the series’ entire run—which causes even more havoc, culminating with a vengeful God declaring the destruction of the world.

Despite the ludicrousness of the premise, there’s always been a tongue-in-cheek aspect that keeps it from completely cratering. It all look sumptuous on Blu; extras include Supernatural Homecoming: Exploring Episode 300; The Winchester Mythology: The Choices We Make; Supernatural: 2018 Comic-Con Panel; commentaries; deleted scenes; and a gag reel. 

DVD of the Week

Montessori—Let the Child Be the Guide 

(First Run)

In this beautifully photographed documentary, French father and filmmaker Alexandre Mourot—whose young daughter is enrolled in a local Montessori school—spends more than a year following children’s interactions in a Montessori classroom in order to dramatize founder Maria Montessori’s dictum, immortalized in this film’s title.

By showing these little students working and playing together without adult interference—which allows them to develop at their own pace, another Montessori motto—Mourot’s sublime film is revelatory about the world of children.

CD of the Week 

(Deutsche Grammophon)

This delightful disc of several John Williams film themes—several iconic, others less familiar—is performed by superstar violinist Anne-Sophie Mutter, with Williams himself providing sensitive accompaniment leading the Recording Arts Orchestra of Los Angeles. Highlights are Mutter’s lovely renditions of “Nice to Be Around” from Cinderella Liberty (a 1973 romance with Marsha Mason and James Caan) and the theme from the 1995 remake of Sabrina (with Julia Ormond and Harrison Ford).

There are themes from Star Wars movies and Harry Potter, of course; more surprising is that only two Spielberg collaborations are here: The Adventures of Tintin (!) and Schindler’s List, whose sadly emotive theme Mutter plays with impassioned lyricism.