Arrow Video’s May Slate is Ghostly Romance, Monkeys And Tearaways

Arrow Video’s May films include a superbly quirky comedy horror debut, a vintage Japanese comedy classic, the worldwide Blu-ray debut of a provocative Seventies masterwork, and a lavish edition of an offbeat, A-list sci-fi favourite.

First in May, Arrow Video presents A Ghost Waits, an ingeniously unique and unpredictable combo of horror, humour and heart from first-time writer/director Adam Stovall and producer/star MacLeod Andrews. From its opening spectral assault to its achingly poignant conclusion – as well as a witty depiction of afterlife bureaucracy in the vein of Beetlejuice and A Matter of Life and Death – A Ghost Waits has shocked and surprised audiences around the world, and now makes its home video debut stacked with insightful bonus features that take you inside the process of creating this phantasmagorical monochrome marvel.

Also released is Giants and Toys, a sharp and snappy corporate satire revolving around the ruthless machinations of a group of admen working in the confectionary industry. Making its worldwide Blu-ray debut, this lurid adaptation of the award-winning 1957 novel by Ken Kaiko is considered a landmark in Japanese film history and a key work by Yasuzo Masumura (Blind Beast, Red Angel), one of the country’s most highly acclaimed directors of his generation. Its absurdist and acidly cynical take on the excesses of the media and advertising worlds recalls the work of Frank Tashlin (Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter?), as it presents a garish vision of a bold new postwar Japan where traditional company values come head-to-head with American-style consumer capitalism.

Also in May, a special edition of Terry Gilliam’s extraordinary classic 12 Monkeys. Following the commercial and critical success of The Fisher King, Terry Gilliam’s next feature would turn to science fiction and a screenplay by Janet and David Peoples (Blade Runner, Unforgiven) inspired by Chris Marker’s classic short film La Jetée. Featuring an Oscar-nominated turn by Brad Pitt (Fight Club) as mental patient Jeffrey Goines, 12 Monkeys would become Gilliam’s most successful film and is now widely regarded as a sci-fi classic.

At the end of May comes Over The Edge, an incendiary ode to teen rebellion that quickly became a Gen X/punk-rock touchstone, and a key influence on filmmakers such as Richard Linklater and musicians like Kurt Cobain (who often cited it as his favourite film). Armed with a classic ‘70s rock soundtrack (including Cheap Trick, Ramones and Van Halen), energetic direction by Jonathan Kaplan (White Line Fever) and an intelligent script by Tim Hunter (River’s Edge) and Charlie Haas (Matinee), Over The Edge still packs a righteously powerful punch today, and makes its worldwide Blu-Ray debut .

A Ghost Waits
On Blu-ray 3 May

Tasked with renovating a neglected rental home, handyman Jack (MacLeod Andrews, They Look Like People, Doctor Sleep) quickly finds out why the tenants keep leaving in droves – this house is haunted. The ghost in question is Muriel (Natalie Walker), herself employed from beyond the veil to keep the home vacant. Against the odds, Jack and Muriel find they have a lot in common… pulse notwithstanding. Having found a kindred spirit in an otherwise lonely existence, they must fight for their newfound affection as pressure mounts for them each to fulfil their ‘cross-purposes’.

SPECIAL EDITION CONTENTS

• High Definition (1080p) Blu-ray presentation
• Original uncompressed stereo audio
• Optional English subtitles for the deaf and hard-of-hearing
• Audio commentary by writer/director Adam Stovall
• Audio commentary by Adam Stovall and MacLeod Andrews
• Audio commentary by the cast and crew
• Humanity and the Afterlife in ‘A Ghost Waits’, a new video essay by Isabel Custodio exploring the film’s themes and cinematic forebears
• Eight interviews with cast and crew moderated by critic and programmer tt stern-enzi
• Interview and post-film Q&A with Adam Stovall moderated by Alan Jones at Frightfest Glasgow 2020
• Outtakes
• Easter eggs
• Theatrical trailer
• Image gallery
• Reversible sleeve featuring newly commissioned artwork by Sister Hyde and original artwork by Julie Hill

FIRST PRESSING ONLY: Illustrated collectors’ booklet featuring new writing by Craig Ian Mann

Giants and Toys
On Blu-ray 10 May

As a new recruit to the marketing department of World Caramel, fresh-faced graduate Nishi (Hiroshi Kawaguchi) is eager to impress his ambitious and hard-nosed boss Goda (Black Test Car’s Hideo Takamatsu), even if it strains his relationships with his college friend Yokoyama (Koichi Fujiyama) and budding love interest Masami (Michiko Ono), who work at the rival companies of Giant and Apollo. With World’s lead over its competitors slipping badly, the two spot a chance to get back in the race in the shape of the pretty but unsophisticated 18-year-old, Kyoko (Hitomi Nozoe). Goda and Nishi get to work polishing this rough diamond as their new campaign girl, but as the three rival confectionary companies pitch themselves into an all-out advertising war that spills out onto the streets of Tokyo as it escalates to ludicrous extremes, Kyoko’s newfound fame starts going to her head.

SPECIAL EDITION CONTENTS

• High Definition Blu-ray (1080p) presentation
• Original uncompressed Japanese mono audio
• Optional English subtitles
• Brand new audio commentary by Japanese cinema scholar Irene González-López
• Newly filmed introduction by Japanese cinema expert Tony Rayns
• In the Realm of the Publicists, a brand new visual essay by Asian cinema scholar Earl Jackson
• Original Trailer
• Image Gallery
• Reversible sleeve featuring original and newly commissioned artwork by Tony Stella

12 Monkeys
Zavvi Exclusive, on Limited Edition Blu-ray Steelbook 24 May

In 1996, a deadly virus is unleashed by a group calling themselves the Army of the Twelve Monkeys, destroying much of the world’s population and forcing survivors underground. In 2035, prisoner James Cole (Bruce Willis, Die Hard) is chosen to go back in time and help scientists in their search for a cure.

Also available
Zavvi Exclusive for Red Carpet Customers [Exclusive in the US via Diabolik DVD], on Limited Edition SteelBook with Slipcase Blu-ray 24 May

LIMITED EDITION STEELBOOK CONTENTS

• High Definition Blu-ray (1080p) presentation
• Optional DTS 5.1 Master Audio and 2.0 stereo soundtracks
• Optional English subtitles for the deaf and hard of hearing
• Audio commentary by Terry Gilliam and producer Charles Roven
• The Hamster Factor and Other Tales of Twelve Monkeys, feature-length making-of documentary by Keith Fulton and Louis Pepe (Lost in La Mancha)
• The Film Exchange with Terry Gilliam, a 1996 interview with Gilliam and film critic Jonathan Romney, recorded at the London Film Festival
• Appreciation by Ian Christie, author of Gilliam on Gilliam
• The Twelve Monkeys Archives
• Theatrical trailer
• Limited edition SteelBook featuring newly commissioned artwork by Matt Griffin
• Limited edition booklet featuring writing on the film by Rabin, and an excerpt of Gilliam on Gilliam by Ian Christie

Over The Edge
Arrow Store Exclusive, On Blu-ray with O-Card 31 May

New Granada is a brand new ‘planned community’, miles from the noise and crime of the big city and a perfect place to raise a family. The only problem is they forgot to build anything for the kids to do. Bored out of their minds and stuck in the middle of nowhere, the teens in the town, led by Carl (Michael Kramer) and Richie (an effortlessly charismatic Matt Dillon in his first film role), do pretty much anything to fill the time, quickly escalating from drugs and sex to petty crime. A rash action by an overzealous local police officer (Harry Northup, Taxi Driver) sets in motion a face-off between the frustrated kids and their clueless parents that will lead to explosive, destructive consequences…

SPECIAL EDITION CONTENTS

• High Definition (1080p) Blu-ray transfer
• Original uncompressed mono audio
• Optional English subtitles for the deaf and hard-of-hearing
• Archive commentary by director Jonathan Kaplan, producer George Litto and writers Tim Hunter & Charlie Haas
• New commentary by star Michael Kramer and journalist Mike Sacks
• Isolated music and effects track
• Wide Streets + Narrow Minds, an exclusive retrospective documentary featuring newly recorded interviews with cast and crew, including Jonathan Kaplan, Tim Hunter, Charlie Haas, talent scouts Jane Bernstein and Linda Feferman, production designer Jim Newport, stars Michael Kramer, Harry Northup, Vincent Spano, Pamela Ludwig, Julia Pomeroy, Kim Kliner, Diane Reilly, Eric Lalich and others
• Full post-film QA from a 2010 screening at the Walter Reade Theater in New York, featuring Litto, Hunter, Haas, Bernstein, Northup, Kramer, Ludwig, Pomeroy and Tom Fergus
• Excerpts from the Projection Booth podcast episode on the film, including discussion by Mike White, Leon Chase and Heather Drain, plus interviews with Haas, Hunter, Spano, Northup and Andy Romano
• Destruction: Fun or Dumb?, the full educational short excerpted within the film, in high definition
• US theatrical trailer and TV spots
• UK VHS promo
• Image galleries
• Reversible sleeve featuring original and newly commissioned artwork by Sister Hyde

FIRST PRESSING ONLY: Illustrated collectors’ booklet featuring new writing by Kim Morgan and Henry Blyth, and the original San Francisco Examiner article that inspired the film