Blu-Ray Releases For August 25-27th, 2008

Another week, another set of Blu-Ray discs hit the streets. A number of new releases will be hitting the streets on different days this week in different parts of the world. I’m going to start with France, as once again they seem to have got some interesting titles coming out this week that have yet to debut on BD in other regions.

The titles that caught my eye on Amazon.Fr were:

Ong-Bak (Thai action / comedy with Tony Jaa)

Taxi 3 (the third episode in the French comedy franchise featuring Samy Naceri – we seem to be working our way backwards through this series of films on BD as episodes 3 & 4 are now both out but the first two films have yet to appear)

The Three Burials Of Melquiades Estrada starring Tommy Lee Jones

Death Sentence (a pretty grim tale featuring Kevin Bacon about the consequences of revenge, from director James Wan)

All of these titles have yet to appear on BD in the US or UK. The big release in both these regions this week is Heroes. Available either as a boxset of Seasons 1 & 2 or in individual sets for each series. I thought both seasons of Heroes were very good in places, but Season 1 got a bit too caught up in its own plot twists halfway through the season and struggled to work its way back out of a corner. Season 2 on the other hand was not as bad as some reviewers have made it out to be, but overall still lacked some of the dramatic punch of the start of the franchise.

The full list of releases this week for the US reads as follows:

• Action Starter Pack (Universal)
• The Adventures of Robin Hood (1938) (Warner)
• Afro Samurai: Season One (FUNimation)
• Blue Man Group: How to Be a Megastar Live! (Rhino)
• Dude, Where’s My Car? (MGM)
• End of Days (Universal)
• Heroes: Season One (Universal)
• Heroes: Season Two (Universal)
• Miami Vice (2006) (Universal)
• The Nightmare Before Christmas (Walt Disney)
• Pale Rider (Warner)
• Postal (UMVD)
• Redbelt (Sony)
• U-571 (Universal)
• What Happens in Vegas (Fox)