This past June, Arrow Video released Dario Argento's 'The Bird with the Crystal Plumage' as a limited edition box set. If you missed out on that release, all is not totally lost, they will be re-releasing the film as a standard edition Blu-ray at the beginning of next year.
They just announced today that 'The Bird with the Crystal Plumage' will be a dual US and UK offering, set for release on February 13 in the US and February 12 in the UK.
“In 1970, young first-time director Dario Argento (Deep Red, Suspiria) made his indelible mark on Italian cinema with The Bird with the Crystal Plumage – a film which redefined the ‘giallo’ genre of murder-mystery thrillers and catapulted him to international stardom.
Sam Dalmas (Tony Musante, We Own the Night), an American writer living in Rome, inadvertently witnesses a brutal attack on a woman (Eva Renzi, Funeral in Berlin) in a modern art gallery. Powerless to help, he grows increasingly obsessed with the incident. Convinced that something he saw that night holds the key to identifying the maniac terrorising Rome, he launches his own investigation parallel to that of the police, heedless of the danger to both himself and his girlfriend Giulia (Suzy Kendall, Spasmo)…
A staggeringly assured debut, The Bird with the Crystal Plumage establishes the key traits that would define Argento’s filmography, including lavish visuals and a flare for wildly inventive, brutal scenes of violence. With sumptuous cinematography by Vittorio Storaro (Apocalypse Now) and a seductive score by legendary composer Ennio Morricone (Once Upon a Time in the West), this landmark film has never looked or sounded better in this new, 4K-restored edition from Arrow Video!”
Blu-ray SPECIAL EDITION CONTENTS:
• Brand new 4K restoration of the film from the original camera negative produced by Arrow Video exclusively for this release • High Definition Blu-ray (1080p) presentation • Original lossless mono Italian and English soundtracks • English subtitles for the Italian soundtrack • Optional English subtitles for the deaf and hard of hearing for the English soundtrack • New audio commentary by Troy Howarth, author of So Deadly, So Perverse: 50 Years of Italian Giallo Films • The Power of Perception, a new visual essay on the cinema of Dario Argento by Alexanda Heller-Nicholas, author of Devil’s Advocates: Suspiria and Rape-Revenge Films: A Critical Study • New analysis of the film by critic Kat Ellinger • New interview with writer/director Dario Argento • New interview with actor Gildo Di Marco (Garullo the pimp) • Eva’s Talking, an archival interview with actor Eva Renzi (Monica Ranieri) • Original Italian and international theatrical trailers • Reversible sleeve featuring original and newly commissioned artwork by Candice Tripp
DVD SPECIAL EDITION CONTENTS:
• Brand new 4K restoration of the film from the original camera negative produced by Arrow Video exclusively for this release • Standard Definition DVD presentation • Original mono Italian and English soundtracks • English subtitles for the Italian soundtrack • Optional English subtitles for the deaf and hard of hearing for the English soundtrack • New audio commentary by Troy Howarth, author of So Deadly, So Perverse: 50 Years of Italian Giallo Films • The Power of Perception, a new visual essay on the cinema of Dario Argento by Alexanda Heller-Nicholas, author of Devil’s Advocates: Suspiria and Rape-Revenge Films: A Critical Study • New analysis of the film by critic Kat Ellinger • New interview with writer/director Dario Argento • New interview with actor Gildo Di Marco (Garullo the pimp) • Eva’s Talking, an archival interview with actor Eva Renzi (Monica Ranieri) • Original Italian and international theatrical trailers • Reversible sleeve featuring original and newly commissioned artwork by Candice Tripp