DVD Review - For No Good Reason (2012)

Terry Gilliam's The Time Bandits Will Be Stealing Your TV Screens This Month

Release Date:
26th August 2013 (UK)
Stars:
Craig Warnock, David Warner, John Cleese, Ralph Richardson
Buy The Time Bandits:
DVD or Blu-ray

To millions he was one member of the iconic comedy team of Monty Python, but to the rest of us The Time Bandits was the film that established Terry Gilliam as more than the Python's resident animator. This month Arrow Video are releasing The Time Bandits digitally remastered on DVD & Blu-Ray chock full of extras too!

Time Bandits is a delightfully inventive children’s fantasy about young Kevin (Craig Warnock) who finds himself travelling through holes in the space-time continuum in the company of half a dozen fractious dwarfs.

Along the way, he encounters Agamemnon (Sean Connery), Robin Hood (John Cleese), Napoleon (Ian Holm) and winds up as a passenger on the Titanic, although not necessarily in that order. But is this just random entertainment laid on for history fan Kevin’s benefit, or part of a wider struggle between the forces of good (Ralph Richardson) and evil (David Warner)?

At the time, this was a rare example of a small-budget British film successfully taking on American blockbusters. Now, it's a much-loved fantasy classic bursting with inspired images and ideas: Gilliam and co-writer Michael Palin (who also appears) are clearly enjoying themselves as much as their audience.



Seeing this is about to get released has unleashed some nice childhood memories and yes kids I'm old enough to remember watching this.Whilst it was typical Gilliam style surreal, silly, fantastical it a Time Bandits essentially a kids film. Though it officially released July 1981 in UK depending where you lived it could take upto 2 years for it to arrive in your local cinema sometimes even longer for the home release! So kids and cinephiles of today you don't realise how lucky you are withing months cinema then home release!

Special Features

- Brand new 2k-resolution restoration of the film from the original camera negative, approved by director and co-writer Terry Gilliam
- Original uncompressed PCM Stereo 2.0 and 5.1 DTS-HD Master Audio options
- Optional English SDH subtitles for the deaf and hard of hearing
- Chasing Time Bandits: A new interview with Terry Gilliam
- Writing the Film that Dares Not Speak its Name: A new interview in which Michael Palin discusses co-writing and acting in Time Bandits
- The Effects of Time Bandits: A new interview in which Kent Houston, founder of the Peerless Camera Company, discusses Time Bandits’ optical effects
- Playing Evil: A new featurette in which actor David Warner remembers producer George Harrison and playing Evil in Time Bandits
- The Costumes of Time Bandits: A new interview with costume designer James Acheson
- The Look of Time Bandits: A new interview with production designer Milly Burns
- From Script to Screen – A new animated featurette in which Milly Burns takes us through her production notebooks, locations photographs and storyboards revealing how twentieth century Morocco was transformed into Ancient Greece
- Original Trailer
- Restoration Demonstration
- Collector’s booklet featuring new writing on the film by critic James Oliver


The Time Bandits is also getting a limited cinema re-release on Friday 9th August, here's where you can catch it:

Prince Charles Leicester Square
Harbour Lights Picturehouse, Southampton
The Belmont Picturehouse, Aberdeen
Cameo Picturehouse, Edinburgh
Picturehouse at FACT, Liverpool
Hackney Picturehouse
Ritzy Picturehouse, Brixton
Exeter Picturehouse
Cinema City, Norwich
City Screen Picturehouse, York
Arts Picturehouse, Cambridge
Dukes at Komedia, Brighton
Curzon HMV Wimbledon

The Time Bandits will be released on DVD and Blu-Ray on 26th August.

Watch Terry Gilliam's Short The Wholly Family

Missing something? A big gap in your cinematic life anything to do with a certain one Terry Gilliam? Probably. whilst we wait for The Zero Theorem to arrive later this year or early next year the ex-Monty Python member back in 2011 had been busy making a 20 minute short called The Wholly Family for Italian pasta company Garofalo. Set in the company's home town of Naples the short film is part of an annual series to promote the city starring Cristiana Capotondi, Douglas Dean, Nicolas Connolly and Sergio Solli. The film is full of Gilliam's trademark, visual, fantastical storytelling  but most of humor, the film has been playing at various European film festivals with best short film at European Film Awards and now the film is available online in its full glory.

BlizzardKid Shorts Award 2012 - The Wholly Family from BlizzardKid on Vimeo.

A crowded street in Naples city center, plenty of shops selling presepi. A wealthy American couple and Jake, their 10 years-old child, try to push their way through the crowd. While husband and wife argue which street to take, the boy is unwillingly separated from them.

source:ThePlaylist

Terry Gilliam to Direct A Opera Production of The Damnation of Faust for ENO