MovieChat Forums > The Day Mars Invaded Earth Discussion > DVD from Fox Cinema Archives!

DVD from Fox Cinema Archives!

posted 10 years ago by hobnob53
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It's just been announced that The Day Mars Invaded Earth will be released on the Fox Cinema Archives line.

Unfortunately this news is so new that the only information immediately available comes from ClassicFlix. Their site states that the film will be in its widescreen format. This would be in keeping with FCA's recent practice (as opposed to the pan & scan prints they originally did), but it would be nice to have confirmation from other sites.

Also, as always the availability dates of FCA discs vary slightly from site to site. The only date I've seen at this point is April 7, 2015 (from ClassicFlix), but on past experience the title may be available a little sooner on some other sites. Retail price (which some sites call the sale price, "marked down" from $24.99) is however the usual $19.99.

As soon as more information becomes available I'll amend this post. But I thought fans would appreciate the basic news as soon as possible.

Update 3/18/15: The DVD is now available from Amazon and is showing up on other sites within the next week or so. Price everywhere is $19.99 and it's still said to be in widescreen (Amazon says nothing but Movies Unlimited says w/s).

[–] jobla 10 years ago

Fox has also announced a MOD of HAND OF DEATH, also listed as widescreen, although I'm slightly dubious about that.

I actually saw HAND OF DEATH at a drive-in theater in 1962. It was a third feature/"sneak preview."

[–] hobnob53 10 years ago

Hi, pal! Yes, I saw that Hand of Death was also coming out. It probably is widescreen, but the notion of that movie even being in widescreen is funny in itself. I saw it on the former FMC a few years back and it was all right for a 60-minute time-passer. Hey, anything with John Agar.

They're also releasing something called Squad Car (1960), which sounds like another sixty minutes of crummy fun. Even I've never heard of it, but it says it takes place in Phoenix and may have been filmed around there, and as that's my old stomping ground I might get it just for the nostalgic views! (Even if it's all-studio, I'll probably indulge.) But that DVD is listed as "fullscreen", which of course means p&s.

An early-60s grade B box set, for sure.

[–] jobla 10 years ago

Hey, Dude! I owe you a letter, which will happen soon. The cheap Lippert/Fox noir film I want to see is WOMANHUNT, about a detective searching for a missing woman in San Francisco's Chinatown, circa early 1960's. I've never seen it, and I think that Berry Kroeger co-stars in it.

I have no idea if Fox even has a widescreen print or master of HAND OF DEATH, but we'll find out soon enough.

[–] hobnob53 10 years ago

You don't owe me a letter -- I owe you. We'll discuss when we PM. No hurry, we know where we are!

I'm dense -- is Womanhunt out from FCA? I never heard of it either but I think I may have seen the title listed a while back...or am I imagining it? Berry Kroeger played a Chinese in John Wayne's Blood Alley, so if he's in it it sounds as though they may have done him up similarly for this pic.

Speaking of Berry, one film I'm hoping they'll release on FCA is The Iron Curtain (1948), the first and best of the anti-Communist flicks of the postwar period, based of course on the true story of the unearthing of the Soviet spy ring in Canada in 1946. Berry's a Commie Canuck, and truth be told he's really scary/sinister. Stalin ordered Dmitri Shostakovich to sue Fox for using his music without permission! That suit went far.

Oh, MU says Hand of Death is widescreen, so that makes two sources. We shall see. Amazon is silent on the a.r. issue but they're not very reliable in that regard anyway. But Squad Car -- a title that sounds like it has absolutely nothing to do with the film's plot -- seems to be in "fullscreen". Actually, the fact that the sources so far say The Day Mars Invaded Earth and Hand of Death are both w/s, but not Squad Car, is somewhat reassuring: it indicates that they have separate information on each and aren't just presuming they're all in one format or the other.

[–] jobla 10 years ago

WOMANHUNT isn't available anywhere, to my knowledge. However, if Fox can release SQUAD CAR, then maybe they can release WOMANHUNT, too.

Years ago, Fox gave actor John Agar a private VHS transfer of HAND OF DEATH when he was quite ill. He wanted to see it again before he died, and the film hadn't been shown anywhere in decades.

I guess I'm lucky that I saw HAND OF DEATH at a drive-in theater in 1962, as few people saw it back then.

[–] hobnob53 10 years ago

Is that what killed him?

[–] jobla 10 years ago

Ha Ha. Nope, but viewing it didn't provoke a miracle healing comeback, either.

[–] hobnob53 10 years ago

Well, maybe if the VHS had been in widescreen he would have rallied. But that was a nice thing for the studio to do.

I never thought John Agar was such a bad actor. In most things he was perfectly acceptable. Though I did see him again last night in Attack of the Puppet People and have to say that in that, he was dreadful -- as was everyone else, courtesy Bert I. Gordon. Except for John Hoyt, who could do no wrong.

Come to think of it, Agar would have been much better for The Day Mars Invaded Earth than Kent Taylor. Agar at least had had previous experience of a sort battling The Brain From Planet Arous. Kent vs. The Phantom From 10,000 Leagues wasn't in the same, well, league. Besides, Agar was more the right age for the part, and he had certainly played enough scientists.