Dirty Dancing has probably had more home video releases than any other film over the last thirty-five years as its ownership went from Vestron to Artisan to Lionsgate among others in the U.S., 20th Century-Fox in Australia, Columbia in the U.K., and Warner Home Video in France to name just a few. It had a 20th anniversary release in 2007, a 30th anniversary in 2017, and has just been released in 4K UHD to celebrate its 35th.

The new Lionsgate release comes with exclusive 4K-only features including commentary from writer Eleanor Bergstein, a separate one with choreographer Kenny Ortega and others, and a new documentary on the making of the film. The accompanying Blu-ray features archival material include interviews with stars Jennifer Grey and Patrick Swayze.

As the liner notes say, the film remains a cultural icon. Loved by generations of fans, this cinematic treasure has inspired multiple films, a stage version, and reality dance competitions watched around the world. The film’s magic features the timeless themes of love, family, class, and perseverance.

Although Grey plays a teenager and Swayze a slightly older dancer, she was 27 and he was 35 at the time of the film’s release. Both had been around for a while and had, in fact, appeared together three years earlier in Red Dawn, but this is the film that made them household names. Swayze went on to star in other major films, notably Ghost, Point Break, and To Wong Foo, Thanks for Everything! Julie Newmar before dying of pancreatic cancer at 57 in 2009. Grey, the daughter of Oscar-winning stage and screen legend Joel Grey, can still be seen in an occasional film or guest starring role on TV.

Co-starring in this classic tale of a girl from the right side of the tracks and a boy from the wrong side, are Jerry Orbach as Grey’s disapproving doctor father, Kelly Bishop as her mother, and Jack Weston as the owner of the resort at which Grey and Swayze meet.

Orbach, at this stage of his career, was best known as the Tony-winning star of such classic Broadway musicals as Promises, Promises, Chicago, and 42nd Street. He would later become even better known as the star of TV’s Law and Order. Bishop was a Tony award winner for A Chorus Line with numerous film and television roles to this day. Weston was a familiar face in such films as Cactus Flower and The Ritz.

Like most people, you will probably find it hard not to hum, sing, and/or dance to the Oscar-winning “(I’ve Had) The Time of My Life” as Grey and Swayze glide across the dance floor in the film’s highly satisfying conclusion.

Kino Lorber has released a 4K UHD edition of Paths of Glory, Stanley Kubrick’s anti-war classic from 1957.

The film should at the very least have been Oscar-nominated for Best Picture, Director, Actor, and Adapted Screenplay, but sadly wasn’t.

Looking more stunning than ever in UHD, the film was an immediate critical success but a box-office failure. It was not a major awards magnet in its time, either, although it was one of sixteen films nominated for a BAFTA for Best Film From Any Source, losing to David Lean’s The Bridge on the River Kwai. In the U.S., its only major nomination was for Best Written American Drama from the Writers Guild of America. It lost to 12 Angry Men.

Kirk Douglas gives one of his best performances as the World War I Company Commander who defends his men in a French High Command-ordered court-martial to make an example of three men selected at random to stand trial for cowardice after the war-weary company refused an order to face certain death in a futile exercise against the Germans. Adolphe Menjou (A Farewell to Arms) and George Macready (Gilda) as his superior officers are both at the top of their game as Douglas’ malevolent superiors.

This release contains a brand-new Dolby Vision HD master from a 4K scan of the original camera negative. It features new audio commentary from novelist and critic Tim Lucas.
Kino Lorber has also released a Blu-ray edition of When Tomorrow Comes, the first ever U.S. home video release of John M. Stahl’s 1939 film.

This was the second film that stars Irene Dunne and Charles Boyer made in 1939. The first was Leo McCarey’s Love Affair, which McCarey would remake in 1957 with Deborah Kerr and Dunne’s The Awful Truth, My Favorite Wife, and Penny Serenade co-star, Cary Grant.

It was the third 1930s film from director John M. Stahl that would be remade by Douglas Sirk in the 1950s. The others were Magnificent Obsession and Imitation of Life. The 1957 remake, starring June Allyson and Rossano Brazzi, would be called Interlude. It would be remade again under that title in 1968 starring Oskar Werner and Barbara Ferris. Stahl’s 1932 film Back Street, starring Dunne and John Boles, would be remade in 1941 with Margaret Sullavan and Boyer, and again in 1961 with Susan Hayward and John Gavin.

Dunne plays a waitress who meets married man Boyer by chance in this one. Boyer is a concert pianist unhappily married to a mentally ill woman played by Barbara O’Neil. O’Neil would again play Boyer’s mentally ill wife in 1940’s All This, and Heaven Too for which she would receive an Oscar nomination in support of Boyer and Bette Davis. She later supported Dunne in 1948’s I Remember Mama.

Sourced from a brand-new 2K master, it features new audio commentary from author and film historian Lee Gambin and costume historian Elissa Rose.

Universal Home Entertainment has released three Bing Crosby hits on Blu- ray. They are 1934’s Here Is My Heart, co-starring Kitty Carlisle; 1947’s Welcome Stranger, reuniting Crosby with his Going My Way co-star Barry Fitzgerald; and 1949’s A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court, co-starring Rhonda Fleming. Grab ‘em while they’re hot!

This week’s new releases include The Phantom of the Open and the 4K UHD release of Cat People.