DVD Reviews
Warner Archival DVDs
- Written by Henry Cabot Beck
- Published August 25, 2009
Everybody who loves movies has a wish list of pictures they’d like to own, that have not yet been made available as DVDs.
Which is why Warner Brothers’ ambitious archives program is a welcome addition. Since March, Warner has been inviting customers to browse its back catalog online and to order DVDs of films that long ago disappeared off of VHS shelves (click on “Warner Archives” at WBShop.com).
These no-frills DVDs are burned to order and mailed to the customer for $20, although you do have the option of downloading a PC-only version for $15.
Even more, the site offers more than just Warner product, including films by MGM, RKO and Allied Artists. You can get Billy the Kid (1941), starring Robert Taylor; Wichita, a smart Wyatt Earp picture from 1955 starring Joel McCrea; and several Randolph Scott pictures from his RKO years, such as Badman’s Territory (1946) and Trail Street (1947), where Scott played Bat Masterson.
Speaking of Scott, this program finally makes Westbound (1959) available for Budd Boetticher/Scott completists who own Seven Men from Now (1956), the first in the series, and the recent box set collection that gathered the remainder of their collaborations last Christmas.
