Big Trouble in Little China is out on Blu-ray today and this is a most important release. There are few adventures on film as great as those of Jack Burton and his epic showdown with Lo Pan for the souls of the green-eyed girls. This is perhaps one of the best tongue-in-cheek 80s action comedies ever made. Besides that, it’s all in the reflexes.

Billy Bob Thornton’s iconic Sling Blade hits Blu-ray today. This was perhaps one of the finest performances anyone has ever directed themselves to and it’s about time Miramax is releasing films of this caliber in a high definition format. The transfer on the film is surprising for an independent film of this era, proving once again that Blu-ray is the way to go. Special Features include a very, very interesting to listen to and informative commentary by Billy Bob Thornton, a Bravo profile of the director, and a number of other behind the scenes supplements that help viewers explore not only the film, but the making of. This is high on my list of recommendations.

Mutant Chronicles is coming out today. This film has a tremendous cast (Thomas Jane, Ron Perlman, and John Malkovich) and looked reasonably cool. I was hoping to see it in the theatre, but it seems to have skipped theatres and gone right to DVD. Usually that’s not a good sign, but this movie still looked like fun, so I’m planning on checking it out.

Today, you’ll also be able to get an extremely cheap Korean pressing of The African Queen. For some reason, this movie has eluded a DVD release of any kind. I’m not sure what the quality is like, but it’s better than no copy at all.

That’s pretty much everything of note this week.  I’ll be back next week, you can write it down.