Holiday Blus: 25 Home Entertainment Gift Ideas for Movie Lovers
2018 has gone by in a flash and the holiday season is upon us. What could possibly make a better gift than the gift of movies? If you’re still trying to find something special for the movie lover in your life, check out our list of 25 gift ideas on DVD, Blu-ray and 4K Ultra HD. From the dawn of film itself to the most recent Hollywood blockbusters, we’ve got something for every taste.
Our first issue Moviebill was dedicated entirely to Avengers: Infinity War. After that Thanos-snap cliffhanger, fans all over the world are now anxiously awaiting the Endgame. With the grand finale in our sights, now is the perfect time to revisit the last decade of Marvel Studios films. That’s exactly why Walt Disney home entertainment has been re-releasing key MCU entries in 4K Ultra HD. Recent additions to the line include the first two Avengers films: Marvel’s The Avengers and Avengers: Age of Ultron, both presented with the highest possible picture sound and picture quality.
Our second Moviebill issue centered on J.A. Bayona’s Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom, which has now come home alongside the entire Jurassic franchise. All five films have been brought together for the Jurassic World: Five Movie Collection, available on DVD, Blu-ray and 4K Ultra HD.
Your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to identify the action movie lover in your life and gift them the Mission: Impossible 6 Movie Collection. The entire Paramount Pictures and Skydance franchise comes together for a 12-disc set that pairs digital copies with Blu-ray and 4K Ultra HD versions of all six films (including the just-released Mission: Impossible – Fallout).
If you’re shopping for someone that prefers massive transforming robots from outer space, look no farther than Transformers: The Ultimate 5-Movie Collection, bringing together director Michael Bay’s entire franchise just in time for this month’s prequel, Bumblebee. When you catch Bumblebee on the big screen starting December 21st, make sure to see it in RealD 3D. You’ll also receive our very first Moviebill Flip edition, which features a fold-out, AR-activated poster!
The next time you’re at the movies, make sure to use the Moviebill scanner on the new Aquaman poster for a special message from the King of Atlantis. If you’re looking for something special for a DC Comics fan in your life, consider a membership to DC Universe, the new streaming service that, for the first time ever, brings together movies, television series and comics from throughout the publisher’s 80 year history.
With Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald now playing in theaters all over the world, J.K. Rowling’s Wizarding World is expanding in all directions. Warner Bros. home entertainment has a treat for potential witches and wizards with the 4K Ultra HD rerelease of the Harry Potter Complete 8-Film Collection. For an extra special treat, track down the Best Buy exclusive version, which offers the set in a deluxe case with eight individual Steelbooks.
Harry Potter isn’t the only Warner Bros. franchises getting the 4K treatment. In celebration of the franchise’s 20th anniversary next year, The Matrix Trilogy has just made its Ultra HD debut. Even if all you see is ones and zeroes, the Wachowski triple feature has never looked better.
Meanwhile, Paramount Pictures Home Entertainment has also given the Ultra HD treatment to their Jack Ryan 5-Film Collection. The new set includes The Hunt For Red October, Patriot Games, Clear and Present Danger, The Sum of All Fears and Jack Ryan: Shadow Recruit, representing the entire feature film oeuvre of the Tom Clancy hero. Of course, you’ll have to turn to Amazon Prime Video to catch Ryan’s latest incarnation where the new, small screen version is played by John Krasinski.
Anyone who loves damned dirty apes should be eager to get their stinking paws on 20th Century Fox‘s new 50 Years of Planet of the Apes 9-Movie Collection. The franchise celebrates half a century on the big screen with the original Planet of the Apes series (Planet of the Apes (1968), Beneath the Planet of the Apes (1970), Escape From the Planet of the Apes (1971), Conquest of the Planet of the Apes (1972) and Battle for the Planet of the Apes (1973)), the 2001 Tim Burton helmed remake and, available in 4K, the new Apes trilogy (Rise of the Planet of the Apes (2011), Dawn of the Planet of the Apes (2014), War for the Planet of the Apes (2017)).
Another Best Buy exclusive release, the complete Rocky Collection Steelbook includes all six Rocky Balboa-centered films (that is to say, everything except Creed and the recently released Creed II). If you need a recap of the franchise, look no further than our in-depth Rocky movies guide.
If you’re looking for a gift for someone who loves early cinema, Flicker Alley is the place to go. Their collection spans from Georges Méliès to Charlie Chaplin to an incredible Cinerama collection. This holiday season, Flicker Alley has been working for the Mary Pickford Foundation on two silent films, Fanchon the Cricket and Little Annie Rooney, both finally available in HD for the very first time.
Kino-Lorber, meanwhile, has a fantastic new collection dedicated to the early days of cinema. Pioneers: First Women Filmmakers offers little seen works from women who helped define the medium. Restored in 2K and 4K from archival sources, the films are presented with new musical scores alongside an 80-page booklet filled essays and photos.
If it’s monsters you’re after, you can’t beat the classic Universal Monsters Complete 30-Film Collection, offering Dracula, Frankenstein, The Mummy, The Wolfman, The Invisible Man, The Creature from the Black Lagoon and The Phantom of the Opera along with all the various sequels, spanning 1931 to 1956.
There’s more classic Hollywood to be had in Criterion’s recent celebration of Marlene Dietrich and Josef Von Sternberg. Dietrich & Sternberg in Hollywood collects six films from the early 1930s: Hollywood Morocco, Dishonored, Shanghai Express, Blonde Venus, The Scarlet Empress and The Devil Is a Woman, all debuting in HD.
If you’re looking for the ultimate gift for your favorite cinephile, be sure to check out Criterion’s massive Ingmar Bergman’s Cinema set. Every film from the Swedish master is collected through 39 films that span six decades. Many of the titles are even making their blu-ray debuts.
Creature feature fans have cause to celebrate with Scream Factory’s just-released Critters Collection. All four entries in the horror franchise come together for set jam packed with special features. While it’s not the series’ strongest entry, Critters 3 has an interesting honor: it’s the very first film to star Leonardo DiCaprio!
Another recent Scream Factory release, the It’s Alive Trilogy collects the ultimate monster infant trilogy, bringing Larry Cohen’s original 1974 It’s Alive to HD alongside 1978’s It Lives Again and 1987’s It’s Alive III: Island of the Alive.
Scream Factory (a Shout! Factory label) specializes in giving cult horror the deluxe treatment. Be sure to peruse their website for all sorts of interesting releases, including various boxed sets and Steelbook cases. A few items, such as the above Silent Night, Deadly Night Part 2, are available on Amazon in standard versions. Through Scream Factory, though, you can get a limited edition NECA figurine!
Not to be outdone, Arrow Films has been releasing their own stellar horror blu-rays. Their recent George A. Romero: Between Night and Dawn brings to blu-ray the three films that the horror master made between Night of the Living Dead and the first sequel, Dawn of the Dead. That includes 1971’s There’s Always Vanilla, 1972’s Season of the Witch and 1973’s The Crazies.
Arrow also has a label dedicated to arthouse films, as represented here by their recent Godard + Gorin: Five Films, collecting Jean-Luc Godard’s collaborations with Jean-Pierre Gorin: Un film comme les autres, British Sounds, Vent d’est, Lotte in Italia and Vladimir et Rosa.
One of the best animated series of all time gets the ultimate upgrade with all 109 episodes restored for blu-ray. It’s not just a small screen release, either, as Batman: The Complete Animated Series also includes two feature films, Batman: Sub-Zero and the theatrically released Batman: Mask of the Phantasm.
Another winner for anyone who was a child in the early 1990s, Shout! Factory’s giant Mighty Morphin’ Power Rangers 25th Anniversary Collector’s Edition brings together the entire American series in four Steelbooks housed in a metal slipcase. What’s more, the set offers — on Blu-ray for the first time anywhere — the 1995 Power Rangers movie.
Despite airing on television, “Finding Frances,” the two-hour series finale of Nathan Fielder’s incredible comedy series Nathan For You, wound up on quite a few film critics “Best Of” lists last year. That’s because there’s really nothing else quite like Fielder’s unique blend of documentary and deadpan comedy. Now “Finding Frances” joins four seasons of marketing misadventures for the year’s funniest box set, Nathan For You: The Complete Series.
Indicator is technically a UK label, but all of their releases so far have been region free. A relatively new company, they’ve been giving domestic boutique labels a run for their money with exquisitely authored Blu-ray discs and Criterion-level special features. Among their impressive box set releases are collections dedicated to the work of Samuel Fuller, Ray Harryhausen, William Castle, just to name a few!
Truly a gift for the movie collector who has everything, Oscilloscope’s Circle of Trust is a fun subscription from the distribution label launched by Beastie Boy Adam Yauch. The recipient receives whatever the next ten releases from Oscilloscope happen to be which, so far, has celebrated all manner of filmmaking from Banksy’s unique documentary Exit Through the Gift Shop to the post-apocalyptic comedy It’s a Disaster.
Silas Lesnick is the Senior Editor of Moviebill. He has been covering entertainment news out of Los Angeles for more than a decade. You can reach him via e-mail or on Twitter.
