Cinefantastique Online

This is an exceptionally dreary week for cinefantastique, with barely a handful of sci-fi, fantasy, or horror titles arriving on home video, and even those few are television series or repackaging of previously available titles: SOUTH PARK - The Complete Eleventh Season; DC SUPERHEROES: The Filmation Adventures; a two-pack of MULAN/MULAN II. The most interesting release - at least from a DVD standpoint -s the Criterion Collection version of Guy Maddin’s BRAND UPON THE BRAIN. This oddball black-and-white effort - essentially a silent movie - was screened with live musical accompaniment and narration when it played in U.S. theatres last year; the gimmick was that different actors would read the narration at different screenings, so the experience of watching the film was always different. A previous DVD release featured a synchronized soundtrack with Isabella Rossellini as narrator. Criterion’s new “Director-Approved Special Edition” adds optional narration tracks by Laurie Anderson, John Ashbery, Cirspin Glover, Louis Negrin, Eli Wallach, and Maddin himself. There is also a new documentary, “The Making of Brand upon the Brain;” two short films by Maddin (”It’s Mother’s Birthday” and “Footsteps”); deleted scenes; a trailer; and a new essay by film critic Dennis Lim. If you’re a fan of Maddin’s eccentric sensibility, this is undoubtedly the disc you want on your shelf in between DRACULA: PAGES FROM A VIRGIN’S DIARY and MY WINNIPEG. Check out this week’s DVD releases below the fold.