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Warner press release:

HUMPHREY BOGART: THE SIGNATURE COLLECTION VOL. 2 DEBUTS OCTOBER 3

DVD Debuts of The Maltese Falcon 3-Disc Special Edition and Bogie Classics Across The Pacific, Action In the North Atlantic, All Through the Night and Passage To Marseille

Burbank, Calif., June 12, 2006 - On October 3, Warner Home Video honors one of the most popular movie actors of all time with the DVD release of Humphrey Bogart: The Signature Collection Volume 2. Highlighting this collection is a deluxe new 3-Disc Special Edition of The Maltese Falcon, featuring a newly-remastered edition of the 1941 John Huston masterpiece starring Bogart as Dashiell Hammett's definitive Sam Spade. This new deluxe set is loaded with hours of bonuses including the 1931 version of The Maltese Falcon and the 1936 film, Satan Met a Lady, commentary by Bogart biographer Eric Lax, a recently recovered additional scene as well as vintage Warner "Night at the Movies"

Wow! That 3-disc Falcon set looks impressive. It'll be particularly interesting to compare the three different versions. I can't remember which of the earlier versions it is, but one of them features a truly bizarre character actor named Dudley Digges in the Caspar Guttman role. He's not as good as Greenstreet, but he definitely puts his own unique stamp on the role.

I'm also interested in how they'll handle this:

a recently recovered additional scene

Have they "restored" this additional scene to the film itself, or is it being offered as an extra "deleted scene" elsewhere? I hope it's the latter.

Shame that none of the other titles are being offered separately. IMO, Across the Pacific is a fun little adventure movie that would be nice to own, but I personally find Passage to Marseilles and Action in the North Atlantic rather dull, despite the casts.

This shit just keep getting better.

It is great to see Warner's releasing more of Bogie's films especially those that he made with Michael Curtiz. I concur, on the 3-disc of Maltese Falcon, it will be great to see Warren William as Sam Spade. I think Warner's should consider a Warren William boxset with the films Employees Entrance, Skyscraper, The Kennel Murder Case and The Case of the Curious Bride (he is Perry Mason in this film and interestingly this is Errol Flynn's screen debut as a corpse)

WOW. I will definitely be picking this up. The Maltese Falcon 3-disc looks incredible and I really like Across The Pacific. It's not a "great" film, but it's a lot of fun.

But what is up with the Joe Doakes extras? I don't find them particularly funny or interesting.

Date change: October 3...original post edited.

what was the first collection? re-releases?

There was no first collection. They released The Bogart Collection that has a head shot of Bogart like other signature collections, but no signature on the box. It includes The Big Sleep, Casablanca - Two-Disc Special Edition, The Maltese Falcon, To Have and Have Not and The Treasure of the Sierra Madre - Two-Disc Special Edition. I think this set was released when they still used snappers (in September 2003). There was also a Humphrey Bogart Collection released in 2000 with Boggie in fedora on the cover.

tavernier wrote:Date change: October 3...original post edited.

I don't understand ... Warner's press release from yesterday gives the September 12th date. Did it get pushed back three weeks on the same day it was announced??

FilmFanSea wrote:Did it get pushed back three weeks on the same day it was announced??

Yes.

Maybe it got pushed from the 12th so as not to compete with the Star Wars DVDs for that day. Those releases will overshadow anything else released on the 12th.

Though it could be argued that Star Wars and Bogie fans aren't exactly overlapping audiences. But my hope is that they'll announce the new Kubrick titles for the 12th instead

I completely agree that many of the fans would overlap (I'm one of them), but from a competitive sales point of view, the Bogart collection probably wouldn't sell as many copies as new Star Wars discs.

Oh well, I can wait another month to once again see Bogart as a Frenchman in Passage to Marseille.

Amazon's pre-order:

This collection will be release the same day as Vol. 2 (October 3):

Casablanca: SE
Treasure of the Sierra Madre: SE
High Sierra
They Drive by Night

Amazon's Pre-order.

More ugly artwork

Man... What's happening to Warner lately?

I actually think the artwork for Passage to Marseille and Action in the North Atlantic is quite good. The other three are a little underwhelming but I assume that's just original poster art.

I really hope that the films other than The Maltese Falcon are packaged in the traditional armary cases. I adore Passage to Marseille, and think it deserves a release of its own, separate from the boxed set.

Does anyone know if the other four films, besides The Maltese Falcon, will be packaged in slimcases or the traditional armary cases?

Judging by the thickness of the box in the picture of the artwork and the fact that the other four are exclusive to the set, I'd say it's a safe bet they will be in slimcases.

Yeah, but if you look at the picture for the John Ford film collection on Amazon.com, which contains five armary cases, it looks as wide as this Bogart collection...

Warner said in the last HTF chat that discs will only be put in slim cases if they are not otherwise available individually. Since the press release indicates that "all titles are exclusive to the collection, except The Maltese Falcon 3-Disc Special Edition," I would think that the discs will be in slim cases.

It definitely looks that way, with The Maltese Falcon packed in 3 disc digi-pak style (Like the Wizard of Oz) and the others in slim cases.

I'm in love with slimcases, I have over 1,000 discs and space has become a major issue. I'm in the process of transferring all of my amray cases, into slim cases, and it makes all the difference. I'm all for Warners doing the work for me.

As I anxiously await some reviews for this set, I wanted to point out that I saw an ad for it and the other four titles were clearly in transparent slimcases.