News
Cleopatra and 1001 Nights Double Blu-ray on June 18
posted on by Andrew Osmond
The new newsletter of Third Window Films confirms that its double disc Blu-ray release of 1001 Nights and Cleopatra will be released on June 18. There will also be a DVD edition.
The set will include an interview with director Eiichi Yamamoto, audio commentaries on both films by Helen McCarthy, author of The Art of Osamu Tezuka: God of Manga, plus 4K scanned trailers and liner notes by film critic Simon Abrams.
The set will be limited to 2000 copies on Blu-ray and a thousand copies on DVD.
There will also be a one-off cinema screening of 1001 Nights on Saturday April 28 at 9 p.m. at London's Castle Cinema, near Homerton and Hackney Central stations. Tickets can be booked here.
From an earlier publicity release by Third Window:
"In the late 60s, Tezuka Osamu with his production company Mushi Pro and director Eiichi Yamamoto (Belladonna of Sadness) started a very short run series of X-rated animations called Animerama. The series only really officially made these two films before Mushi Pro went bankrupt, but they have been totally forgotten in history and we are very happy to bring them back with new 2K remasters."The release will feature many new and exclusive extra features including an interview with director Eiichi Yamamoto, audio commentaries on both films by Helen McCarthy, author of The Art of Osamu Tezuka: God of Manga, plus 4K scanned trailers and liner notes by film critic Simon Abrams."
Both films are part of the Animerama trilogy of Mushi Pro films with adult sexual content. The 1969 film One Thousand and One Nights tells of the adventures of Aladdin as he travels through the Middle East in search of love, fortune, and power. In the 1970 film Cleopatra's story, three people from the future are spiritually sent back in time to relive the era of Caesar, Marc Anthony and Cleopatra. Both films were directed by Eiichi Yamamoto; One Thousand and One Nights has its original story credited to Osamu Tezuka, who is also credited with co-directing Cleopatra with Yamamoto.
The other film in the Animerama trilogy released by Mushi Pro was Belladonna of Sadness in 1973, which had a home release last year from Anime Limited.
