First season of ‘Supergirl’ arrives on DVD with a slew of special features

New on Blu-ray

“A Hologram for the King” (Lionsgate DVD $19.98; Blu-ray, $24.99; also available on VOD)

Tom Hanks gives a terrific performance in the thoughtful drama, a film that did so poorly at the box office that even Hanks fans might not be aware of it. Written and directed by Tom Tykwer (adapting a Dave Eggers novel), the movie stars Hanks as a depressed American businessman who travels to Saudi Arabia to try to sell a new holographic videoconferencing technology, but has trouble setting up a meeting with his busy royal clients. Though it contains some elements of culture-clash dramedy, the movie is primarily a character study about a man who’s been feeling alienated from his surroundings since he started growing old. Tyler uses special effects and a lightly absurdist tone to support Hanks, who — as always — plays confused and sympathetic as well as any actor in the business.

[Special features: A trio of featurettes]

VOD

“Disorder” (available Aug. 12)

Writer-director Alice Winocour’s surprising film is a muted drama that erupts into a gripping genre piece, and it works very well as both. Matthias Schoenaerts plays a French soldier who’s still dealing with PTSD from his tour in Afghanistan when he’s hired to provide security on the sprawling estate of a corrupt Lebanese businessman and his dangerously naive wife (played by Diane Kruger). After spending about an hour establishing the relationships between a pair of deeply damaged individuals, Winocour and co-screenwriter Jean-Stéphane Bron begin turning the screws in the final third, putting the wife and her guard in mortal danger. This is the rare thriller that takes the time to cue viewers to the real stakes involved, which makes every potential threat more terrifying.

TV set of the week

“Supergirl: The Complete First Season” (Warner Bros., $49.99; Blu-ray, $54.97)

“Supergirl” isn’t the best of the Greg Berlanti-produced DC Comics TV shows (that would be “The Flash”), but it may have the best overall star in Melissa Benoist, who plays “the maid of steel” as a can-do nerd, sunny even in the face of public skepticism. As a fantasy-adventure series, it’s hit-and-miss, though once it moves beyond the awkward early episodes it begins to tell some serviceable superhero stories. But it’s worth watching even at its clumsiest because of the likability of Benoist, and because of a top shelf supporting cast that includes Calista Flockhart as the heroine’s hilariously demanding boss, and Mehcad Brooks and Jeremy Jordan as her love interests. These were delightful people to hang out with in Season 1’s 20 episodes, and they should be just as fun in the upcoming second season.

[Special features: Deleted scenes, featurettes and the 2015 Comic-Con panel that introduced the show to fans]

From the archives

“Battles Without Honor and Humanity” (Arrow Blu-ray, $29.95)

Japanese filmmaker Kinji Fukasaku shook up the gangster genre in 1973 with this film, the first of a five-picture cycle that came to be known as “The Yakuza Papers,” which traces the history of organized crime in Hiroshima from 1946 to 1950. Beginning with the post-atomic rubble of a refugee camp, the film follows a group of young men who start out making a living in the black market and gradually ally themselves with warring criminal families. As with the rest of the series, “Battles Without Honor and Humanity” is an unflinching look at Fukasaku’s homeland, using docu-realistic violence to ask whether the legendary Japanese sense of duty was destroyed by American bombs, or whether it was always a convenient myth.

[Special features: A scholarly commentary track and an interview with Japanese cult film legend Takashi Miike]

Three more to see

“Baskin” (Scream! Factory DVD/Blu-ray combo, $29.99); “Dukhtar” (Kino Lorber DVD, $29.95; Blu-ray, $34.95); “11.22.63” (Warner Bros. DVD, $29.98; Blu-ray, $39.99)

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