John Wayne Classics: Always on Target

Until this year, Paramount Home Video had been slow in bringing out digital editions of its classic films. Now, vintage titles are being released every month on DVD.

The latest offerings from Paramount are two John Wayne flicks--”The Shootist” and “Hatari!”--and the western musical “Paint Your Wagon” ($30 each).

Wayne gives a moving, poignant performance as a dying gunslinger in the 1976 western “The Shootist.” The film, Wayne’s last, also stars Lauren Bacall, Ron Howard, Jimmy Stewart, Richard Boone and Hugh O’Brian. The digital edition includes a crisp wide-screen transfer of the film (which was directed by Don Siegel), the trailer and a short but touching documentary on the making of “The Shootist” featuring interviews with O’Brian; producer William Self; Peter Frankovich, the son of producer Mike Frankovich; and screenwriter Miles Hood Swarthart.

Wayne was not the first choice to play “The Shootist.” The actor was battling cancer, and the producers didn’t think he had the stamina for the role. So it was offered to George C. Scott. But Wayne heard about the project, lobbied for the part and ultimately got it.

“Hatari!,” from 1962, is a rollicking action-comedy set in then-Tanganyika. Wayne plays a muy macho trapper who catches wild animals to sell to zoos. Hardy Kruger, Gerard Blaine, Red Buttons and Elsa Martinelli also star. Howard Hawks directed. Henry Mancini composed the score, which includes “The Baby Elephant Walk.” The DVD features a nice wide-screen transfer and the trailer.

“Paint Your Wagon” (1969), based on the Lerner & Loewe Broadway musical, is a turgid, overproduced comedy weakened by the fact that the three stars--Lee Marvin, Clint Eastwood and Jean Seberg--can’t sing a lick. The digital edition features a wide-screen version of the film and the trailer.

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Harrison Ford, Lesley-Anne Down and Christopher Plummer star in the glossy 1979 romance “Hanover Street” (Columbia TriStar, $20). Set in London during World War II, the drama finds Ford as a dashing American pilot who meets a beautiful British nurse (Down) during an air raid. The two immediately fall in love, even though the nurse is married to a British agent (Plummer).

The digital edition includes the wide-screen version of the melodrama, several trailers and frank commentary from writer-director Peter Hyams. Hyams refers to himself as a “dermatologist” because he can find only the flaws in his films. In fact, he says, he never sees his films once they are released and he hadn’t seen “Hanover Street” in 22 years.

Hyams says Ford wasn’t particularly popular when he cast him, but he knew he’d be a big star because he’s immensely likable. Hyams calls Ford one of the most daring actors he’s worked with because he was willing to do almost any of his stunts. And, he points out, the actor was awfully cute in the film--an observation with which most women would agree.

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New from Image is the unique 1929 film “The Silent Enemy” ($30). Produced by W. Douglas Burden, this drama features an all-Native American cast. “Silent Enemy” re-creates Ojibway Indian life before European settlement in the Hudson Bay region. The caribou stampede finale is an exceptional piece of filmmaking. The DVD features a nice transfer of the restored silent film, production notes and bios and a wonderful audio interview between film historian Kevin Brownlow and producer Burden.

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Also from Image is this rarity: a horror film made in Sweden, 1958’s “Terror in the Midnight Sun” ($30). In this goofy, campy U.S.-Swedish co-production, a white spaceship lands in the snow above the Arctic Circle. Geologists--believing it to be a meteor--scurry to the site only to be attacked by a giant furry creature with bad teeth. And just like “King Kong,” the beast falls in love--here with an American figure skating champion (Barbara Wilson) who just happens to be the niece of a geologist.

Included on the DVD is “Invasion of the Animal People,” a 1962 reedited version of the original film with new footage shot in L.A.

The disc also includes the original theatrical trailer; tepid commentary from “Midnight Sun” producer Bertil Jernberg; trailers for several Swedish flicks; two Swedish short subjects; a production gallery; and “The Girl in the Glacier,” an episode of a never-broadcast Swedish TV series, “13 Demon Street,” written and directed by Curt Siodmak (“The Wolf Man”), starring Lon Chaney Jr.

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Before he became Bond, James Bond, Roger Moore starred as Leslie Charteris’ rakish master criminal Simon Templar in the entertaining British TV series “The Saint.” The series, which ran from 1962 to 1968 in England and aired on NBC, is now available from A&E; on video ($30) and DVD ($40).

“The Saint” sets feature complete, uncut and digitally remastered episodes. The video edition features three cassettes containing two episodes each; the DVD set includes two discs with three episodes each, plus a biography and filmography of Moore, a photo gallery of stills and trailers for each episode.

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New from Acorn Media are four episodes of the second season of the outrageous Sci Fi Channel series “Lexx” (VHS and DVD, $30). The truly bizarre and often risque series deals with the adventures of the crew of the Lexx--a living creature that is a mechanically enhanced insect. The crew includes a cowardly ex-security guard who loves women, a love slave, a robot head and a dead assassin.

Both VHS and digital editions include footage too hot for American TV and an interview with star Brian Downey. The DVD features a “making of” segment, storyboards and trivia.

It’s a lackluster week as far as new films available on DVD go, with the African American comedy “The Brothers” (Columbia TriStar, $25) the best of the lot. Morris Chestnut, D.L. Hughley, Bill Bellamy and Shemar Moore star as lifelong friends struggling with commitment to the opposite sex. The digital edition includes trailers, a music video, deleted scenes, an interview with writer-director Gary Hardwick and Hardwick’s commentary track.