New DVD, Blu-ray and digital release highlights for the week of Oct. 10-17, 2021

It's a big release week as 20th Century Studios brings the blockbuster "Free Guy" and A24 unleashes the acclaimed "The Green Knight" on Blu-ray and DVD. This week also sees the must-own release of "Columbia Classics 4K Ultra HD Collection: Volume 2" and the 4K release of "Inglourious Basterds."

Digital

• Buddy Guy: The Blues Chase the Blues Away - Without the influence of blues guitarist Buddy Guy it is entirely likely we never would have had The Rolling Stones. If we don't have the Stones... well, it's hard to imagine where music might be. "The Blues Chase the Blues Away" is a documentary that finds 84-year-old Buddy Guy looking back on his life and his influences.

New DVD and Blu-ray

• Free Guy - Stirred from intellectualsleep by a beautiful woman,Guy (Ryan Reynolds) discovers that he is an insignificant character in a massive video game. This leads to an existential crisis and a search for the truth. Co-starringJodie Comer, Taika Waititi, and Joe Keery, "Free Guy" is much more than a vanity piece for Reynolds. It's smart, fun and is at least a half star better than the original 3-star review that I gave it. It is the year of Jodie Comer. Get on that bandwagon, it's going to be a long ride. [Full Review]
  
  
• The Green Knight -I suspect that somewhere in the vastness of creation there is a stranger version of theArthurian legend than David Lowery's "The Green Knight." I just haven't seen it.The story follows Sir Gawain (Dev Patel), nephew to King Arthur (Sean Harris) and reprobate who spends his nights whoring and his days recovering what the night that was before. He’s hardly the stuff of legend. He knows this. Motivated by his worthlessness and his mother’s dark magic, Gawain accepts a Christmas-day challenge from the mysterious Green Knight (Ralph Ineson). There his fate is sealed. Fantasy mixes with horror in this fantastically odd experience.
  
  
• The Flash: The Complete Seventh Season - The seventh season of DC Comic's "The Flash" sees thetitular character searching for his missing wife.
  
  
• The Haunting of Bly Manor - Director Mike Flanagan follows "The Haunting of Hill House" with this ghostly tale based on the writing of Henry James. An American au pair (essentially a nanny from a foreign county) is hired to look after a young girl and boy. She soon discovers that their home, Bly Manor, is filled with darkness and ghosts.
  
  
• Black Lightning: The Fourth and Final Season - The final season of DC's "Black Lightning" starsCress Williams asJefferson Pierce, a high school principal who for nearly a decade had set aside his role as the crimefighting Black Lightning. With crime running rampant in his city, Pierce returns to his role as the city's protector.
  
  
• Survive the Game - Bruce Willis stars in this thriller as a wounded cop who along with his partner and a grieving man defend a farm against a host of cartoonish villains. If you're looking for the redemption of Bruce Willis, you won't find it here.

• Columbia Classics 4K Ultra HD Collection: Volume 2 - What do "Anatomyof a Murder," "Oliver!," "Taxi Driver," "Stripes," "Sense and Sensibility," and "The Social Network" have in common? They are all excellent films that were released under the Columbia Pictures moniker and all are included in the studio's second limited edition collection of 4K UHD releases. Sony has done a marvelous job with their 4K releases. If you are making a holiday wish list, this should be on it.
  
  
• Casanova, Last Love - Casanova (Vincent Lindon) recalls his time living in London in exile and La Charpillon (Stacy Martin), the woman who tempted and teased him relentlessly, who got away.Benoît Jacquot makes beautiful period dramas that struggle to provide substance to go along with their beauty ("Farewell, My Queen" being a fantastic example).
  
  
• Inglourious Basterds 4K UHD - Quentin Tarantino's revisionist take on World War II features a band of Jewish-American soldiers in Nazi-occupied France known as the Basterds. PAired with a British force, the Basterds plot to kill Adolf Hitler by blowing up a theater hosting the debut of the Nazi's latest propaganda film. There's little truth in the narrative, but the performances from a cast that includes Brad Pitt, Melanie Laurent, and Christoph Waltz are exceptional. The film is making its 4K UHD debut and while it is sourced from 2K digital intermediate there is a substantial upgrade to the film's robust use of color that shows offRobert Richardson's cinematography.
  
  
• Deadly Friend - This Wes Craven horror was released in 1986 and tells the story of Paul Conway, the new kid in town who also happens to be a robotic expert. Paul falls for his neighbor, Samantha (Kristy Swanson in her first film). Samantha is pushed down the stairs by her father and is left brain dead, Paul uses his expertise to bring Samantha back to life. The experiment doesn't go as planned.
  
  
• High Sierra - Roy Earle (HumphreyBogart) is a notorious thief who has just been released from prison. Contacted by his former boss, Earle plans one last heist before going straight. Released in 1941, Raoul Walsh's adaptation of W. R. Burnett's novel was undoubtedly influenced by the gangster films that dominated theaters in the 1930s, but "High Sierra" marked a directional change that points directly to the film noir genre that would come soon after. This was Bogart's big break, the role that took him from second billing to a topline star. This Criterion Collection release also includes "Colorado Territory," the 1949 western remake of "High Sierra"