EUREKA ENTERTAINMENT To Release Kubrick’s FEAR AND DESIRE on DVD and Blu-Ray from 28th January 2013 as Masters of Cinema Series

Eureka Entertainment have announced that they will be releasing on Blu-ray and DVD a new restoration in a proper release for the first time ever in the UK of the legendary Stanley Kubrick‘s debut feature, FEAR AND DESIRE, available from 28 January 2013. It is the only Kubrick film besides A Clockwork Orange that was nearly impossible to see in the UK for several decades.

This release completes the fact that now every single one of Stanley Kubrick’s films will be available on Blu-ray/DVD. Full details of the special features have just been released. The Masters of Cinema edition will contain Stanley Kubrick’s complete early shorts (Day of the Fight, Flying Padre & The Seafarers) made in the run-up to FEAR AND DESIRE, presented completely for the first time on an official release. In addition to the shorts, there will also be a new and exclusive video introduction to the films by Kubrick scholar, film-critic, and Cahiers du cinéma American correspondent Bill Krohn shot in LA in November 2012 & a packed booklet featuring new and exclusive essays on FEAR AND DESIRE and the early shorts by Kubrick scholar, professor, and film critic James Naremore.

Independently financed with contributions from Stanley Kubrick’s family and friends in an era when an “independent cinema” was still far from the norm, Fear and Desire first saw release in 1953 at the Guild Theater in New York, thanks to the enterprising distributor Joseph Burstyn. Now, with this new restoration carried out in 2012 by The Library of Congress, a film that for decades has remained nearly impossible to see will at last appear in a proper release in the United Kingdom.

Kubrick’s debut feature tells the story of a war waged (in the present? in the future?) between two forces. In the midst of the conflict, a plane carrying four soldiers crashes behind enemy lines. From here out, it is kill or be killed: a female hostage is taken on account of being a potential informer; an enemy general and his aide are discovered during a scouting mission… What lies in store for this ragtag group of killers, between their perilous landing in the forest, and the final raft-float downstream… all this constitutes the tale of Kubrick’s precocious entry into feature filmmaking.

Bringing into focus for the first time the same thematic concerns that would obsess the director in such masterworks as Paths of Glory, Dr. Strangelove, and Full Metal Jacket, Fear and Desire marks the outset of the dazzling career and near-complete artistic freedom which to this day remains unparalleled in the annals of Hollywood history. The Masters of Cinema Series is proud to present Stanley Kubrick’s Fear and Desire in its gorgeous new restoration on both Blu-ray and DVD.

SPECIAL BLU-RAY AND DVD EDITIONS:

• New HD restoration of the film by The Library of Congress, presented in 1080p on the Blu-ray.
• Optional English SDH subtitles for the deaf and hard-of-hearing.
• Stanley Kubrick’s complete early shorts, made in the run-up to FEAR AND DESIRE, presented completely for the first time on an official release: Day of the Fight, Flying Padre & The Seafarers
• A new and exclusive video introduction to the films by Kubrick scholar, film-critic, and Cahiers du cinéma American correspondent Bill Krohn shot in LA in November 2012
• A packed booklet featuring new and exclusive essays on FEAR AND DESIRE and the early shorts by Kubrick scholar, professor, and film critic James Naremore