The year in Blu-ray

After nearly a decade on the market, the Blu-ray home video format has been relatively slow to capture the imagination (and wallets) of the general public. Nevertheless, it has built a solid collector base and has become the medium of choice for discriminating viewers, especially those with home theatres.

Many people may be switching to online streaming options for watching movies while others continue to remain satisfied with DVD quality, but just as in 2014 the year 2015 has seen an impressive array of classic, foreign, independent and cult films released to Blu-ray in superior high-definition editions comparable to theatrical presentations. Several smaller labels have taken up the slack left by the major studios and are releasing a surprising number of obscure titles aimed at specific niche markets.

Here are some notable titles new to Blu-ray in the past 12 months.

Box sets have been prominent among the year’s outstanding Blu-ray releases. Warner’s “The Golden Year: 1939” includes “Dodge City,” “Ninotchka,” “The Hunchback of Notre Dame,” “Dark Victory,” all new to Blu-ray, plus “Gone With the Wind” for those who haven’t already got a copy or wish to give a spare copy to a friend.

Also from Warner is a “Special Effects Collection” with four more 1930s-40s-50s classics new to Blu-ray: “Son of Kong,” “Mighty Joe Young,” ”The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms” and “Them!” and a “Musicals 4-movie Collection” including “Calamity Jane,” “The Band Wagon,” “Kiss Me Kate” (in truly spectacular 3-D), plus “Singin’ in the Rain.” Each of these Warner releases is also available in a separate stand-alone edition so you don’t need to get the whole set if you just want one or two titles.

Flicker Alley released a fascinating set of shorts from the 1920s-60s in its aptly-named “3-D Rarities” set, as well as some impressively restored 1915 shorts in its set of “Chaplin’s Essanay Comedies.” Flicker Alley also came out with a Blu-ray set of “Masterworks of American Avant-Garde Film 1920-1970.”

Criterion released a three-disc set of the new restoration of Satyajit Ray’s powerful ”Apu Trilogy,” and the interesting “Andre Gregory - Wallace Shawn: 3 Films” set, which includes “My Dinner with Andre,” “Vanya on 42nd Street” and “A Master Builder.”

For Japanese animation fans, Disney rather unexpectedly came out with an 11-film, 12-disc Blu-ray set of “The Collected Works of Hayao Miyazaki.” Disney also finally released “Aladdin” (1992) to Blu-ray, as well as more recent hits.

More obscure animated cartoons new to Blu-ray include the several fascinating collections of rarities from the small distributor Thunderbean Animation: a disc of 1933-34 “Willie Whopper” cartoons by Ub Iwerks, “Classics from the Van Beuren Studio” (1926-36), and the Private Snafu cartoons made for the U.S. military from 1943-46.

Fans of classic television got a deluxe set of all three seasons of the 1965-68 “Lost in Space,” more seasons of “Little House on the Prairie” and numerous recent TV series.

Best Picture Oscar-winners finally making their debut on Blu-ray this year are Frank Capra’s classic “You Can’t Take It With You” and Fred Zinnemann’s “A Man for All Seasons,” the latter in a limited edition that is already sold out.

Several notable films of François Truffaut now on Blu-ray include his Hitchcockian romance-thriller “The Soft Skin” (1964), his influential “The Bride Wore Black” (1968), his great ode to moviemaking “Day For Night” (1973) and his touching “The Story of Adèle H.” (1975).

Other classics new to Blu-ray include “The Hurricane” (1937), “Stormy Weather” (1943), “The Razor’s Edge” (1946), “The Eternal Sea” (1955), “The Weapon” (1956), “The Young Lions” (1958), “Pork Chop Hill” (1959), “The Best of Everything” (1959), “The World of Henry Orient” (1964), “Solomon and Sheba” (1959), “April Love” (1957), the bizarre John Boorman post-apocalyptic sci-fi film “Zardoz” (1974), the Japanese horror anthology “Kwaidan” (1964), the cult thriller “The Honeymoon Killers” (1969), Kurosawa’s “Ikiru” (1952), Abbott and Costello’s “Dance With Me, Henry” (1956), “The Night They Raided Minsky’s” (1968), “Kiss Me Stupid” (1964) and more.

Paramount just came out with a newly upgraded and substantially improved restoration of “My Fair Lady” (1964), just a bit late for its 50th anniversary.

Classic silents now on Blu-ray include the recently rediscovered William Gillette version of “Sherlock Holmes” (1916) from Flicker Alley, which also released Dziga Vertov’s energetic Russian documentary “Man with a Movie Camera” (1929) with several other recently restored films.

Kino released the Louise Brooks film “Diary of a Lost Girl” (1929), the British documentary “The Epic of Everest” (1924) and a slightly revised upgrade to “The Phantom of the Opera” Blu-ray edition previously released by Image Entertainment. Harold Lloyd’s “Speedy” (1928) came out from Criterion.

Classic film noir titles now in sparkling Blu-ray editions include “Pitfall” (1948), “Murder, My Sweet” (1944), “Night and the City” (1950), “House of Bamboo” (1955), “The Killers” (1946) plus its 1964 remake, “Odd Man Out” (1947), “Ride the Pink Horse” (1947), “The Strange Affair of Uncle Harry” (1945), “The Shanghai Story” (1954), “No Man’s Woman” (1955), “World for Ransom” (1954) and “Track the Man Down” (1955).

Westerns saw several HD releases this year with “Broken Lance” (1954), “Hombre” (1967), “Woman They Almost Lynched” (1953), “Stranger at my Door” (1956), “The Quiet Gun” (1957) and others.

Once again Criterion released a variety of intriguing examples of international and classic cinema, like the long-awaited U.S. Blu-ray edition of David Lynch’s key film “Mulholland Drive” (2001), the powerful anti-war German drama “The Bridge” (1959), Charlie Chaplin’s last great film “Limelight” (1952), Preston Sturges’ hysterical “Palm Beach Story” (1942) and his brilliant satiric look at Hollywood, “Sullivan’s Travels” (1941), Leo McCarey’s dramatic masterpiece “Make Way for Tomorrow” (1937), Yasujiro Ozu’s final film “An Autumn Afternoon” (1962), Ingmar Bergman’s acclaimed “Cries and Whispers” (1972), Nicolas Roeg’s enigmatic thriller “Don’t Look Now” (1973), Guy Maddin’s off-the-wall examination of his hometown “My Winnipeg” (2007), and many more.