Eureka Entertainment is giving two early John Ford films their first UK Blu-ray release as part of their Masters of Cinema Series.
Available from April 19th, the Straight Shooting & Hell Bent: Two Films By John Ford double-bill is presented in HD from 4K restorations with a Limited-Edition O-Card Slipcase for the first 2000 copies and reversible sleeve artwork.
Straight Shooting is landmark in the history of the Western. The first feature directed by Ford, it revived the career of Harry Carey who gives a rough and tumble performance here as a hired gun who turns on his employers to defend an innocent farmer and his family.
In Hell Bent, ‘Cheyenne Harry’ (Harry Carey playing the same character from Straight Shooting) flees the law after a poker game shootout, and arrives in the town of Rawhide, where he becomes friendly with local cowboy Cimarron Bill (Duke Lee) and dance hall girl Bess Thurston (Neva Gerber).
When gang leader Beau Ross (Joseph Harris) kidnaps Bess, Harry goes to desperate lengths travelling across the deadly desert in order to free Bess from the hard-bitten Ross.
Special Features:
- Limited Edition O-Card slipcase and reversible sleeve artwork
- Both features presented in 1080p on Blu-ray from 4K restorations undertaken by Universal Pictures, available for the first time ever on home video in the UK
- Straight Shooting – Score by Michael Gatt | Hell Bent – Score by Zachary Marsh
- Straight Shooting – Audio commentary by film historian Joseph McBride, author of Searching for John Ford: A Life
- Hell Bent – Audio commentary by film historian Joseph McBride
- Brand new interview with film critic and author Kim Newman
- Bull Scores a Touchdown – Video essay by Tag Gallagher
- A Horse or a Mary? – Video essay by Tag Gallagher
- Archival audio interview from 1970 with John Ford by Joseph McBride
- A short fragment of the lost film Hitchin’ Posts (dir. John Ford, 1920) preserved by the Library of Congress
- Straight Shooting: the Czech version* – inclusion TBC
- A collector’s booklet featuring writing by Richard Combs, Phil Hoad, and Tag Gallagher
