Arrow Video Kicking Off The New Year With 4K UHD Steven Seagal, ‘Cannonball Run,’ And More
by David Lewis
If their January slate is any indication, Arrow Video is promising a thrill-filled selection of 4K UHD and Blu-ray releases for 2027. Their January offerings feature cross-country car chases, train crashes, troubled hitchhikers, possessed hands, uneccessary sequels, and much more.
After releasing Under Siege in 4K earlier this year, you didn’t think Arrow could resist the sequel, did you? 1995’s Under Siege 2: Dark Territory — which finds our hero Steven Seagal battling baddies on a train instead of a battleship — is joining the collection. Eric Bogosian, Everett McGill, Morris Chestnut, and Kurtwood Smith co-star. Fun fact: The sequel was co-written by The Batman director Matt Reeves. Available in the US and UK, the 4K UHD sports a new 4K restoration from the original 35mm camera negative, with extras including interviews, appreciations, trailers, a reversible sleeve, a collectors’ booklet, and more.
Start your engines. Burt Reynolds and his bestie Dom DeLuise star in the Cannonball Run duology on 4k UHD. The 1981 action-comedy and its 1983 sequel are basically just feature-length car races across America aimed at Reynolds fans who didn’t get enough from Smokey and the Bandit. The films’ wild supporting casts include Roger Moore, Shirley Maclaine, Adrienne Barbeau, Telly Savalas, a young Jackie Chan, and at least three member of the Rat Pack — namely Dean Martin, Sammy Davis Jr., and Frank Sinatra. The 2-disc set offers a new 4K restorations of both films from the original film elements plus archival materials, commentaries, interviews, featurettes, a reversible sleeve, a collectors’ booklet, and more. Available in US and UK.
Next up, Denzel Washington plays a blind drifter on a mission from God in the Hughes Brothers‘ 2010 post-apocalyptic thriller The Book of Eli, arriving on 4K UHD in the US and UK. It also stars Gary Oldman, Mila Kunis, Ray Stevenson, and Jennifer Beals. The brand new 4K restoration also features deleted and alternate scenes, trailers, a reversible sleeve, a collectors’ booklet, and more.
Oliver Stone‘s little seen early horror thriller The Hand is getting the Blu-ray treatment from Arrow in the UK only. Michael Caine plays a comic book artist who loses a hand in a gruesome accident, only to start hallucinating that the severed hand is committing murder. Or are they hallucinations? Special features includes a commentary from Stone, interviews, a reversible sleeve, a collector’s booklet, and more.
What would an Arrow release announcement be without some good, old-fashioned cinematic sleaze? 1996’s cult psycho-sexual thriller Freeway and its 1999 sequel, Freeway II: Confessions of a Trickbaby, are arriving on UK-only Blu-ray. Kiefer Sutherland and Reese Witherspoon star in the original, a violent contemporary spin on Little Red Riding Hood set in the desolate desert freeways of California, while the sequel replaces them with Natasha Lyonne and Vincent Gallo. Dan Hedaya, Amanda Plummer, Brooke Shields, Brittany Murphy, and David Alan Grier play various lowlifes encountered in the films. The 2-disc Blu-ray set includes both the theatrical and uncut versions of the original, plus commentaries, interviews, featurettes, trailers, a reversible sleeve, a collector’s booklet, and more.
Finally, the 1988 actioner The Big Heat arrives on Blu-ray in the UK only. Directed by Johnnie To (the Election films, Heroic Trio) and produced by the legendary Tsui Hark, Heat centers on a detective on the brink of retirement (Waise Lee) who is drawn into the darkest corners of the Hong Kong underworld after a former partner is killed in action. Philip Kwok and Joey Wong co-star. Extras including a commentary, interviews, a reversible sleeve, a collectors’ booklet, and more.
Don’t miss Arrow’s November slate, which includes a Coen Brothers classic, WarGames, and more ShawScope releases.
