Sam
Peckinpah’s The Deadly Companions
starring Maureen O’Hara and Brian Keith has never been released in Germany in
any form other than being shown on television, so Retro ‘regular’ Mike Siegel,
one of the world’s foremost experts on the renegade director, was more than
pleased when his friend Ulrich Bruckner of Koch-media asked him to co-produce a
special edition DVD for the German/Austrian market. Koch-media also specialize
in rare and niche titles on DVD, with titles including The Sergio Sollima
Western box set, Blindman, and
special editions of certain Hammer films, to name but a few.
Siegel
had just completed and co-produced the very successful German 2-disc special
edition on Peckinpah’s Straw Dogs. Although
Bruckner has since left Koch-media, the label owned the rights to The Deadly Companions and Siegel agreed
to supply the bonus materials for this new release, for which a superb new
widescreen transfer was utilized. (The same print had been used for the
Japanese release DVD, which unfortunately, did not contain any bonus
materials).
Siegel
produced all the supplements, including a 28-minute featurette about Peckinpah’s
early days; Passion & Poetry: The
Early Sam, a 16-page booklet, and an extensive gallery featuring over 130
rare posters, lobby cards, stills and pressbooks. He also provided material for
the artwork and recorded an audio-commentary. However, the latter is in German
only, unlike the featurette, which has an English track.
This
new DVD marks the only really worthwhile DVD release of Peckinpah’s debut film
as a director, and fans will certainly want to add it to their collections. It
is currently available from Amazon.de and various online dealers.