"PANTHER" MARIO VAN PEEBLES REAL DIGITAL TRANSFER WIDESCREEN DVD UNRELEASED RARE
Extremely rare, impossible to find DVD version of the cult classic film, purportedly only ever released on grainy old VHS tape. The story goes it was scheduled for a DVD release but got pulled due to some form of copyright problems, ostensibly in relation to the soundtrack (which, in itself, is awesome).
I cannot vouch for this particular release's full provenance but it certainly appears to be the real deal when the obvious budget-constraints of the production company are considered - strikes me as being perhaps a promotional or evaluation copy although there is nothing on the artwork to suggest this - but one thing is beyond any doubt: this is a proper DIGITALLY MASTERED copy, not transferred from some shitty VHS tape! I have included a plethora of screenshots to add credence to the outstanding quality of this version, it may well be simply an "unfinished" pre-production sample.
The Widescreen version is presented in "Matted" Widescreen format preserving the 1:85:1 aspect ratio of its original theatrical exhibition, and the Theatrical Trailer is included, along with the Cast and Filmographies. And, the movie itself - top-notch quality in its full-length version and, know what, it's a superb film! BLM
ORIGINAL U.S. ENGLISH SPEECH SOUNDTRACK - not the dodgy German language counterfeit that seems to have surfaced on eBay of late!!!
Any questions, please message!
Panther is a 1995 film directed by Mario Van Peebles, from a screenplay adapted by his father, Melvin Van Peebles, from his novel of the same name. The film portrays the Black Panther Party for Self-Defense, tracing the organization from its founding through its decline in a compressed timeframe. Creative license is taken but the general trajectory of the Party and its experiences is factual.
The film is notable for its strong cast: including American actors Angela Bassett, Kadeem Hardison, Bobby Brown and Chris Rock, who later became prominent in film and television.
The film focuses on the rise and decline of the Black Panther Party for Self-Defense, known as the Black Panthers, during the Black Power movement and disenchantment with nonviolent resistance as a tool in the Civil Rights Movement. It explores the COINTELPRO program of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), which was an effort to track and disrupt African-American political movements.
The drama alleges that various Mob networks cooperated directly with the United States Intelligence Community (FBI/CIA) representatives to "flood" inner-city ghettos, which contained majority black populations, with hard drugs such as heroin and cocaine. The ending's structure and concluding voice-over alleges that The Mob (possibly Italian) in the United States agreed to produce and distribute quantities of these types of drugs on an unprecedentedly large scale. Purportedly, only agreed-upon "problem areas" of Black Panthers' potential support would be targeted, so as to "pacify" those populations.
The film further suggests that the huge quantities of drugs quickly spilt out of the "problem areas" and became the drug epidemic in the United States of the 1980s and 1990s. The final lines are shown in the film's closing note that in the 1970s, there were hundreds of thousands of hard-drug addicts, a number that had increased to the "3 million" of "yesterday". It is dedicated to the Black Panther Party's main figures, the communities that supported them, and those who might continue the struggle today.
Numerous actors who appear in the film later became prominent in the industry. Angela Bassett had gained praise for her portrayal a few years earlier as Betty Shabazz in Spike Lee's film Malcolm X.
Kadeem Hardison as Judge
Wesley Jonathan as Bobby Hutton
Bokeem Woodbine as Tyrone
Joe Don Baker as Brimmer
M. Emmet Walsh as Dorsett
Courtney B. Vance as Bobby Seale
Tyrin Turner as Cy
Marcus Chong as Huey P. Newton
Anthony Griffith as Eldridge Cleaver