It’s the end of the year, time to review the year in DVD.

This year’s best DVD releases include both recent theatrical releases as well as a goodly share of classic film upgrades.

Let’s split the best contemporary films released on Blu-ray and standard DVD this year between those released theatrically in 2012 and those released this year.

From 2012:

1. Les Misérables
2. Lincoln
3. Zero Dark Thirty
4. Argo
5. Amour
6. Life of Pi

From 2013:

1. Before Midnight
2. Mud
3. What Maisie Knew
4. The Place Beyond the Pines

If the list is weighted more heavily toward the 2012 films it’s because of the way the film industry tends to release films these days – the “best” films are generally released toward the end of the year for Oscar consideration while the early part of the year tends to favor the release of less “important” films. Home video releases, which generally arrive six months after their theatrical debut, consequently tend to skewer in the other direction.

The home video releases of recent films this year that gave me the most pleasure were the films I saw in theaters at the end of 2012 and the beginning of 2013 and the newer films that I discovered on home video. I suspect that will be the case once again in 2014.

Will some of these films become my all-time favorites in years to come? Perhaps, but the best video releases this year, as usual, were the releases of films that were already among my all-time favorites. All but one was new to DVD in the U.S. The others were all long-time favorites that were spiffed up for Blu-ray release.

These, then, were my favorite classic releases of 2013:

1. The Big Parade
2. Tokyo Story
3. Schindler’s List
4. Oliver!
5. Cabaret
6. How Green Was My Valley
7. The Best Years of Our Lives
8. The Bells of St. Mary’s
9. James Dean Ultimate Collector’s Edition
10. Ultimate Gangsters Collection: Classics

The most profitable silent film, the screen’s first anti-war film, a magnificently restored version of King Vidor’s 1925 classic, The Big Parade, finally made its way to Blu-ray and standard DVD early in the year. John Gilbert, best known today for his later films opposite Greta Garbo, had his best role as the privileged banker’s son who enlists in the Army as a Private at the outbreak of the U.S. entry into World War I. Gilbert and Renée Adore as the French farm girl he falls in love with are both excellent here. The film contains many set pieces which became reference material for later films. More than a dry history lesson, though, it’s an engaging film worth showing to your friends and relatives, even those who wince at the idea of watching a silent film.

Not shown outside its native Japan at the time of its initial release because the Japanese government thought it too Japanese to appeal to the world at large, Yasujiro Ozu’s 1953 masterpiece, Tokyo Story has since the director’s death in 1963 been at or near the top of every list of the world’s greatest films. The simple, yet heartbreaking tale of an elderly couple who travel cross country to visit their children is universal in its appeal. It’s not just a great Japanese movie; it’s a great movie period.

Twenty years after the initial release of the ultimate Hollywood film about the Holocaust, Steven Speilberg’s 1993 Oscar winner, Schindler’s List gets a Blu-ray upgrade worthy of the one of the best films of the last quarter century.

Coming near the end of the cycle of spectacular widescreen film versions of Broadway musicals (1955-1969), Lionel Bart’s Oliver! was one of the best albeit a surprise Oscar winner for Best Picture of 1968. Although previous home video versions were decent enough, nothing compares to Twilight Time’s limited 3,000 copy Blu-ray upgrade in which the vibrant colors pop while the music soars.

Coming four years after Oliver!, Bob Fosse’s 1972 film of Kander & Ebb’s Cabaret was an even more celebrated film musical upon its initial release. Previous home video versions have always looked a bit lackluster, but no so Warner’s fantastic looking Blu-ray upgrade.

Long regarded by many as the best film to win a Best Picture Oscar, even by those who preferred another 1941 release, John Ford’s magnificent How Green Was My Valley was another welcome Blu-ray upgrade as were the Blu-ray releases of the two biggest box-office hits of the 1940s, 1946’s The Best Years of Our Lives and 1945’s The Bells of St. Mary’s.

The long gestating James Dean Ultimate Collector’s Edition was worth the wait whether you went for the three film collection or the separately sold East of Eden; Rebel Without a Cause and Giant on their own.

Finally, Ultimate Gangsters Collection: Classics gave us clear, crisp editions of four vintage black-and-white films: Little Caesar; The Public Enemy; The Petrified Forest and White Heat.

This week’s new releases include Don Jon and Perry Mason Movie Collection Volume One.