Every year there are films that early on seemed to be surefire Oscar contenders that come up empty-handed when all is said and done. Two of 2013’s biggest disappointments on the awards circuit were Inside Llewyn Davis and The Book Thief, both of which are newly released on Blu-ray and standard DVD.

Winner of the Grand Jury Prize at last May’s Cannes Film Festival, Inside Llewyn Davis, the latest film from four-time Oscar winners Joel and Ethen Coen (Fargo; No Country for Old Men), was expected to be a major player in year-end critics’ awards leading up to a bounty of Oscar nominations. The film’s distributers gave it a slow release following its Cannes win. It didn’t surface again until the New York Film Festival in September, followed by showings at other festivals with a limited run in December. It didn’t go wide until January 10, 2014, six days before the Oscar nominations were announced. Its measly two nominations for Best Cinematography and Sound Mixing didn’t do anything to help it at the box office where it died a quick death.

The film deserved better. It was the most conspicuous non-nominee among Oscar’s Best Picture line-up. Set primarily in and around Greenwich Village in the early 1960s, it follows an up-and-coming folk singer during a tough week in his life. Although most of the music used is associated with legendary folk singer Dave Von Ronk, the character of Llewyn Davis is actually a composite of various folk singers on the scene between the folk renaissance of the late 1950s and the emergence of Bob Dylan a few years later. Like the fictional Davis, a number of those guys actually did spend time sleeping on the couches of friends, mostly other singers and patrons of the arts as depicted in the film.

Oscar Isaac (Drive; Won’t Back Down) steps out from the shadows in his first starring role as the driven and determined singer who is basically a nice guy, but not one without faults. Leaving the apartment of a college professor and his wife he locks and closes the door behind him before realizing their cat has gotten out. Taking the cat with him, when the cat later jumps out of his arms, he retrieves it only to learn from the owners that the retrieved cat isn’t theirs. That cat he then leaves in a car with a sleeping John Goodman who hates cats.

Nice vignettes are provided by Carey Mulligan, Justin Timberlake and Stark Sands in New York; Goodman and Garett Hedlund on the road and F. Murray Abraham in Chicago. The exquisite cinematography is by Bruno Delbonnel whose Oscar nomination was his fourth. He was previously nominated for Amélie; A Very Long Engagement and Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince.

Based on the 2005 novel by Australian writer Markus Zusak, the film version of The Book Thief was seven years in gestation, the length of time the story takes place in Nazi Germany from 1938 to 1945. Zusak’s original treatment was considered too dark by the producers who brought in Michael Petroni to make it more of a family film than a story for adults. It was directed by Brian Percival, the Emmy winning director of Downton Abbey and is beautifully acted, particularly by child actress Sophie Néclisse in the lead.

The narrative focuses on young Liesl (Nélisse) whose age is not given but appears to be about ten, her age at the beginning of the book. She is given up by her Communist mother and taken in by sign painter Hans Hubermann (Geoffrey Rush) and his opinionated wife Rosa (Emily Watson). The illiterate girl is taught to read by Hans and soon develops a love for books, stealing one from the rubble at a book burning, which is how she gets her nickname. Her best friend is Rudy, the blond haired, blue-eyed boy next door (Nico Liersch) who despite his perfect Arian look, hates the Nazis.

Leisl and the Hubermanns are harboring Max, the 19 year-old the son of Hans’ Jewish friend who died saving his life in World War I. His discovery could mean death for them as well as Max.

The film, like the book, is narrated by Death, and has an ironically sad but true-to-life climax followed by a bittersweet coda in which two of the main characters are reunited after the war.

Released in the Christmas rush, the film did poorly at the box office everywhere except in Australia. Its only Oscar nomination was for John Williams’ score.

Catalogue titles making their Blu-ray debuts include The Agony and the Ecstasy; The 300 Spartans; Samson and Delilah; Hatari! and Gunfight at the O.K. Corral.

Based on Irving Stone’s best-seller about the painting of the Sistine Chapel, Carol Reed’s film of The Agony and the Ecstasy was one of 1965’s major releases. Rex Harrison, fresh from his Oscar winning role in My Fair Lady, plays Julius II, the warrior Pope who hires and cajoles Michelangelo (Charlton Heston) into painting the chapel between 1508 and 1512. Harrison is perfectly cast and keeps the film at high throttle whenever he is on screen. Heston is good at portraying the agony of the artist but doesn’t seem to have the fire necessary to project the ecstasy. He seems to be playing a reincarnation of his Oscar winning Ben-Hur rather than the greatest artist of his time. The film opens with a twelve minute history of the period and Michelangelo’s role in it prior to his selection for painting the chapel. On a technical level it’s brilliant and richly deserved its five Oscar nominations including one for Leon Shamroy’s magnificent cinematography. Reed wasn’t nominated, but would not only be nominated for his next film, Oliver! , the legendary director would finally win an Oscar himself for that.

Mostly forgotten, Rudolph Maté’s 1962 film The 300 Spartans has piqued renewed interest because of the 2006 film, 300 and its current sequel, 300: The Rise of an Empire. The earlier film ells basically the same story of how Spartan king Leonidas and his 300 men held off the attacking Persian Army of 250,000 which helped shape the course of Western Civilization in 480 BC Richard Egan stars as Leonidas with Ralph Richardson as Athenian statesman Themistocles; David Farrar as Persian King Xerxes and Diane Baker and Barry Coe as fictional characters whose romantic subplot takes up way too much screen time.

Stepping further back in time, Cecil B. DeMille’s 1949 Biblical epic Samson and Delilah was a box office bonanza that was nominated for four Oscars and won two for Art Direction and Costume Design. Taking place around 1,000 B.C., the film is colorful and features several famous scenes, but suffers from obvious studio bound sets and the wooden acting of Hedy Lamarr as the temptress Delilah. The actress was eleven years older than Angela Lansbury who plays her “older” sister and looks it. Her woeful facial contortions and line readings as the “daughter of Hell” are painful to endure. Victor Mature as the “strongest man in the world” is easier to take as are Lansbury and George Sanders as the Philistine Saran. As DeMille epics go, The Ten Commandments, which came along seven years later, is much more satisfying.

One of John Wayne and director Howard Hawks’ most unusual films, 1962’s Hatari! is also one of their best. Set in the wilds of Africa, Wayne is a big game hunter who captures animals for circuses and zoos in this one. He’s supported by a top-notch international cast that includes Hardy Kruger; Red Buttons; Elsa Martinelli and Gerard Blain. Russell Harlan’s colorful Oscar nominated cinematography and Henry Mancini’s jaunty score including the hit instrumental “Baby Elephant Walk” aid the film immeasurably.

John Sturges’ 1957 film, Gunfight at the O.K. Corral is, along with John Ford’s 1946 film, My Darling Clementine, one of the two best of the many films about the friendship of Wyatt Earp and Doc Holliday leading up to the legendary titled gunfight. Burt Lancaster and Kirk Douglas are Wyatt and Doc this time around with Rhonda Fleming and Jo Van Fleet as the women in their lives. John Ireland; Earl Holliman and Dennis Hopper are prominent in support. The screenplay is by Leon Uris of Exodus fame. It was Oscar nominated for Film Editing and Sound Recording.

This week’s new releases include American Hustle and Saving Mr. Banks.