Howard Hawks directed his first film in 1926. He was a prolific filmmaker who excelled in all genres from psychological war movies (The Dawn Patrol) to gangster films (Scarface) to screwball comedies (Bringing Up Baby) to action-adventures (Only Angels Have Wings) to gender-bending remakes (His Girl Friday) to biographies (Sergeant York) to a live-action spoof of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (Ball of Fire) but as late as 1947 had never made a western. He had started one, 1943’s The Outlaw for Howard Hughes, but left the project in a dispute with the megalomaniac producer who took over the film’s direction. Red River, based on Borden Chase’s Saturday Evening Post story, Blazing Guns on the Chisholm Trail, was to be his first completed western.

Great care was taken in the making of this instant classic starring John Wayne and Montgomery Clift. Wayne had been a star since 1930’s The Big Trail with more than 100 credits to his name but except for John Ford’s Stagecoach and The Long Voyage Home, had never been considered a strong actor. Red River would change that. Montgomery Clift was a highly regarded young stage actor who was making his film debut as Wayne’s adopted son. The film was so long in production that by the time it was released Clift had already become a major star in his second film, The Search, released in March, 1948. Red River wouldn’t be released until September, 1948.

Part of the delay was caused by Hawks’ meticulous re-cutting of the film after it previewed. He was bothered by the film’s passages of time conveyed through the turning of pages in a book. Except for the initial sequence, he had all the “book” scenes taken out and replaced by supporting player Walter Brennan’s voice-over narration. This version was all set to go into release when the afore-mentioned Howard Hughes got into the act. He sued Hawks over the ending which he felt was too close to the ending of The Outlaw which Hawks had shot before leaving that controversial project. Hawks, who was on his way by ship to Europe to film I Was a Male Bride with Cary Grant and Ann Sheridan, left the film’s editor, Christian Nyby, in charge of working out a compromise with Hughes. The result was a truncated ending in which Wayne gets off his horse and comes after Clift, eliminating the careful suspense that had been built up in the long sequence Hawks had filmed including some of Wayne’s dialogue and most of the shots of Clift’s piercing eyes.

Somewhere along the way the “book” version, which Hawks thought had been destroyed, was found and shown on television, which had long been playing the narrated version. The narrated version was released on VHS by Playhouse Video, a subsidiary of Twentieth Century-Fox, on its first home video release in 1987. Three years later the rights reverted to United Artists, now controlled by MGM. Someone at MGM found the “book” version and because it was the longer version by eight minutes, assumed it was a “director’s cut” and released it on VHS as such. All subsequent home video releases, including last year’s excellent U.K. Blu-ray restoration, have been of the “book” version. Criterion has finally released both the unssen by many narrated version as well as the book version on Blu-ray in one package along with a paperback version of Borden Chase’s original story. An ideal version, a true director’s cut, would be to restore the book ending to the narrated version, but that will probably never happen.

This release of both versions Red River in one package is easily the best Blu-ray release of the year so far. Criterion has released it in a dual format set with DVD versions of both cuts included.

Mystery fans can rejoice in the release of Miss Fisher’s Murder Mysteries, Series 2 on both Blu-ray and standard DVD. The Australian TV series which is set in 1920s Melbourne features Essie Davis as Phrynie Fisher, the free-thinking, free-loving socialite/adventuress with a private detective license who more often than not works with the local police in solving the most dastardly of crimes. Although the premise sounds like the series might be on the light side, it isn’t. It compares favorably to such contemporary series as Canada’s Murdock Mysteries and the U.K.’s Foyle’s War; George Gently; Inspector Lewis and the long-running Midsomer Murders.

Nathan Page, Hugo Johnstone-Burt and Ashleigh Cummings co-star in the series which seems to be in limbo in Australia. We can only hope that it will back for a third series of delightfully wicked mysteries.

Speaking of mysteries, Claude Chabrol, the French new wave director who passed away in 2010 at the age of 80, was the only member of the movement who specialized in mysteries. Often paying homage to Alfred Hitchcock in his films, his films beginning with 1958’s Les Cousins and 1959’s Le Beau Serge have always been intriguing even when they were not out-and-out murder mysteries. Newly released on both Blu-ray and DVD are five of his later films, all of which are genuine murder mysteries.

In 1999’s The Color of Lies a ten year-old schoolgirl is found murdered on her way home from her art teacher’s home. Suspicion naturally falls on the art teacher although we mystery buffs will know that the most obvious suspect is never the real murderer. Then the teacher’s nemesis who we suspect might be the real murderer is also murdered, putting suspicion back on the art teacher. What are we to think?

The Inspector Lavardin Collection gives us all four of the Inspector Lavardin films Chabrol made in the 1980s. The previously released Chicken With Vinegar from 1985 and Inspector Lavardin were theatrical releases. 1988’s The Black Snail and 1989’s Danger Lies in the Words were made for TV with the same level of distinction.

This week’s new releases include Lone Survivor and King and Country.