Director-producer Stanley Kramer was one of those Hollywood rarities who knew how to make a message movie that was, first and foremost, a good movie.
The "Stanley Kramer Film Collection" (available Tuesday; $59.95) gathers five of his most popular works and packages them with abundant extras. The films are:
- "Guess Who's Coming to Dinner," the 1967 film that won Katharine Hepburn a Best Actress Oscar and also starred Sidney Poitier, Spencer Tracy and Katharine Houghton. The classic tells the story of white parents dealing with the news of their daughter's relationship with a black man. A separate disc of extras includes introductions by Steven Spielberg, Tom Brokaw, Karen Kramer (Kramer's widow) and Quincy Jones, featurettes and Kramer's acceptance speech of the 1961 Irving G. Thalberg Memorial Award at the Academy Awards. "Guess Who's Coming to Dinner" also will be available individually Tuesday in a 40th anniversary edition ($24.95).
- "Ship of Fools" focuses on several passengers on a transatlantic voyage to 1930s pre-Hitler Germany. Their intertwining stories expose disillusionment and prejudice. Extras include an introduction by Karen Kramer and featurettes.
- "The Member of the Wedding" is based on the Carson McCullers novel about an awkward adolescent tomboy. Extras include an introduction by Karen Kramer, commentary by professor Virginia Spencer Carr (a McCullers biographer) and featurettes.
- "The Wild One" is a landmark outlaw-biker film starring Marlon Brando as a gang leader. It was one of the first movies to deal with the generation gap and contains the oft-quoted bit of dialogue "What are you rebelling against?" and "Whaddya got?" Extras include commentary by film historian Jeanine Basinger and featurettes.
- "The 5,000 Fingers of Dr. T" is a musical fantasy about a boy who hates playing the piano and ends up in a bizarre land run by a fanatical piano teacher. Extras include featurettes.