DVD Available - Good quality, UPC # below
I just bought and viewed the DVD (noted as 30th Anniversary Edition on the cover), with UPC #011301688668. As of this writing, it is available both on AMAZON.COM and EBAY.COM for less than 20 dollars, (generally).
This is a Region 1 DVD, NTSC, "all new anamorphic widescreen transfer" 2.35:1, Dolby Digital stereo 2.0, approx 106 minutes.
The studio appears to be MGM, and may also be available from WWW.TIMELESSVIDEO.COM and maybe MGM.COM, but I haven't looked there.
To the best of my recollection, it appears to be the complete original movie, but I did notice several VERY brief omissions of a few frames, noticable in the sound track rather than the visuals. The color and resolution are beautiful, and the sound is clear.
The DVD appears to have very limited "Special Features", as a short photo gallery (of beautiful photos), and a "medium quality" (unrestored) trailer, both including images not in the film, but no subtitles or alternate language choices, and not many chapters in the movie.
So much for the DVD technical info, now to the movie rewiew...
It plays out very much like a novel that was shortened into a movie. It leaves a lot of room for different interpretations of a number of key scenes, but is generally good.
If I had ONE wish, it would be that Brooke Shields would have taken voice lessons before she did this movie. At the time, women with high pitched voices apparently were in vogue, and that describes her voice. One of the Sports Illustrated swimsuit models that went on to make movies and TV show appearances had the same high voice, DID get lessons on her voice, (AFTER she did ALIEN FROM L.A. - namely Kathy Ireland), and had better luck in the movies afterwards!
Given that the listed Executive Producer is Teri Shields (Brooke's Mom?), and the music is by Ennio Morricone (think Clint Eastwood, man with no name, spaghetti westerns), I suppose it was meant to be the 18-yr old Brooke Shields showcase in a middle eastern desert "western". If that was the case, the movie surpasses expectations.
It has elements of 'women's lib', desert nomad culture/laws, a cross-Sahara car race, international competition/intrigue, nomad tribal war, and romance; I must admit that I didn't see "the kitchen sink" included, but almost everything else was. I am guessing, but at the time the movie was made, an "R" rating was just about the kiss of death for a movie at the box office, so the romance, (and any sex scenes) were scaled back or omitted altogether, in favor of including a good deal of generally non-explicit violence, and still retain its "PG" rating.
I would rate it as one of the better "date/drive-in movies" of the times, and it is still not bad after 30 years, but the camera work is a bit dated back to those days. There are many beautiful scenes in the movie...
For the ones asking about "unrated copies",
There was a waterfall scene with Brooke Shields, "Jaffar", and a white garment she wore under her racing jumpsuit, and it WAS almost two decades before Keri Russell's lawn sprinkler romp in EIGHT DAYS A WEEK (which didn't have violence per se, but got an "R" rating which was MUCH milder on box office impact in the late 1990s, than the early 1980s.) The "wedding night" focused mainly on faces, and only briefly showed Jaffar, shirtless, kissing Brooke Shields. Even the HBO version I saw had no more than that, but who knows? There *might have been* a European cut of those parts, but I've never heard about them.