‘Song Sung Blue’ and ‘Sisu: Road to Revenge:’ Blu-ray movie fans get romance versus retribution

Here’s a look at a pair of films on the Blu-ray format starring characters who refuse to give in to life’s challenges.

Song Sung Blue: Collector’s Edition (Universal Studios Home Entertainment, not rated, 1.85:1 aspect ratio, 131 minutes, $22.95) — Filmmaker Craig Brewer’s biographical musical, inspired by a real documentary, surpassed both critical and box office expectations thanks to its stars’ chemistry. Now arriving in high definition, the film gives home theater audiences a fresh chance to experience the songs of a legendary performer and composer.

This late 1980s love letter finds professed alcoholic and weekend musician Mike Sardini (Hugh Jackman), nicknamed Lightning, splitting his time as a mechanic and playing guitar and singing in local bands around Milwaukee.

At a local tribute band gig, where Mike was supposed to play Don Ho but objects, he meets Claire Stengl (Kate Hudson, currently nominated for an Academy Award for the role), who persuades him to interpret his favorite artist, the legendary Neil Diamond.

The pair create the duo Lightning and Thunder and become a local sensation as they fall in love, get married and deal with some serious doses of life-changing tragedy and triumph.

A strong supporting cast included Michael Imperioli (“The Sopranos”) as guitarist Mark Shurilla; Jim Belushi (“Saturday Night Live”) as manager Tom D’Amato; and Ella Anderson (“Henry Danger”) as Claire’s daughter Rachel.

Mr. Jackman and Ms. Hudson shine throughout, embracing their real-life counterparts’ emotional odyssey and love story and especially when they actually sing Neil Diamond hits such as “Soolaimon,” “Forever in Blue Jeans,” “Song Sung Blue,” “I’m a Believer” and, of course, “Sweet Caroline.”

Best extras: Mr. Brewer, the director and writer, offers an optional commentary track where he quickly admits that listening to commentary tracks is basically how he learned to make movies and wants to be helpful to other filmmakers.

He succeeds by talking about minutiae such as the importance of the first line and image of a film, the challenge of creating a third act, working closely with the cinematographer (Amy Vance), the structure of a script, debuting movies at festivals and comparing his film to the original documentary.

More details included the casting of Mr. Jackman and Ms. Hudson as his first and only choice; shooting in a very cold New Jersey; adding a music montage in this very 1980s-themed movie origins of the film; and creating a vintage Mickey Rooney and Judy Garland “let’s put on a show” kind of film.

Viewers also get three featurettes on the costuming, the love story of Mike and Claire Sardini and the production as well as extended performances of “Crunchy Granola Suite” and “Sweet Caroline” that really showcase the multilevels of musical talent of Mr. Jackman and Ms. Hudson.

Sisu: Road to Revenge (Sony Pictures Home Entertainment, rated R, 2.39:1 aspect ratio, 89 minutes, $40.99) — A legendary Finnish war hero who near single-handedly wiped out a company of despicable and desperate Nazi soldiers trying to steal his gold returned to literally take back his home in filmmaker Jalmari Helander’s “Mad Max”-style thriller.

Set in 1946, the film reintroduces former commando, prospector and man of no words, Aatami Korpi (Jorma Tommila as grizzled as ever), returning to where his wife and children were brutally murdered in an area of Finland now occupied by the Soviet Union after World War II.

All he wants to do is deconstruct the house where his family lived and move it to a safe area to live out the rest of his life.

Of course, the Soviets, who suffered mass casualties at the hands of this one-man army will not allow it and release the Siberia-imprisoned Red Army officer, Yeagor Draganov (Stephen Lang), who killed Mr. Korpi’s family and is promised freedom if he can capture the hero.

Based on the first film, fans already knew that was not going to work out for the communist in a movie overloaded with gratuitous bloody violence and extreme action verging on if Tex Avery directed an R-rated, live-action film.

Best extras: Viewers only get a pitiful three-minute featurette offering just a cursory look at the production that features words from the director, Mr. Lang and a subtitled Mr. Tommila.