'Spider-Man 3' tops DVD releases this week

• "The Tripper" (Fox, 2007; R for violence, language, nudity, sex; $27.98). Gory slasher spoof isn't as funny as it thinks it is. Directed and co-written by David Arquette, who includes his wife, Courtney Cox Arquette, in the cast.

Extras: widescreen, deleted scenes, audio commentary, featurettes, bloopers

Vintage films

• "The Three Stooges Collection, Volume One: 1934-1936" (Sony, b/w, two discs, $24.96). Chronological Stooges shorts, beginning with their first. Excellent prints will entice fans who are weary of lousy public-domain copies of the eye-poking, face-slapping trio's antics. Look for Lucille Ball in "Three Little Pigskins" and note how Curly's name is spelled "Curley" with an "e" until "Disorder in the Court."

Extras: full frame, 19 shorts

Foreign films

• "Pierrepoint — The Last Hangman" (IFC, 2005; R for violence, nudity, sex; $19.95). Fascinating, sad but true story of a hangman in England during World War II, who works in anonymity and lives in denial — until he becomes a celebrity after participating in the execution of Nazis following the Nuremberg trials. Tragic and thought-provoking.

Extras: widescreen, deleted scenes, audio commentary

• "Day Watch: Unrated" (Fox, 2007, $27.98). "Unrated" just means more violence, language, sex, nudity and drugs than the R-rated version of this dark horror fantasy from Russia, a sequel to the equally bizarre "Day Watch."

Extras: widescreen, in Russian with English subtitles, audio commentary, featurette, trailers

TV movie

• "The Initiation of Sarah" (MGM, 2006, $22.98). Inferior remake of the 1978 TV movie about witchcraft infiltrating a college sorority.

Extras: widescreen

Straight to DVD

• "DogBiteDog" (Weinstein/Genius, 2006, two discs, $24.95)

• "Buried Alive" (Dimension/Genius, 2006, $19.95)

• "Karas: The Revelation" (Manga, 2007, $19.97)

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E-mail: hicks@desnews.com