One of this holiday season’s most in-demand gifts is sure to be a shiny new Blu-Ray player to go along with the mess of HDTVs that have flooded the market (what economic crisis?). Consequently, this week’s DVD Digest is heavy on Blu-Ray DVDs in titles both old and new, to serve as last-minute impulse buys for movie lovers of all stripes.

DVD of the Week: With all the new Blu-Rays that have hit stores lately, it seems only fitting that this week’s DVD of the Week be the first wave of Blu-Ray releases from everyone’s favorite DVD company, The Criterion Collection. Earlier this year, Criterion announced just over a dozen upcoming Blu-Ray titles, and today will bring four of them. Two are will be Blu-Ray editions of titles that were recently released by Criterion on standard DVD- Wong Kar-wai’s Chungking Express and Wes Anderson’s debut feature Bottle Rocket. But no less notable are the Blu-Ray releases of two old favorites from the Criterion vault, Carol Reed’s immortal The Third Man and Nicolas Roeg’s SF classic The Man Who Fell to Earth. As is the case with virtually all Criterion releases, the new Blu-Rays contain many special features, and the increased definition and sharpness that’s possible with Blu-Ray will undoubtedly make the films themselves look better than ever (Third Man and Chungking should be particularly eye-popping). If you own a Blu-Ray player and you don’t plan to buy at least a couple of these, you don’t have much business calling yourself a movie lover…

… In which case, you’ll probably be more inclined to purchase one of the other Blu-Rays that are hitting stores today. Paramount is releasing a quartet of their comedies- Hot Rod, Old School, The Heartbreak Kid, and the ever popular “Holy Schnike!” edition of Tommy Boy- along with the strange double feature of Coach Carter and Into the Wild, all in Blu-Ray only. And Fox is answering Paramount’s challenge rather feebly, releasing only Uwe Boll’s In the Name of the King: A Dungeon Siege Tale in response. Gonna have to try harder than that, guys.

This week’s recent releases on DVD are highlighted by two late-summer hits that scratch some very different itches. On the one hand, you could watch the Golden Globe-nominated ABBA musical Mamma Mia! (Universal, also Blu-Ray). On the other, you could take a gander at The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor (Universal, also Blu-Ray), the latest in Universal’s effects-heavy franchise.

Heck, practically the only new DVD release not to be coming out in Blu-Ray this week is the acclaimed series Generation Kill (HBO). And while I won’t hold the lack of a Blu-Ray edition against the show, it nonetheless feels like the DVD-release version of bringing a knife to a gunfight. Unless, of course, you don’t have a Blu-Ray player in the first place, in which case the point is moot.