By Peter Covino

Lifestyles Editor

You’re gonna need a bigger TV set.

Trust me on this one little, or not so little thing. Bigger is better with HDTV and with the arrival of Ben-Hur on Blu-ray, anything smaller than a 50-inch screen is just not going to cut it.

I really would like to go back to my TV viewing days of the 1970s or so, when a showing of Ben-Hur on “the small screen” was an epic event.

The TV was square, grand if it was 26-inches across, and the format was the ol’ pan and scan, the director’s nightmare where the action moves all over the place trying to capture all that is taking place in a wide-screen movie.

The director’s nightmare never got worse than in the case of William Wyler’s Ben-Hur. The famous chariot scene was a mess, pure and simple. There was no way to capture the epic-scale of the arena in a square format. And if by some miracle, a wide-screen version was available, it looked like a tiny rectangular sliver on the TV sets of old.

Well here comes Chuck Heston (Notice how they always call Charlton Heston, “Chuck” in all of the bonus features on DVDs) and he and Ben-Hur have never looked grander. Not even close.

This is an amazing restoration, for the 50th anniversary boxed set edition of the film first released in 1959. Okay, you just did the quick math and 50 plus 59, makes 2009. This is actually the 52nd anniversary of the film.

I am cutting Warner Bros. and all involved a little slack on this one. This was a massive undertaking. Rome wasn’t built in day, and restoring Ben-Hur took a little longer than expected. But it was most definitely worth the wait.

Yes, this is a very long film (212 minutes to 222 minutes various versions) and at a times it can be a bit preachy, even to the point of being a sermonette with its story of Jesus running concurrently. But it remains one of the classics, still imitated (Gladiator) and unequalled.

If the movie itself won’t sway you, the beautiful packaging and extras will. Those bonuses include a fully-illustrated reproduction of the diary that Heston kept during the filming of Ben-Hur. There is also a hardcover bound photo book.

The set itself features 3 DVDS, two just for the movie. Yes, it is that long, and a third with bonus features. The bonus features along add up to some four hours of watching, and no, while I usually try to take in as much of the bonus material as possible, there just wasn’t enough time this week. One interesting bonus: the restored version of the original 1920s silent classic.

The ultimate Blu-ray edition is limited and numbered, so it is one of those collectible items. Once it is gone, it is gone. Retail price for the Blu-ray is $64.99 (Three-Disc Blu-ray), $49.92 (Five-Disc DVD set) and $20.97 (2-Disc 50th Anniversary Edition DVD). I checked Amazon at press time and they are listing the Blu-ray collection for $44.99 so there are some bargains out there.

The collection will be available in stores and online Tuesday.

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Oh, the miracle of the DVD.

There are so many shows I have never seen on broadcast TV, like Happy Endings (Sony Pictures Home Entertainment) for instance.

Never saw it. I think I never even knew it existed, but through the miracle of modern science, I just got through watching most of season one (15 episodes) and hey, this show is pretty good.

It is nice to see the ensemble comedy show is alive and well in shows like Happy Endings. A staple of TV since the days of Cheers and Mary Tyler Moore right on up to Friends and Seinfeld, Happy Endings brings a fresh twist to the sitcom.

Happy Endings has one of those modern premises. Alex (Elisha Cuthbert) and Dave (Zachary Knighton) were about to be married in episode one. All of their friends were there, when Alex abruptly pulls out at the alter. They will remain friends however.

How their circle of friends living in Chicago survive all those awkward moments together is the basis for season one. The show returns to the ABC lineup later this month for a second season.

Others in the cast include Eliza Coupe as Jane, Alex’s control freak older sister.

She is married to Brad (Daymon Wayans, Jr.)

Brad is best friends with Dave and Max (Adam Pally), the gay member of the group.

Penny (Casey Wilson) is the desperate single friend, who briefly dated Max when they were in college.

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And now for some family stuff, and who knows family stuff better than Disney.

I still have Dumbo in Blu-ray waiting to be viewed (look for it in the next edition of Putting on Your DVDs), but I still have a few August titles in the the DVD backlog.

But what a backlog.

From 1981 comes Disney’s 24th animated feature, The Fox and the Hound, makings its Blu-ray debut.

This is one of the lesser known Disney animated, coming before that second golden era of The Lion King, The Little Mermaid etc. and features a team responsible for some of those future classics.

This is a heartwarming film about a fox and a hound (surprise) who become friends as pups, but as adults find themselves enemies as in hunter and prey.

The Blu-ray version makes you appreciate classic animation all the more (compared with all of today’s computer graphic driven technology.) And the cast is first-rate featuring everyone from Mickey Rooney to Pearl Bailey (along with Kurt Russell, Jack Albertson, Sandy Duncan and several more notables).

The special Blu-ray 30th anniversary edition also features the 2006 sequel The Fox and the Hound 2 with the vocal talents of Patrick Swayze, Reba McEntire and Trisha Greenwood.

The three-disc set has several bonus features as well including

•"Unlikely Friends" — A collection Of stories about surprising friendships within the wild animal kingdom.

•Passing The Baton: The Making Of THE FOX AND THE HOUND featurette.

•“The Best Of Friends" Sing-Along Song

•The Making Of The Music — Behind-the-scenes featurette.

•"You Know I Will" music video performed by Lucas Grabeel.

Also from Disney is the intergalactic animated film Mars Needs Moms, about a young boy’s adventures after his mom has been nabbed by Martians. The Robert Zemeckis-produced film (with vocal talent supplied by Seth Green and Joan Cusack)is available in a 4-disc Blu-ray combo pack (includes a digital copy) as well as 2-disc Blu-ray and DVD. A regular DVD version is also available.

Mars Needs Moms (budget $150 million, box office $21million) is not one of the better Disney offerings. And it was a failure at the box office. But it really is not that bad. There is a lot to like in Seth Green’s boy character Milo and as Norman Bates once famously said in Psycho, “a boys best friend is his mother.” And this is a much better mother/son relationship that Norman and his mom.

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On of the best online places for movies, the Warner Archive has struck again (and wait until you see what they have upcoming for Halloween), with some classics from the TV spy era.

Yep, Napoleon Solo (Robert Vaughn) and Illya Kullyakin (David McCallum) are back in The Man From U.N.C.L.E in some seldom seem movie versions from the TV series.

There were eight Man from U.N.C.L.E. features, episodes that were released theatrically in Europe with more footage and some material that would not be deemed appropriate for 1960s American TV.

Heavily influenced by the 007 films, The Man From U.N.C.L.E was wildly popular in 1965, but popularity proved to be short lived since they were gone by the end of 1968.

The eight episodes included in the set are:

To Trap a Spy (1965) - Expanded version of the U.N.C.L.E. pilot (Solo aka The Vulcan Affair), includes the famous "too hot for TV" scenes shot with future Bond girl Luciana Paluzzi.

The Spy With My Face (1965) - Expanded version of The Double Affair, in which a fake Solo wreaks havoc on an U.N.C.L.E. secret mission.

One Spy Too Many (1966) Expansion of season two’s Alexander the Greater Affair, in which an ambitious industrialist (Rip Torn) sets out to conquer the world. With Yvonne (Batgirl) Craig.

The Spy in the Green Hat (1966) The Concrete Overcoat Affair gets the feature treatment, in which Thrush agent Louis Strago (Jack Palance) attempts to unleash climate change upon the world.

One of Our Spies is Missing (1967) Vera Miles, Yvonne Craig and James Doohan guest as Solo and Kuryakin head to London and Paris to foil a plot hatched by the nefarious fashion industry.

The Karate Killers (1967) The Five Daughters Affair feature version, with heavyweight heavies Telly Savalas and Herbert Lom provide the menace while Joan Crawford, Jill Ireland and Kim Darby make up the distaff side.

The Helicopter Spies (1968) Carol Lynley and Bradford Dillman lend their talent to the film version of The Prince of Darkness Affair.

How to Steal the World (1968) Leslie Nielsen joins Robert Vaughn and David McCallum for the film version of the U.N.C.L.E. series closer, The Seven Wonders of the World Affair.

And if you want even more U.N.C.L.E. there was that girl who was woman enough to take on the challenge, Stephanie Powers as April Dancer (1966)

The Girl From U.N.C.L.E. Complete series is also now available at the Warner Archive, with 29 episodes on on two 4-disc sets.

Powers was paired with Noel Harrison and the campier series included lots of guest villains such as Boris Karloff (in drag), Edward Asner, Joan Blondell, John Carradine, Yvonne De Carlo, and Wally Cox.

To order all Warner Archive titles go to Warnerarchive.com.