Legendary French star Gérard Philipe swashbuckled his way into film history as the peasant soldier Fanfan in Christian-Jaque's devil-may-care romantic action-comedy. In eighteenth-century France, Fanfan joins King Louis XV's army to avoid a forced marriage to a local lass. And thus begins an adventure that sees Fanfan getting himself out of close scrapes and into tight squeezes with Gina Lollobrigida's impostor fortune teller, Adeline, on his way to fighting in the Seven Years' War.

Filled to the brim with dazzling stunts and randy innuendo, Fanfan la Tulipe, which won the best director prize at Cannes and was a smash hit upon its initial release, remains one of France's all-time most beloved films and sold to 50 countries for distribution, then a record for a French film. It's 2006 US revival prompted some very positive reaction, with Jessica Winter in The Village Voice calling it "a frothy tonic in the midst of blockbuster dog days," while Kenneth Turan writing in the Los Angeles Times assured us that the film is "replete with heroic leaps, speedy horse rides, occasional explosions and clashing sabers."

If you've never caught it – and none of us here have – then Criterion have come to the rescue with the announcement of a DVD release of the film for an 18th November release in the US at the SRP of $29.95. The disc will boast the following features:

• New, restored digital transfer;
• New video program about actor Gérard Philipe;
• A clip from the colorized version of the film;
• Theatrical trailer;
• Optional English-dubbed soundtrack;
• New and improved English subtitle translation;
• A booklet featuring a new essay by Kenneth Turan and an excerpt from Georges Sadoul's monograph on Philipe.