French distributor Studiocanal on Wednesday unveiled a list of 20 titles it plans to release in the high-definition DVD format later this year -- a move that industry observers see as a significant push into the next generation of home video.

According to The Hollywood Reporter, the mixed bag of 20 titles from a total of 30 planned HD-DVD releases includes such classics as The Deer Hunter, The Elephant Man, Terminator 2 and The Graduate as well as more recent hits like Million Dollar Baby, The Pianist, Mulholland Drive and Traffic. There also are a handful of French movies, from the popular classic La Grande Vadrouille to more recent cult films La Haine and Brotherhood of the Wolf.

Studiocanal, the movie distribution arm of French pay TV platform Canal Plus, controls one of the world's largest film libraries, with some 5,000 titles.