Masters of cinema

[Lord Darth Vader]

Abro hilo para ir poniendo las ediciones de la colección Masters of cinema (el Criterion europeo). Ediciones con subtítulos en inglés y bloqueados de zona (aunque esto no nos importa).

Dejo la lista de ediciones que hay de momento por orden de salida.

Disponibles.
[#1] Sunrise (1927), F. W. Murnau
[#2] Mad Detective (2007), Johnnie To and Wai Ka Fai
[#3] Tokyo Sonata (2008), Kiyoshi Kurosawa
[#4] Une femme mariée (1964), Jean-Luc Godard
[#5] For all mankind (1989), Al Reinert
[#6] La Planete sauvage (1973), René Laloux
[#7] Soul power (2008), Jeffrey Levy-Hinte
[#8] City Girl (1930), F. W. Murnau
[#9] M (1931), Fritz Lang
[#10] Profound desires of the Gods (1968), Shôhei Imamura
[#11] Vengeance is mine (1979), Shôhei Imamura
[#12] The world (2004), Jia Zhangke
[#13] The burmese harp (1956), Kon Ichikawa
[#14] Will success spoil rock hunter? (1957), Frank Tashlin
[#15] Make way for tomorrow (1937), Leo McCarey
[#16] Metropolis (1927), Fritz Lang
[#17] La signora senza camelie (1953), Michelangelo Antonioni
[#18] Le amiche (1955), Michelangelo Antonioni
[#19] Coeur fidele (1923), Jean Epstein
[#20] Harakiri (1962), Masaki Kobayashi
[#21] Pigs and battleships (1962), Shôhei Imamura
[#22] The insect woman (1963), Shôhei Imamura
[#23] Silent running (1971), Douglas Trumbull
[#24] The ballad of Narayama (1983), Shôhei Imamura
[#25] Touch of evil (1958), Orson Welles
[#26] Two-lane blacktop (1971), Monte Hellman
[#27] Repo Man (1984), Alex Cox
[#28] Le silence de la mer (1949), Jean-Pierre Melville
[#29] Punishment park (1971), Peter Watkins
[#30] Lifeboat (1944), Alfred Hitchcock
[#31] Accattone (1961), Pier Paolo Pasolini
[#32] Island of lost souls (1932), Erle C. Kenton
[#33] The gospel according to Matthew (1964), Pier Paolo Pasolini
[#34] Cleopatra (1934), Cecil B. DeMille
[#35] Ruggles of red gap (1935), Leo McCarey
[#36] Ugetsu monogatari (1953), Kenji Mizoguchi
[#37] Sansho dayu (1954), Kenji Mizoguchi
[#38] RoGoPaG (1963), Roberto Rossellini, Jean-Luc Godard, Pier Paolo Pasolini, Ugo Gregoretti
[#39] Oedipus rex (1967), Pier Paolo Pasolini
[#40] Gate of hell (1953), Teinosuke Kinugasa (3 de Diciembre)
[#41] Floating weeds (1959), Yasujirô Ozu (3 de Diciembre)
[#42] Rumble fish (1983), Francis Ford Coppola
[#43] Das testament des Dr. Mabuse (1933), Fritz Lang
[#44] Double indemnity (1944), Billy Wilder
[#45] The lost weekend (1945), Billy Wilder
[#46] Die nibelungen (1924), Fritz Lang
[#48] La poison (1951), Sacha Guitry
[#49] The blue angel (1930), Josef von Sternberg
[#50] The passion of Joan of Arc (1928), Carl Theodor Dreyer
[#51] Fear and desire (1953), Stanley Kubrick
[#53] La città delle donne (1980), Federico Fellini
[#55] Onibaba (1964), Kaneto Shindô


Anunciadas.
[#58] Le beau serge (1958), Claude Chabrol (25 de Marzo)
[#59] Les cousins (1959), Claude Chabrol (25 de Marzo)
[#47] La notte (1961),  (22 de Abril)
[#60] Bakumatsu taiyô-den (1957), Yûzô Kawashima (22 de Abril)
[#57] The Murderer Lives at 21 (1942), Henri-Georges Clouzot (20 de Mayo)

[Lord Darth Vader]

This new 2009 reissue of Sunrise (for the first time anywhere in the world in 1080p HD on Blu-ray, in addition to a newly mastered 2 x DVD set) contains two versions of the film: the previously released Movietone version, and an alternate silent version of the film recently discovered in the Czech Republic. The Blu-ray edition includes both versions in 1080p HD.

The culmination of one of the greatest careers in film history, F. W. Murnau’s Sunrise blends a story of fable-like simplicity with unparalleled visual imagination and technical ingenuity. Invited to Hollywood by William Fox and given total artistic freedom on any project he wished, Murnau’s tale of the idyllic marriage of a peasant couple (George O’Brien and Janet Gaynor) threatened by a Machiavellian seductress from the city (Margaret Livingston) created a milestone of film expressionism.

Made in the twilight of the silent era, it became both a swan song for a vanishing medium and one of the few films to instantly achieve legendary status. Winner of three Oscars for Best Actress (Gaynor), Cinematography, and a never-repeated award for “Unique and Artistic Picture”, its influence and stature has only grown with each passing year. The Masters of Cinema Series is proud to present a new 2xDVD and Blu-ray special edition of the film, including an all-new alternate version recently discovered in a Czech archive of a higher visual quality than any other known source.

Special features:

• Restored high-definition transfers of two different versions: the American Movietone version, and the silent Czech version.
• Original English intertitles on the Movietone version, and optional English subtitles on the silent Czech version.
• Original Movietone score (mono) and alternate Olympic Chamber Orchestra score (stereo)
• Full-length audio commentary by ASC cinematographer John Bailey on the Movietone version
• Outtakes with either John Bailey commentary or intertitles
• Murnau’s 4 Devils: Traces of a Lost Film — Janet Bergstrom’s updated 40-minute documentary about the lost Murnau film
• Original theatrical trailer
• Original ‘photoplay’ script by Carl Mayer with Murnau’s handwritten annotations (150 pages in pdf format)
• 16-page illustrated booklet with film restoration and DVD/Blu-ray transfer information, along with a comparison between the two versions..

Review: http://www.blu-ray.com/movies/Sunrise-Blu-ray/6696/#Review

[Lord Darth Vader]

Last year’s largest grossing film at the Hong Kong box office – the smash-hit Mad Detective – is one of the freshest and most satisfying films from that country in a decade. The traditional Hong Kong police film is turned on its head: the imaginative twist being our hero – Detective Bun (a role created for Lau Ching Wan) – who has the ability to ‘see’ people’s inner personalities or “hidden ghosts”. Breaking new ground and establishing new cinematic rules, Johnnie To’s latest giddily entertaining collaboration with Wai Ka Fai radically raises the level of storytelling in modern film.

Detective Bun (Lau Ching Wan) was recognised as a talented criminal profiler until he sliced off his right ear to offer as a gift at his chief’s farewell party. Branded as ‘mad’ and discharged from the force, he has lived in seclusion with his beloved wife May (Kelly Lin) ever since. Strangely, Bun has the ability to ‘see’ a person’s inner personality, their subconscious desires, emotions, and mental state. When a missing police gun is linked to several heists and murders, hotshot Inspector Ho (Andy On) calls on the valuable skills of his former mentor Bun to help unlock the killer’s identity. However, Bun’s unorthodox methods point to a fellow detective and take a schizophrenic turn for the worse…

Nominated for the Golden Lion at Venice, multiple prizewinner at the Asian Film Awards 2008, and winner of Best Screenplay at the 27th Hong Kong Film Awards 2008, Mad Detective has been simultaneously thrilling multiplexes and cerebrally challenging arthouses in the UK and across the world – The Masters of Cinema Series is proud to present the UK DVD debut and also our first ever Blu-ray.

Special features:

• Carefully created new English subtitles
• Q&A with Johnnie To at the Cinémathèque Française Johnnie To retrospective (Paris, France, March 2008) – 35 minutes
• Exclusive cast interviews shot during the Far East Film Festival featuring Lau Ching Wan, and Lam Suet (Udine, Italy, April 2008) – 14 minutes
• Interview with Johnnie To for the French theatrical release of Mad Detective (France, 4th March 2008) – 21 minutes
• Original UK theatrical trailer
• 16-page booklet containing specially commissioned essay by David Bordwell (Jacques Ledoux Professor of Film Studies, University of Wisconsin-Madison)

Review: http://www.blu-ray.com/movies/Mad-Detective-Blu-ray/1316/#Review

[Lord Darth Vader]

Kiyoshi Kurosawa — the hugely acclaimed Japanese director famous for his groundbreaking, existential horror films such as Cure and Kairo [Pulse] — set Cannes alight in 2008 with this highly topical film: an eerie, poignant reflection on the mass uncertainty sweeping the world.

When Ryuhei Sasaki (played by Teruyuki Kagawa) is unceremoniously dumped from his ‘safe’ company job, his family’s happy, humdrum life is put at risk. Unwilling to accept the shame of unemployment, the loyal salary man decides not to tell anyone, instead leaving home each morning in suit and tie with briefcase, spending his days searching for work and lining up for soup with the homeless. Outstanding performances; serene, elegant direction; and Kurosawa’s trademark chills are evident as he ratchets up the unsettling atmosphere and the grim hopelessness of Sasaki’s unemployment.

Widely regarded as Kurosawa’s finest achievement, The Masters of Cinema Series is proud to present the winner of the Un Certain Regard Jury Prize at Cannes 2008.


Special features:

• Making Of documentary [61:00]
• Q&A, Tokyo, September 2008 [12:00]
• Première, Tokyo, September 2008 [15:00]
• DVD discussion [9:00]
• Original UK theatrical trailer [3:00]
• 28-PAGE BOOKLET – containing a new essay by B. Kite


Review: http://www.blu-ray.com/movies/Tokyo-Sonata-Blu-ray/4099/#Review

[Lord Darth Vader]

Long out-of-circulation and unavailable on home video, Jean-Luc Godard’s 1964 masterpiece Une femme mariée, fragments d’un film tourné en 1964 en noir et blanc [A Married Woman: Fragments of a Film Shot in 1964 in Black and White] has, until now, represented the ostensibly ‘missing’ key work from the first, zeitgeist-defining phase of JLG’s filmography. The feature which bridges the gap between Bande à part and Alphaville, Une femme mariée is, nevertheless, a galaxy, or gallery, unto itself — a lucid, complex, profoundly funny series of portraits, etched with Godardian acids, of the wife that represents either a singular case, or a universal example, of “a”/”the” married woman, and the men in her orbit.

Macha Méril (later of Pialat’s Nous ne vieillirons pas ensemble, and Varda’s Sans toit ni loi) plays Charlotte — the title character. She’s married to aviator Pierre (Philippe Leroy, of Becker’s Le Trou). She sleeps with thespian Robert (Bernard Noël). She talks “intelligence” with renowned critic-filmmaker Roger Leenhardt, and takes part in a fashion-shoot at a public pool. The “fragments” of the film’s subtitle are chapters, episodes, vignettes, tableaux; Une femme mariée is a pile of magazines made into a film, and a film turned into a magazine — the table of contents reading: Alfred Hitchcock. Jean Racine. La Peau douce. A Peruvian serum. Nuit et brouillard. The “Eloquence” bra. The quartets of Beethoven. Madame Céline. Fantômas. Robert Bresson. A Volkswagen making a right turn. — A film shot in 1964, and in black and white.

Designed with Raoul Coutard’s breathtaking cinematography, Godard’s picture captures a moment in time — but all its mysteries, its truths, its beauty, comedy and grace, serve to resolve into a work of art for the ages. The Masters of Cinema Series is proud to present Jean-Luc Godard’s classic, Une femme mariée, in a magnificent new HD Gaumont restoration for the first time on Blu-ray anywhere in the world.


Special features:

• New and improved English subtitle translations
• The original 3-1/2 minute trailer for the film, created and edited by Jean-Luc Godard at the time of the film’s original French release, in 1080p
• 80-PAGE BOOK containing: — A new “overture” by legendary French critic and filmmaker Luc Moullet (Les Contrebandières, A Girl Is a Gun, Les Sièges de l’Alcazar, Le Prestige de la mort). // A lengthy roundtable discussion between Luc Moullet; writer/critic and American correspondent for Cahiers du cinéma, Bill Krohn; and MoC’s Craig Keller — on the film, and its relationship to Godard’s oeuvre from the 1950s through the 2000s. // A concentrated investigation into the film by Bill Krohn. // A new statement about the film by star Macha Méril. // A transcript of Godard’s late-’70s lecture on Une femme mariée, originally presented in Introduction à une véritable histoire du cinéma, translated here into English for the first time. // Relevant excerpts from Jean Racine’s Bérénice, in the original French, accompanied by a new parallel English translation. // And many notes on the film, Godard, and modern DVD production.


Review: http://www.blu-ray.com/movies/Une-femme-mariee-Suite-de-fragments-dun-film-tourne-en-1964-Blu-ray/7905/#Review

[Lord Darth Vader]

During the Apollo lunar missions from 1968 to 1972, those onboard were given 16mm cameras and told to film anything and everything they could, in space, in orbit, and on the surface of the moon itself. Two decades later, filmmaker Al Reinert went into the NASA vaults to create this extraordinary compendium of their journeys and experiences.

Assembled from hundreds of hours of the astronauts’ own footage, with a soundtrack made up of their memories and a specially composed score by Brian Eno, the film takes the form of one journey to the moon and back again, building with elegant simplicity and exquisite construction to create an overpowering vision of human endeavour and miraculous experience.

At once intimate and awe-inspiring, For All Mankind is a genuinely mesmerising first-hand document of one of the high points of the 20th century. The Masters of Cinema Series is proud to present Criterion’s beautiful high-definition restoration of the film for its UK home viewing première in a comprehensive, director-approved special edition.


Special features:

• Audio commentary featuring Reinert and Apollo 17 commander Eugene A. Cernan, the last man to set foot on the moon
• An Accidental Gift: The Making of “For All Mankind” a new documentary featuring interviews with Reinert, Apollo 12 and Skylab astronaut Alan Bean, and NASA archive specialists
• A gallery of Bean’s artwork, inspired by his life as an astronaut, with commentary and a filmed introduction
• NASA audio highlights and liftoff footage
• Optional on-screen identification of astronauts and mission control specialists
• New optional English subtitles (SDH) for the hearing impaired
• A luxurious booklet, featuring essays, credits, stills, a new interview with Brian Eno, and more.


Review: http://www.blu-ray.com/movies/For-All-Mankind-Blu-ray/6359/#Review

[Lord Darth Vader]

René Laloux’s mesmerising psychedelic sci-fi animated feature won the Grand Prix at the 1973 Cannes Film Festival and is a landmark of European animation. Based on Stefan Wul’s novel Oms en série [Oms in Series / Oms by the Dozen], Laloux’s breathtaking vision was released in France as La Planète sauvage [The Savage Planet]; in the USA as Fantastic Planet; and immediately drew comparisons to Swift’s Gulliver’s Travels and Planet of the Apes (both the 1968 film and Boule’s 1963 novel). Today, the film can be seen to prefigure much of the work of Hayao Miyazaki at Studio Ghibli (Princess Mononoke, Spirited Away) due to its palpable political and social concerns, cultivated imagination, and memorable animation techniques.

La Planète sauvage tells the story of “Oms”, human-like creatures, kept as domesticated pets by an alien race of blue giants called “Draags”. The story takes place on the Draags’ planet Ygam, where we follow our narrator, an Om called Terr, from infancy to adulthood. He manages to escape enslavement from a Draag learning device used to educate the savage Oms — and begins to organise an Om revolt. The imagination invested in the surreal creatures, music and sound design, and eerie landscapes, is immense and unforgettable.

Widely regarded as an allegorical statement on the Soviet occupation of Czechoslovakia, La Planète sauvage was five years in the making at Prague’s Jiri Trnka Studios. The direction of René Laloux, the incredible art of Roland Topor, and Alain Goraguer’s brilliant complementary score (much sampled by the hip-hop community) all combine to make La Planète sauvage a mind-searing experience.


Special features:

• All-new restored high-definition transfer
• Optional English subtitles with original French soundtrack
• Optional USA dub track
• Laloux sauvage, a new 27-minute documentary on the director
• Five short films by Laloux: Les Dents du singe (1960); Les Temps morts (1964); Les Escargots (1965, in a new 1080p transfer), Comment Wang-Fo fut sauvé (1987); and La Prisonnière (1988)
• The complete soundtrack for La Planète sauvage (1973)
• 56-page full-colour booklet, featuring an essay by Craig Keller; an interview with Laloux; and a lavish selection of ephemera and original promotional materials from the film


Review: http://www.blu-ray.com/movies/La-planete-sauvage-Blu-ray/11140/#Review

[Lord Darth Vader]

Soul Power is a vérité documentary – compiled entirely from footage shot in 1974 – of the astonishing back-to-Africa 3-day music festival “Zaire ‘74”. It was held in Kinshasa ahead of the biggest boxing event of all time: the Muhammad Ali–George Foreman “Rumble in the Jungle”. Directed by Jeffrey Levy-Hinte, editor of Leon Gast’s Oscar®-winning (Best Documentary) When We Were Kings, and sourced from the same archival pool, Soul Power features a legendary line-up of African and African-diaspora musicians – all of whom are at the very peak of their creative powers.

Alongside Ali’s wit and wisdom – profoundly lyrical in its own right – vibrant street scenes of downtown Kinshasa, and “fly-on-the-wall” footage of the festival’s staging, rehearsals, and jams, the three nights of concerts (lensed by Albert Maysles and a host of other legendary cameramen) offer electrifying performances by James Brown, B.B. King, Bill Withers, Sister Sledge, Miriam Makeba, The Spinners, Big Black, The Crusaders, Celia Cruz, and many more.

The concert has achieved mythological significance as the definitive Africa(n)-American musical event of the 20th Century and only now, after years of painstaking restoration – legal wrangling prevented an edit and release at the time of filming – Soul Power joins the pantheon of concert film classics, taking its place alongside others of the late-1960s and early-1970s, including Monterey Pop, Woodstock, Gimme Shelter, Soul to Soul, and Wattstax. The Masters of Cinema Series is proud to present Soul Power for home viewing in the UK for the very first time.


Special features:

• New high-definition transfer of the film
• Exclusive video interview with the director, Jeffrey Levy-Hinte
• 30 minutes of deleted behind-the-scenes footage
• Extra concert performances by James Brown, Sister Sledge, the Pointer Sisters, and others
• Optional SDH subtitles for the hard of hearing
• 36-page full-colour booklet featuring archival publicity stills, a director’s statement, and a compilation of reminiscences by the “Zaire ‘74” organisers and performers

[Lord Darth Vader]

After the visual fireworks of Sunrise and the now-lost splendour of 4 Devils, F.W. Murnau turned his attention to this vivid, painterly study of an impulsive and fragile marriage among the wheatfields of Minnesota.

During a brief stay in Chicago, innocent farmer’s son Lem falls for and weds Kate, a hard-bitten but lonely waitress. Upon bringing her home at the start of harvest time, the honeymoon soon turns into a claustrophobic struggle as they contend with the bitter scorn of his father and the invasive, leering jealousy of the farm’s labouring community.

Tenderly romantic and tough-minded in equal measure, City Girl is one of cinema’s great pastorals, featuring some of the most delicate performances Murnau ever filmed and influencing directors such as Terrence Malick and Jean Vigo. The Masters of Cinema Series is proud to present Murnau’s penultimate film in a glorious high-definition transfer.


Special features:

• A new score, composed and arranged in 2008 by Christopher Caliendo
• Full-length audio commentary by film scholar David Kalat
• 28-page illustrated booklet with an essay by Adrian Danks


Review: http://www.blu-ray.com/movies/City-Girl-Blu-ray/7906/#Review

[Lord Darth Vader]

Of all Fritz Lang’s creations, none have been more innovative or influential than M, the film that launched German cinema into the sound era with stunning sophistication and mesmerising artistry. A spate of child killings has stricken a terrified Berlin. Peter Lorre gives a legendary performance as the murderer Hans Beckert, who soon finds himself chased by all levels of society.

From cinema’s first serial killer hunt, Lang pulls back to encompass social tapestry, police procedural, and underworld conspiracies in an astonishingly multi-faceted and level-headed look at a deeply incendiary topic. One of the greatest psychological thrillers of all time, M remains as fresh and startling almost 80 years on. The Masters of Cinema Series is proud to present a stunning high-definition restoration of a definitive classic of world cinema.


Special features:

• Stunning, restored 1080p high-definition transfer in the correct 1.19:1 ratio, with restored sound
• Two audio commentaries: one by German film scholars Anton Kaes and Eric Rentschler; the other featuring film restoration expert Martin Koerber, filmmaker Peter Bogdanovich, historian Torsten Kaiser and excerpts from Bogdanovich’s 1965 audio interviews with Lang
• The original 1932 British release version of M, presented in its entirety, recently rediscovered after 70 years, featuring different actors, alternate takes and Peter Lorre’s first performance in English
• Zum Beispiel Fritz Lang, a 1968 documentary with Fritz Lang discussing his career in German cinema
• 48-page illustrated booklet, including writing by Fritz Lang, historian Robert Fischer, details of a missing scene, behind-the-scenes stills and production drawings


Review: http://www.blu-ray.com/movies/M-Blu-ray/7907/#Review

[Lord Darth Vader]

The culmination of Shôhei Imamura’s extraordinary examinations of the fringes of Japanese society throughout the 1960s, Profound Desires of the Gods [Kamigami no fukaki yokubô] was an 18-month super-production which failed to make an impression at the time of its release, but has since risen in stature to become one of the most legendary — albeit least seen — Japanese films of recent decades.

Presenting a vast chronicle of life on the remote Kurage Island, the film centres on the disgraced, superstitious, interbred Futori family and the Tokyo engineer sent to supervise the creation of a new well — an encounter which leads to both conflict and complicity in strange and powerful ways.

A tragic view of a passing epoch that teeters on the edge of grotesque farce, Imamura’s merciless gaze combines with spectacular colour ‘Scope photography to create a mythic saga convulsing with earthly impulses. The Masters of Cinema Series is proud to present this unforgettable work in an exclusively restored high-definition 1080p transfer on Blu-ray only.


Special features:

• New and improved optional English subtitle translation
• New video introduction by film scholar Tony Rayns
• Original Japanese theatrical trailer (in 1080p)
• 44-page booklet with a new essay by Tony Rayns (to accompany his introduction); rare production stills; two statements from Imamura; and a transcript of Imamura’s introduction and Q&A session at the 1994 Edinburgh International Film Festival’s screening of the film


Review: http://www.blu-ray.com/movies/Profound-Desires-of-the-Gods-Blu-ray/9926/#Review

[Lord Darth Vader]

Based on the true story of Iwao Enokizu (Ken Ogata) and his murderous rampage which sparked a 78-day nationwide manhunt, Shôhei Imamura’s disturbing gem Vengeance Is Mine [Fukushû suru wa ware ni ari] won every major award in Japan on the year of its release. Both seducing and repelling with its unusual story and grisly humour, Imamura uncovers a seedy underbelly of civilised Japanese society.

Unfolding through multiple flashbacks, Ogata delivers a career-defining performance as a day-labourer and smalltime con-artist who, after killing two of his co-workers, embarks on a psychopathic spree of rape and murder. Eluding the police and public, Japan’s infamous “King of Criminals” passes himself off as a Kyoto University professor, only to become entangled with an innkeeper and her perverted mother. Five years in the making, Vengeance Is Mine transcends the limitations of run- of-the-mill criminal studies by presenting a portrait of a killer imbued with a poignant, tragic banality.


Special features:

• Restored 1080p high-definition transfer on the Blu-ray
• All-new improved English subtitle translation
• Audio commentary by noted critic and filmmaker Tony Rayns
• Video introduction by director Alex Cox
• Original Japanese trailers
• 56-page book featuring a lengthy 1994 career-spanning interview with Imamura by Tôichi Nakata; original promotional material; and a director’s statement


Review: http://www.blu-ray.com/movies/Vengeance-Is-Mine-Blu-ray/12266/#Review

[Lord Darth Vader]

The fourth feature by internationally acclaimed auteur Jia Zhangke was also his breakout success, an epic with a canvas as vast, and intimate, as its title suggests: a state-of-the-modern-world address, and a look at the insular world of a troupe of Chinese stage-performers dreaming of freedom…

Zhao Tao, Jia’s muse, is one of these troupers. For Tao and the larger ensemble of pageant performers at Beijing’s real-life World Park (a sprawling hyper-pastiche of global landmarks — “famous sites from five continents”), love is respite from work, work is respite from love, and the line that extends from the past to the future loses all definition beyond the present.

A testament to the wisdom of this young filmmaker who arrived in the late 1990s with Xiao Wu and, in 2000, Platform (regarded by many to be the greatest film of the 2000s), Shijie / The World provides an image of globalisation as a paradox: at once a phenomenon rooted in social control, and a network that allows connection across individual people and populations. The Masters of Cinema Series is proud to present both Jia Zhangke and his film The World to Blu-ray for the first time ever.


Special features:

• Gorgeous 24fps transfer of the film in its original 2.35:1 aspect ratio
• New and improved English subtitle translations
• Tony Rayns on THE WORLD: a new and exclusive 21-minute video introduction to the film by scholar and critic Tony Rayns
• Made in China: a 68-minute documentary on the making of The World
• The World According to Jia Zhangke: a 25-minute video interview with the director
• A lengthy booklet containing a new essay about the film by Tony Rayns; an essay by Jia Zhangke; and a special dossier-afterword with further commentary on certain elements of the film and its ending


Review: http://www.blu-ray.com/movies/The-World-Blu-ray/13797/#Review

[Lord Darth Vader]

A rhapsodic celebration of song, a brutal condemnation of wartime mentality, and a lyrical statement of hope within darkness; even amongst the riches of 1950s’ Japanese cinema, The Burmese Harp [Biruma no tategoto], directed by Kon Ichikawa (Alone Across the Pacific, Tokyo Olympiad), stands as one of the finest achievements of its era.

At the close of World War II, a Japanese army regiment in Burma surrenders to the British. Private Mizushima is sent on a lone mission to persuade a trapped Japanese battalion to surrender also. When the outcome is a failure, he disguises himself in the robes of a Buddhist monk in hope of temporary anonymity as he journeys across the landscape – but he underestimates the power of his assumed role.

A visually extraordinary and deeply moving vision of horror, necessity, and redemption in the aftermath of war, Ichikawa’s breakthrough film is one of the great humanitarian affirmations of the cinema. Nominated for a Best Foreign Language Film Oscar and honoured at the Venice Film Festival, The Masters of Cinema Series is proud to present this landmark film on Blu-ray for the first time.


Special features:

• New, restored high-definition 1080p transfer officially licenced from Nikkatsu
• Newly translated optional English subtitles
• Exclusive video interview with scholar and filmmaker Tony Rayns
• Original Japanese theatrical trailer
• 40-page booklet with an essay by Keiko I. McDonald and rare archival stills


Review: http://www.blu-ray.com/movies/The-Burmese-Harp-Blu-ray/13178/#Review

[Lord Darth Vader]

Unsold on celebrity? Congested with consumption? Addled by status? You’re in The World, kiddo, brought to you by Frank Tashlin — “Because Someone’s Got to Live in It.” And now a brief word on our latest fine product, the one that gives you the answer to that nagging question: Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter?

Ladies and gentlemen, no-one does straight-and-narrow quite like Tony Randall, and we guarantee his turn as lovable ad-man Rockwell P. Hunter will leave you in so many stitches you’ll be just silly with sc-HAH-rtissue! And speaking of tissue: once you see Jayne Mansfield bob and weave as starlet Rita Marlowe, the ambidextrous angel who takes Hunter under her “wings” to launch his agency into the $trato$phere, you too will coo her trademark “ooo”! But that’s not all! You’ll also get Ms. Joan Blondell, star of Nightmare Alley and of Opening Night, who rounds out the package as Ms. Marlowe’s assistant and handler — as they say in Paris, quel package!

Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter? proves that love CAN be manufactured (how else could we get our Blu-rays in your hands??), and finds Frank Tashlin doing what he did better than everyone else: frank tashlin’!!! Trust us when we say we here at The Masters of Cinema Series are simply over-the-moon to be presenting Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter? for the first time on Blu-ray anywhere on the planet!


Special features:

• Gorgeous high-definition transfer of the film in its original 2.35:1 aspect ratio
• New and exclusive video introduction of the film by director Joe Dante (Gremlins 1 & 2, InnerSpace, Looney Tunes: Back in Action, The Hole 3-D)
• Vintage Movietone short which captures Jayne Mansfield on tour promoting the film
• Alternate music & effects track with a different musical score for the opening of the picture and other ‘temporary’ effects-placement
• Original theatrical trailer
• Optional English SDH subtitles for the deaf and hearing-impaired
• 44-page booklet featuring two new essays by film writer David Cairns, and an exclusive 2003 interview about the film with Tony Randall, conducted by Ethan DeSeife


Review: http://www.blu-ray.com/movies/Will-Success-Spoil-Rock-Hunter-Blu-ray/14426/#Review

[Lord Darth Vader]

Of Make Way for Tomorrow, Orson Welles told Peter Bogdanovich: “Oh my God that’s the saddest movie ever made.” Long unavailable for home viewing, Leo McCarey’s personal favourite among all his films (which included The Awful Truth and An Affair to Remember) is sad, yes, but it also stands as cathartic affirmation of the dignity of human feeling, and in the testament of such achieves a subtle complexity of characterization on par with Renoir, Ford, and Hawks.

Victor Moore and Beulah Bondi, two of the great Hollywood character actors, appear makeup-aged beyond their actual years to portray the couple whose house the bank has foreclosed upon (the film was set and produced in the midst of the Great Depression), and who are forced subsequently to move into their children’s homes in the city. A near-musical restructuring of gratitude and debt ensues once the offspring deem the couple’s lodging an imposition: the two are separated, then reunited weeks later… as they glide inexorably into an uncertain future.

Unrelentingly unsentimental, yet maintaining a balance of pathos and levity unseen in not only American studio pictures but most of the rest of world cinema, Make Way for Tomorrow exerted a powerful influence on Yasujirô Ozu’s Tokyo Story and several other key entries in the Japanese master’s body of work. It is a film profoundly concerned with questions of filial obligation and the way we treat one another as human beings; it is a film that, to give Welles the last word, “could make a stone cry.” The Masters of Cinema Series is proud to present Leo McCarey’s truly great Make Way for Tomorrow for the first time on Blu-ray anywhere in the world.


Special features:

• Gorgeous high-definition transfer of the film in its original 1.37:1 aspect ratio
• 20-minute video piece with filmmaker and writer Peter Bogdanovich (The Last Picture Show; The Cat’s Meow) discussing the film and Leo McCarey’s career
• 21-minute video piece with writer Gary Giddins discussing McCarey’s work and the social and political contexts of the film
• Optional English SDH subtitles for the deaf and hearing-impaired
• Lengthy booklet featuring a new essay on the film by writer and Library of America editor Geoffrey O’Brien, and an excerpt from Josephine Lawrence’s source novel Years Are So Long


Review: http://www.blu-ray.com/movies/Make-Way-for-Tomorrow-Blu-ray/14427/#Review

[Lord Darth Vader]

One of the biggest film events of the century, a “Holy Grail” among film finds, Fritz Lang’s 1927 sci-fi epic can finally be seen — for the first time in 83 years — as the director originally intended and as seen by German cinema-goers in 1927.

Shortly after that 1927 release, an entire quarter of Lang’s original version was cut by Paramount for the US release, and by Ufa in Germany, an act of butchery very much against the director’s wishes. The excised footage was believed lost, irretrievably so — that is, until one of the most remarkable finds in all of cinema history, as several dusty reels were discovered in a small museum in Buenos Aires, Argentina in 2008. Since then, an expert team of film archivists has been working at the Friedrich-Wilhelm-Murnau-Stiftung in Germany to painstakingly reconstruct and restore Lang’s film. The Masters of Cinema Series is proud to present the spectacular results — as premièred at the prestigious Berlinale in early 2010 and subsequently seen at cinemas throughout the UK & Ireland.


Special features:

• 150-minute reconstructed and restored 2010 version (including 25 minutes of footage previously thought lost to the world) in a 1080p AVC encode
• New 2010 symphony orchestra studio recording of the original Gottfried Huppertz score in 5.1
• Newly translated optional English subtitles as well as the original German intertitles
• Full-length audio commentary by David Kalat and Jonathan Rosenbaum
• Die Reise nach Metropolis (2010, 55 minutes) documentary about the film
• 2010 re-release trailer
• 56-PAGE BOOKLET featuring an archival article by Fritz Lang; a 1927 review by Luis Buñuel; articles by Jonathan Rosenbaum and Karen Naundorf; and restoration notes by Martin Koerber

[Lord Darth Vader]

The third feature film by cinema master Michelangelo Antonioni, La signora senza camelie [The Lady Without Camelias], expanded the expressive palette of contemporary Italian movies, demonstrating that a personal vision could take an explicitly poetic tack; that “seriousness = neo-realism” was perhaps already turning into something of a truism; and that Antonioni would answer to no-one but himself.

It’s the story of a shopclerk named Clara (played by the captivating Lucia Bosè, also of Antonioni’s brilliant debut feature, Cronaca di un amore) who finds a chance casting in a small movie role develop into a full-blown career as screen-siren. Tension erupts when her husband can no longer tolerate watching her frivolous cinema escapades, and pushes her into a “serious, artistic” production of the life of Joan of Arc… whereupon she is castigated by the critical establishment.

A riveting ‘behind-the-scenes’ show-business drama, La signora senza camelie explores themes that would haunt its director from L’avventura through La notte and The Passenger — an individual’s tenuous hold on her identity, and the dangers inherent to performance… in life and on-screen. The Masters of Cinema Series is proud to present Antonioni’s masterful, highly personal La signora senza camelie for the first time in the UK — in a Dual Format release containing both Blu-ray and DVD versions of the film.


Special features:

• Beautiful new transfer of the film in its original 1.37:1 aspect ratio, presented in a 1080p AVC encode on the Blu-ray
• Newly translated optional English subtitles
• A new and exclusive video introduction to the film with critic and teacher Gabe Klinger
• A new and exclusive video featuring Gabe Klinger discussing Antonioni in the context of the Italian production system of the 1950s
• The film’s original Italian theatrical trailer
• 44-page booklet containing newly translated vintage criticism about the film, an excerpt from an interview with Antonioni, and a lengthy 1953 back-and-forth about the film between Antonioni and critic Luigi Chiarini

Review: http://www.blu-ray.com/movies/La-signora-senza-camelie-Blu-ray/19209/#Review

[Lord Darth Vader]

A key film of Antonioni’s middle-period, Le amiche [The Girlfriends] finds the Italian master expanding his palette in the realm of traditional narrative cinema by way of his powerhouse direction of an ensemble cast, while entrenching his devotion to expressing the emotional makeup of the modern woman.

Clelia (Eleonora Rossi-Drago) embarks from Rome to set up a fashion-salon in Torino. Shortly after arrival, she finds herself caught up in the (melo)dramas of a bourgeoise circle of acquaintances (including the iconic Valentina Cortese), and their attendant attempts at suicide, their class prejudices, and the romantic alliances that threaten to transform the social clique into an emotional tar-pit.

Le amiche represents the epitome of Antonioni’s ’50s period, and although it lays the groundwork for such ’60s breakthroughs as L’avventura and La notte, it proves itself no less brilliant than those later works. The Masters of Cinema Series is proud to present Le amiche for the first time in the UK — in a Dual Format release containing both Blu-ray and DVD versions of the film.


Special features:

• Beautiful new transfer of the film in its recent restoration by Cineteca di Bologna, L’Immagine Ritrovata, and Martin Scorsese’s Film Foundation, in its original 1.37:1 aspect ratio, and presented in a 1080p AVC encode on the Blu-ray
• Newly translated optional English subtitles
• A new and exclusive video introduction to the film with critic and teacher Gabe Klinger
• A new and exclusive video featuring Gabe Klinger discussing the arc of Antonioni’s entire career
• 28-page booklet containing newly translated vintage critical pieces about the film, excerpts of interviews with Antonioni, and a 1956 letter written by Antonioni to Italo Calvino


Review: http://www.blu-ray.com/movies/Le-Amiche-Blu-ray/18856/#Review

[Lord Darth Vader]

Jean Epstein’s Cœur fidèle [true Heart] established the great French filmmaker as one of the most inventive directors of the (then still silent) art form. A pared-down tale of a barmaid oppressed by an exploitative foster family who attempt to push her into the arms of an unscrupulous regular-about-town, Marie’s heart (exuberantly vivified by Gina Marès) belongs, as far as she’s concerned, to the tenderly blank Jean (Léon Mathot)…

Cœur fidèle drives its simple story (which, with its infamous and exhilarating “carousel sequence”, helped pave the way for the narrative tradition of such Murnau masterworks as Sunrise and City Girl) on into the realm of what might be considered an early incarnation of French poetic realism — all while still anticipating Epstein’s magical, post-surrealist, later works. The Masters of Cinema Series is proud to present Epstein’s breakthrough film for the first time on video in the UK, as a Dual Format Blu-ray/DVD release.


Special features:

• Beautiful new high-definition transfer of the film in its original 1.37:1 aspect ratio, at its true speed and running time – on both formats – and presented in a 1080p AVC encode on the Blu-ray
• New score composed and performed by Maxence Cyrin
• Original French intertitles with newly translated optional English subtitles
• A gallery of rare photography from the Cinémathèque française
• 44-page booklet containing rare production photography, and writing about the film by Jean Epstein, Henri Langlois, René Clair, and more


Review: http://www.blu-ray.com/movies/Coeur-Fidele-Blu-ray/23012/#Review

[Lord Darth Vader]

Of all Masaki Kobayashi’s attacks on the cruelty and inhumanity perpetrated by authoritarian power (including The Human Condition and Samurai Rebellion), perhaps none are more brilliant than his visceral, mesmerising Harakiri [aka Seppuku].

In a magnificent performance, Tatsuya Nakadai (Yojimbo, The Face of Another, Ran) stars as Hanshiro Tsugumo, a masterless down-and-out samurai who enters the manor of Lord Iyi, requesting to commit ritual suicide on his property. Suspected of simply fishing for charity, Hanshiro is told the gruesome tale of the last samurai who made the same request – but Hanshiro will not be moved…

With its intricate structure and pressure-cooker atmosphere, Kobayashi’s first jidai-geki period drama is a full-scale demolition job of samurai ideals and feudal hypocrisy, filmed with artistry and surgical precision, and scored by celebrated composer Toru Takemitsu. Adapted from the same source novel in 2011 by notorious auteur Takashi Miike, the original – winner of the 1963 Special Jury Prize at Cannes – still stands as a startling moment in Japanese cinema. The Masters of Cinema Series is proud to present, for its 50th anniversary, the UK home viewing première of Harakiri in a Dual Format Blu-ray + DVD edition.


Special features:

• New, officially licensed, Shochiku high-definition transfer (1080p on Blu-ray)
• New and improved English subtitle translation
• Original theatrical trailer
• Excerpt from a 1993 Directors Guild of Japan interview with Masaki Kobayashi discussing the film with director Masahiro Shinoda
• An illustrated 28-page booklet featuring a new essay by film critic Philip Kemp, a 1963 interview with Kobayashi, and rare archival production stills


Review: http://www.blu-ray.com/movies/Harakiri-Blu-ray/24529/#Review

[Lord Darth Vader]

With this, his fifth film, Shôhei Imamura finally answered his true calling as Japanese cinema’s most dedicated and brilliant chronicler of society’s underbelly with the astonishing Pigs and Battleships [Buta to gunkan]. A riotous portrait of sub-Yakuza gangsters battling for control of the local pork business in a U.S. Navy-occupied coastal town (Yokosuka), Imamura conjures a chaotic world of petty thugs, young love, tough-headed women, and underworld hypochondria, with one of the most unforgettable climaxes ever to grace the screen.

Featuring dynamic black-and-white ‘Scope cinematography, the director’s typically sly sense of social commentary, and a host of outstanding performances (including Jitsuko Yoshimura from Onibaba), Pigs and Battleships immediately became a cornerstone of the Japanese New Wave and remains perhaps Imamura’s most sheerly entertaining work. The Masters of Cinema Series is proud to present the film in a Dual Format edition, alongside Imamura’s 1958 rarely-seen debut feature, Stolen Desire [Nusumareta yokujô].


Special features:

• Exclusively restored high-definition master of Pigs and Battleships from the original camera negative (1080p on Blu-ray)
• Stolen Desire [Nusumareta yokujô] (1958), Imamura’s debut feature for Nikkatsu in a new progressive transfer [93 minutes]
• Newly translated English subtitles for both films
• 36-page booklet featuring essays on both films by Tony Rayns and rare stills


Review: http://www.blu-ray.com/movies/Pigs-and-Battleships-and-Stolen-Desire-Blu-ray/23029/#Review

[Lord Darth Vader]

“My heroines are true to life – just look around you at Japanese women. They are strong, and they outlive men,” director Shôhei Imamura once observed. And so an audacious, anthropological approach to filmmaking came into full maturity with the director’s vast 1963 chronicle of pre- and post-war Japan, The Insect Woman [Nippon-konchûki, or An Account of Japanese Insects].

Comparing his heroine, Tome Matsuki (played by Sachiko Hidari, who won the “Best Actress” award at the 1964 Berlin Film Festival for the role) to the restlessness and survival instincts of worker insects, the film is an unsparing study of working-class female life. Beginning with Tome’s birth in 1918, it follows her through five decades of social change, several improvised careers, and male-inflicted cruelty.

Elliptically plotted, brimming over with black humour and taboo material, and immaculately staged in crystalline NikkatsuScope, The Insect Woman is arguably Imamura’s most radical and emphatic testament to female resilience. The Masters of Cinema Series is proud to present The Insect Woman alongside Imamura’s rarely seen 1958 feature Nishi-Ginza Station in a special Dual Format edition.


Special features:

• Newly restored high-definition master of The Insect Woman
• New progressive transfer of Nishi-Ginza Station [Nishi-Ginza eki-mae, or In Front of West-Ginza Station], a 1958 feature by Imamura
• Newly translated optional English subtitles for both films
• A video conversation about The Insect Woman between Imamura and critic Tadao Satô
• 36-PAGE BOOKLET featuring two new essays by film scholar Tony Rayns on both films, alongside rare archival imagery

[Lord Darth Vader]

Three years after helping to achieve some of the most amazing imagery in cinema history with 2001: A Space Odyssey, special effects maestro Douglas Trumbull made an auspicious directorial debut at age 29 with the environmentally themed science fiction classic Silent Running.

In the distant future, plant life on our planet is extinct. Remaining specimens are cultivated in vast greenhouse-like domes orbiting in space. Bruce Dern stars as Freeman Lowell, dedicated botanist aboard the “Valley Forge”, awaiting the call to refoliate Earth – despite the scorn of his crewmates. When an order comes to instead destroy the domes and return home, Lowell takes matters into his own hands, beginning a long and lonely voyage into the unknown.

With its remarkable special effects (especially the robot drones Huey, Dewey, and Louie); glorious score (including songs performed by Joan Baez); memorable sound effects (created by Joseph Byrd from the cult band The United States of America); a screenplay co-written by Michael Cimino (The Deer Hunter) and Steven Bochco (Hill Street Blues), and an impassioned central performance from Dern, Silent Running remains a uniquely contemplative and haunting adventure that continues to make hippies of young children, even today. The Masters of Cinema Series is proud to present a new Blu-ray special edition to celebrate the film’s 40th anniversary.


Special features:

• Exclusively restored beautiful high-definition 1080p transfer
• Full-length commentary by director Trumbull and actor Bruce Dern
• Isolated music and effects track
• Optional English SDH subtitles on the feature
• The Making of Silent Running, a 1972 on-set documentary [50:00]
• Two video pieces with Douglas Trumbull [31:00 + 5:00]
• A Conversation with Bruce Dern, a discussion with the actor [11:00]
• Original theatrical trailer [3:00]
• A lavish 48-page full-colour booklet featuring rare photographs and artwork from Trumbull’s personal collection, and recollections of the film’s cinematographer, special designs coordinator, and composer


Review: http://www.blu-ray.com/movies/Silent-Running-Blu-ray/26693/#Review

[Lord Darth Vader]

Cinematic anthropologist extraordinaire Shōhei Imamura won his first Palme d’Or at the 1983 Cannes Film Festival for The Ballad of Narayama [Narayama bushikō], his transcendent adaptation of two classic stories by Shichirō Fukazawa.

In a small village in a remote valley where the harshness of life dictates that survival overrules compassion, elderly widow Orin is approaching her 70th birthday – the age when village law says she must go up to the mythic Mount Narayama to die. But there are several loose ends within her own family to tie up first.

Creating a vividly realised inverse image of “civilised” society with typical directness and black humour, Imamura presents a bracingly unsentimental rumination on mortality and an engrossing study of a community’s struggles against the natural elements. Handled with a masterful control and simplicity, moving effortlessly between the comic and the horrific, The Ballad of Narayama is one of the legendary director’s deepest, richest works, and ranks among the finest films of its decade. The Masters of Cinema Series is proud to present the film’s first UK home viewing release in a new Dual Format Blu-ray + DVD edition.


Special features:

• New, restored high-definition transfer
• New and improved English subtitle translation
• Exclusive new 20-minute video interview with scholar Tony Rayns
• Four original Japanese theatrical trailers, including behind-the-scenes footage
• PLUS: A 44-page full-colour booklet containing a 1983 director’s statement by Shôhei Imamura; a newly translated 1983 interview with Imamura conducted by Max Tessier; the newly translated production diary for the film kept by producer Jirô Tomoda; a wide selection of rare production stills; and facsimile imagery from the film’s original Japanese press book.


Review: http://www.blu-ray.com/movies/The-Ballad-of-Narayama-Blu-ray/24600/#Review