Japanese director Momoko Andô’s 2008 film based on the best-selling manga Love Vibes by Erika Sakurazawa
Depending on your mood, Japanese movie Kakera: A Piece of Our Life may strike you as charmingly gentle and perceptive or maddeningly slow and opaque. You may even find yourself flip-flopping between these points of view within the same scene.
A lot will depend on how you respond to the film’s leading characters: the two very different young women whose awkward courtship and love is the heart of the story. Doe-eyed university student Haru (played by former teen pop star Hikari Mitsushima) is shy and insular; the slightly older Riko (Eriko Nakamura) is confident and outgoing.
Haru is bogged down in a joyless relationship with her boorish boyfriend when Riko swoops upon her in a coffee bar and declares her attraction to women in general – and to Haru in particular. “I like the feel of girls because they are soft,” she proclaims.
Riko works as a prosthetist, painstakingly fashioning artificial body parts to replace ones lost through accident or disease. “I want to help people with something missing,” she says, and you can see a similar impulse in her desire to fill the absence she perceives in Haru’s life.
The duo’s friendship develops fitfully, however; so fitfully that you may lose patience with the pair – and the film. Haru comes across as such a passive drip that you wonder why Riko persists with her after the initial coup de foudre. In turn, Riko is sometimes so suffocating, so assertive that you’re in danger of losing sympathy with her too.
It’s worth staying with the film, though, if only for the artful way debutant director Momoko Andô, with a keen eye for colour and composition, frames her actors in a series of humdrum Tokyo locations.
Andô, the Slade-trained daughter of esteemed Japanese actor-director Eiji Okuda, also makes adept use of former Smashing Pumpkins guitarist James Iha’s low-key, atmospheric score. It comes as a shock, though, when she throws in a brief touch of magic realism and a bottle of pop tossed into the air turns into a two-headed dove.
The bird takes flight, even if heartsick Riko and Haru remain disappointingly earthbound.
From Plaion Pictures comes the blood-splattered action thriller Til Death Do Us Part, which makes its UK digital debut from Monday 15 April 2024.
Natalie Burn and her fellow Fortess (2021) and Fortess: Sniper’s Eye (2022) co-star Ser’Darius Blain reunite in director Timothy Woodward Jr’s 2023 fight fest as a couple whose wedding day turns into a brutal bloodbath when Burn’s Bride-to-be gets cold feet and leave’s Blain’s Groom at the altar.
Holding up at her family’s cabin in the woods, Burn’s Bride soon finds herself facing off her intended’s Best Man (Twilight‘s Cam Gigandet) and his six Groomsmen (including American Gods‘ Orlando Jones) using whatever she can find to take them down – kitchen knife, shovel, golf club, a torn dress and – yep – that old favourite – a chainsaw.
Given her expert fighting skills, this blood-splattered Bride is no ordinary Jane – but a badass heroine with a deadly history. She, the Groom and Groomsmen all work for The University, a shadowy organisation that sub-contracts assassinations to governments around the world.
Now she wants out and a normal life. But after despatching her assailants with deadly force, will she be able to convince her jilted fiancé to join her in escaping from The University’s stranglehold?
Til Death Do Us Part is very much in the 2005’s Mr. & Mrs. Smith mould, minus the comic elements (and the screen chemistry of Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt). Where this film works best is with the practical fight sequences, which are expertly staged, especially so Burns (who’s also one of the film’s producers), who brings her ballet background (she trained at the Bolshoi in Moscow and the Royal Ballet in London) to the fore.
The weakest parts, however, are a subplot set on a yacht involving Jason Patric’s grizzled and mysterious Husband, and the film’s ‘final dance’ denouement – which really drags on. Best performance though goes to the annoyingly handsome Gigandet, who brings some fancy footwork – à la Gene Kelly – to his Best Man and gets all the ‘best’ of the film’s corny lines.
Re-released by Park Circus in UK cinemas this week, Martin Scorsese’s distinctly offbeat 1985 comedy After Hours remains something of an outlier in his filmography, but it was a harbinger for the cycle of yuppie-in-peril movies in the mid-1980s and early 90s that saw a series of free-spirited female hipsters drag well-heeled male metropolitans dangerously out of their comfort zones– such as Melanie Griffiths’ wild thing Lulu and Jeff Daniels’ stuffy Wall Street businessman Charles in Jonathan Demme’s Something Wild. Here’s how After Hours struck me at the time of its original release.
All computer programmer Paul Hackett (played by co-producer Griffin Dune) wanted was a plaster of Paris bagel and cream cheese paperweight – and perhaps a bit of nooky with kooky SoHo boho Marcy (Rosanna Arquette). Instead, in Martin Scorsese’s darkly funny screwball comedy After Hours, he finds himself put through an existential yuppie nightmare: hounded, harrowed and haunted by a succession of female furies who make the Eumenides of Greek legend look like benevolent Girl Guides.
It all starts when Paul and Marcy ‘meet cute’ in a late-night diner: she expressing interest on his Henry Miller novel, he in the aforementioned ‘sculptures’ produced by her artist flatmate, Kiki (played by Linda Fiorentino, pictured above with Dunne). Later that night, ‘after hours’, Paul ventures into SoHo, New York’s artists’ quarter, to see boho and bagel. He soon wishes he hadn’t. Before the night is through he will be drenched, scalped and pursued through the streets by a gaggle of vigilantes led by a distaff Charles Bronson driving a Mr Softee ice-cream truck.
The style of After Hours is hallucinatory: lit with the clarity of a nightmare and bursting with such surreal details as a cashier who pirouettes as he takes your check and a crescent of mousetraps guarding the bed of a demented cocktail waitress. The dialogue is laconic, brittle city-speak that shades from pretension into menace, while Scorsese’s voyeuristic camera tracks, swivels and homes in on the hapless Paul with the beady, dispassionate eye of a Martian anthropologist. Appropriately, Scorsese puts in a brief cameo appearance training a spotlight on the dancers in a new wave disco. Griffin Dunne might not find it fun but if your taste runs to black farce and paranoid comedy then there are plenty of laughs in SoHo.
From Second Sight Films comes the brand-new release of Jeremy Saulnier’s acclaimed horror thriller hit Green Room in a Limited Edition Dual 4K UHD/Blu-ray box set and Standard Edition 4K/UHD and Blu-ray from 18 March 2024.
Struggling D.C. punk band Ain’t Rights are in the Pacific Northwest for a gig, but when its cancelled, bassist Pat (Anton Yelchin), guitarist Sam (Alia Shawkat), drummer Reece (Joe Cole) and singer Tiger (Callum Turner) must find another way of making the money that they desperately need.
When an opportunity for a show in the sticks arises, they take it on, but the venue turns out to be a neo-Nazi bar, run by skinhead gang leader Darcy (Patrick Stewart). When the band witness the murders of skinhead Werm and his girlfriend Emily, events quickly spiral out of control and the band, along with Emily’s friend Amber (Imogen Poots) find themselves trapped in the green room. Forced to fight for survival using anything at their disposal, can they make it out alive?
Picard‘s Sir Patrick Stewart gives a quiet but commanding turn as the white supremacist gang leader, while the late Anton Yelchin (who gets a dedication in the film’s closing credit) shows much nuance as the film’s male protagonist, but kudos go to Imogen Poots as the skinhead gang member who switches sides to help the band – she rocks big time!
Meticulously directed, with echoes of a war drama as well as a violent action horror thriller, and shot in hues of green, blue and blood red, with a soundtrack that fuses heavy metal with John Carpenter-esque ambient musings, Green Room deserves repeated viewings and this Second Sight Films release is just the ticket. Among the many special features, do check out writer–director Jeremy Saulnier’s audio commentary after watching the film first as it’s a masterclass in film design and production (and we also get to learn his Desert Island band is Black Sabbath).
Green Room is presented as a dual format edition that includes the UHD and Blu-ray with the main feature and bonus features on both discs. See all the specs below.
SPECIAL FEATURES
Dual format edition including both UHD and Blu-ray with main feature and bonus features on both discs
UHD presented in Dolby Vision HDR
New audio commentary by Reyna Cervantes and Prince Jackson
Audio commentary with writer/director Jeremy Saulnier
Going Hardcore: a new interview with writer/director Jeremy Saulnier
Punk Rock: a new interview with actor Callum Turner
Rocking Out: a new interview with composers Brooke & Will Blair
Going Green: an interview with production designer Ryan Warren Smith
Nazi Punks F*ck Off: Thomas Caldwell on Green Room
Archive featurette: Into the Pit – Making Green Room
Hard though it might be to credit, Fight Club, David Fincher’s ferocious satire based on Chuck Palahniuk’s cult novel, is now 25 years old. Today’s re-release of Fight Club in UK cinemas by Park Circus has prompted me to revisit the article I wrote for Movie Talk in 2009 after visiting Los Angeles for the film’s release on the then-new format Blu-ray.
Ten years on, Fight Club looks fabulous on Blu-ray (Fincher oversaw the film’s frame-by-frame remastering), as I discovered when I saw the movie screened in the format in a preview theatre on the Fox Studios lot in LA recently. It sounds fabulous too, which has a lot to do with the film’s Oscar-nominated sound designer, Ren Klyce, who gave some ear-opening insights into his craft following the screening.
After enthusing about the delights of Monday-night Blu-ray showings in George Lucas’s screening room (“the other night we watched Dr Strangelove and you’re sitting there and going Wow!”), Klyce revealed a few of his trade secrets, including the formula he and his colleagues hit upon for achieving the distinctive sound of Fight Club’s fights.
When Hollywood filmmakers want to put across the sound of a fight, they usually take the easy option and reach for the SFX disc on the shelf – which is why most fights in Hollywood films all sound the same. Klyce, who has worked with Fincher since 1983, didn’t take the easy option.
“We ended up recording all sorts of different sounds,” he reveals, “from punching our own bodies, to taking a chicken carcase, stuffing it with walnuts and hitting that – we used the walnuts because they’re like little brains. And then we took slabs of meat from the butcher’s shop into the basement of George Lucas’s studio and smacked them around. And then we layered all those noises. And that’s what you’re hearing.”
When it came to the film’s most shocking fight, however, the one in which Norton’s protagonist beats Jared Leto’s character, Angel Face, to a pulp, Klyce took a more expressionistic approach.
“I had a big fight about that scene with Jim Haygood, our picture editor (who I love), because he had edited it to a piece of music. It was great but the music made it fun and kind of playful and sexy, almost like dancing.
He’s beating up Angel Face and there’s Tchk – T-t-t-tchk Dum tchk tchk tchk-er. It almost made it erotic, which took away its message, which is Norton’s anger.
Getting rid of the music created a space for Norton’s narrator, ‘Jack’, and his memorable rant:
I felt like putting a bullet between the eyes of every Panda that wouldn’t screw to save its species. I wanted to open the dump valves on oil tankers and smother all the French beaches I’d never see. I wanted to breathe smoke.
“Without the music the scene opened up. You can now hear Jack’s voice. But there’s nothing supporting it. The punches are just like slap slap. So I thought let’s take the sounds of them yelling and slow them down and speed them up. When you see the footage, Fincher’s cranking it, he’s running it at 60 frames per second and it’s slow motion, and then they come back up to speed and so the sound does the same thing. You take the sound down in layers, deconstruct it and find the beats that work.”
Klyce took this expressionism even further in his favourite scene in the movie, in which Pitt’s Tyler Durden unfolds his vision of the future, the famous Kudzu Vine speech:
In the world I see – you are stalking elk through the damp canyon forests around the ruins of Rockefeller Center. You’ll wear leather clothes that will last you the rest of your life. You’ll climb the wrist-thick kudzu vines that wrap the Sears Tower. And when you look down, you’ll see tiny figures pounding corn, laying strips of venison on the empty car pool lane of some abandoned superhighway.
“It’s so beautiful. Originally, we just had the sound of the rain playing and it was great. When you’re mixing a film there’s a lot of pressure to get things done so that the producers don’t get mad that you’re not done. OK, so we’ll put some rain in there and we’ll get to the next scene. But I kept watching it and I said: ‘This is really an opportunity to put in something that will underscore Chuck Palahniuk’s writing.’”
This Klyce achieved with an audio collage of “things way in the background with a lot of reverb that you can’t necessarily pinpoint”, an eerie mix which leaves the impression of animals let loose from a zoo in a post-industrial world.
An interactive feature on the Blu-ray disc allows you to play around with the mix of this scene, plus three others including Angel Face’s Beating. You can fade a scene’s naturalistic sounds, amplify the expressionistic ones, and tinker with all manner of shades in between. The feature offers a glimpse of some of the subtleties of the film’s sound design, its overtones and undertones, its psychological nuances. I suspect, though, that the majority of users will have most fun with the punches.
Park Circus is re-releasing Fight Club in over 100 UK cinemas from 15-21 March.
From Radiance Films comes the Limited Edition Box Set World Noir Vol.1, which features three hidden 1950s noir gems from across the globe. From Japan, Koreyoshi Kurahara’s I Am Waiting (1957), the French thriller Witness in the City (1959) from Edouard Molinaro and the Italian feature The Facts of Murder, directed by and starring Pietro Germi. Each one is presented in new restorations and include a wealth of special features. Available from 18 December 2023.
Though widely considered an American filmmaking style, French critics first applied film noir to the visual and thematic darkness of the flood of American films in the post-war period. Those films, often by European émigré filmmakers, were influenced by European filmmaking modes, notably French poetic realism and Weimar cinema.
The American noirs that flourished in the 1940s and 1950s, in turn, influenced cinema around the world. Now World Noir Vol.1, the first in a new series, aims to capture the trail of noir influence from around the world, from the pre-War period to the emergence of neo-noir.
I Am Waiting (1957, director Koreyoshi Kurahara) – Newly restored In this enthralling Japanese film, a failed boxer meets a waitress with a dark past who has run afoul of an underworld syndicate that seeks to exploit her to its own ends. With dreams of escaping to Brazil, the boxer agrees to help, but neither the past nor the future is exactly what it seems.
This foundational film from the pioneering studio of post-war Japanese noir Nikkatsu stars real-life couple Yujiro Ishihara and Mie Kitahara, who ruled Japanese popular cinema of the 1950s both on and off-screen.
Witness in the City (1959, director Edouard Molinaro) – New 2K restoration In this French thriller, adapted from the novel by celebrated writers Boileau and Narcejac (Vertigo, Les Diaboliques), a wealthy industrialist throws his lover from a train to make her murder look like suicide. But her husband, Ancelin (Lino Ventura), learns the truth and seeks vengeance. There’s a witness to his bid for revenge, and he soon becomes embroiled in a deadly game of cat-and-mouse that thrillingly plays out the streets of Paris.
Molinaro wrings every ounce of tension from the narrative, focusing on evocative shadows and Parisian nightlife shot by Henri Decae (Le Samourai).
The Facts of Murder (1959, director Pietro Germi) – New 4K restoration Inspector Ingravallo (Germi) is called to a Roman apartment building to investigate a robbery, but as he questions the tenants, he soon realises something is amiss. As the investigation progresses, what appears to be a simple robbery soon becomes a murder case.
Loosely based on celebrated author Carlo Emilio Gadda’s novel, the film is shot with inky shadows reminiscent of film noir, while the mystery element prefigures Giallo films. Featuring a cast of excellent supporting actors, including Claudia Cardinale and Claudio Gora, the film won multiple awards on its release, including the Italian Golden Globe for Best Film (1960).
New 4K restoration of The Facts of Murder carried out by L’Immagine Ritrovata at the Cineteca di Bologna, presented on Blu-ray for the first time in the world
2K restoration of Witness in the City, on Blu-ray for the first time in the UK
High-Definition digital transfer of I Am Waiting, on Blu-ray for the first time in the world
Original uncompressed mono PCM audio for all films
Optional English subtitles for all films
Newly designed artwork based on original posters
Limited edition 80-page perfect bound booklet featuring new writing on the films by critics and experts including Barry Forshaw on noir represented outside the US, William Carroll on post-war occupation period in Japanese cinema, Hayley Scanlon on Japanese noir, an interview with Edouard Molinaro, Roberto Curti on the hybrid nature of Italian cinema, and Sam Wigley on 50s world noir from other countries
Limited Edition of 3000 copies, presented in a rigid box with full-height Scanavo cases for each film and removable OBI strip, leaving packaging free of certificates and markings
I AM WAITING
Audio commentary by Japanese cinema expert Jasper Sharp
Yujiro’s Travel Diary – a documentary on star Yujiro Ishihara during location shooting in Europe (1959, 42 mins)
The Yujiro Effect – a visual essay by Mark Schilling
Trailer
Reversible sleeve featuring original and newly commissioned artwork
WITNESS IN THE CITY
Introduction by critic Tony Rayns
Interview with Philippe Durant, biographer of Lino Ventura, who speaks about the film and the iconic actor
French noir – critic and author Ginette Vincendeau provides an overview of noir in France during the 1950s
Reversible sleeve featuring original and newly commissioned artwork
THE FACTS OF MURDER
New interview with Pietro Germi expert Mario Sesti (2023)
The Man With the Cigar in His Mouth – a documentary about Pietro Germi featuring interviews with his colleagues and collaborators including Mario Monicelli, Claudia Cardinale, Stefania Sandrelli, Giuseppe Tornatore among others (Mario Sesti, 1997, 41 mins)
What’s Black and Yellow All Over? All Shades of Italian Film Noir – visual essay by Paul A. J. Lewis on the presence of noir trends in Italian cinema and the evolution of the genre (2023)
Newly translated English subtitles
Reversible sleeve featuring original and newly commissioned artwork
Director Terry Gilliam’s multi-million-dollar epic fantasy The Adventures of Baron Munchausen was a notorious box-office bomb on its release in 1989. The Criterion Collection’s superb 4K digital restoration shows, however, that the film remains a dazzlingly spectacular celebration of the importance and power of the imagination, and as audacious in its own way as the legendary exploits told by its eponymous hero. For years, Munchausen has been better known for its famously calamitous production than its cinematic qualities, which makes it all the more deserving of rediscovery. And the claim Gilliam made when I interviewed him back in 1989 has been borne out by time: Munchausen actually is a film that improves when you watch it for a second or third time.
Terry Gilliam couldn’t help seeing the funny side of things. The Monty Python animator-turned-director’s 1988 film, The Adventures of Baron Munchausen, had wound up costing somewhere in the region of £45million and needed to do Star Wars-scale business at the box-office to break even. Suffice to say, it didn’t. Still, Gilliam couldn’t stop beaming as he reflected on it all. Great volcanic chuckles continually erupted as he recounted the multitude of disasters that occurred during the movie’s creation, catastrophes that made the filming of those notorious 1980s Hollywood flops Heaven’s Gate and Ishtar look like picnics.
‘We were two weeks behind schedule in the first week and it just got stranger and more bizarre. The making of the film was just like the film itself. The Baron is always almost dying and there’s a theme song, “What will become of the Baron? Surely this time there is no escape?”, which became our theme song because at every point there was another disaster: I was going to be fired, the film was being taken over… On it went, but we got through it. We set out to have an adventure and we did.’
Knickers
Incredible though it may seem, there was a real Baron Munchausen, one Karl Friedrich Hieronymous, a German cavalry officer under Frederick the Great, who became legendary in the Europe of the 1800s as a teller of fabulously exaggerated exploits. Every bit as audacious and improbable as the Baron’s tales, Gilliam’s film opens in a nameless 18th-century European city that is under siege by the army of the Ottoman Empire. There, in the midst of bombardment, we find flailing actor-manager Henry Salt (Bill Paterson) and his moth-eaten theatrical troupe attempting to stage a play featuring a number of the Baron’s tallest tales – travelling to the moon in a balloon made from ladies’ knickers, hobnobbing with Vulcan and Venus in the bowels of Mount Etna, getting swallowed by a giant sea monster… The production is halted, however, by the figure of the elderly Baron himself (wonderfully played by veteran Shakespearian actor John Neville), who insists on his own version of these true events. Somehow, his telling of them then slips and merges into another adventure in which the Baron, accompanied by Salt’s wide-eyed young daughter Sally (played by nine-year-old Sarah Polley, the future director of Away from Her, Stories We Tell and Women Talking), raises the siege of the city with the aid of his four estimable servants.
Putting all this on film was no less implausible a feat than any of the Baron’s wildest exploits. And, although Gilliam was able to laugh uproariously about it all afterwards (and still does, as his audio commentary on the Criterion release shows), something of a nightmare at the time.
‘I’d reached the point,’ he recalls, ‘ where I really thought I wasn’t going to make films again because it was so unpleasant and painful. It wasn’t dramatic, it was just this long, nagging, gnawing unpleasantness.’
‘Intelligent enough for kids and exciting enough for adults’
For Gilliam, directing a multinational, multilingual crew, both on location in northern Spain and in the studio at Cinecitta in Rome and Pinewood in the UK, was like being the overseer on the Tower of Babel. The film’s production designer (Dante Ferretti), cinematographer (Giuseppe Rotunno) and costume designer (Gabrielle Pescucci) and their teams were Italian, the sound crew German, the special effects specialists British, and the Assistant Director Spanish. Filming the crucial scene of the Baron’s escape from the city by balloon involved a race against time, the setting sun and a howling gale, as well as precarious communication via walkie-talkie with an Italian stuntman who didn’t speak any English and a Pakistani dwarf with a cleft palate.
Take after take went wrong, with the balloon flying every which way but the one intended. Then at the last possible opportunity, everything somehow came together.
‘At that moment, the clouds opened up for the first time that day, the sun hit the balloon, and off it went. It was glorious. That was the day we knew we would finish the film.’
The completed scene still looks wonderful, as indeed does the whole film. Against the odds, Gilliam succeeded in creating a positively gargantuan epic, an embarras de richesses, visually sumptuous, farcical and romantic, spectacular and intimate, teeming with invention and wit. A film that is, in his own words, ‘intelligent enough for kids and exciting enough for adults’.
The approbation of children is crucial. Like Gilliam’s earlier films Time Bandits and Brazil, Baron Munchausen gloriously celebrates the invigorating power of fantasy. Not for nothing does the film take place during the Age of Reason, in a world remorselessly organised around the principles of logical thinking and rational behaviour. Of course, such a world has no place for the Baron. ‘We must face the facts and not the folly of fantasists like you,’ he is told by the town’s mayor (and the film’s villain), the totally rational man, the Right Ordinary Horatio Jackson (played by Jonathan Pryce in a role diametrically opposed to his dreamer, Sam Lowry, in Gilliam’s Brazil).
In the film, the Baron’s fantasies prevail and the town is saved. But our own society, Gilliam suggests, has travelled too far down the opposing path, the way of science and logic – as is made clear in the scene in which Vulcan, God of Armaments (played by Oliver Reed as a bluff North Country industrialist), shows the Baron his latest invention – nuclear missiles.
Cartesian Slapstick
In another scene, a cameo of manic improvisational brilliance from an uncredited Robin Williams, the Baron visits the King of the Moon, who is 60-feet tall and has a detachable head. The total incompatibility of the king’s coolly rational head and earthily sensuous body makes wonderful slapstick comedy out of Cartesian dualism.
Williams’ performance, like his character, and indeed the film itself, threatens to career out of control but, like the film, never quite does so. Admittedly, Munchausen is perhaps neither as thrilling nor as funny as it could have been, but Gilliam’s maverick genius is abundantly visible. His cast is magnificent, from Neville’s twinkling Baron to Polley’s endearing Sally and a luminous 17-year-old Uma Thurman as Venus. Above all, the film is flamboyantly spectacular and some shots, such as the Baron’s craft drifting across an iridescent moonscape, simply take your breath away.
‘It’s terribly rich,’ Gilliam grins. ‘I just thought, let’s do it. Let’s not compromise, let’s go all the way and see if people can take it.
‘I think being in Rome was a great influence on the film. That very Baroque, operatic, flamboyant style. Everything is totally over the top. There’s hardly a quiet moment in the film. It’s probably too much. I hope people don’t mind getting too much for their money.
‘The great thing about the film is that it actually is better the second or third time. It’s so rich you miss half the goodies the first time. That’s my secret plan. That’s how we’ll get the money back.’
The Adventures of Baron Munchausen is available on Blu-ray from The Criterion Collection.
DIRECTOR APPROVED SPECIAL EDITION FEATURES:
New 4K digital restoration, approved by writer-director Terry Gilliam, with 5.1 surround DTS-HD Master Audio soundtrack
Audio commentary featuring Gilliam and his co-screenwriter, Charles McKeown
Documentary on the making of the film
New video essay by critic and filmmaker David Cairns about the history of the Baron Munchausen character
Behind-the-scenes footage of the film’s special effects, narrated by Gilliam
Deleted scenes with commentary by Gilliam
Storyboards for unfilmed scenes, narrated by Gilliam and McKeown
Original marketing materials including a trailer and electronic-press-kit featurettes, as well as preview cards and advertising proposals read by Gilliam
Miracle of Flight (1974), an animated short film by Gilliam
Episode of The South Bank Show from 1991 on Gilliam
English subtitles for the deaf and hard of hearing
PLUS: An essay by critic and author Michael Koresky
‘Fascinating indie animation… here to satiate the cravings of those who miss a particular brand of animated storytelling, updated with added psychedelic fervour and plenty of extra-gnarly bloodshed’ ★★★★ Empire
‘Sprawling fantasy epic… glorious… gripping and entertaining… never loses pace or ceases to throw more surprises at us. A must watch for any horror fan’ ★★★★★ Filmhounds
Enter the dazzlingly dark world of The Spine of Night, as the Shudder Exclusive gets its home entertainment release from Acorn Media International.
This delirious fantasy horror animated feature from Philip Gelatt (Love, Death & Robots) and short-film artist Morgan Galen King features a stellar voice cast, including Richard E Grant, Lucy Lawless, Patton Oswalt and Joe Manganiello.
In a barbaric world, a swamp witch, Tzod (Lucy Lawless) seeks out the ancient guardian (Richard E Grant) who possesses knowledge about a mystical blue flower with incredible properties. Together they share stories about how the bloom has shaped not only their fates but also all existence. What follows is a centuries-spanning saga involving a tomb-robber, star-crossed lovers, a maniacal necromancer and winged assassins.
With bucket loads of gore, nudity and striking visuals, The Spine of Night is an action-packed throwback thrill-ride that’s certainly not for children. The Acorn home entertainment release includes a ‘Making Of’ featurette, and two shorts, Exordium (8mins) and Mongrel (3min).
The Spine of Night, is available on Blu-ray, DVD now.
From Eureka Entertainment comes, The Saphead, Buster Keaton’s first feature-length film, and perhaps the most overlooked, on Blu-ray in a stunning restoration by the Cohen Film Collection as part of the Masters of Cinema Series.
In 1920, having served a slapstick apprenticeship in the shorts of Roscoe ‘Fatty’ Arbuckle, Buster Keaton had earned the opportunity to headline his own series of two-reel comedies. The very moment at which he emerged as a star of his own shorts, Keaton was recruited to appear in The Saphead, based on a popular stage play.
Keaton stars as Bertie Van Alstyne, the pampered son of a powerful Wall Street financier (William H Crane). Having known no other lifestyle but privilege, he wanders through a variety of misadventures—an attempt at courtship, a trip to an illegal gambling den, and a tumble onto the floor of the Stock Exchange—oblivious to the obstacles that stand before him.
Though Keaton was not the primary creative force behind The Saphead, as he was on his short films, it became hugely important in shaping his on-screen persona: the lonely, stone-faced man thwarted by circumstance, inept at the art of romance, yet undaunted in his struggle for love within a chaotic world.
1080p presentation on Blu-ray from a restoration undertaken by the Cohen Film Collection from a first generation nitrate print
Score by Andrew Earle Simpson
Audio commentary with film historian and writer David Kalat
Video essay by David Cairns
Complete alternate version of The Saphead, comprised entirely of variant takes and camera angles
A Pair of Sapheads – featurette comparing the two versions of the film
The Scribe (1966, dir. John Sebert) [29 mins] – In his last film role—produced to promote Construction site safety—Keaton plays a janitor who in his attempt to educate workers on safe practices, causes more accidents than he prevents
Previously unheard audio commentary on The Scribe with director John Sebert (recorded before his death in 2015) and writer / silent cinema aficionado Chris Seguin
Buster Keaton in conversation with Kevin Brownlow – a 2-hour audio interview with Keaton and film historian Kevin Brownlow from 1964
1958 Buster Keaton Interview [90 mins]
Buster Keaton: Radio Interview – a rarely heard interview with Keaton
Collector’s booklet featuring new essays by journalist Philip Kemp and film writer Imogen Sara Smith, as well as an appreciation of The Saphead by film writer Eileen Whitfield
From Eureka Entertainment comes the Blu-ray release of King Vidor’s Man Without a Star (1955), starring Kirk Douglas, as a part of The Masters of Cinema Series (available 15 August).
Train-hopping his way to Wyoming, nomadic cowboy Dempsey Rae (Douglas) saves the life of young Jeff Jimson (William Campbell). Taking Jeff on as his protégé, Dempsey teaches him the life of a cowhand; how to ride a horse, rope and herd cattle, and how to shoot… Despite the land they work on being open range, Dempsey is horrified to find the local ranchers are resorting to the usage of barbed wire and refuses to work for anyone who uses it. But when an unscrupulous ranch owner (Jeanne Crain) hires a brutal group of killers to push the other ranchers off the land, Dempsey is the only one who can help them fight back.
Director King Vidor expertly blends humour and excitement in this handsomely filmed Western, which features a career-best performance from Douglas.
SPECIAL FEATURES • 1080p presentation on Blu-ray • Uncompressed original mono audio • Optional English SDH • Brand new audio commentary with writers Barry Forshaw and Kim Newman • Brand new interview with film scholar Neil Sinyard • Trailer • Collector’s booklet featuring essays by film writer Rich Johnson, and critic Richard Combs
Movie Talk 