CriterionForum.org :: Info for Europa

"You will now listen to my voice . . . On the count of ten you will be in Europa . . ." So begins Max von Sydow's opening narration to Lars von Trier's hypnotic Europa (known in the U.S. as Zentropa), a fever dream in which American pacifist Leopold Kessler (Jean-Marc Barr) stumbles into a job as a sleeping-car conductor for the Zentropa railways in a Kafkaesque 1945 postwar Frankfurt. With its gorgeous black-and-white and color imagery and meticulously recreated (if then nightmarishly deconstructed) costumes and sets, Europa is one of the great Danish filmmaker's weirdest and most wonderful works, a runaway train ride to an oddly futuristic past.

Supplements

Audio commentary featuring director Lars von Trier and producer Peter Aalbæk Jensen (in Danish, with English subtitles)
The Making of "Europa" (1991), a documentary following the film from storyboarding to production
Trier's Element (1991), a documentary featuring an interview with von Trier, and footage from the set and Europa's Cannes premiere and press conference
Anecdotes from Europa (2005), a short documentary featuring interviews with film historian Peter Schepelern, actor Jean-Marc Barr, producer Peter Aalbæk Jensen, assistant director Tómas Gislason, co-writer Niels Vørsel, and prop master Peter Grant
2005 interviews with cinematographer Henning Bendtsen, composer Joachim Holbek, costume designer Manon Rasmussen, film-school teacher Mogens Rukov, editor/director Tómas Gislason, producer Peter Aalbæk Jensen, art director Peter Grant, actor Michael Simpson, production manager Per Arman, actor Ole Ernst
A conversation with Lars von Trier from 2005, in which the director speaks about the "Europa" trilogy
Europa-The Faecal Location (2005), a short film by Gislason

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