Re: German Filmmuseum Edition
Posted: Mon Apr 24, 2017 8:29 pm
As I have several to pick up for the pre-20s project- is there a cheap place to buy these, or should I just bite the bullet and buy them from Amazon?
American Cinematheque article including information on the restoration of 'Algol' here. Hopefully the DVD will be on its way out soon...HerrSchreck wrote:Does anyone here (say Tommy) have any idea what in god's name ever happened w Algol from this crew? The slow drip drip drip of atomic releases from this label seems to have thickened into a flat out clog. I understand they're constrained by time and budget and a Europe fracturing like the rest of civilization into rampant political idiocy ("First 50 years of the 20th Century? WTF are the First 50 Years of the 20th Century??--doomed to repeat what???").
But there's no better cure for rampant political insanity than finally wiping away the smog of time via ancient TV telecine analog rips to settle down with a fabulous silent masterwork like Algol or Die Strasse.Adam wrote:Could you mean this newly restored version of ALGOL from the Munich Film Museum that is playing at the American CInematheque in Los Angeles on Sunday April 30?
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FIAF is in LA that weekend, so all the various archivists from around the world will be here. The American Cinematheque is doing a couple of relevant shows. (I was hoping to do another but it didn't work out.) Anyway, I trust that the screening means that the DVD will come soon.
Anyone have this yet? Any issues with the transfers?neilist wrote:Heiner Carow's 'Die Russen kommen' and 'Karriere' due March 2017.
Edition Filmmuseum 107
Heiner Carow's powerful film The Russians Are Coming, about the final days of World War II, was made in the GDR in 1968. However, it did not receive state authorization for release at the time and could only be painstakingly reconstructed in 1987. This double DVD presents a new, restored version of the film and allows viewers their first ever opportunity to compare it with Career (1971), in which Heiner Carow made use of parts of the unreleased material from The Russians Are Coming.
The mid-1970s saw James Benning's first feature films attract the attention of critics, establishing him as a representative of the »New Narrative Movement.« In films like 11╳14 and One Way Boogie Woogie, he combines the structural analysis of image, sound and narrative with auto-biographical traces, as well as with an almost »classical« interest in composition, color, light and landscape. This 2-disc set features 11╳14 (1977), one of the central U.S. avant-garde films of the 1970s, in a restored version. Also included is Benning's recurring view of his hometown Milwaukee at three different points in time: One Way Boogie Woogie (1978), 27 Years Later (2005) and One Way Boogie Woogie 2012. Documents of change and transience.
Well, yet another DVD order is necessary. Wish they would do Blu-ray!Tommaso wrote:Now available: the 2-disc release of Ophuls' "Liebelei" and "Lola Montez". And "Lola" finally is the German-language version!
If that alone wasn't reason to rejoice: the extras look spectacular.
Agreed. I know they generally release obscure films, but bid be shocked if HD/2K masters aren't approaching bog standard even for most of them by now. More and more of EF's counterparts in other countries have made the transition to Blu-ray at least to some extent, but EF remain stuck on DVDs even though they are situated right in Europe's largest Blu-ray market, and more than one of their recent (in relative terms) film releases has a Blu-ray edition made available elsewhere. Unless the elements are in particularly poor condition, this particular Ophüls release would have seemed an ideal candidate for Blu-ray. I'll still probably get the DVD once it goes to general distribution through Alive in a few months, but I'd have gladly paid double the EF price and bought direct for a 2xBD-50 set with the same content.denti alligator wrote:Well, yet another DVD order is necessary. Wish they would do Blu-ray!Tommaso wrote:Now available: the 2-disc release of Ophuls' "Liebelei" and "Lola Montez". And "Lola" finally is the German-language version! If that alone wasn't reason to rejoice: the extras look spectacular.
The reconstruction of the German premiere version of Lola Montez was done in Full HD back in 2001/2002. It was the first complete digital film restoration in Germany.McCrutchy wrote:Unless the elements are in particularly poor condition, this particular Ophüls release would have seemed an ideal candidate for Blu-ray. I'll still probably get the DVD once it goes to general distribution through Alive in a few months, but I'd have gladly paid double the EF price and bought direct for a 2xBD-50 set with the same content.
'Tender are the Feet' (Maung Wunna, 1972, Burma)
Sein Lin, a drummer of a traditional Burmese theatre group, falls in love with the beautiful dancer, Khin San. When she leaves the theatre to pursue a career as a film actress, he gives her a small figure as a keepsake, a symbol of traditional theatre. They part ways and he watches her from a distance as she appears to lose her way in the ultra-glamourous world of commercial cinema. This black and white classic comes with an important message: true art is as private and as intense as the love between a drummer and his dancer. Based on meticulous research of Burmese travelling theatre groups, Tender are the Feet was made in 1972. It is one of the first films of Maung Wunna, a director who developed his artistic style during the golden age of Burmese cinema and continued to do so despite the oppressive policies of the military dic tatorship. An important reference point for contemporary filmmakers, it has now been restored from the only sur - viving source material, a DVCPro archive tape provided by Myanmar's national broadcaster MRTV.
'Das Luftschiff' (Rainer Simon, 1983, East Germany) & 'Unbändiges Spanien' (Kurt & Jeanne Stern, 1962, East Germany)
Rainer Simon's adaptation of Fritz Rudolf Fries' novel "The Airship" is one of the most unconventional feature films ever produced in East Germany. Featuring a complex flashback structure and animated dream sequences painted directly on the film by artist Lutz Dammbeck, Das Luftschiff tells the story of an inventor who dreams of building a revolutionary new airship. When Civil War breaks out in Spain, the inventor refuses to allow his work to be abused for sinister political purposes.
Unbändiges Spanien is an expanded version of Spanish Earth by Joris Ivens, who authorized Jeanne and Kurt Stern to update his work for a new audience.