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WOW...

Does anyone know anything about this edition of Rabbit's Moon (meaning, mainly, will it contain that terrible song, or something else)??

rwaits wrote:I didn't realize they were going to split this up over several volumes. Interesting. Great news!

well considering it'll take until 2038 to get all the music licensing legalities surrounding Scorpio Rising cleared, this is a great approach

rwaits wrote:WOW...

Does anyone know anything about this edition of Rabbit's Moon (meaning, mainly, will it contain that terrible song, or something else)??

The version of Rabbit's Moon I saw a few months ago, in a complete retro direct from Ken and divided as these discs seem to be (i.e. this disc one was the first evening's programme), was sixteen minutes long and had a somewhat random soundtrack of doo-wop classics. (This seems to be close to the 1971 version, but that was reportedly only 12 minutes long). If that programme represents Anger's latest thinking on his films, and the disc doesn't seem to include alternative versions, that's probably what we'll see.

The version of Rabbit's Moon I saw previously was very short, only a few minutes, and I don't recall the soundtrack, except that it was really inappropriate.

For reference, Puce Moment also had an anachronistic, rowdy rock soundtrack (definitely not the original Verdi!) - I can't remember ever seeing a different version of this film, though.

The rest of the details of the discs sound superb. Kenneth is a fabulous raconteur, if not exactly a reliable one.

I saw Rabbits Moon at the Images Festival in Toronto a couple years ago accompanied by a live orchestra.

Here's a post from Frameworks from a few years ago:

> According to Bill Landis' unauthorized bio of Anger, the music used in the
> first version of Rabbit's moon included:
>
> The Flamingos' "I Only Have Eyes for You"
> The Dells' "Oh, What A Night"
> The Capris' "There's a Moon Out Tonight"
> Mary Wells' "Bye Bye Baby"
>
> The "1979 'kiddie version'" is accompanied by "a grating, incessant,
> repetitive, British teeny-bopper tune by Andy Arthur," according to
> Landis.

Does anyone have inside info on this release? Over the past couple years, so many people, on this site and others, as well as friends of mine have seen Anger at various showings, and all have come away with the same conclusion regarding this release--that it wasn't happening. How was this kept under wraps so well? I was just looking at the release notes, which have been updated since the announcement. Not only are we getting new transfers of the films, but commentary by Anger himself, deleted scenes, and a 36 page hardcover book. I only wish the artwork were a bit more clever, but overall am overwhelmed by this disc's potential. Anyone know anything else about this volume, or the ones to follow?

rwaits wrote:How was this kept under wraps so well?

Black magic, of course!

Gregory wrote:

rwaits wrote:How was this kept under wraps so well?

Black magic, of course!

Zap! You're pregnant!

So, are we to assume that the pop songs on the original soundtracks will be presented on these DVDs? Also, I hope that we aren't made to wait too long for volume 2. Great, great news, though.

DVDTalk reviews the new disc of Yasuzo Masumura's Red Angel.

And now DVDBeaver compares the R1 to the R2 editions here.

According to their website the Anger set is delayed until Jan '07. Let's hope this doesn't turn into a dead pigeon thing.

Theodore R. Stockton wrote:According to their website the Anger set is delayed until Jan '07.

Wow, I never saw that one coming.

Don't worry, Matt. At least it will now make a wonderful birthday gift for you.

A pre-Christmas release was suspect, wasn't it. Ho-hum, what's another few weeks.

Fantoma's new DVD of Red Angel features a beautiful transfer of an excellent print, but even under lesser circumstances, this dark masterpiece would merit more attention than it's likely to get. This is, by far, the most formally austere Masumura film I've seen, and the closest in tone to those of Mizoguchi, with whom Masumura had served as an assistant director. The black and white widescreen frames alternately teem with writhing wounded soldiers—or what's left of them—and severely composed passages rendering the less animated private agony of Nishi, Okabe, Orihara, and others caught in a wartime nightmare, a vortex of disease, humiliation, sex and death. Masumura's representation of Nurse Nishi is especially fascinating, revealing her—visually, physically and emotionally—only in restrained increments, initially frustrating our struggle to get a fix on this woman, until extraordinary circumstances and an unexpected force of character bring her into sharper focus. It's not an easy film to watch, but once started, it's impossible to look away, and I haven't yet stopped thinking about it.

Fantastic news! I bought this blind (on the basis of its reputation and Masumura's Giants and Toys) and haven't got around to watching it yet.

In many ways, I actually prefer Masumura to the more classical Japanese directors like Mizoguchi, Kurosawa and Kobayashi.

For example, I love the fact that there are virtually no exterior shots in Manji, none of the swirling fogs or sweeping vistas you get with the more traditional guys. Instead, it's just a fiendishly intense psychodrama that for my money is one of the best literary adaptations ever made.

What a pity Naomi isn't available on DVD with English subs!

Anyway, my reason for posting here is to try to find out more about Red Angel. I have the UK Yume R2 edition that lacks the liner notes of the Fantoma. Does Earl Jackson Jr's essay shed much light on the sources and inspiration for the movie?

Oh and thanks to Itfontaine for a wonderful single paragraph appreciation of the film.

Red Angel is an amazing film - highly recommended. A scathingly anti-war film that dodges the ambiguities of others of its ilk. Here war is exploitation, mutilation, and despair. Camaradarie is fraught and doomed. Even our meagre glimpse of combat is anti-cathartic.

Masumura is operating at a peak of creativity, on a parallel track to the Japanese New Wave - in its thematic concerns, the film is sort of equidistant from the Imamura of The Insect Woman and the Suzuki of Story of a Prostitute, but it has a style and tone all its own.

The most astonishing of a number of disorienting coups is when the armless man is begging his nurse to jerk him off and Masumura overlays the suggestive sound of a harsh rubbing rhythm and a man's wild screams - then reveals this to be an audio flashback to the earlier scene in which a man's leg is sawed off, without anaesthetic.

I know it may seem hard to believe after that description, but, despite its unflinching brutality, this is a film of considerable formal beauty and subtlety. Fantoma's transfer looks very nice.

(The liner notes are not especially substantial, so don't worry, Murasaki)

despite its unflinching brutality, this is a film of considerable formal beauty and subtlety

It's the tension sustained by Masumura between horrific, sordid content and unflinching discipline in the mise-en-scene that accounts for much of the film's mesmerizing power. Imagine a script by Fuller directed by Bresson, and you have a faint flavor of this movie. The initial conversations between the nurse and the amputee soldier, mentioned by zedz, for example, are excruciatingly frank, straining the characters' fragile dignity almost to the breaking point and shredding the viewer's sense of discretion in the process. Masumura's resolute gaze, however, demands that we countenance the humanity that at is passing between these “lovers,â€

Masumura's Black Test Car is up on Fantoma's page, with a street date of May 22. Typically barebones release, priced at $19.99.

-New Digital Widescreen Transfer (2.35:1)
-Enhanced for 16x9 TVs
-Theatrical Trailer
-Photo and still gallery
-Yasuzo Masumura Biography and Filmography

Fantoma wrote:Look for it this Summer.

...and by "Summer" we mean December 2008.