Kubrick, Fellini, Guitry, Sternberg and Shindō Films Join the Masters of Cinema Collection
Posted October 8, 2012 04:49 PM by Webmaster
Eureka Entertainment have revealed their upcoming releases for the months of January and February 2013. Five films will join the Masters of Cinema Collection: The Blue Angel, Le Poison, Fear and Desire, Onibaba, and City of Women.
In January, Eureka Entertainment will release Stanley Kubrick's Fear and Desire (1953), which was recently restored by restored by The Library of Congress. This will be the first ever official release of the film in the United Kingdom. Also arriving on Blu-ray in January is Josef von Sternberg's legendary The Blue Angel (1930). The release will feature both the German and English-language versions of the film.
In February, Eureka Entertainment will present three films, two of which capitalize on sumptuous HD restorations carried out by French label Gaumont.
The first is Federico Fellini's unhinged 1980 post-punk epic La cittą delle donne a.k.a City of Women (1980), starring the great Marcello Mastroianni in a kind of reprise of his role from Fellini's 8½. The second new HD restoration is the initial entry into The Masters of Cinema Series by the French comic genius Sacha Guitry - La Poison (1951) - starring the equally brilliant Michel Simon (of Renoir's Boudu Saved From Drowning, Vigo's L'atalante and Carne's Le Quai Des Brumes). The third and final release of the month is a new Blu-ray upgrade of the recently deceased Kaneto Shindō's Onibaba (1964), an unsettling, atmospheric erotic horror film whose Scope frames veer between sunlit existential dread and moonlit mystery/suspense.
Note: Federico Fellini's City of Women is currently available on Blu-ray in France, courtesy of Gaumont. See our review here.
The Blue Angel
New 1080p HD presentation of both the German-language and English-language versions of the film
Newly translated optional subtitles on the German-language version, and SDH on the English-language version.
New and exclusive video essay on the films by critic and scholar Tag Gallagher.
New and exclusive feature-length audio commentary by critic and scholar Tony Rayns on the German-language version.
Original screen test with Marlene Dietrich.
Archival interview clips with Dietrich.
More features to be announced closer to release date!
La Poison
Glorious new HD restoration of the film, presented in 1080p on the Blu-ray.
Newly translated optional subtitles.
Substantial booklet containing writing on the film, vintage excerpts, and rare archival imagery.
More features to be announced closer to the release date!
City of Women
Glorious new HD restoration of the film, presented in 1080p on the Blu-ray.
Newly translated optional subtitles.
Substantial booklet containing writing on the film, vintage excerpts, and rare archival imagery.
More features to be announced closer to the release date!
Onibaba
Gorgeous new 1080p HD transfer
Full-length director's audio commentary by director Kaneto Shindō and the stars of the film, Kei Satō, and Jitsuko Yoshimura
Video introduction by Alex Cox
8mm footage (40-minutes) shot on location by lead actor Kei Satō
Optional English subtitles
Original theatrical trailer
Production stills and promotional art gallery
36-PAGE BOOKLET with a new essay by Doug Cummings, an English translation of the original short Buddhist fable that inspired the film and a statement from writer/director Kaneto Shindō about why he made Onibaba
Fear and Desire
New HD restoration of the film by The Library of Congress, presented in 1080p on the Blu-ray.
Optional English SDH subtitles for the deaf and hard-of-hearing.
Stanley Kubrick's early short film, The Seafarers, in a new HD restoration.
New and exclusive video discussion of the film by critic and Stanley Kubrick author Bill Krohn.
Substantial booklet containing writing on the film, vintage excerpts, and rare archival imagery.
More features to be announced closer to the release date!
@Lao Che: Hey, the UK hasn't had ANY Blu-Fellini yet... Unless you count Spirits of the Dead, which I only half-do.
I'll prolly get all of these. I try to get as much MoC as possible. Fear and Desire is not likely to be as good as Paths of Glory but it'll be very interesting to finally see it anyways.
Someone, please, arrange a Hi-Def transfer of Fellini's last film, La voce della luna, which was - unbelievably - never shown commercially in the UK, and has never appeared subsequently in any format, VHS, DVD or BD, here.
Anybody interested here in Fellini will have already bought the Gaumont BD release of City of Women, which has English subtitles and shedloads of extras.
And two years ago I was on a Northern Line tube train and thought I recognised the woman opposite, who fell asleep. It was Bernice Stegers, which given the plot of Citta della donne seems like a fine irony....
I'm happy to see Fear and Desire getting a lovely UK release... as opposed to the bare-boned US release, that doesn't even have freakin' subtitles!!! Ugh! Come on Kino, come on.
Fortunately, I didn't buy the French BD of City of Women yet. This will certainly be more english user friendly, but wonder if the French will have better extras.
The MoC cover art for Citta delle donne is in fact the film's original UK poster. And I can't imagine that they'll spring for a separate restoration/transfer. In Europe virtually all the Fellini films derive from the restoration jobs undertaken by Mediaset (the acceptable face of Berlusconi's empire). The Gaumont BD looks better than the film ever did in the cinema, trust me.
