Director Jan Němec made his name during the Czech New Wave of the 1960s, and later saw his career cut short when the ruling party decided to classify one of his films as ‘banned forever.’ This first feature is a striking chase story about two young men escaped from a Nazi prison train. It experiments with filmic space, looking for psychological depth by mixing a subjective pursuit with the main characters’ memories and thought-dreams. The extras give us a close-up look at a director who paid a steep price for defying the state.
Diamonds of the Night
Blu-ray
The Criterion Collection 969
1964 / B&W / 1:37 flat Full Frame / 67 min. / Démanty noci / available through The Criterion Collection / Street Date April 16, 2019 / 39.95
Starring: Ladislav Janský, Antonín Kumbera, Ilse Bischofova.
Cinematography: Jaroslav Kučera, Miroslava Ondřiček
Film Editor: Miroslav Hájek
Original Music: Vlastimil Hála, Jan Rychlík
Written by Jan Němec, Arnošt Lustig from Lustig’s...
Diamonds of the Night
Blu-ray
The Criterion Collection 969
1964 / B&W / 1:37 flat Full Frame / 67 min. / Démanty noci / available through The Criterion Collection / Street Date April 16, 2019 / 39.95
Starring: Ladislav Janský, Antonín Kumbera, Ilse Bischofova.
Cinematography: Jaroslav Kučera, Miroslava Ondřiček
Film Editor: Miroslav Hájek
Original Music: Vlastimil Hála, Jan Rychlík
Written by Jan Němec, Arnošt Lustig from Lustig’s...
- 4/6/2019
- by Glenn Erickson
- Trailers from Hell
Milos Forman was the prince of the Prague Spring with this Czech New Wave classic, a hilarious black comedy about the cheerful corruption and incompetence of petty bureaucrats. A fire brigade throws a bash, and by the end of the evening the lottery prizes are all stolen and the beauty contest has become a travesty. And they can't even put out a simple fire. The joke is clearly aimed at the Communist government. The Fireman's Ball Region-Free Blu-ray + Pal DVD Arrow Academy (UK) 1967 / Color / / 71 min. / Horí, má panenko / Street Date October 12, 2015 / Available from Amazon UK £14.99 Cinematography Miroslav Ondrícek Production Designer Karel Cerny Film Editor Miroslav Hájek Original Music Karel Mares Writing credits Milos Forman, Jaroslav Papousek, Ivan Passer and Václav Sasek Produced by Rudolf Hajek, Carlo Ponti Directed by Milos Forman
Reviewed by Glenn Erickson
We know Milos Forman from his American pictures Hair and Ragtime, but he made big...
Reviewed by Glenn Erickson
We know Milos Forman from his American pictures Hair and Ragtime, but he made big...
- 11/17/2015
- by Glenn Erickson
- Trailers from Hell
You’ll be hard pressed to make a more exciting discovery than Criterion’s digital transfer of Frantisek Vlacil’s 1967 Czech classic, Marketa Lazarova. Voted the best Czech film of all time by a 1998 panel of Czech critics, the film had been unavailable for Western consumption (beyond rare art house screenings) until late 2007 when UK studio Second Run released a Region 2 copy. After a 2011 restoration from Universal Production Partners, the Us now has access to a gloriously restored digital transfer, a phenomenal presentation of what stands as one of the world’s cinematic wonders, a densely structured unique experience of cinema as visual poetry.
While the narrative outline seems succinctly evident, especially considering Vlacil’s attempts to retain the essence of the famed novel upon which it’s based by announcing quick summaries via title cards as before a set amount of chapters, the glorious immersion of sight and sound...
While the narrative outline seems succinctly evident, especially considering Vlacil’s attempts to retain the essence of the famed novel upon which it’s based by announcing quick summaries via title cards as before a set amount of chapters, the glorious immersion of sight and sound...
- 6/11/2013
- by Nicholas Bell
- IONCINEMA.com
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