Sondheim

Red Desert - Spine 522

Michelangelo Antonioni’s 1960s panoramas of contemporary alienation were decade-defining artistic events, and Red Desert, his first color film, remains one of his greatest. This provocative look at the spiritual desolation of the technological age—about a disaffected woman, brilliantly portrayed by Antonioni muse Monica Vitti, wandering through a bleak industrial landscape beset by power plants and environmental toxins, and tentatively flirting with her husband’s coworker, played by Richard Harris—continues to exert force over viewers. With one startling, painterly composition after another—of abandoned fishing cottages, electrical towers, overwhelming docked ships—Red Desert creates a nearly apocalyptic image of its time, and confirms Antonioni as cinema’s preeminent poet of the modern age.

Disc Features

* New, restored high-definition digital transfer (with uncompressed monaural soundtrack on the Blu-ray edition)
* Audio commentary by Italian film scholar David Forgacs
* Archival video interviews with director Michelangelo Antonioni and actress Monica Vitti
* Outtakes from the film’s production
* Original theatrical trailer
* PLUS: A booklet featuring an essay by film historian Mark Le Fanu, an interview with Antonioni by Jean-Luc Godard, and a reprinted essay by Antonioni on his use of color
* More!



Mystery Train - Spine 521

Aloof teenage Japanese tourists, a frazzled Italian widow, and a disgruntled British immigrant all converge in the city of dreams—which, in Mystery Train, from Jim Jarmusch, is Memphis. Made with its director’s customary precision and wit, Mystery Train is a triptych of stories that pay playful tribute to the home of Stax Records, Sun Studio, Graceland, Carl Perkins, and, of course, the King himself, who presides over the film like a spirit. Mystery Train is one of Jarmusch’s very best movies, a boozy and beautiful pilgrimage to an iconic American ghost town and a paean to the music it gave the world.

Disc Features

DIRECTOR-APPROVED SPECIAL EDITION

* New, restored high-definition digital transfer, supervised and approved by director Jim Jarmusch (with uncompressed monaural soundtrack on the Blu-ray edition)
* Two video Q&As with Jarmusch, one from the 2009 All Tomorrow’s Parties festival in New York and one in which he responds to questions sent in by fans
* Original documentary on Mystery Train’s locations and Memphis’s rich social and musical history
* On-set photos by Masayoshi Sukita, and behind-the-scenes photos
* New and improved English subtitle translation
* PLUS: A booklet featuring essays by writers Peter Guralnick and Dennis Lim, as well as a collectible poster



Close-up - Spine 519

Internationally revered Iranian filmmaker Abbas Kiarostami has created some of the most inventive and transcendent cinema of the past thirty years, and Close-up is his most radical, brilliant work. This fiction-documentary hybrid uses a sensational real-life event—the arrest of a young man on charges that he fraudulently impersonated well-known filmmaker Mohsen Makhmalbaf—as the basis for a stunning, multilayered investigation into movies, identity, artistic creation, and existence, in which the real people from the case play themselves. With its universal themes and fascinating narrative knots, Close-up continues to resonate with viewers around the world.

Disc Features

SPECIAL EDITION DOUBLE-DVD SET

* New, restored high-definition digital transfer
* Audio commentary by Mehrnaz Saeed-Vafa and Jonathan Rosenbaum, authors of Abbas Kiarostami
* The Traveler, a notable early feature by director Abbas Kiarostami
* “Close-up” Long Shot, a forty-five-minute documentary on Close-up’s central figure, Hossein Sabzian, five years after Kiarostami’s film
* A Walk with Kiarostami (2003), a thirty-two-minute documentary portrait of the director by Iranian film professor Jamsheed Akram
* New video interview with Kiarostami
* New and improved English subtitle translation
* PLUS: A booklet featuring an essay by film scholar Godfrey Cheshire



Everlasting Moments - Spine 520

Swedish master Jan Troell, director of the beloved classics The Emigrants and The New Land, returns triumphantly with Everlasting Moments, a vivid, heartrending story of a woman liberated through art at the beginning of the twentieth century. Though poor and abused by her alcoholic husband, Maria Larsson (Maria Heiskanen, in a beautifully nuanced portrayal) finds an outlet in photography, which opens up her world for the first time. With a burnished bronze tint that evokes faded photographs, and a broad empathetic palette, Everlasting Moments—based on a true story—is a miraculous tribute to the power of image making.

Disc Features

DIRECTOR-APPROVED SPECIAL EDITION DOUBLE-DVD SET

* New high-definition digital transfer, approved by director Jan Troell
* Jan Troell’s Magic Mirror, an hour-long documentary about Troell’s life and career
* Short documentary on the making of Everlasting Moments, featuring interviews with Troell, cast,
and crew
* Documentary featuring photographs by the real Maria Larsson, accompanied by narration telling her story
* Theatrical trailer
* PLUS: A booklet featuring an essay by critic Armond White



Night Train to Munich - Spine 523

A twisting, turning, cloak-and-dagger delight, Night Train to Munich is a gripping, occasionally comic confection from writers Frank Launder and Sidney Gilliat and director Carol Reed. Paced like an out-of-control locomotive, Night Train takes viewers on a World War II–era journey from Prague to England to the Swiss Alps, as Nazis pursue a Czech scientist and his daughter (Margaret Lockwood), who are being aided by a debonair British undercover agent, played by Rex Harrison. This captivating, long-overlooked adventure—which also features Paul Henreid—mixes comedy, romance, and thrills with enough skill and cleverness to give the master of suspense himself pause.

Disc Features

* New, restored high-definition digital transfer
* New video conversation between film scholars Peter Evans and Bruce Babington about director Carol Reed, screenwriters Frank Launder and Sidney Gilliat, and the social and political climate
in which Night Train to Munich was made
* PLUS: A booklet featuring an essay by film critic Philip Kemp

Plus "The Leopard", "Mystery Train", and "Red Desert", "Close-up", and "Everlasting Moments" on Blu-ray.

Geofferson

Mystery Train & Night Train to Munich are must-buys for me.

MoviePage

Love the cover art for most of these, especially Night Train.

TheDuke

Lot's of trains this month

R. Hilton

All intriguing entries. "Night Train to Munich" is a must-have. Can't wait.

JasonTHX

Red Desert. Hells Yeah!!!! Been searching for this for 15 years.

Mystery Train is a purchase as well.

"Hi...Goodnight."

zombeaner

Both Trains, Leopard, and Red Desert will be mine, the rest are rentals.

Zen Peckinpah

That Mystery Train cover is so beautiful I might cry. Fucking A.

ReduxGuy

Can't wait for Everlasting Moments.

Trevor

Crossing fingers for another B&N sale.

TheySentYou

wooo! Red Desert finally. i was hoping this would finally grace my collection. i'll be snagging the blu ray.

as for Close-Up... i'm half-interested in this. i own The Taste of Cherry and hated it so much, but i still think Abbas Kiarostami has so much potential.

alfonsosoriano

Mystery Train yes please thank you

jewellrunner

Very happy about Red Desert, but where is The Thin Red Line? How long does it usually take to reveal releases after the clue is given in the newsletter?

nycbrent

Close-Up is AMAZING. I saw it in the theater during a Kiarostami retrospective and it blew me away; I found it deeply touching, and it has hung with me over the years since I last saw it...maybe 2002?

I, too, don't care for Taste of Cherry, nor his more recent work (like Five or 10 on Ten, both of which bored me nearly to death and made me want to walk out). However, Close-Up should definitely be checked out as a rental, at least - I'm definitely buying it!

William Fuld

The Red Desert cover is hilariously lazy.

marty888

NIGHT TRAIN TO MUNICH is the instant, buy-it-immediately!!!! title for me.

TheDuke

I will get Mystery Train. I've always wanted to see it, that image of the Asian couple smoking cigarettes has captivated me for years.

NoirFan

I was going to pass on the Close-Up double dip, but the disc is so jam-packed I may have to buy it. Night Train will probably end up being only a rental for me, though that's no knock on the film itself. I'm not familiar with Everlasting Moments, but it looks intriguing.

wd40cloud

I'm in for Mystery Train. I've really been digging his stuff lately.

mikelowry

Red Desert, Night Train To Munich & Mystery Train for me. No Eclipse?

goosh

I love me some Carol Reed.
Night Train to Munich is a definite purchase (too bad no Blu) and possibly the double dip on The Leopard.

Superdaddy

It varies. A few months usually, but it can be longer. I love The Thin Red Line as well, so I'm hoping that is what the clue was about. In any case, I'd say it's pretty likely that whatever the title is, will be revealed in the next few months and probably released near year's end.

Litfuel716

NIGHT TRAIN TO MUNICH For me...skip the rest. Why no Blu-ray for it...either they are committed to Blu or they aren't...drives me nuts.

Mondo Kane

Although I'm sure I won't get it right away, I need that Mystery Train.

JJE-187

2 of those covers seem weird to me. A movie with train in the title that has a picture of a ski lift and Red Desert that is a picture of a blue tinted house.