7 Asphalt

[Martha]

Asphalt



One of the last great German Expressionist films of the silent era, Joe May's Asphalt is a love story set in the traffic-strewn Berlin of the late 1920s. Starring the delectable Betty Amann in her most famous leading role, Asphalt is a luxuriously produced Ufa classic where tragic liaisons and fatal encounters are shaped alongside the constant roar of traffic.

A well-dressed lady thief (Betty Amann) steals a precious stone from a jewellery shop. The aged jeweller prefers to let the young woman go, but the policeman who catches her explains he is obliged to pursue the case further. She tries to seduce the policeman (Gustav Fröhlich), and he gradually succumbs to her charms, but her criminal background dooms their relationship when an argument leads to murder.

Betty Amann's salacious sensuality, May's grand direction, the spectacular sets by Erich Kettelhut, and the photography of Günther Rittau make this largely unknown film a major rediscovery. Until recently, Asphalt was available only in a shortened version with English-language intertitles. In 1993 the Stiftung Deutsche Kinemathek (Berlin) discovered a print of Asphalt at the Gosfilmofond archive in Moscow which appeared to have been struck from the original negative. The chronology of scenes in this print differs from existing versions and there are extra scenes together with the hitherto-unknown German intertitles.

Born Julius Otto Mandl in Vienna, 1880, Joe May is best remembered today for his two-part Das indische Grabmal [The Indian Tomb], co-scripted by the young Fritz Lang and Thea von Harbou. He moved to London in 1933, then Hollywood, and was widely regarded as having discovered Lang, von Harbou and E. A. Dupont. May was one of the most productive cineastes of the silent screen and The Masters of Cinema Series is proud to present his masterpiece Asphalt for the first time on DVD anywhere in the world.

Special Features

• New restored transfer
• Original German intertitles with optional English subtitles
• Sumptuous new orchestral score by Karl-Ernst Sasse
• New English subtitle translation
• 16-page booklet with a new essay by film historian R. Dixon Smith

[Lino]

Here are some pictures of what to expect:

[swingo]

DVDBeaver's review

[Lino]

Congratulations to all the MoC team! This release looks very nice indeed! And those menus....beautiful, just beautiful! And the film looks very interesting as well - I am especially in love with this picture here:

[denti alligator]

My god, yes!

[Anonymous]

Recently posted on the a_film_by list:

"A while back, someone on the list had mentioned Joe May's 'Asphalt' -- as of a week or two ago, it's finally been made available on DVD from Masters of Cinema in the UK, and seeing it for the first time, I find myself mystified by May's omission from the majority of survey-examinations of the pantheon of German silents. In 'Asphalt,' the long-shot style of 'Das indische Grabmal' has been abandoned, along with the potboiler pace, so that May can delve deep into poetic undercurrents for what he must have consciously had to acknowledge would be a final silent expression. So instead of extended cliffside pursuit, we get the better-than-Louise-Brooks Betty Amann, victorious in her seduction of Gustav Fr�hlich, hanging off his torso and rubbing her instep down the leather boot gripped around the "fallen" man's calf.

For the most part, the plot's all pretense -- vertiginous emotion teased out in close-up, bird's-eye ruminations on city infrastructure; the opening sequence of workers, vehicles, machinery, and passers-by, juxtaposed and double-exposed, is a total tour de force, montage out the wazoo -- a fully plastic precursor of the compositions in 'M' wherein Peter Lorre salivates gazing in the mirror behind the storefront window. Generally there's a kind of crazy swing to the pacing -- following the opening fantasia, the plot-proper kicks into gear (after taking a detour to detail a mad subterranean burglary that again recalls 'M' -- and also Feuillade), but there's really only one fulcrum -- the seduction -- and the proceedings receive a fairly elongated treatment on both sides of this, before and after Frohlich's fall, with the assistance of sundry long and rapturous close-ups of Betty Amann, who might be the most sizzling screen-dame in all silent cinema -- in any case the most gorgeous flapper moll whose eyes ever cried out orgiastic conceits. To say May's camera lingers on her face would be an understatement -- May's camera malingers. (Ranciere's 'Sickness in the Aesthetic' is out now from Galil�e; I can only assume it includes a chapter on May and Amann.)

With regard to the plot, I said it's all pretense only "for the most part" -- the quaint Weimar notion of duty (all notion!) exhibited by Fr�hlich's copper -- a traffic cop at that -- comes from the homestead, where he resides like Antoine Doinel in a tiny room off from the kitchen of Mutti and Vati, well in their dotage, who stir stew and browse the broadsheets. Coupled with his angsty histrionics over just -what- to do with less-than-savory Betty Amann (when the answer is patently, blatantly obvious), May's interchange between wholesome and sordid has set the stage for a whopper of a climax at the kitchen table, which I won't spoil here -- even on the Internet, "Recht mu� Recht."

And when the melodrama has passed, we come back to that title, 'Asphalt' -- and marvel how it seems less a material description of the metropolis than a grand and simple summary of all the human drama chronicled by a certain kind of cinema, that of Lang, of Murnau, of May (of G�nther Rittau's, Karl Freund's, Fritz Arno Wagner's cameras fixed on pylon-severed pools of light, or scared faces peaking out of alley trash) -- "Asphalt" stands for the condition of city living.

The film's a huge treasure, and I'm glad it's finally out on disc -- along with a simultaneous release from Masters of Cinema of Lang's 'Spione,' which includes a really fantastic essay by Jonathan Rosenbaum -- AND the original German intertitles, which are subtitled -- rather than the U.S. Kino edition's replacement of the originals with English cards. The MoC release is the definitive one.

craig."

[unclehulot]

AND the original German intertitles, which are subtitled -- rather than the U.S. Kino edition's replacement of the originals with English cards.
craig."

IS there a Kino release planned? Or was that just a gratuitous swipe at them....like they're the ONLY ones that do this?? Just remember that even if the original language cards are recreated today, they are most often NOT the actual originally designed cards. I have nothing against what MoC does (I DO prefer it), but I'm just curious as to how this has become SUCH an important issue lately, considering that for 80-some years nobody has really found translated English title cards for English speaking audiences a big deal.
If you're actually reading BOTH languages that's going to be quite a workout on the remote control! Perhaps what the UK DVD issue of Pandora's Box does is best.....seperate "streams" for titles of either language, selectable from the menu.

[peerpee]

IS there a Kino release planned? Or was that just a gratuitous swipe at them...

He was clearly talking about SPIONE at that point. SPIONE has a Kino disc in the US (called SPIES).

[unclehulot]

IS there a Kino release planned? Or was that just a gratuitous swipe at them...

He was clearly talking about SPIONE at that point. SPIONE has a Kino disc in the US (called SPIES).

I see...or didn't see. Thought he had gone back to commenting on ASPHALT.

[Lino]

DVDtimes review:

Asphalt is at heart a very simple morality tale played out through a straightforward though melodramatic storyline, but like Murnau�s The Last Laugh or Sunrise, through that particular magic of silent cinema and the purity of visual image alone, it touches on a deep human level beyond - or perhaps because of � its very simplicity. The picture quality on this film, which is over 75 years old, inevitably shows a number of problems through its age and is perhaps not as clear as some of the other titles from this period released under the Masters of Cinema label, but the restoration work, seen by the fact that there are few signs of damage on the print whatsoever, is as well done as ever and the film still looks very well indeed on this DVD release.

[What A Disgrace]

I just saw the film last night. I had problems seeing the subtitles on my television (it was overscanning them!), but I really didn't need them. It told its story exceptionally well without needing to rely too much on intertitles (although recognizing a few baby-words of German helped me to grasp them). I was surprised to find myself enjoying the film quite alot, which is something I don't get from alot of silent films on the first viewing. The picture quality of the DVD is excellent, compared to other silent film DVDs, and the score is indeed sumptuous...it played no minor part in keeping me engrossed and attentive throughout the film, which is what a score should do. I hope Tartuffe and Spione are the same way. The design of the whole disc is also very pleasing; in my opinion, aesthetically superior to several Criterion packagings. Bravo, MoC.

The subtitles, by the way, do function properly on my PC.

[HerrSchreck]

I acquired this this week and was a little bit disappointed actually. Some of the images & all of the intertitles have a very analog-y edge enhancement effect and even ghost-image halo's (not improper pal-ntsc or reverse conversion ghosting) a la analog tv. Does anyone or Nick know what served as the master? Was the feature transfered onto digital beta or straight to disc? Sometimes it almost looks like extremely high quality analog. In other areas the image looked very soft & hazy. I have a very flexible Multi Video Labs screen at home which allows me to see way past the bottom border of the frame if I choose, and the telltale digital silver leader stripe (with the little off-center black rectangle, always stable in digital and flying jaggedly about as a telltale sign of analog/VHS) is not there.

Otherwise pictorially a beautiful film of course. A bit simplistic, but it was nice to see Gustav Frolich engage in more naturalistic acting, versus the silly operatics in METROPOLIS. Steinruck inspired casting for his father, they look like old/young versions of each other. Nice to see him in something so different than GOLEM.

[skuhn8]

Not to mention the python-like seduction scene. Beautiful treatment of a seductress: camera loves you baby. Futile to complain, but just wish they would have cut short of the jail scene redemption crap: I'll be waiting for you. Yeah, sure. Pop'll really understand. This is one of the few films that did resonate more for me after reading Caligari to Hitler. The whole deal of retreating back to the mother's bossom after finding loss and chaos in the street. It's an ugly world out there schatz, come to mama.

[John Cope]

I'm hoping the upcoming Kino edition includes the In the Nursery soundtrack. It is really a thing of beauty.

Speaking of which, I stand by the idea that their score to Hindle Wakes improves the film. The standard score is banal and uninformative; ITN contribute a typically sublime and nuanced complement to what is on screen--it brings out all the profound melancholy in a careful and unobtrusive way. It may not have been what was intended but it is a gloriously effective reading in its own right.

[HerrSchreck]

I'm hoping the upcoming Kino edition includes the In the Nursery soundtrack. It is really a thing of beauty.

Speaking of which, I stand by the idea that their score to Hindle Wakes improves the film. The standard score is banal and uninformative; ITN contribute a typically sublime and nuanced complement to what is on screen--it brings out all the profound melancholy in a careful and unobtrusive way. It may not have been what was intended but it is a gloriously effective reading in its own right.

Orchestral Score by Karl-Ernst Sasse Performed by the Brandenburgische Philharmonie Potsdam

[Tommaso]

Speaking of which, I stand by the idea that their score to Hindle Wakes improves the film. The standard score is banal and uninformative; ITN contribute a typically sublime and nuanced complement to what is on screen--it brings out all the profound melancholy in a careful and unobtrusive way. It may not have been what was intended but it is a gloriously effective reading in its own right.

I very much agree. They have an almost unique way of underlining the subtleties of acting and images without ever becoming dully illustrative.
Sasse's score on "Asphalt" is really good (is it the original score?, not quite sure at the moment), but it would have been nice to have the ITN score as an alternative. And I'm glad that they made me aware of some great films simply because I heard their music first on the cd releases. "Asphalt" was the first example, although I guess being interested in Weimar cinema I would have come across it sooner or later without them.... But not so with "Hindle wakes", and that is one of the most enchanting films I've seen last year. I could revel endlessly about Estelle Brody's wonderfully humane and touching acting, and that roller-coaster scene is just priceless. I really wonder why the BFI only released it on VHS. Thankfully we now have the Milestone edition (which looks quite good in my view, much better than your usual Kino release, although some reviewers detected ghosting...)

BTW: if you don't already have it, get "Electric Edwardians", the wonderful collection of early documentary silents by Mitchell and Kenyon (released by BFI and Milestone), again with music by ITN (quite similar to "Hindle Wakes"). A most enchanting but never sentimental glimpse at a time long gone. I never thought simple shots of everyday people could move me that much, and the music alone would be worth the price of the disc. Glorious.... now I only wish that someone releases Kinugasa's "A page of madness", a film for which an ITN score exists as well. I've never seen it, but by all accounts it must be a great masterpiece of early Japanese cinema.

[HerrSchreck]

Ditto on the HINDLE WAKES ITN score, it is actually one of the few modern scores applied to a silent film on DVD that I actually think works, and works very well. And ditto on the celebration of the film itself, which I think is very unjustly underappreciated not only around here but in general probably owing to it's operation as a straight melodrama, and lack of formalist "experimentation", or lack of belonging to a clear cut "ism"... i e expressionsim, impressionism, etc. If anything, despite the studio scenes that comprise the tenement flats where the protagonists reside, the mass of stunning location work (one of the biggest selling points of the feature) nudge this film into that zone of predecessors to neorealism, such as GREED, as well as the Swedes in sum.

I can't believe this was not released on dvd by BFI-- there are by-comparison so few globally recognized masterpieces in the British Silent Cinema-- at least vs the other primary cinematic centers of the world-- you'd think the fahrking BFI of all people would be promulgating knowledge of this film before an American kitchen-table operation (albeit a very very good one with fantastic taste) consisting primarily of PAL ports like Milestone.

[peerpee]

I'm not much a fan of electronic synthesiser, sequenced scores on silent films, and all the In The Nursery scores are like that.

[Tommaso]

sorry, double posting, please ignore this.

[Tommaso]

Well, I also do not exactly rave about "Asphalt", but it is appealing as almost a kind of 'summary' of all that we love in silent era Weimar cinema. The use of light and shadow, the 'decadent' feel, the 'melodrama', it's all there in its 'essential' form.... even the 'street symphony' experimentation of Ruttmann can be found in "Asphalt"'s opening sequences. So, it's certainly a rather derivative film, but a very appealing and stylish one (and Betty Amann of course is gorgeous).

As to synthezisers on silent movie soundtracks: I'm pretty liberal about this. It's not important for me what instruments are used but in which way. You can do horrible soundtracks with conventional instruments and very good ones with electronics (and vice versa). Perhaps synthesizer-based soundtracks have a bad name because so many of them are made by second-rate artists on cheap synths without much consideration for the images and sometimes even lacking a minimum amount of compositional craft (Kino, again, has given us some pretty awful examples...).
But rest assured: ITN are real masters of their genre, and they have been very succesfull as recording artists since the 80s, way before they started doing soundtracks. They know how to handle their instruments and sounds in a way that few others can.

[HerrSchreck]

To my mind singling out a distributor as better or worse for silent film music treatment is inevitably going to be an exposition of personal bias as much as a comment on the actual track record of the distributor. This goes for me too-- I'm American & feel a great debt to Kino so I defend them. A German has an extra reason to resent the intertitle loss (beyond loss of antiquity & relic-tampering) because he can read them himself. But they all suck eggs. All of them-- all of them-- have delivered masterpieces with fucking terrible mdma-friendly electronic dancehall poop... or if not so rendered, then soundtracks with acoustic instruments riffing classical figures into showoffy intrusive high hell. The only distributor/producer with almost clean hands is bfi, LA TERRE, CHESS PLAYER, Bauer, HINDLE, etc, have almost been unanimous home runs viz the global audience. And yet they've had their own albatross's, MAN W MOVIE CAMERA, LODGER, and one or two others which escape me at present. CC blew donkey with FLOATING WEEDS and that Roman Catholicfest for KING OF KINGS. The only reason that HAXAN works is that the score was from the original cues, and JOAN utilized a previously existing score and NANOOK utilizes the Kino/Shepard score. Kino has the largest silent catalog on the face of the earth, always have, so the vastness of their market presence is inevitably going to make them a larger target.

The folks who really astound me are the germans-- much of the slop on Kino's discs (as well as MoC, stuff like the Aljosha Zimmerman, the material coming out of the FWM Stiftung - ZDF/Arte) have been klunkers hitched onto classics & forwarded by by these licensers: the NOSFERATU Al Jourgensen routine by Art Zoyd (must be the worst silent film score in the whole history of the medium), the electric bass solo (!) & jazz drum solo (!???) on CALIGARI, the wheedly pathos of Zimmerman's bar mitvah-type scores on HOLY BERG & GOLEM, ETC.. the nausea on Kino's part on NOS & CALIG was so heightened that they commissioned alternative scores from Sosin.. you know you're providing spoiled potatoes when Donald "King of the Poverty-Criers" Krim opens his wallet to comission a score that is technically unneccessary.

As for ASPHALT, am I the only male hetero who thinks Amann looks like a dude in drag? This individual is so covered in makeup (the film is shot on panchromatic & therefore heavy foundation wasn't necessary) that her body wieght must have increased by half a pound. Her features look very hangdog & crooked-- I think she looks good in the theft scene in the jewelry store, clearly a doppelganger of Margaret Livingston in SUNRISE which the film most obviously resembles in theme, then segues into looking patently canine. Maybe it's just my habit of assessing a woman at first glance to ascertain how much is Real Beauty and how much is Clothing/Makeup 'Front'.. nothing worse than waking up inna morning & sniffing the bad brreath of some chick rolls her head over with her hair sticking up in right angles & looks so different than the trim you took home you'd swear she slipped out inna middle of the night & stuck her skinny little brother took her place as a morning wakeup prank. The worst form of hangover shudder there is-- realizing what your drunk eyeballs dunk your chips in.

In fact I think this film lacks the subtexts of all I love in German silent film: regardless whether the style be pre-Expressionist a la STUDENT VON PRAGUE, to SPINNEN, to obvious pure expressionst specimens like CALIGARI, GENUINE, WAXWORKS, BACKSTAIRS, to the Langs, the Murnaus, the best of the New Objectivity films i e those from Pabst, the Kammerspiel masterpieces of Mayer & Pick, the street films, the mountain films... regardless of the style, the thing that I "love" about German silents is their operation far above and beyond 'the melodrama' of ASPHALT. There is a density, a sheer depth and expertise in the creation of poetic images pregnant with meaning and atmosphere, that was absolutely uncanny. A haunted mystery. The way a poet can use a minimum of words, yet arrange them in a fashion whereby they seem to have had a magic wand "ding" them giving them an otherworldly magic, an mystery & unplumbable depth approaching that of the ancient gloom of scripture-- this is what's missing from ASPHALT for me. When this element is missing, it becomes, like ASPHALT, an example of straight melodrama in it's purest form to me, whereby the physical action on screen is the extent of what the film is 'about'. Soap opera is pure melodrama. For me the Germans of the 20's-- clearly had a lot to do with the German obsession with death, the harrowing state of the economy & the resulting inflation, etc, combined with striking talent & intelligence-- they had a particular thing in common with the best of Feulliade, which was the ability to film the simplest thing.. a woman waking up, a person writing a letter, a shot of a pair of shoes on the floor, or a street filled with pedestrians, and have that shot imbued with a sense of gloom, or menace, or danger, or haunted atmosphere. It's very fascinating, this uncanny ability, as it resides On The Negative only.. otherwise the lighting scheme is seemingly normal, the actor is displaying no particularly frightening mannerism, the angle may even be straight-on. Yet somehow it's as though the devil took the shot & soaked it with his sinister breath.

EDIT: MoC is a brand new company with a small silents catalog, but to be fair they are doing well in the clean-hands dept, as well.

[Tommaso]

To my mind singling out a distributor as better or worse for silent film music treatment is inevitably going to be an exposition of personal bias as much as a comment on the actual track record of the distributor.

Yes, of course you're right. My personal grudge against Kino has mainly to do with the loss of original intertitles as you said, especially because I know how it is done on these Spanish dvds by divisared. That is., no subtitling the intertitles (which admittedly can be irritating), but having the optional spanish subs replace the intertitles completely, BUT: as an OPTION and not forced. I wonder why this cannot be done by Kino...
Another reason why I tend to be angry at Kino is that they really brought out so many substandard dvds, not just of silents (Liliom, The Holy Mountain), but - and I'll never forgive them for these - also of Paradjanov and Tarkovsky. What makes the anger even bigger is that very often Kino's versions are the only ones available. To be fair, some quite good work was done by them on their "The Movies Begin" and Griffith box-sets.

As to the soundtrack question: well, I think we will not agree about it, as I quite like both the Zimmermann scores and also Art Zoyd's - admittedly adventurous - score for "Faust" (I don't know their "Nosferatu"). But talking of specially commissioned soundtracks by Kino: when I hear most of the stuff on their otherwise wonderful double-disc set of "Avantgarde from the 20s and 30s", I wish they'd left it silent as in SILENT.

As for ASPHALT, am I the only male hetero who thinks Amann looks like a dude in drag? This individual is so covered in makeup (the film is shot on panchromatic & therefore heavy foundation wasn't necessary) that her body wieght must have increased by half a pound.

LOOOOL. Welll..... I see your point, and I agree with all you say about the film, but in a way I quite like that particular 'decadent' irreality of both Amann and the whole of the film. It's a typical 'end of an era' phenomenon (it was one of the last silents made in Germany), where nothing new is added, old formulas are just replayed but in replaying become overly stylized and empty.... form over substance, of course, and melodramatic to the highest degree (whereas "Hindle" always keeps that precarious balance between tragedy and romantic kitsch), but well: if you're interested in style for style's sake, you will fare pretty well with "Asphalt" and have some really enjoyable 90 mins.

EDIT: MoC is a brand new company with a small silents catalog, but to be fair they are doing well in the clean-hands dept, as well.

Absolutely, their great advantage is that they came on the market relatively late, and have learned from all the criticism that was directed at Kino or even at some Criterions (and some of Criterion's early dvds - up to about #100, and some later ones as well - are not THAT great, really). For me, MoC is certainly the best company around at the moment, and perhaps it's good that they do not release so many films as Kino does, but give all things they release the best possible treatment.

[HerrSchreck]

as an OPTION and not forced. I wonder why this cannot be done by Kino...
Another reason why I tend to be angry at Kino is that they really brought out so many substandard dvds, not just of silents (Liliom, The Holy Mountain), but - and I'll never forgive them for these - also of Paradjanov and Tarkovsky. What makes the anger even bigger is that very often Kino's versions are the only ones available. To be fair, some quite good work was done by them on their "The Movies Begin" and Griffith box-sets.

Absolutely, their great advantage is that they came on the market relatively late, and have learned from all the criticism that was directed at Kino or even at some Criterions (and some of Criterion's early dvds - up to about #100, and some later ones as well - are not THAT great, really). For me, MoC is certainly the best company around at the moment, and perhaps it's good that they do not release so many films as Kino does, but give all things they release the best possible treatment.

Aside from the intertitles, the HOLY MOUNTAIN disc is basically identical to the MoC. I think it's an interlaced transfer which-- I think, I may be wrong-- the MoC was as well (I know the first string of MoC silents like SUNRISE were interlaced).

If you think there is-- or was, as things are expanding for Soviet cinema due to the dvd explosion-- no market for Tarkovsky, think how tiny the market was for Parajanov in America when that transfer was done. Back in the late 90's, people fucking rejoiced that Tarkovsky's MIRROR even came out on DVD... CC would not acquire a print of it despite employee begging, as they claimed there was no market for it. Kino always stepped up when no one else would. The testament of the size of their balls is the very thing that's pissing you off today: the age of the disc. Way back when nobody was even interested in this shit, these dudes were finding a way to get this stuff out on disc. Their half-partners (Kino started out as the cinematic distributor of the Janus collection, then Krim broke away to start his own collection of really hardcore shit) Janus could sink more into their discs back because they are releasing bourgoise classics like Kurosawa, Renoir, Lang, (a mere four silent films guys?) which is your basic catalog of Palm D'Or ABC's & Best Foreign Feature that you Basic Film Buff 1A has heard of. On top of that throwing in ROCK & ARMAGEDDON & D&C. Kino's POMEGRANITES & MIRROR is no worse than RUBLEV from CC. Simply put, old DVDs suck versus todays'. Remember that even for superobscure shit like Parajanov, negatives are being excavated nowadays for films that shit prints were standard procedure for even 5 yrs ago, and much of what you're complaining about represents the choice these guys were stuck with-- do telecine on the disaster you've been given by the russians off the arthouse circuit, or keep the film out of public view (ASHIK KERIB is the real abomination of the Parajanov catalog.. Pomagranites is actually not all that bad to me, it was a film made on a Film Stock Budget, and the disc probably looks very close to the way it did when it was released)

It's easy to beat up on these dudes, and Krim (I saw him yesterday & felt like pulling him aside & begging him on the intertitles at least... but I'm sure he's heard it a million times) is a cheap dude to be sure, but remember, we're talking from the standpoint of companies moving slow & careful like MoC who release far fewer titles, and whose biz model capitalizes on a market-trail blazed and proven to exist & essentially developed by Kino. Comparing 2005/6 discs from MoC to an early-era transfer of Parajanov (Parajanov for god's sakes) is simply unfair. On the intertitles the mentality I believe is owing to the fact that Kino are theatrical distributors first (they are distributing Janus again, also) and they are creating American theatrical prints, doing what studios back in the old days would do (creating english language intertitles), and using these for DVD as well. This is why these are never true PAL/NTSC "ports" but rather new prints created from source beta's & digital storage. If their translators weren't so first rate, I'd get angrier just enough to blow my top over the new intertitles like you do.

The stillers, Warning Shadows, Edison, the Epstein, the Kirsanoff, the KEislowski box, these guys have for my money proven over the past year or so they still have the absolute best taste in the biz. And despite Krim's tightfistedness being annoying he keeps the biz afloat while living 100% in the zone CC has been too chicken to wade into to any substantial degree, and his refusal to countenance (for better or worse) pop hits by Bay & ZISSOU type titles keeps the good titles coming each month without lull. I try to look on the bright side when it comes to the starvation budget territory, which scares the shit out of even CC, of silent films. And the vast majority of Kino's are quite nice.

[Tommaso]

Aside from the intertitles, the HOLY MOUNTAIN disc is basically identical to the MoC. I think it's an interlaced transfer which-- I think, I may be wrong-- the MoC was as well (I know the first string of MoC silents like SUNRISE were interlaced).

I'm not sure about these technical things as always, but the Kino dvd of Holy Mountain had some of the worst instances of ghosting I've ever seen (probably from PAL/NTSC-conversion). I mean, every time Luis or Leni climbs up a mountain there's a shining halo around the mountain's side.... and this is absolutely NOT there on the MoC disk. And apart from the intertitles they also changed some written parts IN the images themselves (like they did with the letters in Dreyer's "Michael").

Otherwise I do see your points, and I am grateful that they DID bring out dvds of rare films like Tarkovsky or Paradjanov. You say that there's no or little market for these films. Perhaps this is true, at least for the states. But here in Europe almost every country now has their own more or less complete edition of Tarkovsky's films, and although there are very few that are really of high standard, they are surely almost all better than Kino's "Mirror" (even the much-criticized Ruscico version looks pristine; I haven't got "Rublev" from CC). Go to www.nostalghia.com for comparisons, and these guys seem to be even more critical than I usually am...

As to Paradjanov, yes: they probably did have only bad prints available, and if there was no possibility to restore them at a reasonable price, okay, no complaint. But that does not excuse the burnt-in, yellow and unreasonably big subtitles (and no, I don't speak Russian or Armenian, but from time to time I simply want to enjoy the images and then want to turn them off). Your explanation that these were prints made for theatre exposition is indeed a good reason for this, but still: I do not find it is acceptable any longer, and if CC can redo their dvds, why not Kino? What makes me so sad is that by poor standard dvds you do not make the market for rare or unusual films bigger. I have bought dvds from BFI or Criterion blindly without knowing the respective film before, simply because I was assured that at least I would get a decent home-cinematic experience. And on the other hand I have not bought films only available from Kino because I would not want to watch "Jeanne Ney" (for example) without German titles... and my GOD, what shall I DO concerning "Warning Shadows"??!

I think Kino could sell much more of their dvds if they retained the original titles or generally had a higher standard. It would not be necessary to order from Hongkong or Korea just because the Beaver convinced me that even in the case of a new film like "Untold Scandal" the Korean version is superior to Kino's American edition.....

Simply put, old DVDs suck versus todays'.

In general, true. But how come that some old CC's like "The Red Shoes" still look pretty wonderful, and even the old "Seven Samurai" is not THAT bad? Agreedly, their "Autumn Sonata" does not look good at all, but it only goes to show that it was a matter of effort even then....

It's easy to beat up on these dudes, and Krim (I saw him yesterday & felt like pulling him aside & begging him on the intertitles at least... but I'm sure he's heard it a million times)

PLEEAASE do it again, at least this problem could be solved easily. Almost every other company has been able to do it right.

The stillers, Warning Shadows, Edison, the Epstein, the Kirsanoff, the KEislowski box, these guys have for my money proven over the past year or so they still have the absolute best taste in the biz.

Yes, and this is exactly what annoys me so much. They could simply be the greatest dvd company in the world...

I try to look on the bright side when it comes to the starvation budget territory, which scares the shit out of even CC, of silent films.

Interestingly enough (and coming back to another discussion), I have just a few days ago read an interesting article about Transit/Murnau-Stiftung's German dvd releases (or the absence thereof). The article said that there was just no market for these films here in Germany, and that was the reason why there are so few silent film releases over here. For example, only 1400 copies of Murnau's "Der letzte Mann" were sold in Germany, whereas in the US there were much more copies of Murnau and Lang films sold. Although the difference could be due to the fact that of course nobody waits for Transit after Eureka or divisared have published their versions, I was really shocked that there is THAT little interest in silents in Germany even now....
Don't know if you can read German, but the article may be found here.

[HerrSchreck]

I'm aware of the MIRROR editions you're talking about. Again, none are massively superior than the Kino, and some are brand new.

Friend, on the other things you mention you're missing the point. How could you possibly compare the budget prepared on a film like RED SHOES or original 7 SAMURAI (atrocious atrocious atrocious constant artifacting in that nightmare, not only in motion sequences or freeze framing like a non preconverted silent) with huge audiences to silents that very few buy? CC is completely chickenshit of silents: look at NANOOK-- chroma drenched interlaced, single layer. HAXAN: one film per layer, interlaced. JOAN: single layer crammed with extras. They are chicken of them because they are petrified of not making their money back, and know they cannot maintain their usual production values to print enough copies to sell & get an ROI. (return on investment, sorry). If you believe for a minute they're having problems getting their hands on a decent print of PANDORA, or EISENSTEINS silents, I've got a fucking bridge running through Last Week I'd like to sell you tomorrow.

MoC is moving very slowly, very cautiously, and there's a reason for that. It's a high risk operation, this market, and tough to gauge the right balance to stay profitable & yet make the discs look decent.

I used to make the same complaints as you-- go back a few pages & you'll read them from last year. Then I personally realized I was being petulant about the most wonderful company in the biz which is apples & oranges vs both CC & MoC, which will occasionally require the secrifice of a little ghosting here & there. It's the price I paid from graduating in my mind (please dont take this as a superiority kick versus you, I just think my focus was entirely misplaced on elements that might have been unnoticed had I allowed my attention to linger over the film itself rather than dvd beaverville) from my techhead all-region-geek phase, to equanimity viz the price of obscurity. Neither CC or Moc has taken anywhere near the amount of risk on such a regular basis for years & years as Kino. Take some time & go thru their catalog & look at all the weird shit they've invested in over time: bfi, Aeye, Moc, CC, DivisaRed, nobody, nobody, nobody has the balls that these guys do releasing such weird, no-sales, ultra ultra obscure shit. Take a half hour & go thru it all. The VHS's too (so much stuff there that even they are not crazy enough to put on dvd). You can't complain about HOLY MOUNTAIN without ackowledging ON TOP OF THE WHALE, TURKSUB, LOVERS & LOLLIPOPS, NARCOTIC, JOHN HUSTON & DUBLINERS, LIEBELEI, ALIBI, JUDITH OF BETHULA, CIVILIZATION, Edison, all the American Film Theater and so so so much more strangeness.

But I hear you brother- I wish what you wish too, ultimately. But we'll only get the quality we want on selected silents here & there.

And on the other hand I have not bought films only available from Kino because I would not want to watch "Jeanne Ney" (for example) without German titles... and my GOD, what shall I DO concerning "Warning Shadows"??!

I went home for the afternoon & remembered this quote on the way out the building my reply was written so fast. JEANNE NEY are not forced intertitles-- they are vintage ones. There's been no tampering with the print whatsoever... one of those situations like JOAN OF ARC & TARTUFFE & WAXWORKS, where the only prints remaining on the face of the earth that are worth anything are export prints. So JEANNE NEY is actually very much worth your time. And WARNING SHADOWS (My GOD what SHALL I DO concerning W.S.? lol) is a no-intertitle film like LAST LAUGH.

Lastly, one thing you can sort of say in Krim's moderate defense on the intertitle thing, is that they are actively meant to be US-only discs; he actually does not want his discs sold internationally-- the KINO mail order & online store actually says, on these Murnau foundation & other (Svensk Filmind.) titles "NOT FOR SALE OUTSIDE OF THE US & CANADA", and they will not take your order as a German citizen or Swede, etc. It is what it is, I guess.

I can't understand how you'd deprive yourself of watching such masterpieces on the basis of changed intertitles alone when there are no other editions out there, or the promise of one... irritation of varying degrees I understand and experience myself, but simply not seeing the movie at all because of it, is a skewed set of priorities. Silent films on dvd is like dating or marriage-- if you leave your wife because she develops a couple varicose veins (yechh) your love cannot be that strong inna first place. If you choose not to take your date home with you despite her heliumized torpedoesque knockers & ivory snow natural beauty, because she talks with a lisp & says "pleath take me to your plathe tho I can thuck your penith unthil itsth covered wif varicothe veinth..", well then you're not really allat horny. Don't you at least want to see these films first & foremost? If it was possible profit-wise to give the Criterion treatment to silent films, then Criterion would be giving the Criterion-Treatment to silent films... which they are not. Most of the pithy quantity of their own silents have not even been given their usual 'treatment'. MoC is a new experiment-- hopefully it will work, though their silent catalog (Dreyer Lang & Murnau, established sellers, though even these had the initial spine numbers done interlaced) represented no intense risks from the getgo.

As opposed to our groaning about interlacing & changed intertitles, viz your assertion that these silent films would sell better if Kino put them together better, I'd say, au contraire, the average buyer would not even know what the hell we are complaining about. They don't even know what ghosting is, or what PAL is vs NTSC, or what interlaced even means, let alone spot it's properties onscreen. You yourself profess a bit of ignorance on technical issues. They live in the bliss of 'clear picture = great disc', end of story. Don't allow Gary the Beev to make your decision for you on Kino discs because he is notoriously hugely biased, and biased for a reason relating to personal experience. Following so much of this logic straight through to the end (what shall I do because of these problems?? shall I watch the film?) you'd find it impossible to enjoy yourself watching television, and find it impossible to go to the cinema owing to excessive grain & lack of sharpness.

Lastly, Tom: I'm interested on your what your take is on the TARTUFFE/WAXWORKS/JEANNE NEY/JOAN OF ARC situation? Would you rather see the original, antique, era-intertitles preserved, or would you rather see them, like MoC TARTUFFE & CC JOAN, have the original intertitles removed & replaced with electronic screens of the censor cards from source country? Since this is beyond the bounds of ASPHALT I'm also going to ask this question on the silent film on DVD thread.